Not tomorrow.
Not until the Crown had wrung their pound of flesh.
Mairi stroked her hair. “Hush now, sweetheart. Hush…”
But Fiona didn’t hush.
She broke and broke and broke again in the safety of Glenoran’s old stones.
The fire crackled.
The winter wind moaned at the shutters.
And Fiona—new mother, new widow, new legend—held her babe and wept until she had no breath left to spend.
The knock on the door was too polite.
Not a soldier’s pounding.
Not a neighbor’s visit.
A single, measured tap.
Fiona knew before she stood.
Knew before she lifted her daughter from her cradle.
Knew before she opened the door.
A messenger stood on the step—hat in hand, face pale with practiced pity. He extended a sealed parchment.
“For the Widow Mackenzie of Glenoran,” he said softly.
Widow.
The word scraped through her like blade on bone.
Fiona accepted the letter.
Her hands did not shake.
She carried it to the table.
Laid it flat.
Broke the black wax seal.
Read the words meant to bury her husband forever.
To the Widow Mackenzie of Glenoran, by order of His Majesty’s Government,
Harris Mackenzie, late of Glenoran, having been found guilty of high treason in support of the Young Pretender, was executed at the gallows of Inverness upon the 14th day of June, in the year of our Lord 1748.
His body hath been interred within the kirkyard adjoining the prison.
May God have mercy on his soul.
Enclosed are those personal effects returned by the custody of the Crown.
