When the Rowan Returned

Nether Oak Close, number 14, is lived in by Fionn Jennings and his wife Róisín.
They are empty nesters now and feeling the pinch of the government’s austerity programme and rising prices.

Róisín is a woman who knows the cost of things. She is the money person in the house.

Faced with the prospect of making do, she cajoled her husband into converting part of the back garden into a vegetable patch. Onions. Spuds. Carrots. Her rationale was simple enough: her mum and dad had done it during rationing, and there was no reason she and Fionn couldn’t do the same.

After much “suggesting” that he get off his arse and get started, which Fionn privately classified as nagging, he went to the shed and began rummaging through the accumulated junk in search of his spade.

When he thought his spade, he checked himself and corrected it to my father’s.

It was a Spear & Jackson from the seventies. Sturdy. Honest. Very…
Fionn paused.
“Spade-like.”

He brushed off the collective grumble of ten years’ inactivity. Dust and spiderwebs had gathered in small sand dunes along the handle.

Back in the garden, he found that Róisín had pegged out a large square in the bottom left-hand corner and run green twine around it.

The square was a lot larger than Fionn had expected.

His heart sank.

No crafty pints with Michael from number 6 in the Captain’s Bar today.

He sighed and began digging, turning over sods and breaking them up with the spade. Róisín stood to one side, arms akimbo, telling him where and how to do it.

Fionn thought carefully to himself:

I am so glad I married her. Otherwise, how would I know when I am doing something wrong?

The digging continued until he reached the very back corner.

Thank God, he thought. Nearly finished. Might still get to the pub before tea.

CLINK.

The spade struck something solid.

Fionn crouched and brushed the soil away. He had hit a large stone, its surface marked with small indentations and circular patterns.

“Cup-and-ring marks,” he muttered, remembering a lecture he’d attended with Róisín at the Flowerfield Centre about local history.

He wedged the spade underneath the stone and, with a mighty push, levered it free. The soil released it with a wet sucking sound.

He rolled the stone aside and peered into the hole.

There, beneath it, sat a small cast-iron cauldron.

He reached down and touched it.

Poof.

A small cloud of smoke erupted, then cleared, revealing a small man dressed in a smart blue suit, a flat cap worn at a jaunty angle, and a large meerschaum pipe clenched between his teeth.

“Excuse me!” said the small figure.
“What do you think you’re doing?”

Fionn froze, crouched halfway between standing and kneeling, spade still in his hand.

“I… eh… digging?” he said, eventually.

The small man took the pipe from his mouth, exhaled thoughtfully, and looked around the garden.

“Ah,” he said. “A vegetable patch. Figures.”

He walked over to the cauldron and placed himself squarely in front of it, arms folded.

“Donnacha Ó Riain,” he said, with a small bow. “Custodian of this cauldron, keeper of the gold therein, and … until about thirty seconds ago enjoying a perfectly uninterrupted nap.”

Fionn blinked.

“You’re a…?”

“Leprechaun,” said Donnacha, with a sigh. “And before you ask, no, I don’t grant wishes, no, you can’t have the gold, and yes, I am exactly where I’m supposed to be.”

At that moment, Róisín appeared at Fionn’s shoulder.

“What are you talking to?” she asked.

Donnacha looked up at her, took in her stance, her expression, and the tape measure clipped to her pocket.

“Oh,” he said quietly.
“This is going to be complicated.”

Donnacha took a long, contemplative draw on his pipe.

“A prophecy, it is” he said at last. “Aye..the finding of this gold is a prophecy, given to me on the death of the last O’Neil king of Tír Eógain by the Banshee who told of his death, herself no less”

Róisín folded her arms ,not in defiance, but in the manner of a woman preparing to set things straight.

“My maiden name is O’Neil,” she said. “From Tulach Óg. My people lived there for hundreds of generations before anyone thought to put a road through it. If there was a Banshee making pronouncements, she likely knew my lot well enough.”

Donnacha studied her closely now, the way a jeweller looks at a stone.

“O’Neil of Tulach Óg,” he repeated. “That would explain the timing.”

“The timing of what?” Fionn asked.

“The running out of patience,” said Donnacha.

He tapped the side of the cauldron with his shoe.

“This gold isn’t for spending. It never was. It was set aside under a geas , bound to a task that can only be fulfilled when the right one stands over it and asks the proper question.”

Róisín frowned.

“And what task would that be?”

“To restore the homes of the Good People,” Donnacha said, simply. “The ones that were flattened, fenced over, and forgotten when this place was turned into a nice, respectable close with kerbstones and numbered doors.”

Fionn glanced around the garden.

“You’re saying Nether Oak Close is built on…?”

“On a townland that once minded itself better,” Donnacha said. “And the folk who lived here before weren’t asked to move on. They were assumed away.”

Róisín looked towards the copse of trees beyond the back fence , a ragged stand of hawthorn and birch that no one had ever quite managed to tame, no matter how many times the council trimmed it back.

She swallowed.

“And the prophecy?” she asked.

Donnacha smiled, a small, crooked thing.

“The Banshee of the O’Neils said this:
When the land is counted in prices,
and the old ways buried under grass,
one of the blood will stand in a measured square
and ask who was left behind.”

Róisín looked down at the green twine marking out the vegetable patch.

“A measured square,” she said quietly.

Donnacha nodded.

He turned and gestured with the stem of his pipe towards the copse.

“Best not take my word for it,” he said. “Let’s ask the Good Folk themselves.”

He reached into his pocket and produced a small tin whistle, dull with age but lovingly polished. He raised it to his lips and began to play , a light, skipping jig that seemed to lift the air rather than move through it.

