Ronan Boyle and the Swamp of Certain Death

by Thomas Lennon

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Lennon, Thomas, 1970– author. | Hendrix, John, 1976– illustrator.

  Title: Ronan Boyle and the Swamp of Certain Death/by Thomas Lennon; illustrated by John Hendrix.

  Other titles: Swamp of Certain Death

  Description: New York: Amulet Books, 2020. | Series: Ronan Boyle; 2 | Summary: While on an official mission to rescue his captain, fifteen-year-old Ronan Boyle, detective in the Garda Special Unit that polices the wee folk, also pursues a personal vendetta to capture the Bog Man and prove his parents’ innocence.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019033771 (print) | LCCN 2019033772 (ebook) | ISBN 9781419741135 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781683358176 (ebook)

  Subjects: CYAC: Police—Fiction. | Fairies—Fiction. | Magic—Fiction. | Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. | Ireland—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.L4492 Rq 2020 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.L4492 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  Text copyright © 2020 Thomas Lennon

  Illustrations copyright © 2020 John Hendrix

  Book design by Hana Anouk Nakamura

  Original book design by Chad W. Beckerman

  Published in 2020 by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

  Amulet Books are available at special discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use. Special editions can also be created to specification. For details, contact specialsales@abramsbooks.com or the address below.

  Amulet Books® is a registered trademark of Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

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  For Jenny

  OFFICE OF FINBAR DOWD

  Deputy Commissioner

  Special Unit of Tir Na Nog

  Collins House, Killarney

  Kerry, Ireland

  4 March

  To: Trainees of the Special Unit

  From: Office of the Deputy Commissioner

  SOMEWHAT CLASSIFIED

  Per Ireland’s 1997 Freedom of Information Act, I am “delighted” and required to disclose this second volume of the diaries of Lieutenant Ronan Boyle, human of the Special Unit. These journals have been made available despite my own objections and Commissioner McManus himself being oh-so-very annoyed about the whole affair.

  Some of the actions described in this new tome are against the policies of the Special Unit. The name of an undercover operative in Tir Na Nog has been changed to REDACTED throughout the text, as the creature whose real name is REDACTED is still active in dangerous covert operations with the faerie folk both in Tir Na Nog and the human Republic of Ireland.

  As you know from the flyer in the entirely safe Collins House lift—Lieutenant Ronan Boyle is either deceased or remarkably missing. Information leading to the safe return of Boyle and/or his belt will be rewarded by the Special Unit. (Please contact Pat Finch with any information, even if he seems standoffish! Despite his face, he’s quite lovely, especially if you don’t get him started on Roscommon Football Club’s lineup this season, as he thinks they are rubbish, even though they’ve shown a lot of character! On second thought, perhaps contact Sergeant Jeanette O’Brien at the main desk, unless she is in her unpleasant human form.)

  Obviously, the reward is slightly less for just Lieutenant Boyle’s belt, but we can haggle about these details later.

  Your friend when you have literally no one else to turn to,

  F.D., D.C.

  Chapter One

  A RAINY NIGHT IN GALWAY

  “Be still, my beating heart!” said Dolores Mullen, my unreliable guardian, as she smooched the top of my soggy beret and spun me in the air. “Ya look like a movie star, Ronan!”

  Dolores was taking a break from playing her fiddle out on Shop Street. Her face was almost as blue as her asymmetrical punk haircut. She was flush from being out all day in a classic Galway mister-chiller. She squeezed me into a bear hug that left me momentarily drowning in her cozy upper armpit. I cringed, as my entire body was still bruised from my painful run-in with the weegees at Duncannon Fort the night before.

  Dolores strapped her fiddle and bow into their ragged case, which is mostly held together with humorous stickers. I could see a bit of plastic shrink-wrap covering a new tattoo etched into her shoulder. The tattoo read DON’T PANIC. I don’t always understand Dolores’ tattoos, but they’re sometimes tributes to books that she loves. It seemed like solid advice. Don’t panic. I would try to remember this no matter what, even though wide-eyed panic and self-doubt would be the first two things listed on my Wikipedia entry!

