And that was not all they did, for it was at that time there came three flocks of beautiful red birds from Slieve Fuad in the north, and began eating the green grass before the hill of the Sidhe.  “What birds are those?” said Caoilte.  “Three flocks they are that come and destroy the green every year, eating it down to the bare flag-stones, till they leave us no place for our races,” said Ilbrec.  Then Caoilte and his comrades took up three stones and threw them at the flocks and drove them away.  “Power and blessings to you,” said the people of the Sidhe then, “that is a good work you have done.  And there is another thing you can do for us,” they said, “for there are three ravens come to us every year out of the north, and the time the young lads of the hill are playing their hurling, each one of the ravens carries off a boy of them.  And it is to-morrow the hurling will be,” they said.

So when the full light of day was come on the morrow, the whole of the Tuatha de Danaan went out to look at the hurling; and to every six men of them was given a chess-board, and a board for some other game to every five, and to every ten men a little harp, and a harp to every hundred men, and pipes that were sharp and powerful to every nine.

Then they saw the three ravens from the north coming over the sea, and they pitched on the great tree of power that was on the green, and they gave three gloomy screeches, that if such a thing could be, would have brought the dead out of the earth or the hair off the head of the listeners; and as it was, they took the courage out of the whole gathering.

Then Cascorach, son of Caincenn, took a man of the chessmen and made a cast at one of the ravens that struck his beak and his throat, and made an end of him; and Fermaise killed the second of them, and Caoilte the third of them in the same way.

“Let my cure be done now,” said Caoilte, “for I have paid my fee for it, and it is time.”  “You have paid it indeed,” said Ilbrec.  “And where is Bebind, daughter of Elcmar?” he said.  “I am here,” said she.

“Bring Caoilte, son of Ronan, with you into some hidden place,” he said, “and do his cure, and let him be well served, for he has driven every danger from the Men of Dea and from the Sons of the Gael.  And let Cascorach make music for him, and let Fermaise, son of Eogabil, be watching him and guarding him and attending him.”

So Elcmar’s daughter went to the House of Arms, and her two sons with her, and a bed of healing was made ready for Caoilte, and a bowl of pale gold was brought to her, and it full of water.  And she took a crystal vessel and put herbs into it, and she bruised them and put them in the water, and gave the bowl to Caoilte, and he drank a great drink out of it, that made him cast up the poison of the spear that was in him.  Five drinks of it he took, and after that she gave him new milk to drink; but with the dint of the reaching he was left without strength through the length of three days and three nights.