Chapter Text
Edinburgh, December 5, 1768
Oliver Armstrong Grey
Claire Fraser looks up at him, her gaze assessing. “You’re not ill,” she pronounces.
“No, not in the slightest,” Oliver admits. Brianna’s out with her father, running errands along with Royal Mile, but she did show him up to the family’s private quarters, insisting he could catch her mother if he hurried. “I told Brianna something yesterday, and since it concerns you as well…”
“I think you’d better sit,” Claire says, her tone businesslike and just this side of polite. She’s insisted he use her first name, but he’s tempted to fall back on her title. She doesn’t smile, or offer tea. She knows, or has guessed, that this has something to do with his MI-6 employers, or her past, or both.
Before today, if someone asked, he’d have described Claire Fraser—who sometimes goes by Claire McTavish— as warm, clever, and entirely comfortable with herself. At the moment any interest she’s ever had in keeping him comfortable has clearly evaporated. His heart speeds up, and he’s suddenly sweating. He should have taken Brianna up on her offer to stay.
“It’s rather particular to me,” he starts, trying not to stammer. “You see, I’m designated as Charles Gowan’s successor on the technical side— the effort to make time travel regularized and not dependent on genes or the stones. But much of the rest will fall to a fellow you know. Roger MacKenzie Wakefield. And Roger’s concern lately has been the archives.”
“He is an historian,” Claire observes, with the strong implication Oliver only has so much of her time left to waste.
“Charles is supervising, of course, but one ongoing issue is what to do with Frank Randall’s diary and correspondence. It’s all been redacted to remove references to you and Brianna, except for one thing Charles missed. I caught on because I’m a Grey. You know Lord John keeps a private diary, in code?”
“Of course,” Claire says, her expression thawing a trifle. “I lived in his house, remember?”
“It’s passed down, in every generation, because it’s the first record of what we know about my family and time travel. Your family is mentioned only under pseudonyms.”
“John is nothing if not loyal and discreet,” Claire says, and Oliver blinks. He has been in other times, of course, but it’s still startling to speak of a man he’s only seen in portraits in the present tense.“All of us wanted John and his descendants protected, as much as they could be, if MI-6 ever came for them too. Brianna especially. She refuses to trust that they’ll ever really stop studying time travelers for our genes, as I’m sure you know.”
“Brianna is too singular—once I met her I knew I’d read about her in both the diary and in Frank’s reports. I realized she had to be the ‘Deadeye’ Frank mentioned, since Lord John described a girl of similar age who could outshoot him but didn’t grow up in his time. Roger and I burned that page of Frank’s record. We’re fairly sure Brianna is safe from history. That’s what I told her yesterday. I truly did just come to meet you—I didn’t expect Brianna to be...well. But I thought you should know what I know, as it were.” Claire is nodding, not at ease, but not upset, but then there’s a heavy pause.
“What about Frank’s references to me?” Claire asks, and Oliver wonders if ponds can freeze over as quickly as her face just did, covering all signs of life in a merciless sheet of gleaming cold. “Are you under the impression your exposure to Frank, such as it was, left you with insights where I’m concerned? The sort you’ll be preserving for posterity?”
Now Claire’s tone is so sharp Oliver wants to check himself for injuries. Even knowing she’d be the one to dress them. He doesn’t bother controlling his expression.
“Reading Frank’;s diary for insight into you, I imagine, would be like reading the diary of someone's kidnapper and then claiming you understand them. The man was obviously a bloody bastard.” Something new crosses her face then. Amusement? Relief? He can’t be sure. She still looks like she could kill him, or at least quietly sedate him, if he puts a foot wrong. “Roger preserved a few pages of Frank’s diary that betray his poor operational habits—his refusal to tell you what he knew, or let someone else in the Service help. None of the rest of it. But I hope Brianna knows everything you did, all the same—not that Charles wrote any of it down.”
Oliver realizes he’s blurted out the last bit, and Claire gives him a look like the point of a sword, in case her tone wasn't alarming enough. “Perhaps you shouldn’t assume I hide things from my daughter just because Frank did.”
Oliver winces. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
Claire thaws, just a trifle, and Oliver finds himself unable to stop talking. “Randall never discovered where you went when you weren’t at work, if that’s any comfort. The versions of you and Brianna in those files…They aren’t people, if that makes sense. I’m not sure how real you were to him. I realize that now. Perhaps I should have said this at the start.”
