One day when Fionn and the Fianna were returning after a hunt, a beautiful fawn started up before them. Seeking to kill the animal, the men and hounds tracked the deer until all were tired and fell back except Fionn and his two dogs Bran and Sceolan.
The fawn raced through to a clearing that eventually led to a valley. Suddenly, the fawn stopped and lay down on the smooth grass. Bran and Sceolan approached the fawn but did not harm it. Instead, they began to play with it, licking its neck and face.
Fionn found this very strange and decided not to kill the animal and instead he turned around and headed home. The fawn followed him, still playing with the two hounds. When Fionn reached his home, the hounds and fawn followed him into his home.
Later that evening when Fionn was alone, a beautiful young woman appeared before him saying that she herself was the fawn he was after hunting that day. Her name was Sadbh and she explained everything to Fionn.
"It is for refusing the love of Fear Doirche, the Dark Druid of the Men of Dea that I was put in this shape," she said.
"And through the length of three years I have lived the life of a wild deer in a far part of Ireland, and I am hunted like a wild deer."
"A servant of the Dark Druid took pity on me," she continued, "and he said that if I even ventured within the walls of the Fianna of Ireland, the Druid would have no more power over me. Because of this, I made my way into the district of Almhuin. I did not stop until there was no one after me but only Bran and Sceolan, as they have human wits; and I knew that I was safe with them, for they knew my nature to be like their own."
The two fell in love and married, making their home in Almhuin with the Fianna. So great was his love for her, he gave up hunting and all the things he used to take pleasure in, and gave his mind to nothing but her.
Things were interrupted when the men of Lochlann invaded Ireland.
Fionn and the Fianna rode out against them, and drove them back after seven days. After the battle Fionn returned home but Sadbh was nowhere to be found,
"Where is the flower of Almhuin, beautiful gentle Sadbh?" asked Fionn.
Those at the village replied: "While you were away fighting, your likeness, and the likeness of Bran and of Sceolan appeared before the dun, and we thought we heard the sweet call of the Dord Fiann. And Sadbh, who was so good and so beautiful, came out of the house and went out of the gates. We could not stop her as she would not listen to us." "Let me go meet my love," she said, "my husband, the father of the child that is not born." And with that she went running out towards the shadow of yourself that was before her, and that had its arms stretched out to her. But no sooner did she touch it than she gave a great cry, and the shadow lifted up a hazel rod, and at the moment she became a fawn. Three times did the fawn make for the gate of the dun, but the two hounds and the shadow went after her grabbing her by the throat and dragged her away with him. "And by your hand of valour, Finn," they said, "we ourselves made no delay till we went out on the plain after her. But it is our grief, they had all vanished, and there was not to be seen woman, or fawn or Druid, but we could hear the quick tread of feet on the hard plain, and the howling of dogs. And if you would ask every one of us in what quarter he heard those sounds, he would tell you a different one."
When Finn heard that, he said no word at all, but he struck his chest repeatedly. In despair, he went to his room and was not seen for two days.
Over the next seven years, Fionn would look for Sadbh whenever he was in battle of hunting, but could never find any trace of her.
After seven years, Fionn and some others were hunting when they heard a great cry among some hounds that had ventured into a narrow gap. When Fionn and his men went to see what was the commotion, they found five hounds ready to pounce on a young boy with Bran, Sceolan and three other hounds of Fionn standing in their way. They were protecting the young boy.
The boy was not afraid of the hounds, and did not even look at them but when Fionn arrived the tension broke and Bran, together with Sceolan, went up to the boy and whined and licked him as though they had forgotten their master.
Fionn brought the boy back to the dun, where he eventually became tamed. Bran and Sceolan were never tired playing about him.
Fionn thought that the boy had the look of Sadbh in his face and that he might be his son. So, Fionn always kept the boy near to him. Little by little, as the boy learned to talk, he told Fionn everything he could remember.
He said that he used to be with a deer that he loved very much, and the deer always cared and sheltered him. In the summer he ate fruits and roots while in the winter there was always food left for him in the shelter of a cave. The boy also described a dark-looking man that came to the place. The man would sometime speak to the deer softly while at other times he would talk to the deer with a loud angry voice. But whatever way he spoke, the deer would always draw away from the man with the appearance of great dread on her, and eventually the man would go away in great anger.
He also said that the last time he saw the deer, who was in fact his mother, was when the dark man spoke to her for a long time, first softly but he became more and more angry as the conversation progressed. In the end he struck her with a hazel rod, and she was forced to follow him all the while looking back at the child and crying.
The boy made every attempt to follow her but could not move, and when he could no longer hear his mother he lost his senses. When he awoke he was on the other side of the hill where the hounds found him. Afterwards he searched long and hard for the place where he was raised, but without success.
The Fianna named the boy Oisin, and he became their poet and an important Fiannian warrior. Many years later Oisin journeyed to Tir na nOg.
Feeds