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

“It worked,” she whispers.

We both look to Em. She pushes herself up so she’s sitting on her knees. Kat is there, helping steady her older sister, whose hair is now brown. Em looks up and sees Kainda’s hair. Her eyes widen. She pulls her hair, trying to get a look at it, but it’s still too short. She grips some hair between her fingers and gives a tug, pulling a few strands free from where it had previously been red. She holds the strands out in front of her face and grins. She looks to Kainda again. “We’re free!”

I laugh and hug them both. Before today, I was the only hunter to ever be freed totally from the Nephilim corruption. Now there are three of us.

Soon, I think, there will be an army.





27



“You look like our mother,” Kat says to Em.

We’ve just returned to the top of the waterfall leading to Edinnu, carried up the distance by the wind. As with everything in the garden, getting us all up was an effortless task, but as soon as I stepped into the tunnel, I felt weary. Not exhausted, but sort of like if you play too hard one day and wake up all stiff the next.

Em smiles, though she looks a little weary herself. “I think I remember you.”

“You were only two,” Kat says. “I can barely remember you, and I think the memories I do have are just from photos. You couldn’t—”

I clear my throat in a way that says, hello, guy who can remember his own birth, standing right here.

Kat rolls her eyes. “Not everyone has a perfect memory.”

“It’s just an image,” Em says. “I’m lying on my back. There are bars around me—was I kept in a cell?”

“A crib,” I guess. “It’s not a bad thing.”

“And I see you leaning over me. And a man. With a beard.” She rubs her head. “And no hair.”

“Well I’ll be damned. That’s our father.” Kat removes her black top revealing a black tank top beneath, which she also removes. This wouldn’t be strange if Kat were a hunter, but she’s insisted on staying fully clothed up to this point.

“Going native?” I ask her.

Kat, who is now wearing black cargo pants and a tight black sports bra, reaches out for the shofar and motions for me to give it to her, which I do. She takes the tank top and stuffs it inside. Then she wraps the shofar in her shirt and uses the sleeve to tie it tight. “We can’t risk it breaking.”

“Right,” I say, feeling a little stupid for not thinking of it myself. That’s what I like about Kat, she’s focused. Always on task. Even while talking to her long lost sister.

“He looks about the same now,” she says to Em. “Except the little hair left on his head, and the beard, are gray.”

“Is he...kind?” Em asks.

“We learned not to push the limits he set,” Kat says. “But he was kind enough and is pretty much a pushover now.”

“Does he know what you do?” I ask. “Or what you did?”

“That I kill people?” Kat says. “He thinks I’m a dancer for a cruise line. Correction, he thinks I’m a clumsy dancer for a cruise line. Explains the long times I’m out of touch and the occasional injury. No one in the family knows the truth.” She looks at Em. “Well, except for you, I suppose.”

“If you’re worried about what they’ll think of you,” Em starts, “I can always tell them about the things I’ve done, and you’ll look like one of those little animals.” She motions toward Edinnu with her head.

We all take a look back at the garden. The lush, glowing paradise stretches out as far as I can see. I feel its pull on me even now. “We should go,” I say, the words just a whisper forced through my lips.

Without a word, we turn and walk away from the garden, new friends and the birthplace of the human race. As the darkness surrounds us once more, and Kat takes out her blue, green and yellow crystal, my thoughts turn to the story of Adam and Eve. Whether they were the first man and woman created by God himself, or the leaders of the first human tribe that evolved in the garden, I don’t know, or care, but if they really did get the human race kicked out of Edinnu so long ago, I think they’re a couple of jerks.

The journey upwards is long and tiring. There are no downhill slopes or waterslides to help us along. My knees feel it first, then the rest of me. I’m in good shape, conditioned for this more than most, but I think leaving Edinnu made me more keenly aware of my physical discomfort. Kat seems a little more tired than usual as well, but Kainda and Em are struggling even more. Not only are they feeling the effect of leaving the garden, but the anger and pride of hunters that kept them from expressing their tiredness, even as a facial expression, are now gone.