She gives a soft snort, then says “When I wasn’t at work, I was learning Gaelic. There’s a truth for you, since you haven’t lied to me.” She softens, and what he has come to think of as her real face re-emerges, making it seem as though he’s imagined all the perilous edges.“I can appreciate you wanting to be certain we can trust you, that you don’t want to hide from Bree.”
“I should have found a better way.” Charles Gowan is always trying to teach him the past is a heavy thing. He’d remembered that well enough with Brianna, desperate not to make her cry, to see any of her easy confidence diminish on his account.
But he forgot that what reads as clever heroics from the distance of the archive was something very different as daily life. He read those documents knowing Claire would end up here—she didn’t have that certainty. He hopes his research can offer her the chance to practice modern medicine again. Oliver has a hard time believing she truly wants to be in this century for the rest of her life.
He has more immediate concerns than research, though. He’s lucky that that James Fraser is not here to read his wife’s face. He will be luckier still, later, if Brianna is still speaking to him, once she finds out how badly he’s just bungled this conversation. Claire’s voice breaks into his thoughts before he can spiral into self-pity.
“There are any number of things I’ve taught Brianna, or tried to. One of them is the difference between people who withhold information when they have to and people who lie because they mistake deception for power. She’d have tossed you out on your arse by now if you were in the second category.” Claire shrugs.“And your recent lack of tact aside, I do like you.”
“I can appreciate how much you care for Brianna…”
“No. You can’t,” she says, not unkindly. “But it’s a good sign you’re willing to try.”
There are footsteps on the stair, then, and a voice calls, “Milady? Am I disturbing you?”
Claire calls back in French,“No, Fergus. Oliver’s just leaving.”
He takes the hint, and rises. Brianna’s brother enters. Fergus briefly bows to Ollie, then turns to Claire with a wide, open smile, taking a seat beside her on the sofa.
“If you’ll both excuse me,” Oliver says, “I’ll see myself out.”
Claire looks at him. “Brianna’s told us to expect you for dinner on Friday.”
Oliver pauses outside the door— not to eavesdrop, but because he’s suddenly exhausted and a bit out of breath. In French, he can hear Claire telling Fergus she’s missed him, that she’s glad his trip to Glasgow went well.
It’s the same voice she uses with Brianna. It shouldn’t bother him that he’s not family as far as Claire Fraser is concerned. Oliver can’t even get up the nerve to ask Brianna if he can kiss her, though he’s relatively sure what her answer would be. Once he’s made amends with her mother, at least.
Oliver moves down the stairs, and through the print shop, thinking about what he owes Claire Fraser as recompense for his appalling bad manners. He wonders what sort of gift one gets a keen gardener who could undoubtedly kill you with a sharpened trowel. If such an object exists, it’s probably not appropriate to bring it to a family dinner table.
—
Edinburgh, December 30, 1768
Brianna Fraser
“Are you going to tell me why I needed to be at the surgery when I could be working on dinner?” Brianna half murmurs to Ollie, not really caring if Claire overhears or not. He’s been so sweet and apologetic about how he brought up Frank with her mother. She’s inclined to trust him when he says he’s found the right way to apologize.
He pulls off his leather satchel. “You’ll see,” he says.
“Alright, the table’s clear,’ Claire says, raising an eyebrow at Brianna, who shrugs. Hopefully her mother believes she has no idea what’s happening.
At that, Ollie bows, almost like a magician about to do a trick, and pulls something out of the satchel. “I’ve been testing whether people from my office can send me things here other than letters. I believe this is surgical silk And a Pinard horn, unless my assistant is worse at research than I thought.”
Brianna watches as her mother’s smile widens. “No need to scold your assistant. These will be quite helpful. Marsali doesn’t have her own Pinard horn. But you didn’t need to do this, Oliver.”
“I did. Consider it a promise not to let my mouth run away with me.” Mama gives him a smile. Ollie relaxes— she can tell because he takes her hand, squeezing her fingers in his.
Da comes in then, and Mama practically flies over to him. “Oliver’s brought gifts for the surgery,” she explains, a little breathless.
Ollie doesn’t drop Briana’s hand—probably assuming her parents are too caught up in each other to notice them. Da, of course, sees it instantly, but he gives Ollie a grudging nod, and says, in Gaelic, “Tapadh leat.”
