A revelation about Jemmy forces Roger and Brianna to choose between staying in the eighteenth century and returning to the safety of the future. Jamie finds that unrest in the back country has given rise to a new power.
Autumn 1772
The Frasers and the MacKenzies are on their way home with peanuts because Claire wants Jemmy to grow up with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
The group stops at a burned-out cabin, inside the bodies of the inhabitants. Roger wonders why they didn’t leave and Jamie says it is because they were all dead before the fire. Jamie turns a body and Claire pulls out an arrowhead. Jamie doesn’t buy it as there is only one arrow amongst the dead.
The groups spreads out to find any survivors and Roger finds a young girl severely burned lying in the dirt. Jamie knows she can’t survive her wounds so instead of calling for Claire; Roger and he decides to end her suffering. Roger puts a handkerchief over her mouth and nose while Jamie says:
Thou goest home this night to thy home of autumn, and of spring and of summer. Thou goest home this night to thy perpetual home, to thine eternal bed. To thine eternal slumber.
The bury the bodies and then head home to the Ridge.
On the Ridge
Young Ian has the stone Claire found (Otter Tooth’s opal) and is playing with Jemmy. When Jemmy touches it he thinks it is hot and gets upset. Bree comes down to see what is going on and thinks the stone is warm as well. Young Ian is baffled because he doesn’t think the stone is warm at all. Roger also feels it and when Jem hold it again the stone breaks to pieces and a buzzing like the stone circles can be heard by all travelers including Jem.
Bree realizes this means Jem can travel but Jamie wonders if it means they will.
The Browns arrive with a Committee of Safety they’ve assembled to protect the area. The Governor cannot sanction it but he knows. Richard Brown mentions people being attacked and their homes burned and Jamie confirms they’ve come across such things. He wants Jamie and Roger to join him.
Lionel goes into the house for Claire to tend and she asks after Bonnie (Beardsley child). He mentions the ordeal with Morton and wonders if she thinks a father has no right to seek justice for a daughter who has been dishonored, which Jamie obviously just did (different circumstances).
A corporal Hodgepile believes the attacks are from the Indians but Young Ian defends them and Roger back him by saying the people were not scalped.
Inside, Jamie wonders if Bree and Roger will leave. Claire tells him Bree promised Roger once they knew if Jem could travel. Ian comes in and asks if they are going to discuss what happened. Jamie hopes he means the Browns but Ian wants to discuss the opal.
The Mohawk believe the whoever has the stone will see Otter Tooth and see what will come to pass. The Mohawk wondered about her and he says he told them there is no one like her. Ian’s been thinking about this and has wondered where they all came from. He gives Jamie a book that was from Otter Tooth which is in Latin:
“I am. I still exist. Did I in that place between? I do not know exactly when I am, nor can I find out. These people do not measure time by any scale I know, nor do I have the tongue to find out. But I know I am too late.”
Jamie hands the book to Claire and she notes he wrote with a ballpoint pen. Ian wants to know what she is. Claire tells him she comes from the future, 200 year in the future. He thinks she’s a fairy but she says she’s not. He realizes they all are and Jamie knew. Ian asks if Murtagh knew and Jamie confirms it.
Jamie and Claire ride out to a small hut where Ulysses is staying. He’s hiding out because he killed Forbes and no matter the reason he would be killed for harming a white man. Jamie brings him the book Pamela (a nod to the books) and warns Ulysses about the Committee of Safety.
Claire wonders if he’s given thought to where he’d go and suggest Philadelphia where the Quakers do not hold with slavery. Ulysses confesses he is not, in fact, a slave. Jocasta manumitted him after her husband died but he stayed with her. He doesn’t come out and say it but it is clearly because he loved her.
Back at the cabin, Bree and Roger discuss why the opal broke. She believe it could have happened because Jem is the product of two travelers which could mean Jem is Roger’s biological son.
The two decide to tell people he got a job as a professor in Boston.
The next day, Lizzie comes in to tell Jamie he has a visitor who is Lord John! Lizzie seems enamored. Jamie asks after John’s son (wink) who is at school in London. John will be their first guest as they finished the upstairs.
Jamie and John discuss what happened with Bonnet.
Outside, Young Ian wonders if you can change history but Claire tells him despite their efforts they couldn’t stop Culloden from happening. Ian wants to change something smaller like what happens between a man and a woman but Claire tells him it isn’t possible for him to travel.
Inside, John is telling Jamie he will return to Helwater where Lord Dunsaney has died. Jamie sends his condolences. John loves his estate of Mount Josiah and, of course, he’ll miss Jamie. John must go back to teach William how to be an Earl. He does hope to return but worries about the mood in the colonies.
