Three years had passed since his father’s disappearance. It was reasonable to assume that the man was dead, survived by his only offspring and a lifetime’s worth of loose threads, golden as they may have been. Sean still presided over his feelings on the matter. There were days when he missed the old man dearly, pining for that same love and fellowship that had been two of his life’s great constants. And then there were those moments when the bitter taste of his father’s betrayal would taint even the freshest air, leaving him lost and weak and fumbling with those same threads as though they still held some answer to that one enduring question.
Why didn’t he take me with him?
It all began with the bedtime stories. The manner in which his father recited those old tales of myth and legend was to have profound repercussions on the course of his son’s future, always from memory and enriched with such vivid detail that Sean fancied the old man had witnessed the magic with his own eyes. It was storytelling at its most intimate, and still counted as some of his fondest memories of that time, even if the jury was still out on the one who sired them. As the years went by, these lamplit narrations took on a life of their own. Sean’s curiosity conceived a thousand questions whose answers effected a thousand more, and often he and his father would talk long past the hour when they both knew he should have been sleeping.
He often wondered how different his life may have been had his mother taken sole charge of his bedtime readings. As it transpired, any agency he may have wielded as an adult was forfeited when he was just a child, for hidden amidst his father’s words was the taint of the man’s own obsessions.
Sean believed the stories then – tucked into bed without a known worry in the world – and he still believed them now, here, on the west coast, two hundred metres above sea level, where the spring gale whistled through shadowy grikes and rattled the shelter’s walls no matter how they weighted it down. Long as a bus and twice as wide, its PVC was thicker than whale skin. It had been erected where the clints ran smoothest, acting as both their base of operations and a storage house for the more valuable equipment on loan for the excavation. And for Sean Kilmartin, it felt like home.
‘How much farther do we have left to go?’ he asked, gripping the back of Aisling’s chair, leaning over her shoulder to study the screen more closely; even when speaking by her ear, he had to raise his voice to be heard over the drilling.
They’d scanned the entire area as best they could, but the unevenness of the surface and the countless cavities and fissures hidden beneath it made the results a chore to decipher. Each colour that blotted the onscreen map signified a different depth, and the more Ash calibrated the software, the more imaginative its collage grew. He knew better than to voice his concerns, but Sean was genuinely doubting if she understood how to use it. This was a new toy for her, and the woman’s expertise lay in the realm of relics and hardware mostly cut from stone.
‘We’re close,’ she replied, tapping at the keyboard. ‘A few more metres should do it.’
‘How can you be sure?’
Another gust of wind bulged around the centre of the tent’s westerly wall.
‘Here,’ she said, pointing to the screen. ‘This whole section is directly below where we’re drilling.’
‘And what am I looking at?’ Sean asked, every pointless answer pinching down harder on his patience. ‘All I’m seeing are colours, Ash.’
‘It’s a cavern, by the looks of it,’ she replied. ‘Much bigger than anything else we’ve picked up in this section so far. I can’t tell you much more until we send a drone down. But it’s safe to say that our passage definitely leads somewhere.’
Sean planted a hand on his chief archaeologist’s shoulder. ‘That’s all I needed to know. We’ll work through the night if we have to. Time is money, Ash, and you’re not the one paying for all this.’
The excavation’s final cost was beyond estimation. There were too many unknowns and too few viable theories to foresee any complications that lay ahead. The only option was to delve deeper, to break archaeological protocol and prioritise haste over precision, proving once again – as human history tends to do – how even the most civilised endeavour can benefit from a little violence.
‘But don’t worry about the crippling debt,’ Sean added as he drifted away from the desk. ‘This dig’s on me. You can fork out the cash for the next one.’
He knew the lore as well as his father had, having turned it around in his thoughts a thousand times, examining it from all angles. He’d studied the man’s papers and tracked his explorations through the darkest fog of Ireland’s past, drawing whatever light he could from his own findings, and yet not once had their collective research led them here. Whatever lay beneath the Burren had eluded even the great Professor David Kilmartin, and that was cause enough to give the excavation the go-ahead.
