The Last Emperor

by Kari Gregg

  “The rebels took to the streets in protest and screamed those same ideas not too many years ago.” Nick chuckled. “Your own sire crusaded against the tradition of shifter castes.”

  When Arit growled his annoyance, Nick laughed. Arit held on to his temper. Barely. “If you want to do more for the tribes than spread council propaganda, then you must fight for it. That’s what is important. Be the leader our emperor and empress promised us.”

  “Who says I’m not?” Still chortling, Nick tipped his head to a provocative angle. “I haven’t preached to the tribes about accepting humans or given eloquent speeches supporting freedom to choose work outside of bloodlines.”

  Arit rolled his eyes. “The Council would have stopped you.”

  “I let my actions do my talking.” Nick nodded. “Quite effective. The tribes aren’t just demanding change, as they did during the rebellion. The people are finally ready to work for the changes they want, and if providing an example to follow hurries their progress, I’ll have fulfilled my duty to lead the tribes far beyond the humble expectations planned for me at my birth.” The corners of his mouth lifted to form a small, sad smile. “I only wish Eton and Olina had lived to see the potential of the rebellion finally unfolding.”

  When Nick stared at Arit’s grasp on his biceps, Nick’s nostrils flaring with interest, Arit snatched his hand away, but the heat of Nick’s skin on his palm burned him to his core. “You cannot fight for the tribes or lead them if you leave.”

  “I haven’t returned to the lands of men yet.” This time, Nick reached out. For Arit. His senses took a dizzy spin, his heart thudding, as Nick lifted his hand to cup Arit’s cheek. “You’re twisting yourself into knots over this, aren’t you?”

  Arit bit his lip. “Mates don’t run away from each other,” he said, stomach roiling at the raw truth of what he revealed to Nick…and to himself. When had he decided to explore the possibilities of what this mating heat could become? Though Nick had firmly rejected Benjic’s offer, mating Nick was still the last thing Arit should want. The shrewd political maneuvering of his sire wouldn’t stop, and Arit was as ill-equipped to cope with capitol bullshit as ever. He liked his simple life in the Urals, tutoring shifters to embrace their heritage and enjoy the majestic beauty that called their wolfen instincts forward. No matter what Nick chose, being with him would complicate and upend Arit’s world.

  But Arit had also seen Nick’s promise. On the patio in the dark the night before. During their hunt. When Nick had stared down to his people in the valley with affection and fierce longing. Arit wasn’t savvy about the games capitol shifters played, but he recognized strength when he saw it. He may not understand what the crown prince meant about improving the lives of the peoples or agree with him, but Arit grasped Nick’s sincerity as well as his determination. For more winters than he could count, Arit hadn’t nurtured any hope for better from those who styled themselves as elders and high alphas, but he believed in Nick.

  He believed.

  Maybe Arit’s faith was misplaced. The nagging sense that assured him that Nick needed Arit by his side could be misguided, but Arit felt he—only he—could help Nick achieve what he sought for the tribes. He wasn’t sure about a lot. Worry balled his gut. Fear shook him, but still, the desire to be a part of it, joining Nick in some mad quest to change their world, superseded Arit’s concerns and misgivings. Nick could succeed. Arit wanted it more than he wanted his simple life in the Urals, more than the satisfaction of defying his sire, more than anything. If Nick fought for them.

  If.

  “Mates don’t leave.” He gulped, hoping with all he was and would ever be that he wasn’t repeating his fathers’ mistakes. “Mates stay.”

  A shaken sound rumbled in Nick’s chest, his handsome features writ with pained regret. He moved closer, his other arm creeping around Arit’s waist to draw Arit in. “Of course, they do,” Nick said, voice low and husky as he pulled Arit into his embrace. His bare skin brushed like silk against Arit, the temptation of Nick’s hard body and warm muscle bewitching him. “I will not abandon you as your sire did, Arit. If living among the tribes is what you need to be happy, we’ll make our home in the territories.”

  “Your business is with the humans.” Arit gulped. “You love them and the life you made with them.”

  “We’ll compromise. Work toward an arrangement that suits us both.” He leaned forward to kiss Arit’s eyes shut. “Being together isn’t impossible if both of us are willing to bend. Commit to me, here, tonight, and I will devote myself to you, too. Let’s build a future together, you and I. Help me heal the corrupt ruin of an empire.”

