Chapter 11 #3
“Not everyone feels how I do. I created an entirely new entity – a Fairy born into inescapable isolation – as the by-product of forging Folk artwork. Some artists don’t find that troublesome.
As a matter of fact, some of the Fairies created through art don’t mind.
It’s the perfect life for someone reclusive.
Many inhabitants of changeling paintings live contently enough, though not for long.
The magic makes them age quickly. A Fairy in a painting might live for only a hundred years or so! Cruel, isn’t it?”
Florrie did not think it polite to mention that most Folk would be grateful for a mere hundred years alone.
“I am no expert on the subject,” Ceru concluded. “And the matter in question troubles me so greatly that I can hardly ponder it. I cannot help him, I’m afraid.”
“But I’m sure someone can,” Florrie persisted. “Like one of the scholarly colleagues you mentioned, perhaps.”
Ceru scoffed as he rearranged a few stray flowers from the stack on his table.
“It may not be the way in Folk society,” he said, “but no scholar would deign to answer an enquiry simply out of the kindness of their heart. Those colleagues of mine… their time is precious and their moods capricious. I might have gambolled with them in the gloaming over the centuries, but that does not mean they’d grant me a favour unless I offered something of academic value in return.
There are rules, you know. How bothersome. ”
Suddenly, Florrie found herself overcome by an emotion that she managed, after some careful reflection, to identify as hope.
“Might an oddity hold any academic value, I wonder?”
Ceru frowned. “Pardon?”
“Earlier, you said my ability to damage the painting could be a radical discovery,” said Florrie. “Something, as I recall, that might upend established knowledge of changeling paintings.”
“But of course!” exclaimed Ceru. “Why, what a change of heart you’ve had! I’ll arrange your participation in a study at once. Let me find my seer’s canvas to send word—”
“To be clear, I don’t wish to speak with anyone or be studied.”
With a sigh, Ceru laid his head on the edge of the table. “Then you’ve nothing to offer.”
“Oh,” mumbled Florrie. “It’s only that I thought, perhaps, if I wrote them a letter about the painting and my experience with it, and—”
Ceru shook his head, sending petals and paint chips flying across the tabletop. “No good, no good. They require evidence, not anecdotes.”
“Evidence?” echoed Florrie. “Such as…”
She paused. What she was about to suggest felt almost as embarrassing as letting scholars interview her. Almost, alas… but not quite.
“Such as artwork,” she finished in a faint voice.
Florrie shut her eyes until she heard a loud, indulgent laugh.
“Yes, yes,” said Ceru, “I could tell from the moment we met! You have the very look of an artist about you, my dear.”
“Artists have no predetermined looks,” Florrie protested as she opened her eyes. “At least, not in Folk society. There are no codes or procedures governing their appearances. In the third century, however—”
“But this is brilliant!” Ceru continued. “I’ll make them an irresistible offer. A portfolio of works by the only Folk artist ever to alter a changeling painting. Professor Petiole, for one, will practically salivate at the thought, I know, and Professor Dulse—”
“And in exchange,” Florrie managed, “you’ll ask them? About Vern, that is.”
Ceru tutted. “Of course, but that seems a rather poor bargain for you, my dear. You’d make an entire portfolio in exchange for information about a stranger in a painting?”
“He’s not a stranger.” Florrie realised, however, that there was some merit to Ceru’s point. “But I suppose I ought to ask: how many works of art comprise a ‘portfolio’, in your mind?”
“Oh, only a few,” drawled Ceru. “Three hundred, perhaps? And I know you’ll want your answer soon, so how about – hmm, three days to produce them?”
Florrie felt her right hand waving up and down in that slightly unpleasant, slightly calming gesture she adopted involuntarily under duress. She hid the hand behind her back.
“Is that too much?” said Ceru. “Let’s make it easier, then. How about two hundred and fifty, in four days?”
“The most I’ve ever done is three paintings – in one week. And those were really only studies, not full compositions.”
Ceru clapped his hands. “Why didn’t you say so? Three studies in a week, then! That sounds perfectly suitable.”
“If – if you say so,” Florrie murmured before Ceru could change the terms yet again.
“I do indeed. And do you know what else? This sounds like such good fun, Florrie – the most I’ve had in years – that I’ll promise you something even sweeter.
I’ll evaluate the portfolio myself before sharing it with my colleagues, and if I deem it worthy, I will name you my apprentice and bind my brush to you.
No Folk artist was ever blessed with such an honour. Doesn’t that convince you?”
“I don’t care much for honour,” said Florrie, but she was already convinced.
Simultaneously, two images emerged in her mind, superimposed upon each other like the subjects of a fourth-century juxtaposition portrait.
She imagined herself wielding that wondrous, curious brush, using her mind and hands to paint in a wildly new way – just as she imagined a beaming Vern, freed from his painting and exploring the marvels of some fascinating gallery.
She curtseyed to Ceru as her face flushed. “What, specifically, would you like me to paint? You said they could be studies – how much detail do you require? Would you like me to work in a Folk style or emulate a Fairy one? Shall—”
“That’s entirely up to you!” Ceru guffawed.
“The scholars will only analyse your artmaking to determine if there’s any magic in it.
Don’t overthink the matter. Don’t even sketch your subjects in charcoal first. I want to see the very first things you paint – uncensored and unrefined.
However else will I determine if you merit the title of my honorary apprentice? ”
The word apprentice settled and spread in Florrie’s mind like a pigment on lightweight paper.
It was, in fact, a failure to secure apprenticeship that had quashed her dreams of pursuing painting as a profession.
In order to matriculate, a student of the arts at the Painterly Phrontistery required an offer of apprenticeship from an advising artist. There were, however, advisors enough for only ten out of a hundred students, and Florrie had, in her youth, ranked twelfth on the list of contenders.
Her family (save Chary) considered it a fantastic accomplishment.
Lady Hyverfell still bragged to museum guests about her daughter, the one-time rank-twelve artist. Florrie herself might have felt proud of this consolatory achievement if she hadn’t read the comments from her evaluators.
Her paintings had been characterised as “peculiarly promising” and her personality as “utterly bereft of the comportment required to sustain the public-facing life of an artist, who is required, above all, to charm, to beguile, to bewitch the soul of a collector with their eloquence and effervescence”.
“While we welcome students of all abilities and experiences,” a commenter had concluded, “we suspect, given her particular strengths and weaknesses, that Miss Hyverfell ought to consider conservation.”
So Florrie did far more than consider it – and, as it happened, she genuinely loved her current profession. Still, the idea of making her own art (her own designs, created in her own time!) thrilled her.
Yet Florrie knew she shouldn’t feel too confident or ambitious. At present, she simply needed to say her farewells to Ceru before the artist could distract her further with talk of apprenticeships, magic brushes and animating forces – and, well, underpaintings.