Old Friends: The Lost Tales of Fionn Mac Cumhaill

by Tom O'Neill

  If he brought them back from this trip, Mac Cumhaill told Crothán, he could rob all the traders he wanted and he certainly would never be the one dragging him off to Cormac.

  The place Mac Cumhaill wanted him to aim for was south of Móna. They wouldn’t need a harbour, only a quiet sheltered bay within easy currach reach of that island.

  It was a simple crossing and the wind was with them. The boat moved, creaked and flexed her boards as she worked effortlessly with the deep sea. They made it well before dawn. They set anchor in a small bay surrounded by sheer rocks from which no human was likely to spy them.

  ‘What do we do now?’ said one of the currach men.

  ‘We wait,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘Wait for what?’

  ‘For weather,’ said Mac Cumhaill, turning to the boatman. ‘You think we are in for a storm, Crothán?’

  Crothán was a hard man to age. He’d looked old and awkward on land, but since they’d set sail he looked very comfortable in his leather skin.

  ‘I promised you a storm Mac Cumhaill, and that’s what you’re going to get.’

  ‘I think you’re wrong about that,’ said the most forward of the young currach lads. ‘The sea is calm. I’d always know when there was a storm coming.’

  The older man just looked at him as if he had expressed nothing more interesting than a fart. He looked back at Fionn.

  ‘By the gulls, by the calm, by the streamers of light coming through, I’ll tell you now it will be blowing something fearsome before the sun goes back down tonight. And raining down in cart loads. I’m not a glad man to be out in the sea waiting for what I know is coming, rather than warm and comfortable in a shoreside cabin waiting for it to pass.’

  ‘Well, maybe,’ said the lad, realising he was out of his depth, ‘maybe the signs are a bit different on the seas this side.’

  All still ignored him.

  ‘That’s good then,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘And visibility?’

  ‘You won’t be able to see in front of your nose,’ said the seaman. ‘It will be a bad night for any kind of work.’

  ‘It will be a perfect night for the work we have in mind,’ laughed Conán, ‘and you’ll all be very glad indeed of the fog and the rain when there are Crúca arrows trying to locate your flesh.’

  One of the currach men went white.

  Conán wasn’t one to miss out on entertainment.

  ‘Years of travelling the most wicked and violent of seas without a worry and you’re getting nervy about a few harmless men, who have no personal grudge against you, trying to kill you?’

  Mac Cumhaill patted the lad’s head, which, instead of comforting him as intended, just brought forth the contents of his belly. The lad was alright again after that, but Conán wasn’t all that happy about having to lean overboard with his hairy backside in the air, trying to wash the stuff off his tunic while everyone on the boat sniggered at him.

  Everyone, that is, except the cloth-wrapped parcel, which, of course, contained Skellig. Mac Cumhaill now took his dagger and slashed open most of the bindings. The unfortunate Skellig stood up, and, with his great height, he lost his balance, almost falling out into the deep water below. He was large now in every respect. He had obviously been well fed by his minder, as he had some belly and a spreading rear. And he had a thin beard growing out from his yellowish face. When the gag was taken off him, he immediately started talking as though he was continuing a conversation of only a minute previously.

  ‘I may have made some misjudgement, however; I will admit that.’

  Maybe there was hope for the man, Mac Cumhaill thought.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘If you’ll get me my sword I’ll fight you again and this time I’ll show you that you are old and past it. I may forgive you then for what you have done to me.’

  That was the second laugh of the morning for everyone else on the boat. One of the young currach men gave him a tap of an oar and knocked him down.

  ‘Now, let’s be polite to our guest,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘He has important work to do today.’

  ‘What work?’ said Skellig. ‘I need to approve of any plan before I’ll participate in it.’

  The young fisherman gave him another tap of the oar, since the previous one had earned him such approval.

  It was a peculiar day. Just around the coast, as far as they knew, lay one of the most formidable armies the living world had ever seen. Here they were in a rickety old pirate boat, waiting for a storm that might itself sink them, and getting ready to go around that next headland and face into likely death. Yet there was a spirit of merriment that had sprung up on the boat. It started with one of the young lads asking the old seaman what was for breakfast.

  ‘There’s a good few dead cods like yourselves down there in a box if you want to cook them,’ he said.

  The young fellow went down to examine the box and shouted up, ‘How many should I cook up for now?’

  ‘Cook the whole bloody lot up,’ said the captain, ‘because from the little that Mac Cumhaill has bothered to tell us, we mightn’t be needing too much food tomorrow.’

  The boy looked at Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘Indeed, you might as well,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘Pessimism is part of the trade of seamen, and we may surprise this old dog and survive. But if we do, I’ll be happy enough if the worst pain I am carrying home with me is an empty stomach.’

  From that point, the craic and gallery rose up. There was nothing else to do and it was a glorious day, praise be to Daghda. They all started telling yarns. Even the young lads had a sense of the rare time they were trapped in and were telling funny ones they’d never told before. The old seaman told a world of tall tales about near misses, wild seamen and enormous sea monsters.

  By the afternoon, one of the Corca Dhuibhne men revealed that he was a good hand at gob music and the dancing started. It was mostly the young lads, but at one point Mac Cumhaill and the sea hound stood up and, arm in arm, they danced some kind of a reel that had the boat rocking dangerously and the seabirds heading inland.

  Skellig sat quietly, sulking throughout.

  By mid-afternoon, a breeze carried a few drops of rain their direction, reminding them of their situation. They all looked up at the gathering clouds and the old man didn’t seek any acknowledgment of the accuracy of his prediction because they’d all rather he was wrong and that Mac Cumhaill was wrong and that all they had to do was to lift the anchor and head for sweet home. Quietness fell on them. Mac Cumhaill started giving instructions and making sure everyone understood. Any misunderstandings in the storm would mean certain death.

  Time moved quickly now. The dusk wasn’t long coming and the seas were rising quickly. Soon the boat was rolling and rising like a cork. Even inside this bay, the waves were getting enormous. Crothán and Conán were pulling ropes and timber every way to try to keep her facing into the waves. They were all counting the waves intently. The old man had informed them that in these seas it was every sixth wave was the monster.

  Mac Cumhaill turned to Skellig. ‘You were asking what you have to do?’

  ‘You need to tell me the plan and then I’ll see. You don’t order me around like I was one of these green chaps.’

  He got another tap of the oar, this time a bit harder.

  ‘Listen here,’ said Mac Cumhaill, coming up close to him. ‘These green chaps are the ones whose skill will determine whether you and I live or die today. So I’d talk a bit nicer to them if I were you.’

  Skellig said nothing.

  ‘Another thing – ’ said Mac Cumhaill, ‘you have one job to do here. I’ll tell you what it is. You might not like it, but you will count yourself lucky to be allowed to do it, because if you weren’t needed for this, you wouldn’t be needed at all. Do you understand?’

  No response.

  ‘Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Skellig finally seemed to be coming to understand what he’d been told all along – that Mac Cu
mhaill had saved him from certain execution and now he was seeing in Mac Cumhaill’s eyes that Mac Cumhaill was not above unmaking that decision. He suddenly became agreeable. The plan was set in motion. The enormous sack of bladderwrack was opened. Skellig stood like a tree as two men set to work tying the seaweed to his body. They ran strings around and around his now portly belly, giving him an enormous skirt of seaweed. They also tied much of it to his hair and beard, just for appearance. A long rope was tied around his belly and the end of it fixed securely to one of the currachs. A large torch made of a cloth soaked in fish oil and wrapped around a sceach stump was lit and put in his left hand. The three-pronged weapon that Eibhlín had made was put into his right hand.

  Then Mac Cumhaill said to him, ‘Now, listen again and listen well. This is your test. You have to make sure that this torch stays alight and that the fork stays out of the water. That’s all you have to do. If you fail, that is the end of you. If you succeed, you may live.’

