Outlander - Diana Gabaldon [261]
“Jamie!”
He turned at my exclamation.
“You didna know?” he asked curiously.
“That we were coming here? No, of course not.” I felt mildly sick. The hill of Craigh na Dun was no more than a mile away; I could see the hump-backed shape of it through the last shreds of the morning mist.
I swallowed hard. I had tried for nearly six months to reach this place. Now that I was here at last, I wanted to be anywhere else. The standing stones on the hilltop were invisible from below, but they seemed to emanate a subtle terror that reached out for me.
Well below the summit, the footing grew too uncertain for Donas. We dismounted and tethered him to a scrubby pine, continuing on foot.
I was panting and sweating by the time we reached the granite ledge; Jamie showed no signs of exertion, save a faint flush rising from the neck of his shirt. It was quiet here above the pines, but with a steady wind whining faintly in the crevices of the rock. Swallows shot past the ledge, rising abruptly on the air currents in pursuit of insects, dropping like dive bombers, slender wings outspread.
Jamie took my hand to pull me up the last step to the wide flat ledge at the base of the cleft rock. He didn’t release it, but drew me close, looking carefully at me, as though memorizing my features. “Why—?” I began, gasping for breath.
“It’s your place,” he said roughly. “Isn’t it?”
“Yes.” I stared as though hypnotized at the stone circle. “It looks just the same.”
Jamie followed me into the circle. Taking me by the arm, he marched firmly up to the split rock.
“Is it this one?” he demanded.
“Yes.” I tried to pull away. “Careful! Don’t go too near it!” He glanced from me to the rock, clearly skeptical. Perhaps he was right to be. I felt suddenly doubtful of the truth of my own story.
“I—I don’t know anything about it. Perhaps the…whatever it is…closed behind me. Maybe it only works at certain times of the year. It was near Beltane when I came through last.”
Jamie glanced over his shoulder at the sun, a flat disc hanging in mid-sky behind a thin screen of cloud.
“It’s almost Samhain now,” he said. “All Hallows’ Eve. Seems suitable, no?” He shivered involuntarily, in spite of the joke. “When you…came through. What did ye do?”
I tried to remember. I felt ice-cold, and I folded my hands under my armpits.
“I walked round the circle, looking at things. Just randomly, though; there was no pattern. And then I came near to the split rock, and I heard a buzzing, like bees—”
It was still like bees. I drew back as though it had been the rattle of a snake.
“It’s still here!” I reared in panic, throwing my arms around Jamie, but he set me firmly away from him, his face white, and turned me once again toward the stone.
“What then?” The keening wind was sharp in my ears, but his voice was sharper still.
“I put my hand on the rock.”
“Do it, then.” He pushed me closer, and when I did not respond, he grasped my wrist and planted my hand firmly against the brindled surface.
Chaos reached out and grabbed me.
The sun stopped whirling behind my eyes at last, and the shriek faded out of my ears. There was another persistent noise, Jamie calling my name.
I felt too sick to sit up or open my eyes, but I flapped my hand weakly, to let him know I was still alive.
“I’m all right,” I said.
“Are ye then? Oh, God, Claire!” He clasped me against his chest then, holding me tightly. “Jesus, Claire. I thought ye were dead, sure. You…you began to…go, somehow. You had the most awful look on your face, like ye were frightened to death. I—I pulled ye back from the stone. I stopped ye, I shouldna have done so—I’m sorry, lassie.”
My eyes were open enough now to see his face above me, shocked and frightened.
“It’s all right.” It was still an effort to speak, and I felt heavy and disoriented, but things were coming clearer. I tried to smile, but felt nothing more than a twitch.
“At least…we know…it still works.”
“Oh, God. Aye,