Sean eyed up the stacks of crates and containers at the far end of the tent. ‘We’ve brought up everything we need, haven’t we? You know, for when we eventually get down there.’
He didn’t know what was in half of them. Ian – their techie and all-round handyman – had taken care of the excavation’s inventory, checking off the extensive list that Sean’s pocket had paid for. He’d resisted the urge to question it. The lore was his sole speciality, and so he’d no choice but to concede to the better judgement of others.
‘I should hope so,’ she replied. ‘Cameras, lights, harnesses, and all those delicate tools of my craft that you should be using instead of a fucking drill.’
Despite the tone of Ash’s voice, Sean glanced back to catch her grinning. Such an undertaking would have been impossible without modern tools, and she knew that better than anyone. The shaft itself was so tightly packed and with such intricate care that the drill – crass as it may have been – was essential to their efforts. Its iron frame had been bolted into the surface despite the reams of red tape preventing all but the faintest of archaeological interference; an impromptu meteor strike couldn’t shift it. Sean just hoped that whatever they were digging towards, they’d find it before some government official with a soft spot for his nation’s heritage dragged him away in chains.
The drilling suddenly ceased. He’d forgotten what silence felt like, as even the shyest sound now demonstrated some personality – the gruff scratch of his heels on the makeshift floor, the flighty swish of his jacket when he uncrossed his arms, the studious clicking of keys on Ash’s laptop; all those thankless noises that the drill had chased into hiding. Sean had popped so many ibuprofen that everything his tongue touched now tasted metallic, bottled water included. He’d never experienced headaches like these before; they bored so deep between his eyeballs that his brain still ached even when the drill was dormant. But everyone was suffering the same, and so none complained.
Ash’s walkie-talkie crackled aloud. ‘The television crowd are here,’ came Ian’s voice. ‘A reporter, a camera guy, and some other lad who looks a little lost as to what he’s supposed to be doing.’
‘Roger that,’ she replied. ‘Oh, and Ian, best to hold off on the drilling until they’re gone.’
‘Weren’t they supposed to be here before dark?’ Sean asked her, dragging his feet back to the desk. ‘What’s the point of bringing them to the top of the Burren if they can’t see the view? I told them as much when I spoke to them.’
For such a natural formation, Sean was stricken by how alien it felt come nightfall, when its rocky bones glowed white under the stars. Cables ran over the stone like fat veins, linking the floodlights to the main generator. These lined the site’s perimeter and were the brightest that money could buy; so white that he’d joked he could pour out a drum of oil and it’d flood the surrounding stone like milk.
Ash brought the radio to her lips. ‘Ian, did the reporter say why they’re so late?’
She locked eyes with Sean as they awaited some response.
‘Apparently they’d some trouble finding our ground base,’ he replied, his words fizzling with distortion. ‘They’re Dubs, God love them. Their GPS probably doesn’t work beyond the Pale.’
Ash giggled. ‘Cheers, Ian. Tell them we’ll be out in five.’
The lilt of her laughter was music to Sean’s ears. She was a slender woman of thirty-odd years with a face as sharp as her focus; the bone structure of which was forever catching the light in ways that artists only dreamt of. The woman’s eyes were the palest blue he’d ever seen, oceans under ice, and her blonde ponytail whipped around like golden wheat whenever the wind blew. Aside from archaeology, she moonlighted as a part-time folklorist and had been an avid fan of his father’s research since her university days. At least Sean had good genes on his side if wooing her ever became an option… and who knew what the future held for them once the dig was over. This find had the potential not to merely change how the academics viewed Ireland’s past, but also to shape how Sean viewed his own future.
‘Trouble finding our ground base?’ he repeated, shaking his head in disbelief. ‘There couldn’t be any more lights down there. I swear an astronaut could see it from space.’
Ground base was at the foot of the western slope, where jagged terraces of rock rolled down toward the wild Atlantic and Sean’s team slept in mobile trailers and occasionally ate breakfast together. It was there that the generator grumbled twenty-four hours a day, like a beating heart keeping the operation alive. The ascent to the site was slow and steep, and there was only so much gear they could establish there without upsetting those who’d rather the Burren remain untouched, unchanged, and ultimately undiscovered.
