“Your—you mean Jem? You’re taking him as well?” Confusion showed briefly through the deadness in Bobby’s eyes, and he looked over Jamie’s shoulder at Roger Mac. “He is?”

“Aye.” Roger’s Mac’s voice broke on the word, but he said it, bless him. Inspiration blossomed in Jamie’s mind, and with an inward prayer, he rolled his dice.

“Roger Mac will come as well,” he said, hoping he sounded completely sure of it. “He’ll mind both lads and see them safe.” He could feel Roger Mac’s eyes burning a hole in the back of his head, but he was sure it was the right thing. Blessed Michael, guide my tongue …

“My nephew Ian and Gillebride MacMillan will be with me, with dogs. The three of us—and three dogs—will have the upper hand of a bear, no matter how fierce. Roger Mac and the lads will be there only to bear witness for your wife. At a safe distance,” he added.

Bobby sat up, pulling his hands free, and looked to and fro, agitated.

“But—but I should go with you, then. Shouldn’t I?”

Roger, recognizing his cue, cleared his throat.

“Your wee lads need ye, Bobby,” he said gently. “Ye’ve got to mind them, aye? Ye’re all they’ve got left.”

Jamie felt those words strike suddenly and without warning, deep in his own wame. Felt again a bundle of cloth clutched hard against his breast, feeling the tiny pushings of the hours-old babe inside, himself shaking with terror at what he’d just done to save the boy—his son.

That’s what he’d thought. The only thought that came through the haze of fear and shock: His mother’s dead. I’m all he has.

And he saw it happen for Bobby, as it had for him. Saw the life fight its way back into his eyes, the bones of his body, melted with grief, begin to stiffen and form again. Bobby nodded, lips pressed tight together. Tears still ran down his face, but he rose from the settle, slow as an auld man but moving.

“Where are they?” he asked hoarsely. “Orrie and Rob?”

“With my daughter,” Jamie said. “At the house.” He lifted a brow at Roger Mac, who gave him an old-fashioned look but nodded.

“I’ll go up with ye, Bobby,” Roger Mac said, and to Jamie, “I’ll catch ye up. You and the lads.”

THE WOMEN WERE coming. I could hear their voices, faint in the distance, coming up from the creek. That would be Gillebride’s wife, with her eldest daughter, Kirsty, and Peggy Chisholm, who lived nearby, with her two eldest, Mairi and Agnes, and Peggy’s ancient mother-in-law, Auld Mam, who was Not Right in the Head and therefore couldn’t be left alone. Then there were nearer female voices and steps in the hall, and Fanny came in, solemn-faced, with Rachel and Jenny. She glanced at the quilt-hung doorway and then averted her eyes.