Amy Lynn, The Lady Of Castle Dunn

by Jack July

  The men had fashioned a long banquet table out of saw horses and plywood. Bogus filled a plate, sat down and dug in. He shook his head. “I can’t believe I have lived my entire life without this food. It is fabulous.”

  Amy reached across the table and squeezed her Granny’s hand. “Happy birthday, Granny.”

  “Yeah baby, it’s a very happy birthday,” Granny said.

  Amy continued to eat but glanced back to see Granny still staring at her. “What?” asked Amy.

  Granny curled an arthritic index finger back toward herself. Amy got up, walked around the table and leaned in. Granny whispered something to her, and Amy stood up straight. “No,” she said, shaking her head.

  Granny just smiled and nodded. Amy walked over to Kelly and whispered something to her. Kelly smiled and said, “Yeah, in my purse in Joe’s truck.”

  Amy disappeared for about 10 minutes, then walked back by Bogus and Granny with a stunned expression. She looked around at the gathering, cleared her throat and announced, “Excuse me. I have something to say.”

  Everyone stopped and looked up at her. She held up the little stick in her hand and said, “I’m pregnant.”

  The End, almost.

  Enjoy a short story about The Castle Dunn, Amy Lynn’s

  green eyes and why she is six feet tall.

  The History of Green Eyes and The Castle Dunn

  Sometime around 795AD, the Vikings came from Scandinavia to find an Ireland with no apparent central ruler and many small territories constantly warring against each other. They came to rob the wealthy monasteries and soon became a force to be reckoned with. They quickly took over territories, establishing settlements and ultimately laying the foundations for the great Irish cities of Dublin and Limerick. Eventually the Vikings brought trade and new knowledge in ship building, warfare, and the arts.

  For a short time, the Vikings were a dominant power on the island, forcing the native Chieftains and nobles to put aside old feuds and unite. This dominance ended in 1014AD when Brian Boruma (king of Thomond and High King of Ireland) defeated them at the battle of Clontarf, outside Dublin. This did not rid Ireland of the Vikings entirely, but it stopped the growth of their power on the Island. Brian Boruma was killed at the end of the battle, and a power struggle soon arose which brought a return to the old in-fighting and warring of the great chiefs.

  It was to this world in 1088 that a baby girl was born into the MacNamara clan. Her mother, looking upon her for the first time, stared in wonder at her eyes, which glowed and sparkled green like polished emeralds. She named her Grainne, which is the modern-day Grace, the moniker of a Celtic goddess.

  Grace was seen as somewhat mystical. Not because she had powers, but as a child she was very kind and gentle, always with a smile and a twinkle in her eyes. She made people happy. When the clan MacNamara chief would gather other chiefs, meetings could be contentious. He kept Grace at his knee to bring the other chieftains drink. When she stood before them, they could not help but return her smile and become lost in her eyes.

  The clan MacNamara was second in strength only to the O’Brian clan. It was assumed that Grace would marry an O’Brian, though suitors from other clans regularly tried to barter with her father for her hand. By her thirteenth year, folk tales about her were numerous though mostly false. She was claimed to be magical, able to hypnotize with a look and communicate with animals. The legend of the mystical beauty Grace made it all the way to the throne of Norway where one of the most brutal Vikings in history, King Magnus the Barelegs, wanted her for himself.

  Magnus was by all accounts an imposing figure. Said to be very tall, he was known for leading aggressive expeditions into the Scottish islands and the Irish Sea where he got his nickname, Barelegs, because of his fondness for the Irish and Scottish culture. He and many of his men wore kilts and outer garments customary to the British Isles.

  Magnus sent a raiding party to capture Grace, but with help from neighboring clans they were thwarted. Upon their return to Norway, Magnus was furious. He was already at war with Sweden and Denmark, seeking to gain control of the Irish seas. Upon his victory, he put together an army and went after Grace MacNamara himself. A Lendman, an advisor to the King questioned Magnus’ journey as a waste. Magnus’ ax promptly split his skull.

  Several clans assembled to do battle as the Viking armada made its way up the Shannon River. Grace knew what the king wanted and would not allow continued bloodshed in her name.

  She donned a white Celtic wedding dress, her long thick strawberry blonde hair spilling over her shoulders and down her back, topped with a crown of flowers. She made her way out of hiding to a path that wound next to the river where King Magnus and his men stood next to his ship, preparing for battle. She stopped and called, “KING MAGNUS!”

