A Celtic Tale: The Legend of Deirdre

By David Riley and Angelika Pia Schmid-Riley

People like stories. They like to read them, they like to hear them, and they like to tell them. Ill never forget the stories of my wifes cousin Uncle Charles whod pour a cup of coffee, light up his favorite pipe, and begin to recall his seafaring days in the US Navy as we both sat at his small dining room table under the dim light of a homemade Tiffany-like lamp. Hed casually speak of wartimes as if it were just a Sunday walk in the park, only slowing his tempo a bit when it came to those near-death experiences, like nearly being crushed to death as he got pinned between a ship and a dock piling, waiting and praying as the massive ship eased away from the piling with a swell instead of popping open his barrel chest against the timber. I always anxiously anticipated our story time together. Unfortunately, Charles eventually passed away. Two careers, one ending as a lieutenant commander of the navy and one as a captain in a sheriffs department, had finally taken its toll on his health. I miss him, but his stories live on in my mind.

So if stories within our lifetime can impact us and stay with us so long, what kind of story would it have to be to survive over two thousand years of human history? Just such a story is the legend of Deirdre of the Sorrows. My first encounter with this legend was actually musical in nature. In a little shop outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee, I first heard the music of A Celtic Tale by Hearts of Space, and the sound captured my imagination. Not even knowing what the music was about, I bought the cassette and began investigating the tale of Deirdre of the Sorrows that had inspired this music. Think about it! Some old Irish legend survives several millennia and inspires some extremely talented musicians on the west coast of the USA to orchestrate a whole album of music about it! Thats intriguing. From there, I wrote my own narrative to the music and, in time, began contemplating more deeply about this complex tale of love, betrayal, and human destiny. After reading many versions of this tale and looking at the archeological evidence from this time period in Northern Ireland, a more complete story started to formulate itself in my mind. Whether I wanted to or not, it became apparent over time that I was bound by some unseen force to write this novel.

Here is the gist of the story. A dark and powerful druid prophesizes that the most beautiful woman in the world will be born, marry one of three highly admired young brothers in Ireland, and eventually cause the downfall of the kingdom. Instead of killing the baby when she was born, the king decides to raise the girl and marry her on her sixteenth birthday to nullify the prophecy . . . like that was going to work! Well, you can imagine . . . no, wait. You dont have tojust read the story!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 26, 2008
• ISBN: 9781465319050

David Riley

David Riley lives in Grand Junction, Colorado, with his wife, Nealy. He currently exhibits his artwork in Prescott and Flagstaff, Arizona. David is often driven to paint by the desire to capture human emotion and the power of telling stories.

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Copyright © 2008 by David Riley.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

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Contents

Preface

Acknowledgements

Part One

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Part Two

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Part Three

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Afterword

Ballad of Deirdre of the Sorrows

Dedication

This story is dedicated to my wife, Angie,

a modern-day Deirdre and illustrator of this book!

Preface

My first encounter with this legend was actually musical in nature. In a little shop outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee, I first heard the music of A Celtic Tale by Mychael and Jeff Danna in Hearts of Space; and the sound captured my imagination. Not even knowing what the music was about, I bought the cassette and began investigating the tale of Deirdre of the Sorrows that had inspired this music. From there, I wrote a narrative to the music (see appendix) and in time began contemplating more deeply about this complex tale of love, betrayal, and human destiny. This ancient story seems to explore thoroughly the directions that human life can take following a few fateful events. One particular sequence of events that seems to repeat itself through all human times is that beauty is first admired, then coveted, resented, and finally destroyed by far too many people.

Very few of us can look upon a beautiful thing with the same wonderment as that rare child that carefully smells a new flower attached to its life-giving plant to savor its light fragrance. Most of us are like the little boy that crushes the lightning bug, smearing its glowing bowels on the pavement in the dark of night for an immediate gratification. Still, we are all attracted to beauty in our own ways. Maybe nothing can be done about our flawed human natures, or maybe the druids of ancient times knew that there was power in the telling of a good tale, power in its teachings. Perhaps good tales simply help us understand our human condition, or perhaps they hold the key to improving our destiny. Something about this particular story obsessed me, so it appears that I am destined to rewrite this legend along with many others more worthy of the task. For me, this odd Celtic tale keeps growing bigger in my mind the more I think about it and refuses to stay untold.

