Archive of Our Own

Three months.

If Frank is correct, yesterday marked three months since their co-bhanntach’d, since Frank had begun to learn the true meaning of the archaic Scottish practice eradicated by the British so long ago, but not yet. His and Jamie’s hands, rough and smooth, thick and thin, bound together by a length of cord, overlaying Frank’s wedding band. An alliance forged for mutual benefit.

Seven weeks, then, since that night when his and Jamie’s mouths met, when Jamie begged and cajoled him to share his limited knowledge of how men do with men — in Frank’s experience, it would be more accurate to say how boys do with boys. Since they had handled each other like bone china, legs intertwined, Jamie’s fingers finding a home within Frank’s body. He’d looked at his wedding ring that night, resting dull against Jamie’s shoulder. He and Claire were under no illusions that they were each other’s first — it seems that neither were they to be each other’s last.

Six months since Craigh na Dun.

Jamie smiles at him from his horse. Frank responds in kind.

They’ve been riding for days now, heading for the deserter, Horrocks, who may clear Jamie’s name. The dragonfly in amber, the bonding gift at which Frank’s delight had so pleased Jamie and the fascinating Hugh, sits safely in his saddle bag. The party slows to a halt, and Jamie dismounts.

“Why are we stopping?” Frank asks, joining him.

“You’ll have to stay here with Young Willie.”

“Does he require a babysitter?”

“Don’t know if you’re aware, Frankie,” Murtagh calls, “but you’ve got a resemblance to a certain Captain of Dragoons.”

A few of the men laugh. Frank understands.

“And Horrocks, if not the villagers, would know of him,” he finishes for Jamie.

Jamie nods. He steps close enough that only Frank can hear him now.

“It’ll be dark before long. I need you to stay here, Frank, stay put, and wait.”

Frank nods.

“Promise me.”

Frank levels a mockingly serious look at Jamie.

“I, Francis— Beauchamp, do promise you, James Fraser.”

If Jamie notices Frank’s near-slip, he doesn’t react. He merely lays his hand against Frank’s cheek in a decidedly masculine gesture halfway between a caress and a slap. Frank returns the favor.

“Go on,” he smiles at Jamie. “Find the bastard.”

No sooner does Jamie flash him a grin than the group has disappeared into the trees.

“Well,” Willie sighs, “looks like it’s just you and me, sir.”

“A thrilling prospect,” Frank responds flatly.

They pass about a half hour in silence, Willie darning a pair of socks and Frank busying himself with the horses. He gives their manes and tails thorough brushings, and they each reward him by nuzzling at his ear. He recoils from the sensation but can recognize the gesture’s intention.

“Sir,” Willie calls out. “I’m going off a ways to do a jobbie.”

“ I need to tend to some personal business for a moment, Frank , would have been sufficient,” he responds.

Willie laughs and heads off. Almost immediately after he is beyond Frank’s sightline, the woods go quiet. Not a birdsong, barely a rustle of leaves. Even the horses stiffen. Frank places his hand on the hilt of his knife and turns in a slow circle.

Five wolves pad silently through the underbrush a dozen or so meters away, completely uninterested in Frank and the horses.

He gapes.

The last wolf in Scotland was killed in the seventeenth century, in Killiecrankie. There were stories, fairy tales, of wolves seen up till the end of the nineteenth century, but—

Here they are.

Very slowly, very carefully, Frank stalks after them. He maintains his initial distance, walking parallel to the pack and taking great care to avoid any sticks or branches that might crack incriminatingly beneath his feet and draw their ire. They’re bigger than he ever could have imagined having seen them within distant zoo enclosures, the largest of the group easily of a height with him and nearly as broad as Jamie.

So clearly the forebears of the hounds at Castle Leoch and yet so spectacularly different. There is a cold intelligence about them, and he understands abruptly the Romans’ conviction that their republic had sprung from a wolf. He has seen such intelligence in the eyes of men and women. He had long abandoned the supremely Catholic idea of sin, but he knows right now that this is exactly what the eradication of these creatures was. Would that Claire were here now to see, would that he had a camera—

He sees her delighted face, the keen interest sparkling in her eyes. Can hear the lighthearted but acid jealousy she would express if she knew what she was missing.

If she knew all that she was missing.

The underbrush rushes up to greet Frank and he hits the ground hard, as though pulled down by an unseen hand. He stays flat, unmoving, for what feels like several long minutes. Birdsong begins again. A squirrel chatters. A mouse scurries through the leaves about a meter ahead of him. Frank pulls himself to his knees, wiping the dirt and detritus from his front. His foot had been caught in a wayward tree root — a birch, if he’s not mistaken. Careless. He had kissed Claire beneath one, once.

His first real chance to escape in months, and he’d used it to traipse after wolves.

A gun cocks. Frank spins clumsily on his knees in the direction of the sound, reaching for his knife.

From two dozen meters away, parallel to Frank’s own path, a group of English soldiers advances on him.

“Well, boys we were hunting one kind of beast, but found another.” The apparent leader addresses the group, nodding in the direction the wolves had disappeared but keeping his eyes on Frank. “This one doesn’t look quite like a Scot, though, does he?”

He’d mirrored them from the other side of the wolves the entire time and never realized.

Frank rises to his feet, brandishing the knife in the way that Angus taught him.

“None of that now. Set your little knife on the ground.”

There are a dozen of them, all with guns drawn and pointed at Frank, growing closer with each step. Even accounting only for dumb luck, his odds in a fight are not promising.

Frank drops the knife.

“Good man.”

He is bound and led on a forced march out of the woods and to the road where the soldiers’ horses wait, then thrown into a wagon evidently maintained for the express purpose of transporting plunder or prisoners. He doesn’t need to ask where they are taking him. He knows very well he’s on his way to Fort William, to the custody of Captain Jonathan Randall.

Within two hours, probably less, he is deposited with a guard in the garrison commander’s office — Captain Randall’s orders , the soldiers had clucked to each other. He and, judging by his uniform, the corporal stationed as his keeper eye each other uneasily from across the room.

Randall enters. His eyes alight on Frank.

“Mr. Beauchamp,” he smiles, “an honor to make your acquaintance again.” His gaze shifts to Frank’s hands, bound behind his back. “Oh, but that won’t do. Corporal, release Mr. Beauchamp from his bindings.”

The boy obeys, and Frank is quickly freed. He makes a concerted effort not to rub his wrists, staring steadily at Randall.

“Leave us.”

The boy is gone, and with a wave of his arm, Randall invites Frank to sit. He perches on a chair at the table in the center of the room.

“Do make yourself comfortable, sir,” Randall chides, an indulgently scolding edge to his voice. He lifts a decanter. “Brandy?”

Frank looks at him. Randall takes up two glasses and crosses to the table, where he sets them in front of Frank.

“Felicitations and congratulations on your recent marriage, Mr. Beauchamp.” Randall smirks, reaching around Frank’s shoulder to pour a few fingers into each glass. “Pardon me. Partnership . Though I don’t particularly care whether you consider yourself an Englishman or a Scot, and apparently, neither do you.” He inclines his head toward Frank’s hand. “Still wearing your old wedding ring?”

