Happy birthday to our queen of lies, Jude Duarte!!<33
And happy anniversary to Holly Black‼️
cardan just wanted love. 😐
i was just replying to someone regarding nicasia and i had this sorta realization moment abt cardan lol
Cardan is consistently merciful toward people that wrong him. To his abusers.
He spares his mother when she leaves the tower of forgetting. He gives her a courtier title. After her lifelong abuse. he spares balekin from execution time and time again, despite all the death threats and beatings and humiliation. he forgives nicasia and Locke and remains (sorta) friends with them after they screwed around behind his back and broke his heart. He forgives Jude for putting him on the throne, for killing balekin.
Cardan has the capacity to be a lot kinder to those he cares about. While he attempts to act like he has a stone heart, he cares so deeply about the few people around him. No matter how they treat him in return.
Even his sisters, whom treated him like a dog when he was a child, throwing food at him under the table. He held balekin responsible for killing them, even when they had little love for him.
and his father, whom tossed him out of the kingdom for dains lies. He still strove for his fathers love and attention. And he did what he thought he needed to do to get that attention.
All he wanted was love, and he gave a lot more of it than he wanted to show. I’m so glad he found it w Jude 😭
And with Jude, he gave her everything. He gave her half of his army bro. HALF OF HIS ARMY just because she ASKED. She didn’t even have to order him to do it, because he trusts her and he so badly wants her to trust him too.
He secretly desired (and eventually cared for) her for yearsss. It’s so sweet how they went from school rivals besting and beating one another, to them making each other king and queen. ENOUGH
moral of the story, he just wanted LOVE. 😭😭😭😭😭😭
I’ll never stop thinking about them, idc how generic and obvious my posts are, every throwaway thought i have of them i will post
Jude/vivi and madoc parallels
Jude gets revenge on Madoc not just by scheming to keep madoc from coming into power, but by doing to him and oriana what he did to her mother and father.
of course, Jude didn’t kill them, but she did take their child from elfhame to be raised in the mortal world.
She made a changeling out of oak after madoc made a changeling out of her and her sisters.
I like how Madoc and Jude both could use the excuse of having “honor” to justify why they did it. Madoc took Jude and Taryn out of honor and obligation, perhaps a little shame and guilt. Jude whisked oakey to the mortal world out of her obligation not toward him as a sister, but as the high kings seneschal and by being loyal to the greenbrair line, because oak too, is a greenbriar prince.
The same way she goes out of her way to protect cardan consistently is the same way she protects oakey. She was loyal to first dain, then cardan, and through protecting cardan does she protect oak.
anyway- meanwhile madoc, betrayer of the greenbrair line, plans to put oak, his adopted son, on the throne, but in doing so would he more than likely cause oak great trauma. The same way he traumatized his girls, partly by shoving them into the violent and unforgiving high court.
He was loyal at first to eldred, then to balekin, and was ready to be “loyal” to oak before jude stepped in. (Wayy later he was eventually loyal to her and oakey: “I’ll bend my head to you, and only you”.)
add on: i like how madoc raised Jude to always have honor and loyalty, and Jude absolutely lived by that. Through living that way, she maintained her relationship w Taryn, continued to serve in the court of shadows after dains death, serving the greenbriar line thru oak and cardan, became elfhames queen, and was loyal even during her exile. Meanwhile, madoc was loyal-less he had more ego and power hunger than honor, and it cost him everything, his status, his home(bro got exiled), his relationship w his family, nearly everything.
anyway those parallels are crazy, they mirror each other really well. Their plans were literally opposite, but their methods, using multiple greenbriars to come into power, were similar. only Jude was loyal and had good intentions and madoc was not loyal and had bad intentions.
Now, Vivienne and madoc are opposites in this, vivienne didn’t kill her lover and take the lovers children, instead, she brings her lover a child-brother to care for with her.
