There’s too much gold here to keep to myself, so: Virgins - A Thread

(...neither Ian nor Jamie has yet killed a man or bedded a lass—but they’re trying.)

To give you some context, Jamie just escaped Ft William after he was flogged twice and his Da died. He’s an outlaw with a price on his head and very weak from his back being torn to shreds. Murtagh brought him to France where Ian is with a group of mercenaries.

“Ian Murray knew from the moment he saw his best friend’s face that something terrible had happened.”

Ok, Ian’s POV is so fun to read.

“Ian.” Jamie looked so relieved at seeing him that Ian thought he might break into tears. “God, Ian.”

Oct 1740 so Jamie is 19 here. AWWW MY TEENAGE JAMIE FEELS ARE RAW FROM FIC WRITING AND GOD THIS KILLS ME.

He’s so injured and trying to hide it from this whole troop of men. Poor Jamie!

“The wean might be about to fall face-first into the fire, but nobody—save maybe Ian—was going to know it, if it killed him.”

Also, Ian calling him the wean.

Looked it up. Ian is one year older. What a bratty teenage thing to do haha

“What happened?”

Jamie sat down abruptly.
“I thought one joined a band of mercenaries because they didna ask ye questions.”

Ian gave him the snort this statement deserved.

I anticipate so many eye rolls.

“My father’s dead.”

Ian trying to believe he hasn’t heard him correctly.

HUGGING HIM AND TRYING NOT TO HURT HIS RUINED BACK.

My heart:

His godfather had said, in fact, “The Murray lad will take care of ye now. Stay wi’ him, mind—dinna come back to Scotland. Dinna come back, d’ye hear me?”

He’d heard. Didn’t mean he meant to listen.

Jamie gave him the “I went to the Université in Paris and ken more than you do” smart-arse look, fairly sure that Ian wouldn’t thump him, seeing he was hurt.

[Ian gave] Jamie back the “I’m older than you and ye ken well ye havena sense enough to come in out of the rain, so dinna be trying it on” look instead.

“Caisteal DHOON!” Jamie shouted as loud as he could, and Ian turned his head for an instant, a big grin flashing.

“On your right, man!” Ian’s voice came suddenly at his shoulder, and without a moment’s hesitation Jamie turned to take care of the man to his left, hearing Ian’s grunt of effort as he laid about with a broadsword.

ON YOUR RIGHT, MAN. ALWAYS ON YOUR RIGHT.

Jamie asking if they have a surgeon and I’m over here like, boy you’re gonna get your own personal surgeon here in a minute, just wait for her.

“Penis isna even an English word, ye wee ignoramus. It’s Latin. And it doesna mean a man’s closest companion—it means ‘tail.’ ”

Ian gave him a long look.
“Tail, is it? So ye canna even tell the difference between your cock and your arse, and ye’re preachin’ to me about Latin?”

The blood flamed up Jamie’s neck like tinder taking fire, and Ian held out a palm, in hopes of quelling him. He didn’t want a fight, and Jamie couldn’t stand one.

SIMMER DOWN, COWBOY.

“Have ye ever done it?” Ian asked suddenly.
There was a small rustle as Jamie hitched himself into a more comfortable position.
“Have I ever done what?” he asked. “Killed anyone? No.”
“Nay, lain wi’ a lass.”
“Oh, that.”
“Aye, that. Gowk.”

“What makes ye think that a woman who writes poetry would be wanton?”
“Well, o’ course they are. Everybody kens that. The words get into their heads and drive them mad, and they go looking for the first man who—”
“Ye’ve bedded a poetess? Does your mam ken that?”

“I’ll help ye,” Ian said suddenly, in a tone that was serious to the bone.
“Help me…?”
“Help ye kill this Captain Randall.”
Jamie lay silent for a moment, feeling his chest go tight.
“Jesus, Ian,” he said, very softly.

Brian Fraser’s soul must still exist. Surely there must be some way to reach him, to sense him.

“Ye think of me, Jamie, and Jenny and Lallybroch. Ye’ll not see us, but we’ll be here nonetheless and thinking of you. Look up at night, and see the stars, and ken we see them, too.”

