are lasting," she said, "and we do every
kind thing without quarrelling, and we are called the people of the
Sidhe." "Who are you speaking to, boy?" said Conn to him then, for no
one saw the strange woman but only Connla. "He is speaking to a high
woman that death or old age will never come to," she said. "I am asking
him to come to Magh Mell, the Pleasant Plain where the triumphant king
is living, and there he will be a king for ever without sorrow or fret.
Come with me, Connla of the Red Hair," she said, "of the fair freckled
neck and of the ruddy cheek; come with me, and your body will not wither
from its youth and its comeliness for ever."
They could all hear the woman's words then, though they could not see
her, and it is what Conn said to Coran his Druid: "Help me, Coran, you
that sing spells of the great arts. There is an attack made on me that
is beyond my wisdom and beyond my power, I never knew so strong an
attack since the first day I was a king. There is an unseen figure
fighting with me; she is using her strength against me to bring away my
beautiful son; the call of a woman is bringing him away from the hands
of the king."
Then Coran, the Druid, began singing spells against the woman of the
Sidhe, the way no one would hear her voice, and Connla could not see her
any more. But when she was being driven away by the spells of the Druid,
she threw an apple to Connla.
And through the length of a month from that time, Connla used no other
food nor drink but that apple, for he thought no other food or drink
worth the using. And for all he ate of it, the apple grew no smaller,
but was whole all the while. And there was great trouble on Connla on
account of the woman he had seen.
And at the end of a month Connla was at his father's side in Magh
Archomnim, and he saw the same woman coming towards him, and it is what
she said: "It is a high place indeed Connla has among dying people, and
death before him. But the Ever-Living Living Ones," she said, "are
asking you to take the sway over the people of Tethra, for they are
looking at you every day in the gatherings of your country among your
dear friends."
When Conn, the king, heard her voice, he said to his people: "Call
Coran, the Druid to me, for I hear the sound of the woman's voice
again." But on that she said: "O Conn, fighter of a hundred, it is
little love and little respect the wonderful tribes of Traig Mor, the
Great Strand, have for Druids; and whe
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