Alban
One Week Later, The Day of the November Full Moon
I suspected my simple announcement wasn’t going to go as planned when I saw all the other wolves. Every one of them male. Every one of them waiting for the first official audience hours with the righ, since our king’s retirement from the Edinburgh Rovers rugby team.
A long queue stretched all the way from Dùn Faoiltiarn’s entrance to the closed throne room doors. And in front of those stood two guards. One held a Lochabar axe, the other a clipboard.
With an aggrieved sigh, I began to charge past all the other males. But the pubmaster’s youngest son seized my arm before I could reach the throne room's doors.
“Hey! No cutting! You’re gonna have to wait for your chance to put your name on the list like the rest of us.”
I flicked my eyes down to his thin hand on my large forearm. This lad was either aggressively stupid or the sort who didn’t think before he dared to grab onto a wolf twice his size.
“Are you mad?” The pubmaster’s eldest son snatched his brother’s hand away before I could introduce the young fool to the ham of my fist. “He’s the Kingdom Defender and the king’s cousin besides!
He doesnae have to wait here like the rest of us.
He can put his name on the list whenever he wants, you eejit. ”
The younger brother bowed his head and mumbled something. Perhaps it could have been translated as an apology if you spoke the language of Sullen Teenager.
Anyroad, I resumed my mission unabated. But as I continued toward the front of the line, I had a brief wonder about what sort of list would stir up a queue like this one.
Ach, probably better not to know. Most likely it’d be another BUC.
BUCs stood for Big Unnecessary Changes. And that's all our new banrigh had made since moving to our kingdom town a few months ago. She'd even done away with the term banrigh itself.
“Real talk, it creeps me out after what you did to my friend Milly,” she’d told the crowd at her big welcome parade. “Call me Tara—or Queen Tara if you have to be that formal about it.”
So nae, Queen Tara didn’t refer to herself as banrigh. Or call all the changes she’d been making to our old-fashioned kingdom town unnecessary. The opposite, in fact.
She'd labeled all her royal decrees “opportunities to bring Faoiltiarn into the 21st century." Aye, with a straight face.
She'd added invisible money to our banking system. Because according to her, one-hundred percent physical coin and paper systems weren't “a thing” kingdom towns did anymore.
She’d also insisted that Dùn Faoiltiarn running exclusively on candlelight was a fire hazard. Even after Uncle Lachlan explained to her Dùn Faoiltiarn’s proud history.
“The auld dùn’s only burned down a coupla times since its first erection in the late eighth century,” he'd told her. “By castle standards, that’s practically a perfect record!”
But that impressive track record wasn't good enough for Queen Tara. She’d hired electricians to wire up the place all the way from Edinburgh and ordered solar panels on top of that. Then she made me promise to install them.
Even the few children left in Faoiltiarn weren’t safe from her machinations. Queen Tara had insisted on hiring “new blood” to teach our boys. Something about Mrs. Kellywolf being older than Methuselah. She'd also griped about the syllabus not having been updated since the last millennium.
But all the kingdom town residents had been educated in the little schoolhouse behind the castle by Mrs. Kellywolf for over half a century. And we'd all turned out alright. Queen Tara’s mate was a former rugby star. And my younger cousin, Iain, was a tech billionaire even.
She acted as if Faoiltiarn were some wasteland place that hadn’t been surviving just fine before she showed up.
I stopped myself from falling into another mental rant, though.
As I came to a stop at the throne room doors, I reminded myself that the new queen’s BUCs wouldn’t fash me anymore. Not after I made my announcement.
Unfortunately, the two guards standing in front of the entrance weren’t in agreement with the pubmaster’s eldest son.
The one with the Lochabar axe tipped its long staff to bar me from entering. And the one with the clipboard said, “Sorry, Alb, we cannae let you jump the queue. You’ll have to wait the same as everybody else to add your name to the list.”
I raised both eyebrows. Again, what list?
But I’d never been one for the asking of questions.
Another aggrieved sigh—then I snatched the Lochabar axe out of the one guard’s hands. With one arm, I gut-punched him with the bottom of its staff. With the other, I pushed my heavy palm into Clipboard’s face. Action outcome? They both fell to the stone floor at the same time, bottoms first.
Which left no one in my way when I tossed the Lochabar axe aside and let my own self into the throne room.
