Over his shoulder Usha saw the easel, and the back of a white canvas waiting. Negative space. That’s what artists call the white space, that place where nothing is and something might be.
Her throat closing tight around a surge of anger and fear and uncertainty, Usha knew she’d been like negative space since she left Solace, a stark white canvas, waiting for color and shape and her own hand, her will to begin the work. She took Loren’s hand and brought him to the easel. In face of the emptiness of negative space, the woman whose life began in mysteries without answers took a bold step.
“I can tell you who I am not. I am not of the Irda, though they raised me. I am not a mage, though I have magic.” She laughed, the sound of it a little shaky, and she held her arms out from her sides. “I am not the young girl I seem to be. I am a mother of two grown children.”
Silence, for a breath of time.
“I am Palin Majere’s wife. Once I believed that his uncle, the dire mage Raistlin, was my father. Rumor said so, for a long time. Raistlin’s daughter they called me. But I’m not his child. I don’t know who my parents were. I’m told they are dead.”
He slipped an arm around her waist, and Usha realized with a sudden pang that it had been years since a man had held her so easily, so warmly. Her throat closed. It had been too many years since she’d felt the sweep of this kind of warmth rushing through her.
“I don’t know who I am, Loren. I never have.” She reached out and touched the white canvas, the glaze cool under her fingers, the texture only barely noticeable, like that of an egg’s smooth shell. “I’m that, I suppose. Negative space.”
When he bent to kiss her again, Usha shook her head, pushing him gently away.
“Go.”
“Usha, please—”
“Go, Loren,” she whispered. “Now.”
That whisper was a ragged sound. In her own ears it sounded more like a plea than a command. Still, he obeyed.
When he was gone, Usha sat in the chair he’d occupied all morning. She picked up the book of elven poetry he’d left behind and closed it. She sat with the book on her lap, keeping very still until she heard the faint sound of the inn’s door closing. Then she wept.
15
Usha turned into the shady lane that led to the Ivy. Heavy of heart, she also felt heavy of limb at the end of a hot, restless day. Two boys passed her, coming from the inn’s dooryard. One carried a folded piece of paper in a dirty hand. Haven’s unofficial messenger corps had dwindled to a few stalwarts who drifted between one inn and another as the travelers who’d been caught in the occupation had found places to stay with friends or relations. One or two of those had given up utterly on the hope of getting out and rented little houses on the eastern side of the city.
The prisoners are settling in, Usha thought grimly as the boys trudged by.
But she was not. No one was less settled than Usha. She’d done no painting for the past few days. The canvas she’d finished priming sat untouched on the easel where she’d left it. In that time, her feelings had swung between fear and elation, the memory of Loren’s kiss, his arms around her, even his gray eyes, driving her between one pole and the other. There was no middle ground. Reasoned thought seemed to be a thing of the past, as did sleep. At last, this afternoon, Usha had abandoned her studio in frustration and went out to walk.
That had been no remedy, Haven seemed airless. Not even the slightest breeze moved, and Usha became aware of the unpleasant smell of the river. The faint odor of dead fish, the marshes up stream, horse droppings, and all the waste a city generates ... a miasma of these hung in the still air. She had not walked long before giving up and turning back to the inn. Now, in the shady lane, Usha thought she would go upstairs and face the empty canvas in hope that she’d be able to begin one of the portraits that would soon be due.
Someone called a greeting. Usha turned to see Bertie the cook’s boy at the top of the lane. She raised a hand to acknowledge and then cried out in sudden fear.
As though the ground opened under her feet, Usha plunged into freezing, almost mindless dread. She wanted to run, to bolt down the lane toward the inn, yet her knees were so weak she could hardly stagger to the hitching post and hold herself steady. Bertie cried out again and, breathing hard, her heart hammering, Usha recognized the terror gripping her.
Dragonfear!
The shouts and cries of others rang out around her. She became aware of a crowd gathering, of voices rising, shouting. Bertie pointed up, and Usha saw that others did, too.
Red dragons came in over the city, a dozen flying out of the west. Light slid along their scaled hides and glinted from the armor of the knights who rode them. Standing in the street, shading her eyes against the glare, Usha thought they looked like flames peeling away from the burning ball of the sun. On the city walls, Sir Radulf’s men cheered. From this distance, Usha couldn’t see them, but the sound of their shouts swelled as the dragons came closer.
People poured into the street from the inn, from the shops up and down the road. Their voices swelled, some screaming in terror, some shouting one to another. A woman huddled in the arms of her husband. Two dwarves in the street cursed. One was Dougal Scree, the saddlemaker from the shop up the street, the other his apprentice. Dougal shook his fist at the sky as the shadows of the dragons slipped across the crowd, sliding up the street toward Old Keep. The impotent gesture died before the derision of a knight riding by.
“Calm down, old father.” The knight laughed. “You’ll burst a blood vessel.
The dwarf rounded on the knight. “Don’t you ‘old father’ me, you ruffian! Go on! Move off!”
Still laughing, the knight pricked his mount’s sides with his spurs. The horse danced sideways, tumbling the cursing dwarf to the ground. Hoofs flashed as the tall gelding reared, and Usha sprang into the street, grabbing Dougal’s arm before the plunging horse came down. She dragged him back, and Bertie took her sputtering charge from her. The laughter of a second knight joined the first, and Usha recognized the voice.
Lady Mearah put her dark horse between her fellow and Usha. She spoke one word, too low for Usha to make out, and the knight put spurs to his mount, scattering people as he tore off down the street.
“Is there a problem, Mistress Usha?”
Usha lifted her chin, meeting the lady knight eye to eye. “There has been for some time now, milady. It doesn’t look to be getting better.”
“Ah.” The Palanthian looked up as though counting the circling dragons. When she looked back, her chill gaze seemed to go right through Usha. “Well, some would say things should be getting better any moment now.”
A hand touched her arm, gently. Usha turned to see Loren standing beside her. He said nothing to Lady Mearah, only holding her gaze in grim silence. She tilted her head, as though weighing something, then laughed.
“I’ll see you later, Halgard.”
To Usha those words didn’t sound like a reminder of an appointment. They sounded like a threat.
Lady Mearah was gone in a clatter of hoofs, scattering the rest of the curious before her. Loren put his arm around Usha’s shoulders and turned her toward the inn where Bertie was promising Dougal Scree a tankard of ale. “To help calm your nerves, sir.”
“And you,” Loren said, his breath warm on Usha’s cheek. “Saving old Scree from certain death and facing down a knight is a good day’s work. You don’t look like you need anything to calm your nerves, though. Perhaps something in the way of congratulation?”
Usha almost laughed as she slipped out of his embrace, and she almost cried to feel how empty the space between them was. Oh, dear gods, I haven’t felt this way in a long time!
Still, Usha spoke calmly. “Come inside, Loren. Take supper with me in the Common Room. We still have to talk about Tamara’s portrait.”