“Are ye bad hurt, Jamie?”
“No, Da, I’ll be all right.”
For a minute, he had been. So heartened by seeing his father, sure it would all come right—and then he’d remembered Jenny, taking yon crochaire into the house, sacrificing herself for—

JAMIE MY SWEET BOY.

Jamie saying Hail Marys to keep his thoughts off of Jenny and his Da.

The other hardened mercenaries walking along beside him joining in and saying the prayer over and over together.

“D’ye want to go find out later?”
Jamie hesitated.
“I—well. No, I dinna think so... I promised Da I wouldna go wi’ whores, when I went to Paris. And now…I couldna do it without…thinkin’ of him, ken?”
Ian nodded, his face showing as much relief as disappointment.

These boys.

“You know what causes warts, friend?” Jamie said pleasantly—in biblical Hebrew. “Demons inside a man, trying to emerge through the skin.”

“I hope so,” Ian muttered. “Canna bear hangin’ about. I need to be movin’.”

“That why ye left Scotland, is it?”

“Didna want to farm, wasna much else to do. I make good money here. And I mostly send it home.”

And Ian ended up staying at Lallybroch forever.

Jamie wasn’t paying attention to the talk; he was still watching Rebekah. It was her passing resemblance to Annalise de Marillac, the girl he’d loved in Paris, that had drawn his attention.

STOP LOOKING AT WOMEN WHO ARENT YOUR WIFE JAMES.

Jamie shot to his feet, looking round for his shirt. Her eyes were fastened on his naked chest, and he was—for the first time in his life—embarrassed by the fact that he possessed nipples.

“I’m goin’ to the privy,” Jamie said abruptly, and stood up. He looked pale.
“Have ye got the shits?”
“Not yet.” With this ominous remark, he was off, bumping into tables in his haste.

Poor Jamie. I’m dying because of my last chapter of ATTILY & the syrup of figs.

The scene where Jamie gets the idea that you “do it the back way like horses” is actually super sad.

One of the men gets a whore but she doesn’t want to do whatever he asks for, so he hits her and knocks her down and rapes her in the courtyard in front of the whole tavern. @BEAyaNgLangit @displaceintime

The truth was, it made him sick with shame to think about Jenny, and he tried not to—and was the more ashamed because he mostly succeeded.

JAMIE MY POOR BABY BOY.

“If ye’ve got any thought to my sister, ye’re no going to—to—pollute yourself wi’ a French whore!”

Ian’s face went blank but then flooded with color in turn.

“Oh, aye? And if I said your sister wasna worth it?”

IAN MURRAY YOU SHUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH.

“Sorry,” Jamie managed. The agony in his hand was beginning to subside, but the anguish in his heart wasn’t.

“Aye,” Ian said quietly, not meeting his eye. “I wish we’d done something, too. Ye want to share a bowl o’ stew?”

Where did I leave my wee virgin bairns? Ahh, delivering the pretty Jewish girl and her maid to Paris.

Of course, they get held up by highwaymen. This is DG after all.

Ian riding with Rebekah in front of him gives me JC vibes.

“I’ll go and have some supper sent up,” he said. “I smelled a joint roasting. Some of that, and mayb—”
“Whatever they’ve got,” Jamie said fervently. “Bring it all.”

Teenagers.

She calls them Diego and Juan. Why is that so cute to me?

Ian gets some action w/ Rebekah:

“Aye, so?” Jamie whispered, and Ian’s breathing stopped. He swallowed audibly.

“If ye breathe a word of this to your sister,” he said in an impassioned whisper, “I’ll stab ye in your sleep, cut off your heid, and kick it to Arles and back.”

Ian on getting his first hand job:

“So…was it worth the chance of goin’ to hell?”

Ian sighed long and deep once more, but it was the sigh of a man at peace with himself.

“Oh, aye.”

“What is it they call the stick-insect things where the female one bites off the head of the male one after he’s got the business started?”

“Praying mantis, I think. Why?”

“I think our wee friend Pierre may have a more interesting wedding night than he expects. Come on.”

Anyway so THAT storyline was crazy.