Thestory I will tell you now, Peterkin, is more beautiful, though not so old.
In all the regions of the Gael throughout Scotland, and in every isle, from Arran and Islay in the south, to Iona in the west, and Tiree in mid-sea, and the Outer Hebrides, there is no story of the old far-off days so well known as that of Darthool.
She it is who in Ireland is called Deirthrê or Deirdrê; and in Ireland to this day there is not a cowherd who has not heard of Deirdrê.
Her beauty filled the old world of the Gael with a sweet, wonderful, and abiding rumour. The name of Deirdrê has been as a lamp to a thousand poets. In a land of heroes and brave and beautiful women, how shall one name survive?Yet to this day and for ever, men will remember Deirdrê, the torch of men’s thoughts, and Grainne whom Diarmid loved and died for, and Maev who ruled mightily, and Fand whose white feet trod faery dew, and many another. For beauty is the most excellent sweet thing in all the world, and though of it a few perish, and a myriad die from knowing nothing of it, beneath it the nations of men move forward as their one imperishable star. Therefore he who adds to the beauty of the world is of the sons of God. He who destroys or debases beauty is of the darkness, and shall have darkness for his reward.
The day will come, Peterkin, when you will find a rare and haunting music in these names. They will bring you a lost music, a lost world, and imperishable beauty. You will dwell with them, till you love Deirdrê as did the sons of Usna, and would die for her, or live to see her starry eyes; till you look longingly upon the Grainne of your dreams, and cry as Diarmid did, when he asked her, as death menaced them, if even yet she would go back, and she answered that she would not: “Then go forward, O Grainne!”
Many poets and shennachies have relatedthis tale. I have heard it given now this way, and now that; sometimes with new names and scenes, sometimes with other beginnings and endings; but at heart it is ever the same. Nor does it matter whether the father of Deirdrê be Felim, the warrior bard of the Ultonians, or Malcolm the Harper, or any other, or whether the fair and sweet beauty of the world be called Deirdrê or Darthool. But as here in our own land she is called Darthool, that I will call her.
I will tell the story as it is told in the old chronicles, and to this day, and if I add aught to it, that shall only be what I myself heard when I was young, and had from the lips of an old woman, Barabal Mac-Aodh, who was my nurse. She came out of Tiree or Coll, I forget which.
*****
Well, in the ancient dim days when Emania was the capital of the Ultonians, the fair and wonderful capital of the kingdom of Ulster, and before Maev, the queen of the south, had buried the chivalry of the north in dust and blood, there came into the realm of Concobar the Ultonian king, whom some call Conor and some Connachar, three of the noblest and fairest of the youths of the world. These arethey who then bore, and in all the years since have borne, the name of the Sons of Usna, who was himself, some say, a feudal king, in Alba.11
It is because of these three heroes that this story I am relating is often called the story of the Sons of Usna. But first, I have that to tell you which precedes the time when Nathos,12and Ailne, and Ardan, stood in the house of Concobar the high king.
This Concobar was a great prince. He was known as Concobar MacNessa, for though he was the son of Fatna the Wise, son of Ross the Red, son of Rory, Nessa his mother was a famous queen, and had indeed by her beauty and her wiles brought Concobar to the overlordship of Uladh13when he was yet a youth.
In many of the tales of the old far-off days, you will hear the rumour of the splendour and wonder of the city of Emania. In Concobar’s time it was called Emain Macha, for it had been built by a great and beautiful queen—Macha Mongruay, Macha of the Ruddy Hair. A thousand times have poets chanted of Emain Macha, and in the ancient days the bardsloved to sing also of Macha herself. Here is an old far-off lay:
“O ’tis a good house, and a palace fair, the dun of Macha,And happy with a great household is Macha there;Druids she had, and bards, minstrels, harpers, knights,Hosts of servants she had, and wonders beautiful and rare,But nought so wonderful and sweet as her face, queenly fair,O Macha of the Ruddy Hair!The colour of her great dun is the shining whiteness of lime,And within it are floors strewn with green rushes and couches white,Soft wondrous silks and blue gold-claspt mantles and fursAre there, and jewelled golden cups for revelry by night:Thy grianan of gold and glass is filled with sunshine-light,O Macha, queen by day, queen by night!Beyond the green portals, and the brown and red thatch of wingsStriped orderly, the wings of innumerous stricken birds,A wide shining floor reaches from wall to wall, wondrously carvenOut of a sheet of silver, whereon are graven swordsIntricately ablaze; mistress of many hoardsArt thou, Macha of few words!Fair indeed is thy couch, but fairer still is thy throne,A chair it is, all of a blaze of wonderful yellow gold:There thou sittest, and watchest the women going to and fro,Each in garments fair and with long locks twisted fold in fold:With the joy that is in thy house men would not grow old,O Macha, proud, austere, cold.Of a surety there is much joy to be had of thee and thine,There in the song-sweet sunlit bowers in that place:Wounded men might sink in sleep and be well contentSo to sleep, and to dream perchance, and know no other graceThan to wake and look betimes on thy proud queenly face,O Macha of the Proud Face!And if there be any here who wish to know more of this wonder,Go, you will find all as I have shown, as I have said:From beneath its portico thatched with wings of birds blue and yellowReaches a green lawn, where a fount is fedFrom crystal and gems: of crystal and gold each bedIn the house of Macha of the Ruddy Head.In that great house where Macha the queen has her pleasaunceThere is everything in the whole world that a man might desire.God is my witness that if I say little it is for this,That I am grown faint with wonder, and can no more admire,But say this only, that I live and die in the fireOf thine eyes, O Macha, my desire,With thine eyes of fire!”14
“O ’tis a good house, and a palace fair, the dun of Macha,And happy with a great household is Macha there;Druids she had, and bards, minstrels, harpers, knights,Hosts of servants she had, and wonders beautiful and rare,But nought so wonderful and sweet as her face, queenly fair,O Macha of the Ruddy Hair!The colour of her great dun is the shining whiteness of lime,And within it are floors strewn with green rushes and couches white,Soft wondrous silks and blue gold-claspt mantles and fursAre there, and jewelled golden cups for revelry by night:Thy grianan of gold and glass is filled with sunshine-light,O Macha, queen by day, queen by night!Beyond the green portals, and the brown and red thatch of wingsStriped orderly, the wings of innumerous stricken birds,A wide shining floor reaches from wall to wall, wondrously carvenOut of a sheet of silver, whereon are graven swordsIntricately ablaze; mistress of many hoardsArt thou, Macha of few words!Fair indeed is thy couch, but fairer still is thy throne,A chair it is, all of a blaze of wonderful yellow gold:There thou sittest, and watchest the women going to and fro,Each in garments fair and with long locks twisted fold in fold:With the joy that is in thy house men would not grow old,O Macha, proud, austere, cold.Of a surety there is much joy to be had of thee and thine,There in the song-sweet sunlit bowers in that place:Wounded men might sink in sleep and be well contentSo to sleep, and to dream perchance, and know no other graceThan to wake and look betimes on thy proud queenly face,O Macha of the Proud Face!And if there be any here who wish to know more of this wonder,Go, you will find all as I have shown, as I have said:From beneath its portico thatched with wings of birds blue and yellowReaches a green lawn, where a fount is fedFrom crystal and gems: of crystal and gold each bedIn the house of Macha of the Ruddy Head.In that great house where Macha the queen has her pleasaunceThere is everything in the whole world that a man might desire.God is my witness that if I say little it is for this,That I am grown faint with wonder, and can no more admire,But say this only, that I live and die in the fireOf thine eyes, O Macha, my desire,With thine eyes of fire!”14
“O ’tis a good house, and a palace fair, the dun of Macha,And happy with a great household is Macha there;Druids she had, and bards, minstrels, harpers, knights,Hosts of servants she had, and wonders beautiful and rare,But nought so wonderful and sweet as her face, queenly fair,O Macha of the Ruddy Hair!