The sound drifted across the garden, over the fence, and into the trees.

At first, nothing happened.

Then …. lights.

Small, soft glimmers appeared among the branches, like fireflies remembering an older duty. They floated forward, crossing the fence without disturbing it, gathering in the garden.

Shapes formed: small figures, no two alike, glowing gently, their feet barely touching the ground. They began to dance in a widening circle around Donnacha, their movements perfectly matched to the tune.

Fionn stood open-mouthed.

Róisín, however, felt something else entirely.

Recognition.

One of the figures stepped out from the dancing circle.

The others slowed, then stilled, drifting back until they formed a loose ring at the garden’s edge.

She was taller than the rest , not tall by human measure, but carried authority in her stance. Her form was almost entirely blue light, deep and soft as evening sky reflected in water. Where her feet touched the ground, the grass did not bend.

Donnacha lowered the whistle and bowed his head.

“Bébinn,” he said.

The matriarch inclined her head in return, then turned her gaze to Róisín.

“You carry the name we remember,” Bébinn said. Her voice was not loud, but it settled into the garden like mist. “And you stand where the last root was cut.”

Róisín felt her throat tighten, but she did not look away.

“What was lost?” she asked. Practical as ever. Start with facts.

“Our home,” said Bébinn. “And the rowan that held it.”

She lifted one luminous hand and the air between them shifted.

“There was a rowan tree here once,” she said. “It grew when the land was young. My clann lived in it when it first put out leaves. Every two hundred years, a new rowan would rise, and we would move to it. Always within sight of the old. Always within memory.”

Fionn felt a chill crawl up his arms.

“For ten thousand years, since the great cold age,” Bébinn continued, “it was so.”

Her light dimmed slightly.

“The last rowan was felled when this place was measured, named, and sold. Since then, we have lived in the hawthorn.”

She glanced toward the copse.

“It is a poor substitute. Too thorny for comfort. Too angry for rest.”

Róisín nodded once.

“I’m sorry,” she said. Not as apology , as acknowledgement.

Bébinn’s gaze softened.

“Sorry does not mend roots,” she said. “But you did not turn away. That matters.”

Donnacha cleared his throat gently.

“The geas allows for restoration,” he said. “But there is always a cost.”

Róisín looked down at the cauldron, still half-buried in soil.

“What’s required?” she asked.

Donnacha pointed with his pipe to the square of earth Fionn had dug.

“That ground,” he said. “It must be given over. No vegetables. No paving. No neat little border. A new rowan will stand there, and it will be theirs.”

Fionn opened his mouth, closed it again, and nodded.

Róisín knelt and lifted the cauldron. It was heavier than it looked , not with gold, but with purpose that needed resolution.

“And me?” she asked.

Bébinn stepped closer.

“You must will it,” she said. “Not command. Not bargain. Ask.”

Róisín held the cauldron in both hands. She thought of her parents. Of Tulach Óg. Of gardens that fed families when nothing else would. Of knowing the cost of things and paying it properly.

She closed her eyes.

“I ask,” she said, quietly, “for a home for the Good Folk. One that will last.”

The ground stirred.

There was no thunder, no flash, just the slow, patient sound of soil shifting. From the centre of the square, a shoot pushed upward, green and certain. It grew as they watched, unfurling leaves, its bark pale and strong.

A rowan.

As it settled into itself, Róisín gasped.

Fionn reached out instinctively.

A single lock of her red hair had turned white , not grey, but bright, flowing, and clean as winter milk. It ran from her temple to her shoulder like a river of light.

She touched it, startled.

“Well,” Fionn said, after a moment. “I think it looks really nice.”

Bébinn smiled.

“Our home is returned,” she said. “And you are marked as one who remembered.”

The lights drifted back toward the trees. The jig faded. The garden grew quiet again.

Except for the rowan, standing where spuds had been planned.

Róisín looked at it, then at Fionn.

“We’ll manage without onions,” she said.

He nodded.

“Aye,” he said. “And I reckon the Captain’s Bar will still be there tomorrow.”

The following morning came clear and cold.

Frost lay along the garden in a fine, patient skin. The new rowan stood bright against it, its leaves edged in white, its slender trunk already rooted as if it had always known this place.

Róisín sat on the garden bench, her coat pulled close, the long white streak in her hair catching the early light. Beside her sat Bébinn, quieter now, her blue glow softened to something almost human.

“My family are settled,” Bébinn said, watching the tree. “For the first time in a long while.”

Róisín nodded.

“That’s good,” she said. “I’m glad of it.”

They sat in companionable silence for a moment. Bébinn turned her head.

“You are thinking of something else.”

Róisín smiled faintly.

“You have your family around you now, but I haven’t seen my grandchildren in six months,” she said. “My son and his wife moved to Dublin for his work. We kept saying soon, and then time slipped. It does that. Especially at the turn of the year.”

Bébinn studied her carefully.

“Longings left unattended grow heavy,” she said.

Róisín shrugged.

“Life,” she said.

Bébinn smiled , a small, knowing thing.

Just then, the sound of a car horn cut through the cold air.

Róisín frowned.

“Who can that be?”

She didn’t finish the sentence.

She was already on her feet, hurrying through the house, heart suddenly racing.

The front door opened.

“GRANNY!”

Two small, feral children launched themselves at her, coats half-fastened, faces red with cold and joy. Laughter filled the hallway like something restored.

Róisín knelt, arms full, breath gone.

A single tear slipped down her cheek.

She looked back, just once, toward the garden.

“Thank you, Bébinn,” she whispered.

Outside, the rowan stood quietly, holding its frost and its promises, while somewhere within its branches, the Good Folk were finally, properly home.