#trying not to shriek like a deranged banshee and wake the whole house up

[litlunacy]

43 hours in and these goobers are finally talking about feelings!

Also Bellara writing spicy self insert fanfic to cope with said feelings is so adorable idk what to do with myself. Girl tries to be suave for all of 3 seconds and manages to knock everything and herself off the desk.

They are both brilliant and they are both dumbasses. I love them. When can I make them kiss??

[coffeestainsandcashmere]

‘All that’s best of dark and bright’ - a Draco x Hermione x Theo story - Chapter Four

For the 0.5 people following this story on here instead of Ao3...

Chapter One here: Tumblr | Ao3

Chapter Two here: Tumblr | Ao3

Chapter Three here: Tumblr | Ao3

Hermione sat at the Gryffindor table that evening, still mulling over Malfoy’s behaviour in Charms.  

It had been her mention of the snatchers that had prompted his expression to darken and his body to fill with tension, and she still couldn’t shake the way that he’d turned quiet and openly vulnerable under Theo’s gentle touch. Over the years she’d known him at Hogwarts, Malfoy had always seemed to viscerally sharp and prickly, so volatile and yet so cold, that realising he was apparently an extremely tactile person somehow felt like she’d taken a bludger to the head. Yet again she saw a boy who’d been isolated by circumstance, and not by choice, and she resolved to put a little more effort into bridging the gaping canyon that still existed between them.  

At supper that evening, Ginny rather predictably talked the ears off everyone at their end of the table about the Holyhead Harpies and their latest nail-biter of a match against the Wimbourne Wasps. Apparently she and the rest of the Gryffindor team had been glued to the wireless all afternoon during their various free periods.  

“…and then when Helena Abbington swept in at the last minute and stopped a bludger from hitting Wilkins, she and Elcomb only pulled off a bloody Porskoff Ploy so well that the Wasps didn’t even see the quaffle drop until it was too late!” Ginny enthused around a final mouthful of goulash. “Seriously, we were all —” she caught sight of Hermione’s politely bored face midway through taking a swig of pumpkin juice to wash down the clog of goulash, and snorted so hard that juice actually came out of her nose. “I’m sorry, ‘Mione,” she laughed, and Hermione’s chest panged at the unexpected use of Ron’s nickname for her. “I’m so sorry. Oh crap, did I get you with juice?” She dug out her wand. “Oh Godric, I’m sorry - scourgify - but you should have seen your face!”  

“The complexities of quidditch manoeuvres have never failed to entertain me, Ginny,” she said flatly. “I’m sorry.” Dinners in the Weasley household had been interminable on nights when someone got going on the subject.  

“No, it’s totally fine. Just remind me to cancel your subscription to Seeker Weekly that I set up for your birthday.” At the words ‘your birthday’, her eyes went wide and she shrieked, “Oh my Gryffindor! Your birthday! It’s… It’s…”

“This Saturday,” she smiled sadly. Neither Ron nor Harry had mentioned coming down to see her, or meeting up in Hogsmeade, and she rather suspected that they might have forgotten. That stung more than she cared to admit.

From behind her, a male voice drawled, “It’s your birthday, Granger?” 

Ginny’s expression soured immediately and her gaze shifted to a spot behind Hermione as she snarled, “Piss off, Nott. And whatever you’re thinking of doing to spoil it… don’t.”

“Ginny!” Hermione exclaimed. “You’re Head Girl! You should be a little more impartial, don’t you think?”

“Not when it comes to my best friends,” she pouted. Her mistrust of anyone even tangentially associated with Voldemort’s supporters was widely known, and Theodore took a polite half-step back, palms up, dark blue eyes widely innocent. Ginny continued to glare at him, but she did at least let him speak.  

“I’m not putting in a last-minute, bulk order to Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes,” he smiled carefully. “I promise. I was just surprised you hadn't mentioned it on our patrols, that’s all. Listen, while we’re on the subject, Granger, I came over to tell you I’m going to be a bit late tonight. Can I meet you at nine up on the third floor?”

Despite his usually abysmal time-keeping, Nott had surprisingly never been late to a patrol before, so she simply nodded. It wasn’t as if anything the students could throw at her would be more dangerous or daunting than everything she’d faced in the past three years. “Sure. Meet you by the painting of the drunk monks?”