The walkie-talkie disturbed the peace again. ‘They’re asking if they can do it inside your tent,’ Ian said. ‘They’re complaining about the wind out here.’
‘Do what?’ Sean replied, looking to Ash. ‘The interview?’
She pressed in her radio’s button and bit down on her lip. ‘I don’t think that’s going to work, Ian.’
‘Fair enough,’ he replied. ‘I’ll let them know but they aren’t going to like it.’
Ash swivelled in her chair to face Sean. ‘Don’t blame me if they ask you a few sticky questions out there. The preservationists are already up in arms because of your drill and these news reporters lose their shit if they’re caught on camera with a single hair out of place.’
‘I’ll just blame you,’ Sean said, to which she frowned. ‘It was you who discovered it.’
‘Don’t you dare tell them that. If we’re going to pull this off, then we need your name to convince them that what we’re doing might actually be worth it.’
‘You need my father’s name.’
‘It’s as much yours as it was his, Sean,’ she said, ‘and after this, when we find out what’s down there, it’ll be you who they remember.’
*
Professor David Kilmartin had been a luminary in his field, an academic whose zeal for knowledge surpassed peers both past and present, and most likely any future kindred minds to come. And yet, convincing the other, more orthodox scholars had proven an exercise in futility. The act of marrying what they knew with what they refused to accept was like attempting to mate two incompatible species, vicious ones at that. Much to the old man’s dismay, rather than laying bare their bullheadedness, it was his own reputation that was left irreparably wounded. Even the bravest voice could be silenced if no one was brave enough to listen.
Sean had learned from his father’s legacy that there was but one way to continue their research without undue interference, and that was to do so in secrecy. And so, until this night, few were acquainted with his existence, never mind the discoveries he’d made in his family’s very particular sphere of academia. But that was about to change.
‘I’m here atop the Burren in County Clare,’ the reporter began, standing at Sean’s side as she spoke directly to the camera, ‘one of Ireland’s most breathtaking natural landscapes.’
This was why he’d wanted to conduct their interview in daylight – to capture the evening sun streaming across the ocean and glinting like windswept sand on the petals of all those wildflowers seen by so few. If an artist’s brush had created such a place, most eyes would doubt it to be real – a world of sky and stone. But now, bathed in a blanket of white light, it more resembled a frozen planet, hinting at the kind of discovery that science-fiction writers would warn humankind against ever disturbing.
‘Three hundred and sixty square kilometres of natural limestone,’ she continued her introduction, ‘home to untold secrets and the fossilised mementos of our ancient past. And now, the site of a truly remarkable archaeological excavation organised by this man, Sean Kilmartin.’
He’d stared down at his shoes as he leant in to listen, but the reporter’s first question was coming and so he lifted his head, realising in that moment that everyone with a reason for being there had huddled around to spectate – a floodlit flock of sheep all gathered around their shepherd. He picked out Ash at the front, closing the belt of her coat, tightening her body into an hourglass.
‘Sean,’ the reporter said, snapping his attention back to the job at hand, ‘what can you tell us about all that’s happening here?’
He wasn’t sure where to look – at the camera lens, at the woman beside him? – and all those watchful eyes made him uneasy. He wasn’t like his father in that sense, the natural born lecturer; Sean couldn’t stand facing a crowd and their silent expectations. He’d never given an interview before that night. But no doubt those who had known his father – be it as a past friend or foe in the contentious arena of academia – would mark the familial similarities between them.
Already at the tail end of his twenties, Sean’s hairline had receded to the crest of his skull, eloping with any affections of vanity. He’d grown out a beard to compensate, and only now did he wish he’d tidied it up before appearing on camera. Its black hair concealed a knobbly nub of a chin identical to his father’s – an heirloom as unsolicited as the male pattern baldness but one he’d learned to live with. His mother’s side of the family held all the attractive genes. It was a shame that all he inherited from her were her blue eyes and skinniness, but he’d happily take these over nothing at all.
