A Nighean Ruadh

Eyes of Whisky

Featured Gaelic with Pronunciations:

- Thig cuide rium (hig coo-jeh room) - Come along with me

- a charaid (a har-raj) - friend (speaking to)

- Bràithrean (brah-threyn) - brothers (singular: bràthair (brah-hehth)

- Uilleam (oo-yehm) - Gaelic form of William

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14 April, 1743

Castle Leoch, The Highlands, Scotland

Over a week now, I'd been a resident of Castle Leoch, and the whole time, Dougal and his men had kept their eyes on me. It was disturbing, to say the least, but I supposed I couldn't blame them. Were I in their shoes, I likely would be wary of a stranger, too - the English taught us to be wary of everyone. In my time, we had many English who posed as Scots to try and gain intelligence on the rebellion, and it wouldn't have surprised me to hear that the same was done in this time, too, as the feelings towards the English were roughly the same, if not less volatile than in my own time. I had tried to plot an escape, but it was difficult to take a walk around the grounds scouting out the terrain without a wary eye being kept on me.

On this day, however, their guard was down, if only a little, as the Laird was meeting with the people who lived on his land to hear their grievances and serve as judge to their suits. I was to serve as healer to anyone in need of medical care, so I made it a point to go out into the woods searching for herbs, with my faithful shadow of Rupert Mackenzie following closely behind. "Ye'll likely be very bored," I told him, "unless ye want me te put ye to work."

"I'm te watch ye, lassie, not engage ye. Unless ye want a good romp in the woods," said Rupert in a teasing tone, and I rolled my eyes.

"Not the kind of work I was thinkin'," I said, and then I stopped and turned, handing him the basket. "Here, ye'll take this, and I'll collect my herbs and fill it."

"I'll not be told what te do by a lassie!" he exclaimed.

"Fine, I'll ask ye. Would ye please be so kind as te hold my basket while I gather my herbs?" I asked him. That seemed to work fine, as most highlanders often didn't refuse the requests of a lady. I got to work collecting my herbs, coming across some mushrooms growing on trees. There were many, many different kinds of mushrooms, and each of them had various uses that were good for medicinal uses. As I reached out to start pulling them off the tree, I was startled by a nearby voice that was laced with amusement.

"Those are poisonous," said the voice, and I jumped, dropping the mushroom. I sought out the voice's source and my eyes landed on a fair-haired, green-eyed woman maybe ten years my senior looking at me through amused, jestful eyes. "Who are ye tryin' te do in? If it's my husband, I'd be grateful."

"Thank ye but I ken they're poisonous - or rather, the tops are, but the stems are actually quite useful in preventin' bleeding," I told her, bending down to pick up the mushroom that I had dropped.

"Are they, now? What kind of bleeding?" asked the woman.

"Wounds and such," I told her. "Not courses, if tha's what yer askin'." She looked toward the ground, nodded to something and then met my eyes again.

"Do ye see that plant there?" she asked, and I turned my attention to the plant she had been looking at.

"Aye, rue," I said, recognising the small yellow flowers.