The Last Hunter - Ascent (Book 3 of the Antarktos Saga) (18 page)

“Solomon!” A small body swings around a tree, leaps to the ground and rolls before running straight toward me. I recognize the nearly white hair and bright blue eyes immediately.

“Luca!” I shout.

As Luca passes Em, she crosses her arms with a smile on her face and watches her adopted brothers reunite. Krane stands just beyond her, watching the scene with curiosity. Luca leaps up with surprising skill and I catch him in the air. We squeeze each other hard and fast.

When Luca pulls back, he says, “You heard me?”

“I did,” I say. “Thank you.”

Luca looks around like he’s making sure no one is listening, then he whispers in my ear. “Xin says hello, and don’t trust anyone.”

25

Don’t trust anyone?
Don’t trust anyone
! I would love to ask for a little clarification about what Luca has just told me, but some of the others are closing in to greet me now. Luca hops out of my arms like everything is peachy. He’s still all smiles and thrilled to see me, but he gives me a quick, serious glance that says he’s not joking.

Don’t trust anyone…

Certainly, that doesn’t include Luca.

Or Em.

But why doesn’t Em know? If she did, she would have pulled me aside and told me. Instead, she let me chat it up with Adoni. I glance back at the man I’d begun to think of as a friend and find him watching me. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that.
Everyone
is watching me.

Thank you, Xin, for the paranoia.

I almost expect him to answer, but his voice never enters my mind.

“So this is where we live,” Em says. She stops behind Luca, wraps her arms around him and kisses his head.

There is very little Xin could say that would make me not trust Em. I’ll tell her about the warning when I get a chance. See if she thinks any of these hunters could still be loyal to the Nephilim.

“It’s, ahh, nice,” I say, but I’m looking at the ground, lost in thought.

“Sol,” Em says, drawing my eyes up to her. She points to the canopy. “Up there.”

I glance up. “Right. I know. I saw. Kind of like an Ewok village.”

Her scrunched nose confirms that I’ve made no sense. No one here has ever watched TV, let alone seen
Return of the Jedi
. “Forget it,” I say.

She’s trying to figure me out, but can’t, so she moves on. “We sleep up there because there are a lot of predators in the jungle, and while we’re not defenseless, it’s nice to sleep without worrying about being eaten.”

In the underground, sounds are contained and amplified. Predators, like the cresties, had a hard time sneaking up on a hunter without being detected. Out here, with the constant rustle of leaves in the wind, their movements could go unnoticed. Taking to the trees was a good idea. But it seems wholly inadequate. “Is it defensible?”

“Against hunters, yeah,” Em says. “It is now. We have sentries roaming the jungle all around us. They’d be hard to get past without making any noise.”

I point to the cave entrance. “And that’s your escape route?”

Em nods. “Splits into a lot of branches that we’ve all memorized. None are big enough for a Nephilim.”

“But it’s not the Neph’s we fear, is it?” Krane says. The man is so muscular and tough looking, I can’t picture him fearing anyone other than a Nephilim.

“There are hunters looking for us,” Em says. “Before the sentries, a few came close.”

“They found us,” Krane says, “But didn’t live long enough to spread the word.”

“You killed them?” I asked, a little surprised.

Em doesn’t meet my eyes. She knows how I feel about killing human beings.

“There was little choice,” Adoni says. “We tried to subdue the first with the hopes of freeing her. We lost two men for the effort. Some hunters just can’t let go of their bonds.”

I’m not sure I agree, but I understand their point of view. If they let her escape, they would all be in danger. If they captured her alive, how many more would have died? It’s a moral dilemma I hope I never have to face.

“She found her freedom in death,” Krane says.

It’s cold and brutal, but I can’t argue with the big man’s logic.

A tug on my arm reminds me that Luca is still with us, listening to this conversation of killing and death. I feel like he shouldn’t be hearing such things, but he has seen, and survived, far worse. These dark subjects are probably as familiar to him as Go-Bots and Snickers bars were to me.

“Come to the beach,” Luca says. “I want to show you something.”

