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I’m hard at work on the umpteenth draft of Blood Point, the next story in the Nightmare Vacations series. I’m delighted to offer newsletter readers an exclusive teaser from the novel.

Meet Cora Nagle & Roísín Ní Scarath,
wise women of Kinnitty

Cora Nagle is a female officer of Ireland’s police service, An Garda Síochána, living in the rural village of Kinnitty.

Cora Nagle: July 14th, 2021

According to this dusty old book, I am a witch, a bean feasa. That’s Gaelic for ‘wise woman’ and you’re not wrong if you think I’ll take it any day over being a snaggle-toothed old crone putting curses on folk.

Now, being a good witch would have been mighty gas when I was a kid watching Sabrina and all those stories about fairies and the like were gospel, but here's the thing, I'm Garda Cora Nagle, thirty years old and knee-deep in enforcing lockdown in lovely Kinnitty. Witches? Not exactly top of the Garda training manual.

Speaking of lockdown, don't get me wrong, I've still got a job. But sure, keeping the peace in a place like Kinnitty isn't exactly thrilling. Most folks are sound, you know? We all pretty much know each other by face, and let's just say I already had a fair idea who the few gobshites stirring up trouble might be.

Anyway, like everyone else stuck at home these past months, me Ma decided to tackle that mountain of rubbish that's been building up for years. Now, our family's been in this house since practically the Stone Age, and let me tell you, we've hoarded some right bits and bobs over the years. But nothing could have prepared me for the moment she whips out this handwritten manuscript, older than the Irish Free State itself.

‘Cora,’ she says, all nonchalant, 'your granny gave this to me on my eighteenth, it's been passed down from mother to daughter all the way back to the 1890s or something. Apparently it's all about witches and fairies and whatnot. Never did read it myself, but hey, better late than never, eh?”

And that is how I became the unlikely guardian of a hefty tome titled A Promptuary for the Wise Women of Kinnitty, as told to Roísín Ní Scarath by Caragh and Evie Ní Scarath. Sounds like a right mouthful, doesn't it?

Like mother, like daughter, I shoved it in a drawer and forgot about it for ages. Then came Midsummer's Day and a right carry-on up at Knock-na-man. [Editor's note: Knock-na-man is a 337m summit in the Slieve Bloom hills on the border of County Offaly and County Laois, overlooking the village of Kinnitty from the south east.] Bunch of eejits claiming to be druids or something, insisting on watching the sunrise. Now, I wouldn't mind usually, but lockdown and all that. Honestly, I'd have turned a blind eye if nobody complained, but sure enough, someone did. There's a fairy fort up there, old as the hills itself, but celebrating the solstice or whatever? This ain't exactly Newgrange, for God's sake.

Lockdown's driven people loopy, that's for sure. They were decent enough folks in the end, just bored out of their minds and looking for an excuse to get together. We came to an agreement – one of them could stay and finish their, er, ritual, and the rest scarpered. Got talking to this lovely older woman, and sure enough, she was just your typical crystals-and-incense kind of gal, a bit stir-crazy and yearning for some company.

That's when I mentioned the family heirloom. She practically begged me to read it, see what life was like back then, even if it was all codswallop. And like everyone else, I’ve had a bit of time on my hands so I got stuck in. It wasn’t easy going and I don’t just mean the scratchy handwriting, but let me tell you, history lessons would have been a helluva lot more interesting if they'd told us the truth about Kinnitty Castle and that creepy pyramid behind the Protestant church.

If even half of this is true, the Bernards were a mad aul crowd. And whatever's hidden in that pyramid? Let’s just say it wouldn't be something you'd want to find down the back of the sofa. Course, nobody'd believe me if I started spouting off about it. And according to the book, the only one I can tell is my own daughter, which looks unlikely, seeing as there isn't one and my love life is drier than a week-old scone.

Speaking of love life, maybe this book has a decent love spell or two tucked away in the back. Now that would be some magic.

