meanwhile, news of the gathering norse fleet reached alexander, who appears to have made straight for the western coast, diverting his attention to the now rapidly developing crisis. on 28 may, alan is recorded in the presence of the king at ayr, where the scottish royal forces appear to have assembled. it was probably june when the norse fleet finally rounded kintyre, entered the firth of clyde, and made landfall on bute, where óspakr's forces stormed and captured the castle of rothesay. the fortress itself was a holding of walter fitz alan ii, steward of scotland, which may well reveal the anxiety felt by the meic somairle in the face of the steward's steadily increasing regional influence. reports that alan was in the vicinity, at the command of a massive fleet, forced the norse to withdraw to kintyre. in fact, the "eirspennill" version of the saga numbers alan's fleet at almost two hundred ships, whilst the "flateyjarbók", "frísbók", and "skálholtsbók" versions number it at one hundred and fifty. these totals suggest that alan commanded a force of two thousand or three thousand men.