User Image There were several fillies gathered about a stream, each staring into the water. They would toss their heads, angle them just so- and then utter a sound of distaste. None of them were ugly in the slightest, but they would preen nonetheless.

She was hoping to just get a quick drink and be on her way, but they would want to here a tale of the swamp. Something about a beautiful doe rescued by a handsome buck, and swept away into a lifetime of happiness.

Just as her mouth reached the water, she heard a trilling voice ask, "Weaver! Weave us a tale, if it pleases you!" A few giggles accompanied the speaker.

She took a long sip of water.

"Very well," she replied, for she had long ago woven this tale. They were too young to have heard it, but were old enough to remember.

"There is a tale of a legendary mare so beautiful that every buck in the swamp clamored to be her mate, but she would accept only one so beautiful as herself," she began. "This would be quite an impossible feat, for this mare was stunning when she was an ordinary doe, with flanks of silver and scales of gold, and she was encrusted with hair that shone like a diamond.

"She had mated once before, with an angry young buck who pleased her with gifts. The pair only brought forth one life into the swamp, and he was named Winged Love, for he could bring together even the most hateful kimeti with his silver tongue.

"The mare was content with her son and her image, and so she declined the hopeful bucks time and time again, until there was nary a buck to be found that had not been declined. It was at this time, I am told, that she heard about a doe who rivaled her in beauty, even as a mare!

"This doe was named Wisp Tail, and she was far too beautiful and far to naive to survive the attentions of a legendary.

"And so, Winged Love was sent to Wisp Tail, on a mission from his mother to talk her into loving the most vile thing he could find. But he did not want to. He knew she was innocent of any crime, and was just born in the wrong time. But still, he would listen to his mother, and will go to the doe's side.

"But when he laid eyes on the ephemeral doe, all thoughts of any harm coming to her were wiped from his mind. She was the most beautiful creature he had seen - and he was in love.

"He went to her, and she was taken by the attentions of the son of the mare who wanted her destroyed. She loved him back- and they mated there, without ever saying a word. Winged Love returned to his mother, and refused to do her dirty work anymore. When he had seen Wisp Tail, he had seen true beauty, which goes far deeper than any reflection ever could.

"His mother could not take this. She blamed Wisp Tail for ruining her son, and set out to find her, and punish her for what she had done. It was many moons later until she found her, and she had not heard from Winged Love in all of that time (nor would she ever again). When she happened upon the young doe, she found she was heavy with foal, but content.

"She remembered being heavy with Winged Love, and hating every moment of it. Yet here was this doe - after one night with a buck she did not know, nor ever would, and she was happy as could be.

"This changed the mare, straightened her twisted insides, and pulled the spider's gauze she had kept over her eyes. She whispered a quick blessing, and was gone.

"In the end, she disappeared into the swamp, never to be heard from again, and Winged Love is rumored to have left the swamp completely. But Wisp Tail went on and bore many foals from that tryst, and they bore many foals, and so on. It is said there is not a one foal that can't somehow trace his or her lineage to Wisp Tail.

"We do not all have her beauty, but some of us manage to have a piece of her soul. Remember, foals, that you too will fade.