r/TheFolkoftheAir

I've read a lot of people saying that during most of the first book Cardan only had lust towards Jude, which he hated.

Do you think that's the case? After reading his novella I felt he had a lot more than lust going through his mind and he just couldn't figure them out properly. Actually if I'm being honest I didn't get the idea that he had lust.. since we read his thoughts in his novella whenever he thought of Jude he thought about her human traits (ears, ability to leave footprints, etc..) and how hard she tries and her determination and strength etc.. but I never saw him thinking about her body or any thing that may interpreted as lust.

We know that Valerian lusted the twins. However Cardan never showed that kind of interest toward Taryn (she's Jude's identical twin so..)

And even during the series Cardan was so cautious with Jude.. I don't think he tried to do anything with her or hinted some dirty things (correct me if I'm wrong) even after they fulfilled their marriage in QoN he had self control and waited patiently for her in case she changed her mind and wanted to stop

I'm not sure about Cardan’s opinions on intimacy and physical experiences.. so what do you think?

Please remember this is my opinion, and no hate to anyone who disagrees with any of my arguments.

So overall, liked the books okay. Not sure if it’s enough to read them again though.

Positives:

The main positive is that the plot was alright, and I liked seeing more of Oak’s adult personality since we‘ve only seen a small amount of 8/9 year old him before!

I also feel like the other characters did a good job supporting the plot (this is hard to phrase, but I feel in some books there‘s side characters that just exist. The side characters here almost all have a good role in the plot). I also liked how we didn’t lose the personalities of past characters. In particular Jude still seemed like herself, even when it seemed like her character could’ve been changed for the sake of the plot.

Negatives:

I feel like it was rushed. specifically The Stolen Heir! I think we could’ve expanded a bit more into a third book.

Wren’s character portrayal. I don’t like her, and I almost feel like that’s what Holly wanted. I feel like she’s very pick-me-girl-like and it bothers me. I know we’re supposed to feel bad for her life, and I do, especially considering the events in The Queen Of Nothing surrounding her, however she is not the easiest person to empathize with either. And Oak’s actions don’t help.

I mean Oak was kind of a dick to her. It was definitely very weird that to keep everyone safe or something, he had to pretend like he and Wren were getting married! That’s a new low. It just seemed like it was unnecessary thing to do.

Hate me all you want but I just don’t like the love story. One thing that I’ve noticed is, in my opinion, it seems so much like Jurdan but with less character defining details, if that makes sense. I also feel like they’re very much supposed to be in love by the end of The Prisoner's Throne, but I can’t see how.

Also Oak thinking Cardan hated him was kind of a dumb internal conflict to pick personally. You’ve known him for so long. If he resented you, he would have murdered you by now. Also I never got how the conversation Cardan and Jude could have been twisted into a conversation about him.

I'm curious about what type of relationship they might have had?

It was mentioned that vivi went swimming once with Cardan and Rhyia. I'm wondering who invited Cardan and why he was with them. Was it his sister or vivi?

Also vivi gave him a gift after being thr high king and he kept it. And in htkoelths they joked about madoc's situation in the human world.

I'd love to read your opinion or hc or even interpretation!

Surprisingly, I'm developing interest towards their relationship. (Don't get me wrong I don't like Nicasia not even a little but I love how she was written)

I'd like to hear your thoughts about them. Why did he love her? (She's really different from Jude so I'm curious what attracted him to her)

How deep was his love for her?

How deep was their relationship?

Did he love her just as much as he loved Jude?

And any other thoughts about them is very much welcomed!

Posting this here as well (:

Do they experience the same withdrawal symptoms as mortals do after taking Nevermore or Faerie Fruit, or they just sober up and go about their day without need to take more?

I was telling my mother about tfota series, when I finished the events of the first book she said her fav was Jude. But after going further in the story she said her fav now is Cardan. She said the reason was because he had grown to be something different from his initial nature.

I never thought of it this way and to be fair I was always saying whenever I bring the story up is that all the Fae are different than humans and they are morally far from them.

But now I'm thinking of it. Cardan always had a good intentions since he was young. He didn't want to risk hurting a human, he was glad when he noticed that Jude isn't glamoured (when he first met her and she looked into his eyes), he freed the human servants, he wasn't actually THAT much cruel like the others (who were cruel for no reason other than they liked being cruel) most of his cruelty is a defence mechanism (which actually any human beings might develop it, it's not a Fae thing only), he values loyalty and love (ik some fae does but it's not that common), he forgave his mother (kinda) and still wanted her around and still yearned for her love, and overall I really see him as a forgiving person (he really forgave a lot of the people who did him wrong and didn't try to revenge), he mourned his family death and blamed his brother for killing his sisters, he never tried to glamour Jude even though he didn't know about her ability, and many more other things.

I don't think this traits are normal between the folk, and if you excluded the fact that he's not human and looked at his character as a whole at the end of the QoN I feel he'd seem like a human? I feel he gained a lot of humanity during the series and maybe reading all this human stories played a factor in it?

What do you think?

If she didn't cheat do you think they'd have stayed together? Was Cardan's love real enough to stay?