  They began to descend on her when she drew a Scottish dirk from her sleeve and held it to her breast. The King bellowed, “STOP!”

  He approached her slowly, his lips slightly parting as he gazed in awe. She stood tall and proud, her chin up and her green eyes blazing. When he was just outside arms reach and she commanded him to stop. He could see the blood stain steadily growing below her left breast where the blade had already pierced the skin. She looked down at herself then back up at him. “Is this what you want?”

  “Yes,” he said in almost a whisper.

  “Hm. Then I will go with you of my own free will. I will swear allegiance to you as a man and as King. I will lie with you and bear your children. If…” she paused for a moment. “If you swear never to attack the MacNamara clan, and, upon my death or yours, you will ensure the return of my children and me to this very place.”

  He shook his head and with a crooked half-smile said, “You dare try to barter with me?”

  “Barter? No. This is how it is going to be. Or, you will gaze upon me as I deny you what you want. You will watch me die.”

  Her look of resignation and the white knuckles surrounding the handle of the dagger told him that she was not bluffing. The smile left his face, replaced by a look of wonder. He shook his head and said, “You are not a treasure or a prize. You are not mystical or magical.”

  He turned to look at his leaders, the men prepared to follow him into battle as they stood in relative confusion. He suddenly roared, “BOW BEFORE YOUR QUEEN!” They did. He turned back to her and spoke softly, “You are a queen, my queen.” He reached out his hand, “Take my hand, and you will have my word.”

  She took his hand and boarded his ship, and they sailed away.

  In 1103, Magnus made a new ally, the self-proclaimed King of Ireland, Muirchertach O’Brian. To cement this alliance, Magnus’s first son, Sigurd I Magnusson, married O’Brian’s daughter. It was said that Queen Grace played a role in this match. The Norse-Irish alliance was successful in many battles with opposing Irish forces and soon overran large tracts of Ulster. It was, however, during this campaign that Magnus met his fate after being ambushed by a large gathering of Irish clans not friendly to the Norse.

  Queen Grace had two small children, a boy and a girl. Magnus had three other elder sons who all claimed the throne. Fearing an additional claim, his second son, Olaf Magnusson, decided to kill Queen Grace and her children. Magnus’ best friend and most trusted advisor Jonson, stood in the way. Olaf knew he needed both Jonson’s skills as a tactician and his loyalty, as he was highly respected by the other warriors. After listening to Jonson’s wise council, he realized he also needed the support of the people, who adored Queen Grace. Olaf made the wise decision to keep his father’s word and she returned to Ireland with her children. As she stepped off the Viking ship, she saw watchtowers had been built. These watch towers would be the footprints for the outer walls of the Castle Dunn.

  Within the next century, earthen mounds were built in between the watchtowers, followed by walls atop the mounds. By the late thirteenth century the keep, the main structure inside the
walls, began to rise.

  Early in the mid fourteenth century, another pair of unnaturally green eyes appeared. They belonged to a boy. His mother named him Aiden, Aiden McNamara. Something else appeared at about the same time: the Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death.

  The plague took Aiden’s mother and father, but not before they could send Aiden to the rocky northern coast where the Dunn clan took him in. He grew tall and strong, nurtured by a clan with a strong sense of right and wrong. When he was twelve, the clan chieftain told him who he was and where he was from. Five years later, he returned to seek his rightful place in the McNamara clan.

  Though the plague had slowed progress, the fortified beginnings of the castle continued to grow in size. Inner walls were built and a moat was dug that allowed the Shannon River to flow around the outer walls. As a descendant of Magnus and Grace, he received support upon his return but was still forced to fight for his rightful place. Aiden grew to the height of 6’2”, a giant of a man. And with the blood of Magnus coursing through his veins, he was an impulsive and violent individual. By the age of 29, he became Chieftain of the McNamara clan, all the while doing the unthinkable: retaining the surname Dunn.

  Aiden continued building the castle. He added a tall tower to the corner of the keep, doubled the thickness of the outer walls and increased the width and depth of the moat. He married a Norman girl, Eva Marshal, a 5’7” beauty who became a direct ancestor of Richard de Clare, second Earl of Pembroke, known as Strongbow. They would have three children, two boys and a girl.

