Chapter 5

Hastily, Sorcha explained to Bess what had happened to Adela and their fear that no one was yet searching for her.

"We did hear about her wedding," Bess admitted. "But was the man who took her no the one she hoped would marry her?"

"We all thought he was," Sorcha said. "We did not learn that we were wrong until this morning, but my father says that is Adela's fault. And mine," she added conscientiously. "Sidony and I mean to find her, though, since no one else will, and you must help us, Bess. You simply must! It was you, after all, who told me that family counts more than anything else in this world."

"I did," Bess agreed. "Because it does."

"Aye, and when my mother died, you said we had you and Father, and our sisters, plus the rest of our clansmen to look after us. But we lost you when Ranulf was injured. Then Mariota died and Cristina, Kate, and Isobel all married and moved away. Only Maura still lives nearby. I don't want to lose another sister."

"Sakes, m'lady, I ken fine that ye must be worried about Lady Adela, but ye havena lost the others—only your mam and the lady Mariota, poor dearling."

"Aye, but you know what I mean, Bess, and I mean to find Adela. You will help us, won't you?"

"Just what d'ye think I can do? The very notion o' three young lassies traveling about, thinking they can rescue another! That be plain daft."

"Three?"

"Ye dinna think I'll let the pair o' ye go without ye take Una. Ye've better sense than that, Sorcha Macleod."

"But we cannot travel as three young maidens," Sorcha said. "I do know that. And Una, as buxom as she is, could never fool anyone into thinking she is a man. I mean for just Sidony and me to go. We'll dress as lads. And we'll need a real one to travel with us if you know someone who would be suitable."

"And what do ye think ye'll do if ye find her?" Bess demanded. "Ye can scarcely wield a sword or beat off her abductors wi' your fists."

"I've thought about that," Sorcha assured her. "We'll just follow them to see where they take her. We've heard they are riding to Edinburgh, for they passed through Kinlocheil. I do not know where that is, but we'll find it, and when we do, discovering where they went next will be easy enough. Adela is pretty enough for people to notice her, and there cannot be many parties of four men and one woman."

"There may be more than four men by now," Sidony said thoughtfully.

"Aye, Lady Gowrie said there were twenty. Still, there will only be one Adela," Sorcha pointed out. "Unless you think they are riding about the Highlands, collecting brides."

"Faith, do you think they may be doing that?" Sidony demanded, blanching.

"No, goose, I do not." She turned to Bess. "Will you help us?"

"I expect that if I refuse, ye'll just go on your own," Bess said. "But I dinna think ye should go as lads, mistress. Can ye no go as common women instead?"

Before Sorcha could think how to reply, Una said, "Only look at them, Mam. Common or noble, they'd draw too much notice, dress them how ye would. Lady Sorcha be right. They'll travel safer as lads. But what'll ye do about your hair?"

"When Isobel dressed as a lad, she just stuffed hers in a cap," Sorcha said.

"Isobel wore lad's clothes only the one time," Sidony said. "And only long enough to cross the Kyle from Glenelg to Skye."

"She did it more than once," Sorcha said. "But you're right, Sidony. To do it longer would prove more difficult. We'll just have to cut our hair, that's all."

"Cut it?" Sidony stared at her. "How short?"

"Short enough to look like a lad's, of course. You can just keep your head covered afterward until it grows out again," she said. "You rarely let it hang loose, anyway, now that you are grown up."

"Not as often as you do, at all events," Sidony said. "Very well, I'll do it, but it is most improper, Sorcha."

"Abducting Adela was worse," Sorcha said with more sharpness than usual. "So is Father's refusal to go after her."

"You know," Sidony said, "I think he may have said that because he was angry with you. I don't think he will really abandon her."

"He already has," Sorcha said. "Think, Siddy. In less than a sennight now, nearly every member of the Council of the Isles will go with his grace to Edinburgh, to the King's court. Father won't have time to hunt for missing daughters."

Bess said quietly, "Ye've said ye mean to find where they've taken her ladyship, but ye didna say what ye think ye can do then."

