The Last Mound in Ravensdale Woods

The November sky hung like a burial shroud over Ravensdale woods as it hunkered down just south of Enniscorthy, County Wexford. 1919 was a year of joy and sorrow; the war was over, and families could be reunited again as soldiers returned from the conflict. Equally, many families would mourn the missing loved ones, lost to the blood-soaked mud of far-off fields. Helen Colfer, now 12, picked her way along the narrowing path that led into the heart of the woods, her worn boots squelching in the boggy earth. Gnarled oaks twisted overhead like arthritic fingers, their bare branches clawing at the grey light that dripped from the gloomy sky. She had fled the family cottage in anger, her mother's harsh words about her "foolish notions" still ringing in her ears. Since Da's passing in France, Mother had taken to the gin. She was increasingly angry and bitter and was often too drunk to cook meals or clean house. Helen stopped and looked about; the familiar comfort of the woods that she had explored since she was seven felt different today, watchful, malevolent.

Helen continued on the path, her anger stamped out one muddy, water-filled footprint at a time. Mist rose from the ground in ghostly tendrils, and with each step, the path grew fainter, brambles reaching out like grasping hands to snag her rough dress. Ravens perched in the skeletal branches above, their black eyes following her progress with malevolent curiosity. Normal forest sounds, rustling leaves, scurrying creatures, the distant lowing of cattle, had faded to an oppressive silence that pressed against her eardrums like cold, damp hands.

Helen paused again, her breath forming pale clouds in the suddenly frigid air. Familiar landmarks had vanished. The old stone wall that marked the boundary of Rafferty's farm, the lightning-split oak that served as her usual turning point; all gone, as if the woods had swallowed them whole. Her heart began to hammer against her ribs as she realised the terrible truth: she was lost. Maybe she had not walked far enough; maybe just a while longer on this path until something familiar could be seen.

A circular clearing opened ahead, dominated by an earthen mound that seemed to gently glow with its own sickly light. This barrow was old beyond memory, covered in moss so unnaturally green it hurt to look upon. A perfect ring of pale worn rocks encircled its base like tombstones, and the air itself tasted of copper and ages-old decay.

Helen's grandmother's voice echoed in her memory: "Never disturb the fairy forts, child. The Aos Sí do not forgive trespass." But even as ancestral dread crawled up her spine, she found herself drawn forward as if by invisible threads. The mound seemed to shimmer in the gathering darkness, its surface gently rippling like water.

She tried to stop, to flee this cursed place, but her foot caught on a hidden root. Her hands flew out to break her fall, and her palm struck the mound's surface with a wet slap. Earth gave way beneath her touch like rotting fruit, revealing a hollow darkness within. Soil as black as the darkest sin clung to her fingernails like spoiled earth from a grave.

From the violated depths came a sound that turned her blood to ice: the rapid scampering of feet on stone, multiplying and echoing as if a thousand tiny angry dancers had begun an infernal jig. Helen scrambled backwards, but the clearing had changed. The path she had entered the clearing on was gone, replaced by an impenetrable wall of thorns that seemed to glisten like angry feral teeth in the shadows.

The scampering grew louder, more insistent, and the temperature plummeted until her breath came in ragged, cloudy gasps. The mound began to crack and split, dark fissures spreading across its surface like a spider's web. From these wounds in the earth seeped a darkness deeper than the winter night, a blackness that held weight and malice.

He emerged not as the diminutive figure of children's tales, but human-sized and terrible to behold. Helen, whose Da had been 6 feet 6", thought this figure was at least 7 feet tall. His face was carved from gnarled oak, all sharp angles and deep furrows, with eyes like stagnant bog water that reflected no light. His clothes seemed woven from shadows and moss, shifting and changing with each movement. When he spoke, his voice was the grinding of millstones, the harsh snap of breaking bones.

"Child of mortals," he intoned, the words falling like sharp rocks into the silence, "you have violated my sacred ground, and payment is due."

Helen's knees buckled, but she forced herself to remain standing, though every instinct screamed at her to prostrate herself before this primordial horror. The leprechaun, for that's surely what he was, was nothing like the harmless, silly creatures of childish folklore who cleaned shoes and granted wishes that never worked out. This tall nightmare fae circled her with predatory grace.

"Your clumsy hands have broken the seal of our dwelling place," he continued, his terrible gaze never leaving her face. "For a thousand years I have guarded this threshold, and in your ignorance, you have let in the cold stinking air of the mortal world."

His lips curved in a smile that held no warmth, only the cruel anticipation of a pleasant meal. The smile widened, and Helen was faced by a mouth filled with hungry teeth, thin and sharp as needles, bone white and glistening with wetness.

"For this trespass, you will pay with your life, feeding our realm until you are nothing but bones and memory scattered on the wind." His voice dropped to a whisper that somehow carried more menace than any shout. "But first, run, mortal child. Give us sport before we claim you."