“O ’tis a good house, and a palace fair, the dun of Macha,
And happy with a great household is Macha there;
Druids she had, and bards, minstrels, harpers, knights,
Hosts of servants she had, and wonders beautiful and rare,
But nought so wonderful and sweet as her face, queenly fair,
O Macha of the Ruddy Hair!
The colour of her great dun is the shining whiteness of lime,And within it are floors strewn with green rushes and couches white,Soft wondrous silks and blue gold-claspt mantles and fursAre there, and jewelled golden cups for revelry by night:Thy grianan of gold and glass is filled with sunshine-light,O Macha, queen by day, queen by night!
The colour of her great dun is the shining whiteness of lime,
And within it are floors strewn with green rushes and couches white,
Soft wondrous silks and blue gold-claspt mantles and furs
Are there, and jewelled golden cups for revelry by night:
Thy grianan of gold and glass is filled with sunshine-light,
O Macha, queen by day, queen by night!
Beyond the green portals, and the brown and red thatch of wingsStriped orderly, the wings of innumerous stricken birds,A wide shining floor reaches from wall to wall, wondrously carvenOut of a sheet of silver, whereon are graven swordsIntricately ablaze; mistress of many hoardsArt thou, Macha of few words!
Beyond the green portals, and the brown and red thatch of wings
Striped orderly, the wings of innumerous stricken birds,
A wide shining floor reaches from wall to wall, wondrously carven
Out of a sheet of silver, whereon are graven swords
Intricately ablaze; mistress of many hoards
Art thou, Macha of few words!
Fair indeed is thy couch, but fairer still is thy throne,A chair it is, all of a blaze of wonderful yellow gold:There thou sittest, and watchest the women going to and fro,Each in garments fair and with long locks twisted fold in fold:With the joy that is in thy house men would not grow old,O Macha, proud, austere, cold.
Fair indeed is thy couch, but fairer still is thy throne,
A chair it is, all of a blaze of wonderful yellow gold:
There thou sittest, and watchest the women going to and fro,
Each in garments fair and with long locks twisted fold in fold:
With the joy that is in thy house men would not grow old,
O Macha, proud, austere, cold.
Of a surety there is much joy to be had of thee and thine,There in the song-sweet sunlit bowers in that place:Wounded men might sink in sleep and be well contentSo to sleep, and to dream perchance, and know no other graceThan to wake and look betimes on thy proud queenly face,O Macha of the Proud Face!
Of a surety there is much joy to be had of thee and thine,
There in the song-sweet sunlit bowers in that place:
Wounded men might sink in sleep and be well content
So to sleep, and to dream perchance, and know no other grace
Than to wake and look betimes on thy proud queenly face,
O Macha of the Proud Face!
And if there be any here who wish to know more of this wonder,Go, you will find all as I have shown, as I have said:From beneath its portico thatched with wings of birds blue and yellowReaches a green lawn, where a fount is fedFrom crystal and gems: of crystal and gold each bedIn the house of Macha of the Ruddy Head.
And if there be any here who wish to know more of this wonder,
Go, you will find all as I have shown, as I have said:
From beneath its portico thatched with wings of birds blue and yellow
Reaches a green lawn, where a fount is fed
From crystal and gems: of crystal and gold each bed
In the house of Macha of the Ruddy Head.
In that great house where Macha the queen has her pleasaunceThere is everything in the whole world that a man might desire.God is my witness that if I say little it is for this,That I am grown faint with wonder, and can no more admire,But say this only, that I live and die in the fireOf thine eyes, O Macha, my desire,With thine eyes of fire!”14
In that great house where Macha the queen has her pleasaunce
There is everything in the whole world that a man might desire.
God is my witness that if I say little it is for this,
That I am grown faint with wonder, and can no more admire,
But say this only, that I live and die in the fire
Of thine eyes, O Macha, my desire,
With thine eyes of fire!”14
It was in this wonderful forefront of Ulster that Concobar reigned. The fame of Emain Macha was throughout Gaeldom; and there was no man or woman who, as the days went by, did not hear of the greatness of Concobar.
On a day of the days, the king went with his chief lords on a visit to the dun of Felim, a warrior and harper whom he loved. There was to be great feasting, and all men were glad. Felim himself rejoiced, though he would fain have had the king come to him a few days later, for his wife was heavy with child, and looked for her hour that very day or the next.
In the midmost of the feast, Concobar saw that Cathba, an aged Druid who had accompanied him, was staring into the other world that is about us.
“Speak, Cathba,” he said. “There is no man in all Erin who has wisdom like unto thine. What is it that thou seest, with the inner sight that I perceive well is now upon thee?”
“Old as I am with the heavy burden of years and sorrow, O Concobar, did I not beg that I might come with thee to this festival at the dun of Felim? And that was not because I wearied to hear strange harping and singing,good and fine and better than our own as this harping is here, in the house of Felim; for I am old and weary, and care more to listen to the wind in the grass, or to the sighing upon the hill, than to any music of war or love.”
“Then what was it that was in thy mind, Cathba?”
“This, O king. I saw a shadow arise whenever I thought of our Ultonian realm, and I felt within me the burden of a new prophecy. Nevertheless, I was moved by naught till I entered the dun of Felim, and now I know.”
“Speak,” said the king; while all there listened with awe as well as eagerness, for Cathba was the wisest of the Druids, and knew many mysteries, and what he had foretold had ever come to pass. Slowly, the white-haired Druid looked around the faces of all seated there. Then he looked at the king. Then he looked at Felim.
“To thee, O Felim, shall be born this night a sting, a sword, a battering-ram, and a flame.”
Felim the Harper stared with intent gaze, but said nothing. Of what avail to say aught against the decrees of the gods?
“This night shall that which I have said be born unto thee, O Felim. The sting will stingto madness him who is king of the Ultonians; the sword will sever from Uladh the chief of her glories, the proud Red Branch for which Concobar and all his chivalry shall perish; the ram shall batter down the proud splendour of Emain Macha; the flame shall pass from dun to dun, from forest to forest, from hill to hill, from the isles of Ara on the west to the shores of the sea-stream of the Moyle on the north, and to those of the sea of Manannan in the east.”
Still Felim answered nothing. Then the king spoke:
“Thy words come in dust, like wind-whirled autumn leaves. We have not thy further sight, Cathba, and understand thee not.”
Then once more Cathba spake out of the dream that was upon him:
“Two stars I see shining in a web of dusk; and, in the shadow of that dusk, a low tower of ivory and white pearls I see, and a strange crimson fruit; and through all and over all I hear the low, sweet vibration of the strings of a harp, a harp such as the Dedannan folk play upon in the moonshine in lonely places, but sweeter still, sweeter and more wonderful.”
“Is this thy second vision one and the same with thy first, O Cathba?” asked the king.
