Stirling, Sept. 4 -- When Scotland voted in 2014 against independence, that seemed to settle the issue: The hauntingly rugged region where Britain's royal family spends its holidays at its vast Balmoral estate would remain with England, Wales and Northern Ireland in a United Kingdom governed from London.

But less than two years later came the Brexit referendum, and while the U.K. voted to leave the European Union, Scots distinguished themselves as the biggest dissenters. Not only did Scotland vote overwhelmingly to stay in the EU, it was the only one of the U.K.'s four parts where not a single constituency delivered a "Yes" vote to leave.

Simply put: Scotland is being dragged largely unwillingly toward what many of its people fear will ...