Fionn and the Legend of the Blood Emeralds

by Tom O'Neill

  Matha had hoped he might get taken into the royal residence on the near hillside. He tried to imagine unheard of foods. And a bed so comfortable that he could rest for days. But that was not going to happen. As he would learn, those two did not need much of an excuse to set out on a ramble across the country. Tara retained no attraction for them.

  Mac Cumhaill and Conán showed little consideration for Matha, wanting only to make the road short. They walked much faster than he was used to doing. As he tried to keep up, he was surprised at their talk. Not about important royal matters nor interesting debates on matters of law. Instead they were arguing about why rabbits eat their young and telling jokes about Goll Mac Morna, another warrior greatly revered by ordinary people. Matha was not very impressed at all. Also, his legs were finished by the time they looked at him and realised they needed to stop somewhere for a rest.

  That was provided in the cabin of a friend of theirs, who lived half way along the route. After dishing out several jugs of his very flavoursome hare stew, the householder, an old man, shuffled off to a room behind the hearth saying he didn’t want to listen in on the important affairs of important men.

  Conán was for launching straight into the hideout first thing in the morning. Being thieves, they were unlikely to be more than half awake before noon. But Mac Cumhaill decided that would be unwise until they found out more about this powder and what protection it might give them.

  ‘Why don’t ye ask my brother, Cilian Tobín,’ came a voice from behind the fire. It was the old man in the other room, who of course wasn’t sleeping at all but listening to every word. ‘There isn’t a robber in this half of the country who hasn’t some dealings with that miserable bogey man. He may well know what powers these people have.’

  That night, they continued their journey. Matha was desperately disappointed not to get a sleep next to the fire. But he didn’t say so. And he noticed they weren’t asking him his opinion.

  They followed the old man’s directions to get themselves to the hovel that Tobín called home. They had to wade through the treacherous marshy Lishín swamps to get there. Because it was a relatively slow journey, word got around that they were in the area.

  The Runners’ mother heard a neighbour saying: ‘Of course the reason Mac Cumhaill is in these parts is that he’s a great friend of a cousin of mine who was in training for the Fianna once.’

  She went to her sons and said, ‘Loves of my heart, does any of you know why Mac Cumhaill and two companions might be walking around this chieftaincy tonight? Walking around with swords and spears and no hounds, they’re surely not here for hunting.’

  ‘Do you think they’ve found out about us?’ a big Runner said to the others in a panic. ‘Should we hand ourselves over? Is that the end of us now? What’ll happen to Mammy then?’

  ‘Settle!’ ordered the middle one. ‘Sure, nobody can remember seeing us. And none of us is going to tell on the others. So we are just ordinary fellows like the rest around these parts.’

  ‘Maybe we should lie low for a while all the same,’ said the more cautious of the big ones.

  ‘What about Tobín?’ one of the smart smalls asked. ‘They’ll get to Tobín because they know he is a trader.’

  ‘Tobín will have nothing to say to anyone. There is a great bond of trust between us and him going back a long time,’ said one of the bigs.

  There were many places the Runner Banbhs had gone wrong, but this was their last big mistake: to think that you could count on the honour of a man who had once swapped his own son for two slabs of butter. Granted, good butter was scarce that year and the son wasn’t a whole lot of good. But the fact remained that there was no trade Tobín would not consider. Mac Cumhaill, of course, knew that with a man like Tobín it would always come down to a calculation. If there was more benefit for himself in staying quiet, he would stay quiet. If there was more benefit for himself in talking, he would talk.

  And talk he did, after Mac Cumhaill pointed out that there would be no benefit at all to himself in staying quiet. He was quite clear that he wasn’t attracted to the idea of spending the rest of his life back in his dreaded wife’s compound, tied to a peg in the ground like a goat. At the very mention of his wife’s name, he was ready to deal. He immediately told Mac Cumhaill that the five lads Matha had spotted were the Banbh boys. ‘Useless lads have me tormented,’ he said. ‘Always bringing stuff and relying on my soft heartedness to trade them things for it. Only afterwards do I sometimes wonder whether they might have taken the stuff from people who still needed it.’

