Great Fury

Thomas Kennedy

Description

Oengus, the stolen son of the Celtic Gods, has come of age. He must serve his apprenticeship and as a first step, he is made the God of Inconsequential Things. He must go to New York to recover a sword called 'The Great Fury'. Oengus finds his task is shrouded in complexity. Morag the Witch is plotting to contaminate the Manhattan Water System. Oengus is supported by the apprentice witch Maedbh and they are targeted by Morag and her crew of the Greyman with the embrace of death, Dearg Due the Vampire and Leanan Sidhe the seductress.Will Oengus recover the lost sword and save New York from a plague of rats?

Sujets

• Fantasy (canción de Mariah Carey)
• Fantasy

Informations

• Publié par: Andrews UK
• Date de parution: 28 juillet 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785382505
• Langue: English

Extrait

Title Page
The Great Fury
by
Thomas Kennedy



Publisher Information
Published in 2015 by
Andrews UK Limited
www.andrewsuk.com
The right of Thomas Kennedy to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998
Copyright © 2015 Thomas Kennedy
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
This is a work of fiction and any resemblance to those living or dead or otherwise is pure coincidence.



Chapter One
“An Leanbh goidte,” Kitty whispered to her sister Maureen.
She indicated to where Oengus, a young sixteen year old in jeans and sweater, stood below them whistling at the mountain.
Both in their early eighties, they were coming carefully down the boreen from the bog, leading their donkey laden with turf that had dried out in the good weather.
Oengus was standing off the boreen on a large granite boulder directing his sheepdog to work stray sheep by means of a series of whistles. It was concentrated work and he did not notice the two women until they were almost upon him.
“Lá Brea leat,” they both said, almost in unison, addressing Oengus with the Gaelic for ‘good day to you’. They did not use his name nor did they use the words they had whispered earlier, ‘an Leanbh goidte’ the stolen child.
“Lá brea libh,” Oengus replied, wishing them good day also.
The Irish language was still native to this area. The locals spoke in the soft fast Kerry dialect. And when, as they often did, they spoke English to strangers or in the town the underlying syntax of the Gaelic would come through in a quick paced melodic accented speech.
He might have attempted conversation but they would not meet his eye.
He smiled at them but they fussed with the donkey in passing so as to hide their determination not to look him in the eye. Not into those open emerald green eyes for they believed it would bring the bad luck. Sure hadn’t Oengus’s father had to turn to sheep farming when his cattle had all gone sour and died.
Oengus watched them go on their way. And they scurried on down the boreen towards their cottage in the lee of the mountain. They were thin wiry women dressed in black with tweed shawls off their shoulders.
Kitty and Maureen were famous locally and his near neighbors. He knew of them and had heard that they once had been lively at the dances at the crossroads. But that was so long ago it was almost legend. And in an area where most of the young emigrated they had stayed and never married. They eked out a living on the smallholding that had been left to them by their father now long deceased.
It was one of those rare days on Mount Eagle Mountain. The sky was blue and the wind was mild and there hadn’t been a hint of rain all week. Oengus could see the sheep in bunches up on the mountain and he resumed his task, whistling directions to Gaire, the sheep dog.
Gaire took off, wheeling the sheep and turning them down towards the hollow and the corral where his father and their neighbor O’Shea were dousing sheep.
He needed to change position and Oengus decided to get down off the boulder. He turned and stood with his back to the mountain and paused to admire the view.
Below him and stretching to the horizon, the sea was deep blue and out far from the peninsula he could see the Great Blasket Island where it stood like a grass green and granite grey jewel in the sea, on the west most edge of Europe, where the next stop across the broad Atlantic was America.
Oengus and Gaire, doing what they were doing on the mountain they were on, could have been in any century of the past millennium but down below like matchboxes in the distance, the tour coaches and cars of the twenty-first century made their way in traffic along the road that circled the Dingle Peninsula.
Cutting into the mountain tracks Oengus continued to direct the sheep dog and moved towards the location where his father was.
The mountainside had remnants of past settlements in dry stone walls beginning and ending at random, reminders of the pre famine days of the nineteenth century when small green fields were enclosed and fertilized with seaweed brought at great effort up from the beaches and cliffs so that potatoes could be grown.