“Even so. For the shining stars are her eyes, and the web of dusk is the flower-fragrant maze of her hair, that low tower of ivory is her fair, white, wonderful neck, and her white teeth are these pearls, and that strange crimson fruit is no other than her smiling mouth—a little smiling mouth with life and death upon it because of its laughter and grave stillness. As for that harp-playing, it is her voice I hear—a voice more soft and sweet and tender than the love-music of Angus Ogue himself. O shining eyes, O strange crimson fruit that is a little smiling mouth, O sweet voice that is more excellent to hear than the wild music of the Hidden People of the hills—it is of ye, of ye that I speak, and of thee, O tender, delicate fawn, in all thy loveliness.”
None spake, but all stared at the Druid. For dream was upon them at these words, and each man imagined his desire, and was wrought by it, and was rapt in strange longing.
It was Concobar who broke the silence.
“Of whomsoever thou speakest, Cathba, she is surely of the divine folk. That exceeding loveliness is for the joy or the sorrow of the world.”
Only Felim the Harper was troubled, for now he knew well that the ancient Druid spoke of the unborn child with whom even then his wife was in travail. But no sooner had Concobar ceased than Cathba rose, with his great dark eyes aflame beneath his white eye-brows. His voice was loud and terrible.
“Behold, I see this thing; behold the vision of Cathba the Druid, who is old and nigh unto death. And what is before mine eyes is a sea, a sea of flowing crimson, a sea of blood. Foaming it rises, and wells forth, and overflows, and drowns great straths and valleys, and laves the flanks of high hills, and from the summits of mountains pours down upon the lands of the Gael in a thundering flood, blood-red to the blood-red sea.”
But now the spell of silence was broken. All leaped to their feet, and many put their hands upon their swords. There was not one who did not fear the prophesying of Cathba the wise Druid. That deluge of blood, was it not a terror, a great ruin to avert?
“If this child that the wife of Felim the Harper is to bear this night be a blood-bringer so terrible,” they cried, “let us slay her atbirth. For surely it is better to kill a child than to destroy a nation.”
So spake they out of their ignorance that they thought wisdom. For they did not know that there is no thought, no power, no spell, no craft, wherewith to turn aside the feet of Destiny. What has to be, will be, and no man living can say or do aught that is of avail against the inevitable tides of Fate.
For the first time since Cathba had prophesied, Felim uttered word.
“Listen, my kinsmen and fellow-knights of the Red Branch. A sore pity is it for my wife Elva to bear a daughter that shall be a sting to sting the king to madness, and a sword to sever the Red Branch from Uladh, our fair heritage, and a ram to break down the walls of Emania, and a flame to consume the land from shore to shore. And as for that sea of blood, let it not be upon my head. For I, the father of the child of Elva, that Cathba says is to be a woman-child and of a beauty wonderful to see, say unto ye: That which ye would fain do, do. If it seems good unto ye, O Concobar, and ye of the Red Branch, let this child perish, so that the doom foretold by Cathba may be averted.”
At that all were glad save Concobar. Two men was he, this king: a man who recked little of aught save his desire, and a man who had wisdom. Out of his wisdom he knew that Felim and the Red Branch lords spoke madness, for if it was ordained that the child of Elva should bring doom, that doom would surely come. Out of his longing he loved the beauty of which Cathba had spoken, and desired it against the years to come, and for the solace of his years when he had loved much and at the last was fain only of that which was the crown of life. So he spoke to those before him, and prevailed with them. Not vainly was he called Concobar of the Honeymouth.
“I will speak first to thee, Felim, son of Dall, my bard. It is not good to put death upon the fruit of one’s loins. Thine own child should not see death through thee. But even were it so, it is not meet for me or for any one to bring the shame and pain of death to the house of a friend. Therefore, do not speak of putting silence and darkness upon the child of Elva.”
Having spoken thus, the king turned to the lords of the Red Branch. As the wont was, at the royal festivals there were five and threescore over three hundred of the Red Branch there and then.15
“And to ye, Ultonians, I say this thing also. Do not bring blood into the hospitable home of Felim; that would be a stain upon him, upon ye yourselves, and upon me the king. But this is my counsel. Let the child live. There is no good in idle blood, and if ye stain yourselves with it, there shall be greater loss and sorrow to follow. Ye are all grown men, and not boys who do not know our laws. Ye know the Law of the Eric. Well, I will free ye of all doom, for upon my head be it. To myself I will take this fair child, and upon me, and not upon the Ultonians, nor upon the Red Branch, nor upon any other whomsoever save Concobar MacNessa, the high king, be the penalty, if penalty there be.”
At that a son of a king arose.
“That is well, O Concobar. But what of Cathba’s prophecy? We do not wish to seethe sting that shall sting thee to madness, and if the child live shall we not see that sting?”
“Of that I have thought, that I have foreseen, Congal, son of Rossa of the Lakes. For I shall send the child into a lonely place, and there in a solitary rath shall she dwell and grow in years, and no man shall look upon her save I myself, and that only in the fulness of time. She shall be solitary and apart as the Crane of Innisbea, that has dwelt upon its isle since the world was made, and is seen of none.”
“Tell us once more, Concobar MacNessa; dost thou take this child, and the doom of this child unto thee, and to thee alone?”
“I have sworn. She shall grow in years, and be wife to me when the time is come. And if sorrow come with her, that sorrow shall be my sorrow. Not upon Uladh be it, but upon me. I have spoken.”
“And as for thee, Felim?”
“It would be better to slay the child than to drown the land in blood.”
“And as for thee, Cathba?”
“There is but one law: that which has to come, cometh.” But while they were thus debating, the loud chanting voices of women were heard, and soon a messenger came, cryingloudly that a child had been born to Elva, wife of Felim, and that it was a woman-child, and exceeding comely, and strong, and white as milk.
Once more Cathba the Druid spoke.
“She shall be called Darthool,16this woman whose beauty shall be a flame, and whose eyes shall be as stars.”
And so it was. The child was spared, and that night Elva slept in peace, and for many nights.
When the days of the feasting were over, Concobar left the dun of Felim, and returned with all his company to Emania. With him he took the little child Darthool, and Elva came with him for a month and a day.
The month and the day soon passed, and then Elva went back to her own place. It was the will of the high king and of Felim, her husband; nevertheless, she sorrowed to part with her little child, who, even as a breast-babe, had eyes of so great a beauty that it was a joy to look into them.
Before the year was over—for, according to what Cathba the wise Druid said, the child must either be slain or hidden away before the first year of her life were past—Concobar sent Darthool with the nursing woman to whom he entrusted her, to a smalllios, or fort, deep in the heart of the royal forest. A ban was upon that forest that none might hunt or even stray there without the king’s will; and now that ban was made absolute, and it was known that death would be the portion of any man who went under these branches. None was to enter that woodland save Concobar, or whosoever might be of his chosen company, or whom the king might thither lead.
Concobar himself saw that food and milk was sent in plenty to the lios, and once in every seven days he went thither himself. As year after year passed the secret of the hiding-place of Darthool went out of men’s minds, and none knew of the lios save the king, and the sister of the nursing woman, who was his own foster-child and undergeasor bond to him. This woman was named Lavarcam (Leabharcham), and was fair to see, and whom Concobar held to be discreet and trustworthy beyond any other of his own people. She was of the royalhousehold, and of the women trained as chroniclers and relaters.17
The little starry-eyed babe grew to a child, and from a child to a fawn of a girl, fair to see, and from a young girl to a maid, of a beauty so great that Concobar knew when she came to full womanhood she would be indeed as Cathba the Druid had prophesied.