Nott’s handsome, slightly wonky smile split wide and white across his face, drawing dimples in his cheeks that made her stomach flutter, and he inclined his head. “Perfect. Thanks, Granger.”

“You can call me Hermione, you know?” she said in a bit of a rush as he turned to leave, fighting another blush.

He paused and then turned to look over his shoulder at her. “Then I insist that you stop calling me ‘Nott’,” he said with a very slight bow of his head. One of the tighter curls at the front of his chestnut brown hair flopped further forewords onto his forehead. “Call me Theo. Never Theodore.” And he shuddered visibly, his freckles standing out a little more as his cheeks paled for just a moment.  

“Right,” she said and then, because she fancied trying it out, she added, “Theo.”  

With one further and final brightening of that already blinding smile, presumably at the sound of his name on her lips, he strode away without explanation as to why he was going to be late, and Hermione turned back to see Ginny with her jaw practically dangling on the table. Even Neville looked a little stunned, as if he still didn’t believe his eyes, even after their conversation earlier that very day.

“What?” she asked, the blush finally spilling across her cheeks, hot and tingling.

“Since when are you so… ‘chummy’ with the Slytherins?” she asked acerbically.  

She blinked. “I didn’t realise it was a crime to be on good terms with one’s peers,” she sniffed defensively as everyone’s eyes seemed to bore into her. God, it reminded her of the courtroom and Malfoy’s trial. “Besides, he’s actually halfway decent, believe it or not.”

Ginny looked like she’d swallowed a bubotuber whole. “Right,” she said. “Look… Hermione, I really don’t mean to be an arse about this, but… you do remember that he’s friends with Draco Malfoy, don’t you? You know, the boy who tried to kill Dumbledore and who let a bloody horde of Death Eaters into the castle who… you know, who ultimately helped to murder my brother…” Tears sparkled in her eyes as she glared at her.

Her heart went out to the younger girl, but she wasn’t about to back down either. “I’m aware of Malfoy’s history, Ginny, and of who we all lost,” she said, trying to keep her voice from rising and quavering. “I’m not… I’m not saying they’re perfect by any means, but… I’d like to give them a chance. Both of them. Theo was cleared of any involvement, and Malfoy was tried and released on probation, remember?”

Ginny’s eyes filled with tears and her lips trembled. “Tell that to Fred!” she hissed, standing from the table and storming away.  

Hermione took a deep breath and glanced around at the audience their little tussle had gathered amongst the Gryffindors. “What?” she snapped, pushing herself to her feet and disentangling her legs from the bench. “You heard McGonagall at the start of term. And we can’t keep treating everyone like criminals.” Her heart was racing, blood pounding in her ears. Why didn’t they understand? Why did they all think it was still ‘us’ and ‘them’? “We just can’t live like that!” she said shrilly, and she stalked from the hall in Ginny’s wake, tears blurring her vision.  

She’d always hated the fact that she wore her heart on her sleeve like this, emotions always boiling right up to the surface at a moment’s notice when she wished she could remain calm and collected instead of going off like a powder keg. It was something she’d always admired about the people who tended to be sorted into Slytherin and Ravenclaw. Then again, she’d almost been sorted into Ravenclaw, so perhaps it had nothing to do with houses at all and everything to do with her own inability to control her emotions. She’d have made a terrible occlumens.

As the arched entrance to the great hall approached, still in a bit of a blur, she crashed headlong into someone who also happened to be leaving the hall at the same time. A flash of white hair registered in her peripheral vision as Malfoy of all people steadied her with one pale and surprisingly strong hand. He then released her and stepped back.  

“Granger?” he asked in a low, softly-articulated purr, taking in the sheen to her eyes and the colour in her cheeks. He shot a glance back over his shoulder at the table where several astounded Gryffindors were still staring after her, and then turned his fierce, silver gaze back to her.  

“I’m sorry, Malfoy,” she hissed, desperate not to prolong the fuss. “I’m fine. Thank you.” And with that, she fled to Gryffindor tower to curl up with a book by the common room fire until it was time for her patrol. She didn’t see Ginny again, and later that evening when she nipped up to their dorm to grab her thicker cloak to ward off the castle’s wandering drafts, the drapes of Ginny’s four-poster were pointedly shut.  

