Gods and Fighting Men, Lady I. A Gregory [best e books to read TXT] 📗

rain.

 

"We have brought from the dun of the Pleasant Plain thirty cauldrons,

thirty drinking horns; we have brought the complaint that was sung by

the Sea, by the daughter of Eochaid the Dumb.

 

"There is a wife for every man of the fifty; my own wife to me is the

Tear of the Sun; I am made master of a blue sword; I would not give for

all your whole kingdom one night of the nights of the Sidhe."

 

With that Laegaire turned from them, and went back to the kingdom. And

he was made king there along with Fiachna, son of Betach, and his

daughter, and he did not come out of it yet.

 

BOOK FIVE: (THE FATE OF THE CHILDREN OF LIR)

Now at the time when the Tuatha de Danaan chose a king for themselves

after the battle of Tailltin, and Lir heard the kingship was given to

Bodb Dearg, it did not please him, and he left the gathering without

leave and with no word to any one; for he thought it was he himself had

a right to be made king. But if he went away himself, Bodb was given the

kingship none the less, for not one of the five begrudged it to him but

only Lir, And it is what they determined, to follow after Lir, and to

burn down his house, and to attack himself with spear and sword, on

account of his not giving obedience to the king they had chosen. "We

will not do that," said Bodb Dearg, "for that man would defend any place

he is in; and besides that," he said, "I am none the less king over the

Tuatha de Danaan, although he does not submit to me."

 

All went on like that for a good while, but at last a great misfortune

came on Lir, for his wife died from him after a sickness of three

nights. And that came very hard on Lir, and there was heaviness on his

mind after her. And there was great talk of the death of that woman in

her own time.

 

And the news of it was told all through Ireland, and it came to the

house of Bodb, and the best of the Men of Dea were with him at that

time. And Bodb said: "If Lir had a mind for it," he said, "my help and

my friendship would be good for him now, since his wife is not living to

him. For I have here with me the three young girls of the best shape,

and the best appearance, and the best name in all Ireland, Aobh, Aoife,

and Ailbhe, the three daughters of Oilell of Aran, my own three

nurselings." The Men of Dea said then it was a good thought he had, and

that what he said was true.

 

Messages and messengers were sent then from Bodb Dearg to the place Lir

was, to say that if he had a mind to join with the Son of the Dagda and

to acknowledge his lordship, he would give him a foster-child of his

foster-children. And Lir thought well of the offer, and he set out on

the morrow with fifty chariots from Sidhe Fionnachaidh; and he went by

every short way till he came to Bodb's dwelling-place at Loch Dearg, and

there was a welcome before him there, and all the people were merry and

pleasant before him, and he and his people got good attendance that

night.

 

And the three daughters of Oilell of Aran were sitting on the one seat

with Bodb Dearg's wife, the queen of the Tuatha de Danaan, that was

their foster-mother. And Bodb said: "You may have your choice of the

three young girls, Lir." "I cannot say," said Lir, "which one of them is

my choice, but whichever of them is the eldest, she is the noblest, and

it is best for me to take her." "If that is so," said Bodb, "it is Aobh

is the eldest, and she will be given to you, if it is your wish." "It is

my wish," he said. And he took Aobh for his wife that night, and he

stopped there for a fortnight, and then he brought her away to his own

house, till he would make a great wedding-feast.

 

And in the course of time Aobh brought forth two children, a daughter

and a son, Fionnuala and Aodh their names were. And after a while she

was brought to bed again, and this time she gave birth to two sons, and

they called them Fiachra and Conn. And she herself died at their birth.

And that weighed very heavy on Lir, and only for the way his mind was

set on his four children he would have gone near to die of grief.

 

The news came to Bodb Dearg's place, and all the people gave out three

loud, high cries, keening their nursling. And after they had keened her

it is what Bodb Dearg said: "It is a fret to us our daughter to have

died, for her own sake and for the sake of the good man we gave her to,

for we are thankful for his friendship and his faithfulness. However,"

he said, "our friendship with one another will not be broken, for I will

give him for a wife her sister Aoife."

 

When Lir heard that, he came for the girl and married her, and brought

her home to his house. And there was honour and affection with Aoife for

her sister's children; and indeed no person at all could see those four

children without giving them the heart's love.