I think that the common stories of pre-Christian Ireland might provide some key reasons for the general embracement of the philosophy and belief system of Saint Patrick and other Christian missionaries in the fifth century AD. Kings and magic ruled the land for a thousand years prior to his life. Then Patrick and others showed up with an odd Eastern religion based on the life of a carpenter, and a tremendous cultural change sweeps the land. It makes me wonder why. There must have been some degree of dissatisfaction with the spiritual and political powers that dominated Ireland at the time. More than likely, a long time ago in Erin’s beautiful Green Isle, some powerful regime pissed off a lot of people in a big way! So much so that for a long time afterward, common people harbored a deep-seated discontentment with the ruling clans. They must have been waiting for a major change in their lives.

Now don’t get me wrong. I do think there must have been a great deal right with that old culture to have predominated for so long, three thousand to four thousand years prior to Patrick’s arrival. The early Celtic culture seemed to be more balanced in some respects than modern-day culture. Take a look at the Brehon laws, a remnant from that era, if you think that they were a primitive people. They were quite modern and fair in many of their laws. They certainly had a closer relationship with nature than we do today. Where we spend four to twelve hours a day looking at a TV or a computer monitor or talking on a cell phone, they spent all their waking hours interacting with their natural environment and with one another. Their medicines were from nature, not a chemical vat. When they had mental or social problems, they explained the unexplainable with fairies, sprites, and lively stories. Since there was no written word, there was no static bible by which to guide their lives. Thus, all spirituality was very much alive, grounded in the natural world and the people in it.

Clearly, the uncomfortable marriage of human spirituality and social power has plagued mankind since the recorded history. Surely, the Celts had their own problems with this. Then Saint Patrick came along offering a belief system outside the control of Ireland’s kings based on a carpenter persecuted by his own religious establishment and ultimately sentenced to die by public officials. This must have been very appealing to the common people of Celtic Ireland and possibly to the intellectuals of the day, the druids. In fact, it is my understanding that many of the druids of that time became the early-Christian monks in Ireland.

This is what we humans seem to do. We come up with a great idea or belief system. Over time, we get organized. Then we think, How can anyone disagree with this obviously great idea? Then there are those that capitalize on the societal trends to consolidate power for themselves. Given more time, these powerful people begin to force the masses into compliance with the idea, usually to satisfy their own perceived need for security and comfort. The culmination of this process is when we eventually beat one another’s heads in for the sake of change when we decide that maybe it wasn’t such a great idea after all or that the original idea has been lost in the shuffle. We do all this in our endless pursuit for security, love, pleasure, and beauty. Happiness seems to come about when we are able to balance these things… obviously, no small feat, or we would have figured it out by now!

Social rebellion is a classic agent for change. However, it seems that whenever a great thinker or prophet appears in human history, it is just a matter of time before the clear lessons taught by these individuals, meant as help for the betterment of mankind, are twisted into a tool for manipulating masses of people into action, ultimately to satisfy the bloated egos of a few misguided religious or political leaders. When the power of kings begins to dictate who and what a sentient being will love and care for, or hate and die for, then like an awakening dragon, the winds of change will begin to howl until an uneasy peace once again prevails over mankind. Thus, the adventure begins… once again.

Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge my best friend from college and author,

Ken Gilland, who offered valuable advice to me as a first-time novelist.

Martina Wahl, Angie’s oldest childhood friend and avid book reader,

provided an excellent critical review of the final manuscript.

Kathy Patrick, friend of the fairies, took the photograph for the back cover;

and her husband, Ben, provided Lake Patrick and his esteemed moral support.

I especially wish to thank Art Ward, an amazing photographer

from Cloughcorr, Ireland, for his photograph of Fair Head

on the northern coast of Ireland used for the

front cover of this book

Part One

Birth of a Legend

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Chapter 1

You Had to Be There

Christ, here comes another one, Patrick exclaimed as an American tourist turned the corner and began walking up the hill with his 8-megapixel digital camera blazing away. You could tell he was an American by the way he loped as he walked back and forth like some strange long-legged penguin. The city of Armagh, Ireland, depended on the flood of tourists that descended on the region each year to keep employment high and to maintain that economic viability that local politicians loved to talk about. It was a perfect day, with a crystal blue afternoon sky interrupted only by a few cotton white clouds suspended above verdant green hillsides. You would think that the fellow would be taking pictures of the gorgeous countryside, but instead, he was taking aim at any old building that came into his camera’s line of vision.

