France was the most likely. We both spoke French fluently. While Jamie could do as well in Spanish, German, or Italian, I was not so linguistically blessed. Also, the Fraser family was rich in connections here; perhaps we could find a place on an estate owned by a relative or friend, and live peacefully in the country. The idea held considerable attractions.
But there remained, as always, the question of time. It was the beginning of 1744—the New Year was but two weeks past. And in 1745, Bonnie Prince Charlie would take ship from France to Scotland, the Young Pretender come to claim his father's throne. With him would come disaster; war and slaughter, the crushing of the Highland clans, and with them, the butchery of all that Jamie—and I—held dear.
And between now and then, there lay one year. One year, when things might happen. When steps might be taken to prevent disaster. How, and by what means? I had no idea, but neither had I any doubts about the consequences of inaction.
Could events be changed? Perhaps. My fingers stole to my left hand and idly caressed the gold ring on my fourth finger. I thought of what I had said to Jonathan Randall, burning with rage and horror in the dungeons under Wentworth Prison.
"I curse you," I had said, "with the hour of your death." And I had told him when he would die. Had told him the date written on the genealogical chart, in Frank's fine black calligraphic script—April 16, 1745. Jonathan Randall was to die at the battle of Culloden, caught up in the slaughter that the English would create. But he didn't. He had died instead a few hours later, trampled beneath the hooves of my revenge.
And he had died a childless bachelor. Or at least I thought so. The chart—that cursed chart!—had given the date of his marriage, sometime in 1744. And the birth of his son, Frank's five-times-great-grandfather, soon after. If Jack Randall was dead and childless, how would Frank be born? And yet his ring was still upon my hand. He had existed, would exist. I comforted myself with the thought, rubbing the ring in the darkness, as though it contained a jinni that could advise me.
I woke out of a sound sleep sometime later with a half-scream.
"Shh. 'Tis only me." The large hand lifted from my mouth. With the candle out, the room was pitch-black. I groped blindly until my hand struck something solid.
"You shouldn't be out of bed!" I exclaimed, still groggy with sleep. My fingers slid over smooth, cold flesh. "You're freezing!"
"Well, of course I am," he said, somewhat crossly. "I havena got any clothes on, and it's perishing in the corridor. Will ye let me in bed?"
I wriggled as far over as I could in the narrow cot, and he slid in naked beside me, clutching me for warmth. His breathing was uneven, and I thought his trembling was from weakness as much as from cold.
"God, you're warm." He snuggled closer, sighing. "It feels good to hold ye, Sassenach."
I didn't bother asking what he was doing there; that was becoming quite plain. Nor did I ask whether he was sure. I had my own doubts, but would not voice them for fear of making self-fulfilling prophecies. I rolled to face him, mindful of the injured hand.
There was that sudden, startling moment of joining, that quick, gliding strangeness that at once becomes familiar. Jamie sighed deeply, with satisfaction and, perhaps, relief. We lay still for a moment, as though afraid to disturb our fragile link by moving. Jamie's good hand caressed me slowly, feeling its way in the dark, fingers spread like a cat's whiskers, sensitive to vibration. He moved against me, once, as though asking a question, and I answered him in the same language.
We began a delicate game of slow movements, a balancing act between his desire and his weakness, between pain and the growing pleasure of the body. Somewhere in the dark, I thought to myself that I must tell Anselm that there was another way to make time stop, but then thought perhaps not, as it was not a way open to a priest.
I held Jamie steady, with a light hand on his scarred back. He set our rhythm, but let me carry the force of our movement. We were both silent save our breathing, until the end. Feeling him tiring, I grasped him firmly and pulled him to me, rocking my hips to take him deeper, forcing him toward the climax. "Now," I said softly, "come to me. Now!" He put his forehead hard against mine and yielded himself to me with a quivering sigh.
The Victorians called it "the little death," and with good reason. He lay so limp and heavy that I would have thought him dead, if not for the slow thump of his heart against my ribs. It seemed a long time before he stirred and mumbled something against my shoulder.