A Very Highland Holiday - Kathryn Le Veque Page 0,10

at Culloden. There were shoes on the floor, neatly lined up, and on a chest sat a stack of sabers. In the corner, a pile of whole and broken targes caught his attention. Some of them had bloodstains, some of them damaged from the musket ball and cannon fire.

Then, there were the flags.

A Saltire lay torn, with holes in it, and on top of that was a British flag that was equally damaged. James stared at the flags, one atop the other, and the shock he experienced transformed into something horrifying. Although he hadn’t been at the battle, he was experiencing it through the eyes of the remains.

The smashed, stained remains that still echoed the sickening sound of battle.

He could hear it.

“O-Oh… God,” he muttered. “You went to the battlefield and you scavenged all of this, didn’t you?”

Carrie was standing inside the chamber, lamp held high. “Nay,” she said firmly. “Not scavenge. Some of these things I brought from the battlefield, but other things I was given. They were brought here for safekeeping. I’m protecting them.”

James didn’t say anything. He had caught sight of the haversacks and he went to them, a dozen or more piled up. Kneeling down, he picked up the first one and peered into it, poking around.

Carrie came up behind him with the lamp.

“As ye can see, their money is still there, if there was any,” she said. “I dinna take their money, but I put any valuables away for safekeeping. I thought that, someday, their kin would come looking for them, so I took these before the scavengers could get tae them. I brought ye here so ye could look through all of this, tae see if there is something of yer brother.”

James was on one knee in front of the pile of haversacks. As he looked at them, a lone tear popped from his right eye, falling into the ground. The haversacks were stained with blood, most were badly damaged. He was feeling the concussion of the cannon fire and hearing the wail of the musket balls as they flew over his head. If he closed his eyes, he could feel, and hear, everything. He was in the throes of a battle he’d not attended, but his brother had.

Johnathan had been in the middle of it.

Silently, he moved about the chamber, looking for anything that might have belonged to his brother.

“I’ve lived in the Highlands all my life,” Carrie said, oblivious to his inner turmoil. “I see more of people from all over because of the tavern and I talk tae them. I always thought I understood a great deal, but this battle… I dunna understand it.”

James was preoccupied with his hunt. “W-What don’t you understand?”

Carrie watched him rifle through a pile of belts and other leather goods. “The British,” she said. “They came here tae destroy our lads once and for all. Men like yer brother… why did they have tae come? I dunna understand the needs of war.”

James paused. “T-The needs of war,” he repeated the words softly. “T-That is a very good question. My family has been fighting for the King of England since Richard the Lionheart held the throne. He’s the one who went to The Holy Land and fought against the savages there. His need was to bring Christianity to those men. Every war has a need.”

“But what was this need?”

“T-To put down the Pretender, of course.”

“And ye believe he’s the Pretender? Or do the English fight because they’re told tae, not because they believe in the cause?”

James scratched his head. It was an astute question, one without an easy answer. “I-I cannot speak for others, but I fight because that is what I am trained for,” he said quietly. “M-My brother and I come from a long line of soldiers. We fight for our king. It is as simple as that.”

“Then yer heart isna in it?”

“M-My heart is never in war. I-I don’t think my brother’s was, either, which makes his death all the more tragic.”

Carrie pondered that. “I suppose I want tae know what is in the hearts of men who would come tae Scotland and kill our lads.”

“I-It was duty, Carrie. N-Nothing more.”

Carrie fell silent after that. As she continued to follow him about, trying to be helpful by holding the lamp, James dug through piles of bloodied and dirty possessions. There was a neat pile of redcoats, torn and filthy, but nothing that belonged to his brother. In fact, he didn’t see anything familiar until