“You know as well as I, Captain, that a co-bhanntach’d does not constitute a marriage.”

His first words in hours, and he’s telling them to himself as much as Randall. The man hums and shrugs.

“Be that as it may, the more interesting question is why would Dougal MacKenzie consider you of such value that he would rather adopt you as one of his own than allow me to question you?”

At Frank’s silence, Randall’s bright eyes rove up and down his form. He lifts his glass.

“The King.”

Frank responds in kind, and Randall inclines his glass slightly. After a beat, Frank allows the rims to touch with a tinkling little sound. Randall smiles at him and takes a draught.

“I’m glad to hear that you still consider him your sovereign.”

Frank sets his glass down without drinking.

“We MacKenzies are all loyal subjects,” he deadpans.

Randall laughs, loud and real. Frank raises his eyebrows.

“That,” Randall continues, smiling now, “is the single most amusing thing I’ve heard all week.”

There is an inexplicable spark of feeling in Frank’s chest that he cannot quite identify. His father smiled rarely and laughed less. Randall claps a hand atop his shoulder and shakes him very slightly, expression grave again.

“Good sir,” he says with an air of earnestness, “you need to understand your position. In this hour, our third encounter…” He shifts his grip to the back of Frank’s neck. He can’t control a shiver. “I fully intend by any means necessary to discover your true nature and the secrets that you hold.”

Frank turns to look at Randall as he takes another sip from his glass, keeping his eyes on Frank over the rim. He has an incredible advantage, but that doesn’t mean what he’s about to say is without risk.

“Perhaps you should ask the Duke of Sandringham.”

Randall chokes abruptly enough that he spills brandy on his cravat. So Frank’s theory was correct — what a thrill! Randall snaps to his feet and stalks across the room, yanking at the cloth around his neck. His voice is a rumble.

“What do you know of the Duke?”

Frank thinks of the stained glass windows and prayer cards of his youth, of St. Angela and St. Sarah, and attempts to recreate their beatific smiles. He joins Randall at the pitcher and basin, standing before him and laying his own hands over his to stop their clumsy ministrations. Once Randall’s grasping stills, he begins the process of untying the man’s cravat.

“Must I lay it out for you, Captain?”

He unwinds the fabric, concealing and revealing Randall’s glare in quick succession.

“That is impossible,” he spits, breath hitting Frank in the face. “He would have told me.”

Frank lifts the cravat from around Randall’s neck, Randall keeping his gaze steadily affixed to Frank and bowing his head helpfully. Frank furrows his brow in the way some people do out of pity.

“Because he tells you all his secrets?”

He wets the cloth resting next to the basin and dabs at the stain, which quickly fades to a mere wet spot. Randall falters.

“I will simply send a message to Sandringham asking him.”

“Excellent idea.” Frank moves back to Randall and loops the length of fabric over his head. “Surely, the Duke will not be displeased — it would be a waste of time to consider what he might do if so offended.” He and Randall are nose to nose as he winds the cravat tightly around the man’s neck. His dark gaze is poisonous. “Whether he will withdraw the protection to which you’ve become accustomed, leaving you at the mercy of your superiors. He is a reasonable man. He would never believe you might disrupt his efforts on behalf of the king.”

He ties a knot in the cravat now, neat and secure, in the way his mother did for his father each morning and Claire used to do for him. Randall casts a not dissatisfied glance at Frank’s handiwork, sparking that feeling again in his chest.

“You mean, of course,” Randall says mildly, raising his eyebrows, “his wife’s efforts.”

Frank smiles.

“Beneath you, Captain Randall.” He pats him on the cheek like one professor used to do to him. “You and I both know very well that the Duke has never taken a wife.”

Randall averts his eyes in a way that almost belies embarrassment. At length, he spreads his hands to his sides helplessly.

“You are, of course, correct,” he grins sheepishly, looking at Frank directly now. “Forgive me, sir, one can’t be too careful.” 

“I understand completely, Captain,” Frank smiles, inclining his head in a conciliatory bow. He can hardly keep still. He’s nearly done it. “And I trust that you understand now the vital nature of my return to Clan MacKenzie.”

“Of course. I shall escort you out presently.” He crosses to his desk. “I assume our benefactor is well aware of your partnership ?”

“Oh, yes.”

“I have found delivery of letters to be somewhat sluggish of late, particularly to and from the Duke,” he says, opening a drawer. “When did the Duke confirm his knowledge of this latest maneuver, the partnership?”

Frank takes up his glass and sips from it in the interest of buying time. If all he’s seen of Randall thus far is any indication, he is not one for idle chit chat, especially not with Frank. Then again, this is a man who has subverted every one of Frank’s assumptions and expectations in spectacular fashion. Still, he can’t make it seem as though he speaks to his benefactor too often, what with being undercover. It also wouldn’t do to tell him it’s been any great length of time since he heard from him — he may well take this to be a signal of revoked sponsorship and find an excuse to keep Frank at the garrison until receiving confirmation. He may find it beneath Frank’s intelligence.

“I received his most recent letter just yesterday, in fact.”

“His letters to me have been dated at least two weeks prior to delivery of late. I assume this is true of your situation as well?”

“Three.”

“Three weeks?”

Frank nods.

“Yes. We are not often in contact, but delivery to a spy in the Highlands takes rather longer than to a garrison commander at Fort William.”

“I’m sure it does. For instance, six weeks ago,” Randall nods, retrieving something now from the drawer, “the Crown declared your charming Scottish partnership custom invalid in the view of the Empire. A development the Duke and I discussed… four weeks ago.”

Randall holds a length of rope in his hands and looks at Frank with benignly raised eyebrows.

Frank throws the near-full glass at Randall’s face. Rather than see if it hits its target, he runs to the door and wrenches it open. A guard stands directly outside. Frank has just recognized that it is the young corporal from before when he’s grabbed by the collar of his shirt and thrown backward.

He sprawls, protecting his head from impacting against the stone floor only by dumb luck, and is immediately hauled back to his feet. Randall’s chin is bleeding, and the front of his uniform is soaked with alcohol, the smell strong in Frank’s nose. Randall throws him again, this time against the table. Its edge collides with Frank’s middle, bending him double and knocking the wind out of him. Thus incapacitated, Randall wrenches his arms to the small of his back and binds them quickly.

He eyes the corporal, now standing within the room and gaping like a fish at the scene playing out before him. Randall tightens his bindings and pulls him up with a hand fisted in the back of his shirt. Frank tests them — he can barely move his wrists. Randall pats his handiwork almost fondly.

“You can go, Hawkins,” he orders, addressing the boy. “And Corporal — don’t come back, no matter what you hear.” The boy, Hawkins, hesitates, locking eyes with Frank for just a moment. “Go.”

Hawkins snaps to with a perfunctory sir , and he is gone.