Darthool saw no one but her nurse, and the tutor whom the king had sent to teach her all that could be taught, and not only in learning, but in courtesy and nobility; and Lavarcam, who alone went to and fro. From the time that Darthool passed out of her first girlhood the king saw little of her, but twice in each year—at the Festival of the Sun in the time of the greening, and at the Festival of end Summer at the fall of the leaf; and this because of a warning that had been given him by Cathba the ancient Druid.
How can the beauty of so fair and sweet a woman be revealed? Her loveliness was even as Cathba had foretold. It was a surpassingloveliness, and the three women who saw her often marvelled at it, and wondered no more that Darthool should be kept apart, for of a surety she would be a torch to put flame into the hearts of men, and to set great duns and raths and towered capitals and warring nations ablaze. The poets have sung of her, and no man has sung but out of his deep desire. Her great sad eyes, so full of dream, were blue as are the hill-tarns at noon, and often dusky as they when passing clouds put purple into their depths; and like a golden web her hair was, sprayed out with shining light, wonderful, glorious; and her rowan-red lips were indeed that strange crimson fruit which Cathba had foreseen—rowan-red against the cream-white softness of her skin. Cream-white her body was, and her neck like a tower of ivory; slim and graceful was she as a fawn, and fleet of foot as the wild roes on the hills, and when she moved in the sunlight or the shadow she was so beautiful that tears came at times to the eyes of the women in that lonely place. Yet even more wonderful was her voice—low and sweet and with music in it, like the whisper of the wind among the reeds, or the ripple of green leaves, or the murmuring of a brook.
But now and from this time forth Concobar did not see her. For a year and a day after she attained womanhood, Cathba had warned the king it would mean death to him if he saw her. Nevertheless, he often heard of Darthool from Lavarcam, who in her going to and fro had ever one thing to say—that never had there been any woman so beautiful.
The rumour of this great loveliness spread from lip to lip. Yet no man ventured to seek out the hidden place where Darthool dwelled, for to all it was known that Concobar kept her there against the time when he would make her his queen, and all feared the long arm and the heavy hand of Concobar Mac Nessa. None might even question the king.
It was in this year that the shadows of the feet of Fate came into that place.
One day when Lavarcam told the king that Darthool grew fairer and fairer, so that even the wild creatures of the forest rejoiced in her, he all but yielded to his desire. Nevertheless, fearing the prophetic voice, he refrained, but cried: “When the snow time has passed, and the first greening is over, and the wild rose runs like a flame throughout the land, then will I go to Darthool.”
But before the greening was lost in the tides of summer, and before the wild rose had begun to run like a windy flame throughout the land, Concobar had learned that Destiny waits on no man.
One dawn the first snows came over the hills of the north and fell upon the forest. At the rising of the sun they ceased, but every branch was a white plume, and every glade was smooth and white as was the breast of Darthool herself. There was no wind in the deep blue sky, but the air was sharp and sweet because of the frost. For joy Darthool clapped her hands, as she stood upon the wall of the lios.
Then, glancing downward, she beheld the woman who was her attendant standing beside a calf that had been slain for the provisioning of those within the fort. The red blood streamed over the snow, and was as the crimson cloak of an Ultonian chief there, till the red grew mottled as it sank through the frozen whiteness.
Darthool’s eyes ever saddened at the sight of blood, but after a brief while she knew that there was no harm in that shedding, and that no omen of further bloodspilling lay therein.While she was still looking thereon, a great raven, glossy black and burnished in the sun rays, came gliding swift across the snow, and alit by the slain calf, and drank of the warm bright blood.
Of a sudden Darthool laughed low. It was a sweet shy laugh, and Lavarcam, who had come to her side, asked her why there was such sweet low laughter upon her. Mayhap she knew; mayhap she guessed that Darthool dreamed dreams of love, because her womanhood was now come, and because of the old heroic tales she took so great a pleasure in, and because of the vision that every woman has in her heart.
“I was thinking, Lavarcam,” she said.
“And what was that thought, Darthool?”
“It was this: that if there be anywhere a youth whose skin is white as that whiteness there, and whose locks are as dark and glossy as the plumage of that raven, and in whose cheek is a crimson as red as that blood that is upon the snow, then of a surety him could I love, and that gladly.”
For a moment Lavarcam said nought; then the power of Destiny moved her.
“There is one man who is more beautifulthan all others I have ever seen. He is young, and his hair is dark and glossy as that raven’s wing, and in his cheek the ruddy flame is as that crimson blood, and his skin is as white as any sunlit whiteness, or as thine own breast, Darthool.”
“And what will be the name of that man, Lavarcam, and whence is he and where, and what is his decree?”
“He is called Nathos, and is the son of Usna, who is a great lord in Alba. But he is now in Emania, among the company of the king; and with him are his brothers, both fair to see, and princes among men because of their beauty and valour, yet neither so surpassing all men as Nathos. They are called Ailne and Ardan.”18
That was a fatal saying of Lavarcam, for it sank into the mind of Darthool as moonlight into dark water.
Day by day thereafter she thought of nothing but of meeting this proud son of beauty;night by night she dreamed of Nathos and of his love.
At the last, Lavarcam was filled with fear, for she saw that her words had awakened the flaming lion that lies hid in the heart. And truly it was not long till Darthool spoke to her of her longing and deep desire, and how that without Nathos she did not care to live.
For a time Lavarcam smiled; but when she saw that the king’s beautiful ward was ever growing more and more wrought, her heart smote her.
One day, as she was returning from Emain Macha, she met a swineherd, clad roughly in the fell of a deer, and with him were two men, rude, dishevelled hillmen, bondagers to the Ultonians.
These, notwithstanding the law of Concobar, she took with her into the forest, and bade them await at a well that was there, until they heard the cry of a jay and the bark of a hill-fox, when they were to move slowly on their way, but to speak to no one whom they might meet, and above all to be silent after they left the shadow of the wood.
Having done this, she entered the lios, andasked Darthool to come forth with her into the woods.
When they drew near to the well, Lavarcam moved aside to look for some rare herb, as she said. Soon the cry of the jay and the bark of the hill-fox were in the air.
“That is a strange thing,” Darthool said to her, when she was by her side again; “for that cry of the jay was the cry it gives in April, at the nesting time, and the bark of that hill-fox was the bark it gives in the season of the rut, many months agone.”
“Hush,” said Lavarcam, “and look.”
They stood still, as they saw the swineherd and the two hillmen rise from near the well, and move slowly across the glade.
“Who are these, Lavarcam?” asked Darthool, with wonder in her eyes.
“These are men, daughter of Felim.”
“They are younger than those I have seen from the outskirts of the forest, but they are wild in dress and mien, and are not of high degree, and my eyes have no pleasure in looking upon them.”
“Nevertheless,” answered Lavarcam, “these are the three sons of Usna—Nathos and Ailne and Ardan.”
For a brief while Darthool looked upon them. Then she spoke.
“The truth flew past thy lips, Lavarcam. Yonder man whom ye name Nathos has neither raven hair nor white skin, nor the comely red in his face; and the two others are like the slaves I saw that day I beheld the foster-brothers of Concobar driving back from battle, in a chariot dragged by wild rough men in bondage. I remember the day, for it was then that thou bade me know that death was the portion of any man who sought me. That, too, I fear was no true word. Howsoever, as to these men, they may go. And yet—— wait.”
And with that Darthool moved swiftly forward, and, coming upon the three men by a by-path through the fern, confronted them.
