Written in My Own Heart's Blood

William pushes his way through the dockside crowds on Market Street. He attracts the attention of a passing young prostitute and tells her that he is a bastard. She leads him into her brothel.

Claire welcomes her sister-in-law Jenny Murray into the Chestnut Street house. Claire decides that Jamie took John to Valley Forge. She doesn’t think they will go far, since Jamie will want to return to her as soon as possible.

Jamie asks John why he and Claire married, given that John is gay. John tells him that when they made love after drinking too much, they were both making love to Jamie in their minds. Inflamed, Jamie punches John in the eye and stomach. Rebel soldiers interrupt the beating and take John prisoner as a spy.

Claire reassures Jenny that Ian will be with his fiancée Rachel Hunter, near the Rebel camp. Rachel’s brother Denzell (Denny) is an army physician, and is engaged to John’s niece, Dorothea Grey (Dottie). Both Denny and Rachel are Quakers, and Denny’s match to Dottie, who is the daughter of the Duke of Pardloe, as well as Rachel’s match to Ian, a Highland Mohawk warrior, are unorthodox. Additionally, the Duke of Pardloe’s son, Henry, has fallen in love with his landlady, a free Rebel woman of color.

In the brothel, William weeps with rage at both Jamie and John and is startled by the entrance of the prostitute, Jane. There is a scuffle, and William runs out in the street, clad only in his shirt and breeches. He is immediately accosted by a group of his friends who assume he was robbed.

A British officer arrives at the house searching for John, who was recommissioned by his brother Hal earlier in the day. Claire meets with General Clinton and Hal to buy time for Jamie’s return. She says she doesn’t know where John is, but Hal believes she is lying. He attempts to take her to his lodging to question her but is struck down by a severe asthma attack on the way. Claire saves his life in the street and brings him to John’s house.

Jamie reflects on his violent anger towards John, deciding that it arises from his memories of being raped by Black Jack Randall.

The soldiers who captured John discover his letter of recommission, and he realizes he can now be hanged as a spy. The soldiers take him to their camp for execution.

Claire and Jenny nurse Hal through his asthma attack. Germain notes that Hal’s rank will ensure that soldiers come looking for him. Claire forges notes from John to Hal’s lodging and General Clinton, stating that Hal is staying with John. She gives Hal laudanum to keep him quiescent and unable to ask questions about John and Jamie.

On the road back to Philadelphia, Jamie encounters Colonel Dan Morgan. Morgan, who is on his way to meet an important friend, asks Jamie to join him.

Claire and Jenny enjoy whiskey with the weakened Duke and Mrs. Figg, the housekeeper. Hearing shouts in the street, Hal informs them the Continental Army is coming. General Clinton’s army and the wealthier Loyalists are withdrawing from Philadelphia. Jenny decides to go to her adopted son Fergus’s printshop because he is out of town, leaving his wife Marsali and children unprotected. As Jenny leaves, a second messenger comes from the General Clinton asking for John.

Jamie meets George Washington and his officers in a cabin belonging to Sylvia Hardman, a Quaker woman. Jamie agrees to join the Continental Army as a general and also agrees to loan George Washington his horse. Washington and his officers soon leave, but Jamie tore something in his back during the scuffle with John and cannot walk.

Morgan leaves Jamie with money for a uniform and a bag of food. Jamie shares the food with Sylvia and her daughters then falls asleep in the only bed.

John has been seriously injured in the fight with Jamie; his eye is dislocated and his liver may be ruptured. John’s connection to his cousin Charles Grey has inflamed the Rebels; General Grey led the British in the Paoli Massacre during which hundreds of Rebel soldiers were bayoneted as they slept.

John is taken to the Rebel commanding officer Colonel Watson Smith whom John recognizes as a former associate. Although his brother Hal has influence, John has more value as a scapegoat; his rank and connection to the man who ordered the Paoli Massacre will make his execution good for Rebel morale. Smith threatens to send John to General Wayne, who holds a grudge against the Greys for Paoli.

John refuses to promise not to try to escape and is chained to the tent pole. Awakened by the sound of Dottie’s laugh, John alerts her to his circumstances by singing a German ditty that he taught her when she was young.

In Philadelphia, Claire worries about Jamie and is unable to sleep. She joins Hal in the sitting room where she is burning cannabis to ease his lungs. Relaxed from the cannabis, Hal tells Claire about the British’s new strategy to sever the South from the North by suppressing the rebel armies in Georgia, thus starving the North into submission.

Meanwhile, Jamie rouses from sleep by the sound of men outside the cabin. Sylvia opens the door, but when the group sees Jamie on the bed, they leave. Sylvia confesses that she has been prostituting herself at night to earn money for food. She offers herself to Jamie, who refuses.

The next morning, Sylvia’s daughters tell Jamie learns that their mother believes the militia shot their father.

John wakes up feverish, but recognizes Denny, Dottie’s fiancé, as the doctor who tends him. Denny tells Smith that John is too ill to make the trip to General Wayne’s camp, so Smith leaves to retrieve General Wayne. John tells Denny Jamie has returned. Smith, unable to persuade Wayne to leave General Washington, grants John another night of reprieve.