  ‘You poor unfortunate, you have a hard life,’ said Conán.

  ‘Indeed, that’s what I think myself,’ said Tobín. ‘As it happens, I’ve been advising them for a while to take it easy and not to rile people up. If they hadn’t been greedy we could have all got on with our business and lived happily with our neighbours like we always did in the olden times.’

  ‘The only neighbours you have here are frogs and water hens.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Tobín. ‘Do you need directions to their cave?’

  ‘We know where it is,’ said Mac Cumhaill, glancing at Matha.

  Tobín looked surprised. ‘What do you want then?’

  ‘Tell us about the powder,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘Ahem, powder?’ asked Tobín, turning a greenish colour.

  ‘Indeed. The powder. What effect might that have on us?’ Conán lifted Tobín by his long foxy hair and shook him a little.

  Tobín’s memory improved. He told them everything he knew about the powers of the ash. Though as hard as he tried, he could not recall where they had got the merry stuff from.

  Matha then led Mac Cumhaill to the copse of hazel. Not very far in, as the trees descended to cover a bank of chalky rock, they found a cave. They went into the cave and lay down there to wait, among glittering items bulging from mouldy sacks and precious salted meats that had been allowed to go rotten. They were not there long, when they heard the boys approaching. They came dragging bags and a large iron pot with the winter provisions of another unfortunate family.

  As the big Banbhs put down the bags and continued complaining about why the smalls never had to carry anything, Mac Cumhaill said, ‘Well!’

  The silhouettes of the robbers froze in fear and shock though their eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the dark in the cave and they couldn’t make out who was there. Then one of the smalls said softly, ‘Tobín, is that you? What are you doing here? This is our stuff. You have no business here.’

  ‘Tobín couldn’t get here,’ said Conán, ‘but he sends his love.’

  ‘Who the devil are you?’ demanded a big Banbh. ‘Tobín would never have told any soul how to get here.’

  ‘Ah, the great Fionn,’ said a little one, guessing who the visitors were. He bowed gracefully to Conán. ‘What an honour to meet you. If I may speak on behalf of the simple people of our province, we have always been great supporters. In fact it’s an amazing coincidence that you stumbled on our little store here as we have been building it up as a nice surprise tribute for the High King Cormac and the Fianna.’

  ‘You have?’ said Mac Cumhaill, stepping forward from the other side of the cave.

  ‘Yes,’ said the little Banbh, unfazed, ‘to thank them for keeping all the good people of this area safe. We have worked hard and put this humble collection of food and ... and ... and many other good things aside for you.’

  ‘Well, aren’t you the fine considerate young men?’

  ‘Yes indeed, in fact my young brother Seanie here used to draw pictures of what he thought Fionn would look like when he was a child. He is a great artist, actually. Although I’m very good at it myself. And Sebhern, one of the bigger lads here, was often told he should go for the Fianna as he is a top class athlete and very strong. And clever. Though it’s been said that I’m quite strong and clever myself, if I say so. We are a cut above as a family, it has to be said.’

  ‘Shut your gob!’ said another man, now
standing behind them in the mouth of the cave. This man they recognised without any difficulty. It was Ceallaigh, a very rough bandage around his head. Mac Cumhaill had brought him along as a representative of all the people who had been robbed.

  ‘Excuse me?’ said the middling one. ‘I was just about to explain to this great man, who is almost like the father I so tragically lost, eaten away on the insides by swarms of insects – insects, I might sadly add, that our mammy says will one day hollow ourselves out too, may Daghda have mercy on us – yes, wasn’t I explaining to the great Fionn Mac Cumhaill, whom I may say it is a most amazing honour to have among us, telling him now a little bit about how we have set about collecting some few things for the Fianna ...’

  Ceallaigh’s moustache started quivering.

  Mac Cumhaill put a hand on the middling Banbh’s shoulder and said, ‘You’d better be quiet now. I myself have great patience for noise coming out of a man’s mouth, but this man Ceallaigh, I am told, does not have a patient ear for nonsense and raiméis other than when he is talking it himself.’

