The Last Emperor

by Kari Gregg

  Barring Lyd’s voluminous green dress, of course. Even at this distance, she was a vibrant and welcome splash of color. Nick imagined many tribeswomen studying his best friend while others glared with envy at her. Perhaps Lyd would launch a new trend and the fashion for unrelentingly dark clothes more suitable for funerals and mourning would finally subside in the capitol.

  “You shouldn’t leave me behind.” Rolan broke through the curtain of vines behind Nick with a clatter that would have warranted warning murmurs for quiet from the imperial children not many winters ago. “Any one of them could be roaming around these woods—wow.”

  Nick sighed at the panoramic views splayed out before them. Wow indeed. “I’m safe. No one else knows of this place.” No one still alive, at least.

  Rolan dropped next to him on the boulder. “When you lived here, people wouldn’t be aware of it, no, but in the years since—”

  Nick patted the moss. “The copse has reverted to its former untamed state, to what this spot must have been like when Lyssandra first discovered it.” He waved at the encroaching underbrush, some of which had already overtaken the other end of the boulder upon which they sat. “No one has been here since I last was.” Nick was willing to bet on it.

  Rolan was right, though. A few in the tribes were less enamored with the survival of the monarchy and would seize any vulnerable moment to end him. Seeing one familiar place in this ghastly marathon of ludicrous parties was so important to Nick, he’d been willing to risk his life on setting foot where his lost brothers and sisters had once stood. “Tribe representatives in the capitol were never eager to wander from the landscaped paths of the formal garden. They still aren’t.”

  “We passed two piles of clothing.” Rolan crossed his arms over his chest.

  “True.” Nick shrugged. He walked three paces to one of the oaks edging the copse and lifted his hand. He pushed his fingers into the trunk, searching behind a masking layer of lichen growth until the tips found a groove. Joy lighting his heart, he concentrated on his fingers to loose a partial shift that transitioned his fingernails into claws.

  Over his shoulder, Rolan gasped.

  Smiling, Nick carefully pried lichens free of his find.

  “You were quiet about your tribal blood. Mom and Dad wouldn’t talk about it, but I guessed what you were. What you must have been,” Rolan said, voice low and tone brimming with wonder. “But I never thought I’d see it.”

  “Witnessing what was only possible inside the royal family would’ve put you in too much danger. You might have suspected my bloodline was imperial enough to achieve a partial shift, but you, Mom, and Dad were safer as long as I never confirmed I could do it.” He wiped the debris away from the tree trunk, revealing the letters that had been carved into the wood. Relief swamped him. “There it is.”

  Rolan peered over Nick’s shoulder. “Toly?”

  Nick chuckled. “He never went by Tolescu except when ceremony demanded. To us, he was always Toly.”

  The crown prince.

  Toly had been the first to engrave his name into the tree, claiming this place as theirs, but he hadn’t been the last or the only prince and princess to leave his mark. “Toly, Lyssandra, Catterin, Mandariss, Allena…” Rolan’s voice trailed off. He walked to the tree and then bent to more closely examine the bottom of the carving Nick’s scraping claws had revealed. His eyes narrowed. “Elba’s name is missing.”

  The razor-sharp claws tipping his fingers couldn’t stop Nick from fumbling around his neck, patting the fabric of his fancy clothes for the slight bulge indicating the locket still hid beneath. “The rebels captured the palace before Elba’s second Saint Day, but even if they’d waited until Elba was formally recognized as tribe and a princess of the peoples, mother and father wouldn’t allow us to leave our suite once the fighting began.”

  As battle had approached, Nika had tried. If nothing was to be left of them beyond a list of names scratched into a tree, he had wanted the list to be completed with the newest Marisek. Father had understood but had paddled Nick’s butt for endangering himself when guards had discovered him slipping into the woods during the shelling that had preceded rebels overrunning the palace. “We hadn’t been permitted to shift, run, or hunt for many moons.”

  Chuckling, Rolan traced Nika’s name in the wood. “Moons.” He arched an amused eyebrow at Nick. “You talk like they do.”

