by John Lenahan
‘I do.’
‘This doesn’t look like a well-used path to me.’
‘It’s not.’
I waited but Red wasn’t in an extrapolating mood. Sometimes it was easier when he ignored me. ‘So how do you get up there?’ I finally asked.
‘I go an easier way.’
‘So why aren’t we going that way?’
‘My way would not be easier for you.’
‘Why not?’ I asked a couple of times along with some shoulder taps, but Red was just as good at ignoring me when I was directly behind him as he was when I was at the end of the parade.
As the morning progressed the trail became much steeper. Whoever originally designed this route didn’t bother with any of that zigzagging to make climbing easier stuff – when the mountain got steep, so did the path. Getting down on all fours became common. Eventually I wouldn’t say we were hiking as much as rock climbing. An hour after missing my lunch, we finally took a break on a level shelf about two thirds of the way up. We were all, including Red, uncharacteristically exhausted. I wondered if our lack of stamina was due to being so far away from the immortality mojo of the mainland. It was a thought I kept to myself. We drank from a sparkling clear stream that fed into a small pond. Next to Gerard’s wine it was the nicest thing I have ever drunk.
‘So tell me, Son of Duir,’ Red said, ‘what are you going to do with these red eels when you find them?’
‘I’m going to use them to cure my father.’
‘Cure him? Of what?’
I didn’t really want to tell him, but I didn’t have the strength to lie so I explained about Dad reattaching his hand and how that same hand was killing him. Red’s reaction surprised me. For the first time since I met him he looked truly interested.
‘And what makes you think red eels will help?’
‘Have you ever heard of the Grey Ones?’
‘Oh,’ Red said, ‘I remember the Grey Ones.’
‘I found an old manuscript that told of the Grey Ones’ search for the blood of the red eels.’
Red was agitated and on his feet. ‘This manuscript said red eels?’
‘No, that’s the translation into the common tongue. The scroll said they were searching for the blood of tughe tine. We came here ’cause a Pooka once called this place Tughe Tine Isle.’
Red placed both of his hands over his mouth to cover his surprise then threw his head back and began to laugh. If anyone else had done this it would have looked like they were losing it but with Red it strangely made him, for the first time, look sane.
‘I should have known.’ He stood and began to walk down the mountain.
‘Wait a minute,’ I said, grabbing him by the arm. Still laughing, he spun around like a rag doll. ‘What should you have known?’
‘I cannot believe I walked halfway up this mountain just so I could find out what you wanted with eels. Thank you for reminding me why I live alone.’ He laughed again but then became angry. ‘For the love of the gods – has The Land gotten so stupid that the Prince of Duir cannot even translate two simple words?’ He grabbed my head with both hands and pulled my face close to his. ‘Tine, my feeble-minded gold miner, does not mean red it means fire and tughe does not mean eel. Do you not have scholars in Duir? Have you never heard of the Hall of Knowledge?’
‘The Hall of Knowledge is gone.’
‘Gone? What do you mean gone?’
‘It was destroyed.’
Red grabbed me by my shirt and spun me to the left. I lost my footing and he fell on top of me still pulling my shirt with both fists. ‘What have you done?’ he said with fire in his eyes.
‘I didn’t do anything. I lost my grandfather there.’
Red let me go, stood and started back down the path. ‘I cannot help you,’ he said without turning around.
I chased after him. ‘What does it mean? What does tughe mean?’ I placed my hand on his shoulder. He stopped but didn’t face me.
‘It means… worm. Now leave my island.’ He strode down the path with his arms outstretched, brushing the gorse bushes. As he did, they closed behind him. We couldn’t have followed even if we wanted to.
The rest of the gang, mouths open, were on their feet.
‘Does anyone know what just happened?’ I asked.
Chapter Thirty-Two
The Invisible Man
It took a while before the gorse bushes let us pass. There was little talking on the way back. For the most part we concentrated on not plummeting.
Back at The Digs I volunteered to hike down to the beach and scrounge for driftwood. Tuan agreed to come with me and help persuade some fish to be our main course.