Randall shoves Frank toward the wall, and Frank barely has time to turn so his back is against it before Randall is upon him.

“I think we should begin with your name, hm?” Randall grips the collar of Frank’s shirt and rips. “Your real name.”

Frank’s chest is bare. The room is cold.

“You know my real name.”

Randall strikes him with the back of his hand, and Frank feels his lip split. Before he can recover himself, Randall is speaking again.

“Then, you can tell me everything that you know about Dougal MacKenzie.” Another slap to Frank’s face. “His brother Colum.” Another backhand. “The Jacobite Rebellion. And finally,” — he grips Frank’s throat and holds his spinning head upright — “the Duke of Sandringham.”

Frank hears Reverend Wakefield’s astonished voice, sees Claire’s dancing eyes, and he laughs. Randall slams his head against the stone wall, just hard enough to stun him, and says something that Frank can’t hear over the ringing in his ears. He looks hazy, like a smudged watercolor or an old photograph; not a daguerreotype, too blurry, but perhaps a tintype? Colored by hand. Liquid silver. A mirror being made. 

Randall reaches forward and touches Frank’s chest with surpassing gentleness and soft fingertips. He takes hold of his pectoral, runs his thumb over it. Frank’s smiling now — he can see it in his reflection.

Randall grips Frank’s nipple, hard, and yanks. Frank yelps and can do nothing but follow as he is led to the man’s desk. Papers and books scattered across the whole of it, a desktop of the same variety as his at the university. Randall sweeps it all to the floor with one thrust of his arm — more like his father’s old desk, now — and deposits Frank in the empty space. The wood is chill against his bare skin.

Randall grips Frank’s hair and lifts his head to stare at him intently for several silent seconds. Frank’s breath is coming in shallow bursts, but he is determined to keep looking Randall in the eye — brown, like his. This seems to please him.

He murmurs something. Belatedly, Frank realizes it’s you’re filthy, Alex.

A chart of names appears in Frank’s mind. Alexander is the farthest to the right, next to Jonathan. Nothing follows.

Randall licks his thumb and brings it to Frank’s split lip, wiping the blood firmly across his face and down the crease in his cheek. Then, he kisses him.

Kissing was always somewhat gauche in the Randall family, only for children and, on occasions of great emotion, women. Randall’s tongue is inside his mouth. He makes a small sound. His penis makes itself known.

Randall pulls away. Looks at him almost tenderly, lips red with his own blood. Then he lifts his kilt.

Frank gags and manages to stand for long enough to vomit a bit onto the stone floor before Randall slams him down again.

“And you were doing,” he growls, laying a hard slap to Frank’s backside, “so well.”

Frank shakes his head. Randall’s clothed penis is erect, pressing to Frank’s most private parts, and his hand is groping Frank’s backside. He shakes his head again.

There is a shuttered window to their left. Frank traces the engraved patterns with his eyes, imagines the feel beneath his fingers. Such craftsmanship, such beauty, even here.

The shutters burst open. Randall steps back from him. A gun is pointed in his direction. And Jamie is behind it. Frank lifts his head, squeezes his eyes open and shut several times quickly. Jamie remains in the window.

“I’ll thank you,” he growls, “to take your hands off my com-pàirtiche.”

Frank shakes his head, tries in vain to make eye contact with Jamie, to signal in some way that he should go back the way he came.

“Good god…” Randall laughs with genuine delight. He presses his grip between Frank’s shoulder blades. “Dougal MacKenzie neglected to mention that you bedded down with the stripe-backed thief. How’s my handiwork looking these days?

Jamie’s face is stone.

“Very well. Despite your effort.”

“I don’t suppose you’d…” Randall’s hand slides to Frank’s backside and cups him there. Frank closes his eyes. “Show me?”

“It’d be the last thing you ever saw.”

“Well, only risk brings the possibility of reward—”

Frank’s voice rips through his throat as though breaking down a wall.

“ Run , Jamie, shoot him —!”

Randall hauls him up by his neck, cutting him off with a strangled sound. He places Frank between Jamie and himself as a human shield, pressing the cold knife to Frank’s jugular.

“Do,” he husks, voice a rumble against Frank’s ear. “Shoot me. Shoot us both.”

Dam thus broken, Frank interrupts again with no thought.

“Same bloody difference—”

Randall’s blood-streaked hand lands hard over Frank’s mouth.

“Shoot us, and alarm the entire fort to your presence.”

Frank tries to shout, to shake his head at Jamie. Corporal, don’t come back, no matter what you hear. The knife presses harder against his flesh.

Jamie’s jaw clenches, and he lowers the pistol. Frank screams at him from behind Randall’s hand. Shoot us! Shoot us and run!

Randall uses the knife to nick Frank’s jaw, pulling a yelp from him.

“It appears we’re to have an audience.” His tongue runs along the length of Frank’s neck, lapping the blood from his wound. Frank spasms, shuts his eyes again. “I think we should endeavor to enjoy ourselves. I certainly shall.” With his grip still tight against Frank’s face, he yanks his head forward to gesture at the desk. “Now, lay that pistol on the table, and let us commence with the evening’s entertainments.”

Frank forces himself to look at Jamie. He’s hesitating. Their eyes meet, and Frank gives his head the slightest shake.

“Do it.” He emphasizes his hold on the knife and on Frank again. “Slowly. I will slit his throat, I swear to god.”

Would that he do. Jamie obeys him. Frank can feel Randall grin against his neck.

“That wasn’t too hard.” He uses Frank’s head to point again. “Back you go.” Jamie doesn’t move. Randall’s shout is deafening against Frank’s ear. “ Do it! ”

Jamie steps back. He glares at Randall, clenches his fists. Randall removes his hand from Frank’s mouth to caress the lines on his cheeks.

“Run, Jamie.” Frank is begging now. He hopes his gaze conveys how serious he is. “Run. Just go. Go —”

“Let’s all keep calm here.” Randall shushes him in a pantomime of comfort. “You know,” he addresses Jamie now, “I would have assumed that you fuck him. But now, seeing how he orders you about…” He reaches down and grasps Frank’s genitals through his kilt. “Might, perhaps, you be the wife?”

Jamie’s face is red.

“Damn you,” Frank spits.

“For the life of me,” Randall says, ignoring Frank utterly while frogmarching him back to the desk, “I cannot understand why you have chosen this —” He shakes Frank derisively and snatches the pistol, then addresses him in the same tone as one might ask a dog if it would like a treat. “Would you like your partner to join us, maybe?”

“Jamie,” Frank tries one last time, boring into the blue of Jamie’s eyes, “please go.”

“What do you say, Fraser? Hm?” His smile is audible, and he raises the gun. “Or would you prefer to watch?”

Frank makes himself a dead weight at the same moment Randall pulls the trigger. They hit the ground together, the pistol clicks and sparks uselessly, and Jamie surges forward. Frank hears a dull noise of impact. Randall is no longer at his back. He stares dumbfounded at Jamie.

“The pistol,” he pants, “was empty ?”

