A/N - I had started posting this story many years ago. Though I completed it, it never got fully uploaded to this site. It was written as a present for my best friend and was originally considered Fan Fiction. However, since it is not based on a character from The Patriot, but the real life inspiration of that character, it's original. When I started posting this story, I only uploaded 13 chapters. I have replaced these with the edited versions, but very only minor changes. If you have previously been reading, you can skip forward and pick up at chapter 14, very little changed in the edited chapters 1-13. I will be updating consistently. If I don't, review (a kick in the ass) and I will update.

Happy Reading! 7.25.14 - MystyTaurus

A Painting of Blood

I blame Jason Isaacs, Hollywood, the Fourth of July, and Jyoti's penchant for the metaphorical black hat all in that order. Oh, and my own talent as an artist, but even that can be excused by blaming it on Jyoti.

It all started two hundred and forty years after the Declaration of Independence was signed: July 4, 2016.

I watched Jyoti turn on the spot, taking in the scene. Hills rolled gently away from her, all green and lush, vibrant against the backdrop of blood and death. War cries, the ring of swords clashing, the report of muskets and cannon, mingled with the tears of wounded soldiers, the death keel of maimed horses, the wet belch of flesh as it parted beneath a not so sharp blade. Or, at least, that's what it looked like from Jyoti's eyes.

I saw green grass and random dots of color, courtesy of prairie flowers. Trees crowded streams and wet dips in the land, waving their leaves in the light breeze. The only non-peaceful thing here was my best friend, now waving her imaginary sword—cutlass, rapier, broadsword, or whatever she was imaging today—at an invisible foe. Her Revolutionary War replica British soldier's uniform was blood red and death black against the lovely green earth and clear blue July sky. Her hat, perched at an angle on her short crop of black hair, did nothing for her fine facial features. In fact, the uniform did nothing for her at all.

She was small, topping out at 5'2", with the slender build of a full blooded Indian with a fast metabolism. She could be mistaken for a real soldier, I reflected, had it not been for her one telling womanly mark: natural double Ds. Why god stacked a little girl like that, I don't know, but I think it was a punishment. But it kept people from thinking she was a boy when she wore her baggy pants and sweatshirts.

"Thank god a real battle isn't raging."

She turned her sword towards me with a look of murder—or it would have been had she not been grinning—and cocked her head at me in question.

"Why?"

"Because you might actually be mistaken for a boy." Since I had been thinking about it, I couldn't not say something. Besides, nearly an hour had passed since I had made a short, boob, or writing joke. "I told you you should have gotten that dress. It was so much more flattering to your figure. Your boobs alone would have—"

"The boobs again?" she whined, mostly in jest. She enjoyed my teasing, even if she never admitted it. "You can be satisfied at playing the girl. I was born in the wrong time period. And into the wrong body."

"I'm too tall to be the girl to your boy," I reminded her with fake exasperation, as if explaining this to her over and over was tiring. It wasn't. I reveled in it. "You know I don't go for the shorties."

"And yet you love me," she nearly sang as she skipped/hopped down the incline towards me. "And you make such a pretty girl."

I rolled my eyes. But yes, it was true. Wearing a sundress, I looked naturally a girl, whereas when Jyoti postured in dresses, it was more like a masquerade. I had a gay friend who was more natural in dresses and heels than Jyoti, though he wasn't blessed with breasts like hers. Damn the girl, every time. My dress accentuated my hourglass figure, but no amount of money could buy a satisfactory push up bra to bless me with eye-catching cleavage. And Jyoti knew it.

"Come on," Jyoti coaxed, threading her arm through mine. "If you're done I want to go visit the tents. You can find that pretty ring you keep talking about."

"I just mentioned I think it's time for a new ring. I don't actually have anything in mind."

"Maybe you can buy a time period dress. You can wear it to the dance tonight. You can really be my lady." Jyoti flourished her imaginary sword again, as if she were my knight in shining armor. Sometimes she was. She had the courage, will, personality, and a certain no-care attitude, to be exactly who she was every moment of every day. I couldn't hold back a smile.