Also scattered about but not plentiful, were standing stones and remnants of stone circles that dated back to before the Bronze Age. He was careful to avoid these, as they were associated with local beliefs about fairy folk and bad luck.
At five in the evening Oengus’s dad Patrick sent him back down the mountain. Patrick together with Tom O’Shea their immediate neighbor could handle the gathered sheep and finish the dousing. In this part of the world it was normal for neighbors to help one another with peak chores on the farms, from harvests to sheep dipping. These small communities of farmers had made their living this way over centuries.
“Stay!” Oengus said and Gaire stayed where he might be needed with Patrick and Tom.
Gaire watched Oengus depart.
Named Gaire for the Gaelic for ‘laugh’, Gaire was a small black and white sheep dog with a bright intelligent expression and litheness of movement. His willing nature and open mouth and red tongue made it seem as if he was always smiling. Although Patrick had trained him it was accepted that he worked best with Oengus.
Gaire whimpered when Oengus went out of sight but Patrick soon had him working the sheep. Gaire was a working dog that had to earn his keep.
Oengus paused on a ridge as he neared the dwellings. He admired with a farmer’s eye, three of the O’Shea fields above their house. The house was set into a bank and was just two fields away from Oengus’s home.
The O’Shea’s had brought in a contractor with big earth digger called a JCB and had had the fields deep ploughed using the power of the digger. He could see the caterpillar tracks and the breaks in the dry stonewalls where the digger had made its way into the fields. It had broken the crust of a century and the field had been cleared of shrub and heather and replanted with grass. The fields had been transformed and now were squares of emerald green grass just crying out for cattle to graze their luxurious growth. Oengus knew his dad would do the same if the O’Shea plan worked out but considered it early days yet.
As he stood a group of tourists came across the track. He wished them “Lá Brea,” and they said ‘good morning’ in a variety of languages and he recognized German and French.
They looked curiously at him seeing him as one of the local flora and fauna. One of the backpackers was an attractive teenage girl and Oengus wondered what she was like and what world she had come from.
Oengus carried on, thinking of the girl and the way she had stripped to a thin cotton top with all her weather gear draped over her backpack. He had seen the local weather in all its guises but today was exceptional. Today the weather was dressed in serenity and the view of the land and sea was wonderful in the warm scented air.
His mother had asked that he be sent down early. His uncle John was due in from America, coming over from Shannon airport. He was expected to arrive for tea and Oengus was wanted to be there. He wondered why. His parents or the neighbors never ever spoke of Uncle John. But nonetheless a letter had arrived that said he was coming and wanted to see Oengus.
Oengus approached the house from the rear lane. An older former dwelling, now used mainly for storage and as an outhouse, blocked his view of the house as he approached.
The family residence had been built some seventy years ago and adapted to incorporate electricity and indoor toilets.
The rear lane was covered in rounded stones exposed over centuries and was lined with briars and wild flowers on both sides. A stumpy wind shaped line of trees held the windward side of the older house and seemed ill at ease in the landscape.
He scattered chickens where they squawked and scratched in the cobblestone yard at the rear of the family residence. Oengus knew the hens well as it was one of his jobs to fetch in the new laid eggs before the fox got them.
He saw the car in the driveway as he came round to the front. It was a red fiat car with a Limerick registration, easily recognizable with its L for Limerick incorporated into the registration number. Oengus paused when he saw the car and surmised that it was probably a hire car out of Shannon airport. This meant that his Uncle John had arrived.
He did not hurry. He was not particularly keen to meet his long lost uncle, not remembering ever having met him before or hearing his name mentioned.
It was only when a registered letter had arrived a month ago had his uncle John became a subject of conversation. Then it was just to wonder what he wanted and how long would he stay. Oengus had moved down to the back parlour so that his room could be prepared for Uncle John.
And they’d had the front of the house newly whitewashed for the occasion. It looked fresh despite the signs of green moss around some of the iron windowpanes.
Oengus let himself in the narrow front porch that faced down the boreen to the main road. The door was unlocked and as he came in he could hear voices from the kitchen.
First he checked out the front parlour. The parlour was decorated in a chintzy style and usually the