  A little Banbh butted in, ‘You see, we are a noble family, an offshoot of the Uí Néil of Ulster actually, and it is in our blood to do good work and to collect alms for the benefit of the kings and we ...’ As he was talking he was groping behind a flat stone ledge, but of course the jar his fingers were searching for had already been safely removed.

  Matha could not believe that the Banbhs were unable to take the fair warning that Mac Cumhaill had given them.

  Finally Ceallaigh snapped. ‘Shut your slippery gobs, you flowery little men,’ he yelled. He not much bigger than the smallest of them himself. That was the end of the talk.

  The blackthorn sprang back into life. Ceallaigh was now following the stick into all kinds of moves that a man of his age should not have been able to make. After a few minutes of flailing, Mac Cumhaill started to feel pity for the Banbhs. He could see they had no ounce of defence in them and even though they had caused such grief, they were very lacking in intentional wickedness. He lifted Ceallaigh out as it was the only way he could get his stick to stop hammering the Runners.

  Word was sent that anyone who had lost things could come to the cave and then to Tobín’s house to see if they could find their possessions. Before anyone could lay claim to anything, Matha was given the chance to go and look for the bowl. He didn’t know what it looked like so he asked for Shea senior, the woodcutter, to be brought. Shea was the happiest man in the country as every one of his family’s things was still there, all stashed together in an inner cavern. He pulled out a very roughly made little yellow-brown bowl, one any good potter would have thrown aside for shame.

  ‘I hope you will be able to manage this bold little object,’ said Shea.

  Matha thanked him.

  Shea then reached into a sack of halters and rooted around for a while. Eventually he said, ‘Ah, here it is.’ He pulled out a round bronze breast plate. He asked Matha to run his fingers over it. It was the most beautiful object Matha had ever seen. It had a fine relief of a great stallion rearing up in front of giant trees surrounded by finely engraved twirling designs.

  ‘This is the old Shea emblem always worn by our best horse over twenty generations,’ said Shea. ‘Only the most mighty steed capable of pulling two tree trunks was honoured with it. You take it and when your little black pony is better, put it on her.’

  Mac Cumhaill said a strange thing to the Runners as they stood outside the cave waiting to hear their fate. He said, ‘You think your big mistake was using that powder and taking too much gold. But you are wrong. Your big mistake was taking one ordinary little bowl.’ He glanced at Matha with a smile in his eyes and added, ‘You should have known that a quiet little thing like that, stored safely away where nobody could touch it, had a particular kind of rightful owner. One who would not let go. One who would follow you quietly to the ends of time till he got his possession back. It was when you tried to separate that bowl from its destiny that you finally ran out of luck.’ The Banbh boys looked at Matha and he was sure that he saw fear in their eyes. He looked away from them.

  The Banbh boys were brought to a gathering of the flaiths and chief of the area who, after consulting their brehons, decreed that the Runner Banbhs must work for five years without the right to own anything, one of them in each of the fine where they had done most robbing. During that time they would not be allowed to attend any festivals nor to present themselves anywhere as respectable people. On the suggestion of Conán, as well as doing general work they were each to plough, till, seed, weed, weed and weed again two rows of turnips every year and a bag of turnips grown by each of them was to be sent to King Cormac.

  After the five years it was hoped that they would have learned the satisfaction of work and they could work for themselves and their mother – if the dear lady had not had her insides eaten out by insects by then. If they ever robbed again they’d be deported to separate uninhabited islands in Lough Derg without their mother. The Banbhs dreaded this as they were fond of talking. So they vowed, much as they hated work, not to steal again.

  Tobín had a very quiet time from then on. Most other bandits avoided him, fearing betrayal. But at least he was thankful to have been left in the company of frogs rather than his wife’s people.

  The happy ash disappeared completely. Mac Cumhaill and Conán always denied any knowledge of its whereabouts.

