by Tom O'Neill
But he had a plan. He had a strong mind and he thought that if he could keep his mind focused on his favourite thoughts, there would be no room for bad dreams to get in. So, when he walked towards the dirty green mound, he kept saying to himself, ‘Pancakes. Mmmm. Deeeelicious pancakes. Mmmm,’ because Mac Cumhaill had a terrible appetite on him and a mountain of pancakes was just about the nicest thing he could think of right then.
It worked, but not for long. As he got closer, he started to see over the pile of fried batter and on the other side of it was a low, narrow cave and suddenly he was inside it and deep underground. The kind of caves that you couldn’t turn around in. Now he could see himself and feel himself going down into a tiny, twisting tunnel, black with dark. He could feel the terror of getting stuck and not being able to wriggle back.
‘Pancakes, pancakes,’ he shouted as he started running towards the bronloider ’s front door. But it suddenly got much worse. Water. First he heard it. Then he felt it. He could see the cave filling with water, rising towards him. He was trying to reverse out, but he wasn’t able to budge. He felt complete terror. More terror than if facing the most vicious band of swordsmen, unarmed. But somewhere in the shadows of the nightmare he could still see the outline of the dock leaf roof and pushed his hand through. In the bronloider ’s living room sat the malignant little creature, dressed in a black suit like he was in mourning. He was sitting on a tree root, smoking a pipe.
The bronloider was shocked and indignant to see the enormous stranger staring hazily down into his ruptured house.
‘Who and what are you? Get OUT of my house, you great big bog monster,’ he shouted.
Fionn Mac Cumhaill was in a panic, like someone holding their breath for too long. He knew that if he let the cave dream go on for a few seconds longer, he’d have to turn and run away. So he grabbed the bronloider in his great hands and shook him a bit harder than he meant to, saying, ‘Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! You desperate little sack of misery!’
The dream stopped instantly, as the little man’s pipe dropped out of his mouth and broke on the floor.
Now Mac Cumhaill was able to act more calmly, but he was still sweating and he talked quickly for fear the dream would return.
‘You’re asked to leave this village immediately and take your woeful dreams with you.’
‘What? Why?’ said the bronloider, lifting his black hat and scratching his yellow head.
‘Do not stop at any other village in this country,’ Mac Cumhaill continued. ‘If I hear of you tormenting people again, I’ll toss you out onto an island in Lough Corrib, where you can bother nobody but the birds.’
‘What disease have you got, you big amadán? Every one of your louse-eaten brethren likes the dreams of my people,’ said the bronloider, in genuine indignation.
Mac Cumhaill was finally starting to realise that the creature did not know the effect he had been having. He set him down on the tree stump, picked up the slightly broken pipe and put it into his mouth, and started explaining all the terrible thoughts that he had been inflicting on people.
The bronloider was most upset and could think of no explanation for it. Then he started his unmerciful caoining and whining, lamenting that he must be some kind of abnormality and a disgrace to his family, all of whom had been loved by the big people.
‘Well, is there anything different about you?’ asked Mac Cumhaill. ‘Anything that might be festering the dream air that’s coming off you?’
‘No,’ said the bronloider. ‘No. Except… maybe. Maybe. I wonder. I’ve got this awful sore foot that’s been troubling me for a hundred years or more. Maybe you’d take a look at it for me.’
Mac Cumhaill looked down and instantly saw a wound so old that it had grown grass and tiny bushes around it. He was about to ask why on earth the bronloider hadn’t cleaned and healed the wound. But then he looked at the short arms. He realised that it would be unkind to laugh.
Instead, he took the needle-sharp tip of his spear head and poked out the big splinter that had caused the original wound. Then he pulled out a bottle of potion used for quick healing of battle wounds. A little of this and the bronloider was feeling better in less than no time.
