Miss Julianne watched in dismay as Miss Helena, the Justice Minister, came such a cropper following the Dublin riots that Thursday night. As far as Julianne was concerned, it was a mistake to entrust such an inexperienced politician with such a sensitive Ministry, and alarm bells should have been ringing when the rank and file Gardai  voted no confidence in the Police Commissioner. And as for the Minister’s  hate crime legislation, what a gift to the next Government- of which she is so unlikely  to be a part-no great loss, of course. As she watched on T.V. Julianne shook her head in disbelief when she heard the minister describing her fellow citizens as “scumbags” and “thugs”, as if that would do anything other than alienate more people. At that Miss Julianne decided  that an emergency coven meeting was in order and scheduled one for the following Wednesday night.

Agatha opened the meeting, which incidentally was very well attended, with a call to action. “Ladies, we need to do something, the Justice Minister is floundering and our Leader seems to have lost all interest in trying to keep the show on the road and it looks like he will just throw in the towel and let the Opposition take over at the next election. Why, we even have public representatives calling for intifada in Gaza. If only we could have an intifada against wokeness here! Has anyone got any ideas?” Miss Agatha looked  around the table to see if there was anyone anxious to speak. There was absolutely not a murmur from anyone around the table.Julianne piped up, “Come now, anyone got any ideas? Agatha surely you’ve seen situations like this before, have you anything to suggest?” But Agatha just shrugged her shoulders and in a weary voice said, “Julianne, we live in strange times and I really have nothing to say to the unfolding chasm opening up before us. When our dear leader peopled his cabinet with inexperienced sycophants we should have known that this situation was inevitable. No, I can’t think of anything to avert the situation where Mary Louise will become the first female Leader of our country.”

There was a collective gasp around the table, with everyone trying to speak at the same time. “No no no, we haven’t prepared for this eventually, Sinn Fein, appointing the Justice Minister, and Garda Commissioner and Judges with access to all the files in the various departments AND the power to redact whatever they wanted AND with the help of the new hate crime legislation allowing the Garda to access homes without a warrant to size computers and phones on the foot of a complaint from anybody, why the situation would be unbearable,” said Julianna, “we really do need to do something, think of our own records, if the wrong people got hold of them.” 

A shudder went around the table.

         “Hm, I see what you mean, I certainly wouldn’t like the minutes of every meeting we’ve had be scrutinised by the thought police. How long have we got, do you think?” 

        “About a year, I reckon.”

        “ Well, for starters we’d better find a safe home for our records, and all new communication between ourselves must to be in person, or else hand written notes delivered by carrier pigeon, which reminds me, we need to recruit a new carrier pigeon trainer, can I leave that with you, Julianna, and I’ll see about finding a new home for our records.” And with that Agatha, lost that air of despondency which characterised her demeanour at the start of the meeting, and her bearing was a lot more resolute looking.

           But when Agatha got home that evening the cold chill of insecurity coiled her innards. Brexit was just in the tuppenney halfpenny place compared to the thought of a Nationalist party full of left leaning and tax raising spenders some of whom had links to organised crime. And in a country so dependent on corporation tax… all those years nurturing foreign direct investment… to think it might all slip away … and not even having the comfort of free speech to warn the public … without the risk of thought police checking one’s musings. Agatha had a blinding headache at the thought of it all. She tossed and tuned all night, but by morning she came to the conclusion that the most urgent item on the agenda was finding a secure place for the records of the coven. She saw a documentary once about people who when faced with persecution and with precious records they wanted to preserve simply divided the records among themselves and each memorised a section, then they destroyed the written word and when times were safe again, as usually happened, they got together and restored the records.

           But when Agatha got home that evening the cold chill of insecurity coiled her innards. Brexit was just in the tuppenney halfpenny place compared to the thought of a Nationalist party full of left leaning and tax raising spenders some of whom had links to organised crime. And in a country so dependent on corporation tax… all those years nurturing foreign direct investment… to think it might all slip away … and not even having the comfort of free speech to warn the public … without the risk of thought police checking one’s musings. Agatha had a blinding headache at the thought of it all. She tossed and tuned all night, but by morning she came to the conclusion that the most urgent item on the agenda was finding a secure place for the records of the coven. She saw a documentary once about people who when faced with persecution and with precious records they wanted to preserve simply divided the records among themselves and each memorised a section, then they destroyed the written word and when times were safe again, as usually happened, they got together and restored the records.