  With the little bowl safely in his possession, Matha was sure that his life was about to return to what it ought to have been. He would right what was wrong. He would call the horse’s life back to it. He and his mother could live again in peace and comfort. He would not bother to tell his neighbours about meeting the two great warriors as they wouldn’t believe him.

  Matha had no way of knowing that his quest wasn’t over. In fact, it had only just begun.

  Chapter 4

  A ROBBERY

  Dark sat up as a drop of water splashed onto his head. Cold and alone again.

  Guilty panic took hold of him anew. What if his mam had been trying to phone with news? He hurried to the upper fields where he could see some bars of signal. He stood waiting for missed call messages to appear. None did. That was good. He didn’t want messages from the hospital. The hours reappeared on his screen. 05:31:21 am. Then he remembered the task he had set himself for later that day.

  He walked the rest of the way slowly. It was not a task he would want the Old Man or Matha to know about, not to mention his mam. Breaking and entering. Possibly robbing something. Him, Arthur McLean, who had never really broken the law except for the occasional misdemeanour: ‘accidentally’ catching a salmon on a pike-spinner like Connie had taught him, a couple of cracked downloads from peer to peer sites, and the driving, which was mostly on back roads.

  The why and how of his plan were still absent. All he was certain of now was that he was going to do it. It didn’t need any more thinking about than that. That was how things worked best with Dark. Kevin thought he had no fear. That wasn’t it. It was just that he sometimes put his head down and headed straight towards the thing that scared him. Why could it not be like that with the hospital?

  He was asleep in Connie’s lazyboy when his mam phoned. It was about eight in the morning. ‘Art,’ she said distractedly. ‘I have arranged for Brian to milk the cows and then to drive you down here.’

  ‘No need, I’m almost half way through the milking,’ he lied. ‘How is he today?’

  ‘Are you really? Well then Brian can bring you down when you’re finished.’

  ‘That’s alright,’ Dark said. ‘I have another thing to do later. A geography project I need to have finished.’

  ‘You doing a school project in the holidays! For feck’s sake, Arthur!’ she said, a scratchiness in her voice. She only ever swore when she was really fed up with him. ‘You’re avoiding coming down. And you’re lying about it. That means you’re up to something dodgy again. Doesn’t it? I’m warning you Arthur, I don’t have the bandw
idth for you getting in shit now.’

  Bad excuse. Dark’s mam might not have known quite how occasional Dark’s relationship with school was these days. But she sure knew enough to realise that it was no school project that was keeping him away from Connie’s bedside.

  ‘Did you ask them to look at the bite marks?’ he asked, to change the subject.

  ‘Arthur, that’s the third bloody time you’ve reminded me to ask them about the marks.’

  ‘Is he any better?’

  ‘At least he’s not worse,’ she said, the anger gone again. ‘But he’s not eating, so that’s not too great.’

  ‘Okay, Mam, that’s cool.’ Dark wasn’t listening. He didn’t want to hear. ‘I’d better keep the cows moving. Talk later.’

  Dark did not find that the feeling in his stomach was getting any better. Maybe the lack of sleep was making him confused. He went out to work. It was a trick he had learned long ago. When thinking about things was filling him with dread, doing things was the best way to make the feeling go into the background. He set to mixing calf milk and then rounding up the cows. He put fence posts and nylon reels in the transport box and went off in the tractor to look for fencing that needed attention.

  When it was time, he put on his hoody and jacket. He pumped his bike. He locked the dogs inside and headed for town. It was seven miles. Even though he knew every bump and bend from his daily cycle to school, today it felt like the road was much longer then usual. Like he was going backwards. He cycled harder. Any sane person would know that the only chance for Connie was in medicine. And that Dark should have been down there in Cork to be at his side. Connie would want to see him. Instead he was retreating. In truth, he was just bewildered and out of his depth. But stubbornness wouldn’t let him turn around.

  He promised himself that if he got through this mission he would get a lift to the city this evening. And he would go into the hospital. And he would put his hand on his uncle’s head and will him to get better. If he got through this mission.