Page 26 of Crown of the Fae King

Compared to Edinburgh’s long avenues of ancient buildings, Denver was the wild and modern West. The recorded history of Colorado went back about two centuries. The history of Scotland, more than two millennia. We were infants compared to this.

Sure, I’d seen enough on the TV screen to know the world was much bigger than just a few western states, but to see centuries-old buildings up close was like escaping the Matrix and finding out my world view had been painfully narrow.

“I’d once thought Archeology might be an interesting life choice,” I told Wickham, as he led me down a street literally made of bricks and cobbled stone. “But if I’d seen this,” I gestured to the row of spired buildings on the hillside, “I think Architecture would have won me over.”

“Aye? So ye studied Archeology, then?”

“Never got around to it. I only had two years of college, and I mostly studied boys…and whatever they were studying.”

“Well, now it seems ye’re about to earn yer degree in Mythology. Here we are.” He nodded to a low building painted the shade of intense blue you’d expect a high school to choose for their football team. “Ye see this brass here?” He pointed at a handful of golden bricks tucked in among the regular ones on the sidewalk. “This pub takes its name from the City Walls which once surrounded Edinburgh. Back in the sixteenth century, the English defeated us at Flodden, and we put up the walls for protection. The city gate was located here. And the people inside them believed the world was no longer theirs, hence, The World’s End.” He pointed to the sign above the door. “The World’s End Pub.”

Pub be damned. I smelled food.

My stomach became that happy, tail-wagging dog again as we stepped inside the building. The ceilings were low, but made lower still by black beams. A longer, slightly narrow version of railroad ties.

A tall man led us to a table. He kept his head cocked to one side as if he worried he might hit it on the ceiling, though there was enough room for him to stand straight. The space between tables was tight, but the folks sitting around us seemed happy and grateful as they soaked in the details of the place. The women seemed happier still when they soaked in the sight of my companion.

“Famous pub,” Wickham said, then did a little swirl with his pointer finger to indicate the room in general. He was a master at ignoring female attention, but then he’d have to be.

“I hope it’s famous for its food, too.”

“Oh, aye. It’s why we’ve come. My favorite fish and chips in the city, though the competition is fierce.”

Being land-locked all my life, I wasn’t much into fish, but I ordered it anyway. Chips meant fries, I knew that much, so at least I’d have something filling.

After the waiter disappeared, I looked around the packed dining room. “You said I was going to meet others. Are they coming here?”

Wickham shook his head. “Just around the corner. But I reckoned we should eat first.”

I just hoped the pub would accept American money. I had about a week’s worth of tips in the lining of my purse, hidden from snoopy café owners. But when it came time to pay the check—for the food I knew I would crave for the rest of my life--Wickham waved my money away. So I tried to leave the tip.

“Tips is an American custom, lass. We dinnae do that here.”

I laughed. “What? Will it insult him or something?”

“Aye. It will. Wait staff are paid differently. Trust me.”

It was physically painful to take the money off the table and put it back in my purse. I felt like I was stealing. “I’m going to need time to adjust to this,” I said aloud, primarily to myself.

Wickham gave me that look. Even though there was no chemistry between us, I blushed and turned my attention back to my purse. A younger me might have fallen in love on the spot, despite the existence of a Mrs. Wickham Muir. But I hadn’t been that girl for a long time now. I’d changed when I learned I would never have children.

When Wickham said, “just around the corner,” he’d meant just around the building. We reached the end of the bright blue paint when he turned us toward the opening of a tunnel. The plaque above it readWorld’s End Close, and the same thing was etched in the stone beneath our feet. Thankfully, there was light at the other end, and the tunnel opened up into a small courtyard. We entered a doorway under yet another World’s End sign, but this time, apartments.

“I will tell ye now, before we go in,” he said, “that Hank is yer business. I will not speak of him without yer permission.”

At the end of the hall on the second floor, he knocked on a door. I had no idea what to expect, and asking questions made me feel…ungrateful, even though he’d insisted it was I who was doing him a favor, and not the other way around. It didn’t seem to matter that he’d forked out ten thousand dollars to bail me out of my Hazelton servitude, and another five hundred that afternoon replenishing my Andy-defiled wardrobe.

The door to 24A opened. A taller, fiercer version of Wickham Muir filled the doorway. Half a head taller, he also had dark hair past his shoulders, and though he wasn’t as pretty, he was a rustic kind of handsome. He had hazel eyes and wore a drapey kilt of intense blue and looked like he’d stepped out of Scotland’s distant past. I may have gasped.

The man blinked, looked at Wickham, then nodded deeply and stepped back so we could enter.

“Lennon, this is Urban MacKenzie.” Wickham had to nudge me to keep me moving. “Urban, this is Lennon Todd. She’s with us, now.”

The taller man lifted a brow but said nothing. I took that to mean he wasn’t interested in shaking hands.

A stunning brunette stood in the tiny living room, smiling and patient while I stumbled toward her. She wore her shiny smooth hair in a long ponytail that started at the crown of her head and still hung well below her shoulder blades. Her muted green outfit turned out to be tweed that looked so soft I was tempted to touch it. She held out her hand and when I didn’t take it fast enough, she scooped up my hand and shook it.

“Everly MacKenzie. The big one’s mine.” She winked at me, then laughed. “Lennon, is it?”

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