"I've got the pictures I need," I agreed. "Let's go."

Making sure my camera was secure on its neck strap, and hoisting my backpack containing my canvas, paints, and Jyoti's writing things—specifically a college ruled, spiral bound notebook and five dollar black pens—we set off towards the reenactors.

I couldn't completely blame Jyoti for this excursion. It had provided me with a long needed road trip, and was giving her information for the book she had been writing for ten years. It was a trade off anyways. Last summer I had dragged her to every Renaissance fair, Scottish Highland Games, and Pirate Sea-Fair within two hundred miles of Seattle, Washington. And, surprisingly, there were quite a few. This little Independence Day reenactment, however, was in Pennsylvania, a good five day drive away from the humidity-free west coast of our youth.

Each tent was set up, presumably, as they would have done two hundred and forty years earlier. There were the soldier's tents, the officer's tents, the wash tents, the cook tents, the camp follower's tents, and those that sold jewelry, artifacts, swords, posters, movies, instruments, etc. We went from one to the other. Jyoti could be stoic and lazy, I knew her to pass entire days on the couch watching movies and writing, but at this moment the excitement lifted her like helium in a balloon. I constantly watched her from the corner of my eye in case the next bouncing step sent her into the stratosphere.

We were nearing the end of the line of tents about noon. I had a new ring on my finger and another necklace that I desperately had not needed—until I saw it and its price—and I was hungry, itching for some time-period-style-barbeque.

"Jyoti, come on, we've seen everything."

"One more tent," she said in the earnest way a ten year old might vie for more ice cream or an extra ten minutes of TV before bed.

"It's just the same old crap. Aren't you hot in that uniform?" Sweat was running between my breezy breasts. I was wearing cotton; who knew what her uniform was made of; something unpronounceable and from China, no doubt.

"This tent has War memorabilia!" she announced, rushing towards it. Had she been even two inches taller, the people she weaved in between would have looked at her with annoyance. She was, however, no more than a fly on their radar. Four inches taller, I weaved a little more carefully after her, apologizing as I went.

"They all have War memorabilia," I reminded her, getting testy. I was hungry. I wanted to get into tree shade, not tent shade. It was stuffy in this one and smelled of dust and something long dead.

"This has the real stuff," Jyoti corrected, already immersed in the displays. I half heartedly followed her, glancing here at there at something shiny.

Swords, looking a little more real than in the last tent, hung from the walls. Necklaces with dull beads and fraying string were displayed under glass at the counter. Buttons and coins were displayed with exorbitant prices and the years on them; some went back as far as 1600.

Ok, I admitted to myself, that was kinda cool.

An old woman, reminding me of an old crone who, three years ago, had tried to sell us fortunes in the bayous of Louisiana, came out from behind a dusty rug hanging as a door from the ceiling. When she spoke, it was a croak. I imagined her saying, "come look into the crystal ball."

"See something, dearie?"

On my list of pet peeves, right up there with being pestered by old people hawking their useless wares at me while on an empty stomach, was people who said things like "dearie" simply because we were younger and they thought that having grey hair gave them the right.

Jyoti was looking at Dragoon pistols with a lust I had only ever seen on her twice in our friendship: when her friend had presented her with a signed photo of Jason Issacs and when she drooled over her philosophy professor in college. I knew she was about to drop another hundred dollars.

"Looking for something we can't find at any other tent, or online, or at Wal-Mart," I quipped. Jyoti shot me a glare; her dark eyes were even darker in the dim light filtering through the canvas tent. It didn't bother me in the slightest, though anyone else would have described it as "shooting daggers".

"Everything here." The crone gestured the tent with gnarled hands. She stepped closer to Jyoti, who, for once in her life, had to look down at the tiny woman. "This is all real war artifacts."

"They should be in a museum," I huffed. "Jyoti, let's go."

"Stop whining. You have crackers in your backpack. Put them to good use."

I knew my blood sugar was low, but I bristled at being reminded by the one impeding me from getting mouth watering, flame cooked turkey legs. Or short ribs. Or something deep fried.