  ‘That’s easy,’ said Skellig, holding the torch and the fork high in the air. ‘I can do more than that. Give me a sword and I’ll wipe twenty of them out.’

  ‘Easy? Oh, I forgot to mention, jump in there.’

  ‘What?!’ shouted Skellig. ‘Don’t be mad! I don’t swim.’

  ‘That’s fine. The weeds do. Throw him in,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  Skellig had made the mistake of standing to voice his protest and when he made a lunge at the lads, it only took the slightest effort for them to topple him over the side. He went out of sight at first but Mac Cumhaill gave a tug of the rope and sure enough he came back to the surface, bobbing up and down with the support of the thousands of little seaweed bladders.

  ‘Remember the fork and the torch,’ shouted Mac Cumhaill.

  They had to pull him closer to relight the torch. Then the first currach was put in the water and three men set to rowing it with Skellig in tow. Sure enough, the night was so black and wild that when they were only a short bit from the boat, you couldn’t see the currach at all. You could only make out the comical sight of the enormously angry and seaweed-strewn Skellig making good and sure to keep the torch that lit him high in the air and the fork equally visible in the other hand.

  Everyone was too tense now to laugh at Skellig anymore.

  The old man shouted, ‘He might be the best of the lot of you. When you all get swallowed by Her Majesty here, he at least has a chance of getting washed to shore.’

  The second currach was then pushed over the side of the boat. The seas were so big now that a wave almost lobbed it straight back on board. The seaman and Conán held it tight while Mac Cumhaill and three oarsmen got into it. Conán wanted to come with them, but Mac Cumhaill pushed him back. He was needed to hold the currach s steady and help the others quickly in and out of them. Anyway, he would have sunk the currach for sure. As it was, Mac Cumhaill’s enormous weight put the currach lower in the water than it would normally be. In the lashing rain and wild winds, Mac Cumhaill asked them one more time whether they thought they were able for it. They all agreed they were. It was just like bringing home a big load of fish.

  ‘And if it gets too much,’ shouted one of the lads, in his element now, ‘we always throw the catch overboard.’

  This was going to be the lead currach and the boys in the other currach, towing the buffoon, knew their only job was to follow and circle at a distance, keeping sight of each other with uncanny skill, the way Corca Dhuibhne currach men have always done in a bad storm.

  The lads knew more or less where they had to go. They had to stick to the coast and head north until they got to what they didn’t want to see. Mac Cumhaill just hung on to the sides of the little currach, it taking all his efforts just to stay inside it, while the boys sat there effortlessly as if their bodies were part of the structure.

  They cut the currach straight up on mountains of water. They dipped into valleys where they couldn’t even hear the wind, with the enormous walls of water surrounding them. How much worse it must have been for the other boat with the weight on the rope pulling them and going slack, as their cargo navigated waves behind them. But on they went. Mac Cumhaill couldn’t make out whether the other boat was even following anymore, but the lads seemed to know it was.

  After some time, they turned the first headland and were relieved. As they came to the top of each wave, they were all peering through the sheets of rain trying to see lights, fires, the signs of a camp and most of all, to see great ships sitting in the water. But Mac Cumhaill’s heart sank. There was nothing. They saw only another headland far in the distance, with the seas only seeming to get worse. He cupped his hand and shouted into the ear of one of the oarsmen, ‘It may be around the next one, but it’s too far for you to row in this. We’ll head back and move the big boat closer tomorrow.’

  The oarsman just shook his head and shouted back, ‘We could sink as easy going back as going forward.’

  It took hours to get near to the next finger of land sticking out into the water. Again, their spirits sank further as they inched around. Nothing to be seen. Mac Cumhaill decided it was better to put into land to risk being found by some Crúca patrols while waiting for the storm to pass than to risk heading back with the men so tired.

