Thinking about writing a one-shot comparing Cardan's relationship with Nicasia and Cardan's relationship with Jude, I asked myself: why exactly did Nicasia stop loving Cardan? Because she's a big, empty, whiny idiot? Obviously. Because Locke attracted her, perhaps with his magical charm or just because he was different from Cardan? Also. But something tells me that his melancholy bothered her.
I've already written about this in The Bodyguard, but it's canon that Cardan and Jude recognize each other because they both have wounded souls. Nicasia, however, doesn't seem to have suffered at any point in her life, and although Locke is practically an abandoned boy with a ruined family, he seems extremely insensitive to it, but Cardan isn’t. He has always had a deep bitterness inside him, a restlessness that haunted him, created by his fears and abandonment.
She liked his personality, and I don't believe Cardan was such an absent lover that he made her feel needy, but I think something kept them apart. In the novel The King of Elfhame, it is said that the evilness of both brings them together, but while Nicasia is evil for pure pleasure, for Cardan cruelty is a defense mechanism. If being a villain is what unites them, but most of the time Cardan strives to be a villain, then what really unites the two?
In the tale “The Lament of Lutie-Loo,” Cardan tells the fairy that he also feels imprisoned in front of Nicasia, which makes me wonder if he shared his sorrows with her. He told her about his life, of course, but did he confide in her? Did Cardan seek out Nicasia when he felt sad and inadequate, or did he prefer her company just to get drunk and forget his suffering? Did he seek the comfort of her embrace, or did he continue to wear his mask even with her, while hurting others in an attempt to lessen his own suffering?
In his letters, Cardan writes to Jude that she knows all his weaknesses, referring to his cowardice and cruelty. Now, when Nicasia asks Jude to save him from his curse, she simply cannot understand why he does good things, like helping mortal slaves.
Jude likes Cardan's good side, but she loves him for his bad side too, because she loves him for who he is. Nicasia, on the other hand, only admires his cruel side. While Jude embraces Cardan's suffering because she understands it, Nicasia helps him ignore it.
If Nicasia didn't love Cardan completely, then did she really love him at all?
