Only this does Aster know,
Through hard trials he must go;
Eva’s hand must guide him on
Till his flower again be won.
She must wander far and near,
Led by songs he may not hear;
Should she lose me from her hand,
Worse my fate in Shadow-Land.
Then Aster threw himself down on the soft moss at Eva’s feet. But when she asked him where he had learned the words of his song, he could not tell her. Just then a cloud came over the face of the moon, hiding her from their sight; and as the darkness came over everything, only leaving for a moment the pale earth-light, it seemed to Eva that there were faces looking at her, peeping from behind every tree; and then a light breeze sprang up, just moving the flowers, and from the bell of one of them seemed to come these words, all in verse, for in Fairy-Land and in Shadow-Land people seldom speak in plain prose as we do:
O’er this spot do THEY have power,