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

With my connection to the continent gone, am I becoming my old clumsy self again?

Pushing the door away takes some effort and I realize what’s happening. I’m tired. Really tired. Strangely tired.

I’ll sleep, I decide, when I’m done with my search.

My legs shake as I stand, and I frown. What’s happening to me?

Pushing past my growing exhaustion, I stumble into the room, bracing myself against the wall. There’s no hole in the ceiling, no water on the floor and no mold anywhere. Luca’s room has been spared. Not for much longer now that I’ve pulled the door off, but long enough for me to find a clue about where the others are, if there is even a clue to be found.

Despite the lack of rot, the room is in shambles, like there was a fight. The small desk is broken and tipped over. Luca’s rock collection is strewn on the floor. And the blankets from his bed dangle from where they snagged a screw in the wall.

This is where they found him, I think. While Ninnis and Kainda were busy killing Tobias and maiming Em and me, two other hunters, Preeg and Pyke, kidnapped Luca. They must have found him here. And he put up a fight. He might be my duplicate physically, but he’s far tougher than I was at his age. I would have likely wilted in the face of danger and passed out like one of those fainting goats.

A chill starts in my legs and works its way up, spreading goose bumps over my skin. When it hits my stomach, it swirls with nausea. Then the chill moves up, spreads out to my arms and is gone.

What the…

My physical condition distracts me for just a moment. That’s when I look at Luca’s small bed. It was built from the homemade metal crib I slept in as a newborn baby. The mattress is old and flattened, but I know it hides something important. I lift the mattress up and find Luca’s drawings and a single crayon hidden inside an old, large Ziploc bag. Tobias never saw these pictures. Each one is a sketch of some event that Luca witnessed through my eyes. The image on top is easily recognizable. Despite it being a child’s drawing, the Nephilim with an arrow in his forehead is obviously Ull. One of my better moments.

A second chill rips up through my body. This time it is followed by a sharp pain in my chest. I pitch forward with a moan and grit my teeth against the ache.

What is happening to me?

It’s a question I can no longer ignore, and I’m pretty sure there is nothing to find here. I stuff the sealed drawings into a pouch, and then look down to where the pain still burns on my chest.

What I see sucks the air from my lungs. The skin around the single razor thin wound across my chest is bright pink. But it’s the yellow puss oozing from the wound that makes me cringe.

Had I still been underground I would kill a centipede, pry open the wound, stuff the goopy flesh inside the wound and wait for it to do its thing. But out here, in a jungle filled with unrecognizable plants, I’d be as likely to do more harm than good.

I could be back underground and possibly hunt down a centipede in the next two hours, but the chills are almost constant now, and I now know the sweat is from a fever. I won’t be going anywhere. My body is going to have to handle this infection on its own. After removing Whipsnap from my waist, I climb up into the small bed, yank the blanket down from the wall and curl up into a fetal position. I look up at the ceiling and remember the last time I saw this view. It was the day we left Antarctica. My parents woke me up with soft cooing voices.

“Solomon,” my mother said, though it was more like she was singing my name, “It’s time to go home.”

“I am home,” I reply to the memory, somehow giving voice to the emotions I felt at the time. “Antarktos is my home. Don’t make me leave.”

When my father picks me up, I start crying. I don’t want to leave.

“Are you ever going to let me hold you without crying?” my father asks with a chuckle.

“Give him to Aimee,” my mother says. “He adores her.”

I cried louder, somehow knowing it would be the last time I saw this room. And while my baby-self was mistaken, I remember my sorrow keenly. The memory becomes a dream as I slip into a deep, defenseless sleep.





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