Long ago in Ireland lived a king named Lir, who dearly loved his four children: Fionnuala and her brother Aodh, and the twins Fiachra and Conn. After their mother died, King Lir married a woman named Aoife, hoping she would love his children — but instead, she grew fiercely jealous of the great love their father had for them.

One day, Aoife took the four children to a nearby lake, claiming they would go swimming. There, she cast a wicked spell that turned them into beautiful white swans. But her magic could not take away their sweet voices or their human minds, so they remained able to think, speak, and sing just as they always had, despite their new forms.

The spell doomed the four children to remain swans for nine hundred long years, spread across three different lakes and seas, enduring cold and storms far from their family. Yet they stayed loving and loyal to one another, singing beautiful songs that soothed everyone who heard them, both people and animals alike.

The long years passed, and Ireland changed a great deal, until one day the four siblings heard the sound of a small church bell for the very first time. They knew the spell's power was finally nearing its end, and they flew eagerly toward that sacred sound.

There, the four siblings at last returned to their human forms — but they had grown very old after all those long centuries. Everyone blessed them with love, and they spent their final moments together in peace and quiet, after a long journey of patience and devotion to one another.