ic contact post

[givingback]

audio | video | text

Comments

[seventeenfortythree]

I've never felt so broken, Claire.

[ From a man who has been broken in multiple ways over his years. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

And that's all right. She's our baby. Someone, some monster, hurt her. God, but she's strong. Stronger than you and I combined.

[Somehow, greater than the sum of all her parts.]

That's saying something when you're the strongest person I know.

[seventeenfortythree]

[ Jamie takes solace in his wife's words, finding comfort in them. Their daughter is strong. She'll heal and she'll grow and she'll bloom again. He has to believe that. ]

I ken exactly the man who hurt her and if he ever wakes, I'll be there to wrap my hands around his throat and send him to the next life.

[nineteenfortyfive]

[It's a promise. Claire's hand stills in his hair.]

I told you once that I would help you bleed Randall. The same goes for this son of a bitch, too.

[seventeenfortythree]

I'll show him to ye. So ye ken who he is on sight.

[ It's a promise; they will kill whoever needs to be killed together. Whether Randall wakes or Bonnet. They will take care of it for the safety of their family. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

Did... after Culloden, when you knew Randall was dead for good, did it give you peace?

[She's never asked, because she doesn't ask about Randall, and she doesn't ask about Culloden. Until now.]

[seventeenfortythree]

[ Jamie's jaw tightens for a moment, the question one he hadn't expected. He doesn't think about either of those things deeply if he can help it. ]

Nothing gave me peace after Culloden, Sassenach. I was glad, perhaps, that Randall was gone to join the Devil himself, but for years I didna feel anythin' other than anger that I couldna die.

[ It's the truth, terrible as it is. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

And now?

[Her fingers resume their previous task, combing through his hair. She can't hold him or reach to kiss him right now but she will. Eventually.]

[seventeenfortythree]

Ye came back to me, Claire. It was the first time in twenty years that I felt my heart beat again.

[ His hand reaches out so that his fingertips can lightly brush her cheek before dropping to rest on Brianna's back again. ]

Killing Bonnet won't take away the hurt but it will be satisfying, and he willna be able to hurt anyone else. Same as Randall.

[nineteenfortyfive]

What do we do until then?

[They might never get a chance to hurt Bonnet. To make him suffer for harming their baby.]

[seventeenfortythree]

[ What had Jamie done? Tried to die without Claire, but eventually, eventually he'd picked up the pieces of his life and tried to make something of himself even if as a different man in Edinburgh. ]

We soothe her the best we can. Ease her mind when able. Protect her. Be a family. What she has that I didna after Randall was finally dead was us. She has that now. And she's strong, as ye say. She'll be all right.

[ One day. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

[Her little girl. Claire breathes deeply, content with the weight of Bree half on her, and wraps her arms around her slender form.]

She... she also told me she was wed. Or, handfast, like Fergus and Marsali. To Roger. [She told him about the young man, a historian that helped her find him.] He followed her through the stones. After the handfasting, they had an argument, and he left. Then...

[Bonnet. Not only assaulted, but heartbroken, too.]

[seventeenfortythree]

[ Christ this is a lot to process, and if not for Brianna between them he'd get up to pace. ]

He left? After a single argument?

[ It angers him, truly, that he left her alone. Left her alone so that when she ran into Bonnet...]

Mo Chreach, toll-toine.

[ Curses that he won't translate for his wife. ]

Do ye think she truly loves him? This Roger.

[nineteenfortyfive]

[Claire shakes her head. One argument. If she left Jamie after one argument, well, their story would never unfold. She can't even chalk it up to youth--Roger's older than she was when she married Jamie.]

I don't know. The Roger I knew was a good man, and he was there for Bree during her discovering the truth. I can only assume he was there after, too.

Here... here, before this week, she's always said she's unsure. She's been having trouble settling on what love and a marriage means to her.

[Guess whose fault that is.]

[seventeenfortythree]

[ Jamie goes quiet at that, but his eyes settle on Claire's. It's almost as if he can read her mind, and his words in Gaelic are gentler now. ]

Mo chridhe. No one kens what love means to them until they're in it.

[ It's not her fault. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

I wonder if she's figured it out, then.

[She averts her eyes to look down at Bree, dead asleep between them. Poor thing's cried herself out too many times today.]

[seventeenfortythree]

Perhaps. If she truly loves Roger. But I feel I must tell ye, Sassenach, I dinnae like the sound of this man. Leaving a young lass alone? Christ.

[ Jamie would never. This is the man who slept on the floor in front of Claire's door before she ever loved him, just to protect her. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

I agree. To go through the stones after someone is--no small decision. I don't understand how he could just go and leave her.

[Hopefully, Roger remains asleep, wherever his pod might be. He'll have to unhappy parents to deal with if he wakes.]

[seventeenfortythree]

[ Jamie just shakes his head, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly. ]

No doubt his decision to follow her was not for true love.

[ Which only serves to make Jamie angry, of the opinion now that this man wanted something more from his daughter and thought to get it come hell or high water. ]

If I could have gone through the stones to ye Claire it would have been to never leave yer side again as long as I drew breath.

[nineteenfortyfive]

Not all men are you. Unfortunately.

[If only. The world would be a much better place, she thinks.]

Regardless, Bree felt something for him.

[seventeenfortythree]

[ He wonders if she feels anything now. But should this Roger ever wake, Jamie will have a few strong choice words for him. No doubt his wife will, as well. ]

She doesna need to worry about him now. Just healing her mind.

[ Jamie kisses the back of her head, wishing he could part with some of his strength if only to help her. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

[That's the hardest thing to heal.]

... you're very good with her. Like you've known her all along.

[seventeenfortythree]

My heart has always kent her, Claire. Since the day I knew she existed in yer womb.

[ Just because he'd never laid eyes on her didn't mean he hadn't thought of her every day, imagined how he would have held her, spoken to her, how Claire might've sang to her.

Jamie Fraser was a man made to be a father but always denied the chance. ]

[nineteenfortyfive]

You're a good father. You always have been.

[Now, and then, when he made the decision to send them away. To save them.]

let me slide in here real quick

[givingback]

[ This entire time, Bree's been asleep, facing her mother. There have been no smiles tonight, but her forehead does furrow and slowly her body begins to tense. She makes no sounds other than soft, breathless whimpers as her hands tighten into fists; someone trying to fight, someone terrified and overpowered, even in her sleep. Her body shifts, trying to find room to move, to run, to get away. ]