17

I soaked up my spoiling like a fucking sponge. I enjoyed every damn minute of it and ate it up in huge heaping spoonfuls. I didn't egg them into it. I didn't poke… I simply enjoyed it with a big grin.

And ignored the pouts and frowns Neldor kept giving me.

Hey, it wasn't my fault he had to be excluded, and I certainly wasn't rubbing it in his face. But he was very clearly counting down the seconds until we were allowed to stop having our wings out and got the all clear to behave normally.

Which absolutely meant having sex again to him.

He was in for a shock on that, but that would be funny too.

"I don't care, Iolas," Morgan snapped as he tore off his jacket. "I'm sorry for the damn mess, but the collective IQ of this world has drastically taken a nosedive while we've been gone. I thought—I did my best. There is no saving—fuck it. I'm tying one off, so clean it up or let it implode. I'm done."

My mouth was hanging open, and I knew I wasn't the only one watching the fairy throw his tie and jacket against the wall and storm off. Commander Morgan was one of the most patient and calm people I'd ever met.

"What the hell? For real?" I whispered as I glanced over at Iolas. Then it hit me. "He had the interview with the—" I glanced over at Izzy. "What do they call themselves?"

She rolled her eyes so hard it had to strain them. "The fab five making a play on the fab four of the Beetles but they're stupid because there is a fab five. It's a basketball thing." She frowned. "I think they took bribes or something." She waved it off. "Whatever, they say it doesn't count because they're humans, but the Beetles were human. It's all—"

"Not the point," Stefanie muttered, moving us along. "Morgan lost his cool at the interview with those fools?"

Iolas let out a long breath. "And it was all live." He nodded when several of us winced. "That was the only way we agreed to have one of ours go on there, remember? We didn't trust that they wouldn't cut clips and splice things together to make us look bad and spin things into complete lies."

"Oh, I'm getting the popcorn," Izzy purred.

I went to tease her but then looked at my watch. "We need something more than that for lunch."

"You're both incorrigible," Stefanie chastised.

"You're just as curious and giddy," Izzy accused.

Stefanie couldn't even deny it.

"We do need to decide how to handle this because it's blowing up," Iolas warned me as people scrambled to get us food.

I nodded, annoyed that we had all planned to watch it live but a few things had blown up and we'd been pulled away. One of which was the packaging machine at the sorbet factory breaking. All of it was big things including not enough places to put fairies after another big awakening of them yesterday. Now I was doing even more and… We had overflowing plates.

Neldor wasn't even here to watch the start of it with us.

A laugh boomed through the dark fairy hotel we were at and I glanced around to find the source. Onas was leaning into a few captains who were falling into each other as well and looking at a tablet.

Oh boy, this had to be a doozy then.

We loaded it up before food started really coming in, someone having recorded the live broadcast for us. We did the intro and everything at double speed, though listening to Morgan's full resume was impressive.

"We were shocked you offered to come on," the lead guy of the five hosts said.

Morgan dipped his head to the man. "Your show seemed to have a lot of unanswered questions even after everything Commander Shael and Commander Stefanie have put out. We kept waiting for requests for more information or follow-ups as we have received from other media outlets. When I learned we still hadn't received any, I thought to ask."

I smiled. That was about the most backhanded way to say they were idiots and so he decided to educate them.

"I had questions about this whole rumor that she can become queen at twenty-five," the third—and dumbest—woman of the group interjected, clearly wanting to get right to the meat.

Morgan focused on her. "That wasn't an actual question though. Are you asking if it's true? Yes, that is one of three main requirements of an heir being eligible to become queen. They must be over twenty-five, have their wings fully developed, and have finished their schooling. There are other—"

"I don't understand that. That's not acceptable," she argued.

He slowly blinked at her, waiting for more. He realized that was all he really was going to get though. "And?"

She frowned. "And you have to convince me then. Explain yourself to me that you think it's acceptable."

He waited another moment and then flinched. "Oh, you're serious?" He glanced around and blinked, realizing they were before focusing on her with amusement in his eyes. "There seems to be a disconnect as to your job title. You're in news media , maybe entertainment given your lack of factual accuracy, but still the journalism designation.

"You are not in any way legislation. Nor governing. Certainly not judicial anything. I'm sorry for your confusion, but no fairy needs to ever convince you of anything. We do not answer to you." He gestured to the group. "Any of you. You hold no sway over us. No authority. No… Anything. You are not our leaders. You are not in my hierarchy, nor Empress of Earth."

"Yes, of course, but—"

"No, Miss, there is no but there," he chuckled. "Are you trying to ask me the logic behind it? Or maybe the tradition? If you're asking the history and our beliefs, that's one thing, but you very bluntly said I needed to convince you and explain myself to you. I explain myself to my senior officers, Prince Neldor, and my future queen. That's it."