The first half of her solo rounds passed without much incident and she found the solitude strangely grounding as she paced the empty halls. Ginny’s grief at the loss of her older brother was still so raw and close to the surface, and Hermione could certainly see how a friendship - however tentative - with a Slytherin like Theodore Nott would have been anathema to her. Ginny may have been fair and a good choice for a head of school, but when it came to blood ties, the Weasleys were a fiercely loyal family. Hermione had not been present when Molly Weasley had killed Bellatrix, but to hear any of them tell it, Molly had turned into something akin to an avenging banshee to defend her daughter from the deranged Death Eater.  

Near the library she found two first years sneaking about on a dare and deducted a cautionary five points from Hufflepuff to warn them off trying anything again, and moved on towards the third floor. She met Nearly Headless Nick and paused to chat with him at length on one of the few static staircases before spotting Mrs. Norris’ tail disappearing around a corner. The satisfaction she felt at not having to be afraid of that sight boosted her mood somewhat. She moved on through the castle like a stray draft, belonging and yet still disconnected; she knew the place inside out, and yet it still felt strange to her to be back here again after everything, with barely a blast or scorch mark on the stones to speak of what had happened scarcely four months earlier.

Just as she reached the third floor and rounded a corner, she paused. A feminine giggle echoed down the hall, followed by a quickly hushed groan.

Perfect.  

Of all the things she found herself dealing with as a prefect - sleepwalking, sneaking about, dares into the Restricted Section - illicit encounters by moonlight were probably her least favourite. Everyone needed some kind of connection, some kind of… release… but rules were rules after all, and although Hogwarts was probably the safest place in the world once more, it still didn’t do to be wandering the halls at night.  

Inhaling deeply, she stepped out with the intention of interrupting them and sending them packing with twenty points from each house, when a warm, dry palm slid over her mouth from behind her. Before she could squeal or hex her assailant into the middle of last week, Theodore Nott shifted silently into her field of vision, with the finger of his other hand pressed against his smirking lips.  

“Theo,” she hissed like a disgruntled Crookshanks when he released her, and he grinned wider, dimples and all. “Merlin and Morgana! You scared me!”

With a very quiet, earthy chuckle that sent heat rushing right the way through her, he twitched his eyebrows down the corridor. “Who is it then?”

“As if I should know from one breathy little giggle!” she scoffed, still somehow keeping her voice down despite her indigence.  

He actually had extremely nice hands, she thought, trying not to look at them, and that then realisation made her cheeks flush and her heart flutter. While Malfoy had the hands of a potion master, steady and long-fingered, Theo had the hands of a scholar, all ink stained and slightly knuckly. She scolded herself for fixating on her classmates’ hands - now of all times - and rounded on him defensively.  

“Come on,” she said. “Now that you’re here, you might as well make yourself useful. And what were you doing — if I might ask — that was so much more important than your duties as a prefect?”

“Tutoring third years,” he said casually as he turned to face the length of the corridor. “Arithmancy. They’re terrible. An absolute disgrace to Slytherin. Now, come on, let’s have some fun. I reckon they’re behind that tapestry halfway down. You know, the one with that coat of arms and the randy unicorn.”

Theodore Nott tutored students?  

She froze, staring at him with a look of incredulous amusement on her face, trying to imagine him teaching. Actually, that didn’t help her situation at all and she quickly abandoned the image before it took hold. “It’s ‘rampant’, not ‘randy’,” she finally croaked, which only made him snicker softly. Of course he knew that. Flustered at having allowed herself to be goaded by him, she added, “So you’re familiar with that hiding place then, Nott? You’ve been caught there before, have you?”

“A gentleman never tells,” he said and strode off before she could stop gawping like a landed fish.  

He flicked his wand at the huge tapestry and it peeled slowly back like a theatre curtain to expose the two mortified fifth years entangled within the alcove. Mercifully they were mostly dressed, just a little rumpled, and she and Nott sent the pair on their way with only ten points from Ravenclaw and ten from Gryffindor. Hermione would never be able to look the girl in the face again.  

As the fifth years scuttled off like startled beetles, Theo turned to her and let the tapestry fall back into place. The ridiculousness of it caught up with them at the same time, and they both burst out laughing, the sound of it ringing on the cold stone of the corridor. It was a relief to laugh, she realised as her eyes watered and she felt giddy and light for the first time in weeks. She put her hand on the rough stonework of the wall beside the tapestry and let her body shake with it.  

