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25/4/22 I guess that means I have to read the whole series now. It's not like I'm currently reading 10 other books or anything...

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4/5/19 Oops, I didn't mean to start reading this again 5 days after I finished. I will not reread this or The Cruel Prince for at least another week. Or am I lying?

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Fuck that ending. I am as enraged as The Queen of Nothing.

So, I finished reading the library book and had to buy it and book 1 (I read that as a library book too). And yes, I wish I had waited til they were all out to read them one after the other. Will I never learn??

I love that this series continues in the world of Tithe: A Modern Faerie TaleÌý²¹²Ô»åÌýThe Darkest Part of the Forest.

Now I want to discuss that ending with anyone who's read book 2.

(view spoiler)[While I was reading I knew the ending had to be catastrophic. I kept thinking Cardan would die and I really didn't want that. It would have been clever though, the twist to end all twists.

Now they're married and Cardan has banished her, I wonder if he did it to save her life. He needed Jude's vow of obedience lifted to use his magic to broker an alliance with Orlagh. And he chose his affection for Jude to bargain with.

"She didn't have to force me Jude. She didn't have to use any magic. I trust you. I trusted you." p.300

He trusts her, he cares enough to do anything to get her back from the sea.

"When you were gone - truly gone beneath the waves - I hated myself as I never have before." p.266

He lusts after her. When he asked Jude about their night of carnal adventures, she said she did it to get it out of her system. When Cardan asks if it worked, Jude says yes (a lie). Cardan can't lie so he says nothing p.181. The only reason he wouldn't want her to know his answer is if he wants more of the same. He's quite happy to insult or toy with Jude, but he doesn't want her to know his vulnerabilities. They come to the surface when he loses his inhibitions. He asks Jude to kiss him after the assassination attempt when he's drunk p.57. He kisses Jude at the masquerade when he's drugged by the poison p.284.

Or when he's mad at her. When Jude suggests Cardan use sex to get information from Nicasia, he's horrified. He wants Jude, not Nicasia, so he takes the oppotunity to show Jude how he feels p.143. He subsequently gets the information from Nicasia, but only because Jude asked him. She didn't command him, so he had a choice. Then they have the convo about when J & C had sex and whether Jude got it of her system. Cardan wants to know if they'll have sex again. Jude's lie puts a stop to that idea p.181.

I vaguely remember someone saying faeries can't love, not as mortals do. But all these things he feels are part of love. Cardan and Jude's relationship is toxic by our standards, but I'm pretty sure no faerie relationship is what we would deem healthy.

"It seems I have a singular taste for women who threaten me." p.180

He can't lie when he offers Jude his bargain, nor in his betrothal.

"I wanted to show you that you could trust me, that you didn't need to give me orders for me to do things." p.303

He wants the trust he feels for Jude to be mutual, as he says in his pledge:

"until we wish for it to be otherwise and the crown has passed from our hands." p.306

That AND and the OUR are important. He wants their mutual trust to continue all the while he's king and she's queen, which includes when he banishes her.

He has a very good reason for banishing her - to avert a war with Orlagh and keep Jude as far from anyone who might want her punishment to be death. He can't tell Jude in front of a bunch of possible assassins, nor send her a message subsequently. After the Ghost betrayed them, anyone could.

I really hope something along these lines happens in book 3. Otherwise I will scream until even the folk of the Undersea hear me.

Meanwhile, I have no idea what Cardan means by this:

"I want to tell you so many lies." p.145

Is it pillow talk? or does he want to tell her he hates her? or does he just want to be like her with her lying mortal ways?
(hide spoiler)]