The Druidess
    
“The wind is angry tonight, Mam,” Maebh murmured.
    
They sat in wooden chairs by the fire. The wind buffeted their cottage in the blizzard outside, but the fire warmed the small room where Maebh and her mother spent their winter evenings.
    
Mam, her face pale and her eyes closed, didn’t respond. Maebh began to feel anxious. Mam had been ill for months, and Maebh had trekked to the village to get the doctor many times. But she couldn’t do so in a blizzard.
    
Maebh piled another quilt on Mam’s lap. Mam blinked and smiled weakly at Maebh. Then her eyes closed again.
    
Suddenly the fire shuddered and died, like something had snuffed it out.

Maebh knelt on the hearth and tried to rekindle the fire, but it wouldn’t catch. Mam shivered. Maebh looked up and cried out as Mama toppled off of her chair.
    
Just then, a knock sounded on the door. Maebh spun around, heart thumping. She propped Mam against the still-warm bricks of the hearth and went tentatively to the door.
    
Standing on the doorstep was a woman. She wore a gray cloak over a white robe, and something about her made Maebh nervous. Without waiting for an invitation, she stepped over the threshold.
    
“W-who are you?” Maebh stammered, closing the door to keep the wind out. The woman didn’t answer, but strode over to the hearth. When she reached Mam, she bent and put a hand on Mam’s forehead. “What are you doing?” Maebh demanded.

Light shone from the woman’s fingers. It spread into Mam’s face, coloring her complexion and filling the hollows in her cheeks. Mam’s eyes opened. She gasped, and the woman removed her hand.
    
The woman stood and moved toward the door.

“Wait!” Maebh cried. But she was gone. Maebh turned to Mam and fell into her embrace.

“Oh, Maebh,” Mam said, and her voice was stronger than Maebh remembered.
    
Mother and daughter went to the door and looked out. The only thing that showed that the cottage had had a visitor was a row of fox-sized pawprints leading away in the snow.