Ronan Boyle and the Bridge of Riddles

by Thomas Lennon

  Perhaps fate had made Captain de Valera give me the new shillelagh on this exact night so that I could act as her hands in this fight. Or perhaps it was just a lucky coincidence.

  I rubbed my frozen fingers and shortened up my grip on the new fighting stick, getting used to its robust weight. Compared to my training staff, this one felt like a small cannon.

  I was emotionally and physically wrecked, shivering in underwear that had not been changed since my sylph flight. To top it off, I had not had a decent night’s sleep since the time I dozed in Log MacDougal’s arms and she sang me songs in the language of the animals.

  All of my training—except for Tin Whistle for Beginners—had been leading to a moment like this, where I was cold, outnumbered, and facing five powerful wee folk.

  When I saw the Red-Eyed Woman take a swing at Captain de Valera with her brass staff, part of my brain split off from the person I used to be, and I became someone else. Someone different—and honestly, someone scary.

  I bared my teeth and howled like a lunatic.

  The weegees recoiled in surprise, because if you saw me, you would never expect me to howl like a wild animal.

  I leaped and leveled a huge swing at the Red-Eyed Woman’s solar plexus. It was a direct hit and sent her flying almost twenty feet into the stone wall of the fortress. The heavier shillelagh packs a huge wallop, it turned out. Her bronze shillelagh skittered across the cobblestones.

  All of the weegees started musking. The combination of smells was a nightmare of the highest order. Five leprechauns musking at the same time created the sense that someone had left a poop soufflé to burn in an oven built from octopus parts and rotten teeth.

  Before I could get my balance, two of the larger male weegees had wrapped themselves around my legs like bloodthirsty toddlers, trying to topple me over.

  Lily’s huge mouth clamped down on the head of one of the little men just as he tried to bite my knee. The yelp the little man let out was muffled, as his head was no longer visible. Lily shook him like a rag doll and then flicked his body over the wall, presumably into the bay, or more likely onto the sharp rocks just short of the water. It was impossible to hear what happened in the pounding rain. (Note: Please do not shed any tears for this wee man that Lily tossed over the wall. You could drop a leprechaun from an airplane, and he would get up laughing and then steal your cow. Leprechauns are spry and virtually indestructible.)

  The second wee man wrapped on my leg watched Lily’s send-off of his comrade, his mouth agape. How he managed to keep his pipe from falling off of his lower lip is a mystery. In his distracted state, he had no time to prepare for an enormous swing that I delivered to his feet—sending him in a backward somersault into the weegees’ carriage, which jostled, spilling all manner of contraband out of it: leprechaun gold with the stamp of the Royal Mint in Oifigtown, smoking pipes made from unicorn horn, and a dozen of the most magnificent shoes you have ever seen, each with solid platinum buckles. Also, a half-dozen claddagh jars, no doubt filled with the awful secrets of the weegees. There were also several remarkably carved logs in the shape of human children. I had to pick one up to realize it was a log.

  Through the driving rain, I could just make out the shape of a human figure inside the carriage, and from his silhouette, I had a good idea who it was.

  The Red-Eyed Woman was back on her gorgeous gold shoes, and she did a rather spectacular cartwheel toward me. I took a few swings at her, but she was as quick as a snake. I landed a few sloppy shots—nothing that could do any real damage.

  What happened next has given me nightmares many times since. The three remaining male weegees stacked themselves up, one on top of the other. This new “tall” leprechaun rushed at me like a centipede, brandishing three bronze shillelaghs. A dizzying blur of swats and punches from this confusing centipede-thing sent me tumbling across the cobblestones. The Red-Eyed Woman popped up and sprayed me with a short blast of her military-grade pickle juice canister.

  It is no mystery why this item was banned by the international organization Human Rights Watch back in 2009. Had I not been wearing my new glasses, I would have been blinded permanently. The glasses saved my eyeballs, although they themselves melted away. The exposed part of my face suffered a hot-pickle burn of the fourth degree, leaving my skin the color of a baboon’s behind. The pain was staggering, as if someone had peeled the top layer of my skin off and gently tucked a colony of fire ants underneath it.

