Outlander Book Club: Voyager Chapter 31 breakdown

Just the Outlander chapter

The start of the chapter picks up off the back of the previous one. Young Ian has headed to the abbey to warn the others of the ambush, while Claire is trying to create a distraction and get the excisemen out of their hidey-hole before Jamie and his men get to them.

Claire is attacked from behind. She’s partially expecting it, and she is able to fight back. However, it’s not from skills that she’s learned from others. She thinks back to the medical textbook Gray’s Anatomy (my copy of Voyager spells it Grey’s Anatomy like the TV series, but it’s Gray with an A) and thinks of what she needs to do to get her attacker off her.

It all leads to Claire managing to get her attacker in his private parts. Men will often protect this part of the body because it is so painful. Claire manages to get around the block.

And that’s when Jamie catches up to Claire. We find out the person who grabbed Claire wasn’t an attacker after all. It was Fergus. Poor guy!

Claire shares that there are excisemen about. Well, those men are dead. It’s concerning because it means death for those who did kill them.

Jamie realizes that the smuggling business needs to take a break. It’s not safe, and he doesn’t have the usual pay for the men now. He does have a little for them if they need it, and some of them do.

As they leave, we now need to know where Young Ian is. He went in the wrong direction of the abbey. It’s okay, he comes back because he doesn’t want to leave Claire alone for too long.

It’s time to get back to Lallybroch.