My two mates Patrick and Connel and I were sitting on the bench in front of our favorite pub waiting for the doors to open; the owner was still on tea break and setting up inside. I’ll buy the next pint if he introduces himself like a civilized human being, I said to Patrick, referring to the approaching tourist and getting into a sudden spirit of betting. I had just lost my job at the local mill that was closed recently. The reason was that clothes could be made for a fraction of the cost of production in Ireland simply by relocating to China. Who would have ever believed that there would be poorer people in the world to take advantage of than the Irish. We really must be progressing in this wee country of ours! I thought to myself, shaking my head in disbelief at the imagined poverty of the Chinese working class.

I’ll buy you a friggin’ truck if he doesn’t ask what that bloody goat shed is, said Patrick. The shed was an ancient stone structure in the field facing the pub, which over the years had been the favorite unimportant landmark that tourists like to ask about. It was old; and the landowner, O’Reilly, was nearly as old. O’Reilly had refused to sell the property to developers, whom he hated with a passion. It was his last great mission in life to be a major pain in the ass to anyone with money, especially developers. The locals had a running bet as to what he put in his will, which no one, as of yet, had read. It was widely believed that he was going to do something terrible that would symbolize his disgust for speculators and developers into the future after his wrinkled old body gave up its ghost. Patrick had placed a small wager that he had arranged to erect a monument—a giant phallic symbol pointed at the local bank.

Excuse me, what is that stone building over there? asked the tourist.

Bloody hell, there goes my truck! I exclaimed automatically; and then with a bright and friendly voice, I said, It’s the ancient stable of the Brown Bull of Cooley. Buy us a round of beers, and we’ll tell you all about it, laddie, trying to salvage what I could out of the encounter. But the young man took about a dozen photos of the shed instead, wrote down Stable of the Brown Bull of Cooley in his little notebook, and loped off down the road.

You shouldn’t be doing that, Connel said to me from the far end of the bench after the young man was out of earshot, just to get a free round of drinks. You don’t know who that young man might be… could be working for the New York Tourist Board.

Well, if the almighty New York Tourist Board prints a picture of O’Reilly’s goat shed as the Stable of the Brown friggin’ Bull of Cooley, then I say it serves them right. These foreigners with their damn cell phones, digital cameras, laptop computers, and the Internet can kiss my ass if they can’t take the time to look up the proper location of the legend of the Cattle Raid of Cooley in a reputable library! said I, feeling righteously indignant about the plight of modern society and still sore about the recent loss of income. I’m surprised you were even listening, Connel. I thought you were asleep over there. Why should you care about some idiot tourist anyway?

I care about the old stories, he said and went quiet again.

Oh geez, said Patrick, chiming in, half the stories don’t make any more sense than O’Reilly sitting on that prime real estate over there instead of selling it to the bank, moving to Tahiti, and having young nubile native girls massage his wrinkled old head and feed him grapes the rest of his days.

I think some of them make more sense than you think, Patrick, responded Connel in an unusual display of conversation. Connel was a middle-aged bachelor that had spent much more time in the Armagh Library than honing up on his social skills over the last forty years. His idea of a good time was sitting down to a piping hot cup of tea and a history book for the evening. If his friend Patrick didn’t drag him to the pub on weekends, he’d never get out. Connel continued, The Cattle Raid of Cooley is more a part of our history than the Old Testament. The legend of Deirdre, as many times as it has been rewritten, says more about our human nature than most church sermons!

Both Patrick and I turned to look at Connel in amazement. We had never heard him speak with such conviction before and were both temporarily struck dumb by his sudden passionate outburst. All right, all right, Connel, your point is taken. I’ll go easy on the Brown Bull comments. At that moment, a group of Japanese tourists approached, and the Japanese tour guide asked, Please, sir, can you tell us what that is over there (pointing at O’Reilly’s shed)?

