Page 29 of Heart of the Wren
“It’s okay.” He knew what I was thinking and guided my finger. “I had an inkling about what might happen so I made sure I was ready.” He steadied himself against the stone wall.
I spat into my open hand and massaged my dick, making sure the head was good and wet. I took a moment to admire the sight of Dara’s tree trunk legs and beefy, muscular arse, and then I pressed myself against his pink hole and gently pushed. While he’d been complimentary about it, thetruth is I’m not the biggest down there — distinctly average, in fact — but he gasped as I slid inside. He thrust his hips, again and again. He moaned loudly, calling my name and begging me not to stop. As if I had any intention of doing so. The snow pelted down and the wind howled outside but should a hurricane land on top of us, I wasn’t going to stop.
Having Dara’s soft flesh pressed against me felt like everything I was missing from his life. The velvety sensation gripping my cock, the slaps of my thrusting, the groans of his pleasure—it was all so perfect, all I’d imagined and more. The snow fell faster, the winds roared, the bodhráns beat, the harps played, and the singing of four hundred years past filled the air once more. The sky turned night to day, to night again. Torches long, long extinguished flared to life and streaked by. For a brief moment, colourful tapestries flapped on the walls and paintings of serious-looking noblemen hung in elaborate frames, and then were gone. The history of Ross Castle flashed all around us in a kaleidoscope of colour and noise, and then I shuddered, and swore, and finished. And all was quiet.
Dara rose, grinning from ear to ear. I wrapped my arms around him and we kissed eagerly, as if it were the first time, as if it might be the last. I grabbed his fat, pink dick, massaging the bright red head with my thumb, then tugged it until he shot his load over the ancient ground of the castle outbuilding.
Standing with our trousers around our ankles, our energy spent, we laughed and retrieved our clothes. The chill of the day found us once again and we shivered. The snow had finally started to ease and we decided to make a run for the car. As we carefully scaled the front gate, I tried to focuson how I’d felt in the castle. How I’d enjoyed the sex. How I’d relished the feel of Dara’s body against mine. How I loved his company. And yet. The other thought remained. The doubt. The suspicion. What if Dara really had used his magic to make this all happen?
Chapter 18
LORCAN
DUE TO the snow, we got back to the farm much later than I’d anticipated. Carol and Eddie were snuggled up on the couch watching telly, so after I told them to behave themselves, Dara and I braved the weather and walked into the village for a pint.
Casey’s was packed. We settled in by the door as people stood around chatting about the upcoming hurling match. Bullseye was in fine form, doing the rounds of the place.
Dara went to the bar, nodding to everyone onhis way. He made a point of speaking to the Monk but of course he got no response. I caught myself staring at Dara’s bum and wondered if anyone noticed.
“Have you heard?” Bullseye shouted to me on his way over. “Paul Regan is after emigrating to Spain. He got a job offer yesterday. Closed his butcher shop and packed his bags.”
“He’s gone already?”
“With the wife and kids. Can’t believe it. Another one left the country in the lurch. He’ll not be back.” He slurped his Guinness. “We’ll all have to go into town for our meat now. You know us and Cormac MacShane are the only ones left from our class in school? Every last one of them born here, educated here, and gone abroad. It’s an awful shame, so it is. And worst of all, it means we’re a man down for the hurling.
The two pubs in Tullycreena had a long-running rivalry which oscillated between friendly and heated. Generally, people who drank in one dare not set foot in the other, and any who did were treated with suspicion. Newcomers to the area were often unaware that whichever pub they drank in first would be the one they’d frequent for the rest of their lives. The rivalry came to a head every year with the annual hurling match. Patrons of both pubs would put forward a team who met on the GAA pitch on the first Saturday in December. The only thing at stake was honour and bragging rights for the following year. Someone once suggested getting an actual cup made, with the winners of each year engraved on it. The idea was dismissed as “notions” — the most devastating thing any idea could be labelled.
Dara returned, drinks in hand. “What’s this?”
“The annual pub hurling match. Between Casey’s and the LongBridle Lounge. Are we going to drop out?”
Bullseye blanched. “We are in our bollocks! Should I be the only man on the field, I’ll not drop out! Sure wasn’t I the one who scored the winning point last year? And no one’s ever beaten my record from ’78.”
“I could fill in,” Dara said. “If you’re stuck for players.”
“You?” Bullseye looked him up and down. “Have you played before?”
“A little bit, here and there.”
Bullseye wrinkled his nose. “Well, I suppose you’re better than nothing.”
???
A brisk walk in the chill December air would sober us up, or so Dara had said. Bullseye took some convincing. I had to corner him in the jacks when he was washing his hands to try and find out why he’d been so frosty towards Dara.
“I don’t know him,” Bullseye said. “Youdon’t know him.”
Cormac came in and stood at the urinal trough, belching loudly.
“Dara’s decent,” I said. “Give him a chance. Come on back to the farm, and we’ll have a few drinks. I’ll make sandwiches.”
A good ham sandwich with mustard was Bullseye’s weakness, especially after a few drinks, and so we strode along the lane, towards home.
Dara regaled us with tales of his time smuggling bottles ofpoitinacross the border into Northern Ireland and how he’d nearly been shot for his efforts. “Missed me bythatmuch.” He held his thumb and forefinger up aninch apart. “I was a bit slimmer back then, of course, not much of a target for them.” He slapped his belly twice and laughed. “They’d find it’s easier now though!”
I belched. “Did you say they’dfind a sleazier cow?” I slowed my pace. “It’s gettin’ fierce foggy, fellas.Hah, it’s like a rhyme.” I wobbled a bit. The fog rolled from the fields and within minutes I could barely see my hands in front of my face. “Lads?”
I stopped. The hedges on either side of the lane had been swallowed by the fog, not even the trees could be seen. “Lads? Where are yis?”
