When the herons gathered in the old oak tree later that evening and he told his story about how he almost caught the biggest salmon in the river, and then he found a dozen perch just floating on the surface, the other birds laughed at him.
When the salmon felt that she could wait no more, she made a rush for the stream that brought the poison into the river. She pushed herself forward, keeping her gills closed for long seconds. When she did open her gills, the water burned them, but she got some precious oxygen from the water. Then the strength of the poison seemed to quickly reduce, less and less of it, until soon there was just a vague memory.
So she swam on, under mulberry trees and crab apple groves. Past shocked trout and lurking eels and dying baby fish. Beside a flowery bank of daisies and buttercups and daffodils, the salmon heard the laughter and chatter of people, as they enjoyed an autumn picnic of ham sandwiches, tea from a flask (with that special, mysterious taste), apples from the orchard up the road and Tayto crisps, all laid out on a red, checked blanket. She rested a while, let her gills clear and listened to the unseen picnickers. As she swam on, she decided that, once they weren’t trying to kill you, humans were alright.
In difficult, shallow water now and suddenly the channel widened. Not bright stones or silt or dirt below or at the edges of the water now, but a hard, smooth surface. Like the supports of the Great Sky Wall back home.
She was in a concrete drainage channel, taking waste directly into the river system. She didn’t like the alien material, so she flipped back into the stream and found a pool where she could take it all in.
Then human voices.
‘We’re done here for the day.’
‘Aye. Let’s go and get a ham sandwich and a cup of tea. I’m starving from all this work.’
‘We’ve done well. The testing is finished and we can get into full production in the morning. Run the dirt through the cleaning process, add the cyanide, collect the gold.’
‘How long have we got then?’
‘Until the cyanide kills everything in the river and we’ve to run? About three days, I’d say.’
‘Then we better find some gold pronto.’
‘It’s there. I’m convinced of it. And don’t forget your face mask tomorrow or you’ll be poisoned as well. Now come on. Let’s go tell the Boss we’re ready to go.’
Then she heard the roaring sound of a machine, which faded until all was quiet. She breached the surface and glanced at the big trees and the blue sky and the little fluffy clouds. Then she spied a low, grey building, more of a shack really, with barrels and pipes and other junk. And big mounds of black dirt beyond. Dirt with not a trace of gold in it.
The salmon didn’t understand all that the men said, but she understood the gist of it. She knew that time was running out for the river and the millions of creatures that called it home. And the Boss? She didn’t understand the idea of a boss - she’d been left to survive for herself since that cold March day when she hatched from the egg laid the autumn before.
Then the taste of the water. Her sun years in the river, growing up, the fun, the hunting, followed by the sun years at sea. And now she was back, to lay her eggs in the same River in which she herself was born, and thus fulfill her destiny. Then she would retire to the Atlantic Ocean and a further strange destiny that she could only dream about.
She sensed the sunlight then, as it dimmed with the start of sun going away. Autumn was in the air, then the desperate urge to lay her thousands of eggs. So time was the problem.
So she left that small river and returned to the Mother and, fighting the vague urge to turn right, upstream, and lay her eggs, went downstream to where the odd human lived under the water, with her long hair and her traps and her shiny things.
CHAPTER 19. A PLAN, AT LAST
The witches had been at the All-Seeing Eye’s secret mountain-top lair for a night and a day. The banshee’s hair had shared its secrets. The witches now knew that cyanide poison was in the river.
‘This means war,’ said Granny Smith.
‘Think of all the poor craters,’ said Granny Annie.
The hair also told them that the banshee was not evil.
‘Thank God for that. Poor Emily will be safe with her.’
‘But we still have to get her back.’
So they made a fresh pot of tea, baked some scones and did some knitting. Then they made a plan, sitting around a big table on top of the All-Seeing Eye’s house, in the centre of her viewing platform. The All-Seeing Eye stayed at her instruments, keeping a close watch on the river, fine-tuning her cyanide detector.