Anyway idk moral of the story madoc is a hypocritical idiot and Jude is so much better than he ever could’ve been lol.
i also love how Jude learned everything from him. ofc by being the model soldier, endless loyalty and strength, swordmanship, strategy. and then she used it all against him, all while having loyalty to the king. maybe it’s not as a big deal to have honor in tfota as i thought, esp since madoc seems to lack it sm, but i always thought that he’d be pretty proud of her for beating him all while doing what he couldn’t. Being loyal and having honor.
i love Jude’s character sm. she is so loyal and she really does what she can for her family no matter how much it hurts her. On the other hand, madoc does things for his family but sacrifices their well being for it. 😭😭 their parallels are endless and i could go on and on but I’ll spare you
this was just thought soup,(i said the word “honor” way too much didn’t i) and i really hope it made sense lol, feel free to add on! 🫶
tfota pictures w captions for giggles (i hate the word meme guys i can’t take it anymore)
faeries upon eating in the mortal world (namely madoc, vivi, oak, and Kaye):
madoc when Jude yelled at his green ass in tpt:
Eldred when all of his sons turned out to be absolute cunts that all wanted him dead(the land of promise was his only option but it’s ok bc his son beat him to it):
Valerian watching with his pale blue eyes as Jude, from across the battlefield, destroys cardans ego (secretly wishes it was him):
Dain and balekin to each other throughout the entire first book and probably long before that:
Cardan when jude never found out that he sent her a pretty dress and instead forced him to be king instead (atleast she tied him up👅):
Madoc locking in when his least fav prince finds out his dead wife was actually living happily w three kids including his own with his human servant blacksmith, and that prince uses that info to make him do his bidding:
Half of the royal family (pic reminds me of grandpa eldy tho) spotting cardan and Jude having a very heated fight across the mock war field:
Jude when her sisters bitchass husband who is also her ex bf jumped her for fun and stole her sisters wedding gift so he could give it to her sister instead:
How i see oak in every book he’s in: (this FUCKINF PICTURE LMAOOO)
Part 1: here
#tfota#the cruel prince#the folk of the air#tcp#madoc#jurdan#fae#the modern faerie tales#kaye fierch#Kaye tfota#madoc tfota#vivi Duarte#how the king of elfhame learned to hate stories#jude duarte#cardan greenbriar#jude x cardan#the queen of nothing#the wicked king#jude#taryn duarte#tfota memes#cardan#tcp memes#oak greenbriar#locke#fota
screaming and crying at how once Jude is beneath the waves, cardan is a child again. Wanting to resort to violence to pry Jude from the fingers of her assailants. Because his entire childhood was spent being cruel for his mothers attention, and acting cruelly and lashing out for his fathers attention.
It was the only power he had, being the youngest but worst prince. It was one of the only tactics for things to go his way. and now, with balekin gone and Jude being the only one to control him, but beneath the waves, he’s just lost. He feels powerless as high king, but imagines that Jude is there with him, giving him orders.
but after all that she has taught him, all that he has learned from watching her levelheadedness rule elfhame so sufficiently, he works WITH madoc (who slaughtered his family) and the undersea (who stole his seneschal and lover) to get her back.
add on: not only that, but he’s willing to risk war and disloyalty within his lower courts for her, allowing to the undersea to attack lord roibens court. all for Jude.
People talk a lot abt him breaking his moral code for her, but no one mentions how he learned to be a good high king, he learned to not be the boy in the story with a stone heart. For, and because of Jude, so that he could get her back. FUCK. I love him
deleted scene from the wicked king, found in the Barnes and nobles exclusive edition.
#tfota#the cruel prince#jude duarte#cardan greenbriar#the folk of the air#tcp#holly black#jurdan#jude x cardan#the wicked king#twk#the wicked king deleted scenes#holly black deleted scenes#the queen of nothing#jude#cardan#fota#high king cardan#the folk of air#folk of the air#wicked king#jude cardan#jude and cardan#cardan x jude
never getting over how Jude’s idea of love is so intertwined w fear. Bc she grew up fearing and loving the man who murdered her parents.
Her entire life she has loved and feared elfhame, it’s magics and overwhelming beauty.
The feeling of mortals falling in love is like fear, a reoccurring theme in this trilogy.
Holly Black’s idea of Jude being a romantic isn’t just knives to throats and political ways to help those she loves, but jude fearing cardan (and fearing for him) because she loves him.
being vulnerable w him in a way she never has before, so as to not show weakness, bc she loves him.
theory/speculation (add on) abt why cardan sent Jude the coronation dress
I know i answered this already (this post), but i was laying in bed and thinking abt jurdan
so Jude’s dress is the view from her bedroom window right, it’s INDIGO (in caps bc important) and is littered w stars (as gemstones) all over it.
and that got me thinking abt Jude’s mortal eyesight, and Cardan’s faerie eyesight…
how Cardan looks at the night sky and sees indigo, but Jude would see black.
