The Outlandish Companion

by Diana Gabaldon

  The ring doesn’t exist physically, I’m afraid; only inside my head. I wear four rings, myself: two gold ones on the left hand, two silver on the right. On my left ring finger is my own wedding ring, which was a commercial pattern (i.e., it wasn’t custom-made for me, but was simply available). The pattern is called (oddly enough, in view of the fact that I was married long before even thinking of writing a Scottish novel) “Brigadoon.”

  It’s made of gold, and is 8 mm (5/16”) wide. It has an incised pattern of what I think are fern leaves, interspersed with small, four-petaled flowers, and it’s rather pretty. It looks as though the ferns and flowers are incised on a black background, but this is merely a side effect of the fact that I don’t bother to scrub it with a toothbrush now and then; it was all gold, originally.

  When I began writing Outlander, I undertook all kinds of things for research, including going to a Highland Games in Mesa, Arizona. I’d never been to a Highland Games before, and found it fascinating; bagpipes up the gazoo: drums, shortbread, and quite a lot of men in kilts. I came away from this event with two important souvenirs: a Clan Map of Scotland, which is still on my wall, and which has supplied most of the names for minor characters—as well as the odd geographical reference—for all of the books so far—and a silver ring.

  This one is 5 mm (3/16”) wide, and has a narrow band of plain silver at top and bottom, with a single band of interlace (aka Celtic knotwork) in between. Owing to its origins, I’ve always thought of it in terms of Outlander and things Scottish.

  Consequently, when Jamie decided to give Claire a ring (I had no idea that’s why he’d gone off right after arrival at the Castle), I was faced with the problem of describing it. Being a practical person, as well as a person of sentiment, I looked at my hands—and gave her a cross between my own two rings.

  Claire’s ring, therefore, is wide (like my own wedding band), made of silver (because gold jewelry wasn’t common in the Scottish Highlands, but silver was), and made with an interlace pattern (which is ancient, thus historically appropriate, and thoroughly Scottish) interspersed with thistle blooms (flowers, like my ring, but thistles for Scottishness).

  Now, there are certain elements described in the Outlander books that I would not under any circumstances allow to be illustrated—the characters, for instance. (As I say to the occasional person who complains that they want a picture because they can’t visualize Claire or Jamie—thumb through magazines until you find a nice-looking face and use that; it’s certainly as good as any illustration would be. I know what they look like, and so does any reader who has not destroyed his or her visual cortex with an overdose of television.)

  At the same time, there’s at least a sporting chance of coming up with a reasonable approximation of some of the inanimate objects about which people are curious—and with the aid of a pair of talented illustrators2 who were willing to take my rough suggestions and give me approximations to fiddle with, we’ve produced illustrations of some of the principal items of jewelry described in the books: Claire’s wedding ring, Ellen’s pearls, the boar’s-tusk bracelets, and the running-stag brooch worn by the ghost in Iverness.

  Oh, my other two rings? Well, they’re identical, save for the metal; one’s silver, one gold (silver on the right, gold on the left). They’re reproductions of fifteenth-century French poesy rings, and were given to me by my husband—one for a birthday gift, the other for an anniversary. Each of them bears the legend “Vous, et nul autre. “3

  Broch Tuarach means “the north-facing tower.” From the side of the mountain above, the broch that gave the small estate its name was no more than another mound of rocks, much like those that lay at the foot of the hills we had been traveling through.

  We came down through a narrow, rocky gap between two crags, leading the horse between boulders. Then the going was easier, the land sloping more gently down through the fields and scattered cottages, until at last we struck a small winding road that led to the house.

  It was larger than I had expected; a handsome three-story manor of harled white stone, windows outlined in the natural grey stone, a high slate roof with multiple chimneys, and several smaller whitewashed buildings clustered about it, like chicks about a hen. The old stone broch, situated on a small rise to the rear of the house, rose sixty feet above the ground, cone-topped like a witch’s hat, girdled with three rows of tiny arrow-slits.