‘What do we do now?’ Tuan asked as we weaved our way through the gorse. ‘Should we start digging for smoking worms?’
‘I have no idea what to do.’
‘Oh, that’s not good. Conor, you are our ideas man.’
I made a guttural sound. It was meant to be a laugh but by the time it made it out of my mouth it was a pitiful grunt of a broken spirit. ‘Well, start thinking up your own ideas, ’cause I’m fresh out.’
Tuan wisely didn’t say anything else during our walk. I didn’t blame him, even I wasn’t happy with my own company. What the hell was I doing here? What if Red never comes back? What if this whole thing was a giant goose chase? What if Dad dies while I’m shipwrecked out here and I don’t even get a chance to say good-bye?
My mood was no better back at The Digs in front of a roaring fire. When Brendan sat down next to me he had that look on his face, like he was going to bestow a pearl of wisdom.
Before he could open his mouth I said, ‘Shut up.’
‘Well, it looks like someone forgot to put on his feathered underwear today.’
‘I got them on, Brendan, they’re just damp – like everything else in my life. Leave me alone will you.’
‘OK, maybe I’ll just have a game of checkers with my good buddy Turlow. Where is he anyway?’
It wasn’t until the food was ready that we all started asking the same question. We scouted as much of the perimeter as we dared in darkness but The Turlow was gone.
An hour of discussion over a cold dinner couldn’t solve the mystery of what had happened to the Banshee. The only constructive product of the conversation was a plan to search for him at first light.
As I stood from the table I said, ‘Maybe he’s the only one of us with enough sense to abandon this stupid quest.’ No one was disappointed when I went to bed.
Later Brendan sat on the edge of my bunk. ‘Conor, I know about things being so bleak that it seems easier to give up. I’ve been there – but now is not the time.’
‘I know and you’re right,’ I said without opening my eyes. It was exactly what I had been lying there thinking for the last hour. ‘I’m sorry for my foul mood. Do me a favour, apologise to Tuan for me.’
Brendan nodded.
I made the effort and propped myself up on my elbows. ‘I’m not giving up, Brendan. I’m just tired and scratched to hell and cold and
… and too tired to even finish this sentence. We’ve been at this for a long time. I’m going to rest tonight – tomorrow I’ll figure out how to save The Land.’ I attempted a smile. ‘I’ve done it before you know.’
I dropped my head back on my pillow with that thought on my mind. Sure I saved The Land once before but I had my dad with me then – without him I just didn’t have a clue.
‘Tomorrow,’ I said, not even knowing if Brendan was still there. ‘Things will all become clear tomorrow.’
Little did I know how prophetic that sentence would be.
That night was full of fits and starts punctuated by vivid and cryptic dreams. It seemed that the more experienced I became with dreaming the less understandable they were. I had almost given up trying to decipher any meaning in them. That night I dreamt I was in a mayonnaise jar filled with little smoking red-faced worms. I stabbed a tiny red earthworm and he slid away with the Lawnmower. In anoth
er dream the invisible man was back. During a phase of amateur psychoanalysis I had decided that the invisible man was me, but in this vision I dreamt that the invisible man was skulking around stealing stuff and I thought maybe it was Red. Red did have a creepy habit of sneaking up on us. I woke in the darkness and listened – nothing. I reached under my bed and strapped on the Sword of Duir then fell back into a fitful sleep. The last dream I had that night would have, under normal circumstances, shot me right out of bed. The invisible man pulled up a chair next to my bunk and stuck something into my shoulder. Then he reached to his collar and removed an amulet from around his neck – instantly he became visible.
When I opened my eyes I knew exactly what had been done to me? I didn’t have to wonder. Once you have had one of my Aunt Nieve’s paralysing pins stuck in your neck, you don’t forget the sensation. This pin wasn’t actually in my neck; it was in the top of my shoulder. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to turn my head when I heard Turlow’s voice.
‘How do you spell butcher?’
Just like in my dream, Turlow was sitting in a chair next to my bed with his legs crossed as he casually wrote onto an emain slate.
