Hawkmoon (The Hawkmoon Chronicles) Read online

  Table of Contents.

  The Hungry Grass.

  The Rebel.

  Assassins.

  Black Moll.

  Witch’s Keep.

  Leavetaking.

  McGinty Tells a Story.

  The Goblin.

  Kerris and Enoch.

  Paddy McGinty’s Goat.

  Highway Robbery.

  The Awakening.

  Fever.

  The Travelling People.

  Death in the Forest.

  A Scoundrel Surely.

  On the Road.

  Rite of Passage.

  Mistress of Spies.

  Revenants.

  The House on Willow Lane.

  On the Road Again.

  The Royal City.

  The Palace.

  Death of a Courtesan.

  At the Home of Elmund Dwarfdale.

  Aerial Adventures.

  The Queen in Waiting.

  Silverlode.

  Overland.

  Kidnapped.

  Wild Country.

  Soulbiter

  Downriver.

  Rapids.

  In the Dead of Winter.

  The Bridge.

  The Wee Men.

  The Plain of Tarsis.

  The Old Biddy.

  The Conclave.

  The Watcher.

  The Void.

  The Hanging Tree.

  The Battle of Logan’s Cut.

  In the Halls of the Elven King.

  Desolation.

  The Scout.

  The Burden of Friendship.

  Strongbow.

  A Fleeting Goodbye.

  The Company Goes Forth.

  Meeting in the Wild.

  Appendices.

  Origin of the Wampyrhii.

  A Study of the Science and Artefacts of the Ancients. Foreword to Supplement. (Translation from the Elvish).

  Correspondence.

  The Hawkmoon Chronicles. Book 2. The Terror That Flies By Night.

  Chapter 1. Raiders

  Chapter 2. What Dreams May Come.

  Chapter 3. The Desert Born.

  Chapter 4. Norma.

  West Cork.Ireland. 1847.

  The Hungry Grass.

  She would not die before her child. When the hour was at hand she would take her to the grotto wrapped in Christening robes. She would dig the grave with her bare hands, wide enough for them to lie together. When the child had passed she would pray for her soul. Her father died in the night. Her husband passed at sunrise.He left the world as his daughter had entered it. Lying on a bed of rushes, fingers laced with rosary beads, Nana fought for life. No priest would come to her. The good ones were dead; the others cursed her for a witchy woman…

  Seated by the door, Sarah watched as darkness covered the valley. Stumbling with Famine Fever people passed on the road below. They had been going by all morning, emaciated creatures in tatters leaving their cabins to die by the wayside. In the years that followed it was said that in their last moments the ground where they fell took their anguish as their souls rose to Heaven . People would say that anyone walking over that place would feel a biting hunger. Reaching home they would devour whatever was put before them. Watching, someone might remark “surely you walked by the Hungry Grass.”

  It began with a blemish, no more than a brown spot on the leaves. By the next dawn the crop was dead. They dug the drills to find only corruption. Women cried and held their children. Men looked at it and saw the end of hope. The man from the Big House came for his rent until the stench of death drove him away. Thousands died of typhus; their bodies taken out and stacked in piles. The poorhouses had windows on the second floor overlooking a sloping roof down which the bodies could slide.

  Nana woke, shouting. “Sarah… Sarah… I can’t see you,” Gathering her baby from the mud of the floor Sarah went to her.. The old one was staring sightless at a point in the thatch. “Here I am Nana, Here I am.”Sarah knelt by Nana’s side touching her face. “They are here,. Go to Poulnafulla. … Do what she asks of you .The child can live”

  Sarah reached for her but Nana was delirious..

  Lightning flashed by the door, blinding her. The baby was crying, the sound lost in thunder. The thatch started to burn. Wrapping the child in her shawl she ran from the cabin. Crossing the fields on bare feet, hailstones stung the back of her neck. Something struck her on the cheek, drawing blood. A form stood in the half light, barring her way. She lashed out with a foot. It squealed and fell back... She staggered falling to her knees.

  The mouth of the cave loomed out of the murk; Poulnafulla; the Cave of Blood. Streams of water raced down either side and over the entrance. She stumbled as she approached the entrance, not caring to avoid the Rath. The Shee would be angry but what could they do that the Will of God had not already done?

