Hello everyone!  I have Changed the title of this story from Tears of Sorrow, Crystal of Hope to it's current one as I feel that it fits a bit better.

Hope you enjoy it!

N a HUGE thanks to Asma, and Robin for reading this over and offering input

Everlasting Love

Light, it was everywhere. I was surrounded by it, suspended in a swirling glowing pool of light. How did I get there? I had no idea, but if this was death then it wasn't anything like what I had expected it to be. I could only feel the anger from somewhere deep inside of me, the raw emotion at being torn so abruptly from my love. The words 'not again' forming in my mind,

"Not again?" I asked myself, looking into the depths of my soul-memory to find the answers. Yes, again, and if a being of light and air could cry, I would have. For this was not the first time, he and I had been parted, indeed this was only one of a million such incidents, each one serving its purpose in the tale which would eventually lead us to the fulfillment of our destinies. Of course I knew none of that at the time; instead I felt only the pain of the parting.

If you are lost, I cannot say that I blame you, for my life if anything is far from simple, and so I shall go back and open the doors leading to memories inaccessible from my living minds. For you, I shall begin my tale again, recollecting one of my earlier lives so that you will be able to follow along when I continue my journey.

Like all the other times we had been separated by death, I searched for him, looking here in that other plane, hunting patiently for his warmth, comfort, love, until I found him, becoming whole once more. Yet we never had very long, for it seemed that fate was against us, forbidding us more than a moment with each other before we were separated once again. Yet, with each meeting our faith that we would be re-united grew stronger, with each parting our love grew ten-fold, and each tear shed glittered like a sparkling silver diamond, a powerful symbol of what was ours and ours alone.

I remember the morning of our first parting on this other plane, he and I had spent one lifetime together, the only one we would ever see from beginning to end at each others side. On that morning, I was with him one moment, the next alone, his soul having vanished completely from that plane, once more summoned to return to the mortal world. I remember the comforting words of my goddess, my ancestor from a time long, long ago, 'Fear not my daughter you shall meet again.

I knew not how long I spent wrapped safely in her embrace, until she was gone along with the overwhelming light, leaving only the darkness to befriend my lonely soul once more.

In this new place, I could not see, nor hear, my ability to sense was gone beyond the feeling of the warmth and comfort provided by my watery enclosure. I did not understand how I had ended up here, as only the now existed, all recollection of who, or what I had been vanishing, erased completely from my mind.

I hung suspended in this new state of limbo, slowly growing, moving, and kicking out against the walls of my enclosure, until I had outgrown my warm cocoon.

I was pushed from the warmth, shoved out into the coldness my eyes opening for the first time, experiencing a new sense and I cried out. I wailed with the shock of finding myself in this strange and alien world that I could not even begin to comprehend. I screamed as some buried part of me exalted in the joy of being back in the light after my time in darkness. I continued my wails as the awareness of hunger sunk in until I first heard that voice, so kind, so loving, and found myself pressed firmly against the familiar warmth, and felt the familiar rhythm of her beating heart. I was content then to fill my belly, and forget all about the darkness, which had been my home.

It was many years later when my memories of that portion of my life lay buried deep within the layers of consciousness replaced by thoughts more important to my survival that I was to be brutally separated from my home, taken from the life style that I knew to instead be taken to the alien world of our enemies.

I was a child of the light, claiming non-other than Selene, goddess of the moon, mother of us all as my ancestor. My people followed her teachings, and held peace, knowledge, justice, and beauty sacred. I learned my people's history, of how all people were once one, living together dependant on one another, and yet separate. The twin races born from the blood of our gods, the royalty of each it is said emerged from the blood of the gods twin hearts; a product of their very love for one another. Yet, in the midst of this peaceful, perfect world the first betrayal took place over five hundred years ago, a mage found a way to cheat death and in doing so allowed the stirrings of evil to set foot upon the world. It was this betrayal that truly tore the two people apart, as those that accepted the knowledge and used it became the shadow-kin. The king too, tempted by the promise of eternal life fell as well, and with his downfall into darkness caused the abandonment of the old ways, and the people of light were forced into the hills, hated as a reminder of what was lost.

It was to this world I was taken, no longer free to do as the goddess commanded, instead. I Serena, member of the Crescent moon, oldest of blood lines was captured, and subjected to the life of a slave, never to be free again until the day I died.

Author's note

Yep, no other changes, just the title.

Galene