Love And War (6 page)

“Sorry,” apologized Tosch, shrinking just a bit under her wrath. He thought it wise, just
then, to say something nice about her late husband. “It's too bad he never did a self-
portrait,” offered the dragon. “He would have done a fine job. And then you would have had a picture of him always.”

Kyra nodded sorrowfully. “Listen, let me take you for a ride,” suggested the dragon,
trying to change the subject. “It'll lift your spirits. Where would you like to go?”

“Home,” she said sadly. “I'm not very good company when I'm feeling like this.”

She lay in bed for hours, unable to keep from crying. It's been six years, she thought to
herself. Why am I still grieving? Why can't I stop?

The answer was as plain as the tears on her face:

Her love did not die in that fire. Yes, her memory was fading, but her feelings were as
strong as ever.

Finally, late that afternoon, she climbed wearily out of bed and built a fire in order to
make herself a light meal. Later, after sitting down at her rickety wooden table to eat,
she noticed that her hands were smeared with charcoal. Without thinking, she absently
cleaned her fingers by etching an image of her husband in charcoal on her faded white
tablecloth.

When she realized what she had done, she stopped and stared at her work. The picture
stared back at her. It wasn't a very good likeness of Seron, but it was still undeniably
him. More than that, though, while she had been sketching, she had sensed - for the first
time in more than six years - the peace and security she had felt in her husband's arms.

After all this time, Kyra finally knew what she could do with her life besides serving
ale. Still staring at the sketch, she whispered, “I'm going to paint you, Seron. I may not
be the artist that you once were, but I'll do my best to be as good as I can be. I won't
settle for less; I can't settle for less, because it's the only way I can have you close
to me.”

With paints, brushes, and a canvas bought out of her meager savings, Kyra started the
memory portrait of her husband that very night. Painting by firelight, she worked until
dawn. Her body ached, her eyes were strained, and she was thoroughly exhausted. And when
the sun came up, she was also thoroughly disgusted. She hurled the canvas to the floor,
where it landed face down. “Terrible,” she muttered. “He didn't look anything like that.”

It was then that Tosch flew to her door, calling out, “Come look at my new wings!”

Kyra stuck her head out the window and saw gold sparkles on Tosch's wings, dancing in the
dawn light.

“You've outdone yourself,” she declared.

“And so have you,” Tosch cried happily, seeing the paint smears on her face. “Are you
coloring your body now, too?”

“No,” she sighed wearily. “But I have decided to do some painting.”

“Ooh, let me see. I want to see.” Tosch bubbled with excitement.

“There's nothing for you to look at yet,” she explained. But she knew deep in her heart
that even if there had been, she would not have shown it to anyone, not even Tosch. Her
painting was too private, too personal. Later, when she improved her craft, when she had
captured Seron the way she remembered him, only then would she let the world see her work.
Not before.

Tosch was disappointed that he couldn't see her pictures, but the colour on her face
buoyed him up nonetheless. “I'll fly you over to the tavern,” he offered cheerfully. “Lets
go.”

“Not today,” she said. “I want to keep working.”

Her old friend shrugged and said, “Okay. I'll see you later.”

Tosch did, indeed, see her later . . . fourteen years later. By then, Kyra was an aging
barmaid, working only to earn enough money to keep her in paints, brushes, and canvas. She
had never stopped painting her beloved Seron.

“Notice anything different?” the dragon said easily, as if he were just picking up
yesterday's conversation.

Kyra was used to it, though, and happily beamed with joy at his appearance in front of her
crumbling shack. “It's your nose,” she said, after looking him over. “It's changed . . .
it's smaller!”

“That's right!” he exclaimed. “I knew you'd notice.” “But what happened to it? It looks,
well, sort of pinched and turned-up.“ ”Isn't it cute?“ ”Well . . .“ ”I asked a bunch of gnomes to do it for me.
I just had to have a smaller nose. I don't know exactly what they did. They built a strange contraption,
but I think it worked. Look at me. Isn't it darling?”

“Can you breathe all right?”

“Not too bad. You do like it, don't you?” he asked, suddenly concerned that he had made a
mistake.

