The Evergreen Burns

And there she sat, in her tower at the top of the village.

Things had changed since the changeling attack. It had bee a month since and things were never truly the same. Gen missed his friend dearly and it killed him to think that he could have done something besides cower in fear in the caves. Soulstrings was also of some interest. She had fallen into a deep depression since Spark had died and she rarely came out of her tower. The only times ponies would see her was when she would visit his grave in the catacombs. Callie and Fang had tried to get her to come out but she would just stay in there and sit. The two mares had sent Gen over to talk to her since they knew the two were very close. Or at least used to be.

"Soulstrings are you in there?" Gen said as he knocked on the door.

"Just go away, leave me here to die." As Gen heard the reply his heart sank. He hadn't known that she was this depressed. He could hear sobbing and whimpering on the other side of the door.

"Soulstrings, If you don't open this door then I will bust it down! You need help." as he said that he heard growling from the inside. Suddenly the door flew open, Soulstrings standing in the doorway with an enraged look on her face.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT?!" she screamed at him. He stepped back a few paces and looked to see that his sword was still at his side.

"We're all sorry about Spark. It wasn't your fault." he tried to reassure her but he was just making her angrier. She managed a calm look on her face but inside she was boiling up.

"I could have saved him, I was too slow and now he's dead..." Soulstrings began crying again and slammed the door shut.

--

Soulstring went back into the top room of her tower and began to cry again. She wished there was some way she could bring Spark back. She suddenly realized that there was still one option.

"Necromancy..." she smiled at herself in the mirror. She knew that it was illegal to raise ponies from the dead and if a pony was caught doing it, they would be executed. She went over to her book cabinet and dug through, finding an old book about necromancy and famous necromancers. She looked through the spells and found a raise corpse spell. She went over to a cage she had in her living room that housed her pet rabbit. She shot a bolt of magic into the cage and the rabbit suddenly fell over silent. Her horn started to glow as she resited the spell. A puff of dust went over to the rabbit and suddenly he sprung back to life. Fresh as a button and suprisingly unaware of what had happened to him. Soulstrings shrieked with joy and ran back up to her study.

Soulstrings had perfected the spell to raise Spark back, but she didn't know if it would work on ponies or anything bigger. She had to test it first. She had called Cain to come over for some tea and he had accepted the offer. He was due to show up at noon. She was ready when she heard a knock on her door. She ran over to the door and opened it.

"Hello Soulstrings. I must say it is very nice of you to invite me over." Cain stepped in the house and Soulstrings directed him to the living kitchen.

"Oh it's all my pleasure..." she grabbed the rat poison from her pantry and put it in one of the tea cups. She brought it over to Cain then seated herself across the table from him. They both took a sip of the tea and she could tell the poison was taking effect.

"Wh-what's in this?" Cain said drowsily.

"Oh nothing much. Just my special ingredient." the way the mare said it had worried him but he couldn't put his finger on what it was before he blacked out and fell on the floor. Soulstrings laughed maniacally and dragged his body onto her couch. When he would awake she wanted him to think that he passed out. She said the spell and a puff of dust went over his body again. He snapped awake.

"What... What happened?" He asked hurriedly.

"Oh you just fainted. I think you could use some rest." as she said that he seemed confused once more.

"Oh my. I thank you for inviting me over but I must go." and with that, he walked out the door and headed home. Soulstrings broke out laughing and fell onto the couch. She would have her Spark back if it was the last thing she did.

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