Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) and Lord John Grey (David Berry) have been friends for decades on Outlander. Their friendship began when Jamie was imprisoned at Ardsmuir Prison, which was under the control of Lord John, after the Jacobite Rebellion failed, and it continued when Lord John made sure that Jamie stayed in England rather than be sent to the colonies when the prison shut down.

Lord John, who was in love with Jamie—unrequited—had Jamie transferred to Helwater, an estate located in the Lake District of England, to serve out his indenture as a groom, where he caught the eye of Geneva Dunsany (Hannah James), the daughter of the estate’s owner.

Things got complicated when Geneva on the eve of her wedding to the Earl of Ellesmere, a man old enough to be her grandfather, blackmailed Jamie into having sex with her. Their one-night stand resulted in the birth of their illegitimate son, William Ransom.

Geneva died in childbirth and the earl had his suspicions that the baby was not his. When he threatened to kill it, Jamie shot him. William was then taken to Helwater, where he was raised by Geneva’s sister Isobel (Tanya Reynolds) and Jamie was able to spend time with his son.

However, by the time that William was 7, the resemblance to Jamie was becoming obvious, so he knew he had to leave so his son could inherit the benefits of being a lord. John helped him with this, and later went on to marry Isobel and become William’s stepfather.

This made a strong connection between the two men, which survived until Lord John married Claire (Caitríona Balfe) when Jamie was presumed to be dead, and Claire was going to be hung as a spy.

Upon Jamie’s return, Lord John confessed that one night they both had gotten drunk and had carnal knowledge of each other.

“To some degree, he feels a need to come clean and to have some degree of honesty in the relationship that they have,” Berry tells Parade. “I think, also, that he’s projecting a lot of fear in how Jamie’s going to react. He blurts it out, he doesn’t say it in a measured way. He’s worried that Jamie’s going to find out and it’s going to damage their relationship. Of course, there’s no perfect way of breaking the news to Jamie.”

The damage to their friendship is immeasurable, and Lord John knows that. But he’s also fearful of the way that Jamie will respond, and rightfully so. Jamie is too blinded by his jealousy to see that Lord John was doing him a favor, protecting the thing that Jamie loved most in this life: Claire.

“Jamie responds as a person who’s an enemy and someone who wants to brutalize and beat Lord John up,” Berry continues. “I think that’s a huge betrayal of the relationship that these two characters have.”

As Jamie physically assaults Lord John, Lord John tells him to kill him.

“I don’t think that Lord John really wants Jamie to kill him,” Berry says. “I think it’s just sort of a spiteful thing to say. Also, a way to humiliate him. Like, ‘Are you really going to kill me for this? Are you going to kill your friend who’s done these services to you out of love?’ I think there’s a petty spitefulness to what Lord John is saying.”

The beating that Jamie is inflicting on Lord John is interrupted by the arrival of revolutionary soldiers, and Lord John has to decide who he’s safer with. He decides the soldiers, but that’s because he doesn’t know his commission has been reinstated in the British Army, so he gets arrested as a spy.

Luckily for Lord John, his face is so damaged from Jamie’s beating that the doctor is sent to look at him when he arrives at the camp, and Denzel Hunter (Joey Phillips) just happens to be the doctor. He helps Lord John to escape, and Lord John disappears.

Hopefully, next week, we’ll discover what happened to him, but the question now remains can Lord John ever forgive Jamie for that act of brutality.

“How do you walk back your friendship from that?” Berry wonders. “Sure, there’s different ways that people can resolve arguments. But using violence like that, such brutal violence, there’s going to be a real challenge for any friendship to recover from.”

Jamie is a proud man who feels that Lord John did him wrong. But Lord John is of a mind that Jamie owes him an apology and he knows that he may never get it.

“In Lord John’s mind, he acted with a view to protecting Claire. He acted with integrity. You can’t judge him for sleeping with Claire because Jamie was dead. Although, I can see his justification for it was a little bit misguided. I think a lot of this thing comes down to judging someone in grief. John is trying to make Jamie understand that his death really messed him up, and his sleeping with Claire is just as confusing to John as it is to Jamie, and he’s traumatized by it. The complex ways humans deal with grief and trauma, I think in Lord John’s mind should go beyond judgment. Especially when we understand the depth of love that Lord John has for Jamie.”

New episodes of the second half of Outlander Season 7 will premiere at midnight ET on the STARZ app, all STARZ streaming and on-demand platforms each Friday. On linear broadcast, it will debut on STARZ Friday nights at 8 p.m. ET/PT in the U.S.