And Eochaid sent his people to bring her to him, and he asked her name, and she told him her name was Etain, daughter of Etar, King of the Riders of the Sidhe.  And Eochaid gave her his love, and he paid the bride-price, and brought her home to Teamhair as his wife, and there was a great welcome before her there.

And after a while there was a great feast made at Teamhair, and all the chief men of Ireland came to it, and it lasted from the fortnight before Samhain to the fortnight after it.  And King Eochaid’s brother Ailell, that was afterwards called Ailell Anglonach, of the Only Fault, came to the feast.  And when he saw his brother’s wife Etain, he fell in love with her on the moment, and all through the length of the feast he was not content unless he could be looking at her.  And a woman, the daughter of Luchta Lamdearg, of the Red Hand, took notice of it, and she said:  “What far thing are you looking at, Ailell?  It is what I think, that to be looking the way you are doing is a sign of love.”  Then Ailell checked himself, and did not look towards Etain any more.

But when the feast was at an end, and the gathering broken up, great desire and envy came on Ailell, so that he fell sick, and they brought him to a house in Teffia.  And he stopped there through the length of a year, and he was wasting away, but he told no one the cause of his sickness.  And at the end of the year, Eochaid came to visit his brother, and he passed his hand over his breast, and Ailell let a groan.  “What way are you?” said Eochaid then.  “Are you getting any easier, for you must not let this illness come to a bad end.”  “By my word,” said Ailell, “it is not easier I am, but worse and worse every day and every night.”  “What is it ails you?” said Eochaid.  “And what is it that is coming against you.”  “By my word, I cannot tell you that,” said Ailell.  “I will bring one here that will know the cause of your sickness,” said the king.

With that he sent Fachtna, his own physician, to Ailell; and when he came he passed his hand over Ailell’s heart, and at that he groaned again.  “This sickness will not be your death,” said Fachtna then; “and I know well what it comes from.  It is either from the pains of jealousy, or from love you have given, and that you have not found a way out of.”  But there was shame on Ailell, and he would not confess to the physician that what he said was right.  So Fachtna went away then and left him.

As to King Eochaid, he went away to visit all the provinces of Ireland that were under his kingship, and he left Etain after him, and it is what he said:  “Good Etain,” he said, “take tender care of Ailell so long as he is living; and if he should die from us, make a sodded grave for him, and raise a pillar stone over it, and write his name on it in Ogham.”  And with that he went away on his journey.

One day, now, Etain went into the house where Ailell was lying in his sickness, and they talked together, and then she made a little song for him, and it is what she said: