Manannan Trilogy

by Michele McGrath

  McLir taught me the names of the plants I worked with and some of their properties. I found it almost impossible to remember everything he said; they were all so different. In fact, I no longer wondered why McLir wrote things down. My mother had used a few of the herbs for flavour in her cooking, but most were quite unknown to me.

  McLir had collected huge bunches of blackthorn, camomile, wild garlic, mint, lavender, rowan, rosemary, sorrel, yarrow, foxglove, elder, hawthorn and ivy. Unfortunately, he also gathered the smelly comfrey he still made me drink every night. We made brews, teas, poultices, or dressings for wounds from these plants, and they were greatly in demand.

  Every few days, McLir packed up his mixtures and left me in the cave. He took his boat to one of the villages along the shore. He often treated people in the shelter belonging to an old fisherman called Stoill. Sufferers waited there for McLir, many for a long time. His fame had spread far and wide, in spite of the priest’s displeasure. When he returned, he used to tell me where people had come from for his treatments. Some had walked miles, from the west, the east and even the far south. McLir never asked anyone for payment, but he was always given something in return for his potions. No matter how poor they were, everyone brought an egg, some fish, a little milk or a few handfuls of corn. They would have been ashamed to do otherwise. So we fed well that autumn and never went hungry.

  McLir used to tell me all about these things when he returned. He was always kind and concerned and tried to help wherever possible. Often the people were so frightened of him their voices shook and he had difficulty in understanding their needs. McLir said one of the problems with what he did was fear of the unknown. This was a result of all the tales told about him.

  Shea stood silently by his side on these occasions. He never moved or made a noise, but everyone realised he was on guard. Only a very brave or a very stupid man would lift a hand against his master while he was there. I thought Shea’s presence, alone, would certainly have made my voice shake, even if I had no evil intentions, but I did not say that to McLir.

  Only once did I ever see McLir return in a rage. A woman had come to ask him for a spell to put on her neighbour. She said the old man had done her an evil. As he told me this, McLir seemed to change before my eyes. The kindly teacher vanished, and in his place stood a tall, menacing man. He towered over me and blue flames almost seemed to spark from his fingers as he described the scene. He had been so angry, Shea had bared his teeth and growled at the woman making her run away. I chuckled as I imagined what had happened, but McLir did not laugh. He seemed to shrink back to the man I had come to be familiar with, yet his eyes remained sad.

  “Many are like her,” he said with a sigh, “wanting to do harm not good. There’s far too much spite in this world, but the woman will now speak evil of me wherever she goes. Many will believe her.”

  “Why didn’t you give her something harmless and call it the spell she wanted? It might have been easier for you and she wouldn’t understand anything different.”

  He nodded. “Yes, it would’ve been much easier. But who’s to say whether her neighbour would believe himself to be cursed and become sick from fear? Such things have happened before. I will not frighten innocent people just to make life easier for myself.”

  Although I approved of what he had told me, I thought it would be a difficult resolve to keep. So I said,

  “How can anyone live without ever harming others? Everyone gets cross at times and says far more than they should.”

  He nodded and a look of pure sorrow crossed his face. “Once, a long time ago, I hurt someone needlessly; I am still paying the price for my action. I will never do such a thing again if I can possibly avoid it.” He startled me with the sudden passion in his voice, but he would not tell me any more at the time. I had to wait many months before I found out what had happened to him, the tragedy of his life.

  As the weather worsened, the number of McLir’s journeys dwindled, because the sea became too rough and the roads too muddy. Fewer people made the journey to Stoill’s shelter. The days had closed in and daylight became short. Icy winds often whistled into the cave, whipping the flames into golden sparks. Neither of us wanted to be outside and we huddled round the fire, spending our time talking and telling stories. McLir was a wonderful teller of tales and he kept me amused by the hour.

  If half the things he told me were true and not legends, he had lived a life filled with wonders. Sometimes I got the strange feeling that it was almost a relief for him to talk about such events. He seemed to have rarely spoken of them before, for lack of a suitable audience. I found his stories fascinating.

  Occasionally he took out a small lap harp and played to me. Plaintive melodies that made me cry, or rippling jigs that made me want to dance. I remembered the tales people had told about his music. Sometimes he sang strange songs, in a language I did not understand. He smiled when I asked what the words meant, but he would not tell me.

  One night, he told me the story of his father, Lir, as he had promised that first day.

  “I suppose this is as good a time as any for the tale,” he said. “A winter’s night, with the gale howling outside, and we are comfortable, sitting beside the fire. Well then, my father had acquired wisdom in many ways. He passed his knowledge on to me, although he warned me such learning always comes at a price. The ignorant believe in spells and, sometimes, if what they think is magic fails, they turn against the magician. My father learned to be sparing in what he told others, for safety sake.” He shrugged.

  “I am glad he passed his knowledge on to you.” I shuddered at the thought of my fate if he had not. “No one in our village is skilful in such things.”

