How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories

How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories is a young adult fantasy novel by New York Times best-selling author Holly Black and illustrated by Rovina Cai. The book is volume 3.5 in the Folk of the Air series and provides both an epilogue and a prequel of sorts to the main story. It is narrated from the perspective of a prince, Cardan, and depicts his past upbringing and future as the High King of Elfhame. 

How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories was nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award for Readers’ Favorite Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction (2021) and was included in Barnes & Noble Booksellers’ Favorites—Young Adult SF & Fantasy (2020). The Cruel Prince, the first book in the Folk of the Air series, was a finalist for the Lodestar Award, won the Inky Award (2019), and placed second in the Locus Awards.

Black hails from and resides in New England, where many of her stories are set. She has written dozens of contemporary fiction novels for readers of all ages. Her work has been adapted for film and television and translated into 32 languages. Black has received the Mythopoeic Award, a Newbery Honor, and a Nebula Award.

This guide refers to the Little, Brown and Company trade paperback edition, published in May 2024.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of death, child abuse, bullying, and substance use.

Plot Summary

Cardan, now High King of Elfhame, travels to the mortal realm with his beloved wife, Jude Duarte, the first human High Queen of Elfhame. After the events of the main trilogy, they are happy. Cardan is protective of Jude, who is a risk taker. Cardan thinks of his past and the events that led him here.

The narrative shifts to Cardan’s childhood, during which he is neglected and unloved, nearly feral. When he is nine years old, he encounters a troll woman, Aslog of the West, who petitions Cardan’s father, the High King. She petitions him to support her case against her former queen, Gliten, who rules a lower Court under Elfhame’s jurisdiction. The queen had promised Aslog a reward for seven years of work as a miller but tricked her out of their deal. The High King refuses to help, and Cardan has no political influence. 

Aslog tells Cardan a fairy tale about a boy with a wicked tongue who is cursed to have a heart of stone. In this tale, the boy later seeks his fortune and braves three nights with a girl who is cursed to turn into a monster. On the third night, the girl accidentally shatters the boy’s stone heart; believing that he’s afraid of her, she eats him. Aslog tells Cardan the moral of the tale: A wicked tongue is no match for a sharp tooth.

Time passes. Cardan is framed for murder and banned from the palace. His older brother, Balekin, takes him in to use as a pawn for his own aspirations for the High King’s throne. He teaches Cardan how to be a prince but also orders that Cardan is regularly punished. Balekin, who views humans as inferior and makes them his servants, orders a human to beat Cardan as an extra humiliation. When Cardan is older, he returns the human to the mortal realm, supposedly to spite Balekin. 

As an adolescent, Cardan is a princely, petty villain. He is allowed back in the palace, though his reputation is forever tarnished by the murder he was framed for. Cardan’s heart, once made of stone, is now made of fire—his hatred for Elfhame and his family. Princess Nicasia of the Undersea is sent to Elfhame; everyone seeks her friendship to ensure an alliance with the Undersea. Only Cardan is unimpressed, so she chooses him as a friend. Soon, Cardan’s posse of faerie gentry is formed—Nicasia, Locke, and Valerian. Cardan receives his first human book, piquing his interest. He encounters Aslog for a second time.

Aslog tells him a second fairy tale. A boy with a wicked heart is cursed with a heart of stone. He leaves to seek his fortune and spends three nights with a girl who is cursed to turn into a monster. The girl was cursed by a witch for refusing the witch’s son as a lover. In truth, the girl only refused him in order to protect the son, with whom she is in love, from her father, who would have slain him. The witch’s son turns himself into a monster and attacks the stone-hearted boy, shattering his stone heart. The monster lovers flee, and the boy’s curse is broken. The lessons of this story, says Aslog, are that stories—like boys—can change and that even stone hearts can be broken.

Cardan and Nicasia become casual lovers. Nicasia takes Cardan to visit the Undersea and invites him to become her consort. Cardan can’t see a future for himself there; he thinks instead of Jude, the human who will become his wife. Later, at one of Balekin’s wild parties, Cardan discovers that Nicasia has been cheating on him with Locke. Cardan is furious, fights with Locke, and breaks up with Nicasia. He feels that his heart is now made of glass. 

Cardan gets very drunk for three days and disrupts his classes. Balekin is displeased, Nicasia is horrified, and Locke is delighted. Locke later breaks up with Nicasia to pursue Jude and her twin sister. Nicasia is furious, but Cardan refuses to take her back. She persuades him to take revenge on Jude and her sister instead. Cardan agrees; his posse bullies the twins horribly. Jude loathes Cardan openly and becomes his obsession—he has a secret fondness for human things.

More time passes. The story returns to Cardan and Jude in the mortal world. They visit Jude’s family. Jude is asked to deal with a monster in the woods that is inciting Queen Gliten’s wrath, and she agrees. Cardan realizes that the monster is Aslog and sneaks out while Jude is sleeping to confront the troll. He finds Aslog in the woods. His attempt to bargain with her fails; she traps him in a pit with iron filings, a faerie weakness. He distracts her with a story.

In Cardan’s story, a boy with a clever tongue asks a troll to turn his heart into stone. He leaves to seek his fortune and braves three nights with a girl who is cursed to turn into a monster. She had requested that a witch curse her in order to escape a tyrannical father, but the father forced the witch to amend the spell in order to regain his daughter’s obedience. The stone-hearted boy pretends to be afraid so that the girl shatters his stone heart. He frees her by always remaining a little afraid of her so that her spell is never truly broken. They have a happy ending. 

Two possible lessons from this story, says Cardan, are that hearts are necessary, no matter how terrible, and that the hero is always justified by the storyteller. Stories, he and Aslog agree, tell a truth, if not the truth.

Cardan distracts Aslog in order to free himself and trap her in the pit. Dawn light turns her into stone, and Jude comes to Cardan’s rescue. Jude scolds him, but Cardan is happy all the same. He may dislike being a hero, but he has still achieved his happy ending.