I would like nothing more than to spend a few quiet minutes with Luca, but I can feel the eyes of these hunters watching me. They’re clearly shocked by my presence and the fact that I’m alive, not to mention my hair, which honestly has me a little shaken.

“I’ll be there in a few minutes,” I tell Luca.

He frowns and looks at his feet. I crouch in front of him and take his shoulders. His eyes look up so we’re face to face. It’s like staring into a mirror that sees the past. “Have I ever lied to you?”

“No.”

“When you were taken,” I say, “I swore that I would get you back. And I did, right?”

He nods.

“And now I swear I will meet you at the beach.” It’s meant to be lighthearted, but the boy doesn’t smile.

“Daddy died,” he says, and throws himself into my arms. I hold the small child, thinking about how I would have handled the death of my father when I was six. Granted, Luca is a tougher child than I was, but we’re still wired the same way. His tears trickle down my shoulder. His little body shakes in my arms. I can feel my eyes growing wet, too, but like I said, the hunters are watching. I can’t show weakness. Not yet. Not until they know me and understand that, this…love, is where my strength comes from.

“I know,” I say, squeezing the boy. “I’m sorry.”

He pulls away and wipes his eyes, glancing around, and conscious that he too, is being watched, and judged. “You won’t die, will you?”

“I have already been to Tartarus and back,” I say. “I will not die.”

Luca smiles.

“And I will meet you at the beach. In just a few minutes.”

He nods. “Okay.” And then he’s off, running toward the beach. A child again. I envy him for a moment and then stand to face the hunters.

They’ve gathered in a circle. Some in the tree above me. Some on the ground, arms crossed. A few continue with what they were doing before I arrived—preparing food, sharpening weapons, stretching leather—but their eyes are on me more than on their tasks.

“You’re right not to trust me,” I say, taking several of them off guard, including Em, who nearly falls over when she whips around toward me. “I am the chosen vessel of Nephil, broken, corrupted and trained by Ninnis. I contained the body of Nephil for years, and his darkness sometimes consumed me. The spirit of Nephil entered me as well, and I spent the last three months in Tartarus, a land of torture for the corrupt. You have reason to not trust me.”

Some hunters lower their hands, trying to look casual, but I know they’re really just putting their hands closer to their weapons. Kainda, on the other hand, is a rock. Her arms are crossed over her chest. She stares at me with serious eyes, waiting for me to finish. Her gaze unnerves me far more than the hunters reaching for their weapons do, mostly because, for some reason, I care about what she thinks.

“You are hunters,” I say. “You are cautious and slow to trust. As you should be. These traits kept you alive in the underworld when you fought for your life every day. But, you no longer fight for
your
life. You fight for
each other’s
lives, and for a world beyond, which some of you have never seen…and the rest have forgotten. It’s time to start trusting, or you all will die.”

Em looks uncomfortable, but doesn’t stop me. She’s probably wondering where I’m going with this just like the rest of them.

“And you will have to trust me. Most of you know me as Ull, the chosen vessel of Nephil, meant to rule over Nephilim and hunter alike. But that’s just part of my name, part of who I am. My real name is Solomon Ull Vincent. I was taken from my parents and tortured by the hunter named Ninnis. For a time, I forgot myself. My home. My parents. My friends. I did things that crushed me with guilt.

“I can see your hair,” I say. “The streaks of brown, black and yellow. I know you feel the weight, too. But you can be free of it. I once held the body of Nephil, it is true, but I cast it out. As I did with the spirit of Nephil. As I did with the guilt that consumed me before I opened the gates of Tartarus and stepped out. I was told that I would be the last hunter. That I would usher in the time when hunters were no longer needed. The Nephilim believed they would no longer need hunters after reclaiming the surface. But they were wrong.”

I spin slowly, meeting the eyes of each and every hunter watching me. I have their attention. Even those that had been pretending to work have now stopped. “They won’t need hunters,” I say with a grin. “Because they’ll all be dead.”