  Nick grunted. “I measured time by the lunar cycle and the seasons until Dad brought me to the lands of men.” He tapped his temple with a claw before forcing the partial shift to subside so only the tips of his fingers remained. “How we once lived, the culture of our people, all of it is still in my head. Living with humans could never erase my childhood heritage.”

  “I wanted to forget.”

  By all appearances, his brother had succeeded, too. “I’m sorry.” Sorry for what Rolan, too, had lost in the rebellion. Sad what war had cost them both.

  “Don’t apologize.” Rolan’s mouth curved to form a crooked smile. “If I’d been certain of your identity inside the imperial family and what you’d been destined for, I might have left Mom and Dad. Kept running as soon as we reached the lands of men. The war didn’t destroy me, but losing our new family might have.” His wide palm clapped Nick on the back between his shoulder blades. “We’ll get through this like we always have: together.”

  His brother was a good man, better than Nick had ever been. “Your kin belonged to the Ural tribe.”

  “Had your mating pact been fulfilled, you would’ve become my tribe’s prince, yes, but that was a long time ago.” Rolan’s jaw clenched. “It doesn’t matter. Probably none of my family are left.”

  “Probably?” Nick turned from the engraved list of his dead brothers and sisters to face the brother he, rather than biology, had chosen. “You don’t know?”

  “My parents are dead. My brothers, too. When rioters demanded our blood, I was the youngest, but also the fastest and the one who knew the surrounding countryside best.” Rolan shuddered. “My family fought to cover my escape because I was the strongest shot at continuing our line.”

  Nick lifted his arm. He cupped Rolan’s cheek in his palm. “There are others? Grandparents. Aunts, uncles, cousins.”

  “Of all the tribes, the Urals were least important politically and strategically. You were to marry into us. You know it’s true. My kin were never remarkable, wouldn’t have and didn’t catch the attention of the media with too many other slaughters to report.” Fear and hope shone in Rolan’s eyes. “I couldn’t find any news of them. Not during the genocide and not since. We were many, though. The mountains in northernmost part of the Ural range are too steep to cross safely into the lands of men there. Few would have tried it, but some might have survived by waiting out the purges in caves.”

  “You haven’t made inquiries since we arrived?”

  “I don’t dare.” Rolan shook his head. “Drawing rebel attention to a potential bargaining chip to use against you risks any survivors…and you, too.”

  Renewed excitement stirred Nick’s heartbeat to a gallop. “Benjic suggested an adventure tour in the Urals while we wait for the forensic teams to finish their work.”

  His brother snorted. “He wants to get us out of the capitol, let the whole return-from-the-dead furor die down.”

  With a state funeral negotiated and the details even now being finalized, Nick wasn’t opposed to abandoning the capitol spotlight he, Rolan, and Lydia had been moving within these past weeks. “We’d be able to discover information about your kin without alerting the tribes and placing anyone in immediate peril.”

  “You realize these capitol idiots think you can’t shift.” Rolan smirked. “Benjic has been pushing the adventure tour in the Urals to get you out of the way, but he and the rest of them also believe you are an omega so traumatized by the murders and war that your ability to take your animal form weakened…if you can still take your animal form at all. They can’t conceive of anyone in the tribes
, forget a prince of the people and a white wolf, choosing not to shift for two decades.”

  “Benjic recommended the tour to serve as remedial shifter lessons, I know.” Nick chuckled. “To be fair, I haven’t hunted since I ran the palace grounds inside a pack composed of my brothers and sisters.”

  “It’s like riding a bike. If you learned to hunt in a pack once, you can do it again…which is more than I’d be willing to wager about most we’ve met in the capitol.” Rolan grunted. “You aren’t an omega, either.”

  “Are you sure?” Nick grinned. “I do run a yarn shop.”

  “Don’t be an ass.” Rolan turned toward the glittering beacon of the distant ballroom. “How rebels as dumb as they are managed to seize power is a mystery.”

