Work Text:
Despite the stories, the ancient legends and mystical creatures, Faerie was a cold place.
There were glowing plants and devious creatures, shadowed by beauty and promise.
Golden fruit and rich wine to take your mind to strange places and twist your insides until they were lost in themselves.
Raging seas and quiet forests, warm sunsets, black nights, blinding lights and rhythmic music.
Or maybe that was just Cardan's view of the world he had been born into.
A world deprived of the simplest of joys. A life of loneliness and suffering.
A boy forged by flames of resentment into a prince of cruelty and beauty.
Cardan was a lot of things, but loved was not one of them.
He hoped with time, his heart would grow numb to the ache.
Words murmured by villainous lips, poisoned whispers clawing their way into his head until Cardan was drowning in the echo of their voices.
Too weak, they'd say, the words tumbling inside his mind like a broken record, too young, too juvenile, too lazy.
He wastes his time on drink and lady, they'd accuse, pointing fingers behind his back, he is lost to his hopeless romances and adolescent larks.
They didn't see the silvery scars crisscrossing his back, the soreness of his heart he yearned to drown in the cold numbness of oblivion.
He'd tried to understand once, why the only emotion his family could hold for him was cold resentment, needed to understand, to fix.
Some things couldn't be fixed.
Sometimes, there just wasn't an explanation. Some things just were.
Like the fact that Cardan's existence was not wanted.
That he was not wanted.
Dain, his father, Balekin, his mother; they all made that painfully clear, with each hurtful word, every agonizing bite of a belt.
Balekin liked to change things up, punish Cardan in different ways, for different offenses, in different intensities.
There were few constants, but Balekin's lessons in swordsmanship were one of them.
Whenever he ordered Cardan's appearance in his office, held out the sword to him and told him to "get one hit in, little brother," Cardan could almost hear the whistling sound of a belt that soared through the air.
Cardan didn't practice. He chose not to. He was expected to learn how to wield a sword to put an end to the lives of many, but Cardan didn't want that.
He wasn't a killer.
Maybe his weakness was the reason for Balekin's resentment, for the fire that spread through his body as the human servant slashed the belt across Cardan's back.
The tongues of heat lapped at his very being, drawing reluctant sounds from deep within him.
His brother stood and watched, no emotion twisting his features.
Balekin told Cardan he loved him. Sometimes Cardan thought he must surely hate him.
If only Faeries could lie.
Cardan's fingers would clench, nails carving half-moon markings into his palms, torso rocked forward with each forceful strike.
His arms would tremble, his legs barely managing to hold his weight.
Balekin often despaired over his laid-back attitude.
It made the punishments worse. Drawn out. Longer. Harsher.
But Cardan could take the pain. He had been raised in it.
That didn't mean he didn't wish for it to stop.
At some point, the blows would tear something in his back, warmth sliding down his spine. He'd gasp, glaring agony rippling over his skin, wetness beading in his lashes.
At times, Baleking expected him to apologize for his foolishness, his weakness.
Cardan had little, despite the title he bore; Balekin would not take his pride, too.
With a disappointed scoff from his brother, the beatings would continue.
Some days, Cardan's gaze wandered over the uneven islands Faerie consisted of.
Would it be so bad to leave it all behind ?
The thought crossed his mind on a daily basis, often when his back had been flogged open or his heart ripped to shreds.
In the end, he never could bring himself to flee the palace. Love was a fickle thing.
Cardan loved with intense hatred.
He loved unconditionally.
And hated with a burning passion.
From the moment of his birth, Cardan had learned he was an unlovable being, cast aside by the woman that was supposed to be his mother, for feast and dance and revels.
Cardan wished he would not love them, could leave them and hurt them as they did him.
But as said, Cardan was weak, and he loved the people tormenting him either way.
Over time, his heart shriveled. Deprived of the attention he so desperately craved, Cardan began building walls of ice around it, letting it rot and fester and die.
With his mother's imprisonment and Dain's betrayal, Balekin was the only one who had earned a small piece of him, as he was the only one who did not abandon him to his loneliness.
A blade forged in fire will cut through flesh. A prince raised in brutality will inherit cruelty.
They would never love him. But if they did not pay him the attention he sought for being good, then they would for being bad.
So he played into the rumors, ripped wings from backs and repaid cruelty with cruelty. They would see him, one way or another. They had to. They had to.
And then Jude Duarte broke through the walls he had raised to protect himself, tearing them down with brutal accuracy and the sharp edge of a knife.
She conquered what was left of his heart and claimed it for herself.
A human, a fool.
His jailer, his seneschal.
The Queen, his queen.
The High Queen of Elfhame .
A human, a fool:
Cardan resented Jude.
