The Crown Prince's Fated Mate: M/M Gay Paranormal Romance

by J B Black

  “I’m not. My magic is almost completely drained,” Myrddin confessed.

  With a slight hum, Artair asked, “Can you use mine?”

  “Yours?”

  “I have innate magic, but I have no control over it. We rode here in a single day when it should have taken us at least five,” the blond explained. “I can feel it thrumming beneath my skin as if it has been building up. I’ve never felt this before.”

  None of the books in the academy discussed fated mates. Stolen by the contract, the call to one’s fated mate seemed too much a temptation for Ulric to trust even in knowledge alone. Tentatively, Myrddin tested their cord. The thread thrummed. As he had felt earlier, magic pulsated on Artair’s end. He seemed to flow like a natural spring, spilling magic everywhere without a clear direction of where to send it. His skin glowed with it. Beautiful and alluring in a way books described nymphs appearing. Radiating life. With the bare remains of his own magic, Myrddin reached out.

  Immediately, Artair’s magic jumped, surging on the line between them as it seemed to realize a place to go. Wave after wave of power rushed over the wizard, and his exhaustion vanished.

  “Myrddin!” Artair cried as the wizard swayed.

  “It’s - it’s just so much.”

  Artair frowned. “If it hurts you, then we’ll wait. We can regroup. I won’t rush if it means your life.”

  But Myrddin shook his head. “Your magic won’t hurt me. I feel like a pool whose depth you only realize when you try to fill it and who has never been truly full. Your magic has filled me.”

  Pressing his palm flat to where their child grew, the blond gasped. “Myrddin, I can feel him.”

  Sure enough, Artair’s magic curled, almost cooing over their babe as if recognizing its progeny. Artair to Myrddin to their unborn child, the lines blurred, shifting between as the magic stretched, expanding to fill the spaces between. The pair held fast to one another. Their lips brushed, professing their love again and again.

  Chapter Twelve

  On horseback, Artair rode through the portal with Myrddin’s arms about his waist. They appeared in the same alleyway where they first met. Hooves pounded against stone, but where arrows rained down upon him as he left, the guards seeing his return saluted and raised a golden flag - the flag flown first for his mother and then for him. A sign of solidarity.

  Magic flowed between them. Always at Myrddin’s fingertips, but a strange air hung over the capital. Throwing open the doors, they dismounted striding inside. Their hands joined at one side.

  Outside the throne room door, all of Artair’s knights stood in full armor. Wallace stepped forward. “He’s blockaded himself in his throne room, sire.”

  “We hadn’t planned such an overt attack,” Eoin informed the pair.

  Cailean frowned, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “He had to know there would be retaliation after he destroyed the contracts. Word reached the capital quickly. Magic users collapsing dead, burning alive in the streets as their magic turned against them.” His eyes fell on Myrddin. “We were worried Artair hadn’t reached you in time.”

  None had to say how Artair’s nymph blood likely meant Myrddin’s death would have resulted in his own, but the weight of what almost had happened to them and the devastation of what had occurred for so many others.

  Squeezing Myrddin’s hand in reassurance, Artair set his opposite hand upon his hilt. “His cruel reign ends today.”

  The wizard raised his hand, and throwing open the doors, he shielded their group from the arrows of those loyal guards who had stayed at Ulric’s side, but where they had expected the advisors to be gathered there as well, their corpses instead decorated the throne room floor. Ulric stood. His crown sat upon his head, and his emblem cloak upon his shoulders like a cascade of all the blood he had spilt. When his eyes found Myrddin, he blanched.

  “Kill them!” he bellowed. “Kill them all!”

  Arrows flew, and the knights charged. Shields held. Magic burned, pouring out of Myrddin and Artair. None of the arrows landed. When swords clashed, Ulric’s guards had no chance. In a way, the king’s fear of magic users had fair ground. Given enough power, a single magic user could destroy a kingdom.

  Step by step, the mated pair approached the throne as the knights cleared their path. Magic radiated. Ulric stood, drawing his sword, but he trembled beneath the force of their power.

  “You have destroyed Aelion!” Ulric roared. “I raised you to be a man, and you’ve succumbed to be nothing but a beast!”

  Artair shifted, placing himself between his father and his mate. He refused to respond to Ulric’s taunts. No matter what he said, he could not change his father. The man rejected himself. Ulric cast aside his druid mother, and he condemned his fated mate to death through repeated betrayal. His love for his son came conditionally, and the moment Artair showed himself to have taken after his mother, his father abandoned him as well. No amount of self-flagellation returned his father’s love to him, and even if it had, that love fell short of what Aelion needed or undoing the damage of Ulric’s contracts.