“Ned said not to kill anyone,” Jamie responds far too casually as he takes the knife and slices through the rope binding Frank’s wrists. “So I had all the weapons unloaded.”

Anger swells up in Frank’s chest.

“How dare you,” he hisses, standing and turning on Jamie. “How dare you risk yourself just to—!”

Jamie makes a wheesht sound and points a finger in his face, expression clenched tightly.

“ Don’t ,” he says finally.

Frank scowls back.

Jamie removes his cloak and wraps it around Frank’s shoulders.

“This way,” he says and herds Frank toward a door at the back of the room. 

They are crossing the threshold when Frank stops quickly enough that Jamie collides with his back.

“Wait!” he exclaims, pushing past Jamie back into the room.

“Frank, I swear to—”

He falls to his hands and knees and begins rifling through the papers that were thrown to the floor. Pointedly avoiding his own vomit, he turns to Jamie and points at Randall’s motionless body a meter away.

“Undress him.”

Jamie rips his eyes from the evidence of Frank’s nausea to hit him with an incredulous look.

“ What? ”

“Take his clothes off!”

Realization evidently dawns for Jamie about halfway through Frank’s second command, and he drops and begins quickly divesting Randall of his uniform. Frank returns to his own work.

Maps overlaid with writing and symbols. Letters from military personnel, from the Duke of Sandringham. Rosters. Notes. Plans. He stumbles to the desk and wrenches the drawers open, grabbing a slim ledger and turning just as Jamie rises to his feet, holding the dragoon uniform in his outstretched hands. Frank trades with him for the papers.

A kilt is extremely easy to get out of. An eighteenth century British cavalry uniform is not easy to get into. As Frank fumbles with the various fastenings, Jamie steps in and helps, finishing by tying the cravat snugly around Frank’s neck. Frank retakes the papers and ledger and tucks them neatly within the uniform coat. Jamie retrieves his kilt.

“I’m not actually going to tie you,” he murmurs, “but you’ll need to have your hands behind your back with the bindings around your wrists if we’re to fool anyone.”

Jamie doesn’t respond, only picks up a few of the tatters of rope and positions his hands behind his back, still holding the length of tartan balled between his fists. Randall still lies unconscious on the floor. They make their exit through the back.

Even upon disembarking from the hidden stairwell, they proceed through several corridors without encountering a soul. Frank almost dares to think they might make it out of the garrison unseen when they fairly run into three men — more corporals. The three snap to attention instantly at the sight of them, poised at the ready to draw their pistols at the first sign of trouble. They eye Frank’s cropped hair with obvious confusion.

Frank conjures Randall in his mind, the curl of his lip, the half lowered eyelids and contemptuous swagger, and speaks.

“At ease, men. This one oughtn’t give us any more trouble,” he barks, shaking Jamie slightly and smirking. “As you were.”

The men nod uneasily and salute. Frank and Jamie continue on their way, Jamie subtly leading Frank in the direction of his entry point. Upon exiting the corridor, they quicken their pace. The handful of other garrison inhabitants they encounter on their journey merely step out of the way with lowered eyes or perfunctory salutes at the sight of Black Jack Randall, short hair or no, and the hulking Scotsman in his custody. Upon reaching the kitchen entrance where Jamie must have infiltrated, they pass several incapacitated officers, doubtless the clan’s handiwork. Those of them who are conscious cast Frank looks of astonishment. With no warning, Jamie removes his hands from behind his back and holds them in front of him.

“ Stad , stad, it’s Frank! It’s Frank!”

Frank raises his hands as well, turns his head to display his hair.

“Get tae fuck,” Murtagh exclaims.

“Jesus Christ on a cross,” Ned rasps.

This shock lasts only a few instants before instinct takes over and the group activates, exiting the garrison to find their horses waiting outside.

“Wait,” Frank hisses, “the garrison’s horses. Could they be useful?”

“We’ve enough,” Jamie responds, hoisting Frank to sit in front of him on his own mount.

“Lord knows the last thing we need’s some wayward English eich ,” Rupert grumbles.

Jamie seizes the reins, arms around Frank’s middle, and they’re off. They ride wordlessly through the sparse remnants of the night, through blue hour, until the sun peeks above the horizon. Despite the jostling of the horse, the chilly silence, the outstanding discomfort of the uniform, Frank allows himself to take comfort in Jamie’s strong arms around him, Jamie’s firm chest at his back — a welcome change from the contact he’d been subject to at Fort William. He barely registers when the men call out, saying they should water the horses and debating where the nearest source would be. When they finally stop, it’s beside a small river.

Frank dismounts, somewhat uneasily, before Jamie, and extends a hand to help him down. Jamie hops to the ground without taking it.

“Give him a drink of water, will you?” Jamie addresses no one in particular while giving his horse a quick pat. Then, he turns to Frank and inclines his head forward. Frank follows him away from the group.

Frank speaks as soon as they stop walking.

“I’m sorry, Jamie.”

Jamie nods but doesn’t look at him. He holds the kilt out in Frank’s direction.

“Change out of that thing.”

Even if the uniform had nothing but positive memories attached to it, Frank would have jumped to comply — it’s wretchedly uncomfortable, the starched fabric rubbing unbearably against his skin no matter how he moves. After a few moments of Frank’s efforts, Jamie steps forward and unbuttons the jacket himself, taking it, the papers, the vest, and the trousers in turn as Frank sheds them. He makes his body a wall between Frank and the rest of the group as he goes about the surprisingly simple process of donning his kilt once again — Jamie, bless him, somehow maintained most of the pleats.

Thus dressed, Frank stands, awaiting Jamie’s judgment. Jamie tosses the uniform behind himself, out of his sight, but sets the stolen items at his feet. He looks at Frank now and sighs.

“I’m sorry,” Frank says again.

Jamie reaches a hand out to his face but stops short, resting it lightly on his arm instead.

“What did he do to you?”

“Only what you’ve seen.” He gestures lamely at his battered face. “I’m alright. Thanks to you.”

Jamie gives his bicep a squeeze and tightens his lips in something like a smile.

“I’m sorry. There’s no excuse, Jamie. I put you all in danger, and now I’ve kept us there,” Frank continues, thinking of the soldiers undoubtedly hunting for them as they speak. “You oughtn’t have risked the group or yourself for me.”

Jamie shakes his head.

“I’d have gone for you with less than an empty pistol and my bare hands, Frank, so let’s have none of that.” He rubs his hands firmly up and down Frank’s arms. “You’re forgiven.” He scoffs a laugh. “It’ll take the others a wee bit longer, but they’ll forgive you too. Granted, a wee bit quicker than they would’ve without these.” He grins and nods to the papers and the uniform.

Frank laughs now, feels the tension of the last half-day ease away from him. He takes Jamie’s arms so they’re locked together, a stance almost ritualistic. When they kiss, it comes naturally.

“ Could we use the garrison’s horses? ” Jamie mimics him, resting his head against his shoulder. “Christ, Frank, and I’m the one branded a thief.”

Frank laughs again, squeezes Jamie tighter.