‘You’re the invisible man.’
He looked up from the slate. ‘I’m who?’
‘You are the invisible man – I dreamt about you.’
‘That, Conor, is not possible.’
‘No, I did. I dreamt about you but I didn’t know it was you. You were invisible. I saw you walking with Essa and talking to Cialtie, but I thought it was me. I didn’t see that it was you until you took that amulet off your neck.’
Turlow stopped writing and poked the amulet that was now hanging around the emain slate. ‘You and your uncle’s dream vision is truly remarkable. You are the only ones that have ever seen even the tiniest bit past my seithe amulet.’
Seithe, I thought, searching the language database in my head. Seithe means hide.
‘I suspect all of the dreamers in The Land will spot me now, but I had to use the amulet on the slate ’cause I don’t want a reply to come through and erase this message before Red can read it.’
‘That’s Essa’s slate I take it?’
He tilted his head in a gesture of false guilt. ‘I always take the opportunity to steal something when I am in the Alderlands. The next time you are there, you should try it. Everyone always suspects a Brownie. But I don’t imagine you will be visiting in the Alderlands any time soon – or ever.’
‘So Brendan was right, you are Cialtie’s lackey.’
He stopped his writing and looked sharply up. ‘There are no lackeys here. Cialtie rightfully wants back his Oak Throne and I want the Banshees to finally hold the position they deserve in The Land.’
‘Yeah, as Cialtie’s lackeys.’
I thought for a second that he was going to hit me, but then he laughed. ‘I find it very hard to be provoked by a person who can’t move from the neck down.’
He had a point. I would have shrugged in agreement if I could have moved my shoulders. It was amazing how calm I was about all of this. Maybe ’cause last night I had already decided that I had failed, this was just the icing on the cake.
‘How did you get one of my aunt’s paralysing pins?’
‘I have a bag full of them. Cialtie stole Nieve’s recipe book and he still has a couple of Leprechaun goldsmiths under his protection – so to speak. I’ve been aching to use one of these on you for ages – if only to shut you up. I didn’t know what I was going to do when I lost them and Essa’s slate on the bottom of the sea. It took me all night to convince Red to get them for me.’
‘How did Red get them?’
‘Your uncle is right about you – you’re not very clever. You know so little about Red he might as well be your invisible man. Now quiet, I have to finish this before he comes back.’ Turlow bent back down to the slate and asked, ‘How do you spell mortals?’
‘What did you tell Red?’
‘I just pointed out how you and that traitor Pooka over there destroyed the Tree of Knowledge, marooning all of the Pookas in their fur and then I told Red how you were planning to butcher him, so you could use his blood to bring an army of mortals over from the Real World to take over The Land.’
‘Red’s blood?’
‘Like I said, Conor – there is a lot you don’t know about our host.’
‘And did he believe you?’
‘Well, he hasn’t talked to many people in a long time and I do lie particularly well, so yes, he did. And when I show him this letter here that you wrote – then I’m fairly sure he’ll kill you. It would be better if Red kills you. That way I don’t have to lie to Essa when she asks me if I did it – in case she uses that Owith glass she has. I’ll tell you what, if she doesn’t use that pesky truth crystal, I’ll tell her that you died saving my life. Don’t say I never did you any favours.’
‘I wouldn’t want to be you when she finds out.’
‘She’ll be dead before she finds out – along with everyone else in the Hall of Knowledge. The army of the Banshees and the Brownies will see to that.’
He finished forging the message and said, ‘Time to meet Moran.’
‘Who’s Moran?’
Turlow let out an overly dramatic sigh as he stood up. ‘Red is Moran.’
Moran, where had I heard that name? Yes, I remembered, he was the Pooka that left to start the colony of mermaids – the Mertain. Queen Rhiannon had said he was maybe the smartest Pooka that ever lived and that he could change into any animal.
‘So what – does Red change into a worm?’
‘Well well,’ Turlow said as he grabbed me by the hair. ‘The Faerie can be taught.’
