Once upon a time there was a wandering man who had lost his way. One day, he came upon a wizard, more learned than wise. The wizard offered him a place to stay the night, and the wandering man, with nowhere else to go, gratefully accepted. He stayed that night with the wizard and for many nights after. He marveled at the wizard's craft and found himself enchanted by the wizard's clever wit, and the wizard was in turn drawn to the kind and noble wandering man. Together they weathered storms and fought dragons, the wizard with his magic, and the wandering man with steady resolve.
The wizard, however, as many wizards do, delved deeper and deeper into the arcane arts, where mortals should seldom dare tread. Until one day, he slipped and fell from that great precipice of magic, leaving havoc in his wake. His hut lay in ruins. The wandering man emerged scathed, but alive. The wizard was gone.
With nothing left to keep him, the wandering man resumed his travels. He roamed far and wide, doing what he could to help those who crossed his path. Everywhere he went, he looked for the wizard, though he knew in his heart that he would not find him. He was gone, never to return.
The wandering man had stopped on the shore of a wide lake, when he saw a swan. He paused to watch it soar through the air, and land with a splash in the water. It seemed clumsy and new, but soon righted itself, and to the wandering man's surprise, drifted toward the shore where he stood and almost seemed to look up at him with intelligent eyes, lined in black.
In all his travels, he had never seen a swan look with such purpose before, but he knew better than to dismiss it, as he had lived with a wizard and had learned that things are often not as they seem. And that is why, when the swan came to the shore and began to clumsily waddle after him, he made no show of surprise, and instead let the creature do as it willed, content that if it deigned to reveal its motives to him, it would do so in its own time. He only glanced back every so often to see if it had fallen behind or tired of him and flown off to rejoin its own kind, but whenever he looked, it was still there, following steadily behind.
When he stopped for the evening, the swan stopped too. It watched as he set up camp, and then, once he had settled, cautiously approached the fire until it was only a few feet away, and curled up, its head tucked in its wing. From so close, the wandering man could admire its sleek, soft feathers.
That night, the wizard appeared. He called to the wandering man by his name, but when they tried to embrace, they found they could not touch, but passed through each other, as though they were not of the same plane.
"What has become of you?" the wandering man asked.
But as he stepped back, he suddenly saw a resemblance between the man before him and the dark-eyed swan.
"Your own magic did this to you?" he asked, but he already somehow knew it was true. "There must be something I can do to break the spell!"
"I do not know," the wizard confessed. "I only know that I cannot do it alone."
When morning came, the wizard was gone, though the wandering man fancied he had awoken at the feeling of a parting kiss. But the swan remained, stretching its wings and preening its feathers before they set out again for the day. And so it was every day; at night the wandering man met the wizard in his dreams, and in the day he wandered with the swan always a pace or two behind, across open country, over the rolling hills, through thick woods, and up stark mountainous slopes. The seasons changed around them, most birds migrated away, but the swan remained always at the wandering man's side, or curled up beside his fire.
Spring had come again when they came to the dark woods, where all manner of beasts dwelt. The woods could be traversed in a day by a careful traveler - and woe came to any who remained lost in the woods at night. The wandering man had charted his path, but the swan was slow and clumsy on the ground. It could not fly ahead and the wandering man would not leave it behind. And then a thick mist settled over the woods and by nightfall they were lost in the depths.
Despite the unseasonable chill, the wandering man did what he could to set up camp. He managed a small, sputtering fire from the least damp branches in a vain attempt to fend off the darkness. He sat by the fire through the night, the swan curled up beside it, listening to the distant sound of creatures stirring just out of sight in the low flog.
He had just begun to doze where he sat, when out of the darkness, he saw a pair of glowing yellow lights. He blinked back into full awareness as the lights loomed closer. And then out of the haze emerged a great, spectral beast, snarling and scratching at the ground with glowing claws, its phosphorescent teeth bared and its terrible eyes ablaze.
The wandering man stumbled to his feet and tried to warn the beast off with a flaming branch, but it feared neither man nor fire, and readied to lunge.
"Go!" the wandering man shouted at the swan, already awakened by the noise, shooing it away from the danger while he still could, his other hand still brandishing the torch for what little good it did.
But the swan remained. As the man backed away from the beast, the swan lowered its head, raised its feathers, and hissed.
The beast glanced toward it with its glowing eyes.
"No, fly away!" the man shouted, but to no avail, only earning himself the renewed ire of the beast.
He swung wildly, trying to knock it back, but it seemed not to feel his blows and the stick broke against its shimmering hide. He stumbled back again and his foot landed on a loose stick that slid beneath his feet. He fell backward, his arms raised in a feeble attempt to defend himself from the beast.
But it did not lunge, for at that very moment there was another sharp hiss and a screeching call as the swan lowered its neck and charged for the beast. Its beak grazed the beast's side, eliciting a cry.
With a sweep of its great claw, the beast tossed the swan away before it could charge again.
The wandering man scrambled upright and ran to the swan's side, ready to defend it from the beast with his bare arms if it came to that, whatever the cost may be. But the swan was no longer a swan, crumpled on the ground, but a man - a wizard.
The wizard, still torn and bleeding, with a final effort pushed himself upright just enough to face the beast one last time. The wandering man dropped to the wizard's side and held him in as he threw a desperate burst of raw magic at the beast.
It was all he had left, but it was just enough to send the beast running as he collapsed into the wandering man's arms.
But even as the beast fled into the night, they could not rejoice at their reunion. The wandering man gingerly helped the wizard lie down beside the fire. The wizard's eyes were already falling shut, exhausted from the pain and lost blood - the wandering man could only hope that was all.
"Stay with me," he did not beg as he washed away the blood that covered the wizard's chest with what water he had. "I've lost you once - I will not lose you again."
The wizard winced at the chill, but was too weak to make any further protest. Still, he managed to reach out a hand - no longer a wing - and rest it on the wandering man's hand in a silent reassurance that he was not ready to leave yet.
When the blood was washed away, the wandering man could see the deep scratches in the wizard's chest, glowing faintly on the edges. For the swan they may have been fatal, but with care, the wizard could recover.
The wandering man gently propped the wizard upright to wind what cloth he could gather tightly around his chest to stop the bleeding and bundled the wizard in his heaviest cloak to stave off the cold night air. Together they huddled through the night by the glowing fire, the wizard wrapped in the wandering man's arms.
Thankfully no more beasts came.
In the morning, the wandering man found not a swan, but a wizard sleeping at his side, still wounded, but himself and tangibly so. With the night's mists cleared, the wandering man easily found their path again and by midday, he and the wizard had stumbled out of the dark woods. Together, they lay out on the grass, the wizard leaning against the wandering man's chest as they savored the bright rays of the sun.
"The curse is broken?" the wandering man asked.
"Yes," the wizard said, "thanks to you."
"How? It was you who fought off that vicious beast."
"Love," he said simply, and then with a smile, "Isn't that how all curses are broken?"
The wandering man could only smile back and hold the wizard closer to his chest.
Eventually, they wandered on from the dark woods. The wizard's wounds slowly healed and his magic returned, though the faintly glowing lines across his chest remained as a reminder of what had passed.
They crossed new lands, braving even fiercer storms and more terrible dragons, until they came to a place by the sea, where, together they built a new hut. And it is said that if you go to the land by the sea, you can still find the wizard and the wandering man in their little hut, always happy to take in a weary traveler.