They stood amazed at her exceeding great beauty. Nothing like it was in the whole world; so, little wonder that these boors stood as though the face of death was bare to them; for beauty is strange and terrible to most men, and they are prone to stand in dread of it.
None spake. Darthool looked at each, a slow smile of mocking in her lips, a blue flame of scorn in her eyes.
“Are ye the sons of Usna?”
They made no answer, but stared unwaveringly upon her, as do the dull cattle in the fields.
“What brave courtesy!” she cried, mocking with her sweet voice, “how swift in courtesy! Tell me, Nathos, son of Usna, is it the wont of thy people in Alba to stand by agape when a woman speaks? Who is Usna, or what? If he is a king, is he overlord of swineherds? If it is a place, is it the rough bogs of the hills where sword-clad men do not go, but only a poor folk clad rudely in skins?”
Still they answered nothing.
“Were ye whipt into silence when ye were young, ye that stand there wordless as dogs? If indeed ye be the sons of Usna, then truly Concobar MacNessa must be in sore want of men at Emain Macha!”
At that the swineherd could no longer hold to his bond.
“By thy great exceeding beauty I know that thou art no other than Darthool, whom the king hides in this place. But do not mock us, who would rather worship thee. We are no nobles, but a swineherd, and two hillmen who are bondagers to Cairbre of the Three Duns.”
At that Darthool laughed gently.
“That I knew full well, swineherd, for all that I dwell here apart and see none of my kind, save Maev my nurse and Aeifa my tutor and Lavarcam the friend of the king. Those I have seen otherwise have been beheld a great way off, from where I laid hid in the woods. But now, wilt thou do one thing for me?”
“I will give thee my life.”
Darthool smiled into the man’s eyes, and what was only the swineherd died, and a strong heroic soul arose in him.
“I would fain see Nathos, the eldest of the sons of Usna.”
“That is against the law of Concobar: and long is the arm and heavy the hand of Concobar MacNessa the high king. But what is death to me, since thou willest me to do this thing for thee, Darthool of the beautiful eyes? Nay, I swear this thing: that rather would I die by torture, and please thee, than live out my life and refuse thee of what thou art fain. For thy beauty is upon me like the light of the moon at the full on the dark moorland. I am thine.”
Darthool looked at the man. Suddenly she stooped and kissed him on the wind-furrowedbrow. Great fortune was his, and he was well repaid for his death by blunt spear-shafts, when Concobar knew all. For what is death, when a man has reached beyond the limit of his desire?
“Then go this night to Nathos, and tell him that I, Darthool, dream of him by day and by night, and that if he is in anywise fain of me, let him come to me to-morrow, an hour before the setting of the sun, at this well.”
With that she turned and walked slowly back to where Lavarcam awaited her. As they moved homeward through the wood, Lavarcam saw that the dream in the eyes of Darthool had deepened. It was in vain then, or later, that she sought to know what the fair, beautiful girl had said to the swineherd. She feared, however, that Darthool no longer trusted her because of the lie that she had told, and that mayhap the girl had plotted somewhat with the swineherd.
All the morrow Lavarcam watched Darthool closely, but she seemed rapt in vision, and cared neither to chase the fawns, nor to fish, nor even to wander idly through the woods. No speech would she have with any one, and said only that she wished to lie under theboughs of the great oak in front of the lios, and sleep.
“How can that be, when there is snow upon the ground?” Lavarcam asked.
“Is there snow upon the ground?” answered Darthool dreamily. “Then I will lie upon my deerskins, and Aeifa can play to me and sing me songs till dusk.”
Hearing that, Lavarcam was glad, for now she could leave the lios with a mind at rest.
So, in the wane of the day, she passed through the forest and came out upon the great plain in front of Emain Macha, and went to seek the king to take counsel with him.
Nevertheless, Lavarcam was sore wrought by Darthool, and would fain have given her her heart’s desire. Piteous indeed had her plaints been. With tears and reproaches and sweet beseechings nigh intolerable, Darthool had begged her to bring Nathos to her, if for once only, so that she might at least see him, and know what her heart’s desire was like. Moreover, was it not a bitter thing for her to be kept there in that lonely place, and neither to see nor converse with her own kind, and to be kept away from all the joys of youth, and to pass from spring to summer, and from summerto autumn, and from autumn to winter, yea and from year to year, and be exiled there, to hear no young voices, no young laughter? When she pleaded thus, Lavarcam was sorrowful indeed, for she had the heart of a woman, and knew the beauty and the wonder and the mystery of love.
Thinking of these things, her heart smote her as she fared towards Emain Macha, and at the last she decided to say no word to the king as to what she feared Darthool may have told the swineherd. Furthermore, she muttered, what was death to her who had known all that life had to give her? At the worst, Concobar could put death upon her. Had she not lived and known love, and now was weary?
When she drew nigh to Emain Macha she saw three ravens and three hoodie-crows and three kites arise from some carrion hidden in the long grass that waved there.
When she came upon it, she saw that it was the body of the swineherd, loose with the gaping wounds of blunt spear-shafts. In thus-wise she knew that Concobar had in some way heard of what the man had done.
Yet she had no fear from that. The swineherd was still now. Neither king nor raven,neither man nor hoodie-crow, neither spear-shaft nor kite could now hurt him. It was better to be alive than to be dead, but it was well to be dead.
So Lavarcam turned, and went over to the camp in Emain Macha where the sons of Usna were. There she saw Nathos, and told him privily that Darthool longed to see him, and that the forest was open to the stealthy flight of the owl as well as to the soaring hawk.
Nathos was indeed fair to see, and looking upon him Lavarcam knew in her heart that Darthool would love him, and he her. He listened, and she saw his eyes deepen, and a flush come and go upon his face. For sure there was a beating swift of his pulse in that hour.
Nevertheless, he could not come straightway, for Concobar knew that the swineherd had spoken to him of Darthool, and it was for this, and having seen and spoken with the girl, that the king had put the man to death—though for that, added Nathos, little did the swineherd care, for he died laughing and mocking, and, when he lay still, there was a smile upon his face.
“And that was because Darthool had looked into his eyes, Nathos, son of Usna.”
“Truly, he died well. I know a prince among men who also would die gladly if Darthool would look into his eyes with love.”
“Then come soon and hunt the deer in the solitudes to the north of the forest: and there, amid the woods, or in some glen, or on the hill-slopes, surely thou shalt meet with Darthool—and yet none know of it.”
So Lavarcam and Nathos made a bond between them, and parted.
Thereafter days passed. On the morrow of the seventh day Darthool was wandering among the glades and thickets of the uplands far away from the lios, rejoicing in her new freedom and hoping that one day her eyes might look upon Nathos. She was dreaming her dream, when she started at a strange sound, the like of which she had never heard.
That far-off baying of hounds she knew, for oftentimes of old Concobar had ridden to the forest with his deerhounds: but that strange, wild, blazoning sound—— Was it the voice of the flying creature the hounds pursued?
Then the thought came to her that it was the hunting horn she had often heard of in thesongs and war-ballads which Lavarcam and Aeifa were wont to sing to her.
But after that blast the horn no more tore the silence of the deep woods, and the hounds were still: for Nathos had left the chase of the deer and was now moving listless through the green glooms of the forest. Night and day since Lavarcam and the swineherd had told him of Darthool he had dreamed of the beautiful daughter of Felim the Harper. Remembering the last chant of Cathba the Druid, he recalled how Darthool had been named the Beauty of the World, and because he was himself a poet and a dreamer the vision had become part of his life, so that neither by night nor by day was there any hour wherein he did not see in his mind the tall, white-robed figure of Darthool, and the beauty of her eyes, and her face as the sweet wild face of a dream.
And so dreaming he stood at the edge of a glade, his swift eyes watching a fawn dispart a thicket that was close by. Yet it was no fawn as he thought: but rather was it as though a sudden flood of sunshine burst forth in that place. For a woman came from the thicket more beautiful than any dream he had ever dreamed. She was clad in a saffron robe over white thatwas like the 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 golden 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.
So exceeding great was her beauty that Nathos did not think of her as Darthool or as any mortal woman, but rather as a daughter of the elder gods, or of that bright divine race of the Tuatha-De-Danann, whose beauty surpassed that of human beings as the beauty of the primrose bank that of the brown sod. He looked upon her amazed, and in a silent worship. If she were indeed of the Dedannan folk, she might disappear at any moment as a shadow goes, that now is here asleep upon the grass and in the twinkling of an eye is among the things of oblivion.
At last speech rose to his lips.
“O fair and wonderful one, whom I see well art of the old sacred race of the Tuatha-De-Danann, may I have word with thee? It may well be that thou art no other than the wife of Midir himself, she who lives in a fair shininggrianan in the hollow of a hill, and lives upon the beauty and fragrance of flowers.” Darthool looked at him, and her heart beat. He was in truth fair to see: fairer even than him whom she had imaged in her dreams, or him of whom Lavarcam had spoken.
“Speak. What wouldst thou?”
“I am faring idly through this lonely land, and I know not where I am. Yonder, in the valley behind the oak-glade, is a high-walled rath. Is it a place of the Shee, and so forbidden? or who dwells there, and shall a spear or welcome greet me if I enter?”
“Indeed, thou mayst enter there, and a welcome awaits thee, O Nathos, son of Usna.”
“Thou knowest my name, O fair one; then, indeed, thou art of the old wondrous race, who know swifter than our thought, and whose sight is further and deeper than our sight.”
“I am no queen, Nathos, nor am I of the Tuatha-De-Danann, but am a woman as other women are. If I am beautiful in thine eyes, of that I am right glad, for thou art fairer to me than any man I have seen or dreamed of, and my pulse leaps when thine eyes look into mine. I am Darthool, the daughter of Felim the Harper; yet am I no better than a slave, forhere am I bound to stay, and see no one save Lavarcam and my two women, and here I shall die for loneliness and longing.”
Nathos heard her sweet low voice with delight, and it was with joy at his heart he knew she was no strange Dedannan but a woman of his own race, and that she was Darthool. Love rose suddenly within him like a flame: a red flame was it that was in his heart, and a white flame in his mind, and out of these two flames is wrought the love of love and the passion of passion and the dream of dreams.
“Art thou, indeed, Darthool?” he whispered; “art thou that Darthool of whom I have dreamed? Strange is the strangeness of this meeting, O white daughter of Felim. For so great is thy beauty that I was fain to believe I saw before me one of the queens of the Tuatha-De-Danann. But is this thing true, that against thine own will Concobar the high king keeps thee here like a trapped bird among these woods?”
“True it is, and more: for it is not even by Concobar’s will that I roam the woodlands. He was fain that I should never leave the rath save with Lavarcam, and that I should spend most of my days within the stone wallsof the dreary lios where he has doomed me to dwell.”
“Darthool, my heart is filled with a rising tide. That tide is love. Thou hast not seen the sea: but there, when the tide flows, there is nothing, there is no one, in all the world, which can say it nay. So is my love for thee, that now rises; and, once thine, will be thine evermore. Yet I would not put this upon thee; and if thy words and looks come out of thy frank, sweet courtesy and open maidenly heart, and mean no more than that thou carest for me as a brother, it is thy brother I will be, Darthool, to serve thee and succour thee and love thee evermore, and in that way only.”
For a brief while she looked at him. Then the noon-blue of her eyes deepened, and a flush drifted through her face and waned into the deeper red of her parted lips.
“Nathos,” she said in a low voice, which trembled as a reed in the wind, “I, too, love. It is thee I love. If it be wrong for me, a maiden, to speak thus, forgive me, for I have grown wilding here, and am more akin to the fawns of the forest than to women kind of mine own age or estate. But I love thee, Nathos: as of old, in the far-off Dedannandays, Dectura the queen loved the Green Harper, and went forth with him and was seen no more of her own people.”
“If thou indeed wilt have it so, Darthool, be thou my Dectura, and let me be thy Green Harper. For beyond the reach of life or death is the greatness of the love I feel for thee, even now in this first hour of our meeting.”
“Thy words are in my heart, Nathos; and because that this is so, I now putgeasupon thee. Let thy sword be as my sword, and be thou to me as brother and friend and the holder of my leal love; and to this end, lo! I throw this yellow thistle against thy cheek, to raise a mark of shame there if thou dost not fulfil the bond, and there to be seen of all men as a sign and witness of thy disgrace; yea, even thus I putgeasupon thee, to succour me in my ill fate, to take me unto thyself, to give thyself unto me, and to let us go forth together heedless of Fate.”
Nathos looked at her with proud eyes.
“Of a surety, Darthool, there is no hero of the Red Branch who hath a courage greater than thine, even though it may be that thou speakest the more freely from knowing little of what may befall.”
“What can befall save death, and dost thou fear death, son of Usna?”
Nathos smiled out of grave eyes.
“If I feared death, Darthool, I would not now be speaking with thee here. It is swift silence upon any who in this forbidden land speaks with the daughter of Felim the Harper. Concobar MacNessa has the ears of a hare and the eyes of a hawk and the swoop of an eagle. Dost thou remember the swineherd to whom thou gavest word privily? Well, that night he lay in the grass tended only by the raven and the wolf, for he was done to death with blunt spear-shafts.”
“For that I have deep grief,” said Darthool, with tears drifting like a rainy mist athwart the blue of her eyes.
“Nevertheless, he died with a smile, Darthool. Thou hadst looked into his eyes and kissed him. Even so, and for less now, would I too die.”
“That thou shalt not do, Nathos;” and even as she spoke Darthool moved forward and put her honeysweet lips against the mouth of Nathos, and made his blood leap, and a flame come into his eyes, and a trembling come into his limbs.
Then, as though with that kiss she had become as a wild rose, she stood swaying lightly, her fair face delicately aflame. Nathos put his arms about her, and kissed her on the brow and on the lips.
“That kiss on the brow is for service,” he said, “because from this hour thou art my queen; and that kiss on the lips is for love, for from this hour I shall love no woman save thee thyself, but shall be thine and thine only in life or death.”
Nevertheless, though Nathos accepted thegeasput upon him by Darthool, he was troubled at the thought of the anger of Concobar the high king. It would be a swift and bitter death for him, and for Darthool too it might be death or worse.
The thought in his mind swam into his eyes, and Darthool saw it. She shrank from him, and stood hesitating and as though about to flee at his first word of doubt. When he looked at her again his last fear went.
“Fair wonderful one, thou art as a fawn there in the fern where thou standest; Darthool, do not doubt the truth of my words. I am thine to love and to serve, and am undergeasto thee. But my thought was this: ifwe two go hence and are waylaid, it will be death, and if we go hence and are not waylaid forthwith, it will still be death; for long is the arm, and heavy the hand, and tireless the quest of Concobar MacNessa. And this, too: that if we cross the Moyle and go to Alba, it may still be death; yea, though for a year or for a brood of years we elude the undying wrath and vengeance of the king.”
