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

I used to have dreams about falling. From the sides of buildings. From airplanes. From cliffs. I would fall, screaming, but I would never actually land. Instead, I would wake at the last possible moment. But the strangeness always continued because I would jolt in the bed like I’d actually just fallen—not from a cliff mind you, but at least a couple inches off the mattress. I often wondered if I’d actually somehow levitated. Had I known about my abilities then, I might have believed it was possible.

But this dream is nothing like that. I’m not sure where my fall began. I’m high. Really high. So I must have fallen out of an airplane or a space shuttle, because I can see Antarctica. The whole continent—green, but recognizable by its shape. As it occurs to me that I must actually be in space, I’m suddenly falling through the atmosphere. Clouds obscure my view. They’re heavy with rain and they shimmer with light.

I pass through the storm as streaks of hot lightning flash past. Thunder booms instantaneously, shaking my body and drowning out my screams. Cold water pelts my body. Hail follows, so thick that it feels like I’m being punched all over. Something about the storm feels familiar.

You found me, I think, but I’m not sure who I’m talking to.

Then I’m through the clouds and the land below is revealed. It looks like an aerial view of the Brazilian rainforest, stretching as far as I can see. I streak down to meet the ground. This is where I’d normally wake up. But my fall becomes suspended, as though the wind is buffeting me.

Am I flying? I wonder, as the land passes by below.

A gray streak catches my eye and soon I’m passing over it.

It’s a wall. The ruins of a very tall, stone wall. A Nephilim sized wall.

Before I can ruminate on the appearance of the wall, I’m beyond it. A river twists through the jungle beneath me, flowing in the opposite direction, toward the coast. The river ends at a massive lake, beyond which I see mountains, but I don’t get a good look because I’m falling again.

A voice cuts through the wind rushing by my ears. The single word is distant, but shouted. “Soooolomoooon.”

My descent is angled toward the far shore. I’m going to miss the water entirely.

“Soooooolomoooon!”

Who is that?

“Over here!”

The voice is closer now. Familiar.

There’s a small beach on the shoreline. I see a small body standing on it, arms waving madly. “Sol! I’m here! I’m right he—”

I gasp, flail and fall out of the small bed.

Pain stabs my eyes. It’s bright! I turn myself over, covering my head and fish for my sunglasses. Once I get them on, I sit up and take in my surroundings. I’m still in Luca’s bedroom, which was mine when I was an infant. But a lot has changed. For starters, the roof is missing. I can tell the storm is gone because the leaves overhead glow bright green under the sun’s gaze. I turn away from the view above, because it stings my eyes, even through the dark lenses.

The room is a disaster. It looked rummaged through before. Now it looks like a hurricane tore through. Everything is wet. I’m lying in a few inches of water. And there are little white golf balls everywhere.

Hail.

The storm.

“You found me,” I say, remembering the dream.

I look up through the torn open roof. Was the storm really here because of me? The answer is strangely obvious.

Yes.

The storm came when I was born.

It came again upon my return to the continent.

And now, it greets me again as I rise from Tartarus.

But what does it mean?

I push myself up and wince. The pain in my chest is sharp. I glance down and see that the yellow puss is now gone, perhaps washed away by the rain I apparently slept through. But my skin is still red, and sore, and though I’m rested, I still feel quite weak.

Despite my far-from-perfect condition, the subject doesn’t hold my attention for long. I feel my mind pulled between the strangeness of the storm and the meaning of my dream. But I don’t get to ponder either line of thought, because I’m not alone. A man screams, his voice a mixture of vitriol and fear. And happily, the sound is not directed at me.

When a squawk answers the shout, I know who the man is screaming at. I find Whipsnap on the floor next to me, pick it up and lean out the door. Looking down the ruined hallway toward the main living area where the rusted out door was previously—the whole side of the building is now missing—I see the Arab man. He wields a broken branch like a club, swinging it in wide circles to keep the seven turkuins away. They no doubt returned to find their nesting grounds in ruins and another person—not a hunter this time—taking shelter from the storm next to the corpse of their former pack leader.

Both sides of this fight have tried to kill me. I’m almost resigned to let it play out. I’d already determined that the man would have to survive on his own. But letting the man be eaten right in front of me... It’s not right.