Hal wakes up feeling irascible, and Claire laces his coffee with laudanum and brandy. If Claire can get Hal out of the city to meet his troops in New York, then he won’t be able to hunt for John and Jamie. Janet, meanwhile, boards up the windows.

When William gave his parole and was released back to his stepfather John, he begged John to have him exchanged so he could continue to fight. However, the exchange talks fell through in 1778. This left William technically an escaped prisoner who is unable to take up arms due to his parole. Considering his ambiguous position, General Clinton has assigned him to keep order and help the Loyalists evacuate the city.

While monitoring the crowds, William searches for John, worried about his absence. He instead encounters Captain Richardson, a nefarious character who once enlisted William to gather intelligence, which left William lost and wounded in a swamp. William is suspicious of Richardson, who tells him that Hal and John are missing, and asks that William notify him when they turn up.

Jenny and Claire are visited by a British lieutenant who asks for both John and the Duke of Pardloe. The British Army is moving out of Philadelphia, and the two brothers must accompany General Clinton north. Jenny implies that John left the house after arguing with Claire.

Ian and Rachel discuss the obstacles to their coming nuptials. Ian tells Rachel about his first marriage to Emily, a Mohawk woman who put him out due to his inability to give her children. However, Claire believes that the babies were miscarried due to Emily’s Rh factor, and Ian should be able to father a child with another woman. Ian promises Rachel that he will always tell her if they run into a woman that he slept with before meeting her, and Rachel wipes his eyes and tells him she loves him.

Towards evening, Dottie brings John his dinner and tools to escape. When Denny checks on John, he tells him that there is a basket of supplies waiting in the wagon. John escapes that night, although he is unable to remove the chain fetters. He walks four miles away from the camp, then dons Rebel clothing and cuts his hair. After smearing dirt on his face and hands, he falls asleep under a tree.

William returns to his quarters to find that his orderly has absconded with his belongings, including his money. Furious, he leaves the barracks. He encounters his friend Sandy who takes William drinking and then to a brothel, where William passes out. When he wakes, he hears Captain Harkness, a British officer, threatening to sodomize a prostitute. William takes the girl for the night, recognizing her as Jane, and when he swears on his honor that he will not touch her, she makes love to him anyway.

Jamie makes plans to catch a wagon to Philadelphia, and Sylvia puts together a hot poultice for his back. Unable to sleep because of heat from the poultice, Jamie prays for the ability to understand and forgive Claire and John for their betrayal.

Jamie leaves the Hardman’s cabin and walks to the road, planning to get a ride on a wagon so he can return to Claire.

John wakes to a musket jammed into his belly. Discovering that the men are Rebels, John tells them that he was on his way to join Washington’s army but was taken by the British as a spy, hence the chains. They accept his story and invite him to travel with them.

Rachel and Ian travel to Philadelphia, planning to meet Denny and Dottie. When they reach the main road, Rachel recognizes William in the crowd, and tells him of their impending nuptials. William still loves Rachel and reacts badly, punching Ian. They fight, and William has Ian arrested for assaulting an officer. Ian tells Rachel to run to Philadelphia to get Claire’s help.

Jamie, riding covertly on a wagon towards Philadelphia, sees Ian at the head of the British column; Ian is astonished to see Jamie alive. Finding Rachel, Jamie orders her to go to Philadelphia for help while he returns to the front of the column to confront an enraged William. He tells William that if he does not set Ian free, then Jamie will explain to William’s superiors the circumstances of William’s birth. William angrily agrees to release Ian.

Claire, needing a break from Hal, writes to Denny asking him to look in on her patient. Leaving to buy more herbs in Kingsessing, she encounters Benedict Arnold, who gives her a ride in his carriage.

Jamie arrives at John’s house to find Janet holding a gun on Hal. Unaware of Jamie’s presence, Janet accuses the Duke of heavy-handed retaliation against Highlanders after the Jacobin uprising. His men looted and destroyed her home and arrested her husband, whose confinement resulted in the tuberculosis that killed him. Jamie grabs the gun just as Janet shoots it, leaving Hal unscathed. The sound of the gunshot alerts Mrs. Figg, who arrives with her own gun which she points at Jamie, believing he is there to release Hal. During the confusion, Denny arrives to look in on Hal, who rages at seeing his daughter’s illicit fiancé and relapses into an asthma attack. Janet leaves to get his medicine and finds Ian at the front door. Upstairs, Denny soothes Hal, telling him that John is alive and on his way back to Philadelphia.

Claire buys herbs from the Bartram twins in Kingsessing, accepting their invitation to gather additional herbs by the riverside. There, she is surprised to see Jamie appearance. They come to terms with Claire’s relationship with John and renew their marital relationship in the Bartrams’ potting shed.

John, disguised as Bertram Armstrong, takes the oath to serve faithfully in the Continental Army.