My mouth watered like Jyoti's, only mine was over food, not blood stained daggers.

"Interest in the war?" the crone observed.

"I'm writing a book," Jyoti offered. "About Colonel Tavington."

I rolled my eyes. All that talent gone to waste. She was writing a non-publishable book. Fan-fiction. About the fictional character, Colonel Tavington, portrayed by Jason Issacs, sixteen years ago, in the Mel Gibson movie, The Patriot.

The crone bobbed her head up and down and made, I assumed was, an encouraging noise in her throat.

"Banastre Tarleton," she croaked. "Cruel man. British."

I wasn't sure if the two labels were connected or if it was a coincidence that he was both cruel and British. Jyoti was nodding reverently though, and I knew it was time to leave before one of the pistols, or buttons, or small clothes behind the counter suddenly belonged to the man of her dreams.

Sure enough, the old woman moved around the counter and brought something out in a small wooden box. I tugged at Jyoti's sleeve but she didn't budge.

"To know the past is to know the truth. To wish knowledge is to be open to receiving it."

"As hotdog is to hamburger," I mumbled. Jyoti shot me another look then turned with unwavering attention back to the little box. I retreated to a dark corner to glower at her from afar and have nothing to do with her being swindled.

The box opened with a creak. The woman's crooked fingers curved over the lid like a vulture's claws over a branch. Inside was a small, cloudy glass vial, no bigger than my thumb nail. It rested on blue velvet, worn with age. Yet, somehow, the whole display was impressive, even to me. I suddenly found myself two steps closer and leaning forward. I immediately chastised myself and took a step back, but I couldn't take my eyes off the vial.

"What is it?" Jyoti's voice was quiet, in complete and utter awe. Somehow she knew that this moment was about to change her life forever.

Seventy dollars later, with another twenty worth of food in our stomachs, and ten minutes standing in the hot summer sun to warm ourselves—I had suddenly found myself shivering when we exited the crone's tent and Jyoti had had a similar experience though she wouldn't admit it—I went back to pestering Jyoti about the box with the vial.

"You can't possibly be so naïve—"

"If it's true, then it's really cool."

"Really Jyoti? After the Abraham Lincoln top hat incident of '12. And the Joan of Arc ring in '13—"

"Both of which were your mistakes," Jyoti cut in blandly.

My eyes narrowed. "Exactly. You haven't learned anything from my blunders? What good are friends if you can't first laugh at them and then learn from their mistakes?"

Jyoti chuckled. "But it's so cool."

I rolled my eyes for the hundredth time that day. I was getting a headache and worried my eyes would stick in the up position next time I did it.

"That," I jabbed my finger violently in the direction of Jyoti's bulging pocket—I refused to carry it in the backpack, "can't possibly be the blood of Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton."

I reflected only a split second on the fact that after years of saying that name, I could finally breeze through it without getting caught up in the ridiculous syllables.

"But imagine if it were." Her brown eyes were as round as a child's at Christmas. And, as much as my firmly earth planted notions wanted to, I wasn't about to break it to her that Santa was her mother.

She had whittled me down to a peg of my usual sensible self. She had won. Again. But I couldn't begrudge her that. We loved each other as sisters and we had been through far too much, for far too long, for me to skip away from that now. Jyoti had certain notions that I could never agree with, but I could live with them.

I wrapped my arm around her shoulder, glorying for one moment in my superior height, pressing down lightly on her shoulders to make sure she knew it, and kissed her temple.

"You are crazy, but I love you. What do you say we go watch the reenactment? Maybe someone will accidentally stab someone."

"One can only hope." Jyoti's smile was smug satisfaction.

"I really, really, really, need you to go away."

I was testy. Again. Sleeping on a hard hotel mattress for four nights in a row, not to mention the car ride here, and the eating out regularly had done nothing for my back, my health, or my mood. Everything that bothered me, however, seemed to give Jyoti an unparalleled energy. I'd have to call Harvard Research and report her.

"But there is a really cool museum in town I want to go to."