But Agatha knew that the demographic was against them, the age profile was unfavourable. Why, half the coven members had trouble remembering where they parked their brooms when they went shopping! 

How on earth could they memorise book loads of spells, recipes and campaign plans? It just wasn’t practical. Mindful of her advice to her colleagues about maintaining a low profile, she took a broom trip over the hill to Julianne’s cottage to discuss the situation.

     Julianne was delighted to see her, she too had been racking her brains to think of a place to stow the records with no joy.

     “Where will we store those records, Agatha, I’m at my wits end.”

      “Two minds with but a single thought, dear, I wondered if we could manage memorising them and then burning them, what do you think?”

Julianne looked aghast at the prospect, 

      “You must be joking! There has to be another solution!” 

       ‘Burying them, perhaps? Where though?”

Julianne put down her mug of coffee, “Mh, the only place I can think of is the old vault in the old church, I don’t suppose the ghosts there will talk about what they read!”

Agatha gasped in surprise, she hadn’t thought of that. Well, there was hope for the coven yet with bright sparks like Julianne  in their midst.

        “How will we get them in without being noticed?”

        “Could we restart having our monthly meetings up in Dysart, Its hardly likely anyone would notice our bringing the odd book up with us”

        “Far too cold up there for monthly meetings, lets just make it, Winter and Summer solstice and Spring and Autumn equinox. We have a year,  remember, four trips should do it.”

        Having decided on their strategy, their immediate concerns  were making sure the vault was in a proper state to store those records and letting the others know their plans. Now the vault was underneath the chancel of the Old Church ruin and accessed through a hole in the ground. Agatha well  remembered how she used to shimmy up and down that hole in her youth, but wasn’t too confident of her ability to do so any longer. “How ironic” she thought to herself, “this same location was used as a hideout for the old IRA and here we are now using the same location to hide records from the people who consider themselves heirs to those same people.”

She and Julianna took a broom trip to the old church and Young Julianna, a born shimmier if ever there was one, had no difficulty accessing the vault and she reported that the location was ideal, dry with  plenty of room. A few shelves, a desk and a chair and it would make the perfect library. With the plan in place, they left the vault and headed home and made arrangements to let the others know. 

     “This is a wonderful opportunity for us to sort out and archive all our records, Agatha, I’d enjoy that job.”

     “Bless you, dear, I’d hoped you’d volunteer for it.”

     “ Do you think the souls of the folk resting in the vault will mind us using their home for this?”

     “Oh I doubt it very much, I often heard that the rebels who used the vault to hide out during the troubles never feared the people lying next to them just the live people walking over the field.”

Neither of them noticed the solitary figure on the Derry road watching their movements. And after they had left, there was another soul shimmying down into the vault. It was the Warlock John/Witch Joan, who having been turned down for membership of the Dysart coven continued to frequent the place, a bit like Enoch Burke and Wilson’s Hospital, he/she just couldn’t let go! He/she was determined to fight that Coven membership refusal, he/she just wasn’t certain whether he /she wanted to just draw attention to the injustice of the refusal- after all trans witches were real witches, or if he/she wanted to get revenge on Agatha who had written that letter of refusal. He didn’t notice anything amiss in the vault, not the sudden draught that seemed to come from nowhere, but when he left that cold breeze seemed to coalesce around some bones on the second shelf to the left of the opening. 

      As John/Joan walked back to the road with a lighter step, he resolved to keep a close eye on the the ladies and maybe he/she could kill two birds

with the one stone depending on what they were up to and was completely unaware of the forces he/she had awakened in the vault with his/her malevolent intentions.

      As the Winter solstice was fast approaching the ladies had very little time to gather their books and records for storage in the vault. Agatha went round to each member of her little group and told them of her plans and arranged for them to hold their meeting in the old church on the night of the 21st and to bring their Book of Shadows and any any other records with them.It caused quite a stir as they hadn’t held a meeting there for years. Earnestina volunteered to make the mulled wine and Dorothy the mince pies. From a distance, John/Joan watched the activities, envy etched on his/her every feature, he/she longed to be part of that group. He/she was on the lookout that night of the 21st suspecting that that was the most likely time they would make their move and watching as each light was quenched in  all the cottages and he/she could just make out witches on brooms streaming through the clear night air. Living closest to the church he/she was able to get there first and positioned him/herself on top of the bell tower for a good view of the site.