Sorcha sighed. "In truth, I have not thought carefully about that yet, but I do know that Sidony and I cannot easily rescue her ourselves. Mayhap it is a sign from heaven that my father and the others will be in Edinburgh. If the villains really do take Adela there, or even somewhere in the vicinity, and if we can find out exactly where they take her, I'm sure we can get help quickly."

Bess shook her head. " 'Tis plain daft, but I ken fine that ye mean to go, and ye'll ha' to keep safe. So ye'd best take along someone wi' a good head on his shoulders, who'll no let ye make fools o' yourselves or do summat crazy dangerous."

"We just need a stout lad who can look after our horses. Oh," Sorcha added with a start. "We'll also need horses!"

"Ye'll need more than horses," Bess said. "If the lady Adela's abductors left Glenelg Saturday and reached Kinlocheil yesterday, they're already more than two days ahead o' ye. Sithee, Kinlocheil lies well south o' here near Glen Finnan. To get so far, they must ha' taken a boat from Glenelg to Ardnish or Loch Ailort."

"Then, we'll need a boat, too, will we not?" Sorcha said. "Can we get one?"

"Aye, and I'm thinking now that whichever track they take afterward, they do ha' to go through the Great Glen," Bess said. "If they've ridden through Kinlocheil, they'll come to it a dozen miles or so north o' the Narrows and Loch Linnhe."

"But ye dinna go that way, Mam," Una said. "Ye always stay at Shielfoot."

"Aye," Bess agreed, falling thoughtfully silent.

Una laughed and said, "Ye did think o' many things, m'lady, but it be plain ye've no thought o' everything. Where will ye sleep nights, and what will ye eat?"

"Faith, there must be friaries or nunneries along the way, or even a monastery that will take in travelers," Sorcha said.

"Ye canna stay in a nunnery in men's clothes," Bess pointed out. "And most o' them other places put women in one great room and men in another. I saw as much whenever I traveled wi' your lady mother. So ye canna stay wi' them neither."

Sorcha muttered, "Then we'll sleep on the ground and eat roots and berries."

"We'll do no such thing!" Sidony exclaimed.

Dryly, Bess said, "It would be gey wiser to stay wi' kinsmen, as we do."

"But we don't know any kinsmen between here and the Great Glen who would not instantly restore us to Father," Sorcha protested.

"I were thinking o' Ranulf's kinsmen, and me own," Bess said. "If ye was to take our Rory as your gillie and boatman, he could see to all that for ye."

"Aye, that be a good notion," Una said. "Our Rory has a head, he does, and he's been to the Great Glen twice, m'lady. He'll keep ye safe."

Sorcha remembered Rory MacIver only as a lad who had teased her, with small respect for her rank, but she was not about to cast obstructions in her own path, so she said, "Very well, but we must leave today, Bess, as soon as possible. I want to get as far as Kinlocheil, so we can learn where they went from there."

"Well, ye can do that an ye will," Bess said. "But if ye go by way o' Loch Sunart and Glen Tarbert, ye can stay wi' me brother at Shielfoot and save more than a day's travel. The distance from here to Shielfoot be nearly the same as to Loch Ailort, but the distance to the Great Glen from Shielfoot be miles less."

"Then why did Adela's abductors not go that way?"

"Likely they didna ken the difference. Few who dinna live here do."

Sidony said, "But what about Lady Gowrie, Sorcha? "Need we not follow the same route they did to find her and ask her to tell us everything she heard?"

"I'll wager I heard all she knows," Sorcha said. "She said a cousin told her. If he'd told her more, I'm sure she'd have repeated it to her friend. In any event, the way news flies around the Highlands, others are bound to know of them. We'll do as Bess suggests," she decided. "We'll need clothes, though, Bess, and quickly."

Bess agreed, and to Sorcha's surprise, Rory MacIver, now a strapping young man of twenty-two with dark curls, brawny shoulders, and a cheerful smile, seemed as eager as she was to find Adela. It was he who provided their clothing, taking note of their sizes and deciding exactly who might most likely both have and be willing to lend the required garments. The resulting clothing was tattered but clean, and Sidony regarded her share of it bleakly. But Sorcha received her brown leggings, long saffron shirt, quilted jerkin, stout boots, and hooded wool cloak with approval.