“I'll show you what I think of it,” she said. “Lean down close to me.”

The great brass dragon lowered its head close to Kyra, and she gave him a loving kiss on
the nose. “You'll always be the handsomest, cutest, most adorable dragon to me,” she said.

Tosch blushed, though it was hard to tell against the multi-colored cape he wore. To hide
his embarrassment, he cleared his throat and asked, “How is your painting coming along?
Can I see your pictures now?”

“I'm sorry,” she replied evasively. “They're really not good enough yet. Someday,” she
promised.

“Soon?”

A smile creased her worn, but still lovely face. “By your standards, yes. Soon.”

*****

Highlords came and went. Great cities rose and fell. Wars were fought, lost, and won. But
Tosch, in his fashion, was ever constant. Throughout the years, he visited his aging
friend, coming to see her eleven years later, then nine years, then finally twelve years
after that. But during none of those visits, did she ever show him her paintings.

It was beginning to annoy him. While the dragon was as young and vibrant as the day he had
met Kyra and Seron, she had reached an age where it seemed she was always cranky.
Especially on his latest visit. He had seen her earlier in the day and found her to be
strangely unimpressed with his new purple hat. All she wanted to do was get back to her
painting. She said she was finally getting close to achieving what she'd been after all
these years. That was just fine with him, but why couldn't she pay more attention to his
hat? After all, everyone else thought it was boldly original. There was no doubt in his
mind; he had to talk with her about her moods. He resolved to go see her that very night.

Kyra always felt a sweet melancholy after Tosch's visits ended; it was only then that she
was truly aware of her loneliness. This time it was no different, but after a hectic
evening of waiting tables she was anxious to pick up her brushes and paint while she still
had some strength.

She had no idea how many pictures she had painted of Seron; she had long ago forgotten the
count. In fact, she had forgotten many things - but not the face of her husband.

Her husband's image, with all of its sweetness, hung above her bed.

Seron's likeness, with all of its ambition and drive, hung in the alcove that she called
her studio.

Even where she cooked and ate, his face looked down upon her with all of its childish
charm and humor.

Everywhere there were pictures of Seron. They were piled one upon another, and hung in
every corner of her shack. She was surrounded by his image. And yet she was not finished
with her work.

Frail and sickly, she had continued to paint. With eyesight fading, her joints aching, her
fingers shaking, she kept on dabbing at the canvas with her brush, hoping to finally
capture the perfect image of the man she still loved.

On this late night, painting by the light of red coals in a dying fire, Kyra's breath came
in short gasps. She was tired. But she didn't want to stop - not before she completed her
latest work.

In this picture of Seron, he was lying on a sheet that was spread out on the grass behind
their hut. A pile of neatly folded laundry was off to the left. There was a look of
longing on his sad-eyed face. He was alone in the picture, facing forward, with his arms
outstretched, reaching.

Was that the way it really was? she wondered.

She gazed at the image of Seron. The sad eyes of her husband stared back at her. Slowly,
just as the red mist on the Blood Sea would disappear when the sun reached its zenith, so
did the fog lift away from Kyra's memory.

That was exactly how it was. It was Seron in every detail. His hands, with their long,
shapely fingers, his prominent cheekbones, his jutting chin, the shoulders she so often
lain her head upon - it was all just right.

Or was it?

Kyra's heart began to beat wildly in her chest. Was there something wrong with the
painting? Something missing? The picture seemed to cry out to her for its final perfection. But, somehow, she had left something vital out, and she didn't know what it
was.

In that moment, she felt so unworthy of her Seron that she turned her back to the wet
canvas. Except there was no escaping her husband's sad eyes; he looked down upon her from
every wall.

She lifted her arms to him and wailed, “I wanted all of Krynn to stand before you and look
up lovingly, just like I did. I wanted them to feel something of what I felt. But look,”
she sobbed, her arms sweeping in a wide arc, “I never captured your love in a single painting. Not one!”

Kyra fell to her knees and wept with as much anguish as the night the fire took her
husband away from her. Against a deep crushing pain in her chest, she cried out, “Did I
fail you all these years? Are you ashamed of me? Oh, Seron, am I even half the woman you
hoped I would be?”