He jumped up and kissed Mac Cumhaill. That was not a memory that Fionn Mac Cumhaill would cherish. But even if he hadn’t done that, Mac Cumhaill would have known the bronloider was happy again, because as he was preparing to leave a new dream swept over him like a warm breeze.
‘Mmmm. Pancakes. The best pancakes you’d smell in a year of walking the world.’
He left the house feeling like he was floating.
After some time, the villagers started picking up the courage to go closer to the bronloider ’s house – all except the chief, who was so scared that he never went to that part of his lands again.
And every year when Mac Cumhaill was passing anywhere near that part of the country, he would rest for a while in the woods at the back of the little bronloider ’s house. He would lie on the ground and look up at the sky through the branches of the big ash trees that grew there and he would allow his mind to wander for an hour or two into a world of wonderful, happy dreams.
The morning was dry and cold. Dark’s parka was still damp from the previous night’s rain. He was coughing away coming up the fields. He was so used to it now that he wasn’t cautious anymore. As he approached the window the light went on in his room.
Through the slightly open sash he heard his mother saying to his empty bed, ‘You’re coughing a lot dear.’
Then she called out in an alarmed voice, ‘Arthur!’
He couldn’t slide the window up or she’d get an even worse fright. There was a window in the back bathroom that he knew how to open from the outside. He ran around to that as quietly as he could. He was in there in a minute even though he knocked bottles of shampoo and medicine off the window shelf.
He shouted, ‘Coming Mam,’ as he met her in the doorway. ‘I was just at the loo.’
‘Oh my God. You gave me a terrible fright.’
‘Sorry, Mam.’
Then she thought some more about it. ‘In the dark? In your jacket?’
‘I was just cold.’
‘Your jacket is wet, Arthur. What is going on? Come on now. Tell me.’
‘OK. I thought I heard one of the heifers moaning and I just slipped out to check that she hadn’t started calving.’
‘Oh, dear. Why didn’t you call me, son?
‘I didn’t want to trouble you, Mam.’
‘You can’t take all this on, Arthur. It’s too much.’
‘It’ll be fine, Mam,’ Dark said and went to bed, but he didn’t sleep. He didn’t like to see his mam upset and worried. Not at all.
Unluckily, that very morning there actually was a bit of a problem with the cows. Though he knew it wasn’t going to improve his mother’s outlook in relation to the farm, Dark had to ask her to stop the car on the laneway. There was no choice. There was a cow off on her own in the Road Field. She had broken away from the herd as though she might be about to calve. He needed to head her down to the yard so Brian could take care of her.
When he got back to the car, his school shoes were covered in mud. He cleaned them off pretty well, he thought, with newspaper.
His mother was going to be late for work now.
‘Blast Connie and his precious cows,’ she said, staring at the windscreen with tears of frustration in her eyes. She almost never swore. ‘That’s all I can say. A pox on him.’
His mother had wanted to put the cows up for auction the day Connie was taken away. She said that Connie agreed that that was only fair. Dark had been against it. He had already known back then, he had heard from Brian, that anyone who got out of cows was prevented by Europe from getting back into them. Connie wouldn’t be allowed to have his cows again. That would be the end. There would be nothing else for Connie to do around here. He would have to move away. That was why Dark had insisted that he’d be able to help Brian keep them going
. It was just stubbornness, really.
He had learnt a lot, though, and most of the time, he managed. But some days, like this one, he also cursed Connie a little bit for leaving him in the lurch like this. And his mother too. And every-bloody-body else. All inside his head.
When the car stopped, he considered heading off to the river or to see Cash. If he was to tell the truth, he was only going in to school now in the hope he’d get the chance and the courage to talk to Ciara. But he probably should have followed his first impulse and headed someplace where it was easier to be.
It was maths first class. It was always bloody maths. Or bloody geography. Bloody Sullivan anyway. Why would any geography teacher want to teach maths? Or the other way round? She did it on purpose, he wouldn’t be surprised, just to be always in his face.
