Early Irish Myths and Sagas - Jeffrey Gantz [54]
There was great praise and wonder in the house over that story. ‘I will not set my mind on any young warrior in Ériu but this one,’ said Findabair. ‘Promise yourself to him, then,’ said Ailill and Medb, and they said to Fróech ‘Come with your cattle to drive the cattle from Cúailnge. The night you return from the east with your cattle is the night you will spend with Findabair.’ ‘I will do that,’ said Fróech. He and his people remained there that night, and the following day they prepared to go, and Fróech bade farewell to Ailill and Medb.
The company set out for their own land, then; it had happened, meanwhile, that Fróech’s cattle were stolen. His mother came to him, saying ‘Not prosperous your expedition – great sorrow has come of it, for your cattle and your three sons and your wife have been stolen and taken to the Alps. Three cows are in northern Albu with the Cruithnig.’ ‘What will I do?’ Fróech asked his mother. ‘You will not go in search of them,’ she said, ‘for you are not to give up your life for them. You will have my cattle, moreover.’ ‘Not at all,’ said Fróech. ‘I swore on my honour and my soul to go to Ailill and Medb with my cattle to drive the cattle from Cuailnge.’ ‘Their finding is not to be had,’ said his mother, and with that she left him.
Fróech set out, then, with thrice nine men and a falcon and a hound on a leash, and when he reached the land of the Ulaid, he met Conall Cernach at Benda Bairchi. He told Conall his problem, and Conall replied ‘Unhappy that which lies before you. Great trouble lies before you, though it is there your mind would be.’ ‘Help me, then,’ said Fróech. ‘Come with me until we find them.’ ‘I will, indeed,’ said Conall.
They set out across the sea, across northern England and the Channel to northern Lombardy, until they reached the Alps; they saw before them there a small woman herding sheep. ‘Let the two of us go, Fróech, to speak with the woman,’ said Conall, ‘and let the warriors remain here.’ They went to speak with her, then, and she said ‘Whence do you come?’ ‘From the men of Ériu,’ said Conall. ‘Unhappy any men of Ériu who come to this land, indeed,’ she said. ‘My mother was of the people of Ériu.’ ‘Then help me out of kinship,’ said Fróech. ‘Tell us about our adventuring here – what sort of land have we come to?’ ‘A grim, frightful country with truculent warriors,’ she replied. ‘They seek to carry off cattle and women and booty on every side.’ ‘What have they brought back most recently?’ asked Fróech. ‘The cattle of Fróech son of Idath from the west of Ériu, along with his wife and his three sons. His wife is with the king; his cattle are before you,’ the woman said. ‘Give us your help,’ said Conall. ‘I have no power but what I know,’ she replied. ‘This is Fróech here,’ said Conall, ‘and they are his cattle that were taken.’ ‘Do you trust your wife?’ asked the woman. ‘We trusted her before she came, but perhaps we do not trust her now,’ they said. ‘Go to the woman who tends the cows and tell her your need. She is of the race of Ériu, of the Ulaid, in fact,’ said the woman.
Fróech and Conall went to her and stopped her and identified themselves, and she welcomed them, saying ‘What has brought you here?’ ‘Trouble has brought us,’ said Conall. ‘Ours the cattle, and the woman who is in the house.’ ‘Unhappy you,’ she said, ‘to have to face the woman’s host, and most difficult of all the serpent that guards the courtyard.’ ‘I will not go to my wife,’ said Fróech, ‘for I do not trust her. I trust you. We know that you