Thorns parted, revealing a narrow space crowded with brambles and tripping roots. Terror gave Helen wings. She bolted into the woods, branches tearing at her clothes and skin, roots rising from the earth to trip her. Behind her came the sound of pursuit; not footsteps, but that horrible scampering, multiplying until it seemed the very forest floor seethed with movement.

Woods shifted around her like a living nightmare. Paths appeared and vanished, familiar trees rearranged themselves into alien configurations. She ran until her lungs burned and her legs trembled, but always she found herself back at the violated mound, the leprechaun waiting with that awful, teeth-filled smile.

"You cannot escape what you have awakened," his voice echoed from everywhere and nowhere. Trees bent at impossible angles to block her path; solid ground turned to sucking bog beneath her feet. With each breath, the very atmosphere seemed to claw at her throat and burn her lungs.

Hours passed, or perhaps minutes; time had no meaning in this place. Helen collapsed at the base of a gnarled hawthorn, her dress torn to rags, her hands and legs bloody from razor-sharp thorns. Despair settled over her like a funeral pall. She would die here, and her family would never know what became of her.

He stood before her, savouring her defeat. "Serve us willingly," he offered, "and in time your death will be swift. Resist, and we will drain you slowly over decades, keeping you alive to suffer."

Through her tears, Helen looked up at her tormentor; really looked at him for the first time. His clothes, she realised, were not just old but tattered, held together by will alone. His form flickered at the edges, as if he were fading. And in those terrible bog-water eyes, she saw something that made her heart clench with unexpected pity.

Loneliness. Profound, aching loneliness that had festered for centuries.

"You've been alone so long," she whispered, her voice barely audible above the wind. "When did another of your kind last visit this place?"

He stopped mid-threat, his face contorting with shock. In all his centuries of dealing with mortals, none had ever spoken to him with anything but fear or greed.

"The mound is empty, isn't it?" Helen continued, struggling to her feet. "You're guarding nothing but memories."

"Silence!" he roared, but there was something desperate in his fury now. "You know nothing of our ways!"

"I know loneliness," Helen said softly. "I know what it's like to be forgotten, to have no one who understands." She took a trembling step towards him. "I could visit sometimes. Bring news of the world outside. You don't have to be alone."

His weathered features twisted with suspicion and something that might have been hope. "Mortal promises are worthless. You seek only to escape."

"Then bind me to it," Helen said, and meant it. "Make it a true oath, by whatever power you possess."

For a long moment, the clearing was silent except for the whisper of wind through bare, sleeping branches. His terrible gaze bored into her mind, searching for deception, for the greed and selfishness he had come to expect from her kind. Instead, he found only genuine compassion, a light so pure it made him recoil.

Cruelty slowly faded from his features, revealing the profound weariness beneath. "The others departed long ago," he said, his voice now barely a gravelled whisper. "I remain because... someone must remember."

Helen nodded, understanding flooding through her. He was not a monster but a guardian, the last keeper of forgotten history. "I'll return each month," she promised. "I'll bring stories of the mortal world and listen to your tales of old."

A sardonic smile formed on his face. "If ye break your promise, I will take half your life in payment, mind me now. My kind swear on blood and collect upon the same."

A pact was sealed with her blood upon the mound's wounded earth, the magic binding them together across the gulf between mortal and fae. His gift was her life; safe passage from the woods and protection from other supernatural beings that might wish her harm.

A clear path opened before her, leading towards the distant lights of Enniscorthy. As she walked away, Helen looked back once to see him silhouetted against his timeless mound, no longer terrifying but unutterably sad.

She emerged from Ravensdale woods as the church bells tolled six o'clock, forever changed by her encounter with the darkness. Each month thereafter, she kept her promise, walking into the woods to bring companionship to a primaeval guardian who had chosen duty over departure, solitude over abandonment.

Her mother, stewed in drink, never noticed the change in her, how she grew quiet and thoughtful, how she seemed to age beyond her years. But Helen Colfer carried her secret gladly, for she had learned that sometimes kindness succeeds where cleverness fails, and that even the darkest hearts can be touched by the simple gift of understanding. Her grandmother, who was no stranger to the fae, would have agreed.

In the end, it was not wit or courage that saved her life, but compassion, the rarest magic of all. For four years, Helen kept her sacred promise faithfully, finding solace in their strange friendship across the divide between worlds.

Helen never missed a month until she was seventeen, and then boys and the world of work grew more important, and her visits grew less frequent and shorter. She had never seen the leprechaun since the bargain had been struck, but had simply sat next to the mound and told her stories. By the time she was twenty, she had forgotten the promise and never visited the mound at all.

By the time she was thirty-five and in labour with her first child, the leprechaun claimed his due. The Aos Sí are patient in their justice, waiting for the moment of greatest cruelty to collect their payment. She, like all those others who had struck a bargain with his kind and failed to live up to the terms, gave up her owed share of life and was gone, leaving her husband to grieve and her son without the care of a mother's love.