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Tethys ambled through the forest slowly, she knew she was late but she was trying her hardest not to trip. She was on her way to meet Celegras whom she'd met they day before, and had agreed to meet again today. There was something about him that was charming, that made her agree despite her other plans to stay in the area longer to tell him another story. He had asked for just one more...

But she knew somehow, this would probably not be the last.

Moving into the clearing, she could see his hazy outline through her dimming eyes. "Celegras is that you?"

She moved to the mellow sound of his voice. She reached out and touched him with her muzzle. It was to check and see if she was in the right place, but for some odd reason her heart thrilled at the touch of him. His voice was like honey to a parched throat.

She opened her eyes at little wider, straining to see him better but it was futile. "I have many stories to tell, what are you in the mood for today? Stories of things that have happened in my journeys or stories that I have heard?" She moved a step back from him, hating that the heat of his touch had left her.

She could smell the foresty musk of him, the rustle of the leaves in his hair. "Would you like me to tell you of my namesake?" She smiles up at him, hoping he's smiling back

She searched her mind for a story that fulfilled his wish. Giving a great sigh Tethys began. "It is rumoured that in the Kawani lands there were two soquili in love." She smiled, a simple beginning--uneventful, very typical.

Breathing in the scent of him again, she carried on. Her eyes closed, the better to see the story as she told it. "They came from a sprawling heard. There were so many of them, and they were accustomed to how things are. The heard did not believe in different things or in magic.

Lydia met a young mare named Velia. They became friends quickly, the best of friends. But it wasn't for a long time that she met Velia's brother, Lance."

She paused, letting him digest the story a bit.

Tethys listened to the soft rustling of his body moving not too far away. She could feel her pulse quicken at the sound of his voice, urging her to go on. For a moment, her eyelids fluttered but she stopped herself from opening them. The trance of his movements was enough, she liked the feel of him nearby and she did not wish to break the spell.

"Lance was passionate and enigmatic. Lydia was smitten with him right away. She had never met someone so strange or so wonderful as him. Lance fought against his heart, fought against everything in him to stay away from her, but it was too late."

She paused, her ears flicking as she listened to Celegras. "Lance told Lydia beneath the stars one night what he was, in an effort to persuade her that he was bad for her. But Lydia was unswayed. 'Do you think that my heart cares that you have a darkness in you? That it matters to me that you know something of magic? Did you think that you could sway me by any of your entreaties not to love you?'

"Lance blushed in shame, 'But your people will not approve. To love me is to give up the life you know...'

''Then I shall part from it, from this hour on.'

"Lydia left her people and came to stay with Velia and Lance. They planned to wed soon, in the tradition of her people, on the night of the full moon. But as they waited, rumours moved amongst her people of what had happened. They believed her bewitched.

One night, while Lance was out and Velia and Lydia were alone, some of the herd attacked--three stallions, one who had once loved Lydia and his friends. He was jealous, and despite her entreaties that she loved Lance and it was not bewitchery that made her cleave to him, he would not believe her."

She breathed deeply, "They attacked her, did terrible things. When Lance returned home, Velia was dead and Lydia was sobbing over her body."

Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, she envisioned the mares as she had before. "Bereft of his sister, his bride-to-be hurt with wounds that would nevery fully heal, Lance decided to have his revenge."

Tethys breath hitched as he drew close her, her body responding to his closeness despite herself. She tried to steady her voice, "It is the darkness in us all, to love something....to want it, to desire it so much that it pains us when it is not ours. That was the darkness of those who came for her."

She paused, "But perhaps, you mean, the darkness of Lance." She let the words roll around for a moment in her mouth. "His intentions were good, but his magic was what was considered dark. But it was nothing too terrible, but it was the start to a path he could not stay on forever."

She opened her eyes, seeing the shadow of him--the musky, woodsy smell that lingered all around him. "With his sister gone, and his bride-to-be falling aprt, he did the one thing he thought that could fix some of the pain....He turned to necromancy, the raising of the dead."

Tethys pushed back her hair, inhaling Celegras in. "And so, it took some time. Lydia was but a shadow of herself. Lydia wore her veil, the night was supposed to be the night of raising her beloved Velia and her wedding."

"But as she was out picking flowers, she heard a terrible commotion. Lance had gone and murdered the three that had harmed her. It was with their blood, he was going to pay the price to raise Velia. But he was captured as he tried to raise her, with blood still on his hooves. She could hear him screaming, yelling for her to run."

Her voice was sad, pained. "When she had found him, he had been hung."

Tethys squeezed her eyes shut tighter, remembering when she was told the story long ago. A mysterious stranger had told her that he would give her food, when she was starving if she told the story as often as she could. It seemed strange to her, but she did it.

And now, the story was a part of her.

"Lydia sobbed and sobbed. Her Lance was gone and so was Velia. She could no longer go back to her people, she would not forgive them..." She paused again, "She remembered how he had told her to flee, and she did. But not the way he might have meant...

"She was dressed in her veil still. She had cried so much that her tears ran with blood, and her boquet was wilted and dead. She got a rope and tied it up next to him, and hung herself by his side."

For a moment, she paused and then her voice rang out clear and sad,

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man they say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out for his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run so we’d both be free.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree.

Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree

Her voice broke on the last note, sadness filling her voice. "And therein, lies the tale of Lydia and Lance. But some...some say there is more to the story."

Tethys closed her tired eyes, the world was too blurry to look on anymore for now. "Necromancy, or something. I do not know. But it is said that Lydia and Lance wander the earth forever destined to be apart with no memories of their true story. It is why the story must be spread, why the legend lives on...It is the hope that one day, they will hear it and they will remember their lives before."

She paused again, her voice heavy. "But whether it is true or not, I cannot say. Others have rumoured to have seen them, there have been rumours of Velia too...and yet...If they are the real souls from the story or tricked into believing that they are is a mystery."

Moving to him, she nuzzled his face. "I'm sorry," her voice was a soft whisper. "I needed the feeling of warmth after so dark a tale...forgive me for that."