Outlander - Diana Gabaldon [171]
It was cool under the trees; the horse and I both exhaled with relief as we entered the shade. It was one of those rare hot days in Scotland, when the sun blazes out of a bleached muslin sky and the early haze is burnt away by eight o’clock. The copse was loud with birds; a gang of titmice was foraging in the oak clump to the left, and I could hear what I thought was a thrasher in the near distance.
I had always been an enthusiastic amateur birder. If I were marooned here ’til it suited my overbearing, domineering, pig-headed jackass of a husband to finish risking his stupid neck, I’d use the time to see what I could spot.
I hobbled the gelding and turned him loose to graze in the lush grass at the edge of the copse, knowing he wouldn’t go far. The grass ceased abruptly a few feet from the trees, smothered by the encroaching heather.
It was a glade of mixed conifers and oak saplings, perfect for bird-watching. I wandered through it, still mentally fuming at Jamie, but growing gradually calmer as I listened for the distinctive tsee of a flycatcher and the harsh chatter of the mistle thrush.
The glade ended quite suddenly on the far side, on the edge of a small precipice. I thrust my way through the saplings and the sound of bird song was drowned in rushing water. I stood on the lip of a small burn, a steep rocky canyon with waterfalls bounding down the jagged walls to splash in the brown and silver pools below. I sat down on the edge of the bank and let my feet dangle over the water, enjoying the sun on my face.
A crow shot past overhead, closely pursued by a pair of redstarts. The bulky black body zigzagged through the air, trying to avoid the tiny dive-bombers. I smiled, watching the furious small parents chivying the crow to and fro, and wondered whether crows, left to their own devices, really did fly in a straight line. That one, if it kept to a straight path, would head straight for…
I stopped dead.
I had been so intent on arguing with Jamie that it had not until this minute dawned on me that the situation I had been vainly trying to bring about for two months had finally occurred. I was alone. And I knew where I was.
Looking across the burn, my eyes were dazzled by the morning sun blazing through the red ash trees on the far bank. So that was east. My heart began to beat faster. East was over there, Lag Cruime was directly behind me. Lag Cruime was four miles to the north of Fort William. And Fort William was no more than three miles due west of the hill of Craigh na Dun.
So, for the first time since my meeting with Murtagh, I knew approximately where I was—no more than seven miles from that bloody hill and its accursed stone circle. Seven miles—perhaps—from home. From Frank.
I started back into the copse, but changed my mind. I dared not take the road. This close to Fort William and the several small villages that surrounded it, there was too much risk of meeting someone. And I could not take a horse down the precipitous course of the burn. In fact, I had some doubt that it could be managed on foot; the rock walls were sheer in some spots, plunging directly into the foaming water of the stream, with no real footing save the tops of scattered rocks sticking out of the rushing water.
But it was by far the most direct path in the direction I wanted. And I did not dare to take too circuitous a route; I might easily lose my way in the wild growth or be overtaken by Jamie and Dougal, returning.
My stomach gave a sudden lurch as I thought of Jamie. God, how could I do it? Leave him without a word of explanation or apology? Disappear without a trace, after what he had done for me?
With that thought I finally decided to leave the horse. At least he would think I had not left him willingly; he might believe I had been killed by wild beasts—I touched the dagger in my