  As they pulled in further around the headland to try to find a more sheltered spot to land, they saw it. This was a large water channel rather than a bay. And tucked away, some distance in, there were thousands of little fires flickering, spread over the entire hillside. And down below them, rocking in the turbulent waters, they could clearly see the dark outlines of very large ships. Many of them. Even in this foul weather on this miserable mission, there couldn’t have been a man of them who was not struck by the deadly beauty of this sight. The awe that had defeated so many peoples nearly took them too. But they didn’t stare long. A giant wave came crashing over them, punishing them for their pause. They went under, but came back up, all still in position. Mac Cumhaill’s large hands came in handy for bucketing the water out and as they gradually became stable again, they resumed their focus.

  New strength was found. The currach cut through the water towards the ships, faster than they’d moved the whole night. The boys obviously understood that stealth and speed were their best chance of having a new story to tell. Within minutes, they were at the first great boat and pulling in under it. It would have taken the most alert watchman to have seen their approach. They were as dark as the water and they were far below the normal level of attack for such boats. Their featherless oars made no familiar warning. The danger to them, as it turned out, was not through being observed. It was more from the ship herself. Sometimes high, exposing a lot of belly, more times trying to roll back on them and submerge them under her, she must have had a sense that they meant her no good.

  When they had the right position, the creaking and moaning she was doing hid all sound of Mac Cumhaill’s activity. He had felt his way along the crusted timber looking for the end of a board and then feeling for the dowels. He took from the floor of the boat one of the augers that Eibhlín had given him. Once he had a start with the auger he was able to hold himself and the currach steady. He kept turning. It took a little while, but soon he felt a give. The dowel was gone. Then another one below it. Then two from a board above them.

  He signalled the lads to move. They headed to the next ship, where they did the same again.

  He was deciding whether to try a third, when he heard terrible creaking from the first big lady. He had only created the most basic injury to her, but this wild sea, given any opening, was doing the rest. A rip was appearing in her side. He signalled the boys to get away out of sight fast, to beat back for the headland.

  As they worked their way back out to sea, they saw the sight that would surely catch the attention of the now alert watchmen. A light on the sea. A very large, ugly, angry creature bearded in seaweed and waving a three-pointed fork and roaring incomprehensibly. The watchmen wouldn’t have had the advantage of knowing that ther
e was a currach twenty paces in front of this apparition, pulling it up and down through the waves, and that in fact it was the occupants of the currach that this lunatic deity was yelling at, rather than them.

  As Mac Cumhaill’s currach was closing around the headland, he could see the two ships listing, one of them already with its lovely curved nose heading towards the sky. The other currach stayed a little while longer cutting back and forth across the bay, dragging its foul load. A terrible commotion was already striking up on the shore.

  Soon they followed too. Almost as though on time, when they got back around the corner into the long stretch, the sea eased enough for them to start to feel for the first time how wet and cold they were, even the men pulling the oars. They struck on in silence almost afraid to undo their good luck by talking about it. After a while, one of them noticed that they couldn’t see Skellig. Mac Cumhaill’s currach pulled alongside the other as they drew in the rope. It was slack. At the end, it was gnawed. The unfortunate man had got into such a rage at his humiliation that he must have chawed through the rope.

  ‘We’ll go back and look for him,’ said one of the lads, starting to turn the currach.

  ‘We all will,’ said the lads in Mac Cumhaill’s boat.

  ‘There’s no need,’ said Mac Cumhaill, pointing to the shore. There, true enough, was the torch, still waving. The weed had floated him in.

  ‘Will we fetch him?’

  ‘No,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘The amadán could have saved his teeth – I was going to set him down over there anyway. He’s better off not coming home.’

  Despite Mac Cumhaill’s promise of letting Skellig live, it wasn’t something he’d discussed with Cormac yet. And while Cormac, in the right mood, might well show him mercy for having deliberately speared a member of the Fianna, he would be much harder to persuade of the value of a man who had inflicted such a sour bruising on his own royal person.