“We’re both good Catholics, so I don’t need to tell you the Seventh Commandment comes with stipulations.”

“Such as?”

“ Thou shalt not steal, except from His Majesty’s Eighth Dragoons. ”

It’s Jamie who laughs now, full and real and shared with Frank. His Majesty, The Crown and all of its numerous decrees and determinations and invalidations, crosses Frank’s mind. He presses his cheek against Jamie’s to feel his smile.

Jamie reveals their prize, Randall’s papers, upon their return to the group, which goes a long way to thawing some of the ice directed at Frank. Dougal and Ned even nod at him after Jamie shares the news. It also makes things easier on the return that evening to Castle Leoch — he receives no browbeating from Colum. Nonetheless, following dinner, Frank stands from his seat and does his best to project his voice.

“I endangered the clan today through my own carelessness. I apologize to everyone here and hope that I may be of such use that someday I may find myself returned to your good graces.”

He excuses himself after this declaration and heads to his and Jamie’s room. He’s just finished cleaning himself by the basin and pitcher when Jamie joins him. As Jamie removes his coat, Frank slips his sleeping shirt over his head in the comfortable silence before retrieving their most recent read — Robinson Crusoe , a title Frank hadn’t opened since childhood but that Jamie was heartily enjoying. He had thrilled like a little boy when Frank told him the title character was based on a Scotsman. He slides beneath the covers to his side of the bed and watches Jamie, who starts to undress but stops after removing his belt, instead standing strangely beside the bed. Frank raises his eyebrows.

“Jamie, come to bed,” he smiles. “We’ll read a bit.”

Instead of grinning and saying that it’s not stories he wants from Frank this evening, Jamie shakes his head.

“We have a matter still to settle between us before we sleep tonight.”

All at once, Frank realizes why Jamie is holding his belt. What is about to happen.

Anxiety runs through his body, from his chest to his fingertips and back again.

He should have known all along, of course — how many times has he read about the culture of the clans? Of the maintenance of discipline within the groups of freedom fighters? Within a marriage?

But this is not man-to-man. Nor is it man-to-wife.

“Oh. I—” he says stupidly. “I had hoped you wouldn’t.”

“If you were just a wee bit less clever,” Jamie responds easily, inclining his head to the door in oblique reference to Frank’s most recent treason against King and Country, “I’d flog you before all and sundry myself.”

“I know,” Frank says quickly, squeezing his eyes shut in frustration. “I know, Jamie, and,” he jerks his head emphatically to the length of leather clasped in Jamie’s hand, “it’s not half what I deserve. I know. I don’t fault you or any of the others for it. But is there no difference between discipline of a clansman and a— a com-pàirtiche?”

Despite it all, he finds he is genuinely curious. Perhaps he can write a thesis after Jamie’s duty is all said and done, catalog each blow’s cultural significance — Familial Discipline of the Eighteenth Century Scottish Highlands With a Focus on the ‘Co-Bhanntach’d’: A Case Study of James Fraser . Claire would say that the title needs work. He cannot bring his face to twist.

Jamie sighs and looks at him not unkindly.

“The difference is that we are here.” He casts his glance to their bed. “And that this is all. Were we not com-pàirtichean, I can think of some of the others who would call for your ears to be cropped. For you to be killed.”

“Oh, well, in that case,” Frank scoffs, “I thank you.”

He regrets it even as he says it.

“Do you think,” Jamie hisses, planting his fists on the mattress, “that this is funny?” He pays no heed to Frank’s responses in the negative. His muscles are visibly tight, his jaw clenching, his brogue so thick that Frank strains at times to understand him. “You disobeyed my order, a direct order, you put everyone in danger, you’ve kept everyone in danger, and for what? To wander off like a wean? To get fucked by your twin?”

Frank doesn’t need to bite his tongue — he couldn’t respond if he tried.

“Aye,” Jamie nods, wild-eyed and venomous, “don’t think you pulled that over on me. ‘It’s a coincidence. The resemblance really isn’t that strong. Were we next to each other, you’d see we don’t look much alike at all.’ How many times? How many times did you tell me? So imagine my surprise,” he spits, “when I see my com-pàirtiche face down with his kit up about to be buggered by his exact double?”

Frank shakes his head tightly, but he might as well be comatose for all the reaction it pulls from Jamie. He’s cooled now after his tirade and shakes his head, paces the floorboards.

“A man cannae but wonder what it means, Frank. And do you ken what I wonder?” Frank doesn’t bother to react. It makes no difference. “I wonder if the outlander hasn’t really been a spy this whole time.”

Frank slides out of bed and stands before Jamie. The grain of the wood floor is rough and cold against the bottoms of his feet. Faintly, he can hear Jamie breathing through his nose, heavy but measured.

“How shall I take it?”

A beat, then Jamie answers.

“Lift your shirt and bend over the bed.”

He looks Jamie in the eye. Pale, clear, bright.

Jamie blinks. Frank kneels, bends over the bed, and lifts his shirt.

He can feel the still air in the room shift against his skin when Jamie moves behind him.

“Thirty,” he announces — a kindness, Frank supposes.

For the first time in his life, Frank wishes that MI6 had assigned him as a field agent. There were no physical requirements for code breakers and planners and researchers. Desk workers weren’t trained to take pain.

The first strike falls, and Frank buries his face in the bed to keep from screaming. The second in quick succession, and he can’t breathe. The third, and he is vaguely ill. The fourth, and he jerks his hips in an impotent attempt to escape the searing pain. The fifth, and he cries out.

Frank has never been truly beaten before, even as a boy — as Jamie has guessed, he does come from an easier place. Nevertheless, he is able to keep a vague sort of count within the cloud of confused agony in which he finds himself. Jamie beats him quickly, each blow ringing out like a gunshot as it builds atop the pain of the last. The world is narrowed to his own body, the strap, and the young man who wields it.

He shouts out with each blow now, smothering the childish sounds and gripping the counterpane like it holds his salvation. As he’s struck for about the twentieth time, he feels his knee bend and his foot lift to shield himself. Reflexive. Uncontrolled. A kicked dog.

Jamie grips his ankle instantly and wrenches it back toward the floor. Frank complies. He’s bitten open the gash on his lip. He can taste the blood on his tongue. How might the blood of Captain Jonathan Wolverton Randall of His Majesty’s Eighth Dragoons taste?

It’s been several seconds since the last blow fell, and Frank can feel Jamie staring. He tenses as the strap moves lightly, ticklishly, over his flesh. Even this is painful. Jamie traces it across him with great deliberation, eventually running it down the cleft of Frank’s backside.

He wonders how long it’s been since he took a breath.

His penis presses against the mattress.

The next blow forces the air from his lungs and sends him jerking against the bed. He understands distantly that his sentence is nearing its end but cannot be prevailed upon to imagine what will happen after. Jamie has done his duty well, if Frank’s own blind perception can be trusted.

Frank recognizes when they enter the domain of the thirtieth blow. And he recognizes when they have passed it.