  “It isn’t stupidity. Just prejudice. Instead of freeing the people to grow and explore their respective roles and positions, the rebellion constricted what each of us are permitted to do and be. The tragedy was never that the peasantry rose up against us. Even my parents believed more needed to be done for the people. No, the tragedy wasn’t that the revolution happened—it was that the revolution failed.” Nick joined his brother, standing at his side to study the palace’s opulence. “The tribes have lost touch with who they are.”

  Rolan leaned to shove him with a shoulder. “They need an emperor to remind them.”

  Laughing, Nick shoved back. “Cut it out.”

  “I’m serious.” He jerked his chin toward the ballroom. “Opposition to your abdication is growing.”

  Nick wrinkled his nose. “They crave a pretty noble to waltz with. They crave portraits of another white wolf hanging in their galleries and one to trot in their parades. They want Lydia’s goddamn commemorative coins.” He chopped a hand through the air. “None of them understand what being a prince means, the obligations, the costs, the duties I owe to the tribes.”

  “They don’t need to comprehend it.” His brother let his hand fall on Nick’s shoulder. “As long as you do.”

  “Benjic might grasp it.” Dread curled in his stomach. “Which is also why a trip to the Urals for the adventure tour he keeps encouraging could be a smart move.” Despite the parties, parades, and a stream of formal events in the ambitious elder’s company, Nick had been singularly unable to ascertain if Benjic wanted to help, wanted him dead, or was simply manipulating the circumstances for his political gain. Perhaps all three. “He’ll follow us into the Urals.”

  His brother’s brows furrowed. “He won’t stay to capitalize on your absence?”

  “His children will protect his interests.” Nick frowned. “Mating Janen seems to have softened Harr. He’s outgrown his youthful obnoxiousness and become as wily as his sire. His daughters are worse.” Exhaustion weighed down his shoulders. “He’ll come with us, if for no other reason to ensure I don’t cause more trouble.”

  “Trouble? You?” Rolan tipped his head back and laughed.

  Nick smiled. “He’ll try to mitigate the damage anyway.”

  Wiping at his eyes, Rolan snickered. “Don’t we all.”

  Chapter Four

  Arit didn’t often go to the station to meet the train, but as his dad had repeatedly told him, they didn’t usually entertain clients who were former royalty—or current royalty, considering the crown prince had yet to officially abdicate the throne. Arit scowled. What mattered was his father had insisted Arit, as their best guide and managing partner of Shifter Frontiers, greet today’s arriving guests. He kicked a display of tired pamphlets advertising other business catering to tourists—restaurants, hiking and mountain-climbing groups, and driving tour maps featuring the war’s local points of interest.

  One of those stops was the site where Barton House had stood. Arit knew because he and Dad had steered their old Jeep along the circuitous route into the mountain peaks when Arit was a teenager. Nothing remained of the manse. The capitol had ordered the house razed shortly after the imperial family’s executions to prevent supporters from transforming the place into a shrine. When Arit had seen it many summers later, even the ashes were gone. Crumbling stone walls encircling the perimeter still stood, but inside, where campers with enough coin could pitch a tent, the estate was a barren field. No plaque or monument indicated whose blood had saturated the fertile soil. Trees that had born scorch marks from the fire had reportedly been chopped down, too.

  Would the emperor want to see it?

  Arit hoped not. His job was to take shifters into the mountains to tutor them on survival skills and tracking prey. No one, including his dad, could persuade Arit to play chauffeur and tour guide to a bunch of politicians. Arit glared at the ticket window, staffed this afternoon by Marni, a capable mother of four who would doubtlessly find a local to show tourists around if necessary. There was always someone in the forgotten Urals who could use extra cash. Arit hired as many as he could, but jobs were still scarce.

  A lone, high whistle broke the quiet bustle of the station, heralding the arrival of the train. Arit grimaced. He pivoted from the warm building and, feet dragging, headed to the platform where passengers would disembark. He exited the wind break the building provided and hiked up the collar of his work shirt. The chill of late autumn had definitely arrived in the Urals. The cold never bothered Arit. When temperatures plummeted, he shifted to rely on his dense coat of fur for comfort. Capitol shifters, who preferred their human form, rarely arranged adventure tours this late in the season. The last-minute reservations for the crown prince’s party would probably be Arit’s final group until the snows came and capitol goers opted for the main lodge’s cozy hearth and overland skiing for their winter vacations.