Ollie has apparently picked up this much, or looked it up beforehand, because he gives Da a nod back.
“Do I get a present?” Brianna asks, dropping her voice a bit.
Ollie blushes, then answers, “There are dictionaries in my other bag.”
For that, Brianna decides, she’ll definitely kiss him when he asks.
—
Edinburgh, January 4, 1769
Claire
Jamie is reading Tacitus while Brianna and Ollie sit in the corner and argue over the finer points of translating Moliere. It’s almost enough to make me think I need to find something Greek or medieval and pretend that anything about miasma or the four humors will help my patients.
Brianna is smiling a little, saying, “I think you missed that subjunctive, there,” and Ollie says, “Oh, of course,” as if she’s handed him a secret of the universe. Jamie makes a humming noise that sounds almost like cautious approval. It’s too bad he’s leaving soon now that his work with Ned is nearly done—though at least he uses his prototypes and not the stones, so I’m sure he’ll be back. Maybe Brianna will be willing to admit she misses him, once he does go. That will make the inevitable moping easier on all of us.
—
Lallybroch, April 10, 1769 (So, about four months after the above)
Brianna Fraser
Brianna knows it isn’t necessarily usual to be curious about what her parents were like when they were young, not at her age. Only Kitty has recently asked Aunt Jenny how she knew she loved Uncle Ian. She’d asked Aunt Jenny the same question once, and her aunt had clearly been delighted to finally tell the story to a receptive audience.
Her own mother has admitted, after a glass of wine or two, that she didn’t exactly plan to rise on her tiptoes in her wedding gown and kiss Da back, but it’s one of the things she’s never regretted. Da, on the other hand, once told her over breakfast, with no alcohol involved, that it’s not just because he’s a hunter that he always seems to know which distant footsteps are Claire’s. He’d explained, simply, “Ye track to ken where the danger might be, or where your shelter is. But joy has a sound too, mo nighean ruaidh.”
Just now, she’s watching her parents toss a baseball back and forth, laughing, and she wonders if this is what Da looked like playing shinty with the MacKenzies. She turns to Ollie, who takes her hand like he’s always been doing it. He’s only been back here for six weeks, and she’s still thrilled at the solid reality of him.
“Do you think they’ll give you a turn again, or are we doomed to be spectators?” Ollie asks dryly. Mama has just challenged Da to catch ten of her throws in a row. Both her parents accepted help from her and Ollie with tying their baseball gloves properly, so they’re fairly evenly matched.
“And what do I get for bestin’ ye in the wee game, Sassenach? If ye canna catch all ten of my throws back?”
Ollie’s only two inches taller than Brianna, so she doesn’t have to go up on tiptoe to say in his ear,“Not much chance we can get the ball back, but there are compensations. If I kiss you they won’t notice.”
He opens his mouth, probably to ask how she can tell, and she covers it with hers, gratified when he kisses her back. It’s not new, but it’s still exciting, seeing this normally contained man set aside propriety for her.
After they break apart, she hears her mother say, “Oh, awfully sure of yourself, aren't you, Jamie?”
This is the sort of parental flirtation that can easily end in Mama pretending she objects to being carried back to the house. The baseball is new; this dynamic is far from it. She’ll be able to kiss Ollie again shortly.
“Thanks, by the way,” she says, grinning as she realizes Ollie is blushing.
“Whatever for?” He’s practically stammering, and it’s better than winning an argument with him. “It’s not any particular hardship on my part to kiss you, sweetheart.”
She thrills to the endearment, then concentrates more on her parents, who seem to be inventing the art of baseball taunting all on their own. “This is better than a time machine, as far as confirming they’ve always been exactly like this. When they have time to be. I'm not sure if we should get them bats or not, though. The pitching is keeping them entertained and might be safer."
—
Lallybroch, April 8, 1770, afternoon (so a year after the previous section)
Claire
Lallybroch
“If I didn’t know better, darling, I’d think I’m losing my touch.”
Jamie blinks at me— a few tufts of his hair are sticking up, so he looks a bit like a startled owl, if one ignores the rippling muscles everywhere else.
“I can’t remember the last time you were so lost in thought in the armchair. It took nearly two minutes for me to persuade you I’m a more than worthwhile distraction, and another thirty seconds to get you in the bed.”
