Tanis the shadow years (d2-3) by Barbara Siegel, Scott Siegel

overheard talk of raising a monument to honor Scowarr's heroics… if Ankatavaka survived, of course.
    The light from more than five hundred torches bathed the seacoast village in a flickering orange glow as Tanis searched the streets for clues that might lead him to Brandella or deliver him to his father.
    "Do you know a woman named Brandella?" he asked many a scurrying elf.
    "Yes," replied everyone he questioned.
    "Where can I find her?" he immediately countered.
    They all answered, "With Kishpa, of course."
    "And where is he?"
    None knew.
    No one had seen the mage since late afternoon. The wizard apparently had vanished. Teams of elves had been sent out to search for him. Without his magic, the villagers couldn't hope to hold the human army at bay.
    Tanis tried another way of finding Kishpa's lover. He remembered Clotnik had said Brandella was a weaver. "Where does Brandella work at her loom?" he asked a rotund elven smith.
    "Works and lives in the same place, m'boy," said the smith as he sharpened one of countless swords and knives that had been left with him overnight. "Y'know, my wife is rather fond of the shawls Brandella makes; wears them all the time. Costs me a fortune. But it's worth it. Keeps the wife happy, y'know."
    'That's important," agreed Tanis, trying to remain patient. Perhaps ordinary chitchat helped the smith remain calm, maintaining the illusion that life as usual was still possible. "But can you tell me where she lives?" Tanis pressed.
    'Try the second floor over that way," the smith said", using a worn hammer to point down the cobbled street. "See that overhang?"
    Tanis nodded.
    'That's her place. My wife…"
    Tanis thanked the smith, ran directly to the overhang, and looked up at dark windows. He hurried through the doorway and took the stairs three at a time.
    Knocking loudly on the door at the top of the stairs, he stood and waited, wondering what Brandella would look like, how she would act.
    To his dismay, no one answered the door.
    Tanis glanced down the stairway. When he saw no one lurking in the shadows, he put his shoulder to the door. It got away from him and swung open with a crash. Tanis grimaced.
    Lighting a candle he found near the doorway, Tanis scanned the large room. A loom stood in one corner with baskets of bright red, yellow, and purple yarn beside it. Near the back was an unmade bed, the scent from the sheets aromatic and exotic, and there, too, were several baskets of yarn. Then he saw what he should have seen from the very beginning: All four walls were covered with a huge mural; even the ceiling was part of the enveloping painting.
    Despite the meager light from the single candle, the images were bright and lively. Tanis couldn't figure out where the mural began or where it ended, and the more he peered at it, the less it mattered. The pictures told a story that needed no beginning, middle, or end. There were scenes of Kishpa, his physique perfect, his face flawless, his inner essence shining through his blue eyes with regal purity. It wasn't the mage's magic that shone, but the painter's art.
    There were also scenes of children playing games. One of the children-a girl with black, unruly curls-always seemed to have her back turned to the viewer. Exquisitely dressed elven dancers leaped to music one could almost hear. Here, too, was an older girl, her hair flowing in thick, black curls down her back; her face also was hidden. There were scenes of merry festivals, viewed, it was clear, from the terrace overhang off to Tanis's right.
    All of the scenes, wherever he looked, were joyous and happy, save one. On the ceiling, over her bed, Tanis noticed the woman with dark curls, her face obscured this time by the shoulder of a man, running toward a light that seemed to be a great distance away. The man was sweeping her into his arms, carrying her forward, and her body seemed to say, "I will go with you to the very source of light itself."
    Trying to make out more detail of the woman's