"I've thought of something else we need, though," she said. "My sister Isobel always carried a small dirk in a sheath under her skirt. Can you find us each some such thing to put in our boots?"

"Aye, mistress, I warrant I could," he said doubtfully.

Sidony said, "Oh, Sorcha, do you think we should? I doubt I could use a dirk. I do not even know how to wield one. Mightn't I injure someone with one?"

Sorcha regarded her sister speculatively before she said with a rueful smile, "It occurs to me that by the time you made up your mind to use it, it would be too late to do any good. Just one will do, Rory."

While Rory went to find her a weapon, Bess cut their hair, and while they donned their borrowed clothing, she packed a large supper to take and bundled their own clothing to carry with them in case they should need it. She tried to persuade them to stay at least overnight, but knowing that they had little time before Macleod learned what they had done, Sorcha insisted they leave as soon as possible.

To her amazement, when they were ready, Rory took them back to the beach, where a longboat waited, its bow on the shingle, with oarsmen ready to launch it.

" 'Tis me brother's," Rory said. "He's a captain for Lord Ranald, but he's off wi' another o' his lordship's boats to Ardtornish to join the grand flotilla for his grace's journey to Edinburgh. His men here must keep fit themselves, though, and they've agreed that a fast trip to Shielfoot and back will do them good."

Thus, less than an hour after their arrival, Sorcha and Sidony departed. The oarsmen were powerful, the wind at their backs, and the boat relatively light. Three hours later, they landed. Before they sought Bess's brother, Sorcha asked Rory if they could not acquire horses at once and keep going for at least a few more miles.

"We'll no want horses yet, for tomorrow we'll walk across yon ridge south o' here to Loch Sunart," he said. "I ha' a cousin there wi' a boat, who'll take us to Strontian, at the head o' the loch. If the wind be as strong as today, we'll save more time by water and we can get horses from me cousin if the wind turns contrarisome."

Impatient though she was, Sorcha saw nothing to do but agree, especially since Sidony looked exhausted.

The party traveling to Lochbuie, on the south end of the Isle of Mull, arrived well after darkness had fallen, as Hugo had anticipated. But the castle servants had kept watch for them and had a hot supper waiting when they entered the great hall.

Everyone seemed tired, Macleod especially.

Hugo, sitting next to him at the high table, believed he was having second thoughts about his refusal to search for his missing daughter. To raise that subject might prove both tactless and unwise, but remembering his conversation with Hector, Hugo decided he had good reason to speak of something else.

He waited until Macleod had a goblet of Hector's excellent claret in hand. Then he said quietly, "I owe you an apology, sir."

"Do ye now, lad?"

"Aye, sir. The lady Sorcha was right to take me to task for my failure to reply to her message."

"Bless me, the baggage ought never to ha' sent ye any message."

Hugo agreed but said, "As she did, however, simple chivalry demanded a reply from any man claiming knighthood, and I failed to send one. Had I let her know—or you, sir—that I was fully engaged in his grace's installation preparations, mayhap the lady Adela would be safely wed now and at home with her husband."

"Ye're being gey courteous, lad, and I thank ye," Macleod said. "What others must think o' a Councilor o' the Isles who couldna protect his own daughter on her wedding day, I dinna want to think."

"Sakes, sir, you had no cause to expect trouble. The Highlands are at peace, as is all of Scotland—saving the Borders, of course, where peace is naught but a myth. No man could blame you for what happened."

"Aye, well, I canna even think where to look for the lass."

"What of Lady Gowrie?" Hector asked then. "Did she not perhaps see her?"

"Nay, for her ladyship had that tale from some cousin or other, Sorcha said. Moreover, she's nobbut a foolish woman, so I doubt there be anything in it. We'd be days behind them now anyway, ye ken. They could ha' gone anywhere."

"They could," Hector agreed, for that was certainly true.

