My Lovely Fawn,
It’s been two days since I last wrote, and so much has happened and yet hardly nothing at all. We are still here at Mull, and I’m happy to report two boats loaded with food rations and medical supplies arrived at our encampment along with two more clans in support of our cause.
I’ve been forced to partake in some hand-to-hand combat with my comrades as we prepare for the worst our enemy may have for us, but one of the men from the new clan has taken a special interest in my skills with the arrow and bow. I’m lucky we spent so many summers tracking deer and target practicing in the woods. Without your help and steady patience to guide me, I would be sent to the front lines like every other inexperienced man here. It’s you who’s saving my life now!
Even from a hundred fathoms away, I feel you.
I’m sending these letters to anyone I encounter who’s headed through the Highlands. I don’t know if any of them will reach you, but I know without a doubt there is only one Fawn MacDonald in all of Skye. Please forgive their belatedness should they reach you out of sequence.
The snow began in earnest last night, and with the wind frosting my cheeks, I thought of the night we watched a life fade in our arms.
I remember all our happy moments, but I remember the sad ones too. I remember every second of my existence with you. Do you with me?
That night, when you came to my window, I never thought you would change my life. I should have known better, you are the spark of inspiration that ignites an inferno, Fawn. I’d been cautioned away from the old witch down the lane from Leith, so when you threw stones up at the window of the keep and waved me down, I had no idea I’d be going to the one place my father would have insisted I never see.
When you told me you needed help, that someone was hurt and dying, I was quick to follow you. We arrived at your cottage to find your mother struggling to save a woman who’d just given birth to a baby that was struggling to survive itself. The cord had been wrapped around its neck many times, but when the mother lost too much blood from the birth and fainted, your mother had sent you out in search of help. I wasn’t much help at all; the hands of a fourteen-year-old boy are ill prepared to cradle death so closely. But as your mother worked to save the young mother, you and I did what we could to save the tiniest life I’d ever seen. I’m not sure if you knew it then, but I cried as I watched you try to rouse life into the tiny form. We worked under the moonlight near the loch for what felt like hours, until dawn arrived and hope died.
We swaddled the little life and cried together. I knew then that our souls were entwined.
I knew then that death and life mirror each other like twin flames through lifetimes, our blood and bone forged eternally.
I knew then you were mine.
With Fondest Regard,
Atlas
Isle of Mull, Scotland
My Gentle Fawn,
Nerves are on edge as our enemy advances to the north. First, they’ll take Edinburgh, and when they do, we’ll begin our advancement inland. I am told men in coats of crimson aren’t our only concern, but that a few sea monsters and kelpie may threaten our progress too! I imagine sea monsters only come for the sailors who have added a wee too much whisky to their drams.
I spend my nights praying that the loss of blood will be minimal, and my days preparing for the brutality that this battle will require of all of us. My fellow men are ready. I am not. I’d rather set sail for Skye and the tender embrace of your arms, but alas, I was born a Highlander, and I’ve pledged to die one if that’s what it takes.
Many of the men stay up late telling battle tales and drinking until they’re too pissed to do anything but crawl back to their tents. The commanders are hardly more than men who worked the land to feed their families in the years leading up to now. Whilst morale is high and our freedoms and way of life are surely at stake, I fear we are outnumbered to the tune of thousands. No man has a right to rule over the life of another man, especially from a world so far removed from the life of a Highlander.
I trust your father, mother, and sister share my concerns, though your father’s experience and wisdom afford him a life thankfully separate from battle. I hope this brutality never reaches the peace of Skye; I hope you may forever live far distant from the blood of war which I’m about to face. It is in these moments, before we march off like cattle to slaughter, that I’m reminded of the valor of our forefathers, and how it is their courage in the blood that runs through our veins. The clans have finally joined forces against their oppressor. They will not stand for the colonization of their culture any longer.
First, we will circumvent Fort William by water, and then we’ll make our way through the lochs onward to Inverness. You’re in my thoughts, always.
With Loving Regard,
Atlas
Isle of Mull, Scotland
My Sweet Fawn,
I am pleased to inform you that your letter arrived in my hands safe and sound, along with a delivery of salt cod and handmade battle-axes. You are a lamb to write, and your comment about my father lording over his lands and pushing his boundaries is amusing, if not accurate. Clan business is clan business, and my father has always been fair to the tenants of his lands and only uses a firm hand when tithings are due. He provided work to the locals when he commissioned Leith be built a decade ago, and while he may have had the abbey partially demolished, the monks had abandoned it long ago. And anyway, he was persuaded to leave the remaining ruins and kirkyard as a reminder of what has passed.
As the head of Clan Campbell, my father has been strict but benevolent and shown his appreciation to the locals with flagrant generosity. Your family knows the glens and crags of Skye far more than my own and has been indispensable in settling the land around Leith. I can’t think of a better pairing than us—a unification of two of the most prominent families this land has ever born witness to.
Together, we are unstoppable.
And still, fear clutches my throat each night as we near our destination. The only thoughts that soothe my soul are those occupied by you. I think of the way the sunshine glinted off your hair as we lay together the first time. The threads of my wool jacket cushioning you from the hard stone of the abbey walls as we enjoyed our time together under the stars. I wish it was just you and I under the stars of Skye now. Instead, I sit in a cold tent alone, just me and your ghost.
I stand by my request for your hand in marriage, and my utmost priority lies with asking your father for his blessing. As soon as this nonsense passes, I will return to you, my darling.