She asked him about the intersection of a Venn diagram. He might have known the answer, actually, but he was just too tired to think. Before he could try, she said, ‘The answer you have written down, I mean, of course’.
He just looked at her.
She said, ‘Right, up you go. You know where to go.’
Dark did.
As he walked up, some remaining clay, which had been drying in the warm classroom, fell off his shoes. She stopped mid-sentence when she spotted it.
‘Sorry, I’ll get the broom, Miss, and clean it up,’ said Dark, making his way to the cupboard.
‘You will do exactly as I say,’ she said. ‘Stand right where you are. We can’t have you trailing muck halfway across the room.’
Dark stood still right in front of her desk.
‘So…’ she said, in a pleased voice. ‘Mr McLean here decided to bring half a cake of dung into our classroom. Everyone, take a look here at the overgrown city boy who can’t even clean his shoes.’
‘It’s only clay, Miss,’ said Dark quietly.
‘Oh, well excuse me. Only clay. Not to worry, though. You’re not the first clever lad in this school to think there’s more future in traipsing around in bog holes than in learning. Don’t worry, your boots will soon be permanently stuck in cow-dung. And you’ll have plenty of time for regrets later when you are still out clodding around chasing bullocks as your classmates drive past you in flashy cars.’
Dark said nothing.
‘Take off those filthy things and you can hold them for the rest of the class. Double period, what a pity.’
Dark did. Unfortunately, his socks had got wet in the field too and they were not looking great. She just pointed at them, holding her nose away.
‘Those too,’ she said, ‘those too. Put them in your pockets.’
He did that and then just looked down because now he was embarrassed about his feet. The wetness had marked his toes. And because she had him now and he didn’t want her or someone in the class, anyone in the class, to see his eyes. She seemed pleased.
Then she turned and looked around the class.
‘Now. Who will volunteer to clean up the little show-and-tell contribution that McLean decided to bring us? Let. Me. See.’
She was expecting to do her usual picking of ‘volunteers’.
Dark heard one chair push back, as someone stood up. He didn’t look up. Then another. As they pushed past him with the broom and dust pan, he saw it was Tadhg and Ciara. Others stood up too, offering to help. Mostly to break the boredom.
She wasn’t happy with that either, though. She stared at Ciara, who looked intently down at her task as her long thin fingers held the broom more tightly.
Sullivan spoke directly to her: ‘What’s this? Are you two trying to be smart?’
She sat up on the teacher’s table, a thing she never did. She put down her chalk beside her and started dangling her legs like a kid. They were all waiting for her again.
Eventually she said, ‘If there’s only one thing I teach you for life, it is not to throw yourselves in front of a falling wall, thinking you can prop it up. Let’s be honest now. Arthur here has made his own decisions.’
She paused for effect. It was the first time he could remember her saying his first name.
‘There’s no reason for any of you to ruin your own lives just because you feel sorry for him.’
She paused again.
‘How would that make your parents feel? Ciara? Tadhg? How would your hard-working parents feel if they heard you were giving up on your education for a young fellow who doesn’t care at all about his? Because that’s the truth. Arthur simply doesn’t care. Anyone can see that.’
She turned slowly to Dark and paused before asking, ‘Isn’t that true, Arthur?’
He knew it was what she wanted but Dark had to say, ‘Yes, Miss,’ because it was the truth and he was too tired to think of anything more complicated to say.
She turned back to the others.
‘So. You see. Why don’t you settle down now and I’ll forget all about this – I’ll keep it as our secret.’
Everyone sat down. Tadhg looked very glum. Ciara just kept her eyes down.
That was it. It was as if she had decided to rub Dark out that day. She had not succeeded in tormenting him into leaving school, so now she would just pretend he had done so.
From that minute on, she addressed very few words to Dark. He didn’t care.