He laughs, and pulls me back on top of him. “An inexcusable delay, mo ghraidh.” He pulls me over for a kiss, warm and thorough. “It’s the fuss hereabouts that’s the distraction. Sassenach. Bein’ wi’ you, that’s my proper purpose. Especially here, with no printing to tend to.” I return to the kiss, but I’m not necessarily looking for a repeat performance until I know exactly what’s bothering him.
“Fuss like the fact Brianna invited Ollie here s second time, you mean,” I say, arranging myself so my head is on his chest and our legs are tangled together. “But she hasn’t spoken to either of us about marriage. And neither has he. Which fact troubles you more?”
“I canna decide if she’s brought him here again because she’s certain of him, or because she isna, and she wants Jenny to tell her her own mind.”
“My guess is she knows he loves her, and she feels the same, but Edinburgh still isn’t the place to show him what that means.”
I don’t think I’ve ever told Brianna that before Lallybroch, I’d never told Jamie what I felt for him. There had been something about seeing his past, and his roots. It made it easier to speak of the future, to tell him that he was all I saw when I imagined the rest of my life. Lallybroch is where Jamie was young, and had impetuous, hopeful dreams. Brianna brings her dreams here too. Much as I worry over her situation with Ollie, knowing that about her is a gift.
“It’s not as though I think any man could truly deserve her,” Jamie admits, and I fight back a laugh. “But young Grey should have more faith in her knowin’ her own mind than he seems to.”
I sigh. “I’m dying to meddle, but not with Bree. If Ollie so much as twitches in front of me I can’t promise I won’t tell him to stop making an ass of himself when marriage on Bree’s terms is a much more sensible choice.”
“Aye, marriage can be one sensible decision after another. Especially when ye stay right there, where I can watch the light dance on your skin,” Jamie agrees, his tone growing more playful. “Now. Will ye give me my penance for bein’ inattentive earlier, or do I have to invent my own?”
“If you’re going to get on your knees for me, you might as well be able to walk afterward.” I sit up, then gently pull the pillow from behind his head and toss it to the floor. “I plan to keep you there for a good while.”
—
Lallybroch, April 13, 1770
Jamie
Jamie grunts as he catches what Young Grey calls a fastball.
Ollie cradles the ball in his glove, then says, casually, “I feel I should tell you. I’m not as good a shot as Brianna is, but I can hunt. And fish, though I do need a pole, I can’t use my hands. And if you want a reference for my knife skills, ask Fergus. He saw what happened to the last man who tried to pick my pocket while his friend was meant to carry me off somewhere.” Ollie throws him another.
Jamie smiles as he catches it. He throws the ball back, gratified when he hears the answering grunt.
“Am I meant to hire you on, then? To guard the print shop?” He tries to keep his tone friendly, but it’s an effort. The lad is clever, and he makes Brianna laugh. But vague liking is not the same as trust.
“No,” Ollie admits. “But you already know I read Greek and Latin as well as you do, that my French is as good as Claire’s, and that I can survive a dinner party in Spanish and German. Just like I know your concerns about me aren’t that I’ll bore Brianna to death, or demand she dull her intellect to flatter my ego.”
Jamie makes a skeptical noise with the back of his throat, which Claire calls the “Scottish noise” even when he tries to tell her that all his noises are Scottish. He shakes his head, as if to clear it—remembering how that particular conversation with Claire ended is not the distraction he needs right now.
“You’re right about this much, lad. My concerns arena about the languages you speak, or whether you can handle a knife when facin’ down a fool. In part because I’m no’ one myself.”
Grey has the grace to flush. “You already know I’m not a coward. If I were I’d wait for Dr. Fraser to be here to say any of this to you.”
“I’m no’ a brute, either. You dinna need Claire’s protection while you’re my nephew’s guest.”
“I don’t, and of course you aren’t. It’s only that if she were here she’d start arguing with both of us about assuming Bree needs a man to do anything for her, and then I could slip away unnoticed.”
“So you think I’m predictable, then,” Jamie says, letting the amusement creep into his tone.
“I’d rather use the language your wife might. I think she’d say the available data tells the story.”
“Dinna get too complacent, lad. Claire wilna thank me for speakin' for her, but I can say she has her own concerns.. And Bree herself has said that ye’ve still been wonderin’ if she should go to her own time before you’ll make her the promises ye ken well she’s hoped for. For all that you’ve just talked about bein’ a suitable husband here, as well.”