Christ almighty, moaned Patrick, it’s the first church of Saint Patrick, and I should know… I’m related to him on my mother’s side. The Japanese guide’s eyes grew wide with disbelief. So Patrick produced his driver’s license and pointed to the name Patrick. The guide said Ahh so before telling the group this amazing revelation. Two dozen cameras were suddenly pointed at Patrick, and clicking frenzy ensued. Patrick jumped up and posed across the street in front of O’Reilly’s shed to the glee of the Japanese tourists. After much bowing, he managed to extricate himself from the crowd and walked back to us with his hands up, saying with a sly grin, What? I’m just giving them what they wanted. They enjoyed themselves, and I didn’t say a word about the bull.

After we had our little chuckle, I told Connel that I’d buy the next round of pints if he would tell us what he meant by his comment about the legend of Deirdre. Connel was a fairly devout churchman, so his comments seemed a bit strong and out of character, like he had something on his mind. He said he didn’t like talking about these things, but when I said that I’d start the story with as much as I knew and that he could correct me if I didn’t get it right, he grudgingly accepted the offer. Connel was somewhat intrigued that his friends were finally showing an interest in one of his passions, literature on ancient Celtic cultures; but he was wary of the biting humor that often got out of hand around fairy tales, legends, and the like. I read Connel’s concern in his eyes and assured him that we’d tone it down for the next hour or so.

Seriously, Connel, I really want to know what you think about the legends. To be honest, I’ve never gotten that much out of the old stories, but I know how much you like ’em. I just wanted to know why. Sure, they are mildly interesting from a historical context. But personally, I get more out of a Rocky Balboa movie, I said as I handed him his pint and settled onto the bench outside where Connel insisted that we sit. He did this so that the patrons in the pub didn’t disrupt the conversation with a Oh god! Not Deirdre again! Can’t you talk about something in the current century for Christ’s sake! or worse.

Patrick joined us and said, You know, if we sit out here, we are prime tourist targets. How about we hide ourselves in the booth in the back? As much as Patrick liked to be the center of attention, it got old being ogled at by an endless stream of tourists. After a while, you just start to feel like chimpanzees at the zoo, except without the regular feeding. But Connel insisted on sitting outside and watching the sun go down. He was getting into one of those contemplative moods, and he needed to see the far horizon to match his quiet longing for another place and time.

I was looking at my two mates in the glow of the setting sun. Patrick was poking fun at Connel good-heartedly to keep him from drifting too far off in his thoughts. It made me think warmly about the friendship that they had both brought into my life. Both were quite a bit older than I was, in their early fifties, and I had not really interacted with them that much until the tragedy. When my wife had died of pneumonia two years ago, childless, they both came over to the house a month after the funeral. They had the specific mission to not let me wallow one day more in self-pity and depression. I had isolated myself from everyone I knew, including family, but they were not to be dissuaded. I told them to leave me alone, but they just threw a gunnysack over my head when I turned my back on them. They tied me up with a rope and carried me down to the local pub. After much cursing and kicking, they tore a hole in the sack at my face, stared me in the eyes, grinning like two demons, and said, Hey, Fergus, you ready to come out of that sack you’ve made for yourself and join the land of the living? Or do we need to tape up this hole again?

I balled like a little baby for a few minutes and then said, Can someone buy me a friggin’ pint and get this damn sack off me? And with that, our friendship had been sealed forever. Patrick was loud, brash, and had a pile of kids and a ferocious but loving wife. Connel was quiet, polite, and a dyed-in-the-wool bachelor… A more unlikely pair you would never meet, but they seem to blend well somehow.

I took a long drink of Guinness and started, Well, Connel, what I know about the legend of Deirdre is that she was born to the wife of the chief storyteller of King Conor Mac Nessa. Deirdre was supposed to be the most beautiful woman in the universe. Cathbad, the king’s druid, said that she’d cause the ruin of Ulster. And basically, she did. She ran off with Naisi and the other sons of Usna. King Conor chased them out of Ireland, forcing them to be exiled in Scotland. Conor eventually had them brought back to Ulster under the guise of amnesty and then trapped them. Finally, Naisi and then Deirdre were killed by King Conor, which caused a rift in the kingdom. It’s a sad story that nobody but Yeats wants to hear about anymore, and Yeats is dead. Did I miss anything?

Patrick chimed in, Don’t forget your namesake, Fergus mac Róich, the king before Conor that eventually became Conor’s general. I always thought that had to make for an awkward arrangement. He was in there somewhere rolling around the castle at Emain Macha.

