She nodded tightly, then without another word, turned and strode away.
*
“Tell me everything,”Jamie said. “Tell me exactly what happened.”
Before him, his ship captains shifted uneasily. They glanced at each other, unsettled by Jamie’s mood and what they’d seen today. He could hardly blame them.
Beyond where they sat on barrels by the quayside, Islay’s harbor stretched like a piece of polished glass, its smoothness belying the violence that had been done on the waters just beyond. How could it look so peaceful when so much blood had been spilled?
He forced his attention back to the men seated around him. After speaking to Elise, Jamie had come down to the harbor to consult with his captains personally. He’d hoped they might have information that had been missing from the report.
So far, he’d turned up nothing. His captains were as weary and frustrated as he was. They had been run ragged trying to patrol Islay’s coast, trying to guard against attacks on villages and keep their shipments from becoming targets. There were no better sailors than those of the Isles. Every child grew up on the sea as much as on land. Jamie himself could sail a boat almost before he could walk, and the captains of his fleet were the best the Isles had to offer.
And yet it made no difference. Despite their skill, despite their renowned seamanship, the pirates still ran rings around them. It made no sense. How did the pirates always know where Jamie’s cargo ships were going to be? And how were they able to disappear so completely after they’d attacked?
“It was the same as it always is,” Roger Beaufort growled in his rough, half-Scottish, half-French brogue. Around Jamie’s age, and one of the best captains Islay had ever produced, Jamie could hear the simmering fury in the man’s voice. “They surrounded theSea Star, launched an attack without warning, seized all the goods and everyone aboard, then disappeared like a puff of smoke.”
“And ye’ve been out to theSea Star?” Jamie demanded. “Ye’ve seen the wreckage?”
“Aye. She’s listing badly but was still afloat when we went to investigate.”
Jamie chewed this over. He didn’t like feeling helpless. He had to do something. He fixed his gaze on Roger. “Could she be salvaged?”
The man blinked in surprise. “Maybe. But it would take at least three ships for the task, and that would mean three fewer ships patrolling Islay’s defenses. All to salvage what might turn out to be nothing more than a heap of firewood.”
The rational, logical part of Jamie knew that Roger was right. When weighing up the risks and benefits, salvaging theSea Starwas a bad idea. Yet the irrational part of him was consumed by the need to do something. Rage and helplessness boiled beneath his skin. If he didn’t act, he would go insane.
“Ready the ships,” he ordered his captains. “We sail at first light on the morning tide.”
Chapter Seven
Phillip MacClelland, itturned out, was a difficult man to hunt down. When she returned to the keep, the first place Elise looked for him was the great hall. This enormous room, with a high ceiling held up with rafters and a huge fireplace at one end was, she’d been told, where the people of the castle gathered for meals and various other communal things. Yet when she poked her head in, she found it empty except for Andrea and a couple of household staff wiping down the tables.
All three of them came to attention when she stepped inside and gave her deferential nods of greeting. Elise stifled a groan. Were they ever going to stop doing that?
“How may we help ye, Lady Elise?” Andrea asked.
“I’m looking for Phillip. Have you seen him?”
Andrea waved a hand to indicate the floor above. “He’s likely in the counting room.”
He wasn’t, as it turned out. Nor was he in the council room where they had the meeting earlier, the courtyard, the kitchen, or the stables. Finally, one of the cooks pointed her in the direction of his personal study, tucked away behind the kitchens and at the end of so many twisting passages that it would be impossible to find without directions.
But by following the cook’s instructions, she finally found her way to a narrow wooden door that stood closed. She could hear no sound from within.
She knocked. “Phillip? Are you there? It’s me. Elise.”
There was no answer. She tried the door handle and was surprised to find the door unlocked. She pushed it open and stuck her head in.
“Phillip?”
There was no sign of the man. She stepped inside. It was a large room but surprisingly cozy with thick rugs covering the flagstone floor and polished wooden paneling on the walls. It was clearly a study, with stuffed bookcases along one wall and a large desk against the other. It was scrupulously tidy. If the state of someone’s surroundings could be said to reflect their character, she wondered what this said about Phillip. Methodical? Steady? Or uptight and pedantic?
She walked along the bookshelf, perusing the titles. She couldn’t read most of them as they were written in French, Spanish, Italian, and even Latin. Phillip MacClelland was clearly a scholar.
She stopped by the desk and ran her fingertips over its polished surface. It was empty save for a round bowl about the size of her two fists that sat in the exact center and was filled with water.
For some reason, the sight of that bowl set her senses tingling. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, and a faint ripple of air shivered across her skin. She found herself leaning closer. The water was as still and clear as a mirror. She reached out a hand—
