[Carlynee's room ... night before leaving]

  Carlynee cocked her head as Chelea drew, her eyebrows raised as 
she saw the talent the mute dragonrider had surfacing as the graphite 
was pulled across the paper.

  Murmuring softly to herself about Master Baroudi missing out on Chelea 
and how much it was a shame that she was a dragonrider now and 
couldn't become an artisan, Carlynee shook her head slowly in regret 
and looked a little closer at what Chelea was doing.

  Taking the sketch that Chelea offered her, Carlynee's brow creased as 
she tried to figure out what the young woman was trying to do.  She 
was vaguely aware that Chelea started sketching once more, but she was 
too busy contemplating the series of drawings on the paper before her.

  Chewing her lip, the artisan's slender fingers followed the lines drawn 
across the paper.  After careful consideration of the arrows and 
confused little faces, Carlynee would have to say it looked like Chelea had 
broken down the letters to make a mutated looking stick horse.  Well, at 
least she got the idea.

  Hearing the swish of paper, Carlynee looked over to Chelea in time to 
see her other sketch fall to the floor and then start another.  

  Careful to make no sudden movements, Carlynee slowly reached 
down to pick up the paper and looked in interest at it.  Comprehension 
dawned as she looked at the somewhat gruesome picture.  Swallowing 
loudly, Carlynee took a peek at the engrossed dragonrider's newest sketch, 
wondering what exactly happened to this young woman to have her draw 
such pictures.

  Just as Chelea finished, she looked at Carlynee as if startled she was still 
there.  A blush covered the pretty girl's face and she looked down at the 
drawing as if in embarassment.

  "Don't worry Chelea ... I get engrossed in my drawings too." Carlynee 
spoke out loud, even though she knew Chelea couldn't hear her.

  Carefully placing her fingers on the paper, she pulled it from the dragon 
rider's lax grasp and studied it.  Chelea had a unique way with her 
drawings and the positioning of her subjects, it was rather fascinating.

  Squeezing Chelea's hand and pausing long enough for her to squeeze 
back, Carlynee looked sympathetically at Chelea.  Those images must 
have been at the back of her mind for some time if they came out all at 
once.  Not something the lithe artisan would have liked swimming in the 
depths of her mind that's for sure.

  Pulling her hand away, she brought Chelea's attention back to the "horse" 
drawing.  Once again, Carlynee wrote "Horse" and then pointed from 
her original picture, to Chelea's progressional one and nodded.

  "Yes, Chelea.  These mean horse.  I think you got it ... somewhat.  I really 
wish someone had taught you when you were younger.  You and I are 
going to have to work on this.  Hmm, I'm not going to be here for a little 
while, but that's not to say you can't do a little homework while I'm gone.  
But that's only if you are up to it."  Carlynee nattered on to the 
uncomprehending dragonrider as she started to pull sheets of drawings 
from her books.

  Writing a name under each subject, she soon had a tidy little pile of 
named drawings on her lap, plus extra blank sheets.  She held them out to 
Chelea, along with a few more sticks of graphite.

  "Please Chelea?"  Carlynee tried to look eager and pleading at the same 
time.

                                 <tag Bridget>

 {NRPG:  Bridget: I know I didn't add too much, but you may have noticed 
from my post before last, that I'm in the throes of writer's block.  Um ... I 
think that Carl would work with Chelea for another hour before she had to 
somehow subtley get her to leave, so she could go visit Ilara.  I wasn't sure 
if Chelea would go for the "homework" or not, so I thought I'd leave it up to 
you.}

colorful regards, 
Cheryl / Carlynee
Xylian Warren