  Shop Street in Galway is one of the top eleven most-charming streets in the Republic of Ireland as voted by Free Irish Hotel Magazine, which is a solid magazine for the price.

  Dolores is a busker, which means that she plays her fiddle for tips from passersby. The buskers who perform on Shop Street rival any other major metropolis in Europe. Shop Street Galway is playing in the Premiere League for buskers. Dolores makes a tidy income. Her most popular songs are “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” and “Message in a Bottle” by The Police. The latter is nearly impossible to play on the fiddle. The only other busker on Shop Street who gives Dolores a run for her money is The Boy Who Plays a Guitar Like a Hammer Dulcimer with His Bare Fingers. If you’ve never seen him, it’s worth a visit to the west of Ireland just to witness his skill. He’s amazing. Also, please don’t mention to Dolores that I told you how amazing he is.

  I settled in across the table from Dolores, readjusting the salt, pepper, and red chili shakers, as is my nervous habit when I sit down in pizza-themed restaurants.

  I was dressed in my Garda Special Unit of Tir Na Nog uniform, which is a dapper rig: boots with knee protectors, shillelagh, camouflage kilt, utility belt, Kevlar-blend jacket, and optional beret. For a fifteen-year-old, I looked pretty sharp, except for my thick prescription glasses, which I am completely dependent on.

  I unbuttoned my jacket and a bit of steam wafted up from inside and fogged my glasses. We had ducked out of the rain and into my favorite pizzeria in Galway, which is called Dough Bros.

  “Detective!” I whispered to Dolores. “I was promoted just last night. Detective Ronan Boyle!”

  “Detective!? That’s my lad! Does it come with a raise in pay?”

  “Oh. Um. I . . . I don’t think so? I didn’t think to ask,” I replied. “In fact, I still owe the Supply and Weapons Department eighty euros for this new outfit. Plus forty-five euros for the old trainee jumpsuit, and a bit for the shenanogram, plus a fee for the belt and the optional beret. And the trainee manual.”

  Adding it up, my short career in the Garda Special Unit of Tir Na Nog had left me almost five hundred euros in debt.

  “Oh. Either way. You look smashing, Ronan, so very grown up!” said Dolores as she held my face in her ice-cold hands that smelled faintly of rosin. “Pizza is on me, luv!”

  And with that, Dolores pulled a crumpled roll of five-euro notes from her fiddle case, saying, “And put the rest toward paying off this dashing uniform!”

  She slipped the stack of euros into my sporran* and s
napped it closed.

  “Bless you, Dolores. This could be my last hot human meal for a bit. I’m off this very night,” I said with a nervous whisper, “. . . off to you know where.”

  “TO TIR NA NOG!!! LAND OF THE FAERIE FOLK!?! AFTER LORD DESMOND DOOLEY AND THE YUCKY RED-EYED LEPRECHAUN WOMAN!?!?” shrieked Dolores with giddy glee, bumping the crushed pepper and forcing me to reset the condiments again.

  “SHHHH. All that bit’s classified, Dolores,” I whispered, trying not to draw any more attention to us. “Top secret. But off the record, yes, that’s precisely what I’m supposed to be doing. I don’t know why they’re sending me. I’m not remotely qualified.”

  “How did they pick you?” asked Dolores, concerned, and quietly confirming the sick feeling in my stomach that I had no business going on this mission.

  “Well, I—I insisted, actually. In a moment of absolute insane bravado. I told the commissioner himself that it had to be me. Why would I do that? Am I a complete eejit?”

  “No. Because you are brave and loyal. Brave and loyal Ronan Boyle; it even rhymes, luv.”

  “But I’m neither, I can assure you, Dolores,” I said.

  In truth, I had just ordered the margherita pizza because I was frightened that I was likely allergic to almost every other pizza combination on the excellent Dough Bros menu.

  Ronan Boyle is the opposite of brave—he is afraid of pizza.

