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

“Ull?” I hear Kainda’s confused voice ask from behind me. When she realizes it’s me, she shouts with a voice like some wrathful god, “Ull!”


She’d no doubt try to strangle me to death while Alice chewed us both to pieces, so I don’t step any closer. But I shoot her a glance and say, “Kainda.”

“What are you doing?” Her voice is filled with so much vitriol I think she’s actually trying to kill me with it.

Alice’s anger matches Kainda’s. She roars at my sudden appearance. The sound shakes the air from my lungs and makes my head spin. If Alice knew this, she would have struck already. Luckily, the beast isn’t that smart. She simply stands her ground, instinct guiding her as she sizes me up.

“What’s it look like?” I ask. “I’m saving you.”

“Why?” This question is the first that’s not tinged with hatred.

I answer by looking back at her again. When our eyes meet, my stomach twists, and she must see this, or feel it too, because she looks shocked.

Before she can ask “why” again, a question to which I have no answer, Alice roars. I turn to face her, happy for the thirty foot long, several ton dinosaur that could devour the elephant in the room had it been a real elephant and a room instead of a giant cave.

Ull surfaces in that moment with a roar. Alice matches it. We charge to meet each other in combat, both knowing that one of us will soon lie dead.





4



Teeth snap above my head as I slide through the grass beneath Alice. She can’t bend over fully to the ground without toppling forward, and I’m not about to actually collide with a creature whose left arm weighs the same as me. As the massive cresty matriarch stomps past, I thrust Whipsnap up, intending to eviscerate the beast. I’d be covered in blood and entrails, but it would end the fight.

Unfortunately, Alice’s underbelly is shielded by thick, dense skin that Whipsnap’s blade can’t pierce. I leave a long scratch across her lower abdomen, but nothing more.

Alice wastes no time and follows her charge with a tail strike. The giant dinosaur manages to do this so quickly that I barely have time to jump up and over it. If not for the wind carrying me higher, I would have certainly been struck.

Of course, being hit by her tail is preferable to being eaten. Before I’ve landed, Alice lunges. Her jaws open wide to receive my small body. I land a moment before she arrives and throw Whipsnap at her, accelerating the weapon with a gust of wind.

As Whipsnap enters her mouth, the jaws snap shut. For a moment I think the blade might have pierced the back of Alice’s throat, perhaps even reached her brain. But then the beast yanks her head to the side and tosses Whipsnap away.

I slide on my climbing claws knowing that the blades are not long enough to do any real damage, but they’re the only weapons I have left. Granted, I could rain hail down on the beast, but the effort would exhaust me. I’d be open to attack from the twelve other cresties, not to mention Kainda, who, while wounded, is no doubt still dangerous. I catch a glimpse of her sliding through the grass toward her hammer.

Alice charges. I match her again. But this time I leap. Her head drops down to meet me, and when her jaws open, I know her view is obstructed. She’ll wait until she feels my body in her mouth before she clamps down. That’s not going to happen this time, though. The wind carries me up and over her head, which passes just inches below me. I reach out with my clawed hands, find her neck and latch on.

The razor sharp teeth on my climbing claws bite into the skin of her neck. My body slams down as Alice rears up, but I wrap my legs around her and squeeze, locking my feet on the other side. I am stuck to her like a parasite.

Alice roars with a fury I have not yet heard from her, or any cresty before her. My presence, so close, disturbs her. For a moment, I wonder if she’s as bad as I’ve made her out to be. Would she respond so violently to me were my scent and red hair not so tainted by the Nephilim corruption? There’s no way to know.

What I do know is that if I don’t kill her, she will kill me. And then the Nephilim will win for sure. Not that I’ve done anything to stop them. My incessant fear of facing them again has kept me prisoner here for so long already. Why? I wonder. I can face down a thirty foot dinosaur, but not the Nephilim. What am I so afraid of?

My pondering nearly gets me killed. Alice bucks like a rodeo bull and for a moment, my hands slip free. Snapping back to the problem at hand, I reach higher and stab my climbing claws into Alice’s neck. I then loosen my legs and pull myself up. For fifteen seconds, while Alice flails about in an attempt to shake me off, I pull myself higher, toward her head and snapping jaws…and sensitive eyes.