  “My father was a wonderful teacher. He had a mind that retained almost all of the things he’d seen and learned. He tried to teach his knowledge to all of us, but my brothers had no interest in learning. They cared only for the marvels and the strange beasts and never bothered to remember anything useful. My father was both joyful and relieved when he realised that I, alone, wanted more than just the tales. He spent time with me, as soon as I became old enough to understand properly what he told me. He wanted to make sure that, after he’d gone, his teaching would not be forgotten. Although he never learned to read or write himself, he sent me away to gain these skills. I have always been grateful to him, for I lack his ability to remember everything I’ve been taught. Perhaps, the real reason is that I hadn’t gained the knowledge for myself. I’d not seen the wonders with my own eyes or learned them directly from his teachers.”

  “Where did he send you?” I asked, agog with curiosity. I had never heard about anyone going to places where they taught reading and writing before.

  “To the great monastery at Glendalough, a lovely place to go, but a long way from where we lived. The monks were strict and frightening to a small boy. I wanted to learn, but cried every night for a month after my father left me and returned home.”

  I shivered, imagining him abandoned there, young and frightened.

  “How old were you?”

  “I’d just passed my eighth summer.”

  Conal’s age, I thought, picturing my young brother’s face pinched and grey with fear and loneliness.

  McLir continued, “My father always said the greater part of his knowledge came from the lands which surround the middle sea. He wandered far into those sun-kissed wastes. Men live in white stone buildings clinging to the edges of precipices, and spend their time discovering new learning. He stayed for some years among those people. For a while, he even thought about remaining with them and making new discoveries himself. However, he was not native to that place, and the land became alien to him eventually. After many winters had passed, he knew he must leave. The misty green island he came from drew him home at last, and he did not resist its call.

  “He’d journeyed further than any man I’ve ever met. His voyage started when he was little more than a boy. He smuggled himself on board one of the trading vessels which
used to come to our village. He never told me why, but I’ve always believed he ran away after some dispute with my grandfather. They didn’t like each other and valued different things. My people say that Lir favoured my grandmother not my grandfather, the only one of his children to do so. Certainly, something happened which made him leave hurriedly, and he never saw his father again.”

  McLir gave me a crooked smile. I had told him about my own father and that we did not like each other.

  “I understand,” I said. I had deep sympathy for the young lad. I, too, would have preferred a perilous voyage among strangers, rather than to stay with a man I disliked so much. Not for the first time, I wished I had been born a man and not a woman. If I had been, I might have had a similar chance of escape. But such a wish was futile. If I had been born a man, I would be Oshin’s eldest son with no need to run away. I thrust the thought aside. McLir had continued speaking and I had already missed part of his story.

  “My father told me his boat ran into a storm on the first day out. It was tossed and blown, and he became very sick. When one of the men on board found him, several days later, they were well out to sea. They beat him soundly but they did not toss him overboard, as sailors used to do to stowaways in those days. The captain recognised him and he did not wish for trouble with my grandfather, if and when the ship returned. They did not turn round to bring him back, because they had such a long way still to go. The captain set him to work and he learned quickly. He’d helped the men of the village at the fishing as soon as he was old enough. Lir knew about boats, although he’d never been on one so big or which journeyed so far. He made himself valuable to the captain and the other sailors. The boat reached land at last. Then they asked him to stay on board for the rest of the journey and become one of the crew. He accepted gladly. He certainly had no wish to go back and face my grandfather.”

  “Wasn’t he afraid to go so far away from his native land? I would be.” I pictured the small ship sailing on into the unknown. Although I did not have a happy home, I realised I did not want to leave the island where I had been born and my loved ones. Lir must have been brave indeed, or desperate.

  “My father never showed fear. If he felt any, he didn’t display it. Some men can do that. Perhaps he was afraid at the time. However, he considered his journey the most important adventure of his life. He enjoyed telling his sons about what he’d seen. I can still picture him sitting by the fire, gathering all of us round him, our eyes wide with wonder. As I’m telling his tales to you, it seems as if I’m bringing his memory back to life.”

  “You loved him, didn’t you?” I asked gently. I had caught the affection in his tone as he spoke of his own father. For a moment, I felt envious. I would have worked so hard for a father that I loved and who loved me in return.

  He smiled. “Very much. We were alike, you see. He sometimes read my thoughts and, when I became older, I sometimes read his.”

  “You were very fortunate.”

  “Yes.” He fell silent for a moment, then he looked up and smiled at me.

  “Where did the boat go to in the end?”

  “To the middle sea. They landed on the southern shores to trade. It’s a place where curious beasts live and people build tall pointed tombs for their kings. My father sailed down swirling rivers and caught glimpses of strange temples to unknown gods. He met people with dark skins, wonderful horsemen who fought from the back of their horses. They were fierce warriors, but they nursed their sick and wounded when their battles had finished. Many recovered and lived to fight again. My father became interested and he met wise men who taught him their cures.

  “The traders grew rich, far richer than they’d been in the northern lands. They had no reason to leave the southern sea yet. Lir was eager to visit the lands he sailed past. So he left the boat from time to time, making journeys of his own and catching the others up again later. One day, at some distant port, they did not turn up. He never found out what happened to the boat or the sailors on board. Perhaps they sank in a storm, or had been attacked by raiders. He mourned for the men who had become his friends. They must be dead or captive, for he knew they wouldn’t abandon him. Now he was stranded. He had to work at many things in order to feed himself and stay alive. Sometimes he almost starved.”