  Aiden died from natural causes at the age of 52, a long life for the time. The castle was named in his honor. Three short years later, in 1394, King Richard II came with a great army and many Irish chieftains surrendered to him. The Castle Dunn became an English colonial outpost.

  King Richard’s murder five years later caused an English dynastic quarrel that sparked the 30-year War of the Roses between the houses of Lancaster and York. The 100 Years War was reopened with France, and suddenly Ireland was not on anyone’s agenda. The English abandoned the Castle Dunn, but not before they set fire to it. The destruction was not complete, and the McNamara clan slowly worked to rebuild, completing the work in 1425.

  During a battle in 1475, it fell into the hands of the O’Brien clan, who were granted the title of the Earls of Thomond by Henry the VIII. It was at this time that two green-eyed children were born, a McNamara girl and an O’Brien boy. Fifteen years later, the O’Briens would demand the marriage of Lasair McNamara to Donal O’Brian. Lasair was tall, broad shouldered, blonde, smart and quick tempered. She was all Viking. Donal was none of those things; rather he was short, squat and weak from a lifetime of battling illness. Lasair protested but knew that short of an all-out battle, which the McNamaras would surely lose, she had no choice. But the day before her wedding, she spent the evening with the young man she loved, Lugan Dunn.

  A few short months later it was discovered she was pregnant, and she eventually gave birth to a girl. Three years after that, Donal succumbed to illness and died. Because their child was a girl, not a possible heir, and did not have the mystical green eyes, Lasair was allowed to return to her family. She took her child and traveled north to find Lugan and discovered he had never married. He had pined for her long and hard, but even so he was hesitant when she arrived with another man’s child. Lasair held the child out to him and as he looked at her, he began to smile. The child had his nose and light gray eyes.

  In 1641 the castle became home to the McNamara clan leader, who led the Irish rebellion. The castle was later confiscated by Cromwell’s soldiers, but returned to the family after just two years.

  A declaration in 1720 gave the British Parliament power to make laws binding in Ireland. During the 18th century, most native Irish were Catholic peasants working farms for a select group of English and Irish protestant landowners. This was a time of heavy oppression for the Irish people. An English lord inhabited the Castle Dunn, and those in his favor had food those not favored faced starvation or worse.

  Roisen Dunn, born in 1778, was statuesque with the broad shoulders and strong build of a viking but adorned with Irish features: alabaster skin, long fire-red hair and emerald green eyes. No one knew for sure whether it was nature or nurture, but Roisen was an angry, selfish child. Still people treated her with kindness because of the legends surrounding those gifted with the eyes. She eventually married an O’Brien but became angered when he could not provide for her. She gave birth to a son and soon after began an affair with the lord’s eldest son, who gave her food and gifts.

  In 1798, with French support, the Irish revolted against the British. The lord of the castle passed away and Roisen’s lover became the lord. She not only maintained the torrid affair, but also passed on names and information about those involved in the rebellion, including her own husband, who was executed. She was found out and fled to the castle. In 1801, the lord was replaced due to a combination of poor performance and nepotism. This left Roisen with nowhere to go. The terminated British lord did the best he could for her, putting her and her children on a ship to America. She settled in Virginia and kept her maiden name. A few generations later, several Dunn families moved to central Alabama where they still reside today.

  Early in the twentieth century, the castle came under control of the County Clare. Several people of wealth and substance purchased it and tried to rehab the structure. What they all learned was a very expensive lesson: a castle costs more to keep, staff and maintain than it does to buy. In the mid twentieth century, the County Clare rehabbed it once again, turning it into government offices and a tourist destination. It became a popular place to hold family reunions, weddings, business outings, etc. It had become mildly profitable, and because of that was steadily upgraded with modern conveniences.

  In 2006, the castle would once again return to private ownership. A Polish billionaire entered into negotiation with the County to purchase the castle, but he was denied. After political maneuvering that included the Prime Minister and the withdrawal of an outright claim to the castle by a rightful heir, the young American wife of the billionaire, a deal was struck. The billionaire would maintain controlling interest in the castle and agree to maintain it until such time that there was no rightful heir to the castle. At that time, it would be returned to the County Clare.

  After nearly two centuries, there would once again be a green eyed Lady of Castle Dunn.

  The End