Free Amanda Scott by Prince of Danger

lady,” Michael said. “They have small respect for the fair sex. She accounts for only four of them,” he reminded Isobel. “So of the ones we saw, two are missing. In truth, we don’t even know how many there are altogether, only that we have seen six.”
    “If you think they might be waiting at Chalamine to challenge Adela, they’ll certainly have set one man or more to guard against your return to Eilean Donan.”
    “Aye, and at least one to watch the . . . the place where they caught me.”
    “But who are they?” Adela asked with a sharp look at him. “They told us only that they hunted a dangerous criminal. How am I to know they spoke falsely?”
    He met her gaze with his usual calm. “I can offer you only my word for that, my lady. I have no idea how I could prove such a thing to you when I do not even know what charges they might lay against me. I have done naught.”
    “But I do not even know your name! Why should I trust you?”
    “Because he is a gentleman, a guest at Eilean Donan,” Isobel said. She had been thinking as they debated, and an idea took form while her sister digested the information that Mackenzie would speak for Michael. Softly, barely realizing that she spoke her thought aloud, she said, “We’ll go to Lochbuie.”
    “How could you get there?” Adela demanded. “And how would you dare?”
    “I do wish you would stop asking how I can do this or dare that, and predicting my ruin,” Isobel snapped. “Getting to safety is the only necessity now, and necessity acknowledges no law except to prevail.”
    “I doubt that Hector Reaganach or our father would agree,” Adela said dryly. “But I know you, Isobel. You will do what you will.”
    “Lady Adela does pose a good question,” Michael said. “How would we reach Lochbuie? The boat that carried me to Eilean Donan lies in harbor there, effectively unreachable, and I think the sooner we can elude them, the better.”
    “A boat is the least of our difficulties,” Isobel said. “We have only to cross the Sound from Glenelg Bay to Kyle Rhea, where kinsmen of MacDonald’s, who are also friends of my father, will see us safely to Lochbuie. Adela can tell Father where we’ve gone, and mayhap Ian can go to Eilean Donan for you and tell them.”
    “Aye, m’lady,” Ian said eagerly. “I can do that. Likely, me dad willna be back wi’ the beasts till this afternoon, though, and I shouldna leave here afore then.”
    “That will be soon enough,” Michael said. “It would be as well, I think, if we create as little dust as possible, and Lady Adela must keep safe, too.”
    “I left word for my father that I’d be away most of the day, visiting tenants,” Adela said. “I doubt that I would be in any real danger, in any event, since those men do not know me. When they arrived, they demanded to speak to Father. And when he told them Isobel had gone riding early and had not yet returned, they said they’d wait. They spent the night, but they must have gone by now.”
    “I think we should leave at once,” Isobel said. “It must be well past the hour of Terce, so the morning is departing, and we still have to find a way across the Sound.”
    “Beg pardon, m’lady,” Ian said. “I ha’ been thinking since ye said ye’d seek help from his grace’s kinfolk on Skye. Me dad’s got a wee fishing coble ye could use, wi’ four oars and a lug sail. ’Tis beached betwixt the bay and Ardintoul.”
    “Do we not have to go through Glen Mòr to get there?” Michael asked.
    “Nay, sir, for just north o’ here a rough track leads right down t’ the bay. ’Tis a bit steep but it be how me and me dad go, most times.”
    “But surely they’ll be watching for us to cross the Kyle,” Michael said.
    “They’re less likely to see us than if we traipse through Glen Mòr,” Isobel said impatiently. “We won’t be on the water long either, because we’ll cross at the narrows north of the bay. The current is vicious enough there