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‘Why, no. You don’t look heavy. If ye won’t walk, I shall pick you up and sling ye over my shoulder. Do ye want me to do that?’
Yes please
He has cat blood, I reflected sourly; no doubt that was how he managed to sneak up on me in the darkness.
And nine lives too
If I were a horse, I’d let him ride me anywhere.
CALM DOWN CLAIRE
‘Ye need not be scairt of me,’ he said softly. ‘Nor of anyone here, so long as I’m with ye.’
I made my way slowly back to the castle, thinking about men who lived in cold mud and ate grass. It didn’t occur to me until I had reached the courtyard that I had forgotten all about his shoulder.
‘You don’t mind my seeing your back?’ ‘No, I don’t.’ He sounded mildly surprised, and paused a moment to think about it. ‘I suppose … it’s that ye seem to have a knack for letting me know you’re sorry for it, without makin’ me feel pitiful about it.’
‘Je suis prest.’ I am ready
‘Does it bother you that I’m not a virgin?’ He hesitated a moment before answering. ‘Well, no,’ he said slowly, ‘so long as it doesna bother you that I am.’
‘I can’t marry you! I don’t even know your last name!’ He looked down at me and cocked a ruddy eyebrow. ‘Oh. It’s Fraser. James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser.’
“Ye are Blood of my Blood, and Bone of my Bone. I give ye my Body, that we Two might be One. I give ye my Spirit, till our Life shall be Done.”’
‘You are safe,’ he said firmly. ‘You have my name and my family, my clan, and if necessary, the protection of my body as well. The man willna lay hands on ye again, while I live.’
‘Where did you learn to kiss like that?’ I said, a little breathless. He grinned and pulled me close again. ‘I said I was a virgin, not a monk,’ he said, kissing me again. ‘If I find I need guidance, I’ll ask.’
‘Oh, all right. I didna realize that ye did it face to face. I thought ye must do it the back way, like; like horses, ye know.’
lol he did need guidance
‘Haven’t you ever seen a naked woman before?’ I asked. ‘Aye, but not one so close.’ His face broke into a broad grin. ‘And not one that’s mine.’
As yet too hungry and too clumsy for tenderness, still he made love with a sort of unflagging joy that made me think that male virginity might be a highly underrated commodity.
‘Is it me?’ he asked quietly. ‘Can ye not bear me?’
‘Don’t be afraid,’ he whispered into my hair. ‘There’s the two of us now.’
Lacking experience or the pretence of it, Jamie simply gave me all of himself, without reservation. And the depth of my response to that unsettled me completely.
‘I do not know if it will help,’ he said quietly, ‘but I will tell you this: it is a gift and a wonder to me, to know that I can please you – that your body can rouse to mine. I hadna thought of such a thing – beforehand.’
‘Dear Holy Lord,’ he said. He drew his breath in sharply. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘It doesn’t have to be rough.’ ‘Thank God for small mercies.’
‘I meant it, ye know,’ he said softly. ‘I will protect you. From him, or anyone else. To the last drop of my blood, mo duinne
‘It means “my brown one”.’ He raised a lock of hair to his lips and smiled, with a look in his eyes that started all the drops of my own blood chasing each other through my veins. ‘Mo duinne,’ he repeated, softly. ‘I have been longing to say that to you.’
What I meant to ask is, is this … usual? What it is between us, when I touch you, when you … lie with me? Is it always so between a man and a woman?’
‘Does it ever stop? The wanting you?’ His hand came around to caress my breast. ‘Even when I’ve just left ye, I want you so much my chest feels tight and my fingers ache with wanting to touch ye again.’
‘When I hold ye between my two hands and feel you quiver like that, waitin’ for me to take you … Lord, I want to pleasure you till you cry out under me and open yourself to me. And when I take my own pleasure from you, I feel as though I’ve given ye my soul along with my cock.’
‘If you’ll not let me be spiritual about it, you’ll have to put up wi’ my baser nature. I’m going to be a beast.’ He bit my neck. ‘Do ye want me to be a horse, a bear, or a dog?’ ‘A hedgehog.’ ‘A hedgehog? And just how does a hedgehog make love?’ he demanded. No, I thought. I won’t. I will not. But I did. ‘Very carefully,’ I replied, giggling helplessly.
‘Jesus Christ,’ I said. There was a faint chuckle near my ear. ‘I only said I felt like God, Sassenach,’ he murmured. ‘I never said I was
I roused from a drifting sleep to hear Jamie murmur once more, ‘Does it ever stop, Claire? The wanting?’ My head fell back on to his shoulder. ‘I don’t know, Jamie. I really don’t.’
