Therefore at their meetings two clouds lay upon the heart of Naisi:  the presentment of the king’s power and anger, and his relentless hand pursuing through the night, and the darker dread of the sightless doom pronounced of old at the birth of Deirdre, of which the will of Concobar was but the tool.  There was gloom in his eyes and silence on his lips and a secret dread in his heart.  Deirdre wondered at it, her own heart being so full of gladness, her eyes sparkling, and endearing words ever ready on her lips.  Deirdre wondered, yet found a new delight and wonderment in the silence of Naisi, and the gloomy lightning in his eyes, as being the more contrasted with herself, and therefore the more to be beloved.

Yet the time came when Naisi determined to tell her all and risk the worst that fate could do against them, finding death with her greatly better than life without her.  Yet death with her was not to be granted to him.  Deirdre heard, wondering and trembling, and Naisi must tell her the tale many times before she understood,—­so utter had been her solitude and so perfect was yet her ignorance of all things beyond the fort where she was captive, and of all the doings of men.  Concobar was not even a name to her, and she knew nothing of his power or the stronghold of Emain, the armies of the Ulaid, or the tributes of gold and cattle and horses.  Spears and swords and those who wielded them were not even dreams to her until the coming of Naisi, when his gloom blended with her sunshine.

Talking long through the twilight, until the red gold of the west was dulled to bronze over the hills, and the bronze tarnished and darkened with the coming of the eastern stars, they planned together what they should do; and, the heart of Deirdre at last growing resolute, they made their way through the night to where the brothers of Naisi were, and all fled together towards the northern sea.  Amongst the fishermen of the north they found those who were willing to carry them beyond the reach of Concobar’s anger, and with a southerly breeze set sail for the distant headlands of Scotland, that they had seen from the cliff-top lying like blue clouds along the horizon.  They set forth early in the morning, as the sun came up out of the east over blue Alban capes, and when the sun went down it reddened the dark rocks of Islay; so that, making for the shore, they camped that night under the Islay Hills.  On their setting forth again, the sea was like a wild grey lake between Jura on the left and the long headland of Cantyre on their right; and thus they sped forward between long ranks of gloomy hills, growing ever nearer them on both sides, till they passed through the Sound of Jura and rounded into Loch Etive.