The Last Hunter: Collected Edition (Antarktos Saga #1-5)

A man falls away from Ninnis, his throat slit. He tumbles back toward me. I roll to the side, avoiding his falling body. But I freeze again, turning my attention back to Luca and Em.

Neither woman has struck. In fact, they appear to be talking. Then I see surprise register on Em’s face. I know my expression must look similar, because Kainda then hands the boy over to Em, who slings him over her shoulder. The pair duck into the shadows and flee together.

Luca is saved.

Em has escaped.

And Kainda…she has been redeemed.

A clang of metal on metal draws my attention back to the fight. A body falls. Ninnis stands in the middle of a ring of death. The hunters still alive are too busy fighting each other to stop what happens next. When I try to run at him and stumble back down to my knees, I know that I am too weak.

Ninnis grins at me. With a twitch of his hand, Strike rolls up. He attaches the weapon to his belt and then crouches. When he stands again, he clutches the body of Nephil in his hand. Without a word or second thought, he puts the gelatinous purple mass into his mouth and swallows.

A high pitched squeal explodes from Ninnis’s mouth as a violent shaking rises up from his feet and quickly claims the rest of his body. He falls, clutched by the seizure, and disappears within the circle of bodies.

I push myself to my feet, bracing myself with Whipsnap. I see Ninnis shaking, his mouth covered in white foam. I should kill him, I think. And end this. But I can’t do it. I swore to never take a human life, even one as corrupt as Ninnis. But even if I had tried, it would be too late. The swirling black spirit of Nephil descends like a tornado. It touches down on Ninnis and enters him. The shaking stops, but he does not move.

Has the merger killed him?

No, I think, as I see his chest rising and falling from each breath. He is simply unconscious.

Kill him! Ull is free and shouting to be heard. But he has not yet realized what I have. Nephil’s body has been consumed. The spirit has entered Ninnis. He is the Lord of the Nephilim, at least for now, and I am the enemy.

The fighting around me has stopped. The surviving hunters stare at me. As do the thousands of Nephilim watching the scene play out with rapt attention.

“Take him,” Enki says, pointing at me.

They still need me, I realize. Ninnis will not be able to contain the spirit of Nephil forever. I am uniquely suited to the task—if only they could break me again. They cannot break us! Ull shouts at me.

When a buzzing sound fills my mind, I realize there is another option that I hadn’t yet considered. If they can’t break me, they can erase my mind, or at least control it. I feel the probing minds of a hundred gatherers trying to penetrate my thoughts.

I stagger back as more hunters emerge from the wall of Nephilim giants. Fifty. One hundred.

Even at full strength, I could not hold out long against this many hunters.

A sharp bark echoes in the tunnel.

And then chaos returns with a flash of green and red. Twelve cresties pour out of a nearby side tunnel and tear into the distracted hunters. But the attack also spurs the army into action. Some of the hunters counterattack. The rest, come for me.

Ninnis groans behind me, coming to.

I hobble around him, running away from the hunters, but there is nowhere to go. The army is behind me. The gates to Tartarus—a land of eternal suffering—stand open before me. I am trapped.

I turn to face my attackers.

Three hunters lead the charge, weapons raised. They will reach me within seconds.

I glance to the left. There is no sign of Luca, Em or Kainda. They’ve made it out.

The cresties continue fighting, but the tide is turning against them. They are severely outnumbered and when the Nephilim join the fight, the dinosaurs are outsized. I see a number of them quickly fall, heads crushed, bodies impaled. A slaughter. Realizing the battle is lost, Grumpy lets out a bark, and the five remaining pack members retreat, heading in the same direction as Em, Luca and Kainda, perhaps following the familiar scent.

I’ve been abandoned, but I am glad for it. If the cresties follow Em, they will all be safer.

I, on the other hand, am doomed.

The three hunters shout as they lunge.

I thrust my arms out, sending a gust of wind against them and fling them into some of the other charging hunters. The pack slows, keeping a safe distance. They no doubt thought my extraordinary abilities would fade when the body of Nephil left me.

With the gates of Tartarus just thirty feet behind me, the semicircle of hunters tightens. There is nowhere to run. And if they knew how weak I felt, they would have attacked already.

Enki, Enlil, Thor and Osiris join the ring.

“You are stronger than we ever imagined, Ull,” Enki says.

“I am not Ull!” I shout back.

Enki chuckles. “This is the role you were born for. You are the vessel of Nephil, and you will accept him.”