A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [403]
Up the slope, toward the road, he caught a glimpse of red. Brown, turning in the same direction, saw it, too, and fired. Whereupon Donald MacDonald, having thoughtfully hung up his coat in a tree, stepped out of cover behind Richard Brown in his shirtsleeves, and hit Brown over the head with a solid length of tree branch.
Brown fell on his knees, momentarily stunned, and Jamie slipped out of the copse, beckoning to MacDonald, who ran heavily to meet him. Together they made their way deeper into the forest, waiting by a stream until prolonged silence from the road indicated that it might be safe to go back for a look.
The men were gone. So was MacDonald’s horse. Gideon, the whites of his eyes showing and ears laid flat, rolled back his upper lip and squealed fiercely at them, big yellow teeth bared and slobber flying. Brown and company had wisely thought twice about stealing a rabid horse, but had tied him up to a tree and managed to spoil his harness, which hung in bits around his neck. MacDonald’s sword lay in the dust, torn from its scabbard, blade broken in two.
MacDonald picked up the pieces, viewed them for a moment, then, shaking his head, tucked them through his belt.
“D’ye think Jones could mend it?” he asked. “Or better to go down to Salisbury?”
“Wilmington or New Bern,” Jamie said, wiping a hand across his mouth. “Dai Jones hasna the skill to mend a sword, but ye’ll find few friends in Salisbury, from what I hear.” Salisbury had been at the heart of the Regulation, and antigovernment sentiment still ran high there. His own heart had gone back to its usual way of beating, but he still felt weak-kneed in the aftermath of flight and anger.
MacDonald nodded bleakly, then glanced at Gideon.
“Is yon thing safe to ride?”
“No.”
In Gideon’s present state of agitation, Jamie wouldn’t risk riding him alone, let alone double-mounted and with no bridle. They’d left the rope on his saddle, at least. He got a loop over the stallion’s head without being bitten, and they set off without comment, returning to the Ridge on foot.
“Verra unfortunate,” MacDonald observed thoughtfully at one point. “That they should have met us together. D’ye think it’s dished your chances of worming your way into their councils? I should give my left ball to have an eye and an ear in that meeting they spoke of, I’ll tell ye that for nothing!”
With a dim sense of wonder, Jamie realized that having made his momentous declaration, overheard by the man whose cause he sought to betray, and then nearly killed by the new allies whose side he sought to uphold—neither side had believed him.
“D’ye ever wonder what it sounds like when God laughs, Donald?” he asked thoughtfully.
MacDonald pursed his lips and glanced at the horizon, where dark clouds swelled just beyond the shoulder of the mountain.
“Like thunder, I imagine,” he said. “D’ye not think so?”
Jamie shook his head.
“No. I think it’s a verra small, wee sound indeed.”
66
THE DARK RISES
I HEARD ALL THE SOUNDS OF the household below, and the rumble of Jamie’s voice outside, and felt entirely peaceful. I was watching the sun shift and glow on the yellowing chestnut trees outside, when the sound of feet came marching up the stairs, steady and determined.
The door flung open and Brianna came in, wind-tousled and bright-faced, wearing a steely expression. She halted at the foot of my bed, leveled a long forefinger at me, and said, “You are not allowed to die.”
“Oh?” I said, blinking. “I didn’t think I was going to.”
“You tried!” she said, accusing. “You know you did!”
“Well, not to say tried, exactly . . .” I began weakly. If I hadn’t exactly tried to die, though, it was true that I hadn’t quite tried not to, and I must have looked guilty, for her eyes narrowed into blue slits.
“Don’t you dare do that again!” she said, and wheeling in a sweep of blue cloak, stomped out, pausing at the door to say, “BecauseIloveyouandIcan