“You’re telling me you’ve never been caught like that, Granger?” Theo said once his own laughter had died down. He still had those delicious dimples though, and his eyes glittered.  

Her face flushed hot and she remembered a few stolen kisses here and there, and once significantly more, with Viktor Krum.

Theo’s eyebrows expressed a very keen interest, and she began examining the needlework of the tapestry with sudden focus.  

“Well, well,” he said. “I’m not going to pry, but that’s a very interesting train of thought you’ve given me, Granger.”

“Oh?” she said archly, half turning to look back at him over her shoulder and daring him to continue that with flashing eyes, despite the colour in her cheeks.

“Mm.”

“And who was it that you were caught sneaking about with then?”

Theo absolutely refused to say with whom he’d been caught, and in what state of undress, and by the time they reached the end of their patrol route, she’d stopped prodding at him for answers. He was a Slytherin after all, and did not divulge secrets willingly.  

“Any plans for your birthday, Granger?” he asked conversationally as they made their way back towards the grand staircase. She didn’t have to accompany him, but hadn’t felt like returning yet. “You’ll be nineteen, right?”

A stray draft tugged at her hair and she shivered. With a shrug and a nod, she said, “No plans really. I’ll see what happens and play it by ear.”

“When is it again?” he asked, pace slowing as his eyebrows drew together into a little frown.

“Saturday.”

“No plans with Potter and Weasley?” he asked and when she shrugged again, his expression soured just a fraction more.  

As they passed by a painting of a wizard, who looked remarkably like Charlie Weasley, wrangling a Hungarian Horntail, the dragon gave a shriek that made her jump. Theo chuckled softly and she felt her insides heat up all over again at the sound of it.  

“Slytherin and Gryffindor quidditch try outs are this Saturday,” he said, sounding a little regretful, though she couldn’t figure out why.  

“You don’t even play quidditch,” she scoffed, happy to have moved away from the topic of Harry and Ron.  

“Draco does. He’s going for seeker, remember?”

“Oh, of course. He’ll probably get it too - he’s apparently quite good.”

“Mm. Prodigious. You should see him now. He trains practically every morning.”

She thought about the lone flyer she’d seen and wondered if that had been Malfoy. It seemed likely, but she didn’t bring it up. “Ginny asked me to come along, but…” she grimaced. “It’s really not my thing.”

“Really?” Theo snorted sarcastically, turning to look at her from one step ahead. He was still taller than her by a long shot, even then. “I had no idea that you didn’t enjoy quidditch, Granger. It’s not as if you’ve ranted extensively and effusively about how ridiculous you think the whole game is on a number of our patrols this term…”

She punched him on the arm and he just laughed and skipped jauntily down the staircase as he headed back to the Slytherin Dungeons for the night.

“See you tomorrow, Granger,” was all he said as he left, waving jauntily over one shoulder without looking back.  

Hermione didn’t watch him go. Instead, she turned and glared at the Horntail in the painting as she passed, and then stumped back up to Gryffindor tower, feeling oddly conflicted. Patrols weren’t supposed to be this much fun. They were supposed to be sensible and practical, like books, but… then again, books could also be a lot of fun. It had been such a long time since she’d really allowed herself to even dream about anything so flippant as her interest in the opposite sex. Theo’s dimples kept drifting back into her thoughts, and even the silver eyes of Theo’s best friend. Once or twice, when they went soft and even gentle, she’d even thought Malfoy startlingly attractive. He still looked haunted and tired, but he had lost a lot of the hard, jagged edges recently.  

With thoughts of a pair of puzzling Slytherins filling her head, she fell into bed and, for the first time in months, it didn’t even cross her mind to think about setting unnecessary wards. Her head hit the pillow and she fell deeply asleep. 

___

Chapter Five

If you enjoyed, please reblog and share! I’m new to the fandom on here and appreciate all the help I can get!

___

writing masterlist | Ao3

[imagineclaireandjamie]

Flood my Mornings: Climbing

Anon said: This is a prompt for Bonnie & FMM: since BabyBree is becoming quite the strong minded little lady, can we see her get into some antics at the worst possible time?

Notes from Mod Bonnie

This story takes place in an AU in which Jamie travels through the stones two years after Culloden and finds Claire and his child in 1950 Boston.