Cora Nagle: September 9th, 2021

So this is what my life's become thanks to lockdown — scribbling notes about this book my great-great-great-granma wrote all the way back in 1879. School books were never my thing, but this is different. Feels like this woman, Roisín, is talking to me across time itself.

Always thought women back then, especially in a kip like this, wouldn't even know their arses from their elbows. Well, let me tell you, this one could write rings around me. Apparently, her own ma and granny were teaching her all the family secrets since she was a slip of a lass, remedies, spells, the whole shebang. By 34 she already had a gaggle of kids screaming around the house. But the eldest, her only daughter, went all holy rollers and refused to learn the family trade. Seems Roisín realised this knowledge might die with her, so she took it upon herself to write it all down.

Makes you wonder where they got all the fancy paper and ink. Must have had right notions with the neighbours, because the book's cobbled together from different bits — wouldn't be surprised if some of it weren't filched from the bleeding Bernards themselves. Sure, it's rough and bound with string, but they knew what they were doing. Animal hide, probably a cow by the looks of it, keeps the whole thing together. Done a good job too — bit of water damage on the outside, but the pages are mostly grand, just the odd splash of ink, water, and maybe even a bit of candle wax.

Honestly, this thing could take years to copy out. Even then, what the hell would I do with it? Bunch of oul' wives' tales as far as I'm concerned, no different from the shite they preach down at the church. Almost tempted to give it to that bird I met up on Knock-na-man.

First things first — the letter to future witches and that bit about the Terrible Duty — seems like an intro before the real meat of it. Then, I'll see if I can decipher this stuff about Marguerite Bernard and the Kinnitty Pyramid. Grim reading, that's for sure. If even half of it's true, someone needs to shove the door open and see what they really did to the poor woman.

Roísín Ní Scarath: A letter to my wise daughters

Dear children,

Ye hold in your hands the wisdom handed down from mother to eldest daughter over more generations than any Ní Scarath living today remembers. In truth, some of those daughters may have been nieces or cousins, for if nothing else is true on this isle, it is that our blood stretches from the sun’s rise on Burr Point to its setting on Dunmore Head. What is certain is that in each generation there must be one woman who calls herself without shame, Ní Scarath. She carries that name no matter what the townsfolk call her husband and their children.

We are bean feasa, which is to say that we work among the common folk, helping to make their lives a little easier with the knowledge of herbs and simple charms, balms, poultices, soups and teas drawn from bounty of the forests and hedgerows. We help all, but we have a particular duty to aid the women folk in the difficulties which are special to our kind. As for the men, we aid them to secure our station and keep them from using our sisters ill.

This volume contains the everyday charms by which we assist our neighbours, and advice on the lifting of curses, for surely folk will wish ill upon one another from time to time. Granma Caragh insisted that we supply advice on treating with the ancient people of the Sí, should you have the misfortune to happen across their kind. I have not, but every Irish man and woman of sound mind knows that we share this land with the good folk, as they are known, and we do well to respect them.

Ní Scarath feet walked these shores long before Saint Patrick and we have always maintained cordial relations with the priests of the Holy Cross, respecting that each of us represent vital aspects of the natural order. The Catholic Church has in my lifetime been elevated to a position of great authority and we have seen the arrival of priests who no longer acknowledge the unspoken pact between our traditions. The congregations at mass are openly discouraged from seeking our aid, on pain of damnation. Those who come to us must do so as if it were a lovers’ tryst.

I have compiled this Promptuary with the assistance of my ma, Evie Ní Scarath, and my grandma, Caragh Ní Scarath, in the hope that a future daughter of our line may take up their birthright. It saddens me beyond compare that my only daughter refuses the gift of knowledge that was handed down when I came into my womanhood, as have her blood kin. I hope to live long enough to pass it on to my own grand-daughter when she comes of age, so that our knowledge will not be lost to future generations.

If you read no further than this introduction, you must heed this warning: the Bernard Pyramid is a mausoleum in name only. All good Irish folk know that there are nights at the four points of the year on which the boundaries between our world and the Sí are weakened. On those nights you must approach the Pyramid no closer than the gates which mark the churchyard of St Finian’s. Do not enter the Pyramid without first preparing a suitable charm and wearing iron against your skin. Under no circumstances should you pass at any time beyond the main burial chamber unless you have read this volume in its entirety and understood its contents.