  —Outlander, chapter 26, “The Lairds Return”

  “Scotland,” I sighed, thinking of the cool brown streams and dark pines of Lallybroch, Jamie’s estate. “Can we really go home?”

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 29, “To Grasp the Nettle”

  From this distance, the house seemed completely unchanged. Built of white harled stone, its three stories gleamed immaculately amid its cluster of shabby outbuildings and the spread of stone-dyked brown fields. On the small rise behind the house stood the remains of the ancient broch, the circular stone tower that gave the place its name.

  On closer inspection, I could see that the outbuildings had changed a bit; Jamie had told me that the English soldiery had burned the dovecote and the chapel the year after Culloden, and I could see the gaps where they had been. A space where the wall of the kailyard had been broken through had been repaired with stone of a different color, and a new shed built of stone and scrap lumber was evidently serving as a dovecote, judging from the row of plump feathered bodies lined up on the rooftree, enjoying the late autumn sun.

  The rose brier planted by Jamie’s mother, Ellen, had grown up into a great, sprawling tangle latticed to the wall of the house, only now losing the last of its leaves.

  —Voyager, chapter 32, “The Prodigal’s Return”

  The peat fire hissed on the hearth behind me, smelling of the Highlands, and the rich scent of cock-a-leekie and baking bread spread through the house, warm and comforting as a blanket.

  I could feel the pull of it around me—the house, the family, the place itself. I, who couldn’t remember a childhood home, felt the urge to sit down here and stay forever, enmeshed in the thousand strands of daily life, bound securely to this bit of earth. What would it have meant to him, who had lived all his life in the strength of that bond?

  —Voyager, chapter 37, “What’s in a Name”

  Brianna let the reins lie on Brutus’s neck, letting him rest after the last climb, and sat still, surveying the small valley below. The big white-harled farmhouse sat serenely in the middle of pale green fields of oats and barley, its windows and chimneys edged in gray stone, the walled kailyard and the numerous outbuildings clustering around it like chicks round a big white hen.

  She had never seen it before, but she was sure. She had heard her mother’s descriptions of Lallybroch often enough. And besides, it was the only substantial house for miles; she had seen nothing else in the last three days but the tiny stone-walled crofters’ cottages, many deserted and tumbled down, some no more than fire-black ruins.

  Smoke was rising from a chimney below; someone was home.

  —Drums of Autumn, chapter 34, “Lallybroch”

  I caught a strange nonmetallic gleam in the depths of the box, and pointed. “What’s that?”

  “Oh, those,” she said, dipping into the box again. “I’ve never worn them; they don’t suit me. But you could wear them—you’re tall and queenly, like my mother was. They were hers, ye ken.”

  They were a pair of bracelets. Each made from the curving, almost-circular tusk of a wild boar, polished to a deep ivory glow, the ends capped with silver tappets, etched with flowered tracery.

  “Lord, they’re gorgeous! I’ve never seen anything so… so wonderfully barbaric.”

  Jenny was amused. “Aye, that they are. Someone gave them to Mother as a wedding gift, but she never would say who. My father used to tease her now and then about her admirer, but she wouldna tell him, either, just smiled like a cat that’s had cream to its supper. Here, try them.”

  The ivory was cool and heavy on my arm. I couldn
’t resist stroking the deep yellow surface, grained with age.

  “Aye, they suit ye,” Jenny declared.…

  The bannocks were steaming gently in the cool air, and smelt heavenly. I reached for one, the heavy boars-tooth bracelets clinking together on my wrist. I saw Murtagh’s eyes on them and adjusted them so he could see the engraved silver end pieces.

  “Aren’t they lovely?” I said. “Jenny said they were her mother’s.”

  Murtagh’s eyes dropped to the bowl of parritch that Mrs. Cook had thrust unceremoniously under his nose.

  “They suit ye,” he mumbled.

  —Outlander, chapter 31,

  “Quarter Day”

  MacRannoch was studying the wizened little man, trying to subtract thirty years from the seamed countenance.

