Manannan's Magic

by Michele McGrath

The magician’s ship was said to be full of spirits and demons. Strange bright lights had been seen in the night, far out at sea. Sometimes the boat was wreathed in smoke, which had an odd smell. Harp music had been heard coming from it, tunes no one recognised. They made you want to dance or cry or fall into a deep sleep. People said no one was safe to go anywhere near the ship or the man, unless the sun shone brightly. Who knew what might happen in the darkness or the mist? It was better not to find out. No one wanted to be turned into a frog or a pig for saying the wrong thing. If you were stupid or desperate enough to go to him at all, you should carry a twig of rowan. Then you couldn't be enchanted. It's supposed to be a charm against all sorts of magic. I always wonder if such things work. Why should a rowan twig make any difference? Everyone seemed to shiver with a kind of delicious fear when they whispered to each other. Fears or not, though, people always fall sick or injure themselves and so do beasts. Many flocked to the magician whenever his boat came to land, seeking his help for their troubles.

  When the priest heard the rumours, he went to find out the truth. He wanted to know what manner of being this so-called magician was. Father Peddyr's a strange man. He lives all by himself down by the sea, miles from anyone. He spends most of his time praying to God for our sins. At least, he says he does when we ask him. Certainly, he doesn't come to our village often. At Lughnasa, he baptises babies, sets couples hand-fast to each other and says prayers over the dead. He goes around all the villages and he has a busy few weeks until everything is done. Then we don't set eyes on him again until the next year. He's always been our priest, ever since I was a small child. I don't like him, because he never smiles. He condemns being happy and having fun as sinful. I sometimes wonder why. God must have made happiness and fun as He created everything else. Why should God prefer us to be gloomy and unhappy? I don't understand and I've never dared ask the priest or anyone else. I hate to think what would have happened to me if I had.

  I didn't expect the priest to be a brave man. Any one of our warriors would be able to push him over with his little finger. He's scrawny and walks with a limp. I think you must be brave, though, to deliberately confront a strange magician, who might turn you into a frog. Father Peddyr obviously has his own kind of courage, if the need arises. I thought better of him when I found out what he had done. No one went with him or watched the two of them meet. No one really knows what happened. Not long afterwards, the priest returned the same small fussy man he has always been. He said little about his meeting with the magician, before he confronted him. He had only told Mian what he intended to do, when they met by chance along the way. When Mian mentioned this to us, people felt anxious about the priest. They were not apprehensive enough to follow him though. The day he chose to go was misty and strange things happen in the mist, as everyone knows. Mian tried to stop Father Peddyr. He told him he might easily mistake the way down to the strand and fall over the cliff. Perhaps the magician had even deliberately veiled himself with cloud, because he didn't want to be found. Father Peddyr rebuked Mian for his lack of faith and would not turn aside. Mian was sure he would never see the priest again, but Father Peddyr returned unharmed. He passed through the village on the way back to the keeil where he lives.

  He spoke with my father and the elders before he returned home. The rest of us found out soon enough what had happened, as we always do. Father Peddyr called the magician a fili or seer. Apparently, many of them live over on the western island. Why this one had come here, he did not say. He had shown the priest the king's token which allows him to stay on the island. He said he wanted to live in peace with all men. He told Father Peddyr that he, like everybody with his knowledge, had the ability to cure the sick. He explained a few of his cures to the priest. Father Peddyr had shaken his head dolefully and left with the conviction that the man's powers were unholy.

  Father Peddyr has his own beliefs about such things. He thinks suffering is the penance we must pay in this world for our sins. Then we can go to Heaven. Hardship must be borne, not cured. The magician apparently uses the old magic, which has been forbidden. That sort of knowledge was fruit of the Devil. Some of the things the fili did seemed to be good in themselves; yet the way he did them was terribly wrong. The priest forbade anyone to go near him, on peril of our souls. My father supported his words and warned us to obey him. Oshin hates anything to do with magic or ghosts. He always stops us, if we talk about uncanny things. He seems to fear anything he cannot touch. Yet it is strange to think of him being afraid of anything. He is such a brave warrior.

