History Literature / KushielsLegacy

* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex: But S&M is subsumed under this umbrella and Imriel needs to accept and explore his sadistic side in order to accept his sexuality. Basically, especially in Terre d'Ange, the only "bad sex" is rape. If it's consensual and nobody dies (or is seriously injured: Phedre is once yelled at by Anafiel for letting a client burn her with a hot fireplace poker and ordered to use her safeword next time) and everyone has fun, it's good for D'Angelines!

* {{Utopia}}: Terre d'Ange is a land blessed by angels, where everybody is beautiful (as pointed out repeatedly) and there's lots of free polyamorous sex going around. It's so beautiful that ugly evil foreigners want to invade and conquer it, but of course they fail. And they would have succeeded too, if it weren't for those ''other'' foreigners. There is a slight whiff of the UnreliableNarrator about it - of course Phèdre thinks her own country is the best, and even she admits D'Angelines are pretty stuck up.\\\
This begins to [[ZigZaggingTrope zig zag]] a bit in the second trilogy. Imriel more or less says outright that being pretty is the only thing D'Angelines are particularly better at than anyone else, and that physical beauty isn't really important. Much as he loves his country, he makes it sound a lot less like a Mary Suetopia than Phèdre did.\\\
And even Phedre drops the superiority monologue for a few chapters when she visits the island of Kriti (Crete) in Chosen. All she does is gush about how awesome [[FantasyCounterpartCulture Kriti]] and its culture is, not that there was a single bad thing said about it whilst she was there. Probably justified, as earlier in the series Phedre mentions that to the d'Angelines, the ancient Hellenes were the pinnacle of civilization before Elua came to Terre d'Ange. This also has a RealLife basis as to most Western nations today, Ancient Greece is viewed as part of a GoldenAge for classical civilizations. It goes back to Ancient Rome, who saw them in the same way (and ripped off their culture, too).

* CulturalPosturing: D'Angelines love to wax poetic about how advanced, beautiful, and [[EternalSexualFreedom sexually liberated]] they are. This is a poorly JustifiedTrope, since Terre D'Ange is quite the MarySuetopia, for reasons already listed and because everyone else seems to be stuck in the Dark Ages while the D'Angelines are in the Renaissance.

* ButtBrand: PlayedForDrama when Imriel is MadeASlave, sold to a brutal sexual sadist, and given a SlaveBrand on the buttock at age 11. He's rescued, but the ScarsAreForever and the trauma of the experience lingers well into his adulthood.

* DramatisPersonae: Each book in the series has LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters and therefore have a dramatis personae that can go on for pages and pages. Averted most recently in the soft cover edition of ''Namaah's Kiss'', a few pages of praise for the past books, the usual title pages, and the ever present map, then it jumps straight into chapter one with no preamble.

* IncestIsRelative: A mild example that's only mentioned directly once, but Sidonie is Imriel's cousin (twice removed: since his father was the Queen's great-uncle (the brother of the Queen's grandfather), then Imriel is first cousin to the dead Prince Rolande, first cousin once removed to Queen Ysandre, and first cousin twice removed to Sidonie. They are "first cousins", albeit with a couple of "removes" tossed in). They're close in age, but his father was her mother the Queen's great-uncle [[spoiler: who sired him to have a "pure"-blooded heir to the throne because Sidonie's father is the Cruarch of Alba, a dirty barbarian foreigner in his view, and thus made her unfit to rule]]. The objection to their relationship isn't based on them being related, though, but fear that Imriel will [[VillainousLineage be like his parents, both duplicitous traitors]].

* PregnantBadass: Grainne rode into battle against the Skaldi while pregnant with her son Eamonn. Ysandre in particular finds this fascinating and horrifying.

* BandOfBrothels:The Court of Night Blooming Flowers, which is composed of the different pleasure houses at which the Servants of Naamah work.

** It does get twisted from time to time. For example the source of the Aka Magi's powers over death comes from them [[spoiler: [[PoweredByAForsakenChild sacrificing and eating the heart of a person they truly love]].]] This is also the key to why the Mahrkagir is vulnerable to Phèdre. [[spoiler: He loves her, and if he performs the ritual sacrifice, he will unleash the full fury of his God. The fact he wants to do this is the only thing that allows Phèdre to get him alone long enough to kill him.]]

