Old Friends: The Lost Tales of Fionn Mac Cumhaill

by Tom O'Neill

  They went outside without saying anything further. As they headed down the hill, the devastation they were leaving behind in a friend’s house was a weight too heavy for them. They sat down on some boulders and stared silently into the dense, cold night.

  ‘It’s pointless thinking about it,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘Our torment is not going to make their night one bit easier.’

  ‘I can’t tell my head what to think about and what to not think about,’ said Conán. ‘Even when thoughts are making me insane, I can’t banish them.’

  ‘Well, there’s still nothing you can do, so let us go back to the other men and get some rest before starting our journey in the morning again.’

  Conán didn’t stir. ‘Did you see the biggest girl, can’t be more than eight, trying to settle the other two down but hugging the father tight at the same time, thinking maybe she could hold onto him when death comes looking for him.’

  ‘I did,’ said Mac Cumhaill, sitting back down. ‘I was trying to forget it.’

  ‘What did we do to deserve this?’ said Conán. ‘Going along about our business with no great worries and then to get stabbed in the heart like that.’

  ‘You are right, my friend. Curses on her and on fate,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘I don’t want to leave the situation like this any more than you do. Let us ride back to Tara tonight and see what Dreoilín has to say.’

  ‘There’s no point in going back. It will just use up time. And you know what Dreoilín is going to say.’

  ‘That I do,’ said Mac Cumhaill, ‘because I suppose it isn’t the first time he’s told me – there’s no interfering with the banshee.’

  ‘Well, then what?’

  ‘Well, then we have to go and interfere with the banshee.’

  Mac Cumhaill wanted to know what kind of creature exactly the banshee is. It’s a funny thing, but people wanted so little truck with her, that nobody really knew anything much about her.

  He headed to a fairy fort only a short distance from the base of Murtagh’s hill, to see if the little people in there knew anything about her. They didn’t, but one of them said to him, ‘Why don’t you suck that ould thumb of yours since you have it, rather than fluttering around asking everyone else for knowledge you have stored up inside your own self?’

  Mac Cumhaill wasn’t much in the habit of using his thumb of knowledge. He didn’t like knowledge rushing uncontrolled through his head, because he was likely to see more that he didn’t want to know than that knowledge which he did desire. But time was running out and there was no normal course open to him, so he put the thumb in his mouth.

  Conán looked at him impatiently. ‘Well? any news?’

  ‘It seems she’s half ghost’, said Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘What good is that to us?’ said Conán.

  ‘It’s the other half that’s interesting. Half sí. I’m off to the place of the Lugda clan.’

  ‘To Baile Lugdach in the very northwest? Well, you’ll find me here,’ said Conán.

  With only a few hours left for a long journey to places that no chariots could go, Mac Cumhaill would have to run there. And run as fast as the wind. This was not a mission Conán could accompany him on.

  When he got to the fort of Luan, the high king of all the fairies in these parts and beyond, in his hurry, he marched straight in through the trees and headed down into the stone entrance. Suddenly, that’s exactly how he was entering – head first. His approach was too quick for the guards to recognise him. Grass snares had caught his feet and he fell on his face and slid down another twenty paces dragging the two fairy men who were trying to hold the snares, along with him. He ended up right inside the main chamber where Luan was in the middle of a grand midnight meal.

  There was shock at first, when the large, bloodied head slid into these refined surroundings. Small spears were drawn and pointed. Then Luan started to laugh.

  ‘Now, that’s a fine way to introduce yourself, my good man, with your big wild head on you as red as if you’ve run the whole world to get here, and blood streaming out of your forehead as if you had to open the door with your nut.’

  ‘And that’s a fine way to welcome me, having your lads here string me up like fowl for your table,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  Luan nodded to the guards, who were already trying to untangle their snares. Mac Cumhaill stood up, dusted himself off, using the corner of his tunic to mop the blood from the cut on his head. He bowed and said, ‘Luan, Your Highness, excuse my bad manners.’

