“I could have broken him, Sassenach. It would have been messy, though, and likely permanent. I’d rather not use such means if I dinna have to. Mind ye, Sassenach” – his voice reached me from the shadows, holding a note of warning – “sometime I may have to. I had to know where his fellows were, their arms and the rest of it. I couldna scare him into it; it was trick him or break him.”

“He said you couldn’t do anything that would make him talk.”

Jamie’s voice was weary. “Christ, Sassenach, of course I could. Ye can break anyone if you’re prepared to hurt them enough. I know that, if anyone does.”

“Yes,” I said quietly, “I suppose you do.”

Neither of us moved for a time, nor spoke. I could hear the murmurs of men bedding down for the night, the occasional stamp of boots on hard earth and the rustle of leaves heaped up as a barrier against the autumn chill. My eyes had adjusted sufficiently to the dark that I could now see the outline of our tent, some thirty feet away in the shelter of a big larch. I could see Jamie, too, his figure black against the lighter darkness of the night.

“All right,” I said at last. “All right. Given the choice between what you did, and what you might have done… yes, all right.”

“Thank you.” I couldn’t tell whether he was smiling or not, but it sounded like it.

“You were taking the hell of a chance with the rest of it,” I said. “If I hadn’t given you an excuse for not killing him, what would you have done?”

The large figure stirred and shrugged, and there was a faint chuckle in the shadows.

“I don’t know, Sassenach. I reckoned as how you’d think of something. If ye hadn’t – well, I suppose I would have had to shoot the lad. Couldna very well disappoint him by just lettin’ him go, could I?”

“You bloody Scottish bastard,” I said without heat.

He heaved a deep exasperated sigh. “Sassenach, I’ve been stabbed, bitten, slapped, and whipped since supper – which I didna get to finish. I dinna like to scare children and I dinna like to flog men, and I’ve had to do both. I’ve two hundred English camped three miles away, and no idea what to do about them. I’m tired, I’m hungry, and I’m sore. If you’ve anything like womanly sympathy about ye, I could use a bit!”

He sounded so aggrieved that I laughed in spite of myself. I got up and walked toward him.

“I suppose you could, at that. Come here, and I’ll see if I can find a bit for you.” He had put his shirt back on loose over his shoulders, not troubling to do it up. I slid my hands under it and over the hot, tender skin of his back. “Didn’t cut the skin,” I said, feeling gently upward.

“A strap doesn’t; it just stings.”

I removed the shirt and sat him down to have his back sponged with cold water from the stream.

“Better?” I asked.

“Mmmm.” The muscles of his shoulders relaxed, but he flinched slightly as I touched a particularly tender spot.

I turned my attention to the scratch under his ear. “You wouldn’t really have shot him, would you?”

“What d’ye take me for, Sassenach?” he said, in mock outrage.

“A Scottish poltroon. Or at best, a conscienceless outlaw. Who knows what a fellow like that would do? Let alone an unprincipled voluptuary.”

He laughed with me, and his shoulder shook under my hand. “Turn your head. If you want womanly sympathy, you’ll have to keep still while I apply it.”

“Mmm.” There was a moment of silence. “No,” he said at last, “I wouldna have shot him. But I had to save his pride somehow, after making him feel ridiculous over you. He’s a brave lad; he deserved to feel he was worth killing.”

I shook my head. “I will never understand men,” I muttered, smoothing marigold ointment over the scratch.

He reached back for my hands and brought them together under his chin.

“You dinna need to understand me, Sassenach,” he said quietly. “So long as ye love me.” His head tilted forward and he gently kissed my clasped hands.

“And feed me,” he added, releasing them.

“Oh, womanly sympathy, love and food?” I said, laughing. “Don’t want a lot, do you?”

There were cold bannocks in the saddlebags, cheese, and a bit of cold bacon as well. The tensions and absurdities of the last two hours had been more draining than I realized, and I hungrily joined in the meal.

The sounds of the men surrounding us had now died down, and there was neither sound nor any flicker of an unguarded fire to indicate that we were not a thousand miles from any human soul. Only the wind rattled busily among the leaves, sending the odd twig bouncing down through the branches.

Jamie leaned back against a tree, face dim in the starlight, but body instinct with mischief.

“I gave your champion my word that I’d no molest ye wi’ my loathsome advances. I suppose that means unless ye invite me to share your bed, I shall have to go and sleep wi’ Murtagh or Kincaid. And Murtagh snores.”

“So do you,” I said.

I looked at him for a moment, then shrugged, letting half my ruined gown slide off my shoulder. “Well, you’ve made a good start at ravishing me.” I dropped the other shoulder, and the torn cloth fell free to my waist. “You may as well come and finish the job properly.”

The warmth of his arms was like heated silk, sliding over my cold skin.

“Aye, well,” he murmured into my hair, “war’s war, no?”

“I’m very bad at dates,” I said to the star-thick sky sometime later. “Has Miguel de Cervantes been born yet?”

Jamie was lying – perforce – on his stomach next to me, head and shoulders protruding from the tent’s shelter. One eye slowly opened, and swiveled toward the eastern horizon. Finding no trace of dawn, it traveled slowly back and rested on my face, with an expression of jaundiced resignation.

“You’ve a sudden urge to discuss Spanish novels?” he said, a little hoarsely.

“Not particularly,” I said. “I just wondered whether perhaps you were familiar with the term ‘quixotic.’ ”

He heaved himself onto his elbows, scrubbed at his scalp with both hands to wake himself fully, then turned toward me, blinking but alert.

“Cervantes was born almost two hundred years ago, Sassenach, and, me having had the benefit of a thorough education, aye, I’m familiar with the gentleman. Ye wouldna be implying anything personal by that last remark, would ye?”

“Does your back hurt?”

He hunched his shoulders experimentally. “Not much. A wee bit bruised, I expect.”

“Jamie, why, for God’s sake?” I burst out.

He rested his chin on his folded forearms, the sidelong turn of his head emphasizing the slant of his eyes. The one I could see narrowed still further with his smile.

“Well, Murtagh enjoyed it. He’s owed me a hiding since I was nine and put pieces of honeycomb in his boots while he had them off to cool his feet. He couldna catch me at the time, but I learned a good many interesting new words whilst he was chasing me barefoot. He-”

I put a stop to this by punching him as hard as I could on the point of the shoulder. Surprised, he let the arm collapse under him with a sharp “Oof!” and rolled onto his side, back toward me.

I brought my knees up behind him and wrapped an arm around his waist. His back blotted out the stars, wide and smoothly muscled, still gleaming faintly with the moisture of exertion. I kissed him between the shoulder blades, then drew back and blew gently, for the pleasure of feeling his skin shiver under my fingertips and the tiny fine hairs stand up in goose bumps down the furrow of his spine.

“Why?” I said again. I rested my face against his warm, damp back. Shadowed by the darkness, the scars were invisible, but I could feel them, faint tough lines hard under my cheek.

He was quiet for a moment, his ribs rising and falling under my arm with each deep, slow breath.

“Aye, well,” he said, then fell silent again, thinking.