Diana Gabaldon - Voyager

Contents

To my children,
Laura Juliet,
Samuel Gordon,
and Jennifer Rose,
Who gave me the heart, the blood, and the bones of this book.

High Praise for

DIANA GABALDON and her novels

VOYAGER IS, FRANKLY, AN AMAZING READ. An unusual mix of romance, suspense and history.If you can put this huge tome down before dawn, youre made of sterner stuff than I am.

Arizona Tribune

ROUSINGAUDACIOUSEXCITINGGabaldon masterfully weavesflashbackscrossing time periods with abandon but never losing track of the story.

Locus

INTRICATELY DETAILEDRICH IMAGINATIONTHIS COULD BE THE START OF A SERIES TO RIVAL JAMES CLAVELLS ORIENTAL SAGAS.

The Oak Ridger (Tennessee)

SUPERIOR QUALITYA TALENT THAT GOES BEYOND SUPERB, BEYOND INTELLIGENT STORYTELLING.

The Grand Prairie News (Texas)

UNCONVENTIONALMEMORABLE STORYTELLING

The Seattle Times

ELABORATE AND COMPELLINGGABALDON [IS] A NATURAL STORYTELLER. VOYAGER ISA LAVISH AND ENTERTAINING MIX OF HISTORY AND FANTASY.

Blade-Citizen (San Diego, California)

They are middle-aged lovers now, but their passion is just as strong (and Gabaldon had Voyager in her sights long before there was Robert James Waller). The language is right, the feeling is right, and if [Gabaldon] wants to write about Jamie and Claire when theyre 50-something, Id be happy to spend another 870 pages with them.

Detroit Free Press

GABALDON MAKESHER STORY SING FOR ANYONE! [VOYAGER] is an involved tale that smoothly blends several popular genres. After reading the final chapter, youll wish there were more.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer

Acknowledgments

The authors deepest thanks to:

Jackie Cantor, as always, for being the rare and marvelous sort of editor who thinks its all right if a book is long as long as its good; my husband, Doug Watkins, for his literary eye, his marginal notes (e.g., nipples again?), and the jokes he insists I steal from him to give to Jamie Fraser; my elder daughter, Laura, who says, If you come talk to my class about writing again, just talk about books and dont tell them about whale penises, okay?; my son, Samuel, who walks up to total strangers in the park and says, Have you read my mothers book?; my younger daughter, Jenny, who says, Why dont you wear makeup like on your book covers all the time, Mommy?; Margaret J. Campbell, scholar; Barry Fodgen, english poet; and Pindens Cinola Oleroso Loventon Greenpeace Ludovic, dog; for generously allowing me to use their personae as the basis for the excesses of imagination (Mr. Fodgen wishes to note for the record that his dog Ludo has never actually tried to copulate with anyones leg, wooden or not, but does understand the concept of artistic license); Perry Knowlton, who as well as being an excellent literary agent is also a fount of knowledge about bowlines, mainsails, and matters nautical, as well as the niceties of French grammar and the proper way to gut a deer; Robert Riffle, noted authority on what plants grow where, and what they look like while doing so; Kathryn (whose last name was either Boyle or Frye; all I remember is that it had to do with cooking), for the useful information on tropical diseases, particularly the picturesque habits of loa loa worms; Michael Lee West, for detailed descriptions of Jamaica, including regional dialect and folklore anecdotes; Dr. Mahlon West, for advice on typhoid fever; William Cross, Paul Block (and Pauls father), and Chrystine Wu (and Chrystines parents), for invaluable assistance with Chinese vocabulary, history, and cultural attitudes; my father-in-law, Max Watkins, who, as always, provided useful comments on the appearance and habits of horses, including which way they face when the wind is blowing; Peggy Lynch, for wanting to know what Jamie would say if he saw a picture of his daughter in a bikini; Lizy Buchan, for telling me the story about her husbands ancestor who escaped Culloden; Dr. Gary Hoff, for medical detail; Fay Zachary, for lunch and critical comment; Sue Smiley, for critical reading and suggesting the blood vow; David Pijawka, for the materials on Jamaica and his most poetic description of what the air feels like after a Caribbean rainstorm; Iain MacKinnon Taylor, and his brother Hamish Taylor, for their most helpful suggestions and corrections of Gaelic spelling and usages; and as always, the various members of the CompuServe Literary Forum, including Janet McConnaughey, Marte Brengle, Akua Lezli Hope, John L. Myers, John E. Simpson, Jr., Sheryl Smith, Alit, Norman Shimmel, Walter Hawn, Karen Pershing, Margaret Ball, Paul Solyn, Diane Engel, David Chaifetz, and many others, for being interested, providing useful discussion, and laughing in the right places.

PROLOGUE

When I was small, I never wanted to step in puddles. Not because of any fear of drowned worms or wet stockings; I was by and large a grubby child, with a blissful disregard for filth of any kind.

It was because I couldnt bring myself to believe that that perfect smooth expanse was no more than a thin film of water over solid earth. I believed it was an opening into some fathomless space. Sometimes, seeing the tiny ripples caused by my approach, I thought the puddle impossibly deep, a bottomless sea in which the lazy coil of tentacle and gleam of scale lay hidden, with the threat of huge bodies and sharp teeth adrift and silent in the far-down depths.

And then, looking down into reflection, I would see my own round face and frizzled hair against a featureless blue sweep, and think instead that the puddle was the entrance to another sky. If I stepped in there, I would drop at once, and keep on falling, on and on, into blue space.

The only time I would dare to walk through a puddle was at twilight, when the evening stars came out. If I looked in the water and saw one lighted pinprick there, I could splash through unafraidfor if I should fall into the puddle and on into space, I could grab hold of the star as I passed, and be safe.

Even now, when I see a puddle in my path, my mind half-haltsthough my feet do notthen hurries on, with only the echo of the thought left behind.

What if, this time, you fall?

P ART O NE

Battle, and the Loves of Men

THE CORBIES FEAST

Many a Highland chieftain fought,

Many a gallant man did fall.

Death itself were dearly bought,

All for Scotlands King and law.

Will Ye No Come Back Again

April 16, 1746

H e was dead. However, his nose throbbed painfully, which he thought odd in the circumstances. While he placed considerable trust in the understanding and mercy of his Creator, he harbored that residue of elemental guilt that made all men fear the chance of hell. Still, all he had ever heard of hell made him think it unlikely that the torments reserved for its luckless inhabitants could be restricted to a sore nose.

On the other hand, this couldnt be heaven, on several counts. For one, he didnt deserve it. For another, it didnt look it. And for a third, he doubted that the rewards of the blessed included a broken nose, any more than those of the damned.

While he had always thought of Purgatory as a gray sort of place, the faint reddish light that hid everything around him seemed suitable. His mind was clearing a bit, and his power to reason was coming back, if slowly. Someone, he thought rather crossly, ought to see him and tell him just what the sentence was, until he should have suffered enough to be purified, and at last to enter the Kingdom of God. Whether he was expecting a demon or an angel was uncertain. He had no idea of the staffing requirements of Purgatory; it wasnt a matter the dominie had addressed in his schooldays.