  The priest wasn't obeyed, of course, except by the truly pious and there aren't many of those around here. Far more people want an end to their pain, or the things that upset them. So visits were made to him secretly, now the magician had openly admitted his powers. The priest did not find out about them. Nor, for a while, did my father and the other headmen. I only found out because I am a woman and I overheard the other women talking together. I never found out who made the journeys. I did not want to know, in case my father questioned me. I didn't blame anyone for going; I would do the same if I had the need. After all, you can always repent of your sins once you have been cured, can’t you?

  One evening, Margaid brought us the latest rumour. The magician had sewed up a man's broken head like a piece of cloth. His familiar had licked the wound, until the skin seemed to close over. The man had lived, even though he had been terribly injured. His family had given him up for dead before the magician came.

  “What sort of familiar does he have?” Verona asked curiously. This was the first tale we'd been told about such a creature.

  “No ordinary animal. He’s a huge grey hound, almost as high as a man’s shoulder. They say he never leaves the magician’s side and obeys orders no one else can understand. Occasionally the man speaks to him in a strange tongue.” Her voice became hushed as she said the words.

  “Didn't you describe a dog just like that, Renny?” Fritha asked me. “The one that came with the stranger from the sea? You told us his hound was huge and grey.” All eyes swivelled to me, and I nodded.

  “I wasn't even sure what sort of animal it was, at first. It was the size of a pony. Then I remembered Jole saying he'd seen creatures like that in the west.”

  “Well,” Fritha's voice sounded excited, “there are unlikely to be two dogs as big as that here. They say the magician appears and disappears in a narrow boat, just like the one you told us about. This must be the same man.”

  “Perhaps it is him.” The notion made the base of my spine tingle. “I thought he'd gone back to wherever he came from, when his boat vanished.”

  “Remember neither Keir nor Mian saw him go, even though they were watching the shore all the time. They told us the ship must have disappeared by magic.”

  “That lazy pair wouldn't recognise magic if they tripped over it.” Verona chuckled. “Can you imagine either of them staying awake if they wanted to go to sleep? I don't know why Oshin trusted them to keep a proper watch. He knows what they’re like.”

  “Perhaps Oshin didn't want to meet the magician at all,” Margaid argued. She cast her eye at my mother to find out how she would react. “Maybe he just wanted to be seen to do his duty. Sending those scamps made sure he avoided meeting the man.”

  Mummig, for once, did not rise to the bait. “Perhaps,” was all she replied.

  “I'll bet whichever one of that pair was on guard fell sound asleep before the ship left. Then he woke up and realised what had happened. They had to make up a good story to tell Oshin. Of course, the ship disappeared by magic!” Margaid continued, in order to provoke Mummig further. We all laughed.

  “We thought we'd never hear about him again,” I said. Although, in my case, that thought wasn’t true. I had been sure I would.

  “Well, we did, didn't we?” murmured Fritha.

  “You were right anyway, Renny” said my mother. “The man is strange.”

  “He's even stranger than I thought, if he does all the th
ings people are saying. Can we stop talking about him, please? You're making me scared enough to come out in goose pimples.”

  Although I said the words jokingly, I was feeling odd inside, sort of hollow and trembling. Not a very nice sensation and one that came upon me by surprise. The others laughed but they pitied me and the subject was dropped, at least for the moment. It was too fascinating to be left alone forever.

  Some of the rumours came to my father's ears, at last. He, too, had made the connection with the man I had seen on the shore. Once again, he repeated his warning to us not to go near him. Everyone obeyed him this time, in our village at least, or so I thought. No one had any need to disobey at the moment. No one was ill enough. Who would chance my father's wrath for something like a love potion? Not even Fritha is silly enough to do that. Little did I think I would be the one to meet the magician again and it happened in a way I certainly didn't expect.