"How elitest of you not to answer to the people of Faerie," one of the other women drawled.

He glanced at her. "I do answer to the people of Faerie. I said explain myself. Your leaders do not tell everything about their roles and what they know to individual citizens without permission from their bosses. You do not either. But yes, I do answer to the people of Faerie given it's their taxes that pay my salary, and I take that seriously.

"If they ever had doubts in my abilities or my dedication to Faerie, I would listen to their concerns. I would hope they would raise them so that I might better myself. Princess Tamsin herself knows that I value constructive criticism and ways I can improve myself. Coming back to this new world left me terrified and I dove into the technology. We all can better ourselves."

She looked dumbfounded at how easily he volleyed her dig.

The man guy cleared his throat and took back control. "Twenty-five is a bit young. Most people could understandably say that especially given how long fairies can live."

Morgan nodded. "I can see people feeling that way. It doesn't change our traditions or laws, but people are allowed their objections. For us, it's tied into our wings and becoming adults." He continued when the man opened his mouth. "But the dragons have the law of twenty-one. There are several councils that have no limit for Alphas.

"Humans with their monarchies have long histories of the same. It's certainly not the best-case scenario, and no one hopes an heir takes the throne so young. None of us wanted Princess Tamsin to have to become queen so young." They all looked like they won something, but Morgan frowned. "Because it meant our beloved queen died ."

Yeah, they all flinched. Fools.

I shot off a text to Leigh to get things started and focused back on TV.

"This is a failsafe , not the standard," Morgan continued when the second guy tried to interject. "The other option is we have no queen and Princess Tamsin continues to be our leader while constantly having one arm tied behind her back in what she is limited in doing. That is silly and unreasonable, not having her become queen at twenty-five.

"The gods gifted her family the power and continue to given how strong she is. It's in our teachings from the gods that the royal family is continued to be blessed as the leaders of Faerie when their wings come in. Our beloved princess went a step further and had a vote of confidence—every woken fairy and hobgoblin voting in it.

"And the results were overwhelming. Our people want her to be our leader with Prince Neldor as her second and right hand—her vice president or prime minister to unite the realms. If making that happen took someone twenty-five, then I recommend more people have young, passionate people become their leaders. Because a miracle happened when ours took charge.

"So the only people who deserve a say in who should lead our world have had it. Even those who do not normally get a say in a monarchy have had it but should have a voice in the fate of Faerie. What none of you here deserve is to judge how we live our lives, and I certainly don't need to convince you of that like we answer to you. Does that clear things up for you?"

I would have liked to say it got better from there… But it didn't.

Every time he put them in their place, they just brought up something else that they shouldn't have. It was—everything was so over the line that it was disgusting.

They demanded to know if I was lying about my mates and how many men I'd been intimate with. Morgan was clear that I was allowed to be with as many men as I wanted as long as I didn't cheat on my mates and discussed it with them as was the way of fairies.

Also, that they had made comments that I was a prude unlike real fairies, so they couldn't turn around and call me slut too… But they did still.

They demanded to know if I was engaged or mated to Hudson and if that was why he'd stepped down. If anyone was finally going to force me to end things with Darby like they should.

All while he kept reminding them how a monarchy worked.

"I'm done," Morgan said finally as he stood and took off the microphone. "You are all the most idiotic—the gods did not give you life to be this foolish. You know you are telling lies and—there is not a single ounce of decency among you. I truly thought some of you were just confused after years of lies being told while we were gone.

"But you know that this is all propaganda and trying to rile up—you're grateful she's taken down the Underground while disappointed more didn't tear into her for her alliance with Luke." He grabbed the mic pack from his pants and slammed it on the table before pointing to the biggest idiot of the group. "You are so full of jealousy that it's distracting.

"It is ridiculous. You hate her for being so powerful and beloved—mated to matches you would kill to have, so your sole goal in life is to tear her down. It's—how have you no shame, no pride as a woman to not let another woman be treated that way? There is—I remember when journalists fought for the truth. They died to show the truth of wars and crimes.

"You shame them. You are jokes compared to those great men and women who risked everything to tell the people the truth of the world. You spit on those graves and memories. The world was in the dark without journalists fighting to spread the truth and knowledge, and you intentionally lie. Shame on you. The gods will judge you harshly."

The gods wouldn't be the only ones. Morgan stormed off cussing under his breath and asking the gods to pity those who listened and followed the drivel.

"Yeah, this is a huge mess," Izzy worried.

"Yeah, but one I saw coming," I admitted, giving her a wink. I glanced over at Iolas. "Gather the others and start coming up with ideas."

Izzy shot me a worried look knowing me well enough that I was distracting the commanders. Iolas jumped to it, and I managed to slip away in the chaos.

