CHAPTER THREERupert never knew just how he managed to reach the safety of Castle Fitzalan.
Afterwards he supposed that the advice to allow the stars to guide him, plus the use of the compass still safely tucked into his jacket pocket, had enabled him to travel in a direction that eventually brought him to familiar country.
It was sheer willpower that kept him in the saddle.
It was still not midnight when he pulled up a tired Prince before the studded gates of Castle Fitzalan.
Duncan had already gone to bed.
“I’d thought ye’d decided to stay in Pitlochry,” he cried when at last Rupert’s battering on the gate brought him down to open it.
Then he saw the state his new Master was in and was horrified.
“Man, ye need more than a wee drop of the hard stuff. What the hell’s been happenin’