‘Then let amorous kisses dwell On our lips, begin and tell A Thousand, and a Hundred, score An Hundred, and a Thousand more.’
Jamie, I had found out by accident a few days previously, had never mastered the art of winking one eye. Instead, he blinked solemnly, like a large red owl.
Jamie and I have something in common
‘I’ll thank ye,’ said a cool, level voice, ‘to take your hands off my wife.’
EPIC
‘Your wife! Your wife! You don’t care a thing about me! I’m just your property; it only matters to you because you think I belong to you, and you can’t stand to have someone else take something that belongs to you!’ ‘Ye do belong to me,’ he roared, digging his fingers into my shoulders like spikes.
‘And you are my wife, whether ye like it or no.’ ‘I don’t like it! I don’t like it a bit! But that doesn’t matter either, does it? As long as I’m there to warm your bed you don’t care what I think or how I feel! That’s all a wife is to you – something to stick your cock into when you feel the urge!’
‘My pride is hurt. And my pride is about all I’ve got left to me.’ He leaned his forearms against a rough-barked pine and let his head drop on to them, exhausted. His voice was so low I could barely hear him. ‘You’re tearin’ my guts out, Claire.’
You’re my wife, like it or not. Did I want to break your arm or feed ye naught but bread and water or lock ye in a cupboard for days – and don’t think ye don’t tempt me, either – I could do that, let alone warm your bum for you.’
‘Warm your bum’ sounds kinda pleasant tbh
‘I dinna know what’s a sadist. And if I forgive you for this afternoon, I reckon you’ll forgive me too, as soon as ye can sit down again. ‘As for my pleasure …’ His lip twitched. ‘I said I would have to punish you. I did not say I wasna going to enjoy it.’
Jamie. Jamie was real, all right, more real than anything had ever been to me, even Frank and my life in 1946. Jamie, tender lover and perfidious blackguard.
‘Murtagh was right about women. Sassenach, I risked my life for ye, committing theft, arson, assault and murder into the bargain. In return for which ye call me names, insult my manhood, kick me in the bollocks and claw my face. Then I beat you half to death and tell ye all the most humiliating things have ever happened to me, and you say ye love me.’
‘Well, I didna think it right to roger you in that state, however fierce I wanted to. And I did want to,’ he added, laughing again. ‘Terrible strain on my natural instincts.’ ‘Roger me?’ I said, diverted by the expression. ‘I would hardly call it “lovemaking” under the circumstances, would you?’
‘If,’ I said through my teeth, ‘you ever raise a hand to me again, James Fraser, I’ll cut out your heart and fry it for breakfast!’
‘I swear on the Cross of my Lord Jesus, and by the holy iron which I hold, that I give ye my fealty and pledge ye my loyalty. If ever my hand is raised against you in rebellion or in anger, then I ask that this holy iron may pierce my heart.’
‘I want ye, Claire,’ he said, sounding choked. He paused a moment, as though unsure what to say next. ‘I want ye so much – I can scarcely breathe. Will –’ He swallowed, then cleared his throat. ‘Will ye have me?’
‘You’re mine, mo duinne,’ he said softly, pressing himself into my depths. ‘Mine alone, now and for ever. Mine, whether ye will it or no.’
‘Oh, aye, Sassenach,’ he answered a bit ruefully. ‘I am your master … and you’re mine. Seems I canna possess your soul without losing my own.’
‘As to that, sir, I swore an oath before the altar of God to protect this woman. And if you’re tellin’ me that ye consider your own authority to be greater than that of the Almighty, then I must inform ye that I’m no of that opinion myself.’
*mic drop*, or 18th century equivalent
‘Because I wanted you.’ He turned from the window to face me. ‘More than I ever wanted anything in my life,’ he added softly.
And I said to myself, “Jamie, lad, if her touch feels so bonny on your collarbone, imagine what it might feel like lower down …”’
He was laughing so hard at this point that he had to gasp for breath between phrases. ‘Jamie … I said … for all she’s a Sassenach bitch … with a tongue like an adder’s … with a bum like that … what does it matter if she’s a f-face like a sh-sh-sheep?’
‘You mean to tell me that you married me out of love?’ I demanded. He raised his eyebrows, struggling to draw in breath. ‘Have I not … just been … saying so?’
‘My love,’ he whispered. ‘Oh, my love. I do want ye so.’