Co-bhanntach’d, literally translated from the Scots Gaelic, is partnership. Though evidence indicates an imbalance of power was not uncommon — one member might be subordinate to the other by family, wealth, or place of origin — the name is laudable for its concise accuracy. However, a variety of additional facets were implied in this peculiar alliance. Prior to its suppression, criminalization, and eventual eradication by Britain, a com-pàirtiche (partner) was a friend, a protector, and very often a lover.

The author would like to take this opportunity to emphasize to readers that a co-bhanntach’d, despite these relational dynamics and its legally and culturally binding nature, was not a marriage.

He’s sobbing, lungs burning against the smothering he’s imposed upon himself and penis rubbing shamefully against the edge of the bed with each gasping breath.

Frank knows that the belt falls between one and two dozen times further. He has no concept of how long this takes.

Jamie fists his hand in Frank’s hair and yanks, pulling his head up and back and forcing his penis against the mattress in a new angle. Frank spasms.

“Look at me,” he spits. “Look at me.”

Frank does. Jamie’s face is ruddy, his eyes wide and startlingly blue, his lips pulled into a smile. His penis tents the front of his kilt.

“Is that enough?” His words are stilted by venom. “Is that enough?”

For the second time this day, Frank has the same thought, cutting in its clarity.

He is going to rape me.

The only sound in the room is their breathing, heavy and shallow and panting and gasping — which sounds come from whom, Frank cannot say. Sweat drips from Jamie’s brow onto Frank’s. He realizes his face was already wet.

Jamie’s smile slips from his face, he drops Frank’s head, and he is gone.

Frank lies there stupidly, bent against the straw-filled mattress. For god knows how long, he’s only a body. Eventually, he reaches one leaden arm behind himself and gingerly runs his fingers over the burning skin he finds. He brings his hand before his face. Remarkably, he is not bleeding. Claire had not bled their first night together, but Frank had with Jamie. He remembers the boy was near tears with guilt.

He needs to bar the door. When he stands to do so, his vision fogs immediately, and he only barely manages to turn himself so he falls to the bed on his front. There is an unmistakable, undeniable wet spot on the counterpane. He supposes that this all is a happy result for Jamie, perhaps even an intended effect. Another person might laugh.

The intended effect of the clans’ stringent tradition of discipline was to reinforce the culture of obedience and to restore the leaders’ dominion. Though fewer contemporary sources are available regarding spousal discipline, evidence indicates that the same basic concept applied in the domestic arena.

Obedience and dominion.

Frank has been careless in more ways than one.

He will not bar the door. He will not disobey Jamie. He will not speak unless spoken to. He will not ask questions. And eventually, the clan will take their eyes off of him. Jamie will take his eyes off of him.

And he will escape.

Frank doesn’t bother to extinguish the light, instead settling in face down on the bed for the night. Let the light burn itself out, but until then, let him have some idea of what might come for him in the night.

He worries he might vomit again if Jamie tries to touch him tonight. He thinks Jamie — James Fraser, Highlander — might. It would be a fitting end to this. He thinks of Jamie’s rough hands on his waist, his mouth against his skin. The comfort of his lap.

His backside throbs. His throat scratches. His head aches.

Frank is alone.

At some point in the endless waking hours of the night, he sees Claire. She stands in the threshold of their bedroom and smiles sweetly, mass of dark curls framing her face prettily.

“Felicitations and congratulations on your recent marriage, Mr. Beauchamp.”

She is seated at a desk in his classroom now. She has that challenging, clever look about her.

“Pardon me,” she corrects herself. “ Partnership. ”

He stares at her from the front of the room.

“Although it is very much like a marriage, isn’t it?”

He shakes his head and finds himself behind the student’s desk, Claire before him at the head of the room.

“You resent being treated as you would a wife. As a woman. As you’ve treated me, in leaving.”

They are standing together, Claire holding his hand gently, stroking her own fingers across the pale length of it. She is in her nurse’s uniform.

“When a woman gives birth,” she grins slyly, “with the wealth of hormones, of emotions, of pain…” Her cheek is pressed to his now, her soft lips at his ear. “She often achieves release.”

A leg presses against his penis. Claire’s hair has turned red.

When the sun rises, Jamie has not returned. Frank supposes he ought to be relieved. As he hears the first stirrings of Castle Leoch awakening, he battles the splitting headache pounding against his skull until he’s standing.

He retrieves his kilt, spreads it on the ground, and prepares to pleat it. He’s never done it himself, but he should manage — lord knows he’s seen Jamie do it enough times. Domestic rituals. In the mornings, Jamie pleats their kilts and dresses them both. In the evenings, Frank reads to him and has him read back. He’s about to crouch and begin when he remembers the mirror. His face looks like he’s been badly beaten in a match of bare-knuckle boxing. He turns his back, lifts his shirt, cranes his neck, and looks.

His backside is a shocking mass of bruises and welts. He can’t locate a sliver of white skin left between his tailbone and thighs. He notices that his hands are shaking.

The door opens. Frank drops the shirt and spins on his heel.

Jamie stands just within the threshold, hand still on the doorknob. If his face, like a found out thief, is any indication, he caught sight of his handiwork.

He doesn’t look at Frank.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I ought to have knocked.”

“It’s your room.”

“I wanted to tell you we’re setting out in an hour. And,” he nods awkwardly to the tartan spread on the bedroom floor, “your kilt.”

“Don’t trouble yourself. You must be tired,” Frank says quickly. “I’ve seen you do it so many times I oughtn’t need to bother you anymore. Head down to breakfast, and I’ll handle it.”

Dark circles stand out in sharp relief against Jamie’s pale skin. They stand for another few moments, Jamie opening and closing his mouth once. Then, he nods stiffly and exits.

After perhaps a quarter hour of crouching on the floor, resulting in a passably pleated kilt, Frank steps into the great hall. All eyes turn to him. Many are averted quickly. 

Surprisingly, he receives no wolf whistles or teasing comments, no slaps or pinches to his backside. Nor does he receive glares. He concentrates on not limping and walks to the table at which Jamie sits. As he remains standing, Angus grins at him and opens his mouth, but before he speaks, his eyes flicker to Jamie’s seat. Angus closes his mouth.

“Ahright, Frank?” Dougal raises his eyebrows.

“Yes.” He moves his lips into an approximation of a smile. “Thank you.”

As Jamie said, they set out within the hour. Frank lasts what must be at least two further, painful hours horseback before he needs to dismount, knees buckling when he hits the ground. He smells awful, sweating bullets and feeling decidedly ill. It proves more difficult to hide his limp now as he walks alongside the horses. Every part of his body aches, and the friction of the clothes against his skin is scarcely bearable. Again, impossibly, mercifully, there are no comments from the group regarding this. His headache hasn’t abated. If anything, he’s dizzy with it now.

Plenty of men have done far more after far worse punishment. Should he— when he returns to Claire, he cannot see how he could ever hold her to their marriage. He is no man — not even a woman, for that matter.

