To Dust You Shall Return

By Sean Melican

Everyone knows that Christianity was brought to the Celtic Isles when the snakes were banished. But it wasn't serpents that St. Patrick drove from Ireland...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sean Melican
• Release date: Aug 8, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476267609

Book preview

To Dust You Shall Return

By Sean Melican

Copyright 2012 Sean Melican

Photo Credit: Devra Cooper

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

Tiocfaidh an dúchas trí na crúbaidh agus leanfaidh an chú giorria.

Heredity will come through the claws, and the hound will pursue the hare.

-- Irish saying

Winter is coming early. The leaves have turned but have not fallen, yet already the wind cuts like a cold knife. Your shadow is a thin and long and black thing stretched across the whispering grasses.

A flock of loons erupts from the small green and blue islands. Their cry is comforting for it is familiar, but they sound frightened. A ship is coming across the green foamed water. It is so far in the distance it is necessary to put a hand over your eyes to see it. The sails are black. The sky is an empty blue save for a single black cloud that shrouds the boat in darkness.

With a hand you pull your cloak tight against the chill. The priest called them demons. He said they were black, soulless things. Once people, he said, who had been turned. They want only blood. No honor, no rules. Blood only and however they can get it.

Cuan’s red cloak is visible to the north against the green and gray of the world. It is easy to say the word love but it is only a word. Fear is also easy to say, and more common, but strangely, it is said less often. Yet he is tall and strong and his mustache tickles when he kisses. He will not die today. A few words are whispered to the Morrigan that neither his blood nor the blood of Tadhg be washed in her stream today. You pray but not to the Christ despite the priest’s wishes. His is a strange weak god.

Yet the demons fear what he calls a cross. One such hangs on a chain: heavy and cold. The heavy and cold wind, which has been silent for a moment, slices through cloak and armor.

Your sword is light and easy to heft. It is covered in holy water mixed with honey, which is why the air is thick with black insects. The water kills the demons, the priest said. Cut the head off or pierce the heart; all else only angers them.

It comes suddenly that the cloud is not a cloud but a great mass of black birds. The dying sunlight slips from their oily feathers. They look for a moment like a terrible rainbow. Their eyes are red. Their thin, sharp beaks are a foul yellow color tipped with red. They cry. The loons that had settled behind take flight once more with a great ruffling of wings. They are afraid.

The birds attack as the sun disappears. They care nothing for dying. Swooping fast and low, they