A noise of crashing comes over the lake and it brings him back to himself. The evening is fully grey; the colour of the sky has drained away into an oppressive world of shade. He recollects himself and finds that he is amidst a thick patch of nettles that grows higher than his head. His hands are bleeding and numb with nettle stings and the bites of ants, his fingernails torn and raw; his face is swollen and raw from multitudes of thistles. He can only half-open his eyes because of the swelling of his cheeks, and he wonders where the day has gone.

He stumbles back to the lake to find where the noise has come from and sees bright flames are licking the end of a broken bridge that once connected a crannóg to the mainland; parts of it falling off into the water with foamy hisses.

Staring at the flames for a long time, he hears faint bells jingling again and wonders if the noise is only in his mind; and then he goes back to the maple tree under which William of Roscrea lies.

It has become so dark that for a moment Saint John cannot see what is happening. The corpse has fallen over on its side and the little fox that has been following them for three days is eating at the fingers on William’s left hand, shaking its head violently to rip them asunder and free the bones from their sockets.

Saint John sits under a beech tree opposite the scene, resting his sore head gently against the rough bark, and watches the fox jumping around, kicking up with its back legs, its jaws nibbling the fingers with an inhuman speed.

His head is clear, and he is sober. His eyes adjust to the darkness and now he perceives a faint orange glow from the flaming bridge that disrupts the darkness. Everything in the night is visible to him.

The stars appear like sores in the sky, one by one, accusing the infected land they mirror. The moon ripples its light towards him over the gentle, broken crescents of the lapping water that sends its white shine towards him in a straight line. The moon has chosen him for something, but he knows this feeling is a lie. There is no choosing; there is only becoming.

Throughout the night, he thinks of the future. He wants to swim out to the crannóg, to feel the cold water about him, to find shelter in some new isolation, though he knows there is no isolation but that which you choose to inflict on yourself. He wants to continue searching the undergrowth for the mushrooms he needs to release him, but he is too tired, and he knows the mushrooms will not release him, because there is nothing to be released from.