He’s not sure for how long he’s been walking when Dougal calls out “Stad!”

He closes his eyes and leans his shoulder against the horse, a grey mare with a dappled coat that is soft and warm even through his shirt. He fists a hand in her mane, and she huffs as Dougal says something else in Gaelic. The rest of the group dismounts.

“We’re taking a rest.”

Jamie stands several paces behind him, patting the horse’s hindquarters. Frank nods, then points to the area of forest they’d been passing.

“May I go a few meters into the trees, alone?”

“I— are—” Jamie stutters. “Yes, you can go where you like.”

“Thank you.”

Frank doesn’t look behind him and heads a few dozen meters off, into a clearing. The air is clean and clear here, and it is quiet. Gingerly, he lowers himself and kneels like a penitent for several blessed minutes.

A quiet cough breaks him from his meditation.

He leaps to his feet and whirls, already reaching for the knife that isn’t there.

“Frank, Frank, it’s only me.”

Jamie stands with his hands outstretched, like one trying to calm an agitated dog. Frank stretches his lips to show Jamie his teeth — even he knows this can’t be called a smile.

“We’ve taught you well, eh?” Jamie huffs a laugh, attempting lightness. Frank nods. Jamie’s brow furrows. “Frank, talk to me.”

He looks at Jamie’s lips.

“What about?”

“Anything.” Jamie frowns. “You’ve explained breakfast to me before. Told me why my eyes are blue. You stop after every other page when you read aloud to me to go on about something. There’s scarce stopping you talking.” He laughs. “Were you not such an old bride, and were I not awake the whole night through, I’d worry the fairies had left me a changeling.” Something must show in Frank’s face, because Jamie continues quickly. “I’m sorry.”

“It was only a joke.”

“No, not for that , though I am, for…” Jamie hesitates. “For last night.”

“You did your duty. You have nothing to apologize for.”

“Yes, I do,” he insists. “I ken you’re angry with me.”

“I’m not angry.”

He shifts his gaze to Jamie’s right ear now.

“ Yes, you are. ” Jamie waits a moment, takes a breath. “I have eyes, Frank. Even the others can see.”

“I’m sorry I’ve embarrassed you.”

“You haven’t—!” Jamie stops, bites his lip. “You haven’t embarrassed me. I did wrong. I used you ill. And I’d like to explain myself.”

“You’ve explained,” Frank says. “I understand.”

“ No , Frank, I mean about— about him.”

Frank looks him in the eye for the first time since the night before.

“I already know, Jamie.” He begins to walk. “And I understand.”

He moves to pass Jamie.

“ No, ” Jamie grabs his arm. “You don’t —!”

On VE-Day, amidst the grander celebrations, he remembers groups of young children running the streets with sparklers. Some even had the things looped through the spokes of their bicycles. He’d seen sparklers before on Guy Fawkes Day, of course, but they were especially charming here. In place of German bombs, they now had short-lived little Catherine wheels spinning out across England. Such a small thing. The end of the war, dancing in the dark, a star in the fat hand of an infant.

Right now, it feels like there is one sparkler spinning in his head and another in his chest.

He bellows something that could be No! and tries to wrench his arm from Jamie’s grip. Jamie is saying something softly, urgently, now holding Frank’s other arm. Frank can’t speak.

He can’t say what he does, but when he stumbles away, Jamie’s face is bleeding. A bird sings somewhere.

Frank careens toward a tree and catches himself against it. He’s kneeling on the ground now, forehead in the dirt, and he presses his fingers to his ears until he can hear only his breathing and his heartbeat.

The last time this happened, he was in short pants. It was in front of his whole family. His grandfather had pulled him away for all of them to see, his gawping cousins and tutting aunts and disgusted uncles, and taken him to the bedroom for a spanking.

A tantrum. His wife, at least, is spared the knowledge of what she married. He sees Jamie’s face from the night prior, unhinged and open. A pair that cannot reason, that can scarcely approximate human speech let alone human decency, that rips and fucks and spills under the eye of whatever god can see Frank here.

They have made animals of each other.

At great length, he removes his hands from his ears and turns his head to press his cheek against the dirt only to find a pair of boots directly in his sightline. Had he any energy at all, he’d jump.

It’s Jamie, his back to him, hand at his gun. Stolidly keeping watch. He casts a cursory glance to Frank and double takes when he sees his face. Frank rises to his feet quickly enough that his head spins.

“Ahright?”

Frank nods. Jamie’s eyes are lowered, his head bent. He nods to the clearing.

“Will you sit with me?”

At Frank’s answering nod, Jamie removes his cloak and spreads it on the grass, seating himself on one end as Frank kneels on the other. Jamie’s lip is fat. There are short scratches gouged against his cheek, and a bruise is forming below his eye. He plucks a long piece of grass and begins to speak very deliberately.

“I already told you about my sister, about both my floggings. But at Fort William, a week after I was flogged the first time, my father came to beg mercy. I met him in the hall. Told me he knew everything, that it wasn’t my fault. Kissed my cheek.” Jamie gestures to the spot. “As the guards led me away, led me to Randall, he called out to me. ‘Remember to pray. And I’ll stand by you, no matter what happens. You’re a braw lad, son.’ That’s what he told me.”

Frank stares at him.

“Randall ordered the guards away so it was just me and him. He started talking to me. Kindly. Told me we’d got off to a poor start. That there was no way for my father to get a clearance in time to bond me. I couldnae understand it, but I ken now he was playing. Likes to play with his toys.”

They both know this very well.

“But in the end, he was quite blunt about what he really wanted.”

Frank feels cold and hot at the same time. Sickeningly, he knows now what Jamie needs to tell him.

“Said it was simple. I remember, he said, ‘Give over to me. Make free of your body.’ If I did, there would be no second flogging.” Jamie is beating a silent rhythm against the air with his strand of grass. “I considered it.”

Who wouldn’t?

“But,” Jamie chews his lip. “I could still feel my father’s kiss on my cheek. And I thought what he would think of me.” He looks at Frank seriously. “Not the buggery. He’d not give that a thought or care.” Shock strikes Frank to his core. “But for giving in. For letting that man break me.” He shakes his head. “So I couldnae do it.”

Frank feels something at this disclosure. He realizes, despite knowing full-well what comes next in the story, that it is relief. Randall did not fuck him. Did not get the chance to debase him in the way he has Frank or the sister, Jenny. Perhaps Jamie could still take a wife, even, although his family apparently would care not what he does in that regard. He’d not give that a thought or care .

Jamie shrugs.

“Dougal was there, at the flogging. My father, too, though I didnae ken at the time.” He takes a breath. “I fell halfway through. They all thought I was dead. Dougal said he let out a small sound and dropped like a rock and didnae get up again.” He looks steadily at Frank now. “I didnae see it. Didnae see him die. Didnae see him taken away. Didnae see him buried.” He gives a scoffing laugh now. “Never even seen his grave.”

Frank waits a moment. Jamie says no more.