Grey winces. “I have said those things, yes.” No doubt the lad is hoping his visits here will be occasional, once his technology is in wider use and Bree will agree to travel with it. Or perhaps he thinks Jamie can only assess a man’s worth in terms of the skills that have served in his own life. If Ollie has forgotten that Bree has never felt torn between two places at once, that’s his mistake to make.
Jamie is uncomfortably aware his daughter might hit him for what he’s about to say next.“I ken you’re still not sure what to make of this place. You’ll need to make up your mind, and make your peace wi’ the fact that hers isna likely to change.”
Grey nods, paler now. “I’m aware of that too.”
Lallybroch, April 15, 1770
Brianna
Fergus finds her as she’s slipping a note under Mama and Da’s bedroom door. He’s only been at Lallybroch two days— Da has left the shop with him, and there’s only so much longer they can both leave it in the hands of the apprentices.
“I’m a bit hurt,” he says, in a tone that assures her he’s teasing. “Sneaking Milord letters is usually my purview.”
She laughs, surprised by the sound, though not that her brother has been the one to draw it out of her. Ollie has been asking again if she’s sure she doesn’t miss Boston, doesn’t want to go to a movie with him there, or with other boys her age. She thought their fight in November would be the end of it, that he’d start seeing Scotland as something she isn’t truly capable of leaving behind.
“You know what tomorrow is,” she offers, trying to keep her voice steady.
“I do,” Fergus says, all traces of his jocularity gone. “It’s not, perhaps, the wisest time to ask either of them for much,” he points out, the implied warning gentle.
Their parents don’t mark the anniversary of Culloden in any obvious way. But Brianna is observant—or her unusual life has made her so. For all that her mother is an avid gardener, spring can make her subdued, and brings out Da’s tendency to hover when he’s anxious. If she had a palette for her feelings, she’d say Culloden and Faith’s birthday are adjacent colors. Fergus has known this longer than she has. Mama will even let him do his own fussing over her, even when she tells Brianna she’s fine. Apparently it’s his prerogative as the oldest child.
“I know. I chose the date on purpose, though,” Brianna answers, trying not to sound irritated.“I’ve only asked that if they’re coming to dinner tomorrow, Da should wear his kilt. I asked Uncle Ian too. And told them I’ll be doing a toast. But to send a note back, if it’s too much to ask, or not come. I can take a hint.”
Fergus raises an eyebrow at her. “You’re planning something a bit grander than a toast, petite.”
She resists the urge to point out she’s been his height since they met.“You have an advantage over me, Fergus. Your wife knows exactly what it means to be a Fraser. Ollie…needs to see. And I’d like Mama and Da to know I’ve been paying attention.”
“No one doubts that, Bree,” Fergus says, his voice gentle in a way that reminds her he’s spent years rocking babies to sleep. When he looks at her like that, fond but careful, she remembers their parents are the ones who taught him what concern looks like. He learned that particular tone of voice from Mama, as well.
“Ollie is still insisting, then, that you deserve more than he can give you, that he’ll only believe your marriage will work if you can be in your own time to be sure you wouldn’t prefer another man? Refuses to believe you truly wish to be here?”
Fergus doesn’t bother to hide his skepticism, and part of Brianna warms at it. She’s not the only one baffled by Ollie’s stubbornness, his inability to see that his own family’s lack of interest in him is a problem with them, not proof he has to earn her somehow. He can’t see that it’s not her parents holding her back— it’s his refusal to listen to her.
“He is. And I won’t drag myself, or anyone else, into a different century just to assuage his doubts.”
Fergus nods. “I can appreciate that you want Ollie to see who you are. I take it you haven’t told him about this plan of yours.”
“No. Only you. He should see it for himself, when everyone else does.”
“I suppose. But are you sure Milord and Milady need this from you? This…demonstration?”
Brianna sighs. “I’ve never told you this, and I guess I should. On the ship back from Paris, years ago, I finally got up the nerve to tell Mama that Frank took me to Culloden. To see the clan stones on the field. I didn’t understand then. Mama and Da agreed to stop asking me to consider leaving here—but I never agreed not to tell them I’m still sure I’m staying.”
Her brother nods. “I’ll be alongside you, then. So will Marsali, if only in spirit. You know how children are about going to bed when they’re supposed to.”