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I will love you forever, Bria
With all my love,
Dad

APPARITION
THE LOCHABER DISTRICT, according to the North of Scotland Hydro Electric Board (as interpreted by Bria
“That means it goes up and down a lot,” Roger explained to Buck, as they fought their way through what he thought was part of the Locheil Forest, looking for the edge of Loch Lochy.
“Ye don’t say?” Buck glanced bleakly over his shoulder at the distant hump of Ben Nevis, then back at Roger. “I’d not noticed.”
“Cheer up, it’s all downhill for a bit now. And the midgies are all dead wi’ the cold. Count your blessings.” Roger felt unaccountably cheerful this morning—perhaps only because the walking was downhill, after a strenuous week of combing the Cameron clan lands, a bewildering network of corries, tarns, moraines, and Munros, those deceptive summits with their gently rounded tops and their unspeakable slopes. Thank God no one lived on top of them.
Perhaps also because, while they hadn’t found Jem or any trace of him, it was progress, of a sort. The Camerons on the whole had been hospitable, after the initial surprise, and they’d had the luck to find a tacksman of Lochiel, the clan chieftain, who’d sent a man to Tor Castle for them. Word had come back a day later: no word of a stranger matching Rob Cameron’s description—though, in fact, Rob looked like half the people Roger had met in the last few days—or Jem’s, he being a lot more noticeable.
They’d worked their way back along the shores of Loch Arkaig—the fastest way for someone to travel from the Great Glen, if heading for the ocean. But no word of a boat stolen or hired, and Roger began to feel that Cameron had not, after all, sought refuge or help among his ancient clan—a relief, on the whole.
“Blessings, is it?” Buck rubbed a hand over his face. Neither of them had shaved in a week, and he looked as red-eyed and grubby as Roger felt. He scratched his jaw consideringly. “Aye, well. A fox took a shit next to me last night, but I didna step in it this morning. I suppose that’ll do, for a start.”
The next day and night dampened Roger’s mood of optimism somewhat: it rained incessantly, and they spent the night under heaps of half-dry bracken on the edge of a black tarn, emerging at dawn chilled and frowsty, to the shrieks of plovers and killdeer.
He hesitated momentarily as they rode past the place where they might turn toward Cranesmuir; he wanted badly to talk again with Dr. McEwan. His hand found his throat, thumb stroking the scar. “Maybe,” the healer had said. “Just maybe.” But McEwan couldn’t aid them in looking for Jem; that visit would have to wait.
Still, he felt his heart rise as they came over the pass and saw Lallybroch below. It was bittersweet, coming home to a home that was not his and might never be again. But it promised refuge and succor, if only temporarily—and it promised hope, at least in these last few minutes before they reached the door.
“Och, it’s you!” It was Je
“And this will be your kinsman?” She curtsied to Buck. “Welcome to ye, sir. Come ben; I’ll call Taggie to mind the horses.” She turned in a flicker of white apron and petticoats, beckoning them to follow. “Da’s in the speak-a-word,” she called over her shoulder as she headed for the kitchen. “He’s something for you!”
“Mr. MacKenzie and … this would be also Mr. MacKenzie, aye?” Brian Fraser came out of the study, smiling, and offered Buck his hand. Roger could see him looking Buck over with close attention, a slight frown between his dark brows. Not disapproval—puzzlement, as though he knew Buck from somewhere and was trying to think where.
Roger knew exactly where and felt again that peculiar quiver he’d felt on meeting Dougal MacKenzie. The resemblance between father and son was by no means instantly striking—their coloring was very different, and Roger thought most of Buck’s features came from his mother—but there was a fugitive similarity, nonetheless, something in their ma
Buck was smiling, making commonplace courtesies, complimenting the house and its estate… . The puzzlement faded from Brian’s eyes, and he invited them to sit, calling down the hall to the kitchen for someone to bring them a bite and a dram.
“Well, then,” Brian said, pulling out the chair from behind his desk in order to sit with them. “As ye havena got the lad with ye, I see he’s not found yet. Have ye heard any news of him, though?” He looked from Buck to Roger, worried but hopeful.
“No,” Roger said, and cleared his throat. “Not a word. But—your daughter said that you … might have heard something?”
Fraser’s face changed at once, lighting a little.
“Well, it’s nay so much heard anything, but …” He rose and went to rummage in the desk, still talking.
“A captain from the garrison came by here twa, three days ago, wi’ a small party of soldiers. The new man in charge—what was his name, Je
“Who? Oh, the new redcoat captain? Randall, he said. Jonathan Randall.” Her color rose a little, and her father smiled to see it. Roger felt the smile freeze on his own face.
“Aye, he took to you, lass. Wouldna be surprised if he came back one of these days.”
“Precious little good it will do him if he does,” Je
“No, no, I’m sure I put …” Brian’s voice trailed off as he scrabbled in the drawer. “Oh. Erm, aye.” He coughed, hand in the drawer, and, through his shock, Roger realized what the trouble was. The desk had a secret compartment. Evidently Brian had put the “thing,” whatever it was, in the hiding place and was now wondering how to get it out again without revealing the secret to his visitors.
Roger rose to his feet.
“Will ye pardon me, mistress?” he asked, bowing to Je
Je
“What the devil’s wrong wi’ you?” Buck said, the minute they were out the door. “Ye went white as a sheet in there, and ye still look like a fish that’s been dead a week.”
“I feel like one,” Roger said tersely. “I know Captain Randall—or, rather, I know a lot of things about him. Leave it that he’s the last person I’d want to have any knowledge of Jem.”
“Oh.” Buck’s face went blank, then firmed. “Aye, well. We’ll see what it is he brought, and then we’ll go and have it out with him if we think he might have the lad.”
What it is he brought. Roger fought back all the horrible things that phrase conjured—Jem’s ear, a finger, a lock of his hair—because if it had been anything like that, surely the Frasers wouldn’t be calm about it. But if Randall had brought some hideous token in a box?
“Why, though?” Buck was frowning, plainly trying to read Roger’s expression, which, judging from Buck’s own, must be appalling. “Why would this man mean you and the lad ill? He’s never met ye, has he?”
“That,” Roger said, choking down his feelings, “is an excellent question. But the man is a—do you know what a sadist is?”
“No, but it’s plainly something ye di