  Luan also bowed, smiling. ‘Fionn, old rogue, you can enter here any way you like; you are always welcome here. Accept my apologies for my guards’ overprotective behaviour.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  Mac Cumhaill and Luan were not close friends. It was hard to have complete trust in a relationship between a big person and the little people, when all that had gone before for a thousand generations had been caution. Two peoples who had tried to avoid war with each other but yet had never been fully at peace. But Mac Cumhaill and Luan had met many times and they had come to understand each other well. Mac Cumhaill was always the one sent to talk to Luan when the danger of war arose due to some renegade púca who was making trouble with the big people or when there was an errant human who was damaging the property of the little people.

  ‘As long as you bring gifts, of course,’ said Luan, laughing. ‘What gift have you brought me?’

  ‘An invisible gift, Your Holiness,’ said Mac Cumhaill, mocking.

  ‘Ah, the usual kind,’ said Luan. He turned to his people and said, ‘Give this foul human some food and drink and bathe that wound of his in frog piss.’

  ‘I can’t eat. No time. But maybe I do actually have a gift for you this time, other than the gift of my great company,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘What is that?’

  ‘The gift of entertainment.’

  ‘How is that? I’ve never known you to make an idle errand, so I know you didn’t come barging in here tonight to make small talk or to entertain me.’

  ‘Well, how right you are good sir! But maybe you’ll be entertained when you hear my business.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘I want to get the banshee to undo some bad work she has done this night.’

  ‘Ah ha ha.’ The fairy king laughed very loudly and heartily for such a small pair of lungs. ‘As you promised, entertainment. You are surely the only person, big or small, in this land or any other, who would take on such a hopeless task.’

  ‘You are probably right. A big fool is what I am, I know,’ said Mac Cumhaill, ‘but I have to do this. I have set my heart on it.’

  ‘No fool, sir,’ said Luan, serious now, ‘you are no fool. That I know. I don’t need to know why you want to try this impossible task, as I know by the very fact you have taken it on, you must have a burning reason. What do you think I can do for you?’

  ‘Well…’ said Mac Cumhaill, almost embarrassed at hoping for such a long shot, ‘I have come to believe that the banshee is part sí, and I thought maybe you might know some of her people.’

  ‘You know, Mac Cumhaill,’ said Luan, ‘she is not of our realm, as she is not of yours, and we can’t reach her any more than you can.’

  ‘That I know,’ said Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘Right enough, though,’ continued Luan, ‘I did hear it said long, long ago that there was a connection of the sort you mention. I heard when I was a child that Salach, who even then was the most ancient woman in our world, had the same mother as the banshee. But that while Salach’s father was an ordinary humble man of the little people, the banshee’s father was a ghost.’

  ‘Where is Salach, Your Highness?’ asked Mac Cumhaill. ‘Maybe she’ll know how to talk to the banshee.’

  ‘Not to my knowledge. The story was that the banshee had been whipped away from her mother and Salach at birth and nobody had contact with her since. Besides, poor old Salach talks no sense anymore. She is gone very doddery.’

  ‘Do you
mind if I talk to her anyway?’ asked Mac Cumhaill.

  ‘As long as you talk gently and do not upset her. We love her very much.’

  ‘You have my word that I will respect that request faithfully,’ said Mac Cumhaill. He knew that no matter how great the respect his own people had for their old, the little people had even more. They understood that if you listened attentively enough to what the elderly had to say, you might not have to repeat every mistake that was made before. And in the case of an elderly fairy, the wisdom would be of a thousand years rather than a hundred.

  A helper appeared. It seemed he had been standing invisibly right beside Mac Cumhaill all along.

  ‘Come along,’ he said.

  Mac Cumhaill travelled with the little man through many corridors, pink and yellow, some short, some long, all now changing size to accommodate him as he went.

  Eventually they got to a rose-coloured wooden door and the little man knocked very gently. He clearly expected no reply, as he proceeded immediately to open the door slowly. He peered inside and said, ‘A visitor for you, Mother.’

  Still no reply.

