Dragonlance Tales, Vol. 3 – Love and War

started.”

Petal did, in fact, stop crying, but things never quite

went back to the way they were. Petal was lonely, and she

never looked happy.

“What’s the matter?” Aron finally snapped one day from

his loom while Petal, long-faced, was sprinkling fragrant

pine needles on the floor. “I was good enough company all

these years!”

“Oh, Father,” said Petal, pausing in her work, her eyes

watering, “I still love you but as MY FATHER. Now it’s

time I loved another, as my husband.”

“Nonsense!” said Aron with a wave of his hand.

“There’ll be plenty of time for that when I’m dead!”

“Don’t talk that way!” said Petal, stepping toward her

father, dropping the rest of the pine needles.

“What way? One day I’ll be gone, and then you’ll be

able to entertain all the young men you want!” And, with

that, Aron turned his back on his daughter and continued his

weaving.

The arguments usually went that way, and they always

broke Petal’s heart. Finally, she stopped bringing up the

subject, which was what Aron wanted, anyway.

The days settled into a routine. Aron worked

methodically and constantly at his loom, and Petal tended

the cottage and the garden. Neither said much to the other.

Petal continued to look sad, and Aron, even way out in the

forest, continued to feel uneasy:

What if one of those tom cats should sniff his way to the

cottage, after all? What if a whole gang of them should

arrive and start wailing at his door?

Or, worse yet: What if Petal sneaked away?

This last thought truly began to worry Aron. He kept a

constant eye on his daughter, which caused many uneven

threads in his weaving. He became so nervous that if Petal

were out of his sight for any length of time – and he did not

hear her, either – he’d jump up from his loom, knocking

over his chair, and cry out, “Petal! Come here!”

“What is it, Father?” she’d call, hurrying into the

cottage, with, say, a basket of mushrooms she had been

gathering.

Aron never answered. He was just glad to see his

daughter, and, relieved, he’d pick up his chair and resume

his weaving.

Nights, though, proved even worse for Aron than the

days. It was then he had to sleep, and so it was then he

could keep neither eye nor ear on his daughter. He kept

waking at the slightest sound, thinking Petal might be

sneaking away, and he kept checking up on her in her room.

She was always there, curled up beneath her blanket on a

mattress filled with her fragrant pine needles.

But then, on one warm summer night, shortly after

midnight, Aron peeked into her room and found her bed

empty.

“Petal!” he bellowed, stepping from her door back into

the large room. “Petal!”

She didn’t answer.

Aron ran outside into the benighted woods, where only

sprinkles of silver moonlight fell through the canopy and

broke up the dark forest floor, the way Petal’s pine needles

broke up the cottage floor.

“Petal! Petal!”

There was no answer except for the hoot of a lone,

unseen owl.

All the rest of that night, Aron scrambled about the dark

woods, calling his daughter’s name and bruising himself as

he hit his head on low limbs and banged fully into unseen

tree trunks.

By the time the sun rose, sending its early morning rays

to light the misty air and awaken the birds, who promptly

began their warbling, Aron was ready to faint from

exhaustion. He had been searching and calling all night.

Defeated and heartbroken, but determined to march to

Gateway to fetch his daughter if need be, he trudged to his

cottage to get his stick.

Yet, when he got there, whom did he find, sleeping

curled up in her bed as innocently as a doe, but Petal.

Aron rubbed his swollen eyes. His heart soared with

joy. Was it possible, in his great concern, that he had missed

her sleeping there the night before? Everything was as it

was supposed to be – except, Aron noted, that there were

little puddles of water, footprints really, leading up to