Also how Cardan would see tons and tons of stars, but Jude would only see a few of the brightest ones.
and i think it’s sweet that her dress is a view that she sees from her balcony, except in his eyes.
like he’s trying to show her a different point of view, which could mirror how badly he wants her to view him from a different point of view.
Either that or maybe he wants her to see the world(amongst other things) through his eyes.
maybe indicating that she sees herself in a completely different way that he sees her? hinting at his unrequited love/desire for her?
which also brings me to how he knew that Locke was proposing to Taryn, which would lead to the downfall of Jude and lockes relationship. Jude would assume that the dress wasn’t from Locke, and maybe from another admirer?
Could cardan have been planning on telling Jude how he felt for her? (Unlikely, but cute.)
idk guys am i reaching or what. Nonetheless, cardan is the only man ever😭😭😭😭
I miss them too much. feel free to add on🫶
Jude Duarte is just too funny and it’s not talked abt enough!
also love the fact that she did in fact not take orianas advice to keep her legs shut around royalty!
she knows her worth lmao.. she said why have a commoner who screws my sister when i could have a prince and later a high king xoxo
madockisser reblogged
Happy October 1st!
damn ok we all knew he wanted to bite her but 👅👅👅
Anonymous asked:
Ive just finished reading tfota series and something that makes me go awww was Jude wearing a ring that Madoc gave her then Cardan using it to propose to her.
Im very invested in Madoc and Jude's relationship. Father-daughter relationships are such a ride.
This ask makes no sense haha
Jude’s wedding ring symbolism, + how madoc and balekin play into Jude’s place in elfhame
hi! yes omg i adore the complicated Jude madoc relationship, and how cardan comes into play with how madoc sees her and treats her.!
not sure if you can call it a parallel, but madoc bringing Jude into elfhame, and also being the sorta non present ring bearer at their little proposal is kinda crazy to me, while Jude was the one who earned the seneschal title all herself, madoc was still the one that brought her to elfhame, and i think that ring represents that.
say what you’d like about madoc, and I’d probably agree, but him and balekin play such a crucial role in both Jude and Cardan’s upbringings/ how they turned out.
and it’s funny that just before cardan proposes to Jude and marries her, jude kills balekin.
The man that is solely responsible for her being in elfhame.
I see it’s as quite symbolic, like she has finally earned her place in elfhame by killing balekin, not just by becoming its seneschal and queen.
She earns it her own way, the way madoc taught her to. she doesn’t earn her place through cardan, or through having power over cardan (though that undeniably has a large role)
She earns it by killing that man that was responsible for the death of her parents.
Then she ties the knot officially by exiling madoc.
And it’s not just what balekin means to Jude, but also to cardan.
I’ve said before that balekins death was very necessary. Not just to the fate of elfhame and the undersea and whatnot, but to cardan and his happiness.
I like how cardan finally marries jude after balekin is finally dead. And while he doesn’t know it, it also feels a bit symbolic to me.
Like now that balekin is dead, cardan can finally be free of his abusive hold and have the relationship and feelings toward humans (and one human in particular) that he wants.
Anyway, sorry for the word soup, im emptying my drafts, waiting very impatiently for my faeries never lie book to come. feel free to add on!! 🫶🫶
madoc and eventually jude following into her fathers steps. father like daughter ig
madockisser reblogged
Father’s Daughter 🔥 | this a piece that I did for a DTIYS of a fellow artist and I loved it. What do you think?
Madoc/ Oriana parallel
something about oriana cutting liris womb open to salavge all that is left of the woman she loves and madoc cutting down eva and taking the twins to salvage what he had left of the woman he loves, is what makes me love orianas and madocs relationship so much.
the parallels between a loving friend, using a blade to honor her close friends last wish, to protect and save the child whom she then protects with her life and regards as her own child,
and a general’s bloodthirsty, vengeful nature, of which tends to spiral out of control, using his blade to defend his honor, and then caring for the children of his victims as though they are his own, are just so fucking beautiful.
