The Firebird

‘Well, then.’ He crouched before her so that he could be on her own level, though it caused him pain to do it. She could see the sudden tightening along his jaw that showed for but a moment and in that same moment was dismissed. ‘I’ve never made a promise yet,’ he said, ‘that I’ve not kept. Ye hear?’ He waited till she gave another nod before continuing, ‘So bide ye yet awhile, till I come back for ye.’

‘And take me to my mother?’

‘Aye.’

She looked him in the eyes, then. ‘Will I please her? Will she love me?’

‘Do ye doubt it?’

Anna did not want to show him doubts. She wanted very badly to believe. Instead she asked, ‘Has she a husband?’

He was slow to answer, as though weighing what he ought to tell her, but at length he answered honestly as she had known he would. ‘She does.’

‘And other children?’

‘Aye,’ the captain said, ‘but I believe your mother’s heart has long since had a hole in it the size and shape of you, and it will take yourself to fill it, for none else can do that for her.’

He was watching her and willing her, she thought, to trust his words, but still she doubted. ‘Captain Jamieson?’

‘Aye?’

‘If my mother disnae want me, will ye take me home with you?’

His leg, she thought, must still be hurting dreadfully because he closed his eyes a moment, and again she saw his jawline tighten, and again she saw it pass. He said, ‘Your mother has been wanting ye these eight years, Anna, since she had to give ye to another. She’s been wanting ye and waiting, and ye never need to fear her heart will change.’

‘But she might die. My father died.’

He reached a tender hand to tuck a straggling curl behind her ear. ‘Ye worry overmuch,’ he said, ‘for one who will be staying in this convent with the nuns and all their comforts. ’Tis myself ye want to pity, for I must now find a way to pass the days upon the open road without a lass to talk with me, and make me look a fool at playing chess.’

He’d meant to make her smile, to tease her, but it only turned her thoughts towards his journey and the unknown service he might have to do the King.

‘Will there be battles where you’re going? Will ye have to fight?’ she asked him.

‘Och, I doubt there will be battles for a while.’

‘But there are still bad men,’ she reasoned, ‘like the ones who tried to catch my father.’

‘There will always be bad men. But Colonel Graeme and myself will never let them do ye harm. Nor will the nuns.’

She could not tell him it was not her own safety she worried for, because she found it suddenly was taking all her effort just to hold her brave mask in its place. Her gaze slid to the shadowed corner of the church that held her father’s monument, and then she realised what she had to do.

The song sheet folded neatly on its creases as she thanked him for it, and with care she tucked it through the opening that gave her access to the linen pocket tied beneath her skirts. In the corner of that pocket she could feel the small black stone strung on its leather cord, the stone that had the hole in it, and taking it with care into her hand she held it out to show the captain, on her open palm.

‘This was my father’s,’ Anna said, and told him all that Colonel Graeme had explained to her about the little stone and what it meant within her family, their belief that it would keep away all evils. ‘Will ye take it, please, and wear it?’

Captain Jamieson looked down at Anna’s hand, and at the stone, and for a long while it appeared he had no words. He cleared his throat, and said with roughness in his voice, ‘I think your daddie would have wanted ye to have that, and not give it to another.’

She was not supposed to argue with her elders, so the nuns each day reminded her, but how else could she let the captain know that he had come to fill the hole left by the father she had never known, and that she’d miss him even more than she now missed the family that had raised her? How could she let him know that when he’d gone away and left her, she would carry in her heart a hole the size and shape of him?

If she tried to tell him outright, she would shame herself by weeping. She could only match his stubborn nature with her own, and say, ‘But I am safe already. And the stone is mine to give.’ Her upraised hand shook only slightly as she held it nearer to him. ‘Please.’

He looked a moment longer at the stone, and then at her, and then in silence he reached out and closed his calloused fingers round the gift, and still in silence with great care he slipped the cord around his neck so that the stone lay underneath his shirt, below the hollow of his throat. He took a breath as though to speak, and then without a word he reached again and drew her to him.

There was fierceness in his hard embrace, and yet his hand was gentle on her hair as though he feared to break her, holding her so tightly.

Anna held him back. It was like being wrapped in warmth, she thought. The hard wall of his chest beneath the worn wool jacket felt like a protective shield through which no harm could penetrate, and while she nestled there within his arms the world seemed very far away, and unimportant.

She could not have said how long he crouched there holding her, the roughness of his cheek against her forehead, but at length he kissed her hair and gently set her from him and prepared to stand.

She tugged once at his jacket so he’d stop just long enough that she could kiss his cheek. When grown-ups kissed and said farewell, she knew they often wished each other health and a safe journey, and she had practised words herself for this, the worst of all her partings. But the words would not be called to mind, and so she could but stand and tell him nothing.