Using one of their host’s eyeliner pencils, Granny Annie drew out a map on the back of a torn-off piece of wallpaper, part of a batch that the All-Seeing Eye hadn’t got around to hanging. She put in the river, snaking down from Lough Derg at O’Brien’s Bridge, where part of it was siphoned off for generating electricity at Ardnacrusha, and all the way down to Limerick, where it mixed with the sea at King John’s Castle. And there, in the centre, Castleconnell. She licked the tip of the pencil and drew in the footbridge, where Emily had disappeared and where they believed the banshee had her lair. Then there was the village, with the old castle, the houses and the shops. Upstream a bit and the old diving boards, where the people from miles around used to go swimming, what seemed like a hundred years before.
‘Sarah, Irene, Eileen and Patricia. Ye’re to stick to the footbridge area like glue until ye find the banshee’s lair. Ye need to find Emily and find her fast.’
‘What about Edna?’ asked Sarah, stroking her hair with her long red fingernails.
‘My guess is that Edna is with Emily.’
They all agreed with this. Edna had a habit of being in the thick of the action.
‘Gemma, Jackie and Tara. Ye fly upriver with me. We’ll find that poison and we’ll find it fast.’
‘Lola and Rachel. I want ye fly between here, the banshee search zone and the poison search zone. Make sure that we all know what the others are doing and keep an eye out for anything random, down the village, downstream, anywhere we’re not focused on.’
‘Random?’ asked Lola.
‘Aye. All this mullarky is so... so odd, I think we have to expect more mad things to happen.’
‘And what about me?’ asked Granny Smith.
‘I need you to stay here with the All-Seeing Eye. Help her with anything she needs spell-wise. And tea and sandwiches and that.’
‘Thank God for that,’ said Granny Smith. ‘I’m nearly finished this scarf I’m knitting for poor Emily.’
Granny Annie glanced at the sun as it sank towards a fiery western horizon and said ‘It’ll be dark soon, but we’ll have a full moon to guide us. Let’s get moving.’
And so they did.
Not too far away from the witches, Malcolm found himself walking along a wide and rocky road.
‘What am I doing in the middle of nowhere?’ he asked the broomstick.
The broomstick didn’t answer.
Malcolm saw that it would be dark soon. His tummy rumbled. He couldn’t figure out why the broomstick had left him there. It had dropped like a rock, just easing up at the last second for a gentle landing. From the golden clouds, Malcolm had seen the River Shannon ahead, even the village, so he knew that he was near Emily, near the mystery. But where?
So he walked on, towards the sunset, west. The road was like something that was only half-finished, all rocks and dirt and puddles. High rocks towered over the road on both sides, making Malcolm feel tiny and vulnerable. Her kept an eye on the big rocks that rested along the top of the ravine, worried that if somebody gave one a push, he was mincemeat. Literally.
A rumbling up ahead, and a cloud of dust. Malcolm decided not to take any chances and darted behind a huge boulder by the side of the dirt track. A car came by, slowly, its engine squealing, its tyres throwing up stones. Malcolm managed to get a peek and saw two men in the car. He didn’t know why, but he didn’t like the look of them. Not one bit
.
Once the sound of the car had faded completely, Malcolm felt that it was safe enough to leave his hiding place. His heart was pounding so he could hear it in his ears, and his mouth was bone dry. He walked on, looking around behind him every few steps. After a little while, the hills on either side of the track flattened out and dense trees took their place. Malcolm felt safer in the shadows.
He heard the river then, the rushing sound of the water. The track opened up into a clearing, a rusty shack and some big, funny-looking tools, surrounded by a fence. He went to the gate and saw a rusty padlock.
‘I have to get in there,’ he said.
