01 Highland Princess by Amanda Scott

Author:Amanda Scott [Scott, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0446614629
Publisher: Forever
Published: 2004-11-05T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Soon after the five royal galleys passed below the formidable black mass of Duart Castle, Mairi’s favorite among her father’s many fortresses, she discerned his beloved Ardtornish ahead on the opposite shore. Both castles sat on high promontories and enjoyed wide views, but Duart, on the Isle of Mull’s northeastern headland where the Sound of Mull met the Firth of Lorn, provided spectacular ones. The two formed part of a string of eight fortresses guarding the Sound and the Firth, two more of the inner sea-lanes strategically so important to the Lord of the Isles.

Sometime earlier, they had passed the tall, lonely-looking tower of the first of that string, Dunconnel, northernmost of the four tiny Isles of the Sea, on its craggy, nearly unapproachable rocky isle. Dunollie and Dunstaffnage, the next two, lay within sight behind them, and Castle Achaduin, seat of the Bishop of Argyle for over a hundred years, was barely visible on the Isle of Lismore to the north.

Aros and Mingary, the last of the string, lay west of Ardtornish, the former on the Isle of Mull’s north coast, the latter at the west end of the peninsula called Ardnamurchan. The Lord of the Isles controlled all of them and a hundred more for Clan Donald and the people of the Isles.

As the royal galley and its four escorts sailed farther into the Sound, their little-black-ship banners waving gaily in the breeze, Mairi began to hear welcoming horns from the landing seventy feet below the castle, in Ardtornish Bay.

An impressive line of basalt cliffs towered above beech woods and a rocky shore to form the U-shaped bay. Thanks to recent rains, the numerous waterfalls called the Morvern Witches spilled more water than usual from the cliff tops. Most of the year, the Witches were so thin that on windy days a stiff southerly breeze could hurl their skirts upward instead of letting them fall in the usual way.

At the highest point of the cliff face squatted the large flat rock known as Creag na Corp, “the rock of the corpses,” from which men that MacDonald or Morvern’s Brehon court had condemned to death were flung to the rocks below.

Crossing the bay took only a short time, and soon the royal galley, with a splendid display of oarsmanship, slid into place alongside the stone-and-timber landing. Willing hands rushed to tie lines, others to help passengers disembark. His grace stepped onto the landing and turned to assist his lady.

Mairi and Elizabeth accepted lesser hands, as did her ladyship’s two women. Meg Raith traveled in the second boat, which waited with the other three for the royal galley to row away from the pier. Then each in turn would land and unload.

After passengers and baggage had gone ashore, all five galleys would sail west around the point into Loch Aline, where his grace’s ships harbored.

Mairi had no intention of waiting for her parents, let alone for Meg. Instead, eager to see what if anything had changed, she hurried up the steps carved into the stone cliff to the laird’s tower.

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