Gild

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of sexual content, gender discrimination, emotional abuse, sexual violence, rape, animal cruelty and death, death, and cursing.

“The king called me in here a couple of hours ago when he started getting hot and heavy with his revolving harem of concubines—also known as his royal saddles. He decided to have his pleasure in the atrium tonight, probably because of the acoustics in here. To his credit, the moans really do echo nicely.”

The opening scene of the novel uses explicit sexual content to quickly establish the dark tone of the novel and the frequent depictions of sexual exploitation, assault, and abuse. The passage also establishes Auren’s unreliability as a first-person narrator, for despite the clearly exploitative nature of the scene, Auren maintains a casual, flippant tone that indicates her blithe acceptance of these circumstances. The opening moments therefore hint at the psychological manipulation and trauma that Auren has endured under Midas’s control.

“I’m the darling of King Midas, ruler of Highbell and the Sixth Kingdom of Orea. People flock to see me just as much as they come to look upon his gleaming castle worth more than all the riches in the entire realm.

I’m the gold-plated prisoner.

But what a pretty prison it is.”

This passage lays the foundation of the world building in the novel, including the gold-covered Highbell Castle and the six kingdoms of Orea. Additionally, Auren’s descriptions establish her understanding of her status as an object to be envied, and she even reveals a brief glimmer of her dissatisfaction with her captivity. Though she professes to feel grateful and safe, she still acknowledges that her accommodations, no matter how pretty, are still a “prison.” These early flashes of dissent foreshadow her ensuing quest to break free of those who would seek to control her.