  “Aye, I know ye,” he said at last. “Or not the name, but you. Ye killed a wounded boar single-handed with a dagger, during the tynchal. A gallant beast too. That’s right, the MacKenzie gave ye the tushes—a bonny set, almost a complete double curve. Lovely work, that, man.” A look perilously close to gratification creased Murtagh’s pitted cheek momentarily.

  I started, remembering the magnificent, barbaric bracelets I had seen at Lallybroch. My mother’s, Jenny had said, given to her by an admirer.

  —Outlander, chapter 36,

  “MacRannoch”

  1I am an honorary Fraser, as well.

  2Carlos and Deborah Gonzales, of Running Changes, Inc.

  3You, and no other.

  “ARMA VIRUMQUE CANO”

  rapping his hand in the bloodstained cloth, Jamie cautiously pulled the dirk from the fire. He advanced slowly toward the boy, letting the blade fall, as though of its own volition, until it touched the lad’s jerkin. There was a strong smell of singed cloth from the handkerchief wrapped around the haft of the knife, which grew stronger as a narrow burnt line traced its way up the front of the jerkin in the dagger’s path. The point, darkening as it cooled, stopped just short of the upwardly straining chin. I could see the thin lines of sweat shining in the stretched hollows of the slender neck.

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 36,

  “Prestonpans”

  He turned back to the prisoner, busying himself in checking the priming and loading of the pistol. The twelve inches of heart-butted metal gleamed dark, the firelight picking out sparks of silver at trigger and priming pin. “Head or heart?” Jamie asked casually, raising his head at last.

  “Eh?” The boy’s mouth hung open in blank incomprehension.

  “I am going to shoot you,” Jamie explained patiently. “Spies are usually hanged, but in consideration of your gallantry, I am willing to give you a quick, clean death. Do ye prefer to take the ball in the head, or the heart?”

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 36,

  “Prestonpans”

  The priest would have to take care of himself, he thought. Jamie drew the broadsword as he rose, and with one long step, was within reach. The man was no more than a shape in the darkness, but distinct enough. The merciless blade smashed down with all his strength, and split the man’s skull where he stood.

  “Highlanders!” The shriek broke from the man’s companion, and the second sentry sprang out like a rabbit flushed from a copse, bounding away into the fading dark before Jamie could free his weapon from its gory cleft. He put a foot on the fallen man’s back and jerked, gritting his teeth against the unpleasant sensation of slack flesh and grating bone.

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 36,

  “Prestonpans”

  There was a faint, wheezing chuckle from Rupert, and another coughing spell. “Weel, grieve for me and ye will, Dougal,” he said, when he’d finished. “And I’m glad for it. But ye canna grieve ’till be deid, can ye? I would die by your hand, mo caraidh, not in the hands of the strangers.”

  “You are my chief, man, and it’s your duty,” he whispered. “Come now. Do it now. This dying hurts me, Dougal, and I would have it over.” Dougal’s dirk took him under the breastbone, hard and straight. The burly body convulsed, turning to the side with a coughing explosion of air and blood, but the brief sound of agony came from Dougal.

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 43,

  “Falkirk”

  Fire is a poor illuminator, but it would have taken total darkness to conceal that look on Geilie’s face; the sudden realization of what was coming toward her. She jerked the other pistol from her belt and swung it to bear on me. I saw the round hole of the muzzle clearly—and didn’t care. The roar of the discharge caromed through the cave, the echoes sending down showers of rocks and dirt, but by then I had seized the ax from the floor. I heard a noise behind me, but didn’t turn. Reflections of the fire burned red in the pupils of her eyes. The red thing, Jamie had called it. I gave myself to it, he had said.

  I didn’t need to give myself; it had taken me.

  There was no fear, no rage, no doubt. Only the stroke of the swinging ax. The shock of it echoed up my arm, and I let go, my fingers numbed. I stood quite still, not even moving when she staggered toward me.

  Blood in firelight is black, not red.

