The Fostering of Niamh Ó Conaill
A Cursed Daughter Saved by Fire
Inside of heavy square of glass marked with the witchwords of a old preservation spell is a fragile looking piece of aged illuminated manuscript. Frayed so heavily at the edges that the intricate border of knots is almost lost, the ink on its surface has faded until most of its Classical Gaelic text has become illegible. The only part of the document still clear is a rectangular shaped illustration across the top, showing a woman in a bed handing a baby off to a man. There are knives laying across the stark red surface of the covers atop the woman, the man is wreathed in flames at the shoulders, and the babe drips blood onto the floor. A small plaque attached to the box declares that it is the official record acknowledging the fostering of Niamh Ó Conaill, daughter of Marie of the Smith clan, by Rohan Hancóc upon her birth.
- A notation of an entry from Tirlagh Hancóc's personal journal of a meeting he and his cousin, Rohan Hancóc, had with a visiting hunter in October of 1638. It does not name the hunter herself but details that an oath was made to protect her or those descended from her if they came asking for help from the sect, giving them her own personal hunter's blade as payment.
- A notation of an entry from the journal of the steward of the Dún Másc staff in June of 1653. It details the burial of a woman - a hunter - who arrived in the night two months before covered in blood and bearing a child, both of them tainted by vampiric blood according to the witches there that night. There is also a notation that Rohan Hancóc paid particular attention to the woman despite his wife and son, tending to her personally until the day she gave birth. A third notation follows beneath those two, only briefly detailing that Rohan Hancóc wielded the blade that killed the hunter and that her first name was Marie.
- A notation made in the public record book of the castle by the steward of the Dún Másc staff in the year 1700 during the first meeting of the two halves of the sect after the split in 1646. Séarlas Hancóc, who had gone with those who left Ireland for Scotland, was noted to have been kicked out of Dún Másc entirely after he got into a shouting match with Cahir Hancóc over his adopted sister - a blood cursed.
- A notion of an entry from the personal journal of Thomas Hancock, the great-great-great grandson of Arte Hancóc, from 1845. It details a meeting that he had with Niamh Ó Conaill alongside his father Angus Hancock where the full sordid history of the woman he had called Aunt for his whole life had been laid out. This is one of the few records outside of the official record of Niamh's fostering under Rohan Hancóc that mentions Marie Smith by name.
Point of Interest
"Cinaed knew his history, clan and sect, because it was one of his passions. Even as a child at home in Ireland, he had spent hours in the library at Dún Másc, reading over the old histories and records to the exasperation of his mother and his gran's delight. He had stumbled across mentions of a oath that had been made to a hunter, Marie of the Smith clan, and that her daughter had been adopted by Rohan Hancóc after the hunter's torture at the hands of Cael Ward. Her daughter who was the birth sister to Darien O'Connell - formerly Bloody Ó Conaill - and Damon O'Connell, both of Issuru's bloodline.
He had thought it was just a story. Mom had said it wasn't real, that of course their family hadn't adopted a blood cursed."
Excerpt from Drowning in Family Secrets
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