A Book of Myths, by Jean Lang - Umnet

Gaels should lose their lives. For love of her, three heroes of eternal
renown must give their lives away, the sea in which her starry eyes
should mirror themselves would be a sea of blood, and woe unutterable
should come on the sons of Erin. Then up spoke the lords of the Red
Branch, and grimly they looked at Felim the Harper:
"If the babe that thy wife is about to bear is to bring such evil upon our
land, better that thou shouldst shed her innocent blood ere she spills the
blood of our nation."
And Felim made answer:
"It is well spoken. Bitter it is for my wife and for me to lose a child so
beautiful, yet shall I slay her that my land may be saved from such a
doom."
But Conor, the king, spoke then, and because the witchery of the
perfect beauty and the magic charm of Deirdrê was felt by him even
before she was born, he said: "She shall not die. Upon myself I take the
doom. The child shall be kept apart from all men until she is of an age
to wed. Then shall I take her for my wife, and none shall dare to
contend for her."
His voice had barely ceased, when a messenger came to Felim to tell
him that a daughter was born to him, and on his heels came a
procession of chanting women, bearing the babe on a flower-decked
cushion. And all who saw the tiny thing, with milk-white skin, and
locks "more yellow than the western gold of the summer sun," looked
on her with the fear that even the bravest heart feels on facing the
Unknown. And Cathbad spoke: "Let Deirdrê be her name, sweet
menace that she is." And the babe gazed up with starry eyes at the
white-haired Druid as he chanted to her:
"Many will be jealous of your face, O flame of beauty; for your sake
heroes shall go to exile. For there is harm in your face; it will bring
banishment and death on the sons of kings. In your fate, O beautiful
child, are wounds and ill-doings, and shedding of blood.