Chapter 2: Terrible Tea and Trickster Threads

Chapter 2: Terrible Tea and Trickster Threads

Sleep hadn’t come. How could it? Every time I closed my eyes, I saw that impossible silhouette flowing from the darkness of the wynd, and the silent, judging gaze of the woman in the black coat. My mind, usually a reliable engine for sarcastic comebacks, was stuck replaying the whisper that had bloomed in my skull: Daniel MacLean.

The next morning, I sought refuge in the one place that felt remotely normal: the cramped, two-room office of ‘Edinburgh’s Eerie Encounters’. It was a testament to organised chaos, smelling faintly of damp flyers and digestive biscuits. Stacks of unsold t-shirts listed precariously in one corner, and a large map of the Old Town, bleeding with highlighter-pen routes, covered most of one wall. I was trying to force normalcy back into my life by performing its most sacred ritual: making a truly terrible cup of tea.

The kettle wheezed and clicked off. I sloshed the boiling water over a generic, dust-flavoured teabag in a mug that read ‘World’s Okayest Ghost Tour Guide’. I just needed the caffeine. I needed the routine. I needed to not think about the 1-star review from last night that was already online: “ABANDONED BY TERRIFIED GUIDE. ALMOST DIED. WOULD NOT RECOMMEND.”

My own desk was a mess, but Isla’s, opposite mine, was tidy and empty. A half-finished crossword sat by her keyboard. Her absence was a physical ache. Isla would have listened. She’d have let me babble about the cold and the shadow, and then she’d have told me I was an over-caffeinated idiot who’d finally been spooked by his own stories. She’d have grounded me. Without her, I was just a man alone with a pot of bad tea and a creeping certainty that I was losing my mind.

A sharp, confident rap on the frosted glass of the office door made me jump, splashing hot tea over my hand. I cursed, shaking my fingers, and stomped over to the door, expecting a disgruntled tourist demanding a refund.

I yanked the door open and my brain short-circuited.

The man standing in the doorway was a walking contradiction. He was lean and sharp-featured, with a shock of coppery hair and eyes the colour of new spring leaves. His ears, I noticed with a jolt, had the faintest, elegant point to them. But it was his clothes that caused the real cognitive dissonance. He wore a handsome tweed jacket, the kind you’d see on a country laird, but paired it with trousers of a shade of pink so violent it should have come with a health warning. His boots were pointed, made of soft leather, and looked ridiculously out of place on the grimy linoleum floor of our building’s hallway.

He flashed a grin that was all charm and sharp edges. “Daniel MacLean? I’m told this is your… place of business. It has a certain… rustic charm. Like a badger’s sett, but with more paper.”

The use of my full name again sent a jolt of ice through my veins. “Who’s asking?” I said, my hand tightening on the doorknob.

“A concerned party. A patron of the arts. A connoisseur of chaos,” he said, breezing past me into the office before I could object. He surveyed the room with an air of theatrical amusement. “My, oh my. You really do scrape the bottom of the mortal coil for a living, don’t you?” He spun on his heel, his emerald eyes glittering with mischief. “Finnian of the Green Bough, at your service. But you can call me Finn.”

“Right. And I’m the King of Scotland,” I deadpanned, crossing my arms. “What do you want, Finn? Are you from a rival tour company? Because the fluorescent trousers are a bold marketing choice.”

Finn laughed, a sound like wind chimes. “Rival? My dear boy, my concerns are far above such petty commerce. I’m here about your performance last night.”

My stomach tightened. “Look, if you want a refund—”

“Refund?” He looked genuinely confused. “No, no! I thought it was magnificent! You were rehearsing your little ghost story, all sound and fury, and then bang!” He clapped his hands together, making me flinch. “The real thing shows up. And you lit up, Daniel. Like a firefly in a jar. Drew it right to you.”

I stared at him, the cynical retorts dying on my tongue. He knew. He was talking about the shadow, the cold. He wasn’t mocking me.

“What are you talking about?” I managed, my voice strained.

“I’m talking about the Bodach Glas,” Finn said, his cheerful tone making the strange words sound even more menacing. “The Grey Man. A nasty little sniffer-dog of a creature. Not very creative, but persistent. Someone sent it to get a taste of you.”

I felt dizzy. The room seemed to tilt. Bodach Glas. It was a name from Scottish folklore, a type of bogeyman. Part of a script I’d read a dozen times but never truly believed.

“You’re insane,” I said, more to convince myself than him. “You’re from a psych ward, or you’re an actor hired by Isla to wind me up. That’s it. It’s a prank.”

“Your friend Isla is at home with a rather nasty head cold, dreaming of lukewarm soup,” Finn said dismissively, waving a hand. “And I assure you, my madness is of a much higher calibre than anything you mortals can concoct. I am Fae, Daniel. The real deal. And you’ve gotten the attention of someone who likes to play with things that don’t belong to them.”

Fae. Like fairies. My comedian’s brain tried to find the joke. A fairy walks into a ghost tour office… But there was nothing funny here. His eyes held an unnerving, ancient quality that didn’t belong in a man who looked barely older than me.

“Get out,” I said, pointing to the door. I’d had enough. This was too much. A shadow in a close was one thing; a lunatic in neon trousers claiming to be a fairy was another. “The show’s over.”

Finn’s smile faded, replaced by a sudden, sharp intensity. “The show is just beginning, you ridiculous ape. You don’t understand the danger—”

He stopped. His head cocked to one side, listening to a sound I couldn’t hear. The playful light in his eyes vanished, replaced by genuine alarm.

“Oh, bother,” he whispered.

That’s when the cold returned.

It wasn't a draft. It was the same soul-deep, predatory chill from the wynd, flooding the small office. It leached the warmth from the air, from the walls, from my very skin. The mug of tea on my desk, still steaming a second ago, stopped. A thin sheen of ice spread across its surface. I watched in horror as delicate, feathery patterns of frost bloomed on the inside of the office window, blocking out the grey morning light.

My breath plumed in a thick white cloud. The 'World's Okayest Ghost Tour Guide' mug cracked with a sharp ping.

“It’s here,” Finn breathed, his voice stripped of all its earlier flamboyance. He looked at the door, his posture tense, like a cornered animal. “It followed me. Cleverer than I gave it credit for.”

The lights in the office flickered once, twice, and then died, plunging us into a frigid, grey twilight. The only illumination came from the frosted window. A sound started at the door. Not a knock. It was a faint, dry scratching. The sound of dead leaves skittering across stone. The sound from my nightmares.

I was trapped. Trapped in my mundane little office, the flimsy wooden door the only thing between me, a flamboyant stranger who called himself Fae, and the featureless, name-stealing horror that had come back to finish its terrible work.