%%* MayDecemberRomance: As above, Delaunay and Alcuin.

* ButNotTooBi: All three protagonists are at least theoretically bisexual, but all the "main" relationships and final pairings are hetero, as are the majority of the briefer encounters. Phedre [[spoiler: dallies with a few women and has her ongoing complex attraction to Melisande (though they are never lovers again after Skaldia), plus a long-term friends-and-lovers arrangement with Nicola, whom she sees very rarely.]] Imriel largely avoids men due to past trauma, though [[spoiler: he does at least allow a male Servant of Naamah to pleasure him, and makes love with Sunjata as Leander]]. Moirin is often seen to have better chemistry with her female lovers [[spoiler: particularly Jehanne and Snow Tiger]] than her male ones, but is tied into her relationship with Bao, almost literally.

* DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnFemale: Averted, mostly. Phèdre informs the reader that rape is an unforgivable act of treason in her culture. Yet when [[spoiler: Melisande drugs her and commits sex acts that could arguably be rape before selling her into slavery]] this act is never considered rape despite a cultural understanding that both men and women can be sexually dominant and powerful. It becomes gray since Phèdre is a professional submissive, and was under contract to Melisande. Melisande did honor the letter of the contract, including the safe word, and knew damn well Phèdre was a trained spy, working for her enemy, and Phèdre obviously does view what happened as a violation despite not using her safeword, but she also doesn't brush it off because of Melisande's gender.

* PlatonicProstitution: In addition to being Servants of Namaah, the adepts of Eglatine House are cross-trained in a variety of performing arts (singing, dancing, acrobatics etc) and are frequently employed ''en masse'' for those skills alone.

** This defines no less than three of the nations that are not Terre d'Ange: The Eiran, the Albans, and the Skaldi. [[spoiler:After their defeat by Terre d'Ange and the Albans, the Skaldi mutate into a trade power [[FantasyCounterpartCulture rather like Germany did]], seeking to gain through gold what they couldn't through force of arms.]]

* ScreamDiscretionShot: ''Kushiel's Dart'' has a scene where Phèdre is drugged and then tortured by Melisande Shahrizai. It's described by Phèdre as not being rape because Melisande would have heeded the signale. We only hear Phèdre's very short and non-explicit summary of it, which is bad enough.

* SexGod: Any of Terre d'Ange's courtesan, due to the glorification of prostitution as sacred. Special mention goes to Phèdre.

* ShelteredAristocrat: This is played with in the series. Phèdre and the aristocrats she contends with tend to be intelligent, well-educated, and extremely cunning in high society and politics. Very few people are as naive as this trope. However when faced with people who are not as well off, they genuinely don't understand what daily life is like for the masses.

* SiegeEngines: The Skaldi build siege towers for use during the siege of Troyes-le-Mont.

* StarCrossedLovers: Joscelin and Phèdre are presented as this at first, as are Sidonie and Imriel. [[spoiler: Moirin and Bao seem to be setting up for this as well]]

* TomboyAndGirlyGirl: Alais and Sidonie respectively.

* TrustPassword: Used during the siege in Scion.
* TwinThreesomeFantasy: Well, not so much a ''fantasy'', but actually played out in ''Chosen'' with Apollonaire and Diànne.
** Though the trope is played with, worth mention in ''Dart''. Phèdre sleeps with the twin lords of the Dalriada, but separately.

* HonorBeforeReason: Joscelin does this a lot, especially where his Cassiline vows are concerned--however, Phèdre knocks this out of him eventually.

* IDidntMeanToTurnYouOn: Phèdre is an ''anguissette'' and cursed to feel pain and pleasure as one. Any bit of pain will register as pleasure for her. So when she had to get her marque worked on in ''Dart'' she was reduced to an orgasm laden mess. The guy doing the job even complains about how annoying it is to work on someone who is constantly writhing in ecstasy while he's trying to apply the tattoo, just like his grandfather (who did the last ''anguissette'''s marque) told him.

* IGaveMyWord: Comes up a lot, but Melisande takes it to {{catchphrase}} levels with "I keep my promises."

** Hyacinthe finally finds his people, and meets his grandfather. However, when he speaks the ''dromonde'' which is strictly taboo for Tsingani men, his grandfather declares him and his mother dead and everyone begins to mourn with Hyacinthe still ''standing right there.''

