Then she set her hand to her head, and drew forth the tress
of hair which Habundia had given her, and which was coiled up in the
crown of her own abundant locks which decked her so gloriously; she
drew two hairs from the said tress, and held them between her lips
while she did up the tress in its place again, and then, pale and
trembling, fell to striking a light, and when she had the tinder
burning, she cried out:
O wood-mother, wood-mother! How then may we meet again as thou didst
promise me, if I die here in this empty waste? O wood-mother, if
thou mightest but come hither for my deliverance!
Then she burned the hairs one after another, and stood waiting, but
nought befell a great while, and her heart sickened, and there she
stood like a stone.
But in awhile, lo! there came as it were a shadow amidst the mist, or
rather lying thereon, faint and colourless, and it was of the shape
of the wood-mother, with girt-up gown and bow in hand. Birdalone
cried aloud with joy, and hastened toward the semblance, but came to
it no nigher, and still she went, and the semblance still escaped
her, and she followed on and on; and this lasted long, and faster and
faster must she follow lest it vanish, and she gathered her skirts
into her girdle, and fell to running fleet-foot after the fleeing
shadow, which she loved dearly even amidst the jaws of death; and all
her fleetness of foot had Birdalone to put forth in following up the
chase; but even to die in the pain would she not miss that dear
shadow.
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