  Seeing his son’s determination, Ulric flushed with rage, turning his sights upon Myrddin. “I should have killed you from the start! You conniving wretch!”

  He lunged forward, but Artair interceded. Their blades met. Throwing his father back, Artair glowed. His natural magic thrumming in his veins to protect his mate and their unborn child. With ease, he cast aside his father’s blade and pierced the monstrous king through his shriveled heart.

  “The king is dead!” Artair proclaimed.

  From his knights, the call rang clear: “Long live the king! Long live King Artair!”

  Epilogue

  Healing the damage Ulric did to Aelion would take time. People mourned their lost children and swore to never let it happen again. The complacency with which they had trusted their king would not come easily to Artair despite having overthrown his father for the same reason. Having a wizard at his side helped, and when Myrddin’s belly rounded with a curve of undeniable fertility, the people did rejoice.

  As the wizard entered the final month of his pregnancy, a caravan came from the northwest. On horseback, the stoic warrior Wystan rode, and his husband - no longer pregnant but with a babe cradled to his chest - sat upon a giant elk. Dryads and nymphs and magic users who had taken refuge in the forest came, including Tamlin. Lines now wrinkled his eyes, but he smiled nonetheless.

  “Myrddin,” Tamlin greeted. His eyes watered as he pressed his forehead against his foster son’s. “I am so incredibly proud of you.”

  They did not speak of the regret or the guilt which haunted the older man when he allowed the younger to sacrifice himself as a child. Nothing Myrddin said would assuage Tamlin’s guilt. The wizard could only live the happiest life to show that what had been lost was not sacrificed without reason.

  Beside his stoic husband, Altwidus towered over Artair. “Your mother was my subject. I never believed it my right to stand in her way, so when she died, I considered that fate.” He glanced down at the face of the child sleeping against his chest. “Destiny or not, I did not reach out to help you when you came into your inheritance, and I regret not interceding earlier.”

  Glancing to his mate, Artair replied, “My mother’s death sits firmly on my father, and you freed my mate before my father could kill him. I will forever be grateful.”

  “Make certain such evil does not thrive again in the world of mortals and magic. My domain is the forest, and beyond its borders, my sway has limits, but if I must march, I will salt and burn my wake,” Altwidus announced, and at his side, Wystan bowed his head in agreement.

  After a week of celebration, Altwidus returned to his forest. Most of the caravan returned with him, but some of the magic users stayed - optimistic that Aelion was once more safe for them. Artair had expected Tamlin to stay, and perhaps - despite his jealousy - he had even hoped he would for Myrddin’s sake, but the castle held too many ghosts, and at no point d
id he visit the High Sorcerer’s grave, but once - late at night, Artair saw the man outside the High Sorcerer’s room. Tamlin set a hand upon the door. With his head bowed, Tamlin stood there only a moment before heading back into the main hall where the rest of the guests had gathered.

  “Will he visit?” Artair asked, wrapping his arms around the wizard. Their fingers entwined over their child.

  “I believe this was his final goodbye to Aelion,” Myrddin informed his husband. “He spent his life fighting to free Aelion’s magic users, and he lost his mate to it. I only hope he can find some sense of peace.”

  Pressing a kiss to Myrddin’s neck, Artair whispered, “I’m sure he will, my love.”

  Myrddin turned, cuddling into Artair’s chest. The future laid unknown before them. Time could not heal all wounds, but they would do all they could to bring peace to those scarred by Ulric’s reign. Their child would be born and live in a world where he was free to embrace his magic without chains - magical or physical - to hold him down.

  Violet eyes met blue. “I love you,” the wizard professed as they held each other tightly.

  “I love you too,” Artair returned.

  Whatever stood before them, they would face it together.

  If you enjoyed The Crown Prince’s Fated Mate, you might enjoy these other works by J.B. Black:

  Mpreg Novellas

  The Wandering Warlock’s Fated Mate

  The Fae King’s Fated Mate

  From Forest God’s Head Scribe to Fertile Bride

  From Warlock’s Familiar to His Alpha Husband

  Pining Rival to Virile Mate

  Becoming the Incubus’s Fertile Mate

  Proud Dragon’s Fated Mate

  Mpreg Shorts

  Becoming a Werewolf’s Fertile Mate

  Red Rider’s Fertile Bride

  From Brave Knight to Fertile Queen

  M/F Fertile Fantasies

  Fertile Fairytale Horde

  Fertile Fairytale Horde 2

  Major Explicit Short Bundle

  Pleasured by the Demon Lord