  Ninety-nine percent of my days are spent worrying about things I’ve just said to people and wishing I would have said something else. Or wishing I had said nothing at all. I hope you don’t know this feeling, as it can be all-consuming. Sometimes I wake up worried about something I said YEARS AGO.

  Then there are regrettable high fives that I have tried to perform, without thinking. One of these was with Yogi Hansra, who is both an amazing yoga teacher and probably the human world’s best shillelagh fighter. Once at the end of a class I raised my hand for a high five and said: “Yaaassss girl.”

  I have thought about this awkward moment literally thousands of times. WHY? Why would I do that? Likely it would be the thing that passed through my mind at the moment of my death. Yaaassss girl? This is not something that can come out of my mouth without a crash-landing that kills many innocent bystanders.

  I fixed the arrangement of the pizza condiments, suddenly sweaty. Maybe it wasn’t too late for me to back out of this mission. There were dozens of qualified Special Unit officers who should be sent after the captain and Lily the wolfhound. And wouldn’t my personal stake in the case be an additional weakness? I should go back to the commissioner and tell him how unqualified I am and that my personal stake in the case will cause me to make bad decisions. And maybe tell him about the feeling in my stomach.

  Maybe don’t tell him about the stomach part. Certainly don’t tell him that even the imaginary Dame Judi Dench in my head was worried that I wouldn’t survive. Best not to mention imaginary Dame Judi at all. Don’t want to “sound” crazy. Wait, am I crazy? Why am I so sweaty? Is this the right arrangement of the pizza condiments? Why did I try to high-five Yogi Hansra that one time?

  It occurred to me: If I were to back out of the mission, I might have to return the beret.

  I tried to collect myself and keep it together.

  The mission was too much for a fifteen-year-old. Lord Desmond Dooley, the man I was after, was a shady art dealer who ran a gallery on Henrietta Street in Dublin. He dealt in stolen Irish antiquities and framed my parents for the theft of an ancient mummy called the Bog Man. Currently my parents were serving three to five years in the Mountjoy Prison, Dublin, for this crime.

  Later that very night I was scheduled to depart for Tir Na Nog, the land of the faerie folk, to capture the Bog Man and clear their names (and rescue my captain in the process). These were details that Dolores probably should not have shrieked out in Galway’s premiere wood-oven pizzeria, but it’s impossible to stay mad at Dolores Mullen. She is a delight.

  “I don’t think I’m up for this, Dolores,” I said, wishing I could burp away the awful feeling.

  “You’ll be fine. You can probably do it, Ronan,” said Dolores. “Didn’t you graduate top in your Special Unit class at Collins House?”

  “No,” I said. “I got mostly B minuses, except for Tin Whistle for Beginners, in which I got a D, the lowest passing grade.”

  “Oh,” said Dolores, clearly trying to think of something encouraging to say. “But—you’re lucky! Think how lucky you are, Ronan! That’s . . . something, isn’t it?”

  “I suppose I am lucky,” I said, thinking a dreadful thought that I sometimes ponder: Was I only in the Special Unit because of my luck? Because I fit through a little hole at Clifden Castle that Captain de Valera had needed me to go through to find a baby? I shouldn’t be here. Not Dough Bros pizzeria, I certainly deserved to be there, although I’m not as cool as most of the patrons. On second thought, maybe I don’t fit in at Dough Bros? Galway is very hip these days. Really I shouldn’t be in the Special Unit, one of Northern Europe’s most venerated faerie policing forces. I’m just a frightened kid. And why the high five that one time? Where had I even heard “Yaaassss girl” before? Perhaps on the radio? Oh, for a time machine to undo all of this.

  This is what it’s like to live inside my head. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. The only part of my head I’m really at peace with is the beret.

  The waitress set down a margherita pizza between us. Dolores shook hot pepper flakes on only her side, knowing full well that I am allergic.