Magnus was meeting with the baker’s son when I entered the cavernous space.
Besides a throne room, it also served as a ballroom and an alternative event space when rain interrupted any of our festivities.
So, this being Scotland, pretty much every wedding, town meeting, and holiday fete ended up going inside the throne room/ballroom/whatever-you-needed-it-to-be-today room.
“I’m sorry, Craig. You're a good male, but there’s so much demand, we’ve decided to cut the list off at the age of forty,” Magnus was saying to the baker's son.
Craig slumped his shoulders and bowed his head as if Magnus just told him the castle had decided to go gluten-free. "But this was my only chance!"
“I know it’s difficult with your sister being one of the very few eligible she-wolves in town,” Magnus said with a sympathetic tone. “I wish I had better news for—hello there, Alban! I never expected to see you at the front of the line!”
Instead of answering right away, I cast my cynical gaze around the large space. Had Queen Tara started in with her BUCs here, too?
The answer to that question turned out to be not yet. For the time being, the throne room remained as it always has since the time when both the wolves and the humans of this land had a Scottish king.
Two embedded marble thrones sat on a raised dais in front of a royal blue velvet canopy hanging down from a solid gold curtain crown.
Seven-armed six-foot-tall candelabras flanked each side of the stage.
And even more candles provided the room with all the light it needed from the giant wrought-iron chandelier hanging overhead. No, bulbs that I could see.
But those solar panels would be arriving any day now.
Everything was changing.
I flared my nostrils. And, I was almost grateful when I heard the scuffle of feet behind me. Those useless guards back for another round. I tensed, curling both hands into fists.
Good. I needed the excuse to hit something.
“Thank you, I’ve got it from here, mates.” Magnus dismissed the guards before I could show them exactly why I had been appointed as the beta of our pack. “And take Craig here out with ye while I have a word with our Kingdom Defender.”
I had to settle for glaring the two smaller males down as they shuffled out with the baker's son.
“Isn’t this a grand surprise!” Magnus said after the doors closed shut behind them.
I eyed my cousin up and down. Since moving back to the Highlands for good at the end of his final season with his rugby team, he’d taken to dressing in a full breacan-an-feilead.
For this afternoon's first audience look, he'd wrapped the Faoiltiarn tartan over a tunic jacket and sporran purse, then belted the rest around his waist to hang down like a traditional kilt.
The Scotswolf Royal Family brooch sat at his breast, announcing to the world he was the king of the Scottish Wolves.
Had to admit, the full royal kit suited him.
If he found a piece of furniture to lean upon and struck a pose, he’d look like one of the portraits of our royal ancestors lining the throne room’s walls.
At least until Queen Tara decided something more modern was needed.
Perhaps wallpaper with pictures of computers—like the ones she’d decided to have installed in the castle library.
Another cloud of steam rose between my ears.
“So, you’ve changed yer mind about adding your name to the list for the Bridal Exchange program too, eh?” Magnus said, with a knowing grin. “Got a good look at our newly arrived wiving stock, did ye?”
Wiving stock …
I cast a frown over my shoulder. So, the Canadian she-wolves were the cause of the long queue outside the closed throne room doors.
Aye, I’d gotten a few glimpses of the lot the town referred to as the “St. Ailbe Brides.” Had to stand in another long queue of them this morning when I went to the grocer to get extra provisions for my trip.
But that wasn’t why I was here.
“Look at me, forgetting your formal greeting. Where’s my head, today?” Magnus rose to his feet and spread his arms with a warm, “Good day to you, Kingdom Defender.”
His mate, our new banrigh, remained seated. Even though there was a rule about the king and queen rising to greet the Kingdom Defender whenever he enters their throne room on record. It had been written down with a quill pen in the Faoiltiarn kingdom’s Book of Law centuries ago.
I suspected her failure to abide by this rule had nothing to do with her being five months pregnant with twins.
She’d been charging about the kingdom for months now.
Changing things that didn’t need changing.
And telling any and all how things would be operating now that she was carrying the first set of direct-line royalty in over three decades.
More likely, she’d chosen not to rise from her cushioned throne seat because she didn’t care for me very much. Probably something to do with me kidnapping her from her posh life in Edinburgh on Magnus’s behalf a few months ago after I discovered she was pregnant.