Then, before she turned once more to her looms of life and death, she lifted her eyes till her gaze pierced the brown earth and rose above the green world and was a trouble amid the quietudes of the sky. Thereat the icy stars gave forth snow, and Angus Ogue was wrapped in a white shroud that was not as that which melts in the flame of noon. Moreover, Orchil took one of the shadows of oblivion from her mystic loom, and put it as a band around Ben Monach where Angus Ogue lay under the mountain-ash by the tarn.
· · · · ·
A thousand years passed, and when for the thousandth time the wet green smell of the larches drifted out of Winter into Spring, Orchil lifted her eyes from where she spun at her looms of life and death. For, over the shoulder of the hill, came three old Druids, advancing slowly to where the Yellow-haired One lay adream beneath the snow.
“Awake, Angus,” cried Keithoir.
“Awake, Angus,” cried Manannan.
“Awake, Angus,” cried Hesus.
“Awake, awake,” they cried, “for the world has suddenly grown chill and old.”
They had the grey grief upon them, when they stood there, face to face with Silence.
Then Orchil put down the shuttle of mystery wherewith she wove the threads of her looms, and spoke.
“O ye ancient gods, answer me this. Keithoir, if death were to come to thee, what would happen?”