" 'Tis plain to me now," Macleod added gloomily, "that a cautious man must beware for a sennight either side o' any Friday falling on the thirteenth. When I think that Ardelve wanted his wedding on that bleak day itself, I shudder to think what grief could ha' come of it."

Hugo's attention sharpened. "Do you believe that one should be wary of Fridays that fall on the thirteenth of any month?"

"Aye, sure, any man o' sense believes that," Macleod said firmly.

"Indeed," Hugo said. "And why is that, do you think? To most folks' minds, a Friday is just a Friday and as good as any other day."

Macleod shrugged. "There be good reason behind it, lad, and I'm no a man to go against superstition. For such to gain acceptance means it ha' proven itself many times over."

"Or perhaps that it relates to some event so significant that none can ever forget it, which leads men to fear anything having a connection to it."

"Aye, perhaps," Macleod agreed, looking narrowly at him.

"May I pour you more claret, sir?" Hugo asked quietly.

"Aye, ye may, lad, ye may indeed."

At dusk, his lordship had called a halt to make camp in a steep-sided, heavily wooded glen a half mile past four or five thatched huts and crofts in a loosely formed group that Highlanders called a clachan. Despite the steep, encroaching walls of the glen, he had avoided riding near or through their midst, as he had made it his habit to do with any habitation they could skirt. But Adela knew the alert ways of such folk and believed that someone must have seen them.

Darkness had fallen by the time the cook fires were ready, and after she had eaten a hasty meal, she approached his lordship and said quietly, "I would retire, my lord, but first I would beg leave for a few minutes of privacy, if I may."

As usual, her stomach clenched at having to ask his permission as much as at the fear that he might refuse it.

"Aye, lass, you may, although the moon will not rise for another hour. Can you see your way?"

Thinking only of getting away, she said she could, drew a deep breath, and hurried toward the area they had set aside for the purpose. As she neared it, one of the newer men stepped from behind a tree to bar her way.

"Dinna fear me, lass," he said quietly. "I hoped ye'd come by."

When she stepped back, he grasped her right arm and murmured near her ear, "Come now, give me a wee kiss, and mayhap I'll do summat useful for ye later."

As she jerked her arm away, astonished at such familiar treatment, a fist shot from nearby black shadows, knocking him flat.

Her captor stood over him and said to someone in the darkness behind him whom Adela could not see, "Throw a rope over a limb and hang this fool."

"Faith, sir," she exclaimed. "Is it not enough to have knocked him senseless? He was not going to harm me."

"I am not punishing him to protect you," he said coldly. "I'm hanging him because I told every man here that unless I command otherwise, they are to treat you with respect. He disobeyed me. See that you do not."

He walked away as silently as he had come, but Adela stood trembling in the darkness long afterward.

Roiling black clouds engulfed the sky, and lightning flashed through them in jagged spears. All else was black and formless, as if hell had engulfed the earth and heavens, and all that dwelt upon and within them.

Faint music sounded. Until that moment he had failed to realize that no thunder accompanied the lightning, but now he heard a harp or perhaps tinkling bells. Then, before his astonished gaze, the clouds parted, speared through by a narrow, circular beam of golden light. It began slowly to lengthen, then widen as if a single, solid ray of sunlight had broken through the clouds.

Doubtless only the sea existed below, for only the sea could look so black at such a time, but he thought it odd that the golden light seemed not to touch the water or reflect from it. The beam grew longer, the circle wider, and golden steps formed. At the top of them, a figure appeared, dark and menacing.

An icy chill made him shiver as he watched the figure descend the steps. Something familiar about its movement, its very shape—broad-shouldered and powerful-looking—made him watch more intently.

The golden steps began to radiate light until at last he saw the horizon where the water below touched tumultuous black clouds above. The steps appeared to end at the water, although water and clouds seemed endless. He saw nothing that resembled dry land anywhere.

The eerie, tinkling music stopped when the figure reached the bottom of the steps, but the figure kept walking toward him as if it mattered not what the surface was that it walked upon. He had no sense of himself now other than as a pair of eyes, watching. Even the chill had gone.