  —Voyager, chapter 62,

  “Abandawe”

  “Sometimes I know there’s something there, like,” Maisri said suddenly, “but I can block it out of my mind, not look. ’Twas like that with his lordship; I knew there was something, but I’d managed not to see it. But then he bade me look, and say the divining spell to make the vision come clear. And I did.” The hood of her cloak slipped back as she tilted her head, looking up at the wall of the Priory as it soared above us, ochre and white and red, with the mortar crumbling between its stones. White-streaked black hair spilled down her back, free in the wind.

  “He was standing there before the fire, but it was daylight, and clear to see. A man stood behind him, still as a tree, and his face covered in black. And across his lordship’s face there fell the shadow of an ax.”

  —Dragonfly in Amber, chapter 41,

  “The Seer’s Curse”

  It was the gralloch prayer he had been taught as a boy, learning to hunt in the Highlands of Scotland. It was old, he had told me; so old that some of the words were no longer in common use, so it sounded unfamiliar. But it must be said for any animal slain that was larger than a hare, before the throat was cut or the bellyskin split.

  Without hesitation, he made a shallow slash across the chest—no need to bleed the carcass; the heart was long since still—and ripped the skin between the legs, so the pale swell of the intestines bulged up from the narrow, black-furred slit, gleaming in the light.

  It took both strength and considerable skill to split and peel back the heavy skin without penetrating the mesenteric membrane that held the visceral sac enclosed. I, who had opened softer human bodies, recognized surgical competence when I saw it.

  –Drums of Autumn, chapter 15, “Noble Savages”

  PART NINE

  FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

  Q: Is Craigh na Dun a real place?

  A: Let’s put it this way; if it was … would I tell you?

  ANSWERS

  Who is speaking in the prologues? Claire? Brianna? You?

  A: Well, that’s a good question. To me, the prologue is essentially the voice of the book speaking, if that makes any sense. All the books are designed to stand individually, as well as to interlock as parts of a whole. Consequently, while I hope the various plot elements, characters, etc., are consistent among the books, each book is meant to be unique in tone, structure, and approach. So, each prologue is meant to convey something about the tone and essence of that particular book.

  With the exception of Outlander, the prologues have been the single most difficult passage to write in each book.1 It always takes multiple tries to get one right, and I often have to wait for inspiration—in the form of a phrase or vision—to hit.2 In Drums, the prologue was the last thing written!

  As to the question, though, I prefer to leave the prologues ambiguous. Who is speaking?
The book itself (though I do imagine that any given reader may hear the book speaking with the voice of one or another of the characters).

  One peculiarity regarding the prologues is that while the ambiguity works fine in written form, the recorded version really has to be a little more certain. That is, the poor actress who does the audiobook recordings (Geraldine James for the abridged Bantam audio versions; Davina Porter for the unabridged versions from Recorded Books (see Appendix VI: “Foreign Editions Audiotapes, and Strange, Strange Covers”) is obliged to read the prologues in someone’s voice.

  Evidently, either the abridger or Ms. James decided (they didn’t ask me) that the prologues of the first three books should be read in Claire’s voice, while the Drums of Autumn prologue was read in Brianna’s voice.

  However, the first paragraph of the Drums prologue contains this line: “When I look in the mirror, my mother’s eyes look back at me.…” For what the observation is worth—we’ve made rather a Big Deal through three books, now, about how much Brianna resembles Jamie Fraser, up to and including the slanted blue cat eyes. Claire’s eyes, on the other hand, have been described at no-doubt tedious length in terms of sherry, whisky, and other intoxicant substances of a brownish hue.

  And Claire does once describe her own mother, while looking at a photograph (in Voyager): “Warm brown eyes…”

  Q: Is there going to be another book about Jamie and Claire?

  A: Oh, yes. There will be two more novels—The Fiery Cross and (so far) King, Farewell—that complete the story of Jamie and Claire. There will also be a prequel volume, dealing with Jamie Fraser’s parents, Brian and Ellen, and the 1715 Rising.