See all past installments via Bonnie’s Master List

Previous installment:  Vermont (ii)

Fernacre, July, 1951 

“JESUS, lass!” Jamie hissed as he lunged to snatch Bree mid-stride and prevent what would have been a flying leap off the picnic table. He forced himself to exhale before setting her onto her feet and asking, “Why in the name of all that is holy and right do ye turn demon the instant we go out in public?”

The demon giggled. 

“Brianna, hear me, it’s no’ a game, this.” He dropped to a crouch before her, trying to keep his already-worn temper in check. “I mean it. NO climbing up upon things, d’ye hear?” 

“Okayyyy!” she trilled, beaming with joy, already turning on her heel. 

“Wait just there, we’re not—” 

But she was already out of reach, scampering off to join a pack of other children headed toward the play-slides. 

“Stay within the yard!” he called after her. “Heaven BLOODY help me,” he groaned under his breath in Gaelic, getting back to his feet and his conversation. “I’m terribly sorry for that wee hooligan, Tom.” 

“It’s alright, bud,” Tom Harper laughed, handing him back his bottle of terrible American beer. “Kids will be kids, no harm done.”

“Perhaps it’s some great test of parenting, to see how well I cope wi’out Claire to hand....or how poorly, as the case might be.”

It was the annual Fernacre employee summer picnic, or as Bree saw it, a battlefield ripe for the carnage her impish soul apparently craved. Scarce an hour the two of them had been there, and she’d already knocked over a pitcher of Lemonade, bitten another child who had bumped into her, squirted tomato sauce all down her front, and managed to get a lollipop stuck in her hair. This was to say nothing of the tantrum on the car ride about not being able to see the clouds (it being a hot, blue day and there being no clouds), and several outbursts of language he was more than grateful Claire had not been present to overhear. Nine days out of ten, Bree’s heartbreaking sweetness outweighed the net destruction (though there was plenty of the latter in any given day, and no mistake); but there would be a full moon brewing in the sky this evening, certainly, for Brianna Fraser had come out IN FORCE. 

“Really, though, she’ll grow out of it,” Tom said with a veteran’s confidence. “Our Rob was just the same at that age. It’s your first kiddo’s job to put you through the wringer. It’s in their contract and everything!” His wink went suddenly sideways as both brows furrowed over his Sunglasses. “Speaking of which, Claire’s okay, I hope?” 

“Oh, aye, she’s well enough,” Jamie assured him, taking what restorative strength he could from the watery excuse for a draught. “The babe kept her up all through the night, and she didna think she could manage being out the heat, besides.” 

“Don’t blame her one bit.” He wiped sweat from his forehead before adding significantly, “Not long, now, huh?” 

“No,” he grinned back, “not long at all.” 

Earlier that morning

“Will you absolutely hate me if I stay in bed today?”

“Of course not, mo nighean donn,” He tucked the covers more securely around her and then stood, looking around to see what he might bring her. 

“Would it be pressing my good luck to beg you to take the monster with you?”

He kissed her, then Ian. “...Which one?” 

“Oh, I'd happily give you BOTH, if I could!” She rubbed her now-still belly ruefully and winced a bit. “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ, little one, you have got to give Mummy a BREAK when she’s trying to sleep. We can’t keep having these midnight drill parades!”

A whinnying horse galloped into the room and catapulted herself onto the bed next to Claire. “Mum-ma, you comin’?”

“No, lovey,” Claire said, pulling Bree close into a great, warm hug. “Mummy’s going to stay here and take a nap.” 

“Nappin’ isna FUN!” 

“Oh, it’s LOADS of fun for me! But you and Daddy will go and have a lovely time at the picnic, just the two of you.”

Bree grumbled for a minute, then brightened. “Can’see iffee’s ‘wake? If Beeyin’s ‘wake?”

Claire smiled that warm, sweet smile he loved so well. She pulled up the hem of her nightshirt from under the blankets, patiently letting Bree inspect the whole expanse of her with exuberant pats. 

After a few moments, Bree glowered up and whispered in a confidential yell, “I dinna heer’im.”

“I don’t feel him ei—Oh! There he is!” 

Bree shrieked in delight, dissolving into insane giggles as she poked the heaving mass back to and fro. At such a degree of intensity, it was rather like the game Jamie had seen the Fair where you clubbed the stuffed groundhog with a mallet only to have another pop up on the other side. ‘Clubbed’ indeed, for Claire was obliged to grab Bree’s hands and croon, “Gently, Bree, baby, *gently*...” 

