A Book of Myths
shining of the sun on foam of the sea, and this was
claspt with great bands of yellow gold, and over her
shoulders was the rippling flood of her hair, the sprays
of which lightened into delicate fire, and made a mist
before him, in the which he could see her eyes like two
blue pools wherein purple shadows dreamed."
Fiona Macleod.
From that moment Naoise "gave his love to Deirdre above every other
creature," and their souls rushed together and were one for evermore.
It was for them the beginning of a perfect love, and so sure were they
of that love from the very first moment that it seemed as though they
must have been born loving one another.
Of that love they talked, of the anger of Conor when he knew that his
destined bride was the love of Naoise, and together they planned how
it was best for Deirdre to escape from the furious wrath of the king
who desired her for his own.
Of a sudden, the hands of Naoise gripped the iron-pointed javelin that
hung by his side, and drove it into a place where the snow weighed
down the bracken.
"Is it a wolf?" cried Deirdre.
And Naoise made answer: "Either a dead man, or the mark of where a man
has lain hidden thou wilt find under the bracken."
And when they went to look they found, like the clap of a hare, the
mark of where a man had lain hidden, and close beside the javelin that
was driven in the ground there lay a wooden-hilted knife.
Then said Naoise: "Well I knew that Conor would set a spy on my
tracks. Come with me now, Deirdre, else may I lose thee forever."
And with a glad heart Deirdre went with him who was to be her lord,
and Naoise took her to where his brothers awaited his coming. To
Deirdre, both Ainle and Ardan swiftly gave their lifelong allegiance
and their love, but they were full of forebodings for her and for
Naoise because of the certain wrath of Conor, the king.
Then said Naoise: "Although harm should come, for her dear sake I am
willing to live in disgrace for the rest of my days."
And Ardan and Ainle made answer: "Of a certainty, evil will be of it,
yet though there be, thou shalt not be under disgrace as long as we
shall be alive. We will go with her to another country. There is not
in Erin a king who will not bid us welcome."
Then did the Sons of Usna decide to cross the Sea of Moyle, and in
their own land of Alba to find a happy sanctuary. That night they
fled, and with them took three times fifty men, three times fifty
women, three times fifty horses, and three times fifty greyhounds. And
when they looked back to where they had had their dwelling, they saw
red flames against the deep blue sky of the night, and knew that the
vengeance of Conor had already begun. And first they travelled round
Erin from Essa to Beinn Etair,[16] and then in a great black galley
they set sail, and Deirdre had a heart light as the white-winged
sea-birds as the men pulled at the long oars and sang together a
rowing song, and she leaned on the strong arm of Naoise and saw the
blue coast-line of Erin fading into nothingness.
In the bay of Aros, on the eastern shores of the island of Mull, they
found their first resting-place, but there they feared treachery from
a lord of Appin. For the starry eyes of Deirdre were swift to discern
evil that the eyes of the Sons of Usna could not see. Thus they fared
onward until they reached the great sea-loch of Etive, with hills
around it, and Ben Cruachan, its head in mist, towering above it like
a watchman placed there by Time, to wait and to watch over the people
of those silent hills and lonely glens until Time should give place to
his brother, Eternity.
Joy was in the hearts of the three Sons of Usna when they came back to
the home of their fathers. Usna was dead, but beyond the Falls of Lora
was still the great dun--the vitrified fort--which he had built for
himself and for those who should follow him.
For Deirdre then began a time of perfect happiness. Naoise was her
heart, but very dear to her also were the brothers of Naoise, and each
of the three vied with one another in their acts of tender and loving
service. Their thrice fifty vassals had no love for Alba, and rejoiced
when their lord, Naoise, allowed them to return to Erin, but the Sons
of Usna were glad to have none to come between them and their serving
of Deirdre, the queen of their hearts. Soon she came to know well each
little bay, each beach, and each little lonely glen of Loch Etive, for
the Sons of Usna did not always stay at the dun which had been their
father's, but went a-hunting up the loch. At various spots on the
shores of Etive they had camping places, and at Dail-an-eas[17] they
built for Deirdre a sunny bower.
On a sloping bank above the waterfall they built the little nest,
thatched with the royal fern of the mountains, the red clay of the
pools, and with soft feathers from the breasts of birds. There she
could sit and listen to the murmur and drip of the clear water over
the mossy boulders, the splash of the salmon in the dark pools, and
see the distant silver of the loch. When the summer sun was hot on the
bog myrtle and heather, the hum of the wild bees would lull her to
sleep, and in autumn, when the bracken grew red and golden and the
rowan berries grew red as Deirdre's lips, her keen eyes would see the
stags grazing high up among the grey boulders of the mist-crowned
mountains, and would warn the brothers of the sport awaiting them. The
crow of the grouse, the belling of stags, the bark of the hill-fox,
the swish of the great wings of the golden eagle, the song of birds,
the lilt of running water, the complaining of the wind through the
birches--all these things made music to Deirdre, to whom all things
were dear.
"_Is tu mein na Dearshul agha_"--"The tenderness of heartsweet
Deirdre"--so runs a line in an old, old Gaelic verse, and it is always
of her tenderness as well as her beauty that the old _Oea_ speak.