Good lady, my daughter, I welcome you to the sisterhood of Ní Scarath. I bid you read on, embrace your birthright and carry your true name with pride.

Roisín Ní Scarath, Kinnitty, 1879.

Cora Nagle: March 4th, 2022

I never really bothered with the Pyramid before now. It's been there forever, like a giant lump in the back garden. You wouldn't bat an eyelid at it if you saw it every day, would you? Plus, the Brits built it, and let's be real, they're always up to something. Littered this whole country with all manner of follies. We've got our own proper history anyway, way older than anything across the water.

Now it turns out that great great great great granma Roisín passed in 1926. She must have laughed to see Kinnitty Castle burned out by the RA. She’d still be laughing to know it’s a hotel now and owned by one of the Wolfe Tones no less. That's what I call history getting its revenge.

The thing is, finding out anything about the Bernards or my own folk is harder than finding a decent cuppa after 6pm, even before the lockdowns. Been digging around since I started reading this old Promptuary book, and between the fire at the castle and the whole Civil War records office fiasco, there's next to nothing on the family. Found Caragh, Evie and Roisín in the census and church records but that's about it. Never was a history buff at school so it's giving me some serious grief. Half tempted to show it to someone at a university but then I remember Roisín's letter. This knowledge is mine to keep alive, not for some posh professor at Trinity to poke and prod.

That Marguerite Bernard stuff though, proper sent chills down my spine. Even if it's a long shot, there's no way anyone's going in that pyramid without some protection. Need to learn those charms and make a copy of this book, just in case things go sideways.

Roísín Ní Scarath: A terrible duty lies upon the wise women of Kinnitty

It is the responsibility of the bean feasa to aid and protect her community. The Ní Scarath carry an additional responsibility to prevent the return of an evil that is as old as Ireland itself. This terrible responsibility is no ancient burden, but a task imposed upon us by the foolish actions of the masters of Castle Bernard.

Kinnitty has for nigh on two hundred years been cursed by the rule of this family, who were once of proud Irish descent, lately bred by greed and desperation with English blood. The current lord of Kinnitty Demesne is the sixth Bernard to sit in the castle of that name, and the fifth to call himself Thomas, but he is known to all in this county as Black Thomas on account of his base treatment of the starving tenants during the Great Hunger.

There are many who would see Black Thomas swing from a gibbet at the crossroads for these actions alone. If the truth about him were known to all, he would be justly drawn, quartered and cast upon the spoil-heap. And if the truth about his mother and father were known, the folly we call Castle Bernard would be razed to the ground, for it is by their vanity and arrogance that we Ní Scarath were drawn into an undertaking that will stain our souls for eternity.

Caragh, Evie and I take comfort daily in the knowledge that Black Thomas will die without issue. Though my grandmother is ten years that vile man’s elder, she has sworn to outlive him. On that day the reign of the Bernards over Kinnitty Demesne will end. We pray that this heralds the end of English rule over all Ireland. Upon the passing of the Bernards, it will fall to the women who call ourselves Ní Scarath to guard safe their foul legacy.

The later chapters of this Promptuary will furnish the reader with the horrific truth of Marguerite Bernard’s demise. If you feel the temptation to pass judgement upon your ancestors, Caragh and Evie Ní Scarath, consider for yourself the impossible position in which they found themselves. This account serves in part as confession for their role in a debacle of which they are eternally ashamed. It is their hope that should the evil within the pyramid find a fresh vessel in which to reprise its aims, you will follow their advice and become the vessel for their redemption.

In next month's preview of Blood Point:

Cora Nagle chooses to embrace her witchcraft heritage. Back in the 19th century, Roísín tells the story of her granma Caragh’s first encounter with the master of Kinnitty, Thomas Bernard, and his strange sister, Marguerite.

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