  Inside the light was dim, the storm muted.. She felt a draught of warm air and the scent of burning turf A light beckoned. Two women sat by a fire, fish roasting on a skillet. . She ran at the fire, seized the food and stuffed it in her mouth … One of them came to her with a bowl of warm milk. Sarah took it and sucked a mouthful. Pursing her lips she passed it to the child’s mouth. …

  “Sit by the fire”

  Sarah came near the warmth. One looked down, tending the fire. The other sat, gazing at her. Tall, fine boned, aristocratic women, they wore long dresses made of a rich material. It might have been velvet. She had seen velvet once, the day of her fifteenth birthday when they went to buy shoes for her wedding. She liked the feel of it until the huckster said to get out.

  “Who are you?”

  “You know who we are”

  “Are you one of the Shee?”

  “We are known to them”

  “Why are you here?”

  “Sarah,You know the answer to that .”

  “Tell me…. Say the words”

  “We have come for the child. You have given her life; you cannot preserve it”

  “I can’t give you my baby. No mother could”

  “Then she will die.”

  “Is she to be a servant? “

  “She will be a queen and no man’s servant. . .”

  “Can I go with her?”

  “That is not possible, Sarah. You must return to the world. Make a life”

  “My life is over when she goes. She is my heart, how can I live without my heart? Why me?”

  “Your people worshipped on the mountain before Patrick came and long after. They lit the Baal fires and sacrificed their enemies near where you are sitting. You have served us before. You must serve us again”

  “My people serve the Redeemer. Nana is steeped in the old ways but she is a woman of the Spirit.”

  “The Spirit has more than one voice”

  Silence took hold. The wind howled outside. Sarah sat by the fire. She would run from here with the child. The stranger sat watching, knowing her thoughts. If the woman had a conniving way about her, if there was greed or malice in her eyes it would have been easy. She would have cursed them. She would have run from the place to do what she had decided. All she saw in the other was compassion. It frightened her.

  “It is time” The lady said finally.

  Sarah started to weep.

  “I cannot force you. This must be your choice.… We will stand here and wait” Time passed in the cave. All that could be heard was the sound of rushing water. Another sound reached her. The women were leaving.

  It took all her love to stand, to make the first steps She was sobbing as she gave them her child , head bowed as if in offering. The stranger took the baby and passed to the inner gallery. Sarah’s legs buckled under her .There was a tearing in her heart an
d the sight left her. The sun came out as she returned to the cabin.. The fire on the thatch had died under the rain... Nana was p , sitting on a three legged stool... Opening her arms to her granddaughter Sarah, knelt trembling.

  She went back the next day. There was food, some of which she ate. When Nana was stronger they went together. It was then she found the gold, in a bag by the ashes. She was on the point of throwing it away when Nana caught her arm. “This is not blood money. It is a chance for life.. Keep it.”

  The Great Hunger ended in 1849, the year Nana died. By that time a million were dead and a million gone to make lives in Britain, Australia and the Americas. Thousands perished in Coffin Ships within sight of their new lives... Sarah married again; Thomas Howlin a blacksmith from Ballycotton. They sailed from the Cobh of Cork, to a town in New York State where they bought a hotel. Thomas was a quiet man, a good worker, slow to take offence and patient with the black moods that would seize his wife. When the Civil War began Thomas joined the Army of the Union in whose service he died of a wound received at the first battle of Bull Run. After the war Sarah married a German who came to stay at the hotel. They sold up and moved out West.

  The Rebel.

  West Cork, Ireland. 1921.