  3

  I was alone, picking blackberries on the headland. The storm came up out of a clear blue sky. One moment I bathed in warm sunshine, reaching out for the ripe fruit. The next moment, a dark shadow fell over me and rain pelted down on my unprotected back. My clothes were drenched in seconds, and I could hardly stand for the buffeting of the wind. Tumbling black clouds covered the sun, and the noise of the storm rose to an evil scream. I thrust my basket deep beneath a bush. I hoped it would still be there on my return. I had to leave it, because I needed two hands to scramble down the twisting path to shelter. I groped my way along, clinging to branches for support; my eyes half-closed against the stinging rain. I blinked hard to find my way.

  I was still high up on the cliffs where the sweetest berries grow. The path narrows near the edge. My skirt tangled around my legs and snagged on brambles, jerking me forward. As I turned to free myself, the wind whipped me round, and I slipped. I fell and the cliff was falling with me! Sand stung my face, stones and branches lashed against me. I was bruised, cut, and terrified. I caught at a ledge and dug my fingers into the soft ground, hoping to slow my fall. It was no use. My weight was too much. The fragile handhold gave beneath me, pitching me down through the darkness. I went down, down towards the rocky shore and the sea below me. I plunged into a dark hole, the sand swirling around me, above me, under me. I hit the beach with such a thud, I heard the snap of a broken bone. Then, for a long time, I knew no more.

  When I opened my eyes again, the rain was beating down on my face. Grains of sand scoured my skin. The night was black. I must have been lying there for hours. In panic, I pushed away the sand that was piling up into a drift against my head. A little dune had already started to shift over my nose and mouth, beginning to smother me. That's what had woken me up.

  My hands felt bruised and stiff, when I moved them. I coughed and tried to roll over, but my legs were trapped beneath a barrow of sand. One of them had twisted under me, sending out waves of pain. My senses swam and I groaned aloud. Then a sudden wetness touched my out-flung hand. Not the pattering of the rain, it swirled beneath my fingers. In that instant, I realised what it was. Oh God! The sea, the sea! Was the tide coming in to drown me? I lay helpless, trapped, and unable to move.

  Alerted now to the danger, I listened to the roar of the waves breaking on the shore. The water lapped near me. I peered into the gloom, and made out the whiteness of the breakers. They were very near. I scrabbled at the sodden sand that was holding my leg down. It parted in my hands but each hole I dug filled instantly. Groping around, I tried to find something solid to pull against. Pain seared through me like a hot knife and I fainted again.

  A strange snuffling in my ear, louder even than the roaring of the wind, woke me up. My eyes snapped open, and I beheld a face out of nightmares, huge, hairy, and inhuman. I screamed, as all the childhood tales of demons and spirits flooded into my mind. Then the thing howled, and I realised what it was - a dog, only a dog. It was enormous, like no dog I had ever known. In the darkness, I glimpsed the gleam of its eyes and the whiteness of its teeth. It opened its mouth. I waited, terrified, knowing I had no means of defending myself against the creature. All at once, the snuffling ceased and hands touched my face - human hands. I looked up into the face of the stranger from the sea. He held a small torch aloft, spluttering in the rain. The light dazzled me but I recognised him for who he was. I shrank away and put my hands up to shield my eyes. What on earth would happen to me now?

  “I mean you no harm,” he shouted to me over the roar of the wind. I could hardly hear him for the noise, and I did not understand his words properly. I started to tremble for I had no escape. If he left me on the shore, I would surely die when the tide came in. He did not leave me. He ran gentle hands over my body and down my side and my leg. Everything hurt so much that I cried out and merciful blackness engulfed me again.

  I don't remember him lashing my leg to a piece of driftwood. I don’t remember him lifting me up in his arms to carry me to his ship. He told me about it later. Only once did I come to my senses on that terrible journey when his cloak snapped in the wind and stung my face. I quickly lost consciousness again.

  The night was still dark when I woke. Now I was warm and dry, lying beside a crackling fire. I had a soft pad underneath me and I was covered by a cloak. The cold and the terrors of the cliff and the darkness had left me. I tried to find out where I was. I could not see much in the dim light. Yet I felt certain I had never been inside this place before. Salt stung my nostrils and the wind whistled through the darkness, echoing and shrieking like a tortured beast. The sound was eerie and I drew the cloak over my ears to muffle the noise. As I did so, firelight flashed in an animal’s eyes. The dog turned his head as he heard me move.