“Your father loved you,” he croaks. “He told you that he would, no matter what, because he meant it. And to find out you had been—” Frank searches for the words. “So coerced? So ‘broken’? Would have been every bit as painful to him as seeing you flogged, as seeing you dead . I know this. And,” he scowls, “do you think, had you given in to— to him, that he is the sort of man who keeps his word? That it would have made any difference?”

Jamie just presses his lips together.

“I’ll never ken.”

“ I know, Jamie.” He’s surprised by his own words. “Nothing you could have done would have changed what happened. The only person to blame is— is Randall. And that’s why I understand.”

“No,” Jamie says, shaking his head so vehemently that his curls fly around his head. “I meant that I wanted you to understand why I did it. Because there was reason why I acted the way I did. And the way I acted was wrong. I brutalized you, after he brutalized you, and not for anything that you did.”

“You’re not like him, Jamie.”

Jamie barks a laugh.

“Whatever may be,” he continues gravely, “I betrayed your trust. I accused you, knowing you’re no spy and no traitor. I told you how many strokes you’d get, and I gave you more — too many. I was— I was like a devil. I betrayed our co-bhanntach’d. I’m sorry , Frank.”

Frank chuckles, and Jamie looks at him with confusion.

“Jamie,” he says, grinning now inexplicably, “thank you. Thank you.” He splays his hands before himself. “But you’d have brutalized me anyway.” Jamie’s face twists in confusion. “The beating , Jamie. You beat me with a belt. Your duty was to brutalize me, to establish dominance over me.”

Jamie’s face is some combination of emotions beyond Frank’s limited ability to identify, but it is not positive.

“No, Frank,” he shakes his head. “No. I felt the same way as a bairn, as a young man, thought it uncivilized. But my father told me that there are certain things you need to learn in your skin as well as in your mind. And that until I learned respect, I’d be spending a lot of time bent over touching my toes getting my civilized arse beat by my uncivilized elders.” Jamie laughs at this, as though recalling a pleasant memory. “I got whipped more as a lad than I could tell you. And I’m the better for it.”

Frank isn’t smiling anymore.

“That’s a very English sentiment.”

“Frank.” Jamie responds disbelievingly, laughing again. “We’re neither of us fathers, but surely you ken of a man’s duty to his weans.”

“So, in beating me,” Frank asks, squinting, “you treated me as a father would his child?”

“I—”

“I’m certainly no man, now, I’ll admit that, but do you think of me as a child, Jamie? Do you consider me as intelligent—?”

“Frank—”

“And what of your floggings? Were those justified? You needed to learn to respect—”

“You’re twisting my words, you ken that’s not what I mean!” Frank raises his eyebrows, and Jamie continues gravely. “You are a man. But even a man needs to be reminded. And don’t tell me you aren’t a better man for having been thrashed as a bairn.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Wasn’t what?”

“I was never beaten as a child.” He laughs again. “Jamie, where I come from, a man is considered a great brute if he hits his children beyond, say, a spanking. Even teachers draw the line at canings, and though I never earned one, I heard they were often quite…” He struggles to think of a word that would make sense to Jamie and finally gives up. “Clinical.”

The excitement of that threat, of the punishment inflicted upon his classmates, their bodies. The comfort sought by another boy in the night, the softness of his hair and the heat of his abused skin. The temptation to take the blame and the retribution in a friend’s stead, to bare himself before one of the instructors he’d worked so tirelessly to impress. He had etched into his own skin with a pen nib, once, with the guilt of it.

Jamie’s brows are knit tightly together.

“Are you saying last night—?”

“First beating I’ve ever gotten.”

Jamie’s skin is naturally pale — not like Frank’s, to be sure, but as pale as you’d expect of a redheaded Scotsman. Right now, he’s as white as a sheet. He’s gripping the cloak hard. His eyes are wide, and his mouth is tight.

“Jamie?”

He holds his hand out, and Frank takes it. Being careful of his backside, Jamie pulls him to his arms, and Frank goes limp as his head hits Jamie’s chest. Warm, solid, strong. Held. Jamie is rocking him slowly, and he realizes that the front of Jamie’s shirt is wet — that his own eyes are wet. Can he really blame Jamie for looking upon him as a child, a bairn?

“I shan’t lay a hand on you again,” Jamie says at length.

Frank maneuvers himself to look Jamie in the eye.

“I think this is beyond us both. I don’t know why he and I share a face, Jamie.” This is the truth. “But I can’t hold it against you when you look at me and see him.” If this is my penance for taking— for welcoming what you have to give.

“No,” Jamie says firmly. “ No . You’re not him, Frank. And I’m no bairn either. A man works things through without taking it out on his com-pàirtiche. This is my load to bear.”

Frank sobs once against Jamie’s shirt. Just one more humiliation. He is something beneath a child, beneath even an animal. Jamie squeezes him closer.

“The Crown,” Frank rasps, “has decreed co-bhanntach’d invalid. It is no longer recognized within the Empire’s domain.”

Jamie rubs his back.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Jamie sighs and, at great length, speaks.

“I won’t make you stay, Frank. I’m no protection to you anymore—”

“No.” Frank speaks without a thought. “I mean, I— Jamie— you’re a great protection to me. I mean— ”  He looks at Jamie now and speaks deliberately. “We are com-pàirtichean.”

Jamie presses his lips together tight and nods. Then he leans down and presses a chaste kiss to Frank’s mouth, as though they were children in a schoolyard, boys in a dormitory. Frank kisses him back. They part and stare at each other for several moments, exchanging tight smiles, before Jamie mutters something in Gaelic.

“Pardon?”

“ Sgàile ,” he repeats, enunciating clearly this time. “A shadow. That’s what England is. What Randall is. Your shadow. A shadow on us . Like… like you’re the sun and he’s blocking you out.”

Like you’re the sun .

Were a student ever to have turned in writing with such amateur machinations, Frank would shake his head and roll his eyes. He would bring the paper home to share with Claire, drawing her attention with a silent gesture and a raised eyebrow. “Oh,” she would laugh, “how queer! ”

“You sound confident,” he says after a moment, clearing the emotion from his throat. “I’m not so sure who shadows whom.”

Jamie looks at him intently.

“Would you like me to teach you Gaelic?”

Frank blinks. At his silence, Jamie continues.

“You been helping me with my reading and writing,” he shrugs, “least I can do is return the—”

“Yes,” Frank blurts. “Yes.” 

Surrounded by codes and he’s just been handed the key.

“You’re a smart man, Jamie,” he continues quietly, “I’m only giving you practice.”

“ Get tae ,” Jamie mutters, a blush actually rising to his cheeks.

“Oh,” Frank laughs, “starting now, are we?”

Jamie groans with no real malice and bends again to kiss him. It’s Frank who deepens it, opening his mouth beneath Jamie’s and sliding his tongue between his lips. They’re like Claire’s.

Jamie had offered him permission to leave. To return.

Frank presses his heels against his backside and brings his arms around Jamie’s neck, pressing their mouths together painfully and removing any semblance of space between them.