  Across the plaza, the captain now had the harpy fully contained in the net. Lily rushed to her side and bit down on the harploon’s rope, holding it tight.

  The six-handed leprepede lurched toward me. I closed my useless eyes, took a deep breath, and swung at it.

  My first swing was such an epic miss that it hurt me more than anybody else. I was not controlling my breath, which is the number one rule of training with Yogi Hansra. My second swing was accompanied by a satisfying thunk and a tiny yelp, as the wee man in the middle of the stack went flying. His sudden absence sent the other two tumbling like a bearded house of cards.

  I began to spin my shillelagh in front of me, using both hands like an unstable majorette in some kind of angry parade. This proved to be a good tactic, and I made many direct hits with the weegees as they ran at me. I kept pressing forward, spinning my staff until I could hear nothing at all over the whir of the wood.

  A downside to fighting an opponent with an illegal brass shillelagh is that whenever you make contact, it hurts your hands, as the reverberations are strong. Especially on a cold night, which Ireland has in spades. So now my baboon-butt face and my hands were both burning, and I had swallowed some of the pickle spray and it was sliding down the back of my throat.

  I could just make out the Red-Eyed Woman pulling something off of her belt and waving it toward Lily. I was horrified to see that it was a high-quality French chocolate bonbon, and chocolate is very dangerous for a dog. You know this, and I know this, but dogs cannot remember that they can’t have chocolate. Luring Special Unit wolfhounds with chocolate treats is a wicked move, even for the weegees, and it made me angrier than I already was, which was a solid twelve out of a possible fifteen on the Ronan Boyle meter.

  “NO!” I shouted as I jumped for the bonbon, my body becoming parallel to the ground. I caught the chocolate in my frozen hand, and then ate it, out of sheer force of habit. It was remarkable.

  The Red-Eyed Woman pounced onto my shoulder. Her tiny fist landed several jabs at my nose with a set of brass knuckles that were so beautiful, they belonged in a museum. But the joke was on her, because my face was already so numb from pain that these hits might as well have been kisses from the world’s most agreeable Chihuahua.

  Lily still had control of the harpy, which freed up Captain de Valera, whose purple shillelagh shot out through the night like an eel. She delivered an astonishing combination of thwacks and bonks that were difficult to see with the naked eye and impossible to see with mine.

  I pulled myself up, switched my shillelagh to my left hand, and took a huge swing at the Red-Eyed Woman, delivering a wallop to her nose that already looked like it was put on upside down.

  I thwacked her two more times across the noggin, knocking her hat off. My confidence was on the rise. Her stinky musk was coming on strong, and it was like we were inside an airplane that was stuck on the runway in which every seat had been purchased by fish heads. I was driving her backward toward the carriage. I was surprised with the ease with which I was gaining advantage over her.

  “I haven’t forgotten you,” I shouted at her as we whacked at each other with our sticks. “You bit my nose at Dooley’s. I’ve got your shoe print. I will have my revenge. Also, I will get my umbrella back, as it’s a nice umbrella.”

  The Red-Eyed Woman cackled, even though she was losing the duel. This should have been a clue. I will never really forgive myself for the next turn of events. My adrenaline was pumping, and it seemed like I was winning, but remember: The wee folk are unrivaled in thei
r devilish cleverness.

  I could have acted differently and saved the captain from being stolen away from the Republic on that night. As Yogi Hansra had taught me: The failure of your endeavors is because of your ego. And right now, my ego told me that I was being a real hotshot.

  But really, I was about to be duped by a tiny stinky woman with a nose that looks like it was put on upside down.

  The Red-Eyed Woman’s trick was one of the oldest in the book. Literally. So literally that it’s covered on page three of the course book for Practices of Irish and Faerie Law:

  Never accept gold from a leprechaun. All leprechaun gold has been mallact.2 Which just means a curse has been cast on it. The same way that we can faerie-proof doors against the wee folk, they enchant their gold to keep it from falling into human hands. This is why I’ve heard of only two cases where a human got off with a pot of leprechaun gold. Those crocks were foolishly left uncursed by their wee owners.