When Dark turned into the Bog Field that night, he stopped dead. It was a still night with a good moon. There was not a leaf rustling on the trees in the ditch next to him, but at the other side of the bog, the trees of the rath were swaying like they were in a violent storm. Then it stopped completely, in an instant, and the rath trees also became as calm as the ditches around the field. He felt real fear. He suddenly realised that he was very alone and he didn’t really understand anything about this place. A gateway between worlds – but how did he know that all the forces which stepped through that gateway were kindly ones?
He stood for a while.
He considered the alternative: going home and forgetting he had ever ventured onto the forbidden ground. But that was hardly better. He decided to go on, whatever might be waiting for him. He focused on the courage of the Old Man and the laughing face of Conán and the looks from Etain and hoped they were going to be the people he found there this night.
He approached slowly. He felt fear like a weakening tingle in every muscle of his body. But he got there and felt his way through, more cautiously than ever, as though whatever was in there tonight might not notice him.
Inside, it was black dark. Much darker than he had ever seen it before, even on moonless nights. He became so afraid that he felt limp and he had to sit down.
And then, all of a sudden, it was fine again. The Old Man arrived and it was as if nothing had ever been wrong in the world.
It was strange, though, Dark thought. The Old Man usually saw into every slight mood and thought he had. Yet, if he had noticed Dark’s shaken terror this night, which surely must have been written in bold on his white face, the Old Man didn’t make any mention of it at all. It was as if he was distracted by the story he was about to enter.
As the others gathered, they all looked cold. Even Etain was pale. He touched her slender fingers as he took the cup. They were as cold as the metal. Even the fire burnt reluctantly.
As the Old Man cleared his throat, the scene Dark soon saw before him in the flames wasn’t a warm or comforting one.
The Winter of the Black Wind
Cóbh was never a place renowned for good fortune. When the message came one day for Fionn to go there, he was immediately overcome by a sickly feeling of foreboding. It was a peculiar call from a peculiar place. A boy was stuck up in a tree and Fionn was wanted there, to see what could be done.
‘What kind of thing is that to be asking the leader of the Fianna to attend to?’ growled Goll at the young man who brought the message. ‘Can’t ye get the whelp down from the tree for yourselves? Next you’ll be calling Fionn Mac Cumhaill every time your cow is sick or your hen stops laying.’
‘I dunno,’ said the lad, looking
at the ground. ‘I was only sent with the message.’
‘No luck will be had from answering that call,’ predicted Conán, quite correctly.
Nevertheless, the image of the boy became peculiarly vivid in Mac Cumhaill’s mind: a small fellow high up on the weak upper branches of one of the few tall larch trees that grew in Cóbh. In his mind, he could clearly see the tree leaning out and overhanging a part of the bay that had no bottom. He worried about why this image was coming through to him. What dark forces wanted to draw him to that place? But he could see the lad perfectly and he knew the little boy was innocent and afraid. He could almost hear the boy or the tree calling his name. He had no choice. He had to go.
When they got there, the scene was exactly as he had envisaged. The violent waters were already reaching waist height, submerging the bank where the tree was rooted. The tree was leaning outwards like a bent old man over water that was much, much deeper and very angry. It looked as if that water’s plans did not include good deeds or kindness as far as anyone present was concerned. The little red-headed child of no more than ten years was on the branch that reached furthest out. He was too frightened to move a limb, let alone climb back in. There was freezing rain blowing, and the lad, suspended in the wind with only a light tunic on him, was surely nearly paralysed with the cold.
It didn’t look as if there was an easy solution. There were no ladders long enough to get up to where the boy was. The branches he was clinging on to were mere twigs and would certainly have broken before any grown man could climb near him.
They had to do something quickly though, as the boy was wailing and sobbing softly. A kind of sound from someone getting ready to give themselves over to death. He would not hold on much longer. His family were all gathered near the tree, along with neighbours and friends, and they were trying to keep back their own tears and looking pleadingly at Mac Cumhaill to do something to save the beloved little boy.