First of all, started Connel slowly, there were no castles like you and I think of, not two thousand years ago. The circular forts were built out of timber on old mounds of earth. That’s why there is so little left from those days because the wood and leather became food for worms… The one thing that did last was the spoken word, passed on from generation to generation. Secondly, the account you just gave me is about right. But most of these legends were probably poorly transcribed from the original language around the time of Saint Patrick, three to four centuries after the actual events.

Hold on, Connel, I exclaimed. You don’t really mean to tell me that you believe these legends are based on actual events? Aren’t they just the combined ramblings of a thousand years of drunken Irishmen and monks that had nothing more interesting to do? Even Yeats had his way with the legend of Deirdre. Seems by now, we’ve made a real mess of them. I mean, sure, there’s always a grain of truth to any story. But I think that you’re reading way too much into everything you do read. Come on, Connel, a legend is basically cheap barroom entertainment. I stopped as I saw Connel’s face starting to redden with anger and thinking to myself what an ass I’d just become. All of the sudden, I regretted speaking before thinking, a bad habit of mine, especially with such a good friend as Connel. I knew how important this stuff was to him.

This—circling his finger between me and him—is why I don’t want to talk about it, Connel said through clinched teeth and went silent again, clutching his pint but not drinking a drop.

Now I knew I had really pissed him off. I’m sorry. I mean it, Connel. I promise I’ll keep my trap shut. You know how bigheaded I can be… to my own detriment. You remember the gunnysack incident. I said I’d be quiet and listen… and I will. My man Patrick here will hit me with this stick—reaching down to pick up a discarded branch next to the bench—if I say another disparaging word, I said, trying to appease Connel. See… pint’s on the lips, not another word.

Patrick calmed his friend down with a joke. You mean the O’Reilly stone goat shed is not two thousand years old? Christ, it looks it! And we all chuckled, settling back down a bit. Several quiet minutes passed; and soon, all three of us were in a peaceful reverie, staring at the magnificent golden sunset that was beginning to edge across the western sky.

Connel started again and said almost to himself, The old stories are real, not because somebody recorded them accurately over the centuries, but because they continue to inspire over the centuries. They’re more real than most things I see around me these days. I think it would have been so nice to hear the legends in the original tongue of our Celtic ancestors. It would probably explain a lot of why the modern versions of the legends are so fragmented and difficult to read. Saint Patrick’s monks preserved the legends in a translated form for posterity, but at the cost of the Celtic culture. The Celtic language and stories were alive in the minds of the people, not statically imprinted on a piece of paper. I’m not saying that the ancient Celts didn’t deserve the change that came. The common people were ready to follow Saint Patrick into the Middle Ages for some reason, but I can’t help but think that we should not have turned our backs so completely on our Celtic culture and history, losing the lessons of three thousand years of mistakes.

Oh, I could give you my thirty years of my mistakes if you think it’d make a difference, I quipped but immediately put the pint back to my lips as Connel shot me a disapproving glance.

The legends, stated Connel with more conviction, are the fragments of the moral lessons of the ancient Celts, told over and over again to each generation to keep people grounded in real life values. They were entertaining, dramatic, and required real skill to deliver. Just like today, the audiences back then were not likely to be any more receptive. On top of that, the story had to be told in such a way that the messages were understood. The only written language before the arrival of Saint Patrick was ogham, which wasn’t detailed enough to serve this purpose. So communicating complex ideas was all in the storytelling. The ancient Celts were the consummate storytellers. Connel finally took a long slow drink out of his pint and settled into his own storytelling mode, a side of Connel that Patrick and I had rarely seen before, so we followed his example and sipped on our nearly empty pints.

The legend of Deirdre, which culminates in the death of the sons of Usna, is important because it brings all the elements of ancient Celtic culture into a single story. Even though it’s a combination of several stories from different periods of time, I think that it comes close to describing the key to human happiness and human misery in its day. It is the story of the sacrifice of love, the courage of convictions, and the folly of the pursuit of power. It tells us how even the religious power that existed two thousand years ago, already with several millennia of cumulative knowledge, was not enough to protect the people from the destructive power of their own egos…

Wait a minute, wait a minute, I pleaded. This sounds like it’s going to take another pint. Can I get you one, Patrick? Patrick nodded and gratefully handed me his empty glass. Give me a minute, Connel, got to get rid of some used Guinness.