‘Well,’ he began, clearing his throat, calling to mind the lines he’d rehearsed throughout the day, ‘as you know, the Burren is a site of great historical and archaeological significance. The first farmers were believed to have settled here some six thousand years ago, and it boasts an array of megalithic tombs and forts which, I guarantee you, will be around long after we’re all dead and gone. You could say it’s a place where the past, the present, and the future collude to inspire us. For example, running under its stone there exists a system of caves that have yet to be explored in their entirety, caverns whose shadows have never been stirred by the light of man. Naturally formed or otherwise, there is mystery here, and questions that have patiently waited until now to be answered.’
It was Ash who’d thought to comb the Burren for curiosities. She’d brought a small team, mostly students on loan from the university – free and willing, if perhaps not the most useful. Extra credits for a cold hike. Despite Sean’s low expectations for their expedition, the lack of any findings would, at the very least, have removed it as a point of interest for further research. How wrong he had been.
‘And what we’ve identified beneath our very feet,’ he continued, ‘could possibly date back even further than all of our recorded finds thus far. It truly is an astonishing discovery, and one that I’m exceptionally proud to be a part of.’
A sudden rush of wind lifted the reporter’s hair high above her head, and Sean couldn’t help but chuckle as she hastily patted it back down.
‘And what exactly have you discovered?’ she asked, the frustration hardening her tone.
His eyes tarried on Ash’s before he answered.
‘I’ve discovered a vertical shaft, perfectly persevered, that connects the surface to a hidden cavern beneath us. And I can say with absolute certainty that human hands – not those of Mother Nature – are responsible for its creation.’
‘How can you be so certain that this shaft, as you call it, was man-made?’ the reporter asked, an obvious question that Sean had anticipated.
‘The interior of its throat has been reinforced with a thin casing of granite – an igneous rock not native to the area. Its purpose, I assume, was to hold the shape intact and to prevent the passage from crumbling inward from erosion.’
‘And this, as you said, is a unique find?’ the reporter asked.
‘Most certainly, it’s a one-of-a-kind in every way. And would you believe that the oddity of its construction isn’t even the strangest part of it. You see, I believe that whoever sealed it up didn’t want it to be found.’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘The entire shaft was filled in with limestone,’ he replied, permitting himself the pleasure of smiling now that he’d found his groove. ‘A taxing and time-consuming labour unlike any I’ve encountered before. And near the surface, where it opens out – leaving a cavity approximately two metres in depth – more of the Burren’s indigenous stone was laid in place as a means to keep it hidden from any wandering eyes. Over the centuries, this eroded from the elements, leaving the pit that led me to making this discovery. As cruel as time can be, sometimes it does do us a kindness.’
He felt like a charlatan claiming it as his own. But maybe Ash was right. Sean had no credentials and no scroll to vouch for his expertise, but the Kilmartin name was still respected enough to make a difference.
‘How deep does this shaft go?’ the woman asked.
Sean glanced over at the drill, safely tucked out of the camera’s sight. ‘It’s too early to tell just yet but I should know more within the next twenty-four hours.’
He hoped to reach the cavern much sooner than that, but Sean didn’t want the camera crew hanging around after the interview. Once that drill started up again they might come to question his methods.
‘And what do you believe might be down there?’
The million-dollar question – the one he’d been waiting for.
‘Do you want the honest truth?’ Sean asked her, dramatising his solemnity, making the moment count. ‘I believe that what I’ve discovered is the last great vestige of our ancient history: proof that what we have treated for centuries as lore and fantasy is in fact more a part of our reality than we could possibly imagine. This is the missing link. This is what I’ve dedicated my life to finding, as did my father.’
‘Yes,’ the reporter said, visibly pleased that he’d segued into her last question. ‘You are, of course, the son of the late Professor David Kilmartin, a noted academic whose life’s work he dedicated to our nation’s rich cycle of history and myth. What do you think he would say if he were here to see you now?’
This question Sean had not anticipated.
He looked to Ash who simply shrugged her shoulders, comically flinching as if this were the sticky question that he’d brought upon himself. Sean was his father’s son in more ways than mere flesh and blood. Those same obsessions had led him to this moment. And had his mother been alive to see it, her heart would have surely broken.
‘I guess we’ll never know.’