  But I wasn’t thinking about my Practices of Irish and Faerie Law class at all, which is why, like the world’s biggest eejit, I instinctively put my hand out as the Red-Eyed Woman tossed a gold coin at my face.

  Everything slowed down for a moment. I caught a good look at the figure lurking in the carriage, and indeed, I knew his face well. He smiled and winked at me, which felt like adding insult to injury.

  I’m certain I meant to slap the gold out of the air, as we had been specifically trained to do at Collins House. But I did not. I was distracted, and I blew it. The gold was now clenched in my stupid fist.

  I had accepted leprechaun gold. That’s when the nightmare began.

  * * *

  1 Leprechaun slang for money, as fancy shoes are so important to their economy.

  2 There are at least two hundred known mallacts that can protect faerie gold, all of which are catalogued in the pamphlet The Handling and Safe Storage of Mallact Faerie Gold, available in the Joy Vaults gift shop in Dublin or the S&W Department at Collins House for two hundred and ninety euros in hardcover or best offer in paperback.

  If you accept gold from the wee folk, one of the curses will befall you. Some of them are fast and painless—like going instantly bald, or losing your sense of humor. You will meet men and women who have been a victim of the latter one, as they are always out in droves on election days. Some of the curses are ironic and cruel. I would later read about some mallact gold that made a man named Brian O’Flaherty from the town of Doon have an insatiable desire to eat the gold. He melted it down and stirred it into a Bolognese sauce that looked amazing and tasted not amazing.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  TO THE UNDERNOG

  When the Duncannon paramedics found me at daybreak, they thought I was dead, because I seemed very much so. My body was paralyzed. Frozen solid, mouth agape, with a piece of heavy gold clenched in my petrified fist. Thank heavens, someone checked for a pulse before they sent me to the morgue, and they were surprised to find that I was very much alive inside my body. I was not aware of my surroundings because of the tromluí. It’s a pretty simple curse: The person who accepts this gold goes to live in a nightmare from their own memory. From the moment I had caught the coin, while my body was in Duncannon Fort, my mind was reliving one of the most embarrassing moments of my short life. Vividly.

  Luckily it was my most embarrassing memory, and not my worst memory, for I wouldn’t have survived the day of my parents’ arrest over and over again.

  This was just a humiliating event, and yet to live it over and over was rough indeed. The place was Eyre Square, central Galway. Dolores had introduced me to her pretty cousin Bridget Sullivan, who is a bit older than me and works at Powell’s Music Shop. Dolores had rented us Rollerblades for what I realized later was a blind date, because Dolores is a bit crazy and decided that I should try to meet a girlfriend before I turned sixteen and “became boring.”

  Bridget was nice enough, I supposed. We were attempting to skate around the park, which is difficult, as Eyre Square tends to be full of legitimate kooks.

  I thought I would try to impress Bridget by doing a little jump over two small stairs that led from one level of the park down to the next. The entire “jump” would have been about fifty centimeters, had it not resulted in serious bodily harm. Something, perhaps a lace, had caught on the top step as I tried to lift off, and with a horrible crack—which was the sound of both of my wrists breaking—I landed in a split, causing a massive rip in my pants. A pigeon nearby coughed up a pizza crust right as it happened.

  I’m not sure if the pigeon was reacting to my fall, or if it was just amazing timing. It certainly added some sad punctuation to the whole affair. I wish I could tell you that I did not start to cry, but if you’ve never broken both wrists at the same time, trust me—you are going to cry. And I did.

  So there I was. Pants split, wrists snapped, near a pigeon with tummy trouble—all from trying to do a “stunt” to impress Dolores’s lovely cousin Bridget Sullivan.

  Needless to say, I would probably never Rollerblade again.