After a long, peaceful while, Claire happened to glance up and catch his expression. She was a canny one, his wife, and she gave him a gimlet eye at once. “And just what are you smirking at like a cat in the cream?”

In truth, he WAS grinning, so widely he must have looked positively deranged. “You. are. SO. BIG.”

“You ARSE,” she laughed, managing to land him a kick in the belly even through the blankets.

“Ye ARE! I mean, LOOK!” He came to sit on the edge of the bed and joined Bree in outlining just how massive she was. “Big as a—a—”

“A HOUSE!” Bree finished helpfully, “or A ‘POTTAMUS!” 

“I do hope wee Ian comes out a fair shade more polite and complimentary than YOU lot,” Claire said, splitting a glare between the pair of them. 

“And just think, you’ve *two weeks more,* forbye.”  

“One and a half, thank you very much,” she corrected primly.

“But let’s just stop and consider.” He raised a significant brow. “Should wee Ian see fit to bide his time…”

“Don't EVEN suggest it.”

“....It could be THREE weeks more...” He was having trouble speaking normally through the bubbling laughter. “....or even FOUR, until—”

“You wish four more weeks upon me, Jamie Fraser, and I will make you wish otherwise.”

Bree turned her coat in a flash. “Don’ wisp that at Mum-ma, Da.” 

“Oh, verra well, if ye say so,” he said, mock-abashed, with a wink at his wife. Glancing at his watch, he groaned and straightened with a yawn. Claire’s tossing and turning in the night from Ian’s acrobatics hadn’t done him any favors, either.  “Alright, a leannan, let’s see to your clothes and get along to the picnic.”

“You really do delight in seeing me as huge as a beached whale, don't you?” Claire asked sardonically as Bree scurried from the room, cheering.

“Aye, I do,” he admitted freely, wrapping both his arms around her and nuzzling his nose against hers. “Truly one of the happiest sights I’ve ever seen.” 

In the cave, he had many a time wondered—longingly—what Claire might look like at the time of her full term; and what he had imagined paled in comparison. She was full and lush in every single inch of her. Hair thick and glossy. Skin softly glowing like sunlight on a flower petal. Whisky eyes seeming to sparkle with the same light, heavy with a soft, sleepy happiness. Claire was absolutely exquisite in this height of her bearing, and he would happily spend all his days glorying in the memory of her, this way. 

“I never imagined...” He bent and laid a kiss on her straining navel, reflecting that spending a fair number of those days in good fun and laughter would *also* be greatly rewarding. “...that anyone could get even bigger wi’ child than JENNY.” 

“Bree!” Claire shouted, swatting him with a pillow as he lunged up to kiss her cheeks and neck ferociously, “tell your Da to take his imagination and shove it up his—”

A crash sounded from the other room, followed by a ‘whoops-eeee’, which, in retrospect, had not boded well for the rest of the day

“MISTER FRASER!!!” 

His head whipped around so fast he heard his neck crack.

She was on the top rung of the fence separating the yard from the adjacent pasture, and he felt his heart stop as she fell from it headfirst. 

The next moments as he sprinted toward her seemed to pass as slowly as in a dream. He could hear shouts and cries behind him, but he didn’t stop for an instant until he was vaulting over the fence and snatching her up off her back. He didn’t remember what words he may have uttered, or in what language, but a few moments later, he was exhaling in great gasps of relief seeing that she was conscious and not injured, just badly scared with the breath knocked out of her. 

Dazed, she began to cry with great long wails that drove away the two mares that had come to investigate the visitor to their pasture. Thank the Lord she hadn’t chosen the next paddock over, where the true brawlers were kept. 

“You’re alright?” he demanded once more as he got back to the right side of the fence, vaguely aware he was speaking in Gaelic. “You’re not hurt?” 

She coughed and gasped for breath, considered, then showed him, lips trembling, a slightly-red patch on the fleshy part of her palm.

He laid a fervent kiss in her hand—silently praising heaven she hadn’t broken the wrist, for all that she was still crying like a banshee—and then could contain himself no longer. 

“What did I say about climbing?” His teeth were gritted tight and his hands were shaking even as they strove to remain gentle. “AND about wandering off??”

“I din’knowww,” she wailed, hearing his tone and trying to hide her face in his chest. 

