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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Holly Black
Read between
November 1 - November 5, 2025
So long as you’re begging, he doesn’t mind a bit.
yo????
He cuts his gaze toward his unpredictable, mortal High Queen, whose wild brown hair is blowing around her face, whose amber eyes are alight when she looks at him.
HISSSSSSS
Fatima and 1 other person liked this
She feels as though she has something to prove at all times.
JUDEEE 😭😭😭😭😭
While Cardan was in the next room, drinking wine and chatting, she was swinging a sword at her foster father, stalling for time.
iconic shit
Yily and 1 other person liked this
It’s absurd, sometimes, the thought that she loves him.
is it tho 🤭🤭🤭
Fatima and 1 other person liked this
One of his primary duties as the High King appears to be reminding her she isn’t personally responsible for solving every tedious problem and carrying out every tedious execution in all of Elfhame.
awwwwwwwww i’m going to explode
He wonders if he ought to remind her of that, wonders if she had been impressed.
aw shucks he wants to impress her 🤭🤭🤭🤭
It was warm there, and he could pretend he was hiding, could pretend that someone was looking for him. Could pretend that when he was not found, it was only because the spot he’d chosen was so extremely clever.
[ugly sobs]
That made her laugh. “I ought to saddle you and ride you around the gardens, teach you some manners.”
ew wtf you weirdo
He knew the High King had no interest in him.
stop making me sad
His mother would have slapped the troll woman and ordered her off. But his mother wasn’t coming.
these poor traumatized characters bro
But tell me, child, what is the purpose of a High King who will not interfere?”
valid question but why are you asking A CHILD that clearly the king doesn’t care abt
Despite being a little afraid of her, despite knowing better, he had a tendency toward levity at the worst possible moments.
ok but real
She is rumored to be so fearsome that no man can spend three nights in her chambers. But if you do, you’ll win her hand—and her dowry.’
what in tarnation??
He certainly asked no one to tell him stories, and yet he found it was nice to be told one. He kept that to himself, too.
😭😭😭💔
When he did not, but rather climbed into the bed, she followed, curling up at the end of it like an enormous cat.
lol what
Cardan heard something in her voice that suggested that wasn’t how things were going to go at all.
dammmnnn did she eat him
Whatever the reason, when he didn’t move away, she butted her head playfully against his chest. But she didn’t know her own strength. His back slammed against the wall, and he felt something crack in his chest.”
oooh did he die
thats fucked up
“Tears that the monster took for a sign of fear.
ooohh yikes
In that moment, she sprang on him and tore him to pieces.”
omfg she did eat him…
The troll woman peered down at him. “Oh, I think there’s a lesson in it, princeling: A sharp tongue is no match for a sharp tooth.”
oh!
“Welcome, my princes,” said the door, swinging open to admit him and Balekin into the ominously named Hollow Hall.
arghhhh not this guy
He liked seeking pleasure!
bruh
But that doesn’t mean you’re not a disgrace.
i’m so glad he died argh wtf is wrong w you
And there were the twin mortal children that Grand General Madoc had stolen and insisted on treating as though they were his own born daughters, kissing them on the tops of their heads and resting his clawed fingers protectively on their shoulders.
if you listen carefully i’m screaming in the distance
“Because I won’t dirty my hands,” Balekin said. “Better you experience the humiliation of being beaten by a creature who ought to be your inferior.
i’m going to throw my ipad across my room
Hate that was so bright and hot that it was the first thing that truly warmed him. Hate that felt so good that he welcomed being consumed by it. Not a heart of stone, but a heart of fire.
i’ll never forgive ANY OF YALL
everyone pretended he was no longer in disgrace.
PRETENDED? this why yall dead
Orlagh hopes the girl will marry one of Eldred’s offspring,
quick point and laugh 🫵🤣
tiny shrimp quivered on trays of ice
bro someone SAVE THE SHRIMP
Prince Cardan bit into one of the raw, wriggling shrimps.
EWWWWW WTF
“And you’re the princess of fishes.” He sneered, making sure she knew he wasn’t impressed. “Over whom everyone is making such an enormous fuss.” “You’re very rude,” she told him.
not rude enough clearly
His sister closed her mouth abruptly, looking comically surprised.
serves you right
Valerian, who loved cruelty the way some Folk loved poetry. Locke, who had a whole empty house for them to run amok in, along with an endless appetite for merriment. Nicasia, whose contempt for the land made her eager to have all of Elfhame kiss her slipper.
I HATE ALL OF YOU
But before they got what was coming to them, they got to be the fairest in all the land.
karma comes back baby
You deserve—” He couldn’t get out the rest of the sentence. You deserved everything you got. That would have been a lie,
😭😭😭😭
Nothing like the twins from the palace school.
giggling like a child rn 🤭🤭
He thought of one of those girls frowning over a book, pushing a lock of brown hair back over one oddly curved ear. He thought of the way she looked at him, brows narrowed in suspicion.
interesting that you’re observing HMMMMMM
“Because I don’t want to look at you anymore,” Cardan said.
well damn okay ouch
but it wouldn’t return him to Elfhame until he went to a nearby general store, glamoured leaves into money to buy it an entire six-pack of lager,
someone send this moth to rehab
The odd curve of her ear was what he had noticed first.
HEHEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEH i LIVE for this
But at the palace school, he really looked.
IS THAT SO?
When she stood up against him, she was so good that it was almost possible to believe she hadn’t let him win.
!!!
