"Welcome, O master Conaire!" quoth he. "Though the bulk of the men of
Erin were to come with thee, they themselves would have a welcome."
When they were there they saw a lone woman coming to the door of the
Hostel, after sunset, and seeking to be let in. As long as a weaver's
beam was each of her two shins, and they were as dark as the back of a
stag-beetle. A greyish, wooly mantle she wore. Her lower hair used to
reach as far as her knee. Her lips were on one side of her head.
She came and put one of her shoulders against the doorpost of the house,
casting the evil eye on the king and the youths who surrounded him in
the Hostel. He himself addressed her from within.
"Well, O woman," says Conaire, "if thou art a wizard, what seest thou
for us?"
"Truly I see for thee," she answers, "that neither fell nor flesh of
thine shall escape from the place into which thou hast come, save what
birds will bear away in their claws."
"It was not an evil omen we foreboded, O woman," saith he: "it is not
thou that always augurs for us.
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