Page 21 of A Scot on the Rocks

“It is.”

Jamie lifted one shoulder. “Then mayhap we should leave the innocent grain out of it.”

Fergus made a choking sound behind him as Alasdair’s eyes narrowed.

Jamie reached for the bread. Someone had left half a loaf near the smaller hearth beside a pot of stew, and he tore off a piece before dipping it into the broth. The men ate that way whenever the work was heavy, taking bites between tasks, passing bowls, cups, and knives around without ceremony. The stew was mostly onion, potato, and a little salt pork, though someone had added a bit of pepper, which Jamie suspected meant one of the women from the village had made the stew.

He chewed while looking back toward Alasdair.

“The upper burn took half the hill with it after that rain. Mud from the bank, stone, roots, whatever came down from higher ground. It hasna run like that in weeks.”

“You can taste mud now?”

“I can taste that the spirit lost its sweet edge.”

Alasdair snorted. “You’ve always been too fond of talking to the whisky.”

“It’s easier company than some.”

Ewan snorted as Jamie pointed a piece of bread at him. “Don’t encourage him.”

“I’m not certain which one of you I’m encouraging.”

The still demanded their attention before Alasdair could answer, and the argument folded back into work. Jamie shifted a receiving vessel, tightened a loose hoop, checked the fire after Fergus fed it too eagerly, and labored with men who didn’t need to explain each task because they’d learned years ago.

His father had taught him the feel of the water and the sound of a healthy boil. Alasdair had taught him where to cut and when to wait. Other men, some long dead, had taught him what to notice when the spirit changed. None of them had called it expertise. They’d simply expected him to pay attention.

When the run settled enough that the others could manage without him, he reached for his coat.

“Where are ye going?” Ewan yawned, not bothering to cover his mouth,

“The burn.”

Alasdair groaned loudly enough to be heard over the fire.

Jamie opened the door, and cold damp air swept into the room. The rain had eased to a fine mist, though the hill still shone wet beneath a sky the color of old pewter. Two ponies grazed near the edge of the alder trees, their pack frames resting against the wall, ready for the casks that would be moved once darkness fell.

The still house had been built low in a hollow where brush and trees concealed most of the smoke on damp days. From the higher track, a traveler might notice the roof if he knew where to look, but he was more likely to dismiss the place as a ramshackle shed and keep riding.

He mounted Bess and took the narrow path toward the upper burn. The storm had altered the hillside. New channels cut across the track, carrying grass and reddish grit toward the lower ground, while several stones that had sat half buried all summer now lay exposed and clean. Bess picked her way carefully, ears flicking forward whenever the soft earth shifted beneath her hooves.

Jamie slowed her near the alder trees and dismounted. The burn ran hard and brown over the rocks. He drank from his cupped hand, caught the same faint metallic edge that had bothered him in the whisky, then climbed to the spring and tasted again. It was cleaner, somehow softer here.

His father had brought him to this same hillside when Jamie had been young enough to complain that water was the dullest part of making whisky. He had been made to taste from three different places until he stopped complaining and paid attention. Standing there now, Jamie finally appreciated the lesson.

The storm had cut through the bank and exposed a line of red-brown stone beneath the roots. He rubbed the damp grit between his fingers.

Behind him, a horse snorted.

“Have ye solved it?”

He turned to see Ewan above the bank, rain darkening the shoulders of his coat.

“Look there.” Jamie pointed toward the exposed earth.

Ewan crouched and frowned. “There are lots of stones about, what’s so special about these?”

“They’re red.”