“He will forget when once the bird is flown. Neither the bird nor the wind leaves any track, so let our flight be as that of the bird and our way be as that of the wind.”
“The king forgetteth not. If so be that we might escape him many years, he will yet have his will of us in the end; and this though thou wert old, Darthool, and wert no longer his desire, and though I were outlawed and broken and no more in his sight than a wolf of the hills, good to slay if come upon, but not worthy of chase.”
“Concobar is not a king in Alba?”
“No.”
“Then let us go to thine own land. He can do no more than send emissaries after us, and with these thou canst deal swiftly, Nathos.”
At that, Nathos lightly laughed.
“Truly, I am seeing Concobar as a man sees his own shadow in the water. He is a great king in Uladh, but he is no more in Alba than any hero of the Red Branch. Come, Darthool; across the Moyle are the pine-green shores of Alba. It is a fair, beautiful land. The sea-lochs reach far among pine-clad hills, and green pastures are on the slopes of the great mountains and around the shadowy, inland waters. The forests are full of deer and wild birds, the rivers and lochs of fish, the pastures of cattle and sheep and swift brown mares. Thou shalt have milk to drink, and the red flesh of the salmon, and the brown flesh of the deer, and the white flesh of the badger. Thou shalt lack for nothing, who art my queen; and thou shalt have love till the sun grows a lordlier fire and the stars leap in their slow dance from dusk to dawn.”
“I will come,” Darthool whispered, with glad eyes.
“Only thou must not delay. Thy coming must be now. Thou must not even enter the rath again. Otherwise it is never the waters of the Moyle that we shall see, but only the red flame in the eyes of Concobar.”
Even while Nathos spoke his eyes grew hard, and his hands slipped to the javelin he had by his side. While Darthool watched him in amaze, he swung the iron-pointed shaft at a place where a bent bracken hung listless in the air.
“Is it a wolf?” cried Darthool, in sudden affright.
“It is worse than a wolf,” answered Nathos; “for if thou wilt go to that place thou wilt see either a slain man, or the form of a man, in the grass beneath the bracken.”
Swiftly Darthool ran to the spot wherein the javelin had swung singing. There was no one there, but, where the javelin still quivered slightly, she saw the still warm shape of a crouching man, and discerned, by the bending of the bracken, what course he must have twisted away.
Nathos followed and stood beside her. As he stooped to pluck the javelin from the ground, he descried a wooden-hilted knife.
“It is as I thought,” he said gravely. “Concobar has set a spy upon me. No Ultonian carries a knife such as this. It belongs to the hillmen of the north-west, of whom a few years agone we made slaves. Mayhapone of these men who were with the swineherd has been told to follow me secretly wheresoever I go.”
Darthool turned and looked at Nathos with eyes filled with a new fear, because of her love of him.
He took her hand in his.
“There is yet time, Darthool. Wilt thou go back to the rath, and stay there till Concobar wills thee to be his wife?”
“I cannot go back.”
“Then come, O Darthool.”
And with that the twain turned and moved swiftly northward through the forest, by the way Nathos had already passed.
“By dawn we may reach the dun where my two brothers now are, and for that day and that night we may rest in safety,” whispered Nathos, as Darthool turned and looked for the last time upon the place where she had lived all these years.
“But thereafter, O love that I have won, the wind must be in our hair and the dead leaves be upon the soles of our feet, for there can be no resting for us till we are away from this land: no, and not for us only, but also for Ailne and Ardan. Concobar will not restcontent with bitter wrath, and, if he cannot track the stag, will slay the fawns.”
Soon thereafter they drew near the place where Nathos had left his hounds and his huntsmen. Bidding Darthool hide among the bracken and undergrowth, he went forward alone and told the men to go back to the dun of the sons of Usna, but not till the third day, and by circuitous ways. Thus he hoped that he might the longer elude Concobar, whose emissaries would follow the track of his hounds.
Thereafter Nathos and Darthool fared swiftly hand in hand through the sombre ways of the forest. While it was still light they emerged upon a great moor, which they crossed, and then ascended the gorges of the hills. There the night fell, as though a wind-drifted darkness suddenly suspended and then swiftly enshrouded everything. They dreaded to rest, and yet so deep was the darkness that they could fare no farther.
But while they were still whispering the one to the other, Darthool descried a soft, silver shining, like a dewy gossamer. It was the little group of seven stars that we call the Pleiades.
“See,” she whispered, “An Grioglachan! When they shine, others will soon be seen.” And so it was.
All through the night the fugitives hastened onward by the light of the stars, ever keeping close to each other, for the mountain solitudes were full of dreadful noises, and in the black tarns among the peaty moss they could hear the moaning of the kelpie, or on the shores of the hill-lochs the shrill neighing of the water-horses, terrible creatures of the darkness.
For the last hour of the dark they rested a brief while, lying close hid among the bracken, in a sheltered place on a rocky mountain slope. Darthool heeded little now the weariness and fears of that perilous faring by night, for she was with Nathos; and Nathos now was glad, and no longer cared whether death was sure or not. He fell asleep there under the morning stars, among the winter-brown bracken, with Darthool’s head upon his breast; and his last thought was, that if the swineherd had died smiling because Darthool’s eyes had looked into his, how well might he too die content if his hour came suddenly upon him.
The dawn wavered among the hills, but still they slept.
A wolf tracking a wounded doe howled, and the howling wailed from corrie to corrie. Darthool stirred, but slept again. An eagle screamed as it rose and wheeled against the broadening light, but its wild voice was drowned in silence. Then came the first sun-rays rippling, dancing, leaping, from amid the crested heights and peaks to the eastward, and Nathos awoke.
For some moments he lay breathless with wonder. Darthool, in all her radiant beauty, was by his side, her golden hair ablaze in the sunlight, and her fair face like a flower amid the bracken. It was too great a wonder. Then he knew that Concobar’s hounds might any hour now be upon them, and so he put his dream away from him, and stooped and kissed Darthool upon the lips. With a cry she woke, and put her arms about him. Hard it was for him to add to her weariness; but she rose at once, and seemed, indeed, in his eyes, as fresh as any fawn of the hill-side. She went to a little tarn close by and drank of the cool, sweet water.
As she drank Nathos looked at her, and again wondered if she were not one of the divine race of old, the mysterious Tuatha-De-Danann,whom, ages before, the Milesians had driven to the hills and remote places. So fair was she that his heart ached. Then a swift pulse of joy leaped within him, and he was glad with a great gladness.
Thereafter they sped swiftly onward, and now Nathos exulted, for he recognised the peaks and the trend of the valleys. Within an hour from the rising of the sun he saw the grey walls of the dun of the sons of Usna.
His long cry—that of the heron thrice repeated—brought Ailne and Ardan forth. Darthool looked at them wondering, for they, too, were taller and nobler than other men, and only less beautiful in her eyes than Nathos himself.
But if she wondered, much more did they marvel at what they saw. Never had they beheld any woman so beautiful, and their first thought was that of Nathos, that Darthool was of the fair divine race who were now so seldom seen of men.
But when Nathos had told them all, and that she who was now his bride was no other than that Darthool whom Concobar the high king had set aside to become his queen, they were filled with sorrow. Well they knew thatConcobar MacNessa would not lightly relinquish the fair maid whom he had so long secreted in the forest-lios, and that blood would flow because of this thing.
