Tales of Wonder by Jane Yolen Page B

Wanderer, and forward to what will come.
    And you, starfarer, bring change. You and your people are like cups of sleep. Without changing yourselves, you deal out death to our ways. The Wanderer knew this, but she could do nothing to stop it. And neither can I. I can but tell you what you do, force you to look backward and forward. That was the real reason I said that you could come and capture me in your boxes. But you, yourself, starfarer, who are a woman and might have been a griever or a queen, listen to me well. Forget your boxes, and hear my words in your heart and bones. Do you mean to be a death card? Do you know what it is you do?
    So much telling. My mouth is dry. Hand me that cup, the one on the table. Yes, it is a lovely thing. The engravings are quite old. From the third kingdom, I believe. I need to moisten my tongue. That is good.
    What do the writings mean? I will read them to you. “Here is the Cup. Take it willingly. May your time of dying be short.”
    Do not look so startled. I know what I do. And now you know, too. Remember, there is no penalty in our world for giving a peaceful death. Tell your people that. Mine already know.
    But you can do something for me. Grieve for me. Grieve for all of us in this quiet, dying land. You owe us that immortality at least.
    Now go, for I feel sleep coming on me. The time of dying will, indeed, be short. I hope my lines of mourning will be very, very long, for I want to see my beloved Gray Wanderer again in the cave beyond all stars.

Old Herald
    Old Herald closed his eyes and reveled in the dancing stars. The last few days had become darker and darker. He did not begrudge his dying, only the loss of light. He wanted to see the world brightly as he went out of it. He wanted to glimpse again the riot of color that he had captured so lovingly and well during his life. His hands could barely hold the color sticks; his veins were all but dried up of paint. But his eyes could still praise color and light. He did not want to fail now. Not now. Surely, he thought, the greatest of all the Life Painters—those who quite literally bled onto the canvas—should not end in darkness but in a great rainbow burst of eternal light.
    â€œCritics!” he cried out, refusing to disguise the agony in his voice. His crabbed hands scuttled into the air.
    The two hurried to his side. Prime, a short, stocky woman with a noticeable mustache and a brilliant smile, put her arm around him and whispered into his ear, “I am here. I am always here.”
    Secondary, a gray-haired boy-man with faded good looks, hovered by Old Herald’s feet. His hands fluttered nervously, crossing and recrossing as if they were pale butterflies seeking a place to land.
    â€œBring me the sticks,” Old Herald ordered. “I feel a painting. I want to paint one last canvas before I die.”
    â€œBut … but you can’t … can’t …” Secondary began in his hesitant way. It was that stuttering, an affliction of judgment rather than tongue, that made him a Secondary. He would never rise to Prime in the pantheon of artists. It was only because he had been around for so long, serving his apprenticeship under boy-loving Life Painters, that he had ever risen so high.
    â€œOf course, Visionary,” said Prime. She plumped the pillows around the old man’s head and pushed him gently but sternly back against them. “And the colors?”
    Old Herald had drifted off to sleep, but awoke with a start at her questions. “Reds. Bloods. Crimsons. The Phoenix rises.”
    â€œI serve,” said Prime, placing her hand over her heart.
    The old artist did not seem to hear, falling back into the half-sleep of age.
    Prime nodded to her companion critic and went out of the room. His hands touching one another helplessly, Secondary followed. When they were out of the old man’s hearing, he pulled on Prime’s sleeve.
    â€œHe can’t see,” Secondary