  Shuddering, Arit looped his arms around Nick’s neck. In his head, Arit knew Nick had chosen him, at least in part, because mating him cemented Nick’s alliance with Benjic. In spite of rejecting Benjic’s bargain earlier, Nick would find no stronger support in the capitol than what he stood to gain from Arit’s sire, who had thrived not only under the rule of an emperor and during bloody revolution but had also increased his powerbase tenfold in the war’s aftermath. Arit despised his sire, but only an idiot would bet against Benjic.

  That the union between Arit and Nick had been blessed by the Goddess with a mating heat to lure them together hadn’t hurt, either. His mate had been raised in the lands of men and brought from the humans new ideas that could revitalize the tribes. Reopening the border to trade and allowing the species to mingle again without fear of punishment constituted a welcome change for many. Encouraging shifters to seek out whatever avocation interested them instead of working the same jobs passed down their respective bloodlines for generations would be a harder sell, especially in the outer territories where tradition was still highly esteemed. Arit wasn’t oblivious to the fact the tribes had misjudged Nick’s alpha nature and his capabilities in his wolf form based on old stereotypes, too, Arit included. By virtue of refusing to be anything other than who he was, the crown prince had already triggered the tribes to reevaluate those outdated notions, but change frightened some. Shifters differed little from humans in that respect. The tribes resisted forces dragging them out of their customary ruts, no matter how beneficial the improvement might be. Mating with a shifter as steeped in tribal traditions as Arit would assuage the hesitation of nervous nellies.

  Arit wasn’t sure Nick liked him. How could he? They’d barely met. While Arit admired what he’d seen of the crown prince so far, he was by no means confident they suited one another enough to sustain a long-term relationship. Outside the political considerations, Arit and Nick could be as bad a match as Arit’s dad and his sire. Mating heats were no guarantee of lasting happiness. Arit’s fathers had proven it in abundance.

  He stared at Nick, though, both of them with their eyes wide open.

  Their mating could fail catastrophically, the hurt inflicted on the mating couple and on subsequent generations like Arit and Benjic’s other children in the capitol. But for the tribes and the future of the empire, they could try.

  “Okay,” Arit said, mouth as dry as sandpaper, his heartbeat fluttering.

  “Yes?”

  Shoving down spiraling insecurities, Arit gulped. “Yes.”

  “All right.” Grinning, Nick angled his mouth to one side. He leaned forward, lips seeking Arit’s.

  Chapter Nine

  Arit had kissed—and been kissed—countless times before. The disaster of his fathers’ failed mating had taught him wariness. Some might argue he’d been too careful of physical intimacy, but he had never claimed to live as a monk nor a saint. For this much at least, Arit knew what to do, what he liked, and how this first kiss would feel.

  He was both right…and wrong.

  When he tipped his head to greet his mate’s mouth, Arit expected the awkwardness of their teeth clacking. Their mating heat helped, but they were nonetheless strangers who had yet to learn their way to each other. In time, they’d discover the familiarity of how the other moved, be capable of anticipating desires and fully satisfying
each one. Someday in the future, and perhaps not long, they would each reward the other’s needs with pleasure unclouded by uncertainty. Creeping doubts would fritter away.

  Just not today.

  That night, they bumped noses, fumbled caresses, and sliced open a lip on a wolfen canine pushing through Nick’s gums.

  Pain shot through Arit’s nervousness, and he jerked his mouth away. “Ow.” He probed his lip with his tongue, tasting salty blood. “Dammit.”

  Nick winced. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize—I’m sorry,” he repeated.

  Of course.

  The crown prince hadn’t dared a shift into his wolf, not once throughout his many seasons in the lands of men. Powerful alpha though he may be, he wasn’t an experienced one. The excitement of mounting or being mounted by his mate had called forth Nick’s wolf, and as Arit’s bottom lip stung, Arit could not fault him for his enthusiasm at delivering the mating bite, not while his own gums prickled. “It’s all right.”

  “I hurt you. That’s never…” Lines grooved both sides of Nick’s mouth, his noble features twisting in horrified dismay. “I’ve always controlled shifting, especially partial shifts. Always.”