"Which will lead us to another battle field." I'd lost count at how many we had been to now. My mind could only take so much devastating beauty and heart wrenching stories and mind boggling death tolls.

"You can take more pictures."

"I'm trying to finish this picture." I jabbed my brush, dripping with green paint, towards my canvas. It was nearly finished. I needed to get it done before we moved on to the next battlefield and I was struck anew by inspiration. Death apparently inspired me to paint beauty the way it inspired Jyoti to write gruesome battle scenes.

"You can finish it later."

"I said that yesterday. I want to finish it. An hour, Jyoti. That's all I ask."

She was ready to burst with energy and disappointment, and no doubt get her guts all over my beautiful landscape. I had captured the sweeping hills with an elegant flourish, and the flower heads bobbed solemnly in an unseen breeze, and the trees stood stately with importance and age. I'd been tempted to paint Jyoti onto the scene, exactly where she had stood two days ago on the top of that hill, twirling in the uniform she was wearing again today.

With a pout, Jyoti flopped onto the bed beside me and dug out the box. I cringed and turned back to my painting. She'd become obsessed with the box. She created whole stories surrounding the making of the box and how someone had captured Tarleton's blood and why. We'd gone back to the reenactors the next day, but the old crone's tent was gone, and with her the answers Jyoti sought.

She opened the box and brought out the vial. The glass was so clouded it looked like sour milk and I could just barely discern something dark and previously liquid inside. The thought curdled my stomach.

Jyoti watched me, turning the vial over and over in her hands, as I applied the finishing touches to my landscape, an infinitely pleasanter thing to think about than the vial.

"Done," I said finally, leaning back in the hotel chair and admiring my work. The invisible sun touched just the right notes. It looked like a photograph, only not like any real photograph reproduced by a heartless machine. This one had my very soul in it. If I reached out and touched it, I'd be surprised that the flowers didn't bend beneath my fingers.

Jyoti sat up and rubbed the short nap out of her eyes.

"Nice," she said in one long drawn out syllable. She leaned over my shoulder, that damn vial still in her fingers and actually touching me. "I can almost imagine Tavington killing a hundred rebel soldiers just off there." She pointed to the right edge of the scene where I had been standing in real life. "You should paint some blood and body parts into it. And a dead horse. Cavalry horse. I have pictures."

I rolled my eyes. They didn't stick. Halleluiah.

"I'm serious!" Jyoti exclaimed, pushing me playfully on the shoulder.

"The painting is finished. Now if you could only finish a chapter or a full sentence before wandering off on some tangent or other—"

I was only half joking. Recognizing the familiar trend—we'd been past that tree before—Jyoti pounced on me. We rolled backwards out of the chair, holding onto each other for the impact to the carpeted floor, before rolling again and wrestling. I had height, but Jyoti had strength. She'd always been athletic and freakishly strong for such a little girl. With my leg strength and her all-over strength, we were pretty evenly matched.

We rolled and grabbed and elbowed, careful enough to sustain only a bruise or two apiece, until we were a tangled mess of clothes and hair. I lamented my perfect hair, combed into something resembling respectability—which was hard to find in this humidity. Finally, right near the end of the fight—we were both panting heavily—at the same time, she kicked out and my fist knocked upwards. The easel teetered. The vial flew.

I was expecting something horrible. What, I didn't know. In slow motion, I watched Jyoti launch off the floor and towards the painting. The vial struck the painting and cracked, shattering with an ominous but disproportionate tinkling noise (was that cannon fire in the echo?). As blood, still very much a liquid form, spilled across my work of precious art, Jyoti's hand made contact with canvas and went through it. And didn't come out the other side.

Like a certain boy's phone number had blown out a car window two years ago, to many tears on my end and laughter on Jyoti's, Jyoti was sucked into the painting.

Glass tinkled down to the carpet. Blood seeped and vanished into the painting. And there, on the hill where I had thought of painting her, stood Jyoti, spinning in a slow circle, observing an arm I had definitely not painted, and spilled blood that was entirely too real looking.

And just like that, Jyoti had been painted onto the canvas of history.