  My memory returned then, and I remembered who had found me lying on the shore. Oh my God! I had fallen into the clutches of the magician! Despite the fire, a chill entered my bones again and a cold sweat formed on my brow. I squirmed and tried to move. Another sharp pang made me gasp for breath. I fell back and huddled down, murmuring prayers to Our Lady for deliverance. I wondered what would happen next.

  Nothing did. After a while, I touched my side again with shaking fingers. I tried to find out how badly I had been hurt. I should not have tried, everything was sore and I cried out. At the sound, the stranger rose from the shadows and came forward into the firelight. He was carrying a shallow cup which he held gently to my lips.

  “Drink this,” he said, “and go back to sleep again.” I seemed to lack a will of my own. Although fear made me want to stay awake, I swallowed the clear liquid obediently. An unfamiliar taste, at once bitter and sweet, but it was effective. Before I was able to speak to him, I fell asleep again.

  Daylight streamed into the room when I awoke. A strange milky light flickered across the smooth stone walls, which seemed to have no cracks. Not a house then. Where on earth was I? The dog was lying curled up against me, sharing his warmth. I stirred. He turned his head to me, rose and trotted away. He must have given some sort of signal, because, only a few moments later, the stranger appeared again.

  “Ah, you’re awake. Good.” I shrank from him. He saw me recoil and frowned. He came over to stand beside me. My eyes blurred with fright and a red haze veiled my sight. He reached down and took my hand. His grasp was gentle and a ripple of calmness passed through me.

  “Why are you afraid?” he asked. The tone of his voice was kind too. He spoke in my own language, with the lilt of a foreigner.

  “Because you’re a magician!” I blurted out. Then I clapped my hand over my mouth in horror as I realised what I had just said. He laughed a big rumbling laugh.

  “You shouldn't listen to the tales people tell of me.”

  “Aren't they true?”

  “Some of them, perhaps, not all.”

  “People say you use enchantments…” Another laugh interrupted me.

  “They would! My enchantments are only the magic of the earth itself and the things that grow. I heal not harm. I repeat – you have no need to fear me.”

 
“You won't turn me into a frog, will you?” I had never believed that particular story anyway.

  “I prefer you the way you are,” he replied with a smile.

  I gazed into his eyes. In that instant, I knew he spoke the truth and I had nothing to fear from him. I smiled back. That was the last time I thought clearly for many days.

  Afterwards, I drifted in and out of wakefulness. At times, I became aware of my surroundings. At others, everything appeared misty and the sounds were indistinct. It seemed as though the world had been smothered in a thick fog.

  “What’s happening to me?” I once cried aloud.

  His voice said soothingly, “You have a fever. You were stone cold when I brought you here. It was only to be expected.” I heard his words from a distance and they seemed to echo in my mind. He pressed cool cloths against my skin. I shivered violently, although I felt boiling hot, as if I was burning up.

  “Am I dying?” I whispered. I had never been so ill before. His hand grasped mine firmly, comforting me.

  “You won't die. You’re young and strong, and your fever is not getting any worse. The illness will pass. Sleep. The more rest you have, the sooner you’ll be better.” He held another cup to my lips and I drank greedily. I did not know or care what the liquid was. Again, I slept.

  Then one day when I awoke, my skin felt cool and I was clear-headed. Sunlight poured into the place where I lay. It made the stone walls flash in colours of white, grey and bronze. A breeze blew through the opening, and the air had the icy tang of frost. My side was uncomfortable. My leg felt worse. Yet the aches were not as painful as they had been before. I raised my head gingerly, delighted to feel only a slight throbbing across my brow. The dog sat, watching me. He barked when I moved. The unexpected sound made me jump. He came to stand over me, wagging his huge tail. I put out my hand to pat him and I thought he almost grinned.

  “Ah, you’re awake at last,” the stranger said, ducking as he passed through the entrance. He carried a fishing line. “Are you hungry now?”