I could’ve worded this better but i will say this now and forever, holly black, you are a fucking genius.
and i am waiting on that madoc/ oriana book pls 🙏🛐
(Emptying out my drafts bc i have 82 of them but most are unfinished)
#tfota#the cruel prince#jude duarte#the folk of the air#holly black#tcp#madoc#oriana tfota#madoc tfota#madoc x oriana#oriana x madoc#the wicked king#eva duarte#jurdan#jude#taryn duarte#vivienne duarte#vivi tfota#tfota analysis#fota#the cruel prince series#the folk of air#the folk of the air series#folk of the air
madockisser reblogged
See, I get the whole Jude is the dom argument because of how strong and scheming and power hungry she is, but that is EXACTLY why Cardan doms, and stay with me on this, Jude spends every single second of her life on high alert, I guarantee you she want nothing more than to relax and let someone else take control and Cardan would do anything for his wife
cardan is the only man jude would ever let top her! but fr them being vulnerable w only eachother is too sweet. and so accurate too.
Could you write an analysis about *the* dress Cardan commissioned for Jude to wear at Dain's coronation? I'd love to read your thoughts on why he did it and the dress itself! 💖
jude’s coronation dress, and why cardan sent it analysis
hi! yes! thank you for the ask!
ah yes 🚬 the infamous coronation dress.
firstly let’s start w the how.
madoc is the grand general and very influential yaddah yaddah, it makes sense for him to share the same seamstress as the greenbriar family. this seamstress is also tight w dain, so cardan having access to her makes sense.
i’d assume he’d sketched out the deign he wanted and just gave it to the seamstress. but me personally, i’d die if he personally chose out the colors thinking, “this would suit my future wife’s color palette fs!”
as for what it looks like:
it’s ombre, and described as dark indigo at the bottom, to pale blue, then white at the top. there is a silhouette of trees that that start at the bottom and move upwards. there are gems sewn on that resemble stars in the night sky. i WISH the actually shape of the dress was designed/mentioned, just for the visual ig lol
when locke sees the dress, he says jude is beautiful, like a winter night.
now the design (my fav little detail that ppl seem to forget) is actually a view jude can see from her balcony/window!!!
so, perceive that how you want, but me personally, i def think cardan was obsessed w her enough to 1 know where her balcony is(from locke ig) and 2 watch her from it (just a hc but 👅👅👅)
as for the why. i think deep down cardan had started to realize that even he wasn’t a complete monster asshat that wanted to kill jude for making him want to kiss her so bad, and he started to want to almost apologize, but w out showing weakness. so he sent that dress anonymously.
i mean, we already know that by this point he knows he desires her, and he knows that he doesn’t want to hurt her and see her humiliated.
i think it’s mostly sweet bc from his pov, he knew that jude would assume the dress was from locke, but he sent it anyway. or maybe, since locke was going to declare himself as taryns man at the coronation, that jude would have to guess she had some other secret admirer waiting for her once she finished w locke.
he also knew that taryn was screwing her over w locke, and i think he could really relate to that (lockes an asshole) and didn’t want to see her humiliated. (both are canon so it makes sense)
so he sent her an extravagant dress, like the ones liriope wore, to spare jude from the embarrassment of having her twin steal her man. (Outshine her ig!)
another reason i think he did this was for protection. it’s mentioned directly after the dresses come that they must be careful at dains coronation so this is pretty plausible.
i recall the commission for judes original dress being red and covered w madocs crest. but the fact that she is a human, and wearing the crest of a noble household, would make her seem like a slave to the other courtiers at the coronation.
so commissioning a grand dress, one worthy of the high courts gentry, would make it seem as though she were one of the high courts courtiers, and would make those that want to hurt her probably hesitate to do so, bc why does this human girl have this nice ass dress? they’d think that she must be important or atleast well cared for.
another detail abt the dress is that nicasia knew cardan sent it. now she says this in qon, so we don’t actually know when she found out that cardan sent it. she could’ve known in tcp, maybe she caught cardan sending it off or making the sketch? or maybe she found the sketch and then later saw jude wearing that dress? she could’ve found out in twk, or when jude was in exile, etc. we may never know.
but i still think it’s sorta bittersweet that nicasia knew that cardan loved her.
anyway, cardan is on top as always🫦 thank you for the ask! 🫶🫶🫶 and feel free to add on!
#tfota#the cruel prince#jude duarte#cardan greenbriar#the folk of the air#tcp#holly black#jurdan#jude x cardan#jude#cardan#dain greenbriar#nicasia#fota#the folk of air#folk of the air#the queen of nothing#the wicked king#taryn duarte#high king cardan#locke#prince cardan#prince cardan greenbriar#judecardan
madockisser reblogged
Cardan talked about feeling like he was in a cage when in a relationship with Nicasia. With her standing right there.