  Probing his injured lip with his tongue, Arit winged up an eyebrow. “Accidents happen.”

  “Not to me.” Nick’s shoulders bunched under Arit’s hands, the muscle going taut. “My life and the lives of those who protected me depended on never revealing who I was.”

  When the prince would have jerked from their embrace, Arit tightened his grip. “Shifters bite during sex. It’s what we like and what our instincts compel us to do. We nibble to show our affection. Taking it too far at times in the heat of the moment is no big surprise.” Arit, who had little experience beyond kisses and light petting, knew that. “We all struggle with the wolf when our emotions are roused, and you’ve more reason for stress, anxiety, and distress than most.”

  Though Arit hadn’t believed it possible, Nick stiffened even more in his embrace. “W-what?”

  “Burying your mother, father, brothers, and sisters. Returning to cities you knew as a child, now fundamentally and substantially changed. The political posturing and gamesmanship in the capitol.” Arit dug his fingers into Nick’s warm skin, securing his hold. “Meeting your mate—our mating heat alone would have delivered a grave blow to your self-control. Mating shakes everyone. Including you.” He licked his wounded lip. “I’ve already stopped bleeding. It’s fine. I’m fine.”

  The crown prince gaped at him. “No.”

  “No?” Arit laughed. “I heal as quickly as you do, and no one is more keenly aware of what damage my body is capable of absorbing than me.”

  “Not your lip.” Nick shook his head. “What you said before that.”

  Eyes narrowing, Arit studied the sudden pallor of Nick’s face, the glimmer of shock reflected in his gaze. “You’re under a lot of pressure?”

  “Like hiding among humans to survive hasn’t been stressful?” Nick grimaced. “No, what you told me before your laundry list of my perceived weaknesses.”

  Arit jerked his head back. His brow furrowed. “You are my mate. I was not attacking—”

  “You said we all bite.” Nick stared at him, spine straightening.

  Frustration prodded Arit to stand taller, too. He and Nick were the same height, and Arit refused to show submission by hunching his shoulders or slouching. Nick’s station as Arit’s emperor was irrelevant behind closed doors. Inside this suite if nowhere else, they were mates alone. Mating alphas did not play dominance games unless they were spoiling for a fight. “Shifters regularly nip at each other, lovers and family members alike.”

  “Rolan likes chewing my fingers. I doubt he realizes he’s gnawing on me most of the time.” Nick frowned. “I’ve caught him nibbling Mom’s hand while he was still in his human form, too.”

  “Biting is natural for us. In normal everyday life, we bite those we love, but that’s especially true during sex.” Arit glowered. “The mating bite has been romanticized by humans into some mystical means of triggering a pair bond, but the importance of bites when we mate cannot be understated. The marks mates leave on each other prove our wolves have accepted the mating and signal other shifters to stay away from what is ours until the individual scents of each mate comingles to become a single new scent.”

  “Human teeth won’t leave a mark unless the bite is particularly violent.”

  Bewildered, Arit nodded. “When we’re showing affection to family or friends, our teeth remain blunted so we don’t hurt them. Only during sex will our shifter teeth push through—”

  “You can’t achieve a partial shift. Only my bloodline or those closely tied to the imperial family can manage the transition from man to wolf with enough precision.” Nick glared at him. “I’m the last Marisek strong enough to control a partial shift. No one else survived who has the discipline.”

  “Ah.” The epiphany crashed through Arit like a tsunami, sweeping away his budding anger and replacing it with fond indulgence. Tension fled from his taut muscles. He dared a small grin. “How old were you when the war began?”

  Nick scowled at him. “I finished my eighth winter in rebel captivity, right before the executions.”

  Thoroughly steeped in shifter history and lore, Arit had known the answer to his question, but asking it would help nudge his mate into his own realization. “Seven summers then, when food riots over hunting restrictions in the southern plains launched the rebellion. You were a child.”

  “I was young.” Nick sighed, the bare shoulders under Arit’s hands drooping. “I don’t think I was ever genuinely a child.”

  “Perhaps not.” Far be it from Arit to argue the pressures born by royalty. “The murder of your parents orphaned you before you’d neared sexual maturity, though. They wouldn’t have had The Talk with a boy at such a tender age.”