While I darted inside, I heard a passing tourist ask Patrick, Sir what is that stone structure over there? and Patrick replying flatly, An IRA bomb shelter.

When I got back, Connel was saying, There are a lot of commonalities in the Celtic literature, for example similarities between the King Arthur story and the legend of Deirdre that I think reoccur because all of these stories are reaching for some common truth. I don’t think these stories are simple at all. For example, King Conor Mac Nessa was not necessarily a sinister king, at least not initially so. His mother, Nessa, likely was more power hungry than her son, Conor. This has to be true if as some suggest Conor was Cathbad’s son from a planned sexual encounter instigated by Nessa. Nessa had no problem with seducing Fergus to get her son, Conor, onto the throne. I’d say there is little doubt of Nessa’s ruthless lust for power from a very early age. Is it any wonder that King Conor was a little screwed up later in his rule… with a mother like that!

We nodded and drank another sip of beer. Everyone there was momentarily thinking about their mothers, comparing them to the terrible Nessa, thinking either Yeah, about like that, or No, my mum was all right, thank God.

Yeah, Connel, but you’ve got to admit that King Conor was one messed-up puppy if he thought that he was going to raise a baby to become his future wife. They’ve got places for people like that these days, I said with disgust.

No doubt, no doubt, but you’re missing the context in which the story happened. Cathbad had just predicted that the baby would cause the demise of the kingdom by growing up and marrying an enemy of the king. Cathbad was the head prophet in the land, so this was as good as fact. The next logical conclusion that everyone in power came to was simple… kill the baby as soon as it was born. This was in the household of the king’s best friend, or at least his best storyteller, and this was his friend’s wife’s baby that they were talking about butchering. King Conor was nothing if he wasn’t quick-witted, and the answer came fast. He’d marry the baby when she grew up, nullifying the prophecy since he could not be his own enemy, and he’d get a gorgeous female in the bargain. Actually, it was a pretty cunning solution, brilliant even. No wonder Conor was king and not Fergus, he said with satisfaction.

Well, I said, I guess you had to be there… and, Connel, you’re the only one of us old enough to fit that category, I finished, slapping his leg in good humor. He looked at me, smiling at the joke, and then I knew I was fully back in his good graces.

About that time, I saw two Swedish female tourists coming up the road. Oh sweet Jesus, I’ve got this one, Patrick, I said, shoving him back as the two young ladies approached.

Sir, can you tell us what that house is over there? one asked, pointing to O’Reilly’s goat shed.

Why, certainly, little lassies. It would be my divine pleasure to tell you exactly what that magnificent structure is, I said with a grin from ear to ear. This beautiful stone relic—

Is a goat shed, interjected Connel. Will you two ever give up? he asked in frustration.

All right… it’s a goat shed, I relinquished. You both are probably too young for me anyway, but you can’t blame an eligible bachelor like me for trying! I said, winking at the smiling ladies, and they rewarded me by smiling divinely. If you want to hear a real legend, you should sit and listen to my man Connel tell the tale of the most beautiful woman in all of Irish history. My goodness, ladies, you will never hear a tale that is more inspiring, more heart wrenching than this legend handed down for generations of Irishmen… the tale of Deirdre of the Sorrows, I said with my most eloquent and dramatic flourish.

Now it was Connel on the hot seat, and Patrick couldn’t help but stifle a chuckle when Connel stammered a response. Ah… well… ah… well… ah…

Come on, Connel, Patrick said. You know he’s right. Deirdre was the moooooosst beautiful, the most sorrowful creature that ever roamed the face of the earth, and you can’t possibly deny these two lovely ladies the best story ever told on Irish soil! You couldn’t do that… ! Why, look at these two beautiful young ladies. I have to say that you, fair maiden—nodding to the girl with the friendly catlike eyes—have the eyes of our fair Deirdre, and you—nodding to the girl with the wavy auburn hair that glowed in the setting sun—most certainly have her lovely hair. Can’t you just imagine how beautiful Princess Deirdre was… two thousand years ago, he said, moving over on the bench so that the intrigued young ladies could sit down between them.