  The train crept down the tracks, sliding into the station with a loud screech that hurt Arit’s ears. Porters rushed to the luggage bays as soon as the train halted. He employed one of them, Noryl, a cousin hired fresh out of school to help at the lodge. Noryl was shorter and stockier than Arit but shared his love for the wild. The young shifter heaved a trunk from the train onto a handcart he’d eventually unload onto a lodge cargo van. Station attendants wheeled a staircase platform to the train door through which passengers soon streamed. Although few visitors came from the capitol this time of year, Arit would have identified the royal party easily whether the train’s riders had been plentiful or few.

  No one else would arrive in the Urals with a human.

  Arit squinted at her. Grunted.

  Though he traded with human smugglers a lot, he hadn’t realized their women grew that tall. She was no skinny twig, either. A bright blue pea coat against the chill didn’t mask her reassuringly solid frame nor the curves one of the other passengers ogled furtively. That one definitely was a shifter—no hiding the feral glint of his beast in his eyes nor the mottled gray mane of hair tied at his nape in a que. Arit immediately rejected him as the probable crown prince. At this distance, he could readily discern blond strands streaked through the shifter’s hair, but not enough. Besides, nothing in the media blitz he couldn’t avoid glimpsing on Dad’s kitchen TV had hinted His Highness might arrive at his next stop on his imperial visit dressed in casual red flannel and faded blue jeans, regardless of the swooning reports Nika Marisek had grown up to become a man of the people.

  At least adapting the provisions at the lodge for the human might not be as much of a chore as Arit had dreaded. She seemed sturdy enough.

  The shifter perving on the woman turned his head and shouted over the din of the train.

  When the next passenger passed through the door to leave the train car, Arit’s breath caught.

  No wonder shifters in the capitol had lost their collective minds over the long-lost royal.

  Nika Marisek was exquisite.

  He was blond, which shouldn’t surprise Arit, because his Dad hadn’t tuned out the wall-to-wall news coverage since the crown prince had come forward, very much alive. According to his history lessons, Mariseks were fair in coloring in their human forms, too, but where he’d expected a vapid air of weakness, the crown prince’s
honey-shaded hair made him shine like the sun. Arit didn’t even mind Nika had turned his back on the traditional shifter mores of growing his hair out and had instead adopted the human custom of cutting it close and short. Those blond curls didn’t cover the prince’s nape, which would have been scandalous on anyone else, but for the newly discovered royal, somehow seemed right. Proper. Unlike the human girl, Nika had eschewed a heavy coat. A long-sleeved black t-shirt hugged broad shoulders, arms with an astonishing amount of muscle, and a flat abdomen. Blue jeans, indeed, outlined lean hips and, when he turned to speak to someone still inside the train compartment, denim also showcased a mouthwatering ass. Arit clenched his hands into fists, already itching to caress the delectable curve of the prince’s perfect butt. He wanted those thighs wrapped around him, the heels of the feet tipping Nika’s stretch of legs digging into Arit’s ass as Arit pumped into him.

  Arit’s pulse doubled, trebled, shot as high as a rocket.

  He wasn’t a randy teenager anymore. After the painful mistake of a botched mating with Arit’s sire, his dad had taken pains to provide guidance so his son would not also succumb to hormones run amuck. He’d taught Arit the signs of a mating heat and cautioned him through more than one that would’ve resulted in a poor match. He knew what the hot flush of his skin, instantly hard dick, and breathlessness meant.

  He wasn’t sure the crown prince would. Raised by humans, living among them the past many winters, would His Highness know what a heat was? Recognize the signs?

  When the prince searched the crowd at the train station with pupils blown wide with lust, doom flooded Arit alongside his own capricious desire.

  Then, his sire stuck his head out of the train door.

  Nothing could kill his arousal faster. “Oh, hell no,” he muttered, fury blossoming in his chest.