I stood still, vision blurring, and in that moment, I heard my heart break. It was a small, clean sound, like the snapping of a flower’s stem.
I can bear pain myself, he said softly, but I couldna bear yours. That would take more strength than I have.
Blood of my Blood,” he whispered, “and bone of my bone. You carry me within ye, Claire, and ye canna leave me now, no matter what happens, You are mine, always, if ye will it or no, if ye want me or nay. Mine, and I wilna let ye go.
Ye are Blood of my Blood, and Bone of my Bone, I give ye my Body, that we Two might be One. I give ye my Spirit, ’til our Life shall be Done.
For where all love is, the speaking is unnecessary.
You are mine, always, if ye will it or no, if ye want me or nay. Mine, and I willna let ye go.
And I mean to hear ye groan like that again. And to moan and sob, even though you dinna wish to, for ye canna help it. I mean to make you sigh as though your heart would break, and scream with the wanting, and at last to cry out in my arms, and I shall know that I’ve served ye well.
It has always been forever, for me, Sassenach.
I shook so that it was some time before I realized that he was shaking too, and for the same reason. I don’t know how long we sat there on the dusty floor, crying in each others arms with the longing of twenty years spilling down our faces.
Don’t be afraid. There’s the two of us now.
It wasn’t a thing I had consciously missed, but having it now reminded me of the joy of it; that drowsy intimacy in which a man’s body is accessible to you as your own, the strange shapes and textures of it like a sudden extension of your own limbs.
Character, I think, is the single most important thing in fiction. You might read a book once for its interesting plot – but not twice.
Lord, ye gave me a rare woman, and God! I loved her well.
This is our time. Until that time stops – for one of us, for both – it is our time. Now. Will you waste it, because you are afraid?
You dinna need to understand me, Sassenach,” he said quietly. “So long as you love me.
Damn right I begrudge! I grudge every memory of yours that doesna hold me, and every tear ye’ve shed for another, and every second you’ve spent in another man’s bed!
For if you feel for me as i do for you – then I am asking you to tear out your heart and live without it.