Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [301]
“She is a witch’s child,” she said. “And ye know it, all of you!” She glanced around the room, challenging each uncomfortable face. “They should have burned her mother in Cranesmuir, save for the lovespell she’d put on Jamie Fraser. Aye, I say be wary of what ye’ve brought into your house!”
Brianna brought the flat of her hand down on the table with a thump, startling everyone.
“Hogwash,” she said loudly. She could feel the blood rushing to her face, and didn’t care. All the faces were gawking, mouths open, but she had no attention to spare for anyone but Laoghaire MacKenzie.
“Hogwash,” she said again, and pointed a finger at the woman. “If they ought to be wary of anybody, it’s you, you fucking murderess!”
Laoghaire’s mouth was open wider than anyone’s, but no sound came out.
“You didn’t tell them all about Cranesmuir, did you? My mother should have, but she didn’t. She thought you were too young to know what you were doing. You weren’t, though, were you?”
“What …?” said Jenny, in a faint voice.
Young Jamie looked wildly at his father, who stood as though poleaxed, staring at Brianna.
“She tried to kill my mother.” Brianna was having trouble controlling her voice; it cracked and trembled, but she got the words out. “You did, didn’t you? You told her Geillis Duncan was ill and calling for her—you knew she’d go, she always went to anybody sick, she’s a doctor! You knew they were going to arrest Geilie Duncan for witchcraft, and if my mother was there, they’d take her, too! You thought they’d burn her, and then you could have him—have Jamie Fraser.”
Laoghaire was white to the lips, her face set like stone. Even her eyes had no life; they were blank and dull as marbles.
“I could feel her hand on him,” she whispered. “In our bed. Lying there between us, wi’ her hand on him, so he would stiffen and cry out to her in his sleep. She was a witch. I always knew.”
The room was silent, save for the hissing of the fire, and the tender singing of a small bird outside the window. Hobart MacKenzie stirred at last, coming forward to take his sister by the arm.
“Come away, a leannan,” he said quietly. “I’ll see ye safe home now.” He nodded to Ian, who returned the nod, with a small gesture that somehow conveyed both sympathy and regret.
Laoghaire allowed her brother to lead her away, unresisting, but at the door she stopped and turned back. Brianna stood still; she didn’t think she could move if she tried.
“If you’re Jamie Fraser’s daughter,” Laoghaire said, in a cold clear voice, “and ye may be, given your looks—know this. Your father is a liar and a whoremaster, a cheat and a pander. I wish ye well of each other.” She gave in then to Hobart’s tugging at her sleeve, and the door swung to behind her.
The rage that had filled her drained suddenly away, and Brianna leaned forward, resting her weight on the palms of her hands, the necklace hard and lumpy under her hand. Her hair had come loose, and a thick strand fell over her face.
Her eyes were closed against the dizziness that threatened to engulf her; she felt, rather than saw, the hand that touched her and tenderly smoothed the locks back from her face.
“He went on loving her,” she whispered, as much to herself as to anyone else. “He didn’t forget her.”
“Of course he didna forget her.” She opened her eyes to see Ian’s long face and kind brown eyes six inches away. A broad work-worn hand rested on hers, warm and hard, a hand even larger than her own.
“Neither did we,” he said.
“Will ye no have a bit more, Cousin Brianna?” Joan, Young Jamie’s wife, smiled across the table, serving spoon poised invitingly above the crumbled remains of a gigantic gooseberry tart.
“Thank you, no. I couldn’t eat another bite,” Brianna said, smiling back. “I’m stuffed!”
This made Matthew and his little brother Henry giggle loudly, but a gimlet gleam from their grandmother’s eye shut them up sharply. Looking round the table, though, Brianna could