Commissioned Artwork Quotes

I slap the paper down on his desk and hold my flat palm over it. “What the fuck is this?” He looks down at it. “That was a perfectly good invitation, until somebody fucked it up with hearts,” he growls. I look down at it. “I kind of like the hearts,” I admit. “Next time, I’ll use hearts,” he says. He smiles. “You’re looking for a roommate?” I ask. I toy with my lip piercing until his gaze lands there, and then I force myself to stop. “Since when?” “Since I found out you’re homeless,” he says. “I’m not homeless,” I protest. “Where are you living after today?” he asks. I’m not at all sure about that, but he doesn’t need to know it. “Shut up,” I say instead. He pushes the paper toward me. “I have an extra room. You need a place to stay. Let’s not make it more than it is, okay?” “That’s all you’d expect?” I ask, hating how quiet my voice suddenly gets. “You could be pregnant, Friday,” he says. “What else would I want from you?” My breath catches. He is so right. I have been looking at this like it’s all about us, but it’s not. It’s all about this baby I have to protect for nine months, a baby he’s now fully aware of, even if he’s not aware of the details. “How much?” I ask. “How much can you afford?” he asks. He knows full well how much money I make; he pays me. But he isn’t aware of the money I make doing commissioned portraits and other artwork. He waves a hand in the air. “Don’t worry about what it costs,” he says. “Pay me whatever you can. The room is just sitting there empty. And if you live with me, I won’t have to worry about you being homeless.” I snort. “Like you’d worry anyway.” His brow rises. “I worry. I worry about you all the fucking time. But if you live with me, I won’t have to. So take pity on me and just take the fucking room, dammit.” “Okay.” He looks surprised. “Okay?” “Yes.” He grins. “Okay.

If an artist of the caliber of Leonardo or Michelangelo was paid a hefty commission for a new private piece of art, that artwork had to be a constant delight and stimulus for the rest of the patron’s life, and then usually go on to become a family heirloom. If an artwork was commissioned by the government, it had to serve as a permanent expression of that society’s ethos and values.

And then it was my turn. I stood there, shoulders back, head high, eyes focused somewhere over Sorcha’s left shoulder as, wordlessly, she stalked back from retrieving my oath gift from the chariot. And what she gave me . . . was already mine. My sword. The only thing other than me that had survived the long journey from Durovernum. The thing that had convinced Charon that I had value and had prompted my sister to buy my life for a ridiculous amount of money. It seemed that she had commissioned a new leather sheath for it, dyed black and embossed with the intricate, tortuously beautiful artwork of our people. Sorcha belted the sword around my waist and, as its comforting weight settled against my left hip, my hand dropped reflexively to rest on the hilt. It felt as though a severed limb had suddenly been sewn back onto my body. But then I noticed that on my right hip there hung a second—empty—sheath. I frowned in confusion, then glanced up into my sister’s face. With a start, I saw that there was the thin line of a scar, beneath the blue-painted designs on her forehead, running from the shock of silver in her hair down to her over-dark eye. She stared down at me, her expression fierce and hard, as her right hand crossed her body to her own left hip, and she drew the sword she wore. It was a twin to my blade. The sword she had carried into battle the last time I’d seen her. With a swift, brief-as-lightning flourish, she resheathed the blade in the empty scabbard on my hip. A murmur rippled through the watchers beneath the portico. The dimachaerus technique—fighting with two swords—was a rare choice among gladiatrices, and so the second sword was a rare gift. Of course, no one there watching would come close to understanding the true significance of Sorcha’s gift to me. I wasn’t even sure if I understood it.