  But now the gold curse was causing me to relive this moment again and again. And again and again and again, while paralyzed, in the wet plaza of Duncannon Fort. While I was in this tromluí state, the Special Unit at Collins House was contacted, and the Mysterious Doctor Boiko was dispatched by sylph to the scene, along with Commissioner of the Special Unit Colm McManus, who is a handsome and somewhat severe man of about sixty who carries a white shillelagh, which is quite rare to see. This kind of shillelagh is made from the root of the hilarity tree, which grows only on the west coast of Tir Na Nog. Hilarity tree is a classic clurichaun name, because the tree is in fact the most poisonous plant in their world. Just one of the hilarity tree’s fruits contains enough poison to kill a herd of the most robust hippopotami.

  Doctor Boiko brought me out of the tromluí with the aid of a very disgusting tea that is designed for this purpose and must be served directly into the nose.

  Duncannon Fort was eerily quiet as I came to. The storm had passed. The captain, Lily, and the Red-Eyed Woman were gone, as was the harpy. At this point I did not know what had befallen them.

  “Captain de Valera?” I asked, my voice raspy from a long night of shrieking.

  The commissioner shook his head as he consulted a shenanogram that was wavering listlessly. “She didn’t report in. Likely that the weegees have taken her. And the wolfhound. There’s a few geatas around here; we’re checking them all.”

  I picked myself up. I was angry but also severely exhausted, still reeling from my pickle-burnt face and now a noseful of a potion that seemed onion-based. I tried to control my breathing, as the yogi had taught me. I’m not sure if I was shaking on the outside or just the inside.

  “I’d like to request permission to go and find her, sir,” I said.

  “You need to rest a bit first, lad. You don’t look well at all,” replied the commissioner, looking me up and down with genuine concern. His eyes lingered on my baboon-butt face, then turned away, as if he couldn’t stand to look at it.

  “Of course, sir. I understand. I would need to stop at Collins House first. I require some things from the Supply and Weapons Department. And I need our second-best wolfhound,” I said, staring off at Waterford Bay. My eyes, which could not focus, caused me to squint with an intensity that accurately represented the anger brewing inside me.

  I wanted the captain back. I wanted Lily back. I feared what terrible things would befall them in the custody of the stinky Red-Eyed Woman.

  “I cannot send a cadet into Tir Na Nog to recover a captain, Boyle,” said the commissioner.

  My heart sank, but my voice strengthened. I stretched tall and grabbed hold of the commissioner’s arm, which was both passionate of me and a breach of protocol.

  “But it must be me,” I pleaded. “They’re my friends. And the weegees have an accomplice who is well known to me. I saw him in their carriage. He even winked at me.”

  The commissioner twirled his white shille
lagh. He stared out at the bay. We were now locked in a quiet competition to see which of us could stare at Waterford Bay with more gravitas. After a long moment, he finally turned back to face me.

  “The Special Unit does not send agents on vendettas, Mr. Boyle. I’m aware of your parents’ legal situation. The stolen Bog Man. I know all about your history with Lord Desmond Dooley, who is a well-connected man. And who, I should remind you, has been found not guilty in the highest courts of the land.”

  “Yes. I understand. But I have to go, sir. It must be me. Please.”

  The commissioner furrowed his brow, then tapped me with his white stick, which was as light as a feather. “Let me finish, boy. I cannot send a cadet to Tir Na Nog . . . so I shall have to promote you.”

  I smiled. Which hurt my face a good deal in its current state.

  And that is how, at nine o’clock that night, I set off for my first mission to the Undernog, accompanied by Log MacDougal and a large gray wolfhound named Rí.

  My face was tingling, my body bruised, but there was an undeniable spring in my step, for I was wearing a new uniform for the first time—camouflage kilt, knee-whack guards, wool and Kevlar jacket with epaulets. On the left breast, a gold badge bearing a single word that identified my new rank: LORGAIRE, the Irish word for detective.

  This was my first night as a detective of the Special Unit of Tir Na Nog.

  I will tell you now the one detail that I kept from the commissioner. The figure in the weegee’s carriage, the one who winked at me. He was well known to me. And his face would haunt me for the rest of my life. But not because it was Lord Desmond Dooley.

  Because it was the Bog Man.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  THOMAS LENNON is a writer and actor from Oak Park, Illinois. He has written and appeared in many films and television shows, as well as the music video for “Weird Al” Yankovic’s “Foil.” This is his first novel.