Sometimes she would hunt the red deer with Naoise and his brothers, up
the lonely glens, up through the clouds to the silent mountain tops,
and in the evening, when she was weary, her three loyal worshippers
would proudly bear her home upon their bucklers.
So the happy days passed away, and in Erin the angry heart of Conor
grew yet more angry when tidings came to him of the happiness of
Deirdre and the Sons of Usna. Rumour came to him that the king of
Alba had planned to come against Naoise, to slay him, and to take
Deirdre for his wife, but that ere he could come the Sons of Usna and
Deirdre had sailed yet further north in their galley, and that there,
in the land of his mother, Naoise ruled as a king. And not only on
Loch Etive, but on Loch Awe and Loch Fyne, Loch Striven, Loch Ard,
Loch Long, Loch Lomond and all along the sea-loch coast, the fame of
the Sons of Usna spread, and the wonder of the beauty of Deirdre,
fairest of women.
And ever the hatred of Conor grew, until one day there came into his
mind a plan of evil by which his burning thirst for revenge might be
handsomely assuaged.
He made, therefore, a great feast, at which all the heroes of the Red
Branch were present. When he had done them every honour, he asked them
if they were content. As one man: "Well content indeed!" answered
they.
"And that is what I am not," said the king. Then with the guile of
fair words he told them that to him it was great sorrow that the three
heroes, with whose deeds the Western Isles and the whole of the north
and west of Alba were ringing, should not be numbered amongst his
friends, sit at his board in peace and amity, and fight for the
Ultonians like all the other heroes of the Red Branch.
"They took from me the one who would have been my wife," he said, "yet
even that I can forgive, and if they would return to Erin, glad would
my welcome be."
At these words there was great rejoicing amongst the lords of the Red
Branch and all those who listened, and Conor, glad at heart, said,
"My three best champions shall go to bring them back from their
exile," and he named Conall the Victorious, Cuchulainn, and Fergus,
the son of Rossa the Red. Then secretly he called Conall to him and
asked him what he would do if he were sent to fetch the Sons of Usna,
and, in spite of his safe-conduct, they were slain when they reached
the land of the Ultonians. And Conall made answer that should such a
shameful thing come to pass he would slay with his own hand all the
traitor dogs. Then he sent for Cuchulainn, and to him put the same
question, and, in angry scorn, the young hero replied that even Conor
himself would not be safe from his vengeance were such a deed of black
treachery to be performed.
"Well did I know thou didst bear me no love," said Conor, and black
was his brow.
He called for Fergus then, and Fergus, sore troubled, made answer that
were there to be such a betrayal, the king alone would be held sacred
from his vengeance.
Then Conor gladly gave Fergus command to go to Alba as his emissary,
and to fetch back with him the three brothers and Deirdre the
Beautiful.
"Thy name of old was Honeymouth," he said, "so I know well that with
guile thou canst bring them to Erin. And when thou shalt have returned
with them, send them forward, but stay thyself at the house of
Borrach. Borrach shall have warning of thy coming."
This he said, because to Fergus and to all the other of the Red
Branch, a _geasa_, or pledge, was sacrosanct. And well he knew that
Fergus had as one of his _geasa_ that he would never refuse an
invitation to a feast.
Next day Fergus and his two sons, Illann the Fair and Buinne the Red,
set out in their galley for the dun of the Sons of Usna on Loch Etive.
The day before their hurried flight from Erin, Ainle and Ardan had
been playing chess in their dun with Conor, the king. The board was of
fair ivory, and the chessmen were of red-gold, wrought in strange
devices. It had come from the mysterious East in years far beyond the
memory of any living man, and was one of the dearest of Conor's
possessions. Thus, when Ainle and Ardan carried off the chess-board
with them in their flight, after the loss of Deirdre, that was the
loss that gave the king the greatest bitterness. Now it came to pass
that as Naoise and Deirdre were sitting in front of their dun, the
little waves of Loch Etive lapping up on the seaweed, yellow as the
hair of Deirdre, far below, and playing chess at this board, they
heard a shout from the woods down by the shore where the hazels and
birches grew thick.
"That is the voice of a man of Erin!" said Naoise, and stopped in his
game to listen.
But Deirdre said, very quickly: "Not so! It is the voice of a Gael of
Alba."
Yet so she spoke that she might try to deceive her own heart, that
even then was chilled by the black shadow of an approaching evil. Then
came another shout, and yet a third. And when they heard the third
shout, there was no doubt left in their minds, for they all knew the
voice for that of Fergus, the son of Rossa the Red. And when Ardan
hastened down to the harbour to greet him, Deirdre confessed to Naoise
why she had refused at first to own that it was a voice from Erin that
she heard.
"I saw in a dream last night," she said, "three birds that flew hither
from Emain Macha, carrying three sips of honey in their beaks. The
honey they left with us, but took away three sips of blood."
And Naoise said: "What then, best beloved, dost thou read from this
dream of thine?"
And Deirdre said: "I read that Fergus comes from Conor with honeyed
words of peace, but behind his treacherous words lies death."
As they spake, Ardan and Fergus and his following climbed up the
height where the bog-myrtle and the heather and sweet fern yielded
their sweetest incense as they were wounded under their firm tread.