Drave lay, completely wasted, in her hospital bed. The brightly-coloured stuffed toys and art pieces seemed a cruel contrast to the rest of the room, crowded with IV drips and machines of all sorts, all connected to her. Trying to keep her alive.

That's probably how I'd have written it, if I was writing a story.

Drave was my older sister by six years. She was seventeen, I was eleven. She was an artist, I was a writer. We'd always collaborated to make story books, ever since I learned to read and write.

Right now I was keeping vigil. Our parents were with the doctors while I kept watch on Drave, begging them to find some way to stop the cancer that had invaded their daughter's body and was leaving nothing untouched.

I looked over at Drave's sketchbook. It was blank, and her set of charcoal and pencils was waiting next to it, ready to dance across the paper and bring something to life.

Drave told me that when she was small she'd always wanted to do a painting of Queen Elizabeth the First, not from a previous drawing, but a completely original piece, because Queen Elizabeth had always been what she thought of when she thought of a good queen. "Well, before I realized I'd have to go back five hundred years and poop into a pot," she always added drily. What I wouldn't give for her to be able to live that out, even though it was completely impossible.

"Hey shortcake," Drave said softly, snapping me out of my reverie. She smiled when she saw my startled look. "Off into Bookland again?"

I laughed, unwillingly. "Just thinking, D."

Drave shook her head, smiling, and went back to dozing.

"Where am I?"

I whipped around, to see a red-faired young woman in a magnificently opulent dress standing in the room. But her dress… if I was correct, it had gone out of fashion some five hundred years ago. Drave was asleep by now.

I will never find out why I didn't just scream and run, but instead asked, "Who are you?"

The woman looked shocked that I didn't know, which I thought was pretty arrogant. "Queen Elizabeth! I am Queen Elizabeth of England! Tell me, maid, where I am!"

"Please, be quiet, my sister is resting. You're in a hospital room, Your Majesty," I said, the last part automatically coming to my lips. Definitely not the current Queen, but if she was telling the truth and wasn't bat-crap insane, how was someone who died over four hundred years ago in my sister's hospital room? On an impulse I added the year. "In the year of Our Lord two thousand and twelve."

Queen Elizabeth the First seemed surprised, glanced at Drave, and then looked mildly frightened by the things she was hooked up to. I couldn't blame her. Those things had scared the life out of me the first time I saw Drave with those machines attached to her, when I was nine. "She is ill?"

"We do not expect her to live, Your Majesty," I said.

She looked around the room, taking in the Spartan furnishings, contrasted sharply with the pile of toy animals and bright canvases Drave was surrounded by. "What are your names?"

"Joanna and Drave Lee, Your Majesty. She is Drave, I am Joanna."

I could see the pity in her eyes as she looked at Drave. Drave used to be lean and fit, and even after two solid years of cancer it was still evident.

A thought occurred to me. "Your Majesty, would it be possible for you to pose for a drawing? My sister is an artist, and she had always wanted to do a painting of you. You are famous even today, Your Majesty."

Queen Elizabeth glanced at the art pieces, charcoal and pencils on Drave's bedside table. She smiled and nodded.

I shook Drave gently. "Drave, wake up."

Drave mumbled incoherently for a second or two. "Whu… Huh? Hey, shortcake, just had the weirdest dream. I heard you and a woman talking and she said she was Queen Elizabeth the First, and you asked her to pose for a drawing."

I laughed when I realized Drave had been awake this whole time. "It's real, Drave! Grab your stuff, you get to live out your dream today!"

Drave sat up, shaking her head. "The things you come up with sometimes, Jo," she muttered, before she turned and saw Queen Elizabeth. Her mouth dropped open. "Gods of drawing, it's her. And I have to be dreaming now."

I pinched Drave's arm and she yelped. "Alright. Definitely not dreaming!"

I could see Queen Elizabeth smile a bit at our antics. Drave suddenly blushed right up to her ears. "I apologize for not being able to show you the proper respect due to you. I would stand, Your Majesty, if I could."

This time Queen Elizabeth actually smiled. "There is no need, Drave. Now, are you going to draw or not? Should I sit?"

"Anything, Your Majesty," Drave said, awe at being in the presence of her idol starting to set in.

Queen Elizabeth pulled a chair over and sat down as if she were sitting on a throne.

Drave shook herself, grabbing her sketchbook and pencils and setting to work.

For the next ten minutes the room was perfectly silent except for the sound of my older sister's pencils on paper, then her carefully shading and blending the piece.

"Finished," she finally declared, leaning back in her bed with a satisfied smile.

Queen Elizabeth looked like she was about to laugh when she saw Drave's drawing. It could have been a photograph. "'Tis a pity you were not born in my own time, you are as skilled as many of my painters. I could dismiss the lot of them and have you instead."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," Drave and I said in unison.

Queen Elizabeth actually laughed then. "No, thank you for allowing me to finally do something quietly worthwhile. No law-making or reforming a country, simply helping a girl fulfil her dream. But you must promise to finish that painting of me your sister said you wanted to do."

As suddenly as she had appeared, Queen Elizabeth disappeared.

Drave hugged me. She was crying, her face resting on my shoulder. "Jo, you have to be the best little sister of all time. All freaking time."

I don't know what the doctors thought when for a change, Drave was determined to get better instead of just being resigned to death. Every day, she would take out her sketchbook and look at the portrait, and little by little, she got better. If you asked me then, I would have sworn that Drave was forcing her body to fight, just so she could finish her painting.

Finally the day came when Drave was released from the hospital. The first thing she did? Grab her biggest canvas and her oil paints, and get to work. It took her a week to complete the thing, but eventually it was finished.

The portrait now hangs in our living room.