  “How awful. How did he manage to come home at last?”

  “The journey took him almost twenty years. It was a long time before he even found a boat that traded in the right direction. The crew agreed to let him work his passage. The ship only crossed the middle sea and didn’t sail out into the ocean. So they dropped him on the northern coast and he had to walk the rest of the way. Going through the Frankish kingdom took him years and many adventures, but he came to the end at last. Then he had to make two more voyages before he finally came home. By that time, my grandfather was long dead and a cousin held sway over his people. The cousin had no place to give my father. By leaving, Lir had denied his birthright and he didn’t argue. I asked him once why not. As my grandfather’s eldest living son, he could’ve become the chieftain of the land. He said simply that he’d seen enough people killed in his travels for better causes than this one. He didn’t want to shed his family’s blood merely to regain something he’d never truly valued. He thought about taking ship again and returning to the southern sea, but he wearied of voyaging. He was determined not leave the land where he’d been born. He accepted, though, that he could no longer live the life he had lived there before.”

  “I’d be sick of travelling too, after all that time,” I said trying to imagine so long a journey. I had never gone further than Brede’s and she lives only two days from our village. The journey had seemed long enough to me at the time. Twenty years was unimaginable. Lir had been on his travels longer than I had been alive.

  “My father decided to travel on the land not the sea. He used the skills and the knowledge he’d acquired to earn his way from place to place. He cured the sick and his reputation went before him. People came to beg him to come back with them, to help others who ailed. In one village, some years later, he first met my mother. He told me that, in all of his voyaging, he’d never thought much about women. From the first, she was different. He did not tell me why he thought so. She became his wife and, shortly afterwards, I was born, the eldest of his three sons. We’d started to travel onwards when a message came to my father from his own people. His cousin had died, without leaving an heir, and his kin wanted him to come back to them. They’d heard of his ‘magic’ from others. Now that he was no longer a penniless voyager they asked him to take his father’s place. Although he hadn’t been treated well, he felt he had a duty to his people. Also, I think, he longed for the only home he’d ever known. So we retraced his journey to the point he had started from over five years before. My father took over the guardianship of the land of his father and my brothers and I grew to manhood. I stayed in my home for many years, until the time came for me to wander in my turn.”

  “You wish you were back there now, don’t you?” I asked softly. I had caught the lingering note of longing in his voice for something that seemed beyond his reach.

  He sighed and passed a hand over his eyes. “Sometimes, in the spring, I would give much to be among those hills again. But many things must change before I can wander there again.” He shook his head, as if he would erase an unpleasant memory. “The evening is growing late and now is the time for us to go to sleep.”

  I dreamed that night of strange sunlit places, trees bearing fronded leaves and deep calm rivers. I imagined speckled, long-necked animals and golden cats wearing shaggy manes. Their images stayed with me even after I awoke and I wondered if I would ever see such things myself. The possibility seemed unlikely, and I am not sure I even wanted to. Could these wonders be as fantastic, in reality, as they are in the tales told by a master storyteller?

  We spent many evenings like that, telling stories, making music or just dreaming by the fire. Only the dog took long rambling walks across the sli
ppery rocks outside. The cold did not bother him. He had heavy fur, which seemed to grow shaggier as the winter became colder. He would go out by himself to hunt and come back smelling of seaweed or bog. Once he came home wining, a long thorn stuck deep in his foot. McLir cut the evil thing out and the dog let him. He did not move as the knife cut into his flesh. He seemed to understand McLir had to hurt him in order to make him better. I had never seen such trust between man and beast before. I said so to McLir, when he had finished.

  “I can’t believe Shea let you cut him. He might’ve bitten your hand off for hurting him so.”

  McLir smiled. “Shea understands me and I understand him. We’ve been together since his birth. He saved my life more than once and I his. I’ll tell you those stories one day,” he promised, but he never did.

  I still ached too much to wish to move further than I must. To my surprise, the cold weather did not make the hardship worse. I had a new interest in the small world around me. Every day, I learnt new things. McLir had decided to teach me more about the plants he used, and how to perform some of his simpler cures. I tried not to become confused, but so much was new. I wished I were able to write things down in a book, as he did. Everything would have been so much easier then.

  About this time, I began to call McLir ‘Máistir’. He was a wonderful teacher to me, as his father must have been to him. He smiled when I used it first. When I asked him why, he told me that I was not the only person to call him by that title. I felt a little jealous and I tried to find out whom else he had taught. He only said,

  “It was long ago and far away. The person I taught did not live to make use of the knowledge he learned. May his soul rest peacefully in the halls of his gods.”

  McLir spent a lot of time writing. I felt fascinated by the whole process. I always asked him to show me what he had written, the words and the pictures. Little by little, I began to recognise some of the lines that he used for sounds and their meaning. Whenever I did so, he seemed pleased with me.