Dragonfly in Amber - Diana Gabaldon [290]
His hand patted my shoulder, and he sighed. “I would give anything, mo duinne, could I leave ye here safe, but I cannot. So you will go with me—you and Fergus.”
“Fergus?” I was surprised by this. “But I thought you wouldn’t take any of the younger lads!”
He sighed again, and I put my hand flat on the center of his chest, where his heart beat beneath the small hollow, slow and steady.
“Well, Fergus is a bit different. The other lads—I willna take them, because they belong here; if it all goes to smash, they’ll be left to keep their families from starving, to work the fields and tend beasts. They’ll likely need to grow up fast, if it happens, but at least they’ll be here to do it. But Fergus…this isna his place, Sassenach. Nor is France, or I would send him back. But he has no place there, either.”
“His place is with you,” I said softly, understanding. “Like mine.”
He was silent for a long time, then his hand squeezed me gently.
“Aye, that’s so,” he said quietly. “Sleep now, mo duinne, it’s late.”
* * *
The fretful wail pulled me toward the surface of wakefulness for the third time. Baby Katherine was teething, and didn’t care who knew it. From their room down the hall, I heard Ian’s sleepy mumble, and Jenny’s higher voice, resigned, as she got out of bed and went to soothe the infant.
Then I heard the soft, heavy footfalls in the corridor, and realized that Jamie, still wakeful, was walking barefoot through the house.
“Jenny?” His voice, low-pitched to avoid disturbance, was still plainly audible in the creaking silence of the manor house,
“I heard the wee lassie greetin’,” he said. “If she canna sleep, neither can I, but you can. If she’s fed and dry, perhaps we can bear each other company for a bit, while you go back to your bed.”
Jenny smothered a yawn, and I could hear the smile in her voice.
“Jamie dear, you’re a mother’s blessing. Aye, she’s full as a drum, and a dry clout on her this minute. Take her, and I wish ye joy of each other.” A door closed, and I heard the heavy footfall again, heading back toward our room, and the low murmur of Jamie’s voice as he muttered soothingly to the baby.
I snuggled deeper into the comfort of the goose-down bed and turned toward sleep again, hearing with half an ear the baby’s whining, interspersed with hiccuping sobs, and Jamie’s deep, tuneless humming, the sound as comforting as the thought of beehives in the sun.
“Eh, wee Kitty, ciamar a tha thu? Much, mo naoidheachan, much.”
The sound of them went up and down the passage, and I dropped further toward sleep, but kept half-wakeful on purpose to hear them. One day perhaps he would hold his own child so, small round head cradled in the big hands, small solid body cupped and held firm against his shoulder. And thus he would sing to his own daughter, a tuneless song, a warm, soft chant in the dark.
The constant small ache in my heart was submerged in a flood of tenderness. I had conceived once; I could do so again. Faith had given me the gift of that knowledge, Jamie the courage and means to use it. My hands rested lightly on my breasts, cupping the deep swell of them, knowing beyond doubt that one day they would nourish the child of my heart. I drifted into sleep with the sound of Jamie’s singing in my ears.
Sometime later I drifted near the surface again, and opened my eyes to the light-filled room. The moon had risen, full and beaming, and all the objects in the room were plainly visible, in that flat, two-dimensional way of things seen without shadow.
The baby had quieted, but I could hear Jamie’s voice in the hall, still speaking, but much more quietly, hardly