Warning: This article contains MAJOR SPOILERS from the Outlander book series
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Outlander returned this week with an episode that finally gave fans what they had been waiting for since the first episode of this season - Claire's (Caitriona Balfe) return to the past, and the first moments of her reunion with Jamie (Sam Hueghan). It was an epic moment made all the sweeter by the fact that fans have had to wait nearly six full episodes to get there; and that episode 5 gave only a tiny taste of what's to come when these two lovers are properly reunited next week.
However, while the biggest moment of the episode was undoubtedly those few seconds in the printshop, there were plenty of other major scenes in 'Freedom and Whisky'. Claire and Brianna (Sophie Skelton) said a tearful goodbye when Claire decided to return to Jamie, and of course, a fairly hilarious Batman-themed montage as Claire made herself some appropriate travelling clothes. But a much bigger moment, especially for fans of the books, was her discussion with Joe (Wil Johnson) about a mysterious skeleton.
The Mystery Woman
The skeleton appears early on in the episode, as Claire visits Joe in his office, and finds him unpacking a skeleton from a box. Joe explains that it's been sent to him for a second opinion, and as he describes the bones, he and Claire have an... interesting conversation:
Joe: Pretty lady, full grown, mature, maybe late 40s....
Claire: He sent you over a 150 year old murder victim?
J: You're only off by about 50 years. Harris is an athropologist. He's looking for a cause of death - what makes you think she was murdered?
C: I don't know.
J: She's from a cave in the Caribbean, there were artifacts found with her. Aha, look here. You were right.
C: Broken neck?
J: More than that - bones aren't just cracked. Fracture planes right through the center. Somebody tried to cut this lady's head clean off, with a dull blade. How did you know?
C: She just... felt like it.
Joe then goes on to say that she was originally thought to be a slave burial, but that the bones show that the mystery woman was white. The two then go on to talk about Claire's relationship in Scotland, and the bones are forgotten. However, it's clear that these bones mean something in the series. Not only are they given a lot of attention in a show that doesn't waste time on the unecessary, but the soundtrack makes it clear that there is something spooky going on here. Claire's uncanny ability to pinpoint the age and cause of death is also clearly something to do with her time-travel abilities - but who do these bones belong to?
Could They Be Claire's?
A logical theory would be that Claire is breaking all kinds of rules of time travel and fondling her own bones, from a death that will take place after she has returned to live her life 200 years in the past. It's a theory that would fit in many ways; the bones match Claire's own physical descriptions, and we know that she is going to return to approximately the same point in time that the bones are from. She also seems very connected to the bones, and seems to get a sense of how the woman died just by touching them. Given that she's returning to a dangerous time, it's possible that she may well come to a brutal end - a possibility that the viewer is reminded of a few scenes later, when her past escape from the stake is brought up.
The only part of this that doesn't make a whole lot of sense is that the bones are found in a cave in the Caribbean, while Claire is planning on heading back to Scotland. There's a considerable distance between the two, and no reason to travel from one to the other - but if they are not Claire's, then who could the bones belong to? Which middle-aged woman from two hundred years ago would be important enough to warrant this kind of attention in the series?
Geillis Duncan, of course.
Geillis' Duncan's Death in the Books
Readers of the book series will know exactly who these bones belong to: Geillis Duncan (Lotte Verbeek). Of course, Claire doesn't know that yet (in the books or the series). Instead, she simply gets a vague feeling of being connected to the bones, and that the woman didn't want to die when she did. It's a moment that is vaguely creepy for both her and Joe, but isn't immediately relevant.
However, we later learn that the bones actually belong, not to Claire, or to some other unknown woman, but to Geillis Duncan - the witch that Claire was almost burned with when she was first in Scotland. Geillis was also a time traveller, one who passed through the same standing stones as Claire herself, although very much intentionally. Obsessed with the Jacobites, Geillis (or Gillian, in her own time) studied the lore of the stones and inteded to go back and support the cause. After Claire returned to her own time, she even tried to stop Geillis from heading back in time to be burnt at the stake, but was too late to stop her from crossing over. The last that was seen of Geillis in the series, she was being dragged away to be burnt as a witch, after Jamie was able to save Claire from the same fate.
Geillis Will Return To The Show
Of course, if Geillis's bones show up in the Caribbean, that means that she didn't end up burnt at the stake as fans will have thought. Instead, book readers will know that Geillis was spared because of the child she had with Dougal. When she threatened to kill the child rather than let it be taken and be burnt at the stake, Dougal agreed to give her her freedom by sending her to France to start a new life. Not a whole lot is known about her life there, although it is eventually pieced together that Geillis continued to practice witchcraft and herbcraft, moving further and further into the darker elements of her interests.
Black Widow that she is, she also married and killed off another couple of husbands, before eventually marrying a man named Barnabas Abernathy, a plantation owner in Jamaica. After killing him, too, she reigned over the plantation as mistress of the house and practitioner of voodoo, still obsessed with the Jacobite line and the dark arts. She and Claire meet up once more when Claire and Jamie head to Jamaica to try and hunt down Jamie's nephew, Ian, who has been kidnapped by pirates.
Geillis's Death In The Cave
Geillis, in her obsession with time travel and the dark arts, finds a new stone circle with the same energy as the one in Scotland where both she and Claire travelled through time. She learns of a prophecy that makes her determined to return to the future, to find Brianna, and believes that she can do this by sacrificing Ian to use his blood in order to help her travel.
Obviously, Claire and Jamie are none too pleased about any element of this plan, and track Geillis to the cave to try and save Ian (and Brianna, potentially). In an altercation there, Geillis shoots Jamie (non-fatally, of course), and Claire flies into a rage, decapitating Geillis with a dull axe. It's a brutal scene, and while it ends well enough for everyone except for Geillis herself, Claire is deeply shaken by her actions, and still in shock and fear over what could have happened to both Ian and her daughter. She leaves Geillis's body on the floor of the cave... where Joe's paleontologist friend finds it, two hundred years in the future.
What Does This Mean For Claire's Next Adventure?
No secret has been made of the fact that this season will see Claire and Jamie leave Scotland, and head to the Caribbean, just as the story happens in the books. Now, with the inclusion of the bones in 'Freedom and Whisky', it's clear that the story will continue to follow along from the books, with the return of Geillis and her eventual murder at the hands of Claire herself.
But how will Claire be affected by the appearance of the bones when it comes to making her voyage to another part of the world? Her reaction to the bones in Joe's office show that she is freaked out by her connection to them, and may even believe that there is a possibility that they are her own. As a result, she may be much more reticent to travel to the Caribbean... and that's something that could cause some conflict between her and Jamie, when he decides to go after his nephew. Alternatively, she could forget about it entirely, until she realizes who Mrs Abernathy is, at which point she will know that she has to kill Geillis to save her family.
Outlander season 3 continues next Sunday with A Malcolm' @8pm on Starz.