High Lord of the Summer Court · The Youngest High Lord
Tarquin
The nicest High Lord in Prythian, and we repaid him with a Book theft. Youngest of the seven, crown shaped like a cresting wave, a kinder Prythian on his mind. We feel terrible about it.
Rich brown skin, white hair, turquoise eyes, a reformer's heart in a sea-king's body. The one ally Feyre and Rhys genuinely liked — and wronged anyway. We're not over it.
At a glance
The Sun-and-Sea Lord
Who he is
The youngest High Lord
He was never supposed to wear the crown. A prince of Adriata, an admiral co-commanding the Summer armada with Varian — until Amarantha murdered his cousin Nostrus for one of the rebellions Under the Mountain, and the throne dropped onto a man barely eighty. Newest of the seven, youngest of the seven, handed a court still wrecked from what Amarantha left. And his first thought was to build something better out of the ruin. Of course it was.
What he believes
A reformer's heart
At his own dinner on the pleasure-barge, he just says it out loud: the lowest High Fae servant has more rights than the wealthiest lesser faerie, and he wants that gap gone. He'd seen the cruelty up close, known good lesser faeries punished for nothing. This is the whole reason Rhys spared him Under the Mountain and wanted him in the fold — the one other High Lord who cared about levelling the field. The bond was right there.
The betrayal
A friend made an enemy
We came to Adriata as guests and left as thieves, and we will be apologising about it forever. He gave Feyre warmth, a black-diamond necklace, the easy start of a friendship — while she and Amren lifted the Summer half of the Book of Breathings out of its drowned temple. When he found out, three blood rubies went out, one each to Rhys, Feyre, and Amren: egg-sized, so pure they look made of blood, a price on three heads. He was the only High Lord who looked past Rhysand's villain mask and wanted to be his friend. We knew. We always knew.
Iconography
Sea, crown, and ruby
The court, the wave, and the rubies we earned.
His register
Sun on turquoise water
A fairer Prythian
Closing the gulf between High Fae and lesser faeries. The conviction that made him worth allying with, and the one nobody else was saying out loud.
Adriata
His sea-city of canals and shell-flecked halls, sea-glass chandeliers swaying on the warm breeze. Yes, we'd live there.
The high summer day
Salt-spray and sun, white-sand bright, the dry suffocating heat broken only by the breeze off the water.
Hospitality given freely
Warmth before wariness. He greeted the Night Court as the ones who saved his court's neck, not as a threat. We did not deserve him.
The arc
From betrayed host to war ally
The unexpected crown
Amarantha kills his cousin Nostrus for rebelling, and the young admiral of Adriata inherits a court he never wanted — youngest of the seven, barely eighty.
The host of Adriata
He welcomes the Night Court to his sea-city, flirts lightly with Feyre, jokes that the wave-crest crown hurts, and talks openly about a Prythian without its old caste cruelty. We liked him immediately.
The Book stolen
Feyre and Amren lift the Summer half of the Book of Breathings from the drowned tide-temple — and the enchantment clocks the deceivers and floods the chamber to drown them.
Three rubies
Betrayed, he sends a blood ruby to each of the three: a formal declaration of mortal enmity. The friendship Rhys wanted dies before it ever got to start. We did that.
The siege of Adriata
Hybern attacks his city. Standing feud and all, the Night Court marches to defend Adriata — and he assumes, fair enough, that we've come to finish Summer off.
No debts between us
At the war council, he rescinds the blood rubies and joins the alliance against Hybern. He had every right to the grudge and chose forgiveness instead. Of course he did.
His defining choice
“I rescind the blood rubies. Let there be no debts between us.”
ACOWAR — High Lords' war council
In his words
Lines from the Summer Court
“I rescind the blood rubies. Let there be no debts between us.”
ACOWAR — High Lords' war council
“The Spring Court is my southern neighbour... I will not mention that you were here.”
ACOMAF — Summer Court (wording paraphrased in source)
“Welcome to Adriata.”
ACOMAF — Tarquin's welcome to the Night Court