He resented her for the father that was not her father but loved her anyhow. For the sister she could confide in, who would watch her back as she offered her weaknesses. For her heart, that still beat strong despite the cruelty of the Folk. His cruelty. His hatred.
He resented her because she bested him in swordplay, and Balekin wouldn't stop saying her name.
He resented her for capturing his interest, attracting his thoughts, invading his dreams.
He found himself thinking of her brown hair, the color of a willow tree, the elegant way she would twist it into a mockery of horns.
The beauty of her gaze, startling intense, was forever burned into his mind.
He resented her because she was disgustingly human, recklessly beautiful and always on his mind.
The more she fought, the worse it got. Where she had avoided his eyes and bit her tongue, she would now glare with sweet hatred and spite venomous words. Jude rebelled against him. She was the first person to ever dare tell him off, stand against his cruelty and see him.
She saw him.
And that put the final nail in his coffin.
His jailer, his seneschal:
Playing the game of Kings and Queens with Jude Duarte was exhilarating in a way Cardan couldn't quite grasp.
There was a steady push and pull between them, angry threats and secret gazes.
And still, he thought of it as nothing but a children's game, a little playful battle to pass the time.
He imagined her a weak human, and then she put a dagger to his throat and uncovered his darkest desires.
Despite the childhood he'd had, the days spent trapped in that chair were the most terrifying of them all. He had not only her to fear, the girl he had tormented, threatened and humiliated, but also his own foolish feelings, the secret longing in his heart.
And maybe he should have known better, he had never forgiven his family for their mistreatment either, but starting with that kiss, something changed.
She was less feral, or maybe Cardan had just brought out the worst in her, and he slowly started realizing he never actually knew the girl he hated.
Plotting against his brother, spending time with Jude's friends, all blurred the picture of the girl he had in his mind until the rage, disgust and contempt morphed into something warmer, more gentle.
He started liking her.
He started trusting her.
He swore loyalty.
And then she forced the blood crown on his head and took away any chance at the freedom Cardan had fought for.
It was the kind of betrayal Jude should have expected from Cardan, not the other way around.
It was the first and last time he would underestimate Jude Duarte.
He became her puppet-king.
She became his seneschal.
Jude grew as his object of unrivaled hatred once more.
And despite it all, the longing that pulled him towards her didn't diminish.
He still wanted her, in a way he had never wanted anyone before.
A night filled with searing touches and hot breath and undeniable pleasure to take off the edge did nothing to calm the raging feelings inside his chest.
The Queen, his queen.
The Queen. A spy. An assassin. A mystery.
How could one small human girl be so much more than anyone Cardan had ever known?
Jude Duarte was a kingmaker, with the world at the tips of her fingers.
She was strong and powerful, despite her mortal weakness.
He fell in love more and more each day, and he was powerless to stop it. She was the light to his darkness, drawing him in like a moth to the flames.
And Cardan burned with glorious agony.
When he proposed to her, offered her the power of Elfhame for his freedom, Cardan had not meant to deceive her, had only his and her future in mind.
For the first time since his mother gave birth to him, he asked for something he wanted and received it without the hidden deceptions of a Faery bargains.
And then she murdered his brother and Cardan exiled her with his heart shredded in two.
He prepared for her anger, her resentment and violence. His heart yearned for it because at least he would have her in arm's reach then, with him, even if she wouldn't be with him.
But days turned into weeks turned into months, and his queen remained in the mortal world, not responding to the pathetically desperate letters he wrote. He should have known, should have seen it coming. Why should she return to him, to a kingdom that had only ever shunned her, if she could live a life with her sister, surrounded by her own people?
What made him think he'd be enough to make her stay?
The High Queen of Elfhame:
Jude Duarte, a girl that went from an outsider in her own home to the ruler of all of Faerie.
She fought for a crown and land that Cardan had so desperately wanted to leave behind. The irony was not lost to him. A human girl, longing to belong in Faery, while its prince despised the very roots of it.
When Jude's baby brother put a crown on her head, Cardan had been... happy. Jude was back with him, she was his wife, for all of Elfhame to know, she was his everything. His Queen of Hearts with a sword strapped to her armored back. He didn't think he'd ever been happy before.
Of course, turning into a serpent had put a dampener on that happiness, but it also gave Jude a chance to finally prove herself worthy of the title. She took the leap and struck, aiming to kill. And out of the warm body of the reptile rose Cardan as the true ruler of Faery, belonging on the Throne he'd later restore.
Despite all the hardship and pain that had dictated his life, Cardan had been chosen by the Folk, the very same people who had feared and humiliated him during his early years. He had been chosen by the girl who had broken into his heart with the grace of a raging storm.
He had been chosen.
They saw him.
They loved him.
Cardan was finally home.