Aunt Nieve’s paralysing pin only meant that I couldn’t move – it didn’t mean that I couldn’t feel pain. Turlow dragged me out of bed by my hair and then bumped me like an ironing board over empty bunks. My heels hit the floor hard as I was dragged backwards at a forty-degree angle through The Digs. Just inside the front door I saw Araf, Brendan and Tuan all vertical and propped against the wall. Araf was still curled up like he was asleep. Brendan had his arm outstretched as if to stop an attacker and Tuan looked like a toy soldier who had fallen backwards against the wall while at attention. As I was dragged past, their eyes frantically dashed back and forth in their sockets, but they couldn’t speak. Turlo must have pinned them very high on their necks.
‘Red is Moran,’ I shouted over to Tuan. I saw his eyes widen just before the sunlight blinded me.
My heels slammed painfully into each of the steps that led down from the porch. It hurt like hell but I refused to let the Banshee hear me yelp. He finally propped me precariously up against a tall stump. When he let me go I slid and fell nose first into the hard ground. He didn’t even try to catch me. When he propped me up again I spat in his face.
‘Ooh,’ he said, wiping his cheek with his sleeve, ‘I was wondering when you would get a little fight in you.’
‘Wouldn’t you really like to fight me yourself – man to man? Take this pin out of my shoulder and grab a sword. Only lackeys use lackeys to do their dirty work for them.’
‘Conor, I am The Turlow, I do not need to prove my manhood to anyone. I have long ago discovered that it is not the way of winning that matters, just the winning.’
‘The ends justify the means.’
‘Yes, well put.’
‘I can see why you get along with my uncle so well. Tell me, Turlow. Where were you when I cut Cialtie’s hand off? Were you in Castle Duir?’
‘No, I was in the Reedlands.’
‘You’re welcome,’ I said with a snort.
‘For what?’
‘I saved your life.’
Turlow shook his head. ‘Cialtie told me that you would say something like that.’
‘Yeah, ’cause he knew it was true. He tried to kill you.’
Turlow wasn’t listening any more. He looked past me – I couldn’t turn my head far enough to see what he was looking at. He w
alked towards me and stuck another one of Aunt Nieve’s pins in me. This time in my neck, then he removed the one in my shoulder. I could no longer turn my head and when I tried to speak I found that I no longer could do that either. All I could do was look straight ahead as a strong gust of wind from behind whisked my hair into my face.
‘Good morning, Moran,’ Turlow said as Red appeared in my peripheral vision.
Red walked around me. All of the previous frippery in his demeanour was now gone. He eyeballed me like a general inspecting his troops.
‘What do you have to say for yourself?’ Red asked me. When I said nothing he asked, ‘Can he speak?’
‘He could speak if he chose,’ Turlow lied, ‘but he knows he is caught. I found him writing this letter to his father – the father that is supposed to be encased in glass.’ Turlow showed Red the message on the face of the emain slate.
‘I am sorry for bringing these troubles to your island,’ Turlow said, ‘but I must go. I must make the tide and I must warn my people of what I have just learned.’
‘Of course, Banshee,’ Red said, ‘and thank you for bringing them to me. I have bn away from the treachery of The Land for too long. Where is the Pooka traitor and the others?’
‘They are in The Digs – dead. They put up quite a struggle when I found them out. It is a mess in there, I wouldn’t go inside.’
‘Thank you, Banshee. It is about time I had new digs.’
Red bowed and Turlow returned it, then with the tiniest of smiles to me he turned and jogged to the beach path.
Red crouched down and covered his face with his clenched fists – then he stopped and stood up. ‘Have you nothing to say for yourself, tree killer, before I send you and your cohorts to the pyre?’
From Red’s point of view I must have looked like the coldest of criminals. I just stood and stared – inside I was screaming.
Red walked up to me. ‘Do you not even want another lesson in translation? I told you that tughe means worm but worm is an old word. Do you not want to know what worm means in the common tongue? No? Well I’ll tell you anyway – no wait, better yet, I’ll show you.’