I'm not sure if I understood the whole thing correctly so I'm going to write it down and waiting for someone to tell me if what I understood is correct or not.

So basically humans are "mortals" and it's mainly because their lifespan is short. Not because they die, since Faes and humans both can die.

But for the Faes I don’t understand the aging system. In a lot of official works for HB series it's obvious that some Faes are older than others. So I'm assuming that the Faes do actually age but it's just really really really slow compared to us? Also madoc said while the Folk don't die from age, they can grow weary with it, and I'm not sure the I understood that. Madoc said that Eldred was going to neverland or smth like that and Jude said it was their way to take about death. So Eldred was eventually going to die? (I knew he was being poisoned slowly but that was an info madoc didn't know by then)

Also what is the difference between the Folk and the Gentry

I find it odd that Jude never mentioned that to Cardan. Like after ten years and she never thought of telling him that? Especially since the curse was something she thought about several times during the series a d was stressed about.

In htkoelths it was mentioned that jude told cardan about her fight with madoc when she poisoned him and how she told him "I am what you made me father.." so I get the idea that jude now is really open towards him.

Even holly said smth like cardan is the one who understands jude the best. And in the duology they seemed really close and happily married and really really understanding each other- they matured together beautifully.

What are your thoughts? Why she never bring it up to cardan? Do you think cardan was pissed after knowing she never told him?

Hey! I just wanted to ask really quick if anyone has a list of all the different types of faeries and fey mentioned in the Folk of the Air series. I was hoping to make a list of my own

HELP

Ok so I'm having problems with figuring out if a certain thing happened in twk or not 💀

I do remember reading that Jude discovered something Cardan was hiding from her and he was working with the Court of Shadows to solve it and she said something like "no one bothered to tell me that"

I don't remember what they didn't tell her and what was the problem Cardan was solving on his own with the Court of Shadows.. therfore I'm not sure anymore if what I'm remembering is actually real or not since I can't remember anything more than that

Note: I tried to skim twk quickly but found nothing

Before anyone comes for me - I know Jude is supposed to be morally grey. I loved her the first time around. But rereading the trilogy as an adult, I found myself genuinely uncomfortable with her in ways I didn't expect, and I think a lot of it comes down to one thing: the narrative frames her defence mechanisms as power, and we never question it because we're locked inside her perspective.

The "I'm not impressed by anything" performance

This is the one that gets me most on reread. Jude's permanent unimpressed exhaustion is sold to us as strength - she's not dazzled by magic, not seduced by glamour, not swept away. But she's also a 17-year-old raised in trauma by the man who murdered her parents, surrounded by creatures who have existed for centuries. The idea that she has not just adapted but outplayed them all at their own game is a lot. And the tell is that she maintains the performance even inside her own head, when no one is watching. That's not strategy. That's an identity built entirely around never being caught caring. It has a name, and it isn't confidence - it's the faerie world equivalent of pick-me energy. I'm not like other mortals. I don't need wonder. Watch me be more fae than the fae.

Control as trauma response, sold as ambition

Her obsession with power is framed as political genius. And yes, she's smart. But her parents were murdered in front of her at seven years old by the man who then raised her. The hypercontrol - the scheming, the refusal to trust, the need to always be three moves ahead - is a completely understandable response to that. What's strange is that the narrative never names it as such. The famous speech to Cardan in book one >!- "you have much to lose and I have nothing" - !<is presented as an iconic power move. But it's a dissociation from fear, not the absence of it. A person who genuinely isn't afraid doesn't need to give that speech.

The hypocrisy with Cardan

She spends book one hating Cardan for how he treats her - fair enough - and then spends the rest of the series doing equally questionable things to him, including >!binding him to her will entirely.!< The fandom romanticizes this. If the genders were reversed we'd be calling it what it is. She deceives almost everyone she claims to love, the narrative rarely calls her on it, and we forgive her every time because we're inside her head hearing the justification in real time.

>As you can guess from my username - you know exactly where I'm coming from. I love Cardan enough to be frustrated by what happens to him narratively. He's a fae prince with a genuinely complex inner world and one of the best redemption arcs in YA - and so much of it gets filtered through the lens of what it means for Jude. The wonder of existing in a world of actual magic, of being him - treated as background noise. Meanwhile Jude meets all of it with permanent deflection, and we call that strength. But Cardan is the one character whose mask the narrative actually acknowledges as a mask. Jude's mask is just called her personality. That asymmetry bothers me more every reread.

None of this makes the books bad. But I think we give Jude a pass we wouldn't extend to a male character doing the same things, and I think we do it because we've spent three books justifying everything alongside her. Curious if anyone else felt this shift on reread.

Exactly what the title said. I have just finished the prisoners throne and I cannot get over how oak gets treated . I need a fanfic where he actually starts resenting suren or starts outright hating her. Any help in this regard would be highly appreciated 😊.

This might be a really dumb question but:

1. Why did Cardan ask Jude to tell him again that she hates him during the queen of mirth scene

2. Why did he ask her to say that again during that scene

3. In how the king of elfhame learned to hate stories. When Cardan ask her why she didn't hate everything and everyone, why Jude answered "I hated you"? What was this moment intended to show exactly?