When Tosch arrived at Kyra's shack, he called out to his old friend . . . but he heard no
answer. Again he sang her name out. And again there was silence.

Finally, in exasperation, he roared, “Kyra!” as loudly as he could.

Half the inhabitants of Palanthas were stirred out of their beds by the frightful sound.

But Kyra didn't answer him.

Tosch had no patience left. He slammed one of his huge feet against the door and it flew
wide open.

The brass dragon's anger instantly turned to pity when he saw the crumpled form of Kyra
lying on the floor at the foot of a painting.

Tosch let out a deep, mournful sigh. As old as Kyra was, he never really thought she would
act like just another human and die. She was always there to tell him how he looked, to
tell him what he should wear - to be his friend. And now she was gone.

She had died all alone in this old, dilapidated shack.

He peered inside and, for the first time, focused on the picture that loomed over Kyra's
body. Tosch's eyes opened wide. It was Seron, just the way he used to be. It was a
magnificent likeness that caught every bit of character, every nuance of emotion, in the
long-dead painter's face.

The dragon stuck his head farther inside and saw scores upon scores of Seron's image.
Seron in every imaginable pose and activity. But Tosch's gaze kept coming back to the picture on the easel. The
paint on that one was still wet. He knew that this had been Kyra's last, impassioned work.

He had never known, never guessed, what she had been painting all these years. Even now,
staring at the evidence of Kyra's lifelong devotion to Seron, Tosch could only shake his
head in wonder. He couldn't quite understand how she could have loved Seron so much. But
then again, maybe he could. After all, didn't he love her in his own way, too?

He felt his wings quivering and he knew he was going to do a rare thing - he was going to
cry. Kyra had meant so much to him, and he had done so little for her. He felt suddenly
ashamed, realizing that he had been selfish, always taking. Why didn't he give her gold
dust for her clothes? Why didn't he chisel her teeth, too? He could have done all sorts of
things for her. But he hadn't. And what could he give her now?

He stared at her limp, cold body and then lifted his gaze to the painting of Seron. Then
he looked a bit closer . . . Something was missing. The picture didn't seem quite right. He studied it for a long, quiet moment, trying to discover what was overlooked.

Ah, I know what it is, Tosch said to himself. It's so obvious! He spoke a magical
incantation and then slapped his tail against the ground three times.

Kyra was in the picture with Seron. Now it was right.

They were laughing and crying in each other's arms alive in their art. Within the bounds
of the canvas, Seron and Kyra were living, breathing, loving souls.

Tosch flapped his wings with joy. He had made Kyra happy. When he turned to fly away, he
heard Seron say to his beloved, “You are ALL the woman I had hoped you would be.”

“Now THAT'S a good painting,” said the dragon as he flew off into the night. “Then again,”
he mused as he soared among the clouds, “a little more color wouldn't have hurt”

Hunting Destiny Nick O'Donohoe By daylight, the stag, with an effort of will, appeared to the knight. The knight's
enthusiasm was gratifying, if anything could please in Darken Wood. The knight even
mentioned Huma's having followed the stag. The stag moved forward on Prayer's Eye Peak, knowing the knight and his companions would follow. If
it was his destiny to lead, it was others' to follow him.

But they did not follow immediately. With one ear he heard the company debating behind
him. The half-elf said, “Though I have not seen the white stag myself, I have been with
one who has and I have followed it, as in the story the old man told at the Inn of the
Last Home.”

The stag, turning to look, saw the half-elf fingering a ring of twisted ivy leaves,
presumably because it reminded him of his former companion who had seen the stag. Neither
half-elf nor ring brought any memory to the stag.

The mage among them, a robed figure with hourglass eyes, spoke more of the story they had
heard, apparently a few nights ago, at an inn. An old man had told how Huma, lost in a
forest, prayed to Paladine. A white stag had appeared and led him home. “That I remember,”
the stag thought, “but I had thought no other living being did. Whatever man they met was
old indeed, though if he were older, he would remember it as song, not story.” A pang of
regret for simpler days and easier faith swept over the stag, much as it sweeps over old
men for times gone by. He shook his rack of antlers fiercely and kept listening.