“Moreover,” said Ailne, “hast thou forgotten the prophecy? There is the saying of Cathba the Druid, of which we have all heard: that from the daughter of Felim the Harper would come sorrow to the king, and severance of the Red Branch from the lost kingdom of Uladh, and rivers of blood.”
“That may be, Ailne, my brother,” Nathos answered; “but I ask none to go with me into this doom, if that doom indeed must be, though mayhap the dark hour of it is passed. For Darthool and I shall now fare forward, with some of our following, and with horses and food, and haply we may reach the coast and find our great galley in the Creek of the Willows, where we secreted it, and so gain the shores of Alba before Concobar can overtake us.”
But while Ailne pondered, Ardan spoke.
“That shall not be, Nathos. Listen! By the Sun and the Wind I swear that where thou goest I will go, and that I will never desert thee nor Darthool, who is now oursister. If the doom must come, let it come. What is death, that it should put a paleness into the face of love? Are we not close-kin, children of one mother, and is not Darthool thy wife now and our sister, and are we not henceforth as one? Speak, Ailne, is it not so?”
“It is so. Ardan has spoken for me. But I say nothing, for I feel upon us the shadow of that doom of which, as we have heard, Cathba the Druid spoke.”
But here Darthool moved forward.
“Listen, Nathos, and ye, Ailne and Ardan, my brothers: it is not for me to bring sorrow upon the king and upon the Red Branch and upon Uladh, and still less upon ye, my brothers, and upon thee, Nathos. Therefore, let me now go back to the lios, and tell Lavarcam, who will tell the king, that I have no will to stray, and that I will abide in that place till I die, or till Concobar dare put his face against Fate and take me thence.”
At that Nathos smiled only. There was no word to say; in his eyes was all his answer to Darthool.
But Ardan answered for himself and Ailne:
“Though the stars fall, beautiful daughterof Felim, who art now Darthool, our sister, we shall not leave thee, nor suffer thee to go from us save by thine own free will, and that in no fear for what may befall us. Nathos and Ailne and Ardan are the three sons of Usna, upon whom long agogeaswas set, that each would abide by each until death.”
Thereupon all kissed each other, and took the deep vow of fealty. The sons of Usna knew well that it would be a madness to withstand Concobar in their dun, strong as it was; for in time he would take the place, as dogs hunt out the badger from its lair, and at the best would still starve them into surrender or death.
So with all speed they summoned those of their following who were under the sword-bond, and put together food and raiment, and then mounted and rode swiftly away.
As they passed the highest ridge to the eastward that night they looked back. A red light flared in a valley far to the west. It was their dun, a torch amid the darkness. A single column of flame rose above it, and wavered to and fro. And by that sign they knew that the long arm and the heavy hand of Concobar MacNessa had already reached out towardsthem. Three times fifty men went with them, and so swift was their flight and so sure their way that before long they came to the coast-lands. There, in the Creek of the Willows, the long black galley was found; and swiftly all embarked.
It was with glad eyes that Darthool and the sons of Usna saw the dancing waves of the sea, and felt its free breath break upon them. From three great tiers, fifty score men to each, the vassals thrust out their long oars, and with their blades threshed the waters into a yeast of foam. In the dazzle of the sea Darthool rejoiced, and made the hearts of all there to swell because of an exceeding sweet song she sang.
Nathos and Ailne and Ardan sat beside her, and could scarce take from her face their dreaming eyes.
Towards noon the wind shifted, and slid out of the north towards the west. Then the great sail was hoisted, and bellied out to the steady breeze, and the oars were shipped. The black galley now flew along the waters like a cormorant. Darthool laughed with joy at this new beautiful world of the sea, and never tired of trailing her hands in the swiftlapsing wave, or in the send of the following billow.
In the afternoon they came close to the shores of Alba, and made northward, past many isles and through narrow straits and fjords. In one and all Darthool took pleasure, and was glad indeed that the land of Nathos was so beautiful.
At sundown they reached the eastern shores of the great island of Mull, and there the wind failed them, so the galley was put into a bay that is now the bay of Aros.
There the sons of Usna debated long as to what course to follow. Nathos and Ailne thought it best to move inland, and to gain the protection of the high king of Alba; but Darthool feared this because of a dream she had thrice dreamed, wherein she saw a strange king and a strange folk laughing over the slain body of Nathos, while she stood by crowned but a captive. As for Ardan, he said only that the sons of Usna should go to where their father’s dun had been, before the last king of Alba had destroyed it.
That night a galley came to them from the long island of Lismore. In it were a score of men, commanded by a lord of Appin, namedFergus of the Three Duns. With him was a stranger, clad in a rich robe of fur, so claspt across the throat with gold that the hood he wore fell about and covered his face. While Fergus spake with the sons of Usna, and told them how they had been seen by men of his in a swift war-galley, off the south coast of Mull, and urged them also to go inland to meet the king, the stranger looked steadfastly upon Darthool.
When at last he had to speak to the brothers he addressed them courteously, but in a Gaelic strange to their ears. He bade them come with him to his high-walled dun, a brief way inland: to come alone, as his guests, and to bring Darthool with them.
“It is not well to go to a man’s dun, and not be knowing that man’s name,” said Nathos courteously.
The stranger hesitated, and looked at Fergus.
“They call me Angus Mudartach,” he said. But at that Darthool asked him to let her look upon his face.
“For it is not meet,” she added, “that we should go to a man’s dun and not have seen his face.”
Angus of Moidart drew back his hood.
Darthool’s lips grew pale. Then she smiled.
“Let us rest here for to-night, Angus Mudartach,” she said, “and, if thou wilt come again on the morrow after to-morrow, thou canst take us with thee to thy great dun. But meanwhile we have travelled far and swiftly, and would fain rest: and, as thou seest, the skies are clear, and we want for nothing.”
Once more Angus pleaded to the sons of Usna.
“Ye are brave men, and can laugh at weariness or danger. But if the island be swept by a great storm to-night, or if the followers of Concobar, king of the northlands of Erin, come upon ye, or if other misadventure befall, shall ye wantonly expose this fair young princess? Nay, rather, let her come with me, and she shall not only be safe in my great rath of Dunchraig, but there my wife and her maidens shall make much of her, and give her white robes and golden torques and garments of delicate furs. This maid whom ye call Darthool is too young to be thrown thus idly before the feet of the evil powers who are for ever clamouring for death.”
But, at a sign from Darthool, Nathos refused; saying, with gracious words and courteous mien, that it would rejoice them all to visit Angus Mudartach later, but not then.
So Angus of Moidart turned, frowning, and went back to his galley with Fergus of the Three Duns. And as he went he asked mutteringly how many men the sons of Usna had with them. When he learned that there were thrice fifty, and that Fergus had but a score and ten men with him, he said no more.
When the strangers had gone, Nathos turned to Darthool and asked why she had not shown more graciousness to one who was surely a great lord among the Alban Gaels, and why she would not go with him.
“Because, Nathos, that man who called himself Angus Mudartach is no other than the King of Alba. He it is whom I saw in my dreams, laughing over your slain body, and beside whom I stood crowned and yet a captive. And by that token I warn ye of this thing: that the Alban king desireth me, and would fain slay ye all, or deliver ye into the hands of Concobar MacNessa.”
Nathos stood brooding, but Ardan stepped forward.