John has a gift for Jamie, a small portrait of William who John says looks more and more like Jamie.
That night, Claire is saying she asked Bree to draw some portraits of all of them so they can remember them. Claire goes to brush her hair and she puts perfume on in some discreet places but when she turns back to Jamie he is asleep.
In the night, she wakes to a hot flash and goes to the window for some air. Jamie wakes and comes to her soon realizing she wanted him and he fell asleep. Now he means to make it up to her in the window of their bedroom.
The next morning, Claire is looking through her telescope lens Lord John brought her. Jamie looks and finds wee things with tails. He thinks they are the germs she talked about but she tells them they are sperm and he realize she means seed. He wonders who they belong too and she tells them they’re his. He wonders about she got them and she informs him she woke in custody of them.
In the dinning room, Jamie finds Bree and shows her the portrait of William and tells her about her brother and what happened at Helwater. He explains William is the Nineth Earl of Elsmere and maybe she could follow him through history when she returns to her time. Jamie tells her she has made his life whole.
Out on a walk, Bree and Roger tell Marsali and Fergus about the “job offer” and they are leaving. Fergus says Boston is so far. Marsali is upset and says Bree is like a sister to her and she doesn’t know what she’ll do with ANOTHER bairn on the way.
Claire catches Bree saying goodbye to others on the Ridge and walks away. Bree goes after her but Lizzie stops her and says she should start saying goodbye as well. Brianna breaks the news that she won’t be going with them. Lizzie is upset and tells her she’s been with her through good times and bad. Bree saved her and she’s meant to be with her always. Brianna tells her she wants Lizzie to stay and look after her parents. When Lizzie cries Bree tells her not to because she’s trying to be brave and Lizzie tells Bree she’s the bravest person she knows.
Lionel Brown arrives again, this time with a wife that needs tending and a message about whether they will join the Committee. Jamie respectively declines. They’ve been married almost a year.
Claire tells the woman her wrist is broken and it happens when you fall or the wrist is twisted. She tells her she’s going to splint the wrist and she can’t use it much. Claire asks Lionel to ask Jamie for some whisky for a tonic for the pain. He goes off and Claire talks with Rose. She says she can’t do all the choir with one arm and Lionel gets angry when they aren’t done. He gets sad and drinks when he thinks about Alicia. Lionel wants another child but he got mad when she wouldn’t lie with him because she was taking Dr. Rawlings advice. She doesn’t want a child Lionel might harm.
Lionel comes in and puts the whisky on her worktable noticing the encryption of Dr. D. Rawlings in her medical kit. He gets upset and ushers Rose out of the surgery. He ominously says he’s obliged to her.
Roger approaches Ian in the yard and asks that he comes with them to the circle. They don’t want Jamie and Claire to go because she might not want to go herself and someone must bring home the horse and wagon. He then tries to give Ian his land but Ian won’t accept it and Roger tells him to look after it.
Brianna finds John on the porch and says her own goodbyes. She tells him she learned of her brother and he is happy she knows. They are very much alike and like Jamie. John says in disposition as well. Bree says that means he has a temper as well. John will be taking Ulysses with him to England with him where he will remain free and be safe. John tells Bree she’s impossible not to like.
Roger and Bree watch Jamie with Jem on a horse through a window. Bree never had grandparents and Roger says he never had parents even.
Brianna and Claire hug saying their own goodbye.
At dinner, Claire serves the futures ‘journeycake,’ peanut butter and jelly sandwiches though Jamie thinks you could seal boots with it. They all laugh and Jamie toasts.
Later, Roger, Bree, Jem, and Ian set off for the stones. Ian watches as they tie themselves together and touch the stones, disappearing. Ian touches the stones himself but doesn’t go anywhere.
On the other side, Bree and Roger are reeling from the trip and seem surprised by something once they look around.
Two weeks later, Claire is in the cabin thinking Bree and Roger must have made it to the stones by now. Claire is upset they are alone again but Jamie reminds her they are not alone. The two look at Bree’s portraits.
The mean are digging a new privy when they hear an explosion and realize the still must have exploded. The mean run for the still.
Claire is teaching Marsali how to help a dislocated shoulder when armed men break into the house. Marsali hides Germain under the bed in the surgery and tries to defend Claire when she is attacked. Marsali is knocked unconscious while Claire is dragged away and the man she was helping was killed.
We see it is the men who were with the Browns.
The men return to find Germain outside. Fergus asks what he’s doing and Germain says Mama won’t wake up and the bad men took Grandmama. Fergus goes to Marsali who is breathing and Jamie rushes to the cross and lights it, calling the men of the Ridge to him.