  “Like that matters.” Nick rolled his eyes. “I’m no virgin.”

  “I am.” Arit chuckled. “Yet about mating, I am the expert. Not you.”

  In the span of a heartbeat, Nick pounced on Arit. He pushed into Arit, hip to hip, chests rubbing. Arit’s pulse roared in his ears at the rigid swelling at Nick’s groin pressing into him.

  “Oh, really?” Nick said, voice husky and low as he looped his arms around Arit’s torso to drag Arit closer still.

  “Really.” Lust heated his blood. The musk of arousal perfumed the air, and Arit trembled, his dick hard as flint in his pants, but he regarded his mate with a steady stare. He’d hesitated over—and craved—this mating, in part because he’d desired the challenge of strength on strength, an alpha mating another alpha. Although Arit supposed at least one of them should know what the hell they were doing during sex. His virginity putting him at a grave disadvantage with his worldly mate had stirred anxiety in Arit’s gut, but they were more equally matched than Arit had guessed, the both of them innocent in their own unique way. “For all your travailing with humans, you are as virginal as I am.”

  A slow wicked smile curved Nick’s pink lips. He arched his hips, rubbing the hard length tenting his boxers deliciously into Arit’s crotch. “You—”

  “—know things about mating you do not yet know.” Arit released Nick’s shoulders and slid his arms around Nick’s neck instead. With his fingers, Arit played with the short blond curls at Nick’s nape. “You have only experienced sex, not mating. They aren’t the same.”

  Nick wrinkled his nose in distaste. “More mystical tribe bullshit.”

  Arit chuckled. Rather than fighting his instincts, he relaxed, and his shifter canine teeth pushed through his gums. He traced the sharp points with his tongue, showing them to Nick.

  Who stiffened in his embrace like a nocked bow. He gaped, his eyes widening.

  “Only our teeth,” Arit said, happiness flooding him. His desire kindled anew. He anchored his fingers in Nick’s silky hair as best as he could and pushed his hips forward to grind into Nick’s urgently hard dick, still veiled behind Nick
’s boxers. “Our wolves will be very interested in mounting each other for many, many moons. Shifters can seal a mating in animal form. Obviously. We mark our mates in both forms, though, as wolf and as men.”

  “You can partially shift.” Lines fanned the corners of Nick’s eyes, and his stare focused on Arit’s canines. “You must have some Marisek blood in your veins.”

  “I’ve not a single drop of imperial DNA in my family line.” Shaking his head, Arit leaned forward to lap at Nick’s plump lips. He tasted delicious, of heat and man and lust. “I can’t halt or limit a shift to my claws or change only enough to use my wolf’s sharper night vision like you. But I can do this.” He leaned back to flick one of his canines with his tongue. “We all can.”

  “Rolan hasn’t.” Nick’s brow furrowed. “None of the refugees back home could that I ever noticed.”

  “Did you spy on any of them while they mated?”

  Nick glared at him. “Of course not.”

  Arit let his eyebrows climb high and stared at Nick, waiting. Nick pressed his lips together into a tight seam, and Arit traced Nick’s delectable mouth with his tongue. “Our wolfen canines are natural for us when we bed our mates. Ask your human if you don’t believe me. She’ll tell you true.”

  A warm puff of air accompanied Nick’s disgruntled huff. “I am not asking Lydia about her sex life with my brother.”

  Snickering, Arit palmed Nick’s skull to urge his mouth closer. “Come here.” Arit swallowed Nick’s grumble as Arit slanted his lips over Nick’s. Hot, wet, the joining of their mouths was a wonder of building urgency. Nick explored the tips of Arit’s canines, and Arit returned the erotic play, licking at Nick’s sharp teeth as well. They both trembled at the synchronizing of their needy moans. Arit resented the clothing he’d grabbed after his run, hated the sweater especially because the soft wool blocked him from the heated skin of Nick’s chest, cooled barely at all by gusts of frigid wind through the narrow windows. He wanted the sparse spirals of blond hair tangling with the dark pelt carpeting Arit’s chest, longed for the scrape of Nick’s hard nipples on him. Nick claimed Arit’s mouth, tongue darting to tease and to taste. Arit opened wider and shook, edging nearer, as close as he could.