Page 42 of Highlander's Sinless Nymph
The Scotsman did not answer for a little while, but that did not worry her. She was becoming accustomed to his taciturn ways, his thoughtful silences. She had been touched by the way that her story on the previous evening had clearly touched him. So much so that he had told her how sorry he was that she had suffered so.
“It was nay bother, Sassenach,” Edward said abruptly, his deep voice rumbling through his chest and back. “I was happy to hear ye speak of yerself.”
“I was worried that maybe it was a little presumptuous of me to think that you would want to hear about my problems,” Charlotte replied.
“Problems do nae have to define us,” the Highlander said. “Sometimes, voicin’ our feelin’s and thoughts is the best way to realize what we have to do if we are to change our own lives.”
“And who do you voice your problems to?” Charlotte asked, leaning forward so that her chin was almost resting on the Scottish man’s muscular shoulder.
“I used to tell me––” Edward began to reply, but then stopped himself. “Well, it does nae matter who we voice ‘em to. Ye can speak ‘em to the hills if ye like. It’s the speakin’ ‘em aloud that is the trick. Fer in doin’ that ye make them real, and once they’re real ye can fight them, mold them,fixthem, ye ken?”
Charlotte gazed thoughtfully out at the passing countryside. They were following a track––made by wild pigs, or so Edward told her––that snaked across the face of a broad hill. Out in the distance, she could just make out a loch sitting like a puddle of quicksilver surrounded by smears of yellow that she took to be great swathes of flowering spiny gorse, which was so prevalent in this part of the world.
Now that she seemed to have broken down Edward’s reticent demeanor to a degree, she was tempted to start probing him a little on his background. A plethora of questions were collecting inside of her head: Where did he grow up? What was his family like? Was she going to be introduced to his mother and father? How did he actually make a living out in this wild country?
I wonder if he has a wife.
Bizarrely, the notion had not even occurred to her before. However, now she came to consider it, she could not imagine that a man such as Edward could not be married––or, at the very least, betrothed to someone.
In a land and world that is probably a lot harsher––in some respects––than my own, he would strike me as a fine prospective husband...
She found that the thought dampened her buoyant mood a little.
They followed the animal track down from the face of the hill and out onto an open plain that rolled away from them like a great green sea. Wind whipped the grass like it might the waves. High above a buzzard hung, keeping a yellow eye out for rabbits and unsuspecting field mice.
Charlotte was about to ask Edward whether he had someone special waiting for him at home, but before she could do so the Highlander half-turned in the saddle so that he could speak to her.
“Hang on tight now, Sassenach,” he said. “We’re goin’ to ride hard fer a space now, while the ground is firm and level. Keep yer head tucked down behind me. We would nae want ye to get a mouthful o’ midges now, would we?”
“A mouthful of wha––” Charlotte tried to say, but her words turned into a small shriek as Edward pressed his heels to Cogar’s flanks and the mare took off in a manner that suggested she had been spoiling for a race for days. She held on to Edward like grim death and closed her eyes, whilst, under her, the steed’s hooves beat a thunderous tattoo against the rich Scottish turf.
As she tried to get used to the rise and fall of the powerful animal’s heaving galloping, Charlotte sent up fervent prayers that she and Edward should be spared from being caught by her father’s three most feared trackers. It was a prayer that she repeated over and over again in her head, willing God to hear her.
To her surprise, another eager hope occasionally rode piggyback to these prayers. It was one that she could not stop despite how inappropriate it might be, nor how little might come of it being granted.
Please, please, please do not let him be promised to another.
14
Charlotte noticed Edward sagging in the saddle about three hours after they had started really riding in earnest. When she asked him whether he was all right, the Highlander shrugged her questions away.
“Do nae worry about me, Sassenach,” he said, as they spent a little time walking the horse so that Cogar could have a bit of a rest. “I’m just tired is all. I’ve got a wee headache, but there is nothin’ we can do about that right now.”
He passed her the water skin and ran a hand through his sweaty locks. He had stripped off his own cloak and was now riding in just his shirt, but Charlotte could see that he was still extremely hot.
“Are you sure that we should not stop, just for a moment or two?” she asked.
“Nay,” the Highlander snapped at her. “We cannae spare the time, Sassenach. We are nae far from me peoples’ lands––maybe a full day’s ride and a half––but that will count fer nothin’ if those three men huntin’ us catch us.”
They marched on at Cogar’s side for a while. Charlotte kept one eye on Edward, but did not speak.
After a little while, they came to a small stream that trickled down out of the hills and was lost somewhere in the marshy lowlands to the east of them. Edward stopped them there so that the horse could get a good drink. He too dropped heavily to his knees and splashed his arms in the ice-cold water. Charlotte did the same, washing the dirt from her hands and the sweat from her face.
After Edward had bathed the back of his neck with handfuls of water and splashed his face, he turned to Charlotte. He looked weary and, Charlotte thought, not entirely well.
“They shall drag ye––kickin’ and screamin’ if ye make them––back to yer faither, Charlotte,” he said quietly, water dripping from his chin in silver drops. “And, they will make ye watch as they do things to me that will haunt yer dreams fer the rest of yer days.”
He looked at her steadily. Charlotte saw nothing but truth in his brown eyes. He was not trying to scare her––not that she wasn’t scared––but nor did he want to lie to her. He must have seen the realization of this dawn in her eyes because he nodded.
