"All in the cold and still of that night, the stepmother wakened, and she knew not why.
She sat up in her bed, and knew not why.
She knew not why, and she looked into the room, and there, by the light of a burning fish's tail -- 'twas such a light the folk used in those days -- was a woman, weaving.She had no loom, and shuttle she had none.All with her hands she wove a wondrous cloth.Stoop-ing and bending, rising and swaying with motions beautiful as those the Northern Lights make in a midwinter sky, she wove a cloth.The warp was blue and mystical to see, the woof was white, and shone with its whiteness, so that of all the webs the step-mother had ever seen, she had seen none like to this.
"Yet the sight delighted her not, for beyond the drifting web, and beyond the weaver she saw the room and furniture -- aye, saw them through the body of the weaver and the drift-ing of the cloth.Then she knew -- as the haunted are made to know -- that 'twas the mother of the children come to show her she could still weave cloth.The heart of the stepmother was cold as ice, yet she could not move to waken her husband at her side, for her hands were as fixed as if they were crossed on her dead breast.The voice in her was silent, and her tongue stood to the roof of her mouth.
"After a time the wraith of the dead mother moved toward her -- the wraith of the weaver moved her way -- and round and about her body was wound the shining cloth.
Wherever it touched the body of the step-mother, it was as hateful to her as the touch of a monster out of sea-slime, so that her flesh crept away from it, and her senses swooned.
"In the early morning she awoke to the voices of the children, whispering in the inner room as they dressed with half-frozen fingers.Still about her was the hateful, beau-tiful web, filling her soul with loathing and with fear.She thought she saw the task set for her, and when the children crept in to light the fire -- very purple and thin were their little bodies, and the rags hung from them -- she arose and held out the shining cloth, and cried:
"'Here is the web your mother wove for you.I will make it into garments!' But even as she spoke the cloth faded and fell into nothingness, and the children cried:
"'Stepmother, you have the fever!'
"And then:
"'Stepmother, what makes the strange light in the room?'
"That day the stepmother was too weak to rise from her bed, and the children thought she must be going to die, for she did not scold as they cleared the house and braided their baskets, and she did not frown at them, but looked at them with wistful eyes.
"By fall of night she was as weary as if she had wept all the day, and so she slept.But again she was awakened and knew not why.
And again she sat up in her bed and knew not why.And again, not knowing why, she looked and saw a woman weaving cloth.All that had happened the night before happened this night.Then, when the morning came, and the children crept in shivering from their beds, she arose and dressed herself, and from her strong box she took coins, and bade her husband go with her to the town.
"So that night a web of cloth, woven by one of the best weavers in all Iceland, was in the house; and on the beds of the children were blankets of lamb's wool, soft to the touch and fair to the eye.After that the children slept warm and were at peace; for now, when they told the sagas their mother had taught them, or tried their part songs as they sat together on their bench, the stepmother was silent.For she feared to chide, lest she should wake at night, not knowing why, and see the mother's wraith."
