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

“That was Gaia,” I say.

Zuh nods. “I apologize for her reaching the surface, my King. Had I known you were—”

I wave her apology off and motion to the small dead Nephilim. “What are they?”

“Nephilim,” Zuh says. “Given time to grow, warriors.”

This news staggers me. “Warriors?”

“Without a warrior’s blood, the surviving breeders are lost to failed attempts,” she says. “But they are trying.”

“How many are left?” I ask.

Zuh shrugs. “Less than fifty.”

“Fifty is not an insignificant number,” Kainda says. Breeders can birth Nephilim fairly frequently, and they have the capability of producing any class, though apparently not without a sample of blood.

“They are starving,” Zuh says. “Hiding deep.”

I point to Gaia’s body, now floating beside a sand bar. “She was not deep.”

“She…” Zuh says, “could run faster than you’d think. Used the rivers to mask her scent.”

That Gaia would risk traveling in a river said a lot. Drowning is one of the few sure ways to kill a Nephilim.

“But,” Zuh says, “If one of these breeders manages to find some warrior blood, or comes up with some kind of new class taller than my waist, they could be dangerous. Not a threat. But dangerous.”

I hear the question in her statement. “You’ve been underground for more than a year.”

“A year?” She looks a little surprised. “I thought...”

“You were deep,” I say. I spent two years in the deep, only to discover that twenty had passed on the surface. “If you spend too much time there, you may find Samuel on the throne.”

She smiles. “How is your eldest prodigy?”

“Wiser than his father,” Kainda answers. “And stronger.”

I don’t argue. It’s true.

Zuh thinks for a moment, but then sets her jaw and turns to Kainda. “Your father taught us that sacrifice is sometimes necessary. This will be mine. I will cleanse the underworld.”

“We can help!” Aquila says. She pounds Strike against her chest twice and raises the blade above her head. Norah follows suit, pounding her chest and raising her hammer.

Thankfully, Kainda defuses this bomb for me. “You are not yet old enough to hunt the underworld by yourselves.”

“Someday,” Zuh says, rubbing her hand through Aquila’s hair. “But I believe my place, for now, is in the underground.” She takes a step back, and I realize she’s prepared to return, right this second. Could the danger posed by these rogue breeders be that great?

“I will send help,” I say.

“If you must,” Zuh says with a grin. “But I would be pleased to kill them all myself.” She continues to back away, slipping into the trees. “Goodbye girls. Kainda.” She bows slightly. “My King.”

I bow in return, thankful for loyal, brave and honorable hunters like Zuh. There was a time when she would have killed Kainda to claim me as her own, but the old ways are done, and she has accepted that. Though, I fear, she has yet to embrace a life in the sun.

“Girls,” I say. “Gather close.” As I’m hugged from all sides by the three women I love most in the world, a cyclone of wind lifts the scattering of small Nephilim bodies up from the river bed before scooping up Gaia as well. The gale moves out to sea and deposits the lot in the ocean, far away from Antarktos. The act gives me a small measure of peace. Knowing, without doubt, that Gaia is dead, lifts a weight from my shoulders I didn’t realize I’d been holding. When the deed is done, I look down to find Aquila and Norah whispering conspiratorially. I can’t hear them, but I don’t need to. I know them. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Think about what?” Aquila says, fighting her mischievous smile.

“The underground is off limits,” I say, and I realize I sound like my father. “And don’t even try to argue.”

The pair kick stones and wander upstream, but not too far. They’d never admit it, but the attack has made them wary. They have yet to sheath their weapons, and they’re keeping a close watch on their surroundings.

“They’re not going to listen,” Kainda says, standing beside me.

“How can you be sure?”

“I wouldn’t have.”

“Then what do you suggest?” I ask.

“There is only one way to prepare a hunter for the underground.”

I sigh, but I know she’s right. “You can train them in the underground, but only in the tunnels beneath the citadel. They can’t go any further until I’m convinced they’re ready. Agreed?”

Kainda kisses my cheek. “Agreed. Now...defend yourself!”





ANTARKTOS RISING (Origins Edition) by JEREMY ROBINSON

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