Polygon, 2023, 187 p.

This is another of Birlinn’s Darkland Tales.

One summer day in 825 AD the red sail of Helgi Cleanshirt’s longship appears on the seas surrounding Iona. Helgi is intent on procuring the bones of Saint Columba for their supposed mystic powers. It turns out only one relic, a finger bone, remains, but Abbot Blathmac has buried it somewhere on the island’s only hill, Dùn Ì, so that none of the brothers can reveal its whereabouts. This, of course, does not end well for the monks and the lay people of the island.

While the rest of the longship’s crew is causing mayhem, the slightly tardy Grimur has come upon the island’s smithy, killed the blacksmith (somewhat luckily,) and been plied with her potent concoction by the meadwife. In his subsequent stupor he is taken for dead by his shipmates and buried.

There are thus only three survivors of the raid: Brother Martin, who hid in the latrine pit, that meadwife, Una, who had made herself scarce, and Grimur, who, on wakening, manages to dig himself out of the shallow grave with his knife.

The three then have to make do as best they can. Martin resolves to be the best monk he can be and to complete the illuminated manuscript he had been working on, Grimur to rub along with the other two and to understand the strange religion of the islanders, Una to survive. What livestock remains has to roam the island more or less untended.

When a delegation from the mainland arrives the three are told they cannot be protected and ought to leave but all are unwilling to do so.

Later, an Irish princess, Bronagh, turns up, attempting to escape an unwanted marriage and asking to become an anchoress. Brother Martin complies with her request but finds her presence a sinful distraction. Bronagh soon enough, though, finds the monastic life too irksome. Una and Grimur manage to find solace in each other.

We are, here, in a clash of cultures; between the single-minded focus of the Norse warriors, exploiting the usefulness of their brutality, and the Christianity of the monks, that intense faith manifested in the face of extreme adversity, exemplified by Grimur’s incomprehension of its sheer oddness and Martin’s redoubling of his devotion despite its failure to protect the monks; but also between that Celtic Christianity, its call to utter dedication, and our modern individualistic eyes. Greig conjures it all well. Like all the Darkland Tales so far this is beautifully written, with economically well-drawn and believable characters.

There is still Helgi Cleanshirt’s return to come, the aftermath of which hints that there may have been a miracle occurring on that island in the interim.

(A foreword mentions that Iona has previously been known as I, IO, HII, HIA, IOUA. IOUA was in the 18^th century corrupted to IONA by a typographical error.)

Pedant’s corner:- gulley (gully – used later,) “his prophesy” (the noun is spelled prophecy; prophesy is the verb,) “He wanted …. to dissolve in the enormity of God” (surely Brother Martin would not think of his God as monstrous? ‘He wanted …. to dissolve in the immensity of God’, then,) “Jesus’ head” (Jesus’s head.)

Polygon, 2022, 112 p

On a cold December night in Edinburgh in 1591 Geillis Duncan awaits execution in the morning for the crime of witchcraft. She is visited in spirit by Iris, a woman from our own time, who calls herself a time traveller and a modern-day witch.

Historically 1591 was the height of the hysteria against witches encapsulated by James VI’s Daemonologie and Geillis Duncan was one of the victims of the North Berwick witch trials.

The scenario gives Fagan the platform to outline the misogyny behind the witch hunts and its prevalence today.

In the conversations between Geillis and Iris the question arises, “How does he” (the King) “fight the Devil?” The answer? “Via teenage girls. Doesn’t everyone?” The rationale back then being, “We go after the Devil via womb-bearers – they are weak for him.” So the targets were women. Women who were alone, or tall, or ugly, or smart; women who inherited, sassy women, women who were healers. If a woman doesn’t exalt men always she is a threat, “a Demon whore, a witch.”

Despite all her efforts to be polite, docile and unthreatening, not to draw attention to herself, still Geillis was picked on: primarily since she was handy, a servant in the household of a man called Seaton but also suspect because, “I helped women birth, I helped calves, I knew the right herbs to cure a headache.” Seaton was jealous of the fact that his sister-in-law, Euphame, had inherited her father’s estate and wanted a legal reason to eliminate her so Geillis was tortured and abused to implicate Euphame and others.

Fagan has her characters try to explain misogyny. Geillis says, “We bring life from our bodies where before there was nothing,” – that being a kind of magic – and Iris tells her, “Men want to know how they got trapped on Earth,” but the real crime is that, “There is no man on this Earth who didn’t get here except by a woman parting her thighs.”

Apart from the conceit of Iris time travelling Fagan’s tendency to indulge the fantastical sees Iris during the night begin to grow feathers and eventually turn into a crow.

Though Geillis’s prior suffering is never in doubt the set up allows Fagan to treat the witch trials almost indirectly but nevertheless underline that misogyny is ever with us.

This is another of Birlinn’s Darkland Tales (see here) and again was borrowed from the local library by the good lady.

Pedant’s corner:- lightening (lightning,) “filed into a tea-room” (in 1591?) “the thing I had that shined” (shone,) a priest comes to hear her confess at the last (a priest? In Reformation Scotland?) the priest uses a pencil to sign in to the jail (suitable graphite for this purpose was discovered in 1560 so it’s possible; but pencils as such would not, I suspect, have been widely available, a scratchy pen is more likely,) smoothes (smooths,) okay (in 1591?) ditto teenage.