John Lenahan - Sons of Macha

I wasn’t quite sure what to do. Macha was being awfully rough with Ruby, but then she was my grandmother and what do I know about how to treat kids? Still, it was plain to see that Ruby didn’t like it. When I saw Ruby cock her blind stick back ready for a strike, I grabbed her wrist and got between the two of them. I never saw Ruby hit anybody with her stick but I’d bet money that she was good at it. Macha looked angrily at me.

‘Sorry Macha,’ I said trying to explain myself, ‘but she can’t see, you know.’

‘I do know,’ Macha said. ‘I have been waiting for you, little girl.’

‘Is my mother here?’ I asked.

‘No,’ Macha answered absently, never taking her eyes off Ruby.

‘Are you waiting for her?’

Macha didn’t even answer that. I walked over and looked behind the desk. There was a dagger on the floor and the skirting board had been prised away from the wall.

‘What were you doing behind the desk?’ When she didn’t answer me I said, ‘Does Deirdre know you are here?’

That seemed to get her attention. She started to answer then looked to Ruby then back to me like she was trying to make up her mind about something. ‘Oh well,’ she said reaching into a fold on the side of her dress. ‘I was hoping that I could be around for longer but it seems that now is the time.’ Out of a pocket she produced a lace fan that she snapped open like a Spanish lady at the opera. With a flick of her wrist the door to Mom’s room slammed closed in a way that looked a lot like the magic that Oracle guy used on the mountain. I started to ask her how she had done that but I only got as far as, ‘How …’ before her fan flicked in my direction and I sailed across the room and into the wall. By the time I came to my senses she was sitting on my chest painfully holding my nose. I opened my mouth to gasp for air and when I did I felt and tasted some kind of liquid hitting the back of my throat. She then pushed my mouth closed and jumped on my chest – it was swallow or drown. It tasted awful and I coughed and rolled onto my side as Macha jumped off me.

Ruby let loose one of her migraine-inducing screams. Macha was on her in an instant, covering her mouth, snatching her stick and throwing it across the room. I got up to help her but Macha shouted at me, ‘Stay where you are!’ And I did. Unlike one of my aunt’s paralysing pins it wasn’t like I couldn’t move, it was like my body just didn’t want to move.

‘What have you done to me?’ I said, desperately trying to move my legs.

‘That fluid I placed in your mouth was horse … well you are better off not knowing what part of a horse it was but now that you have ingested it, I have control of your body. Sit,’ she commanded and I dropped hard on my butt. ‘See?’

‘What do you want?’

Ruby squirmed and then Macha pulled her hand away in pain. Ruby had obviously bitten her. As she started to scream again Macha gave her a hard slap. Shock and then tears came to the poor kid’s face. She went instantly from the woman-child that bosses me around to an all-too-fragile twelve-year old.

‘What I want,’ Macha said, looking at her bitten hand, ‘is this child to be silent.’ She reached into her pocket and produced a handkerchief. ‘Come over here, Conor, and gag her.’

I almost laughed. There was no way I was going to do that but even as the smirk hit my face my body stood up, took the handkerchief from my puppet-master grandmother and pulled it across the child’s mouth.

Macha said, ‘Make sure it’s tight,’ and, despite every cell in my brain telling me to stop, I pulled it tighter before I tied it in the back. A muffled cry of pain came from Ruby and the only thing I could do was say ‘Sorry.’

Macha went back down onto the floor and recommenced ripping up the skirting boards. I looked to the door and felt that with Macha’s attention elsewhere I could pick up Ruby and make a break for the door, but when I tried Macha said, ‘Don’t even think about leaving.’

‘What are you doing?’ I tried to ask and was surprised to find I could.

Macha didn’t stand up but from the floor said, ‘Do you know whose room this is?’

‘Yes, it’s my mother’s.’

‘Do you know whose room this was before your mother?’

‘No.’

There was another sound of splintering and wrenching of wood. I heard Macha exclaim, ‘Ah ha,’ followed by the sound of scraping. Macha then reappeared from behind the desk in a plume of dust and loudly dropped on it – a leather-bound manuscript. ‘This room was once Ona’s lair.’

Holy cow, I said to myself. A manuscript chock full of Ona’s predictions. As if her prophecies hadn’t caused enough problems – here were a stack more.

‘Where are they keeping Lord Lugh?’

I didn’t want to answer her but found myself saying, ‘The guest chambers, one floor down.’

‘Come. Bring the girl and make sure you are not seen.’

My possession was the strangest thing. I was still able to do ordinary things as long as they didn’t seem to contradict the will of Macha. Before we left the room I picked up Ruby’s sunglasses and put them on her face. I pushed her hair back and told her everything would be OK just before I gruffly dragged her by the arm. I stuck my head through a crack in the door and saw a guard on his usual patrol. I tried to shout to him but instead I unwillingly ducked back inside the room and waited for him to pass. When he had gone I led us past my room and down the servants’ staircase.

The floor had been cleared of all guests except Lugh. There were two guards posted outside the door and another two walking a patrol. Macha waited for one of the patrol guards to come past and blew him hard into the wall with her fan. I was surprised his head didn’t crack open.

Macha pointed to the unconscious guard and said, ‘Take his sword and kill the other one.’

‘No,’ I said. I was proud of myself when that came out. All the way down the steps I had been incanting a Fili meditation chant and was beginning to think I was getting control again.

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