  He sat on a stile, overlooking the Black Valley on a bright morning in Spring . The sun was warm, the hills a riot of Heather. To the north, lay County Limerick, to his left the Atlantic, to the east Tipperary, where the first shots had been fired in the War of Independence. He wanted to rest but sleeping on wet ground had killed more men than the Royal Irish Constabulary. Ryan was a fighter in one of the Flying Columns, so named for their ability to strike and disappear before the echo faded…

  Of all the peoples of Europe north of the Alps the Irish are the oldest of the settled tribes. The Book of Invasions records the arrival of Ir, Heremon and Heber who came from Spain with iron swords to wrest the land from the People of the Goddess .The Tuatha De Danann were a strange tribe, part mortal, part spirit, wise in the ways of Magic . Rather than succumb to the iron wielders they cast the spells that took them to the world beyond. In time they were known to those who live in the world of men as the Shee. Before the people, water spirits lived in the rivers and wetlands. In the forests the Firbolg hunted while Fomorians, melancholy giants, lived by the sea.

  The Vikings came, steering their longboats on any river leading from the ocean. Barbary pirates sailed from Africa to take slaves from the coastal settlements. The English were the latest. If he and his kind had their way they would be the last. He dreamed of a free Ireland. Until that day sacrifices would have to be made; men like him would make them...

  The attack went well until the armoured car came up. It must have been coming on behind waiting for the sounds of contact. In minutes six had gone down under fire from the Vickers. Brannigan swore on the lives of his children that he would execute anyone known or suspected of spying for the English. He sent Jack across the road with grenades. When they broke contact Ryan was to keep the enemy pinned down. In the normal course the Tans stayed with their vehicles but this lot wanted to fight.

  Raised by Winston Churchill the Black and Tans were a remnant of the army that survived the Great War. They came to Ireland in a motley of green jackets, tan trousers, black belts and mixed headgear. The people of Limerick called them after a pack of hunting dogs known for their vicious nature. Luckless, bitter men crazed by years of slaughter, they spread a reign of terror across the country. The suffering they provoked served only to fill the ranks of those who hated them.

  The Brigade started to pull back, one man covering the other as they made their way to high ground. Ryan launched a Mills Bomb at a group near the Whippet..Someone pointed , the turret on the armoured car revolved, guns firing as it came to bear. Ryan buried himself in the heather as phosphor tipped rounds screamed overhead. The heather started to burn. Abruptly the firing switched back to the other side Crawling through wet ground he parted the scrub to see a squad forming on the road.. He armed the last bomb and threw it. It exploded short but three fell wounded. On the wrong side of the pass he could not risk exposure to sniping fire. There was nothing for it but a long retreat over the hills. He would lie up at the Fullertons’. The family were in London for Mary’s first season. He wondered if Anna had gone with them...

  A crunch of gravel brought him out of his reverie; his hand stretching for the rifle only to remember he had hidden it in Ballagh Woods with a smashed bolt . Paudy O Callaghan was seventeen, and growing like a weed. Born in the mountains he knew every tree, rock, hill and hollow, every shortcut, woodland cave and boreen. His sport was to take fish, deer or rabbits from under the noses of any gamekeeper. He knew everything the English were up to including the business of His Majesty’s Customs and Excise . Those who made Poteen in the glens would ask if he fancied a taste. Paudy would refuse saying he had a sweet tooth, which he did but mostly because his mother hated drink as much as she hated the English. She had sworn to kill whoever got her son drunk. The I.R.A. feared no man but they walked wide of Mamie O Callaghan.

  “How’s the man?” Jack enquired.” Grand Jack, and yourself?” Paudy replied in a lilting Cork accent.

  “Grand entirely. Have you a message for me?”

  “ Brannigan says to meet him at Murphys’ in Macroom on Friday night. He’ll have a bolt for the rifle.And Mills bombs.”

  “Is there something up?”

  “I can’t say Jack, Brannigan will tell you himself” That was Paudy. The right message, no gossip, no speculation. It was getting hard to come up with reasons why he could not fight with them. The fact was he was too valuable at what he did. It would only be a matter of time until he became known to the Tans. Before an informer passed word to the Constabulary. He was always on the mountains, up to no good.… The English understood how the Brigades depended on their runners and hunted them without mercy. If he was taken it would be Cork Prison; a place where men died under torture.