“Ye DO know.” He pulled her up and made her look at him. “Brianna Ellen, ye must listen to what I say! Don’t ye understand ye could have gotten very badly hurt? Lass, look at me.”

She was sobbing, now, working herself up into hysterics. “C—can—na—”

“Why not?”

“Cause—mad—dit—m—meee—”

He went completely still at that. Closing his eyes, he took a deep, deep breath. 

Help me, Da. 

With gestures and apologetic looks, he shooed the well-meaning onlookers back to their picnic and made for the big oak tree in the opposite corner of the yard. It was well-shaded, and he sat down against the trunk, holding his daughter to his chest as she sobbed against his shoulder. 

Thank God she wasn’t hurt. Thank GOD. 

“Bree, cub?” The walk had calmed him, and he was glad to hear his voice was gentle and soft. “Look at me, aye?” 

After a moment, she glanced timidly up (face red as an apple and covered in liquids of all description) and he smiled at her, stroking her cheek and her hair. “I’m here, a leannan. It’s just me...just Da... I love you.” 

“Love—” she hiccuped through her tears, “—too.” 

He kissed her and held her close for a minute before setting her on his legs facing him and saying gravely, “But ye made me verra afraid today, a chuisle. Ye disobeyed and could have hurt yourself.” 

“I did’nint mean to,” she said, rubbing her eyes.

“Aye, I ken ye didna mean to get hurt,” he said, gently pulling her fists away from her face, “but ye meant to be climbing the fence, even after I told ye not.” 

“...It was fun, though,” she offered with a shrug, voice tremulously defiant.

“Aye, well...” 

Come on, Da.... How would ye have explained this to me?  

A shrill whinny sounded in the distance, then another, and Jamie glanced around to see the two sorrel foals playing together in the south pasture, teasing and prancing about one another.  

He smiled and felt peace whispering through the grasses. Until the day break, and the shadows flee away. 

“Ye ken, when wee Ian is born, Bree, he’s going to grow up fast. Before long, he’ll be as big as you and running about on his own! And you’ll want your wee brother to be safe, aye?” 

She straightened at that, no longer crying. Bairn safety was no small matter, in her book. She nodded. 

“Say there were something like a great, nasty snake crawling about in the grass about to bite your brother on the foot.....Would ye just stand by and let him be hurt?”

Brianna looked up at him in absolute affront. “NO, I’d kill dat snake!”

He very nearly choked, but managed to keep a moderately straight face. Call upon a Fraser, and a Fraser ye shall get, he supposed;  but he cleared his throat and plunged on, determined to make his point. “But what if wee Ian didna understand the beast was dangerous? What if he went running to the snake because he thought it would be fun to play wi’ it?”

“Well...I jus’tell him not.”

“Aye, just so,” he said, “because we have to protect the people we love, d’ye see?” 

“Uh-huh.” She was staring up at him, rapt but not quite understanding. 

“So when I tell ye not to do things like climb the fence, mo chridhe, it’s only to keep ye safe, to keep ye getting hurt because I love you so. And when the bairn comes, it’ll be your job to keep him safe, too.”

She nodded emphatically. “I’ll do him safe, Da, promise.”

“But that means ye have to keep yourself safe, as well. Elder sisters have to be the best at obeying Mam and Da so the smaller bairns ken what’s the right way of things. Can ye do that?” 

“Aye,” she said at once. “I’ll ‘bey.” 

For precisely sixty seconds out of every hour, he predicted. 

“Hear me, though, Bree: the next time ye disobey like ye did today, I shall have to strap ye. I dinna want to do it, not one bit, but it’s how you’ll learn. Are we understood?

“....What’s s-tuh-rap?” 

“Getting smacked hard on the bottom wi’ a belt.” 

“Hard?” she clarified, shocked. 

“Aye, hard enough that it hurts.” 

“But ye said—” She scrunched up her face and gestured with both hands. “NOT do things to KEEP me of getting hurted....”

A Dhia, Da, he laughed silently, how by all the saints did ye raise three—

“JAMIE!!”

His head snapped up and he saw Marian rushing down from the house, beckoning wildly, with a look of—

“Da—ddy—” Bree gasped out from where she bounced against his shoulder. “Why we runnin’?”

His heart was pounding.

“Because your brother has decided he’s going to arrive early.”