His mind raced. He had never picked a lock before. What could he use? He grabbed the lock and it swung open. A lucky break! Never assume anything, Malcolm, no matter how it looks. He opened the gate and made sure to close it behind him and put the lock back in place. He went to the shack and through the open door. There was a huge machine there, a kind of a steel table with a funnel at the end. At one end, a big steel pipe sent water gushing across the table and off the other end, where it dropped into what looked like a big cement mixer. Then there was a ramp for spilling the waste onto a concrete platform and away. Malcolm noticed that there were pipes coming from the back of the shack, along the roof and over the table. He followed the pipes back, to an open end of the building. Just outside were huge piles of stony dirt and a little digger with a bucket on the front. But inside, something terrifying. At least a dozen big barrels, each with a skull and crossbones printed in black on yellow. His blood froze when he read the word CYANIDE.
Suddenly there was the screeching of tyres outside, and the crunch of gravel, and the growling of engines. The car Malcolm had seen earlier, and also a flat-back jeep that had a long tubular object mounted on its rear, covered by a tarpaulin. Malcolm moved quickly, down behind the drums of poison, just as footsteps crunched on the gravelly ground and entered the shack. He was afraid that they would hear his heart, it was going so fast.
‘Right,’ said one of the men. ‘Get the juice pumping and crank up the digger and let’s get this show on the road.’
‘Okay Boss,’ said another voice.’
‘And you, Jimmy,’ said the boss. ‘Get out and keep the anti-aircraft gun ready. My witch detector tells me that there’s something brewing. If you see anything in the sky that’s bigger than a bat, anything, just blast it, yeah?’
‘Okay Boss.’
‘In fact, no. If you see a bat, blast that as well. We’re about to wipe out every living thing for miles around. We may as well do a proper job.’
They all laughed then, nasty laughs that made Malcolm squirm. His thoughts raced as quick as his heartbeat. They’re going to shoot the witches! They’re about to poison the river! What if they find me? What am I going to do?
CHAPTER 20. THE BOSS
The Boss was in trouble. His sprawling estate on the north side of Castleconnell had been in his family for hundreds of years, all the way back to Oliver Cromwell’s time. The Boss’s ancestor, back in 1651, had been a builder who’d worked on the Walls of Limerick. And he’d given Cromwell’s army information about a weak spot in the defences. So they’d concentrated their fire, rained cannon balls down on that spot from Singland Hill. Eventually, the wall was breached and the garrison was forced to surrender. The traitor was rewarded with a fine estate on the banks of the Shannon and, over the centuries, his family enjoyed an easy life, keeping the origin of their good fortune a closely-guarded secret.
But the Boss was a gambler and the estate took a pretty penny to keep going. He had a workshop out the back of the manor house, a place where his family had been building stuff for centuries. Fishing gear, hunting traps, mining equipment, gadgets, all sorts. The Boss had designed and made his witch detector there, based on plans he found on the internet. For his family knowledge was powerful, built up over a long, long time. A little clue here, another clue there and they all added up to the strange conclusion that many of the odd goings-on could be blamed on witches, somewhere close to the village.
The witch detector was a kind of radar, but as well as picking up objects in the air, it also detected the strange, magical particles that came from witches. Protons, neutrons, electrons, quarks. The Boss had built it over many’s the long night. He tested it and, at least twice, he swore he saw a trail moving quickly across the screen.
He also built the gold processor, along with his two goons. But he was clever enough not to put it on his own land. He’d used a fake identity to rent the land with the shack off a widow in the village, so she’d end up getting into trouble.
He didn’t care about the widow. He didn’t care about anyone or anything except getting gold and getting it fast.
CHAPTER 21. EMILY’S CHANCE, MALCOLM’S CHALLENGE
As night fell over the river, the atmosphere in the banshee’s lair mellowed. They’d enjoyed a fine dinner of salmon omelette made with duck eggs, warm soda bread and lots of tea. Then they all sat by the fire and Bill took out his fiddle and began to play. After a while, Edna started singing, old songs that Emily had never heard before.
When the banshee joined in, her voice was as high and as clear as a mountain stream. Emily enjoyed it for a long while. Then she got up to make some fresh tea for everybody. In the kitchen, she waited for the kettle to boil on the big iron range. She glanced up through the magic portal, at the river above. It was dark now, but it still shimmered beautifully with the currents, glints of the moon visible as she rose in the east.
