Heart of a Dragon by David Niall Wilson

flushing as he knew he'd stared too long, but unable to look away.   Then he closed his eyes, sat back, and rocked gently.
    The image was very clear.   Greens and golds, magnificent, slender and sinuous like a serpent.   The dragon leapt to the forefront of Salvatore's mind, and he nearly gasped at the sudden clarity.   None had ever asked him to see, to understand.
    "Salvatore," he said softly.
    "Huh?   You see what?"
    "My name," the boy repeated, is Salvatore, Senor Jake, and I see your dragon."
    Jake leaned back, rocking on his heels.   He did not look at Salvatore, his gaze was fixated on the dragon that sprawled, nearly complete, across the dirty sidewalk.   He reached out once again, as if to touch the design, and then pulled away.
    "It's funny," he said.   "I look at your picture, Sally, and I see things too, familiar things.   I see a man, someone I've known.   You drew this dragon, but I see Vasquez.   Don't know if you've heard about Vasquez - Tony wasn't anyone special, not to anyone but the Dragons.   He died just the other night.   Your picture brought him back to me."
    Salvatore's eyes shifted quickly to meet the big man's gaze.   "He was a tall man, Senor Jake?   Tall with long, dark hair and a scar high up on one cheek?"
    Jake stared at Salvatore for a long moment before nodding slowly.   "He was.   He was also my brother."
    Salvatore lowered his eyes to the dragon, thinking.   "It is a magnificent dragon," he said at last.   "It is Senor Vasquez's dragon.   I saw him many times in the Barrio, parked near the market, or the park.   It was there I first saw the dragon."
    "Why did you draw it?" Jake asked softly.
    "I have no choice, Senor.   The dragons, they call to me.   I see them, and I brush them aside.   They do not leave me alone.   I see them again, and again, in my dreams, in the soft glow that surrounds the streetlights at night, in the flashing lights of the policia .   Always I see them -   until I set them free."
    "That is a gift," Jake breathed softly.
    "I wish that the gift were less painful," Salvatore blurted.   "I wish that I could sleep, and that they did not wander through my dreams."
    Jake was silent for a long moment, then he spoke.   "Set mine free, Sally.   I want you to set my dragon free now.   You won't be haunted by it then, and I will see it, as you do.   I want you to paint my dragon."
    Salvatore's heart nearly stopped.   The dragon had already formed in his mind.   The moment he'd glanced up and felt Jake's shadow fall over him, he'd seen it and known it.   He'd expected to carry that image with him, holding it and sleeping with it, sharing it with Old Martinez and waiting.   The Dragons were a fearsome lot, but they had a habit of disappearing, one after another.   It was never until one of the Dragons died, or had been taken away, that Salvatore released the images.
    "I..." He said softly, "I do not paint.   I have my chalk, the sidewalks and the walls of the Barrio.   I work where I can and when I can.   I have no paint, Senor Jake."
    "I think I can help with that."
    Martinez had come up on the far side of Salvatore's drawing silently. Salvatore turned, startled.   Jake glanced up as well, apparently just as surprised to see the old man.
    "I can make paints," Martinez said.   "I have been working on them and gathering what I need.   This," he waved a hand at the sidewalk, "deserves so much more.   The wind and the rain will find it…it will fade."
    Jake knelt down and brushed his finger very gently along the edge of the dragon, not really touching it.
    "He will never fade." He said.   "This drawing…this is a drawing of something that has already passed.   I never saw him –not like this – but Sally did.   He saw it, and he remembered it," Jake turned to stare at Salvatore.   "And he honored it.   This is…"
    Jake