  Crossing to a bank of turf Paudy rolled the bicycle on to the track . It had a wicker basket tied on the carrier. “What did you catch? “Ryan asked.. Paudy had Rainbow trout. “I’ll take two.” Stripping a twig Paudy hooked on the fish. Jack gave him a shilling. “No, Jack. It’s alright. Honestly”

  “Take it Paudy. Buy sweets … A present for Moira… “He said with a grin. Paudy looked away, blushing. Moira Cassidy was the leading beauty in the town with a retinue of courtiers to feed her vanity. A year older than Paudy, she had her sights set on a rich farmer. Her father was the town publican. He was known to the I.R.A. as a spy for the English.

  He watched as the boy careened down the mountain. Only Heaven knew what state the fish would be in by the time he reached home. Once, in another life he read a story by Maupassant about the woman who lost her son to the Prussians and her revenge . If the Tans hurt her boy God Himself would not save them from Mamie O Callaghan.

  He waited in cover, eyes searching below. The farm nestled in the depths of a glen surrounded on three sides by rising ground. Brushes and hayforks at the door of the barn, milk churns outside the dairy, a pair of muddy boots at the kitchen door;Nana would take the skin off anyone tracking mud into her kitchen…. About to put the glasses away he watched the barn. Something blocking the light….

  The kitchen door opened and Brede, stepped out with a basket. A man’s laugh came from inside. She sauntered across the yard , hair glinting in the morning light. A soldier stepped outside, lighting a cigarette. As Brede passed his eyes followed the sway of her hips. He followed. Laughter came from the storehouse. Two soldiers came with rounds of cheese and fletches of bacon. The one following Brede stopped to relight his cigarette. A sergeant came from the kitchen. As Brede returned she passed the idlers. The one who had been watching her must have passed a remark because without breaking stride she swung her arm and backhanded him across the face, hard enough to knock his cap off. The others laughed. The sound of a rifle bolt put a stop to the merriment.

  Brede stood befo
re them, head lifted in defiance. Except for Jack and his sister the Ryans were small , dark eyed and swarthy . People like that were descendants of sailors wrecked on the coast as the Spanish Armada sailed around Ireland to avoid a second meeting with Francis Drake. … Brede was tall with red hair and flashing green eyes Acccording to Nana Brede was a changeling but for once the people had the better of the bargain. Changelings could be known by their thin Elvish faces and disagreeable nature. Many the bonny child had they taken for a sickly wailer...

  Time passed as the Tan pointed the weapon. Without warning a blackthorn stick crashed on the barrel of the rifle. It discharged, the round screaming from the cobblestones.Unnoticed Nana had come out.. She laid about the soldier, raining blows on his head and shoulders. If the others thought their mate being hit by a girl was funny, the sight of him beaten by an old woman was a cause of uproar.

  “Murderin’ English bastards. Get out of my yard or I’ll kill the lot of ye… Get out”

  Captain Stewart stepped out of the kitchen. He marched across ,uniform pristine, Sam Browne belt and boots polished to a shine. The day war was declared Stewart left Magdalen College to join the Coldstream Guards. Unlike many of his generation he survived to return to England. When the chance of a posting came he took it. He expected a quick mission but what he got was a grimy little war. Ryan drank with Stewart on the occasion he went to Cassidy’s. They talked about books and Literature. As the evening drew late people wondered at the sight of an I.R.A. man and a British officer reciting poetry.

  Despite official policy encouraging brutality Stewart forbade torture. The I.R.A. had let it be known that he would be given safe passage if he left Ireland. To date he seemed reluctant to avail of the magnanimity. He drank in Cassidy’s every evening. There was talk about him and Moira who took a lot more time with him than she should…

  “Sergeant. “The sergeant snapped to attention. “Sir.”

  “Put that man on a charge and return those items. We’re leaving “The sound of an engine came from the barn. A Rolls Royce drove out, machine guns revolving in the turret. Holding Nana by the arm Brede took her back to the house. The patrol left the yard. Ryan waited an hour . It would be typical of Stewart to leave a man with a rifle. Staying in cover he moved down to the back of the chicken house. Timber slats had been loosened on the back partition. Easing the timbers he slipped inside to the musty halflight . Behind a barrel of grain his hand fell on a canvas sack with porridge, a half round of cheese, boiled eggs, tea, sugar, and a loaf of fresh baked bread. Brede had carried it over underneath their noses.