* LadyInRed: Phèdre sometimes does this on assignations to play up her unique role as an ''anguissette''. Even when she wears other colors, at least in ''Dart'' she also wears a cloak a color D'Angelines call "sangoire" a red so deep it is almost black (indeed, the word is a portmanteau of the French words for "blood" and "black.")

* LoveAtFirstPunch: Well, she never actually hits him, but Sidonie's snarkiness is one of the first things that attracts Imriel to her.

*** ”Love is hard. Harder than steel and thrice as cruel.”
* LoveRuinsTheRealm: One of the prime arguments against Imriel and Sidonie's relationship in the second trilogy. (No one is really bothered about them being relatives: Terre d'Ange is that kind of place. They aren't ''that'' closely related, anyway... [[spoiler: Sidonie is his first cousin once removed-it's a complicated family.]])
** Comes roaring into play in the ''Naamah'' trilogy. If [[spoiler: Daniel and Jehanne]] didn't love each other quite so much, [[spoiler: Jehanne's death]] probably wouldn't have crushed her husband's spirit so much--which ends up causing many of the conflicts in ''Naamah's Blessing.''

* MamaBear: Phèdre becomes one to Imriel after she finds him, to the point that she strong-arms the queen into letting her adopt him.

* MayDecemberRomance: As above, Delaunay and Alcuin.

* MentorOccupationalHazard: Damn you, Jaqueline Carey! Why does such a MagnificentBastard like [[spoiler: Delaunay have to die?]]
** Also, [[spoiler: Lo Feng]]

* MoeCouplet: Imriel and Alais.

* MrFanservice: Nearly every darn male in the series.

* MyGreatestFailure: Backstory that transformed [[spoiler: Delaunay from being a Crown Prince's consort to the man known as Whoremaster of Spies.]]

* NonHeteronormativeSociety: The D'Angeline society is very open about sexual freedom, to the point of Everyone Is Bi, especially among the nobility. Certain forms of prostitution are also considered to be a sacred calling, and there is a highly respected Band of Brothels called the Court of Night-Blooming Flowers that operates as a form of nobility in their own right.
* NoPeriodsPeriod: In Terre d'Ange women can only become pregnant if they [[FantasyContraception pray to Eisheth, a fertility goddess to open their wombs]], and then the Goddess may or may not grant this wish. So essentially no one has a menstrual cycle until then, and no one has to worry about unwanted pregnancy unless they change their mind. BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor. (This was not fully established until after the first book of the series, in which Phedre is called "a whore's unwanted get". Carey may have quietly RetConned things.)

* GoodParents: Actually more than the [[AbusiveParents other kind]] for a fantasy of this nature. In paricular, Ysandre and Drustan are wonderful with their children.

* BatmanGambit: It's heavily implied that the first 2/3rds of ''Kushiel's Avatar'' is part of Kushiel's plan to [[spoiler: punish Melisande]] and [[spoiler: kill the Mahrkagir]]. The former Punisher of God does not putz around.

* BetterToDieThanBeKilled: A Cassiline technique called ''Terminus'' is built around this trope. If things are looking particularly grim for a Cassiline and their charge the Cassiline will use their daggers to kill both of them.

* BigDamnHeroes: The biggest BigDamnHeroes moment in the series is when [[spoiler:Barquiel L'Envers charges out of Troyes-le-Mont to rescue Phèdre and Joscelin, just as Joscelin is about to perform a MercyKill on himself and Phèdre to save them from Waldemar Selig.]]

* BilingualBonus: ''Languisement'', the poetic word in D'Angeline for fellatio (and typically the start of a sex scene), is one letter away from ''languissement'', meaning "yearning" in French. Make of it what you will...

* BoringReturnJourney: Subverted often in this series: it still takes a pretty long time to get home from every journey, and things still happen.

* ChekhovsGun: The Companion's Star Ysandre gives to Phèdre at the end of ''Chosen'', which entitles her to one boon. It finally pays off in ''Avatar'' when [[spoiler: Phèdre uses it to force Ysandre to let her and Joscelin adopt Imriel]]

* ChekhovsSkill: Surprisingly enough Joscelin's ability to ''fish'' becomes important in ''Avatar''.

