Page 17 of Finding Closure

“I need a minute,” I rasped. “I just need—all of this could have been avoided, Nel. Our moms could be having tea and planning for our future and to see their grandkids. Instead, they’re dead and this is our life. I need a fucking minute!”

He nodded and let me go, but I felt his worry come with me.

Yeah, mine too. I was shocked I’d blown up like that, but as the days counted down to losing my dad because Faerie needed me to become queen, my emotions were all over the place.

Shocker, right?

It took me a few minutes, but then I sat back at the table, mumbling an apology. I let out a slow breath and tried to get back on track, but it took another minute or two.

“We look to the future and do better, but we don’t ignore how badly things went wrong so we don’t do it again,” I said firmly. “So I’m publishing all of the ordinances as they stand. You can all see the corruption I’ve been fighting and which families clearly stuck it to the queens worst as I have had to learn as well.

“From there, you will see the regression to the mean I will institute once I’m queen. Thepeopleof one area shouldn’t have higher taxes than another area because the noble didn’t have anything to threaten a queen with. And normally, those were the richer areas, so that’s ridiculous. Everyone pays their fair share. People who make more pay more.

“It’s basic logic. Inspections happen for everything as needed, not because someone has money or not. All of that ends. Or leave Faerie. I don’t care if it lowers my favorability for the last vote of confidence. I want to be able to look at myself in the mirror and pray to the gods without guilt weighing on my soul. If I’m to take this job and shield Faerie, then I will do it fairly.

“We say we’re fair and fight for fairness, then we should start doing as we say and enough with the hypocrisy. No more monsters wearing the pope hats and lying through their teeth that they’re doing this for the people. Neldor and I are killing ourselves and using our personal money for companies on Earth to pay for what Faerie needs and some people pay no taxes here?

“No. Not when I’m queen. The farmers love the new system in place. The merchants at the markets. It’s all fair, and now that all of Faerie is open and running at almost eighty percent, taxes will resume as normal this year. The first half of the year will be what it was. I cannot change that yet, but the second half of the year will be at the new ordinances and laws.

“However, I will be open to actual specific instances that certain ordinances might not work because of a location’sactual needs. I’ve taken into account the ones that I know of andunderstand, but I have never lived in any of these places. I hope thepeopleof each area take the time to review all of this, see the differences of what others have lived, and what I am proposing.

“From there, I will be holding meetings at the town squares to get feedback and hear concerns.Valid concernsand questions. Let me be clear that I will not be bullied or pushed into anything because of the vote of confidence. The ancients and nobles thought they had me backed into a corner because of the law that they had to approve the queen before her coronation.

“Well, I got around that. So no matter the pressure applied to me, if it’s not good for Faerie or her people, I won’t cave. If it’s good for Faerie and something I don’t understand, I will always listen and do my best to adjust as I’ve shown again and again. We have all been through a lot, and I want the changes when I become queen to go smoothly. I hope you do too.”

I wasn’t sure what else to say, and the whole thing had gone a bit off the rails, so I mumbled a thank-you and left… Much to the shock of Neldor and the commanders. Yeah, well—fuck it.

An hour later, Neldor sat down next to me as I ate my weight in Taco Bell while making diamonds to sell. They’d been selling like hotcakes at the threeVeritasPortasstores that now carried them. I worried about flooding the market and seriously throwing off the lab grown diamond economy of Earth if I kept going at the rate I was.

So, we needed something else because it was a few months into the year and we’d already eaten through most of the proposed budget.

Again. Great. We were ahead of schedule for everything and so much was getting done, but there was so much to do. It was never enough.

“Don’t be mad at me,” he said as he sat down and handed me a tablet. “This wasn’t as your mate. I did it as your right hand, I swear.”

I wiped my hands and nodded, taking it from him and hitting play.

“Your Grace, is the princess okay?” someone asked him.

“Princess Tamsin has too much on her shoulders rebuilding both realms and finishing her schooling plus all of the wants and demands the supes of Earth constantly hassle her forpluspeople of Faerie still treating her too often as if she owes them everything—the list is long,” he answered. “And she will lose both her parents after she becomes queen.

“I know many lost loved ones in the war or know that feeling. I don’t think anyone fully understands how looking down at the exact date is a knife in the gut. I feel her pain constantly echoing as her fated mate even if we are not together. She is literally giving up her father to become your queen, and too many do not appreciate her or her sacrifices.

“It kills those of us who love her. My soul hurts for her all of the time. She never stops. She never rests. She never got—at least I had decades with my parents before I lost them. She never knew her mother who died to save everyone, and so many never even thank Meira for that nor Tamsin for waking them. It makes her want to walk away from Faerie.

“A group the other day blasted her that she doesn’t give enough and hasn’t fixed enough wings yet. It’s amiraclethat has never been done before and takes vast magic that can make herbleedfrom her nose and ears and people yell at her that she’s not doing it enough? Like she sits around and is watching TV instead?

“I wish she would watch TV and relax. No, instead, I would bet my entire family fortune that she is using her magic right now to make money for Faerie while spending her own moneyto fuel her magic. No one works as hard as she does. No one. My mother did not work as hard as Tamsin does. I’ve never met anyone who gives everything for Faerie the way Tamsin does.

“And she doesn’t even get to live here yet. So it’s—things are better, but people need to be better too. The last few million who woke are not taking the time to understand the progress and how much has happened—how far we’ve come. They’re upset they were woken last and kept frozen longer. None of that was Tamsin.

“They’re upset she’s not doing more, not caring all she’s done and sacrificed. So I hope the people who have been awake and seen how much our beloved princess has already accomplished smack sense into those people before we lose her. Because if I had the chance to keep my father around with me longer, I don’t know I would make the sacrifice she is for all of you.”

“Yes, that would be—I cannot imagine,” the reporter whispered. “Thank you, Your Grace.”

Neldor nodded and wiped under his eyes. “Are there any more questions?”

“I have a few, and I want to be clear that I am not questioning or doubting the princess,” a man asked from off camera. “She is diligent, and—I know these answers without a doubt. I ask them because some in Faerie are not as well informed as I am nor follow the princess as I do because of my job.”

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