no, but what really kills me, first of all, is cardan’s genuine confusion. he needed jude to spell out for him exactly what she was telling him to do because the thought of seducing anyone else–even his old flame, the former lover stolen away–never even crossed his mind.
“yes, well, i don’t think it would be politically expedient to put thumbscrews to a princess of the sea.”
that’s where his mind goes from the first, because he’s been so consumed with thoughts of jude–the sound of her voice, the feel of her skin, the taste of her mouth–that the idea he even has wiles he could use to get the information from nicasia in some other way hadn’t even occurred to him.
i think there’s a fair bit of self-loathing mixed in, too–jude points out how the courtiers are always hanging over him, to which he replies that he’s a king, so of course they would, and before that he was a prince, and even the youngest and neglected prince of Faerie is worth at least a little fawning over. but not cardan himself.
his arrogance is almost entirely a front, and i think it’s meant to cover up what he feels about himself–the way he has internalized the disdain of everyone in his life who should have loved him and cared for him–than it is an actual belief in his own superiority.
the entire exchange where he tells her to tell him how, im going to set myself on FIRE
“You just think I ought to. That I can. That I’d be good at it. Very well, Jude. Tell me how it’s done.”
don’t mind me i’m just going to FLING MYSELF INTO THE SUN
He doesn’t kiss me as though he’s angry; his kiss is soft, yearning.
it’s so very different from their first kiss–harsh and angry and desperate and devouring–and neither of them know what to do with that. cardan looks surprised, horrified, even as he’s laying her on the couch and begging her to tell him she hates him.
and she does it, again and again, like a prayer.
A ward against what I really feel.
because she doesn’t hate him. she can’t. she hasn’t hated him for far longer than she’d care to admit. and that terrifies her.
“This is an absolutely terrible idea,” he says with a kind of amazement in his voice.
“Yes,” I tell him, kicking off my boots.
a terrible fucking idea, but neither of them can stop any more than a train could stop itself from colliding with another barreling down the same track
and this, just… everything about this:
His eyes are open, watching my flushed face, my ragged breathing. I try to stop myself from making embarrassing noises. It’s more intimate than the way he’s touching me, to be looked at like that. I hate that he knows what he’s doing and I don’t. I hate being vulnerable. I hate that I throw my head back, baring my throat. I hate the way I cling to him, the nails of one hand digging into his back, my thoughts splintering, and the last thing in my head: that I like him better than I’ve ever liked anyone and that of all the things he’s ever done to me, making me like him so much is by far the worst.
i’m just gonna…..sit here for a while. and let this just simmer in my head. delicious. every word of it.
2087
romaincrisis
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