The others were taken with the music and the singing. What if I just go? Just up, hold your breath and go. But the river is so dark, and deep, how will I get up? You got down, didn’t you? What about Edna? She’s happy here. No that’s not fair. You can bring the rest of the witches back for her.
In the end, it was the fact that Emily had a clue about the poison, a clue that the banshee couldn’t follow up on, that made up her mind. She wrote a short note, explained that she had to go and stop the poison and not to worry. She was about to step up and through the portal when she remembered the kettle on the range. The hot water was bubbling up inside and it would start whistling any second. She moved the kettle aside.
Then she took a really deep breath, went up and through the portal and into the cold, dark river. The music faded. She floated gently upward, a really weird feeling, her hair drifting around her head, the moon seeming to bob on the surface, high above her head. She felt serene, thought This must be what it’s like to be a mermaid. Curious fish watched her, including the clever salmon, who wondered if she was the human who could save the river from the poison. The salmon sensed that plans were in motion above the surface. She felt the urge to move upstream and lay her eggs even stronger now. She had to help the human.
Emily suddenly began to feel that her breath was gone and wanted to open her mouth to breath in. Her lungs screamed for oxygen, the cool, refreshing night air. Her body twitched as she tried to kick towards the surface. But she felt weak. A moment of panic, the water feeling colder, the current stronger. Then and unexpected nudge and a bump under her left armpit. A rush of power and she was moving upwards. Up, up, up and she broke the surface and gasped and sucked in the precious air. A splashing beside her and she glanced, just in time to see a beautiful salmon as it turned to look at her before it thrashed its tail and sunk back into the inky depths.
Emily could have sworn the salmon winked at her.
She was breathing again, which was good, but the river’s powerful current had her now, which was bad. There were rocks ahead and she was afraid of being smashed against them. She tried to swim to the left, towards the nearest bank, but her arms had no strength in them. And the water was so cold. Emily was close to tears when she looked to the moon and saw a sight that lifted her spirits instantly. For she saw the silhouettes of witches on broomsticks and saw them grow bigger and bigger as they zoomed through the night to her.
‘Emily!’ they called. ‘We see you!’
In
seconds, strong hands were under her armpits and her ankles as the four witches lifted her into the cool night sky.
‘To the All-Seeing Eye!’ shouted Sarah. ‘Lola!’ she called out to the patrolling witches, ‘Hurry back and let them know we’re on the way.’
Lola zoomed back to Granny Smith and the Eye and helped put the kettle on and place a blanket by the fire. The All-Seeing Eye ran a hot bath, with lavender oils and rose petals and a million pink bubbles.
In just a few minutes, Emily touched down. She was shaking, both from the chill caused by the water evaporating from her sodden clothes and the shock of what she’d been through. But she was safe now and that’s all that mattered.
As Emily warmed up, so did Malcolm. Sweat dripped down the back of his neck as he saw everything coming together, almost in slow motion.
Two of the men, the Boss and a minion, were about to start pumping the cyanide through the machine and destroying all life in the river, maybe forever. As this was happening, Malcolm heard the other minion, they guy on the anti-aircraft gun, call out that three big blips were coming straight for them. He pulled back a knob on the side of the big gun and it made a horrible, sliding, click-clicking noise.
‘Blast them!’ called the Boss. ‘Blast them out of the sky. This is it, lads! This is our chance!’
Chance? thought Malcolm. What does he mean?
‘What do you mean, Boss?’ asked the minion.
‘What do I mean? I mean that these witches have been upsetting the lay of the land around here. It’s because of their magic that I’ve lost my luck at the cards. And the horses. And the dogfights. Witches hate men, you know that don’t you? Well I’m not going to take it any more. We’ll shoot these three out of the sky and that’ll draw the rest of them here.’
‘The rest?’