* ChildByRape: Bao. Also Kamala, daughter of the bodhisattva Laysa by the Falconer Tarik Khaga, a warlord who kidnapped her and many other women to join his harem.
** Hyacinthe. His mother was raped by a patron of Bryony House.

* CityOfCanals: La Serenissima.

* CinderellaCircumstances: Phèdre starts as a whore's unwanted get and ends up Comtesse de Montrève.

* ButNotTooGay: Many gay characters do exist in the serious (though no lesbians, oddly enough), but none are ever shown even kissing, let alone getting a sex scene. While that is partly due to them all being supporting characters, [[FanserviceExtra even minor ones]] are seen getting it on otherwise in the books. EveryoneHasLotsOfSex ''except'' the gays (bisexuals do explicitly get some).

* IncestIsRelative: A mild example that's only mentioned directly once, but Sidonie is Imriel's cousin (twice removed: since his father was the Queen's great-uncle (the brother of the Queen's grandfather), then Imriel is first cousin to the dead Prince Rolande, first cousin once removed to Queen Ysandre, and first cousin twice removed to Sidonie. They are "first cousins", albeit with a couple of "removes" tossed in). They're close in age, but his father was her mother the Queen's great-uncle [[spoiler: who sired him to have a "pure"-blooded heir to the throne because Sidonie's father is the Cruarch of Alba, a dirty barbarian foreigner in his view, and thus made her unfit to rule]]. The objection to their relationship isn't based on them being related, though, but fear that Imriel will [[InTheBlood be like his parents, both duplicitous traitors]].

* InTheBlood: Imriel is the son of the biggest traitors to his country, and despite him being a goodhearted person (and raised by other goodhearted people), many people suspect that someday he might take after his mother. [[spoiler: Later on, a group of TheFairFolk have a psychic prediction that Imriel's son would take after his mother and destroy their nation, and so they kill his pregnant wife to make sure this doesn't happen.]]
** Almost every character has a significant level of their personality determined by their ancestry. This is justified, though, since the progenitors of the D'Angelines were angelic embodiments of various traits. It's not as explicit with other nationalities, but by and large every deity is assumed to be (or was once) a physical presence in the world, so their people could have their traits written literally into their genome.

* : The later half of ''Scion'', and most of Justice, deal with Imriel and this. Not to mention Phèdre and Joscelin's rocky start in ''Dart'' and ''Chosen''.

* LoveHurts: The later half of ''Scion'', and most of Justice, deal with Imriel and this. Not to mention Phèdre and Joscelin's rocky start in ''Dart'' and ''Chosen''.

* AlternateHistory: The details are somewhat murky but, other than the definite existence of magic, the course of history in Europe seems to have been about the same up until the death of [[UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}} Yeshua]]. No resurrection occurs and Christianity is never founded. Instead the Magdelene's tears fall on Yeshua's blood and create Elua. This miracle causes Judaism to develop into the messianic faith of Yeshuism which rejects Elua as an illegitimate son of the One God. Elua [[WalkingTheEarth wanders the Earth]] for some time and eventually founds Terre d'Ange, the land of angels, with his angelic followers. With Terre d'Ange as a buffer against the [[UsefulNotes/AllTheLittleGermanies Skaldi]] the [[AncientRome Tiberien Empire]] is not obliterated when it collapses, leaving almost all of its works intact. Also, Zoroastrianism exists but never became the dominant religion of Persia, instead being confined to Drujan (located in real-life Azerbaijan). Khebbel-im-Akkad, culturally similar to Ottoman Turkey but located from the Mediterranean coastline to Afghanistan, controls Drujan (in theory) and follows Mesopotamian paganism.

* SiblingYinYang: Sidonie and Alais. Sidonie resembles their D'Angeline mother, she is blonde, fair-skinned, cool to the point of being perceived as an IceQueen. Alais resembles their Cruithne father, she is brown-skinned, dark-haired, spirited, and considered to be not as well-mannered.

** Basically every single location is some version of this. Terre d'Ange is France down to the language and various other parallels; in one particularly egregious example, the Venice-counterpart is named "La Serenissima", a nickname by which the real city is sometimes called.

* ButNotTooBi: Phedre and Moirin, two of the series' three protagonists, are bisexual. However, both women not only have a clear preference for men, they each get just one relationship with a woman. This gets far less detail than is given when both are with men too.