  Or am I just afraid of hot chili peppers? Is my allergy really just psychosomatic, based on my fear? And what about that time that I told Yogi Hansra that her new haircut looked “LEGIT”? WHY WOULD ANYONE DO THAT?

  Dolores took a bite of pizza and began to weep. Nobody should take a bite out of a Dough Bros pizza the moment it arrives at the table—it’s straight from a nine-hundred–plus-degree oven. Her mouth was going through the experience of a Hawaiian island being born from the seafloor.

  Or maybe Dolores wept because she knew what a dreadful legal guardian she had been to me. Dolores is quite popular, and one of the most beautiful fiddle players you will ever meet—I had been left on my own quite a bit ever since I came into her “care.” At best I would see her two nights a week. But I was never cross with her about this. In fact I should thank her. If it weren’t for Dolores, I would never have learned one of my top Ronan Boyle mantras: Everyone will let you down some of the time, but only you can let yourself down all of the time.

  When our pizza reached normal Earth temperature, we scarfed it down and caught up on everything we’d missed. Dolores and I walked arm in arm through the drizzle across Eyre Square to the offices of the Galway Garda (the Irish human police force).

  Captain Fearnley was in his chairless office, reading a report that seemed to be annoying him a great deal. When he spotted me, he leaped to his feet, his eyes glistening with pride.

  Captain Fearnley had been my boss and mentor when I was an intern with the Galway Garda in the evidence department. He brushed the rain off my shoulders and eyed me up and down. I stood between him and Dolores, feeling like I was being bookended by my surrogate parents. Or the actual ceramic bookends I have of my parents’ heads.

  “Their salad!” he said, almost bursting. Fearnley’s country accent is like a jazz concert being played by a jug band of friendly woodland creatures—almost impossible to follow, even for Irish people. In reality he likely said: “There’s a lad!”

  “Half to freight off dem Colleens wifferswitch,” he said, thumping me on the arm.

  He may have said “You’ll have to fight off the girls”—Colleens, in slang—“with a stick,” but without a professional linguist, I will never know.

  * The pouch worn with a kilt.

  Chapter Two

  YUM YUM

  At midnight, I lost contact with my foot. My brain was sending messages to wriggle my toes, but the signals dissipated somewhere in the snow. The toes
had gone rogue like Tom Cruise in so many wonderful films. This was disconcerting. What if I never felt them again? They had been my toes for fifteen years, and I was sentimentally attached to some of them. Ah well, they were on their own mission now.

  And so was I—Ronan Janet Boyle.*

  I could only suppose it was midnight, as there isn’t conventional time in Tir Na Nog, the land of the faerie folk—which includes leprechauns, clurichauns, far darrigs, and all sorts of stinky, biting, nightmarish creatures. Midnight was the time it seemed like to a human, the category of thing that I fall in. Specifically, a gangly, nearsighted, teenage human, and the former owner of a set of working toes.

  Within minutes or hours, I would likely perish on the Steeps, which is the way that leprechauns pronounce the name of a mountain range I was climbing called the “Steps.” The Steps is a snowy set of jagged peaks that separates the Undernog from the southern portion of Tir Na Nog (see map).

  After my meeting with Dolores in Galway in the human Republic of Ireland, I returned by coach to Collins House in Killarney to beg Commissioner McManus to send someone else on this dreadful mission. Perhaps Dermot Lally would go—he’s a proper dreamboat. Dermot Lally could probably knock out a mission like this with one eye closed—which is how he does everything, as he wears an eye patch over his left eye to correct his vision.

  I waited at the door of the commissioner’s office, nervously humming Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face” and fiddling with the hem of my kilt. As a visual reference: I am as thin as a scarecrow, with a face that is alternately sickly white or neon pink, depending on my level of anxiety. When not flashing neon pink, my face reveals some freckles on the left cheek that someone once pointed out are the pattern of the archipelago called the Maldives. Perhaps these details don’t paint me in the most flattering light, but if you are reading my diaries, you must understand that I will not whitewash the facts, ever! Unless it is to make certain bits sound a bit more interesting.