“Understandable.”
“No thanks to—”
“Dinna say it,” Jamie said, cutting her off before she could indulge her anger, leaving her sputtering. “Ye dinna ken what ails the poor lass. Aftyn did everything possible and kept her alive until I arrived.”
Agatha sputtered. “I dinna…”
“Ye blame the healer unfairly for a tragedy no one could have prevented,” Jamie said, cutting her off.
Agatha’s gaze dropped to the floor. “I wish she’d saved my bairn instead of me.”
Shocked, Aftyn spoke up. “Ye were never in danger. And the bairn’s death had nought to do with ye, or his birth. He simply was no’ strong enough to survive.”
Aftyn had heard his heart stutter and stop. She’d tried but could not make it beat again. Agatha had lost two daughters to stillbirth. Perhaps the dashed hopes after the joy of a live birth—a son—had been more than anyone could bear. In any case, Aftyn stayed away from both Agatha and her husband, and hoped they never needed a healer again, because they would not accept her help. The day their son died, her future in the glen became tenuous at best, dangerous at worst. If people would not call on her, and she knew some who wouldn’t, she remained on her father’s sufferance, nothing more.
“What she says is true, Agatha,” Jamie told her.
Agatha didn’t look up. “How would ye ken? Ye were no’ here.”
The pain in her voice still tore at Aftyn.
Jamie answered her. “I’ve seen the like before, and I’m sorry for all ye have been through, but ye must no’ blame this lass.”
“Dinna tell me what I must no’ do! I do blame her.”
“Ye always have,” Aftyn said, then wished she hadn’t. Provoking Agatha was not wise.
“Get out of my sight,” Agatha snarled.
“And does that apply to me, too?” Jamie asked, his voice remarkably calm.
“What? Nay, of course no’. Robena might still need ye.”
“It does, Agatha. Ye canna see it for yer grief, but ye canna drive away one healer and expect to keep the other.”
She crossed her arms and glared at them both. “Then I’m done with both of ye.”
“But perhaps Robena isna.”
Aftyn held her tongue, letting Jamie’s tone of calm reason settle Agatha. Nothing she could say would make Agatha behave any better. She glanced at him for some indication of what he wanted to do.
“This is no place to argue what canna be changed,” he said, his gaze on Agatha.
Agatha sniffed, stood, and marched out the door without a backward glance.
Aftyn thought to follow her, to try to explain yet again what had happened to her son. Agatha refused to hear that anything could be wrong with her strong husband’s son.
“Are ye no’ going to follow her?”
“I’d rather talk to ye. What potion did ye give Robena? She sleeps so long, so deeply. And she breathes after weeks and months of gasping for air when the mist rolls in and the air gets thick and heavy. Did ye give her aught for her pain?”
“I’d tell ye, lass, if I could, but ’tis aught learned from my mother and hers, and is no’ mine to share. Ye must rely on all yer mother left ye.”
Again, that look of pain pinching his forehead, hooding his gaze. Did he lie? Or did he truly regret not being able to share his methods with her?
She needed Robena to wake so she could see for herself how much improved the woman was. And she needed Jamie to give up his secrets. She tried a different tack. “Why are ye here again without me? I asked ye to wait.”
He glanced at the door as if wishing he could go on his way rather than answer her questions, but she wouldn’t take her gaze from him as long as it held him pinned in place. She would use that regret she saw in his eyes against him, as she must.
