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At Cruacan, on the hillside, with the lakes of the Great River all around them, with the sun setting red behind the Curlew hills, with green meadows and beech-woods to gladden them, Meave and Ailill kept their court, and thence they sent many forays against Emain of Maca and Concobar, with Fergus the fallen king ever raging in the van, and, for the wrong that was done him, working measureless wrong on his own kingdom and the kingdom of his fathers.
The Red Branch feasted one night in their great hall at Emain Macha. So vast was the hall that a man, such as men are now, standing in the centre and shouting his loudest, would not be heard at the circumference, yet the low laughter of the King sitting at one end was clearly audible to those who sat around the Champion at the other.
The birds returned to life and Cuculain cut the binding cords, so that the birds flew over and on either side of the chariot, and singing besides. In that manner, speeding northward, Cuculain and Laeg drew nigh to Emain Macha.
He was freckled, and with red hair, and his voice was loud and fierce. "Thou shalt have a comrade in thy battle henceforward," he said, "O brave stranger. And she answered, 'I see him standing against a green wall at Emain Macha, at bay, with the blood and soil of battle upon him, and alone he gives challenge to a multitude.
At a period rather more than two thousand years ago, a warrior-queen, Maca by name, founded a great fort and citadel at Emain, some two miles west of Armagh, in the undulating country of green hills and meadows to the south of Lough Neagh.
Cuculain bade Laeg let the steeds go. They went like a storm and three times encircled Emain Macha. It was the custom of the Ultonians to march thrice round Emain ere they went forth to war. Then said Cuculain "Whither leads the great road yonder?" "To Ath-na-Forairey and the borders of the Crave Rue." "And wherefore is it called the Ford of the Watchings?" said Cuculain.
For I take the Clan Usna under my protection from this day forth, and well I know that there is not in Erin or in Alba a man born of a woman, no nor the Tuatha De Danan themselves, who will break through that protection!" "I will break through it," said the King. After that Fergus departed from Emain Macha and went away with his people into the east to his own country.
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.
Then more sweetly shall we drink while the bards chaunt our own prowess. Once I knew a coward who boasted endlessly about his forefathers, and at last my anger rose, and with a flat hand I slew him in the middle of his speech, and paid no eric, for he was nothing. Valiant men, too, will one day come hither and slay us as I slew that boaster, and here in Emain Macha their bards will praise them.
It was on account of this that there arose at first that dissidence and divergence of opinion in the great Council at Emain Macha between Concobar Mac Nessa and Fergus Mac Roy, Concobar standing for the law which he had been sworn to safeguard and to execute, and Fergus casting over the lovers the shield of his name and fame, his authority and his strength, and the singular affection with which he was regarded by all the Ultonians.
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