  He opened the door fully and they went in. The room was like something from a dream. Even though burrowed deep in the earth, it was filled with sunlight. The curtains were flapping gently in a breeze. The walls were sky blue. Climbing roses draped the wooden bedposts. In the middle of it the poor little old person lay all curled up, her eyes shut. She had a kind face and seemed to be blessed with good dreams, though her face had the cracks and hollows of her thousand years.

  The little man called her.

  ‘Mother Salach, there’s someone to see you.’

  She didn’t stir.

  They turned to go. Fionn Mac Cumhaill was despondent. He knew the little man wouldn’t disturb her further, as waking her might frighten her.

  Then, crystal clear, from behind them, she spoke.

  ‘Fionn Mac Cumhaill, I have heard of you. What is it you want?’

  They turned back to look at her. She was sitting up with her eyes opened wide in an unnatural way. Her lips didn’t move when she spoke.

  ‘I want you to tell your sister that Murtagh made a foolish mistake. He is soft-headed. But he respectfully begs not to have his children orphaned when they are so young.’

  The old woman laughed strangely. But no – it was another voice. A shiver ran through the whole room. Mac Cumhaill realised that the fairies weren’t the only ones minding old Salach. The other woman, her sister, was there in the room with them, though the fairy man couldn’t see her any more than Mac Cumhaill could. He was just as frightened by the coldness in her voice. She must have been taking care of her older sister all this time, without the fairies knowing anything about it.

  Mac Cumhaill got down on his knees and begged. The fairy man looked at him in horror, thinking he had gone off his head.

  The voice that still appeared to be coming from the old woman just laughed again. But Mac Cumhaill was blind now with determination. The more he thought about Murtagh, the more determined he became.

  ‘I say to you with respect, this is wrong.’

  The laughing stopped.

  ‘You are long enough around to know there is no right and wrong in who gets taken and who gets left behind.’

  ‘I normally accept that. But may I respectfully say that it seems to me this man would not have been marked by you tonight were it not for a few foolish words. That doesn’t seem like random bad luck as much as it seems like you showing your power. It seems to me that if it weren’t for your pride being injured, he would not have been chosen tonight.’

  ‘That is rude, son of Cumhall’, she said.

  ‘Grant me this request then,’ said Mac Cumhaill. ‘Take me instead of Murtagh.’

  The little fairy man grabbed Mac Cumhaill. Even though he didn’t know him at all, he tried to tug him out of the room and out of his foolishness.

  ‘She’ll take you and your friend if you’re not careful,’ he whispered.

  But Mac Cumhaill pulled away from him.

  ‘I’m a man who’s lived long and seen much. I’ve done plenty of things I regret. I’ve cut down people I had no personal quarrel with in battles. I am lucky to have escaped your attention so many times. Leave this harmless farming man with his children and take me now in his place.’

  There was silence. Clearly the banshee was thinking about this.

  Then Mac Cumhaill saw her shimmer into view above the old woman for a few instants. She had a sad face. Maybe her fear for the life of her sister had made her heart slightly softer than usual.

  She said, ‘You must love this Murtagh. You are brave, if foolish. I hope not to cry for you for many’s a long day. For your devotion to your friend, I will also grant your request. Murtagh must stay home tomorrow to avoid the falling tree that would have killed him.’

  Then she was gone. The old woman’s voice was back and she was rambling, forgetting who the strangers in her room were. She fell back to sleep and Mac Cumhaill pulled the multicoloured quilt back up to her chin, saying, ‘Rest well, Mother’.

  He and the little man quietly closed the door behind them.

  Mac Cumhaill had to leave hastily, as he needed to make it back to Murtagh before daybreak so that he could warn him. As he was fleeing, Luan was looking out the door after him laughing.

  ‘As short of manners in your departure as in your entrance,’ he called. ‘It’s lucky I know you well enough not to take offence.’

  Mac Cumhaill found Conán still sitting on the same rock, half asleep. Only Conán could do that.

