It happened that before this a child had been born, a girl
golden-haired and with blue eyes, of whom the Druids had foretold many
dark and terrible things. That the evil might not be wrought through
this child of sad destiny, the king had from her earliest childhood kept
her securely hidden in a lonely fort, and there Deirdré grew in
solitude, daily increasing in beauty and winsomeness. She so won the
love of those set in guard over her that they relaxed something of the
strictness of their watch, letting her wander a little in the meadows
and the verges of the woods, gathering flowers, and watching the life of
birds and wild things there.

Among the chieftains of the court of Emain was one Usnac, of whom were
three sons, with Naisi strongest and handsomest of the three. Naisi was
dark, with black locks hanging upon his shoulders and dark, gleaming
eyes; and so strongly is unlike drawn to unlike that golden-haired
Deirdré, seeing him in one of her wanderings, felt her heart go forth to
him utterly. Falling into talk with him, they exchanged promises of
enduring love. Thus the heart of Naisi went to Deirdré, as hers had gone
to him, so that all things were changed for them, growing radiant with
tremulous hope and wistful with longing. Yet the fate that lay upon
Deirdré was heavy, and all men dreaded it but Naisi; so that even his
brothers, the sons of Usnac, feared greatly and would have dissuaded him
from giving his life to the ill-fated one. But Naisi would not be
dissuaded; so they met secretly many times, in the twilight at the verge
of the wood, Deirdré's golden hair catching the last gleam of sunlight
and holding it long into the darkness, while the black locks of Naisi,
even ere sunset, foreshadowed the coming night. In their hearts it was
not otherwise; for Deirdré, full of wonder at the change that had come
over her, at the song of the birds that echoed ever around her even in
her dreams, at the radiance of the flowers and trees, the sunshine on