This was a difficult decision for Connel. He had spent his whole life reading other people’s stories, critiquing their writing styles, thinking about how he would do better if it had been him. But this was so different. Now it was him under the spotlight, with an audience of close friends and beautiful strangers, each posing different consequences from the telling of a bad story. He could simply refuse right now, and they would all forget about it as one of the many mundane conversations that occurred every day of their lives. Or he could really attempt to tell a magnificent tale… and fail miserably, leaving a lasting bad impression on all. Or he could tell the tale as magnificently as he could for the sake of the tale… and maybe, just maybe, leave a lasting impression that might inspire. He wondered for a second, what would the druids of old have done? What the hell? he thought; at his age, it was time to speak up or forever hold his peace, and this story deserved better than that.

As the sun was disappearing over the horizon and the streetlight flickered on, Connel reluctantly agreed to tell the tale of Deirdre. He was settling into the prospect of laying out this long story. It began growing in his mind, even as he started to organize his thoughts. Connel had apparently been thinking about just such an opportunity for a very long time. No, this was not going to be a short tale. And as they all waited patiently for Connel to begin, Connel was already imagining himself two thousand years ago.

Connel started, Once upon time, there were three common men, just like the three of us here. They were sitting on wooden bench… just like the bench right here, ladies, smiling at them in a fatherly fashion, and they rewarding him with their own beautiful smiles. But it was just outside a small circular fort, one that surrounded the house of Felimy, son of Dall, on the eve of the Feast of Samhain. There was Little Fergus, he said, smiling at me, Padac, winking at Patrick, and of course, a quiet gentleman known as Conal, he said with a genuine smile for the young ladies.

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Chapter 2

The Prophecy

Connel began by describing what it must have been like two thousand years ago in ancient Ireland. Of course, there was no electricity, no paved roads, no plastics, no gasoline, and no brick buildings, just ringforts and wooden crannog huts. There were no televisions, radios, cell phones, newspapers, books, or printed manuscripts of any kind because there was no writing! Well, none except for ogham symbols carved in large stones posts… and those didn’t move! The only communication was face-to-face talking and songs, that’s it. Your family’s honor and the loyalty of clans supporting your clan determined your social standing. The only land transportation was walking or riding a horse or a horse-drawn cart. There were no schools… at least not what we would think of as schools. Knowledge was handed down, word of mouth, through an established system of druids, which included the storytellers and bards. What was there? In ancient Ireland was an endless expanse of brilliant green landscape… Erin’s Emerald Isle…

From a bird’s-eye view, you could look out across a vast landscape of green rolling hills and valleys with scattered dark green patches of trees that coalesced into a thick, impenetrable forest far off to the east. A flock of crows were calling as they descended onto patches of drying rye grain, a sign that autumn was full in bloom. Fall flowers of goldenrod, heather, and the like, painted the dusty green hillsides. As you flew north, you could see a hill that was clear of trees but topped with a large teepee-looking wooden structure surrounded by a large wall of upright smooth logs. Numerous large flags projected from the ramparts. They danced in the breeze, drawing your eye to the structure as if to say that there is celebration afoot here. A pair of magpies, with white-painted wings and sheens of green and blue on their tails, noisily chattered on the front gate as if gossiping about the coming party. This was the Hall of Dall, ringfort of Lord Felimy, chief bard of King Conor Mac Nessa. Around the fort could be seen a large number of wooden huts where the majority of the inhabitants dwelled. On this fine day, almost everyone was out working in their gardens or tending the cattle that dotted the landscape. There seemed to be anticipation in the air as the workers were clearing the main paths and building log pyres on the tops of the hills surrounding the fort. Something big was about to happen; and everyone, especially those inside the fort, was busily preparing for an arrival.

You could hear Lavarcham inside the walls checking the food in the numerous storage baskets brought in for the Feast of Samhain. She was in charge of preparations since Felimy’s wife, Aoni, the lady of the house of Dall, was heavy with pregnancy. Lavarcham was one of the most competent women in the kingdom, being trained as a druidess as a young child and a soldier later on. She had been married to one of the best soldiers in King Conor’s army who had been killed in a freak accident just a year after they had been married. In the three years since that tragedy, she had been assigned to work as the head mistress and general house manager for the king’s retainer and chief storyteller, Lord Felimy. Just then, Lavarcham was looking for the three workmen assigned to her. They were supposed to gather the wood, maintain the fires, and generally run whatever errands she needed done for