Outlander: The Standing Stones

Revelations

Yes, this story is finally winding down, but I am so slow, I promise it will take forever.  To all my gentle readers who have stuck with this, my eternal thanks and gratitude...

After Geillis' revelation, I started spending more time on the battlements watching. Watching for him, of course. It was going to be Mac, I was sure. Had he not wanted to come with me the day I went to explore the standing stones, but had the wisdom not to object when I insisted I wanted to go alone?

Of course, I couldn't say for sure that it would be him, but it made sense. They would no doubt hear from the old couple that they had picked up a girl with hair like golden sunlight and had driven her to the trailhead. And Mac and Mrs. S knew where I was going. In the short time I'd been there I'd become familiar with the locals, everyone (well, not everyone) knew who I was and what I did for a living. Mac was an archaeologist himself, and had told me that the stones were a familiar tourist attraction, smaller and more easily accessible than Stone Henge.

How much did the canny Mrs. Struan know? Was the spell of the stone, the disappearances, part of the local folklore? I'd never taken that into consideration, I'm an archaeologist, not a cultural anthropologist, after all. Myths and legends are a part of that, but I dealt in facts—well, theories too, after all, that's how Carter found Tutankhamun's tomb.

I'm Russian though, and we believe in signs, magic, superstition, and possibilities. My father took us to visit relatives in Moscow who lived in a haunted house. The ghost tended to drift freely around the house. If it liked you, you might feel the occasional icy hand on your shoulder that would come out of nowhere. One night, it caressed my hair—really—and scared the shit out of me.

I might have been skeptical about the stone circle if Mac had warned me, but, then again, I might not have cared. But now I could hear my father's voice telling me, "You should have been more careful, dushka, what have I told you about the fairy rings?" Well, so much for his warnings.

I heard footsteps on the battlement stairs, and turned to see Jamie's familiar red head. He was carrying a cloak which he wrapped around my shoulders. "Ye never remember your cloak, do ye lass?" He put his arms around my shoulders and hugged me tightly. Clair must be nowhere to be seen.

I wonder how much Clair had told him, or if she'd stuck to her "my carriage turned over and I hit my head" story. Clair seemed happy with her new toy, er, marriage, while Jamie seemed ambivalent at times. Sometimes he seemed happy, but I frequently heard them quarrel, so I guess she had told him yet. It would help if she did, she might find they fought less if she removed this burden from her shoulders. I didn't approve of that marriage, but if both worked at it, it might work.

Having Jamie hold me made me feel nostalgic. Our meeting at the stone circle, the way he would come and see me to make sure I was all right. I even missed our two brief trysts. I did not want Jamie Frazer, but if he were to ask me if I wanted to slip away to the hayloft, or my room, I was not so sure that I was inclined to say "no."

I turned in his arms and lifted my face, which he kissed, and it was not a brief kiss between friends. I began to have very bad thoughts, I suspected Jamie was having them, too. I slipped out of his arms and took his hand.

"Come with me," I said softly, and I took him to my room, fully aware of what I was doing.

But he was, too. He opened the door to my room for me, and locked it securely behind him. Our cloaks seemed to fall off our shoulders, and as I began to undo his shirt, he hands undid the laces of my gown and my petticoat.

He was self-conscious about being shirtless, but I turned him around and ran my fingers over his scars. "Randall ought to be drawn and quartered for what he did to you. Had he not flogged you so many times, some of this would have faded with time. I don't understand this, how it can be allowed to go on. If he truly wanted to kill you, he should have just hung or shot you and got it over with."