He had no sense of standing on anything, no sense of touching or smelling, hearing or tasting, only of seeing. He could not move, did not seem to have limbs or a body. He could only watch as the figure drew near and the golden light spread out over the rippled sea.

Then light touched the figure's face, and he experienced mild shock, the sort of feeling one gets when one half expects something to be so, hopes that it isn't, and finds that it is. He knew that face as well as his own, but the body it belonged to had no business to be walking anywhere, let alone on the water as it appeared to do now. It had, after all, drowned in the river North Esk eight months ago.

The figure's eyes met his, and a familiar, challenging smile touched its lips. Then it stepped aside to reveal the smaller figure of Lady Adela Macleod. Abruptly, he could hear the sea, taste the salty dampness of the air, and feel the chill again.

The light passed, abandoning the figure's face to darkness as a still-familiar voice broke the silence. "My vengeance has begun," it boomed thunderously. "Your lady belongs to me and will serve me until my need for her ends."

He tried to speak, to rail against such vengeance and tell Adela to have courage. But he had no power to speak or move, and as his mind struggled to overcome the lack, the golden light faded to impenetrable darkness.

Hugo awoke sitting stiffly upright in bed, briefly disoriented not only from the dream but from a familiar need to recall exactly where he had gone to sleep. A crackling spark drew his attention to glowing embers on the hearth. Memory swept back, and he remembered he was at Lochbuie Castle, a guest of Hector Reaganach.

Within moments, he had scrambled into enough clothing to hurry to the next chamber, where Michael and Isobel lay sleeping.

He had no worry about waking his cousin, knowing that the soft click of the latch and the opening door would do so without disturbing Isobel.

"What is it?" Michael murmured as Hugo stuck his head in.

"Come," Hugo replied in the same soft tone. Then he eased the door to again and waited the few moments it took Michael to pull on breeks and join him.

When he did, Hugo gestured toward his own chamber and Michael followed him without a word. Inside, with the door shut, Hugo said bluntly, "It's Waldron."

"What is?"

"He has Adela."

"By heaven, Hugo, if I didn't know you better, I'd…"

When he hesitated, Hugo said, "I know it sounds daft. He's got to be dead, or we'd have heard from him long before now. But I'm nonetheless sure of it."

"Have we heard from him?" Michael demanded as he grabbed the poker and bent to stir the embers, nudging the liveliest ones together as he reached for a log.

Hugo hesitated. Then, with a sigh, he said, "Nay, but I had a dream, and he spoke so plainly that when I awoke, I knew it must be true."

Michael laid his log on the embers and blew gently, waiting for flames to begin licking it. Then he straightened and said, "Perhaps you'd better tell me more about this dream."

Moving to warm his hands, Hugo said, "You'll recall that he told Isobel he would seek vengeance against all who had stood in the way of—"

"Careful," Michael warned. "There may be unfriendly ears, even here. I do remember what he told Isobel, and I'll admit I'd not have been surprised to learn that he survived that fall. He was always like a cat, landing on his feet when one least expected it. But I find it nearly impossible to believe he could be alive and yet have waited eight long months to seek his revenge."

"Mayhap he decided to lie low until opportunity presented itself. And mayhap, Adela's wedding provided that opportunity."

"But how could he have learned where and when she would marry?"

"The same way you or I would," Hugo said. "He gathered all the information he could. Lady Sorcha sent messages to me at a number of places. What is more likely than that Waldron intercepted one?"

"Then Adela may not have been his sole target," Michael said grimly. "Waldron would want vengeance against you and me more than he could possibly want to hurt Adela, and he is not a chivalrous man."

"True," Hugo said. "He'd not think twice about using a woman for bait to catch us off our guard."

Michael nodded. "Only think what a coup it would have been for him to lie in wait for you to appear at that wedding, or beforehand, and wreak whatever vengeance he had planned for you before the entire wedding party."

Another thought struck Hugo. "What if he sought more than that? Most folks would have expected you and Isobel to attend that wedding, would they not?"

"Aye, they would," Michael agreed. "Few outside the family know of her condition. No enemy could know that despite her insistence on how hearty she is, I persuaded her to consider the health and well-being of my heir. She travels nowhere without me. She yearned to attend that wedding, as you know well, but Henry had promised Ranald that the house of Sinclair would support Donald, so we could not."