 

And Bodb Dearg used often to be going to Lir's house for the sake of

those children; and he used to bring them to his own place for a good

length of time, and then he would let them go back to their own place

again. And the Men of Dea were at that time using the Feast of Age in

every hill of the Sidhe in turn; and when they came to Lir's hill those

four children were their joy and delight, for the beauty of their

appearance; and it is where they used to sleep, in beds in sight of

their father Lir. And he used to rise up at the break of every morning,

and to lie down among his children.

 

But it is what came of all this, that a fire of jealousy was kindled in

Aoife, and she got to have a dislike and a hatred of her sister's

children.

 

Then she let on to have a sickness, that lasted through nearly the

length of a year. And the end of that time she did a deed of jealousy

and cruel treachery against the children of Lir.

 

And one day she got her chariot yoked, and she took the four children

in it, and they went forward towards the house of Bodb Dearg; but

Fionnuala had no mind to go with her, for she knew by her she had some

plan for their death or their destruction, and she had seen in a dream

that there was treachery against them in Aoife's mind. But all the same

she was not able to escape from what was before her.

 

And when they were on their way Aoife said to her people: "Let you kill

now," she said, "the four children of Lir, for whose sake their father

has given up my love, and I will give you your own choice of a reward

out of all the good things of the world." "We will not do that indeed,"

said they; "and it is a bad deed you have thought of, and harm will come

to you out of it."

 

And when they would not do as she bade them, she took out a sword

herself to put an end to the children with; but she being a woman and

with no good courage, and with no great strength in her mind, she was

not able to do it.

 

They went on then west to Loch Dairbhreach, the Lake of the Oaks, and

the horses were stopped there. And Aoife bade the children of Lir to go

out and bathe in the lake, and they did as she bade them. And as soon as

Aoife saw them out in the lake she struck them with a Druid rod, and put

on them the shape of four swans, white and beautiful. And it is what she

said: "Out with you, children of the king, your luck is taken away from

you for ever; it is sorrowful the story will be to your friends; it is

with flocks of birds your cries will be heard for ever."

 

And Fionnuala said: "Witch, we know now what your name is, you have

struck us down with no hope of relief; but although you put us from wave

to wave, there are times when we will touch the land. We shall get help

when we are seen; help, and all that is best for us; even though we

have to sleep upon the lake, it is our minds will be going abroad

early."

 

And then the four children of Lir turned towards Aoife, and it is what

Fionnuala said: "It is a bad deed you have done, Aoife, and it is a bad

fulfilling of friendship, you to destroy us without cause; and vengeance

for it will come upon you, and you will fall in satisfaction for it, for

your power for our destruction is not greater than the power of our

friends to avenge it on you; and put some bounds now," she said, "to the

time this enchantment is to stop on us." "I will do that," said Aoife,

"and it is worse for you, you to have asked it of me. And the bounds I

set to your time are this, till the Woman from the South and the Man

from the North will come together. And since you ask to hear it of me,"

she said, "no friends and no power that you have will be able to bring

you out of these shapes you are in through the length of your lives,

until you have been three hundred years on Loch Dairbhreach, and three

hundred years on Sruth na Maoile between Ireland and Alban, and three

hundred years at Irrus Domnann and Inis Gluaire; and these are to be

your journeys from this out," she said.

 

But then repentance came on Aoife, and she said: "Since there is no

other help for me to give you now, you may keep your own speech; and you

will be singing sweet music of the Sidhe, that would put the men of the

earth to sleep, and there will be no music in the world equal to it; and

your own sense and your own nobility will stay with you, the way it will

not weigh so heavy on you to be in the shape of birds. And go away out

of my sight now, children of Lir," she said, "with your white faces,

with your stammering Irish. It is a great curse on tender lads, they to

be driven out on the rough wind. Nine hundred years to be on the water,

it is a long time for any one to be in pain; it is I put this on you

through treachery, it is best for you to do as I tell you now.

 

"Lir, that got victory with so many a good cast, his heart is a kernel

of death in him now; the groaning of the great hero is a sickness to me,

though it is I that have well earned his anger."

 

And then the horses were caught for Aoife, and the chariot yoked for

her, and she went on to the palace of Bodb Dearg, and there was a

welcome before her from the chief people of the place. And the son of

the Dagda asked her why she did not bring the children of Lir with her.

"I will tell you that," she said.