Leigh was waiting for me with Claudia. I nodded to both of them.

"What's the legality of this?" I asked them. "Or how do you suggest letting this play out to have the least amount of mess later?"

"You're going to have a mess no matter what, Your Highness." Claudia shrugged. "You have diplomatic immunity. My advice would be to do it in Faerie, tell them that Leigh can show them your castle or show them something they know is illegal to see. Really, it doesn't matter. You're planning to take this all the way like normal so you're not a hypocrite."

"Great minds," Leigh chuckled. "I told them that I had a window to get them into Faerie and show them where your mother was frozen." She shrugged when we couldn't hide our shock. "I needed something too good for them to be stupid about after how Morgan freaked out. I said everyone is in a panic of how to handle it, so it had to be now."

"Do it," I agreed when Claudia nodded. "Everything else is in place?"

"Yes, Your Highness."

I extended my hand to her. "I wish you the best of luck and may the gods bless this decision. I pray you never go against the agreement we made."

"You as well. I pray we can both stay in our own lanes and neither power nor greed corrupt us." She shook my hand and headed out.

"I hate that she doesn't like you, Tamsin," Claudia said when Leigh was gone.

"It works better that she doesn't." I shrugged as I glanced at her. "I don't like her either, but we can still respect each other. If I was to do it, it had to be someone I wasn't friendly with and we both know that."

"Yeah, but I don't like risks for you." She ran her hand over her hair. "It's ingrained in me as your attorney." She frowned. "Even more so now that I've fallen for your best friend. Izzy is going to beat my ass."

I snorted. "She's tiny. She can't take you." I shrugged again when she shot me an unfriendly look. "Sex her up. Apparently, you're super good at it."

"You're incorrigible."

"I hear that a lot," I chuckled darkly, beaming at her.

Not even an hour later, the trap was sprung and the five hosts of the show Morgan had just been on were restrained in chairs. Lights and cameras were up, Leigh giving me the thumbs-up we were rolling.

"You wanted to see my castle, welcome to it," I purred, opening my arms wide and gesturing around. "Let's see if the magic is working. Which of you knew it was illegal for you to trespass here and try to see my mother?" I chuckled when all five of them immediately answered that they did. "Excellent, so let's get started, shall we?"

I moved closer to them and pulled up a chair and sat down.

"You set us up," the main guy hissed as Leigh came into view.

"Yes, yes, I did," Leigh chuckled darkly. "I find the five of you detestable, and when my future queen came to me with a proposal to expose just how big of liars you are, I jumped at the chance."

"You're one of her sycophants," the other guy accused.

"Actually, we don't like each other," I said honestly, gesturing between us, glancing at Leigh and shrugging.

"We would never be friends, that's true, Your Highness," Leigh accepted, wanting to keep her answer careful given it was going to be seen by everyone. "But I have to give you credit for being bold. I may think Faerie should move away from the monarchy and let the royal bloodlines die out, but you are bold."

"Let's back up before their tiny brains explode and they assume you're trying to kill me," I drawled, glancing over at Ara. "We need to tell someone that I was bad. I cannot keep my telepathy on with these fools and not give myself a migraine, especially with what else I'm planning. I made a miscalculation with that."

"Yes, Your Highness, and you need the time check because while we're not doing this live, you will air all of the footage so they cannot lie and say it's only clips," she reminded me.

We did all of that for the cameras and then I took back over once a few very pissed-off captains showed up. I was the big boss. They could deal with it.

"So, let's start from the beginning of this story," I said, focused on the five "guests" but also for the new arrivals. "I don't like that there is so much propaganda in supe news. Councils and more have too many hands in everything. Hell, one station went completely under after we took down the old warlock elders.

"I can't even imagine the mess Councilwoman White has there and it's not ours to handle. But also, fairies are always going on your shows and your stations and your everything. I'm over that. I'm over watching your reports. Your this and that. Also, I set up announcement boards in every town square in Faerie to get better information out to my people.

"But that was just the first step. Right now, it's just stuff from me or Neldor or the commanders. It's needed announcements and information as we are still in crisis mode. However, I don't want it to be government—I'm not allowing state government crap in Faerie.

"I know there was free press, but it's not fair if I bring in technology for the government and then they go back to pamphlets and print newspapers which weren't even like humans had. But how to do it? Everyone would want me to pick a friend, but that's no better than state media. It's really not.

"But I can't allow some asshole to just have access to what I put in and risk more of you guys." I gestured to the five of them. "That could end up with another war and more of my people dead. So against the advice of my attorney and in a move that will undoubtedly have me lectured for hours and hours —I decided to speak with one of the heads of the anti-monarchy movements.

"She was polite enough to personally thank me after I woke her up. She has been clear about her position, but I've never heard her tell a lie. Hell, I actually heard her apologize and correct herself after she said something wrong about Neldor. So we won't be friends and we don't like each other, but we both have integrity. We just see the world differently.

