Patience Budge

“Luck be a lady tonight.”
― Amanda Adams, The Voyeur's Yacht

“When I am out there, in time, I am inverted, change into a desperate version of myself.”
― Audrey Niffenegger, The Time Traveler's Wife

“I climb the vine-covered walls
using stillness as a braided rope,
and drop like a cat
into the garden of the eternal.”
― Don Hynes, Something Will Change Me: Poems of Hope, Healing, and Personal Transformation

“Lord James did not know whether to feel proud of his daughter or
throttle her. He had managed to collar her quietly among the guests at the
Shinar manor, and they were alone together in the Lord Steward’s library.
He ordered her to a sofa in front of a ceiling-high bookcase.
Helen heard the same hard quality in his voice that she had perceived the first time they spoke together. She swallowed hard. He was not in a mood to be trifled with or flouted.
“You dress and behave modestly enough, Lieutenant,” he said. “But
your language earlier today was utterly appalling. You sounded like
a Lesser Shore whore, not a proper young woman, or a professional
healer. I simply won’t have it.”
“Two out of three is a start, Lord —”
He brought the back of his hand down across her face. She leapt
to her feet, not wounded so much as angry. “Is force your answer for
everything, Lord Protector?”
“Are sarcasm and insubordination yours, Lieutenant?”
― Candace L. Talmadge, Stoneslayer: Book One Scandal