The Traitors films at Ardross Castle in the Scottish Highlands, and unless you know someone, you can't book a room there. But Britain has no shortage of castle hotels and holiday lets where you can live out the cloaks-and-chalices fantasy, from a £108-a-night fortress in Durham to a whole Scottish baronial pile for up to 30 friends.

A handful of the picks lean properly theatrical. Thornbury Castle near Bristol, a 1520s Tudor stronghold, has a Catherine of Aragon tower suite up 77 spiral steps and a three-AA-rosette dining room — Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn once stayed. Lumley Castle in Chester-le-Street, perched above the River Wear, runs murder-mystery dinner nights with a three-course meal in its Knight's Restaurant, which is about as on-brand as it gets. Rooms start at £108.

Group bookings get more dramatic still. Birkhill Castle in Fife sleeps up to 30 across a private 1,500-acre estate on the Tay Estuary, complete with oil paintings, grand pianos, a library and fireplaces made for evening cocktails — though you'll need patience as well as money: 2027 stays start from £9,000 a night. Knock Old Castle at Largs on the Ayrshire coast sleeps eight in a restored 14th-century tower with hand-painted ceilings and a sea-view hot tub, from £3,134 for a week.

Several options are surprisingly affordable. Drum Castle in Aberdeenshire has a National Trust for Scotland courtyard cottage for two from £581 a week, with access to a 4,000-book library and grounds where red squirrels and roe deer roam. The Knoll Tower at Weston Park in Shropshire sleeps two in an 18th-century turret with a roof terrace, from £844 a week. At Scone Palace in Perthshire — where the Stone of Scone was kept for centuries — six guests can take the Balvaird Wing apartment for two nights from £1,300.

For the full luxury treatment, Glenapp Castle in Ayrshire offers 17 period suites with four-posters and sea views from £353 a night, plus a Hebridean sea safari. Dunskey Estate near Stranraer adds archery, axe throwing and wild swimming to its 25-room Edwardian castle — traitor training, essentially. On the Isle of Harris, The Broch is a three-storey modernised ruin entered over a slate drawbridge, from £260 a night, with the Harris Gin distillery nearby. Augill Castle in Cumbria keeps things relaxed with doubles from £190 including breakfast, and Mar Hall near Glasgow — a stately home rather than a true castle — rounds out the list with 74 rooms and clay pigeon shooting from £315.

If you've ever yelled "traitor" at the TV, there's a stronghold here for almost any budget.