Cardan referred to marrying Nicasia as a more poetic cage (bound in misery) to her face.
But in marrying Jude he finally saw a way out of the cages.
i’m actually screaming how are u a genius
balekin greenbriar and his relationship w humans/jude theory
i was reading qon, and jude thinks of something abt what balekin said and it had me thinking.
“i have heard that the feeling of falling in love for mortals is very much like the feeling of fear.”
balekin had tons of human servants, they’d come and they’d go, he probably enslaved them himself just bc of the vow/glamour of obedience the mortals have to give in order to serve specifically him.
“they could’ve been palace mortals” his servants wear his livery, w his crest on them, so maybe some of them come and go from the palace, but balekin was very cautious, so i doubt he’d wants his brothers and fathers servants all up in his house.
anyway, balekin loves power. like a lot, probably almost as much as he loves himself.
so i wonder if he’d long been aware of humans and their tendencies to mix up the feeling of love and fear, and got off on that power trip.
the same way cardan hates courtiers for their fake admiration, balekin may feel the same way, and so, he seeks the “admiration” from humans that are actually just afraid of him.
and so, he travels to the mortal world (or mortals are brought to him) and forces them into a bargain, probably freakishly obsessed w the way that they fear him, in a completely different way that faeries fear him. since he thinks that mortal feelings of fear are like their feelings of love.
and it’s 10x worse thinking that those humans probably find balekin terrifyingly beautiful all the while he’s abt to ruin their lives. and he knows it too.
the power trip that balekin can find by looking in the eyes of humans he’s about to destroy, convincing himself that they just might adore him, that they will come to serve him, just makes him all the more of a sick and twisted asshole.
it checks out, the way that he treats jude in the undersea. forcing her to kiss him, maybe bc jude’s too tired to be afraid of him? maybe bc balekin wants to feel the power trip of seeing jude afraid of him, convincing himself and glamouring her into adoring him. into wanting to willingly serve him.
the way he also treats her in hollow hall after they’re free from the undersea. “tell me you’re my creature” as though he’s speaking to a lover. disgusting.
also looking back on how he made that guard slap her in twk, like he’s trying to find weak spot in her armor, like he wants to see her afraid.
it’s like a game to him. wanting to see jude afraid, time and time again. his whole life he had taken advantage of humans, but then jude gets one over him and takes his place in power. it’s like he’s trying to get one over her, by making her fear him, by making her serve him.
like he needs constant reassurance that he’s the first born prince and that he deserves love and admiration and servants, bc he was denied his birthright of being king.
looking WAY back, how balekin was the one to find eva and justin, makes me think he may have felt that twisted way abt them too, since they are the only few humans w any semblance of power in the high court. but they didn’t serve him or i would even say fear him(they had protection), so maybe he took it personally and sought out their demise?
that also makes me think abt eva and madoc, and how he might’ve felt abt their relationship. probably initial disgust, but overall jealousy that he didn’t have anything over eva. he was probably so smug when he found them out and told madoc abt them. he’d finally had something over them. and his point of humans and love and fear had been proven. maybe he thought eva feared madoc throughout their marriage, and that she convinced herself it was love.
maybe he thought that he and madoc shared that sickening power trip over humans, which is why he was so sure madoc wouldn’t betray him when it really mattered. he also called madoc a coward after the fact, so maybe he felt that madoc feelings towards humans got in the way of madoc backing him completely. (just speculating)
also the way he regards val moren after killing val morens lover, forcing him to crown him. sickening tbh. he just loves making humans suffer ig
or even in tcp, his coronation. he turns to jude, knowing that he’s a big fat narcissistic asshat, and probably thinks that the only reason that jude is there is bc of him, bc he had her parents offed. and he wants to take advantage of that, by granting her a boon (making her a faerie) so that jude can further owe it all to him. so that maybe she would want to willingly serve him, or maybe he wants to grant her a gift as a way of paying her back for getting her parents killed, since it’s the faerie way yk.
anyway, even if most of this is just speculation, we know he enslaved humans, just the added fact that he just might get off on it is so much grosser.
but do feel free to add on!! this is super interesting and i hadnt thought of this before but it really adds layers to his character.! 🫶