Emerald Magic_ Great Tales of Irish Fantasy - Andrew M. Greeley [118]
Terrible anguish seized him then, and he said aloud, “Och, ochone my grief! It is a bad journey that was to me, and to be without tidings of Fionn or the Fianna has left me under pain through my lifetime.”
But he had not yet given up hope.
Back down the road he went, and turned his horse’s head toward Glenasmole, the Glen of the Thrushes, another favorite hunting ground of the Fianna, near Dublin.
The valley measured one mile across, from north to south, and three miles in length. Grassy walls sloped gently down to the stream flowing along the floor of the glen. Clumps of trees grew at random on the slopes; rowan and hawthorn, beech and wild apple, punctuated with clots of yellow-flowering gorse and rosy briars. Along the banks of the waterway, old willows let down their attenuated showers of green hair.
The soil was thin, and in patches the bare rock showed through. Granite boulders rested here and there, whose surfaces were flecked with mica and tapestried with lichen. Most of these monoliths were small enough for a child to sit on, but some were as large as a bull, and one was taller than a man.
It was there in Glenasmole that Oisin first spied some people. A group of men was struggling to move the largest rock, and on seeing this, Oisin grew puzzled. Any one of the Fianna could have picked up the block with one hand, and the strongest among them would have been able to throw it from the south side of Glenasmole and landed it on the north side. Yet here were ten men shoving and hauling and levering at the rock, and not able to shift it as much as an inch.
Beetles of dread swarmed in Oisin’s vitals, and he murmured to himself, “What has happened to the people of Ireland since I departed for Tír na Nóg?”
He rode up to the men, but was unable to recognize any of them. As he took in their appearances he noted that they were small and puny, by comparison to the Fianna. Upon noting Oisin’s approach they straightened up from their task, and when he reined in the horse they wished him good health. There was wonder on them all when they looked at him, seeing this stranger so unlike themselves, so tall, so strong, yet obviously no more than twenty winters of age.
The scion of the Chieftain of the Fianna sat erect in the saddle. Proud of bearing was he, powerful of shoulder, hard and lean as a blade of bronze. Flawlessly carved was his countenance, and from beneath dark brows lanced two flashes of brilliance from lakes of shadow. His hair was a spillage of black water infused with points of light, and the onlookers were dazed by his extreme comeliness.
“Greetings, good folk!” said Oisin. “Have you heard if Fionn mac Cumhail is still living, or any other one of the Fianna, or what has happened to them!”
“Fionn mac Cumhail?” one man echoed. “There’s no one in these parts by that name, and there never was.”
“The Fianna?” repeated another. “Back in days of yore, mothers and nursemaids used to tell tales to frighten naughty children, about a race of wicked giants called the Fianna, who wandered the countryside devouring people.”
“But nobody recounts those gests anymore,” said a third man. “It must be nigh on three hundred years ago those tales were invented, and after three centuries they’ve lost their fascination.”
It was at that instant, when it was borne in on him by their talk that Fionn was no longer living, nor any of the Fianna, that a cry of sheer desolation seared through Oisin’s spirit. It expanded through the core of his being, filled his skull, and escaped from his mouth to fly away like a wounded bird.
All this time he had thought he had been away for three years, but his father and his friends had been dead for centuries. Despair turned his veins to ice, and all of a sudden a tremendous weariness overwhelmed him. Desperately, he yearned after his lost family and friends.
The men stared in apprehension at the young rider, who was obviously waging