You know, Warlock/Witch John/Joan had been going through quite a difficult time in the previous couple of years. After a moderately successful career as a Warlock in Dublin where he even rose to the position of Deputy Treasurer he relocated to Co. Laois because of its more favourable housing costs, but what he didn’t realize was that whatever Laois’s sporting prowess or lack thereof, when it came to Magick the wizards of Laois played Senior Hurling! He hadn’t a hope of getting on a team of Warlocks here, hence his decision to transition, as he felt that surely the Witches would welcome him. When his/her application was rejected by Agatha he/she was devastated and he/she made it his/her life’s mission to make people accept that trans witches were real witches. The difficulty with this position was that he/she found this mission so all consuming that he/she took little notice of anything else taking place in the world. The consequences of a change of government which so exercised the witches had no place in his/her consciousness.

       So when John/Joan noticed that the witches were all carrying books and notes into that vault he/she was at a complete loss as to what was afoot. He/she was so absorbed in watching the operation of shadow book transfer that he/she leaned forward and darn it! He/she slid off his/her perch and came tumbling down into the body of the church with such an almighty clatter that the roof of the vault shook.

What was that?” Said Agatha

No one volunteered to go and find out. So with her customary resolution and courage, Agatha went outside and walking around the perimeter of the church she called: “Hello, anyone there, anybody needing help?”

 John/Joan crouched in the corner of the old church hoping to escape detection but the moonlight betrayed him and Agatha spied him as she came through the tower entrance.

     “Good heavens John, what on earth are you doing here?”

     “I saw lights up here from my kitchen window so I thought I’d better investigate.”

Agatha thought quickly, now that John was here the coven would have to change their plans, but she still had a trick up her sleeve.

      “ Do you want to know what the coven are doing up here on this Winter solstice eve, John.?”

     “Well, if you choose to tell me that’s your business, but I’m not committed to secrecy of course, not being a coven member,” John/Joan replied with a smirk.

     “Come with me then, and I’ll fill you in,” said Agatha, as she lighted the way back towards the vault for them.

And when the rest of the coven saw John/Joan slither into the vault behind Agatha, they were so shocked that they completely failed to notice the sudden drop in temperature and cold draught that came from the second shelf to the left of the opening.While the ladies were recovering their sangfroid, Agatha grabbed John/Joan’s left hand and placed it on that shelf, the scream he/she  let out of him/her rattled the vault, but Agatha held it firm.

      “ I don’t know if you were aware, John,  but we arranged the internment of the bones of baby John, the son of our founderess , Miss Sophia, here during the summer solstice when the tower repair was complete, and goodness knows they have acted like a guardian to the site since,” Agatha said with a bright smile, “only those who swear fealty to the group have left this place intact.”

 

John/Joan was on his knees whimpering with the pain at this stage,       “Anything, anything, Agatha, please release me,” he said, failing to notice that Agatha had already released him but his hand was still clutching that shelf as though it had a life of its own.

     “Well, ladies, this does present us with a bit of a dilemma, what are we to do?” 

     Earnestina was the first to recover from the shock of what had just transpired. 

    “You know, we have had Warlocks as honorary members, consulting for the group, in the past, but clearly a transitioning Warlock just doesn’t fit the bill, we can’t have someone who is confused about their identity. Pity!”

    “WAIT, WAIT,” screamed john/Joan, “ I’m only questioning!”

    “ Well, you’ll need to find the answers within yourself before that shelf will release your hand, John,” said Agatha.

“Please, please listen, I only wanted to transition because there was no place for me in the Warlocks coven, and I heard you had a vacancy, it’s just been a social transition I’ve taken no potions nor had any surgery, I swear it! I could be that honorary member to you, the most loyal you ever imagined!”

     “But what if someone teases you about being a member of a witches coven, will you be tempted to go on with your transitioning then? Can we trust you to remember your place, we could do with a warlock to consult, not a make believe witch trying to compete.”

      “Ladies, please, please, take me as your warlock consultant, I’ll do all that’s expected from one in such a role,” and John could feel the pain in his hand easing ever so slightly as he spoke the words.

       “”Better have him in than out, I suppose,” said Earnestina, “after all, an honorary male member worked fine for The Derry Girls, it could be the answer, and we do have that second shelf to the left, if things don’t work out!”

And so the ladies got some help moving those records, I’ll let you know how things evolve.