"Aye, I do know that, to my own cost," Hugo said.

"Did you want the lass so badly then? You should have told me."

The blunt question made Hugo hesitate. "She would make any man a fine wife," he said at last. "But I don't have the feelings for her that you have for Isobel. Sakes, I've never felt that way about any woman, and I doubt I ever shall. I don't have time, because I'm married to my duty to you and to protecting the—"

He glanced around, remembering Michael's warning. "… to other obligations that must come before one's family and other personal business. I'll admit that her abduction has hit me harder than I'd have thought such a thing could, though."

"So your feelings for her are stronger than you knew," Michael said.

"Aye, perhaps," Hugo admitted. "Her wretched sister has brought it home to me that I do bear some responsibility for what happened to her. Moreover, if the poor lass fell into Waldron's clutches, she did so through no fault of her own and now faces more than unhappiness. Our cousin is capable of any evil, so if he does have her, I'm honor bound to do all I can to help her."

"Agreed," Michael said. "I've already told Macleod that we'll do all we can to help, but we've also decided that we'll do best to await news of their whereabouts from Lachlan Lubanach's sources before going in search of them."

"But we are constrained by matters of time, too," Hugo pointed out. "The King of Scots and his court move to Edinburgh in a sennight, and you've pledged us all to accompany Donald when he swears fealty as Lord of the Isles. And, too," he added quietly, "we have our own council at Roslin the following night."

"Aye, but if what the lady Sorcha told her father proves true, the villains will be in or near Edinburgh by then," Michael reminded him. "Indeed, if Waldron proves to be their leader, he may have the effrontery to take the lass to Edgelaw. For all we know, he has been living there these eight months past. It is his home, after all, and we do know he still has henchmen there. Without proof of his death, we did not order them off, and they have paid his rents. However, you have every authority to look around there when we return, and to ask if they've found his body yet."

"Aye, sure, but with your leave, I want to track down Lady Adela's abductors, whoever they are, and bring them to justice," Hugo said. "If Waldron and his men are guilty, I'll have served both you and her ladyship well."

"Do you remember any more details of this dream you had?"

"As clearly as I'd remember anything else that happened less than an hour ago," Hugo said. He recounted the dream as if he were reliving it.

"It struck you hard," Michael said when he had finished. "I know some think dreams can foretell events, but I'm guessing that one just put a few facts together to suggest a possibility that we cannot ignore. The vision you had of the sunbeam and stairs seems no more than a plaguey reminder that Waldron claims to be the hand of God, rather than the villain we know him to be. What do you want to do?"

"I'm not sure," Hugo admitted. "The lady Sorcha wanted Macleod to talk to Lady Gowrie to see if she knows more, but Macleod says she is a fool repeating information she had from a cousin. He says there's nothing in it."

"We cannot discount that opinion," Michael said. "She is friendly with the widow he means to marry, so he must know enough to form such a judgment."

"Aye, but he is also an exceedingly superstitious man who may just believe in letting well enough alone," Hugo said.

"Superstitious, eh? I've heard that, too. If I recall correctly, Hector Reaganach has the man's superstitious nature to thank for his own marriage to the lady Cristina. Do you think Macleod may be a fool?"

"Nay," Hugo said. Then, watching his cousin closely, he added, "Although he did object when Ardelve wanted to marry Adela on Friday last. Macleod insists that a Friday falling on the thirteenth of a month must always be unlucky."

Michael was silent for a long moment, frowning. Then his somber gaze met Hugo's as he said, "So Macleod will bear watching, too."

"Aye," Hugo said. "I'll leave that to you. I'm thinking now that even if Lady Gowrie might help, Lachlan Lubanach's minions will learn more in less time than it would take me to track her down. If the lady Adela's captors are making for Edinburgh or Edgelaw from the Highlands, I'd be wiser to take a score of our men and a boat to Oban, and take horses from there to intercept them."

"Aye, then we'll wait to hear from Lachlan," Michael agreed.