The Wicked King

Throughout the course of the novel, everyone struggles with their own goals and the various moral, ethical, and personal obstacles to obtaining them. Jude is maintaining a delicate balancing act of running the kingdom from behind Cardan’s throne, but this causes her to keep secrets from her family and push them away. Her constant juggling of court politics also begins to erode her morals as a mortal in Faerie, causing her to think and act more like them. For instance, she treats mortal laborers as cargo, taking them from their homes to work on new rooms for the Court of Shadows. She also deflects responsibility for the actions she has taken in the name of ambition and self-preservation, such as the murder of Valerian.

Taryn also has great aspirations, but she goes about them another way. Instead of fighting her way to respect, Taryn seeks to marry her way into acceptance and secure her place in Madoc’s family. However, this often puts her at odds with Jude, who can’t understand that they use methods to achieve the same thing: belonging. At the opening of the novel, Jude is still processing a betrayal that Taryn committed in the first book of the series: Taryn turned away and allowed Locke to manipulate Jude, seeing it as a test of her own loyalty to Locke. She also betrays Jude at the novel’s climax as she sides with Madoc in his plot against Cardan. However, Taryn sees this as loyalty to the family that raised her, with Jude the one betraying them for her own ambition.

Madoc is also characterized by his ambition, and he makes it clear that his need to rule the kingdom would come before even his love for his son, Oak. He betrays Jude repeatedly by keeping her away from Cardan after her return from the Undersea, and later by sending Taryn to secure him his freedom in Jude’s place. All these actions support his goal of gaining power over the Faerie courts. However, he also gives Jude every opportunity to stand by his side as a member of his family. He values the loyalty his family shows him very highly and protects those loyal to him in return. Therefore, he feels that he has done right by Jude and that she has secreted her own fate by choosing her ambitions for the crown over those she loves.

Throughout the novel, every one of these characters faces difficult choices between the people they care about and the need to improve their positions, each in their own way.