  They went together back up the hill. Murtagh was given the warning. Only the little girl who was still wide awake and still holding onto her father, fully understood the news immediately and jumped up screaming ‘Buíochas le Daghda, Buíochas le Fionn, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you…’

  To be sure that his work was not squandered, Mac Cumhaill stayed with Murtagh the entire day, keeping him inside the compound at all times, but also resting and talking, with a pleasure you can only enjoy in times of enormous relief.

  As they were leaving that night, they overheard Murtagh saying to one of his neighbours, ‘See, it’s just what I said all along. Just a pisreóg. She doesn’t exist. My friend Fionn Mac Cumhaill was just trying to get a rise out of us all for the entertainment.’

  ‘Call her again then,’ the neighbour said to him. Mac Cumhaill had to hold Conán back from going in to physically silence Murtagh.

  But Murtagh hesitated. ‘Well, maybe I won’t, because…I don’t want to frighten the children again.’

  Mac Cumhaill laughed.

  Fionn and Conán headed back down the hill, again in the dark. They had to take a detour around a giant pine tree that had fallen across their path. The tree that was supposed to have been meant for Murtagh.

  ‘Daghda is Mhorrigu orainn!’ exclaimed Conán, calling on the gods, when he saw where it had fallen, square on the rocks where he and Mac Cumhaill had sat the previous night.

  Something caught Mac Cumhaill’s eye. He looked up and he thought he heard an echo of thin laughter flitting away across the treetops.

  When they got back to the river bank, the men minding the chariots had gone off beating the countryside looking for them. When they found them, they all set off again on the thankless task of making people who wanted to talk war, talk peace instead.

  The voice faded. A chilly wind cut across Dark’s shoulders. He looked around him and he was completely alone. No trace remained of the fire on the bed of pine needles and twigs. A glimmer of dawn was peeping through the tops of the trees. As he looked around, he thought he heard a soft voice whispering to him from the bushes. But it wasn’t repeated.

  He stood up from the massive base of the yew tree and made his way home in a daze.

  Back in the yard, all was peaceful. As if nothing had happened. Georgina must have finally gone to sleep. He used a broken pallet to help him climb in the window and he had about two hours
of very sound sleep before the alarm went off for him to go and feed the calves and get ready for school.

  ‘You’re looking very pale, Arty,’ Dark’s mother said in the car on the way to school. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m fine, Mam,’ said Dark. He was. Though his mind was full of what he’d seen last night.

  All day in school it was the same. He was turning things over and trying to make sense of them. He must have been looking a bit dazed because Sullivan zoned in on him again. Sullivan taught maths and geography and had them for the first three lessons every morning.

  She came over to his desk and said, ‘Well, I see our Mr McLean sent in his ghost to take his place today.’ She paused for dramatic effect, as always when she had a good putdown prepared. ‘But I see he sent the lanky ghost out with the pants still six inches too short.’

  Dark felt himself blushing. He had outgrown his uniform so many times in the past two years, he didn’t want to ask his mam again, as he knew things weren’t going so well with her and she seemed to be ignoring some of the farm bills. They stayed on the table, unopened, for months.

  That night, Dark had no hesitation. He could hardly wait for it to get dark and for his mam to come into his room to say good night. She stopped to talk a bit, about nothing in particular. She was distracted and was looking at her shoes. She was saying something about her sister going on a holiday or a honeymoon or something. Then she looked at him and got irritated because she said he wasn’t listening to her. To tell the truth, he wasn’t.

  She was hardly out of the room when he had the window open and was climbing out. He had a piece of bacon rind to keep Georgina amused while he headed across the yard.

  The fire was already blazing and the three big people were sitting around it. The Old Man came over to Dark.

  ‘Is everything OK?’ Dark ventured.

  ‘Whisht,’ said the Old Man. ‘Listen.’

  There they stood at the edge of the rath, saying nothing for a length of time Dark could not have measured, short or long. They stood while the sounds of the fire faded and the sounds of the fields grew louder. Every breath of the slight breeze became a rhythm. The blackbird was watching his back. He could even hear woodlice scurrying along the bark of the trunk at his back. He had never felt anything like it before, and for a moment he felt like he was lifting out of his body and floating.