"Which led us to a very frank discussion months ago. I told her what I wanted for Faerie. I wanted a media corporation that had honest news programming but could make money with other programs on supe channels even. But I wanted some sort of failsafe so it never fell into the traps of greed that humans find themselves in.

"No donations save the first one to get everything started. No nobles or even royals influencing anything. There would be liability laws and a chance for people to prove if something is reported wrong. No burying stories—basically it could make money as long as it stood on the principles fairies fight for. And there was a cap on the money type of thing.

"So we outlined a sort of morality agreement and compensation plan that adjusts with the cost of living and blah, blah, blah. No bonuses for promoting products like you lot get. No luxury trips for getting sponsors and becoming fat cats. No being bought off for reporting corruption was all a myth. And I—and my government—cannot ever interfere.

"She and her people can bash me all they want even over the lines of what is normally acceptable in Faerie and it will be okay. The hobgoblins… Can do what they want." I shrugged when Leigh sighed. "I can't tell them not to be pissed at you because that's just as bad as telling them to be pissed at you. Staying out of it is staying out of it , Leigh."

"Yes, yes it is, Your Highness." She rubbed her hand over her face. "Fine, there might need to be some sort of agreement with Irma or the ones who are more than in your government or—she is biased and adores you and too many take cues from her and—"

"This is why too many supes think hobgoblins aren't mentally sound," I said coldly. "Just because Irma is my close friend doesn't mean hobgoblins can't make their own decisions if she sides with me. Believe me , that woman yells at me when I mess up before anyone else. She just does it privately. Always privately. But she calls me out before anyone else.

"And hobgoblins have their own minds more so than fairies sometimes. They can more than figure out where they stand. They are not pack minds like fae dogs just because they're fair folk. I know you disagree with having them in charge and—"

"I've actually changed my mind on that," Leigh muttered, nodding when I couldn't hide my shock. "You're right that my opinion of hobgoblins wasn't accurate. I didn't grow up around many, and from what I saw they did act more of a hive mind—I was wrong. I can admit that. I understand your position, and I think the program is working… It has potential."

"This is why I agreed to start this with you. I had hope you would always be fair," I praised before turning back to the five "news" people. I gestured to Leigh. "That is an example of journalism. She took new facts and adjusted her view to try her best to keep unbiased. She tries to keep the lens she sees things through uncolored."

"We are an opinion show that—" that first guy defended.

"Your show is listed as a news show with five journalists to give commentary on events and what is happening in our world. That is supposed to be informed and educated insight to help the average person digest some of the complex issues like council laws and interspecies politics," I snapped. "You spew bullshit and lie through your damn teeth.

"And for the first show on this new Faerie network, there will be an expo proving it. I will be doing it because I can. You illegally came into Faerie and trespassed on my family property knowing it was a crime. And I have diplomatic immunity. So you're mine."

"This is retribution for embarrassing Commander Morgan," the second man bitched.

"He didn't embarrass himself." I snorted when they argued. "He held out longer than any of the commanders. Longer than I could. You were rabid animals frothing and beating him with stupid. He handled himself admirably. No, this is because you pissed me off upsetting one of my people."

"That makes no sense!" the idiot woman whined.

"That man is the most loyal fairy I think I have ever met," I told her as I stood. "He didn't even like me . He was embarrassed that I would be queen, but he respected my mother and hated himself for failing to keep her alive, so he kept his mouth shut about my failings out of loyalty to her. And was loyal to me. Always.

"Constantly. Unfailingly as best as he knew how. Changing and adapting as best as he could even as a stick-in-the-mud noble and old man. Seriously, I'm not sure anyone really tries as hard as Commander Morgan." I tapped my head. "I've heard it all from the start. He's so loyal to all of Faerie he would give his soul to save one dying child.

"He truly would. He is that good and believes that much in people. He thought you were all misguided and just needed to have a sit-down and hear face-to-face that fairies really did want me and I'd won them over. He didn't know you were all bought and paid for. It was like you told him there's no Santa and beat up the Easter Bunny to his face.

"You broke him a bit and that pisses me off. So you didn't embarrass him." I leaned down in her face. "But I'm going to humiliate you because I can. Because I know that you're horrible people and I have an evil streak, so I'll enjoy it. More than that, it will do some good for the supe world, so it's like cleansing."

"And this is how we're going to launch the new network I'm the CEO of on the supe dark web," Leigh told them. "We have it all set up and ready to go. The princess invested millions of dollars to get it all up and running with her human friend. After her involvement in this, she's out. It's mine and I'll be hiring and getting the shows all running. It's done."

Yes, yes it was.

I smirked at the five people. "Let's get started."