Despite having given a rousing speech worthy of a Hollywood football locker room scene, there’s no cheering, no whoops, or clapping. Only silence. These are, after all, hunters. But then, one of them steps forward. He has wild spiky red hair with a blond streak front and center. His eyes are cold and focused. He moves like a snake, smooth but ready to strike. He’s about my height, but stronger and older. This is a seasoned hunter, not accustomed to listening to the words of anyone save his master.

I glance at Em. She looks unsure and whispers, “He is Tunis. One of our best.”

The man stops in front of me. I can’t read his face. He could be seconds away from slitting my throat and I wouldn’t know.

“What I want to know, last hunter,” he says. “Is will
you
trust
us
?”

Xin said to trust no one, but I don’t think that’s a choice. Not really. If I don’t show trust in them, how can I expect it in return?

We stare at each other for a moment. A simple “yes” will not convince him, or the others. I reach down to my belt and the man tenses. I move slowly, drawing my knife and hoping that Xin is wrong, or at least that this is one of the people I can trust. His eyes follow my hand, his muscles tense and ready to defend himself. But then I turn the knife toward myself and place the blade against my neck. He’s so shocked by my actions that he doesn’t resist when I take his hand and bring it up to the knife. When I let go, Tunis is holding the knife to my throat.

“You could kill me,” I say. “There is nothing I, nor anyone else, could do to stop you. My life belongs to you.”

Tunis’s forehead scrunches up. What I am doing right now makes no sense to the man. “You are wrong,” he finally says, and I see something change in his eyes—understanding. He pulls the blade away from my neck and drops it to the ground. It lands between our feet, piercing the earth. “It is my life that belongs to you.”

“As does mine,” says another.

And then another.

The hunters each speak the words and bow their heads to me. This is different than what happened in the jungle. That was awe. Wonderment. At me being alive. And at my hair. This…is allegiance. The phrase is repeated around the circle, finishing with Em who speaks the words as seriously as the rest, despite not needing to.

Only one person remains silent. Kainda. As the others move in to greet me, she slips away.

26

I spend an hour with the hunters, learning their names, who their masters were, where they lived, what weapons they prefer—the kinds of things hunters talk about. As the group disperses slowly and the hunters go back to their work, Em clears her throat signaling that she would like a word with me. I nod a goodbye to the last few hunters and turn to Em.

“Well done,” she says.

I shrug. “I’m not sure how much of this is me and how much is a show.”

“Don’t worry,” she says. “I know you, remember? That was all you.”

I’m not so sure, and certainly not as confident as I appeared. But I don’t argue, mostly because there are other things I want to do.

And as usual, Em can read my mind nearly as well as Xin. She points to the right. “The beach is that way. Go. Spend some time together. We’ll talk tonight.”

Her words, “We’ll talk tonight,” carry weight. The reprieve with Luca will be short-lived.

“Krane. Adoni,” Em says. “Keep an eye on them.”

As I move to the lake, Krane and Adoni fall in line behind me, hands near their weapons. I should probably be wary, too, but as we reach the beach, Luca sees me and beams with excitement. He quickly shows me the sand castle he built, which is really more of a mud castle. I crouch next to him and start to feel like a kid again. I used to build castles just like this when my parents brought me to the beach.

“This is my house,” Luca says. He begins decorating it with leaves, flower petals and blades of grass. “You can build a house next door.”

Slightly embarrassed by the request, I look for Krane and Adoni. They’ve taken up positions twenty feet to either side of us, backs turned to us as they watch for trouble. I have a hundred questions for Luca, but decide the child has the right idea, and I dig into the mud. The earth is wet, but warm, no different from the air really.

Twenty minutes later, I’ve got a foot-tall tower built and glowing in the light of the now setting sun. It has finger indents for windows and a flag-like branch and leaf stabbed into the top. As I smooth out the sides of the tower, I say, “This means something,” quoting
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
.

Luca laughs like he understands the joke and says, “What could a mud house mean?”

“I have no idea,” I say.

“Are you done?” he asks.

As I take my mind off the task of building my tower, I realize that Luca has been done for several minutes. We built in silence, just enjoying being with each other, the ways kids do. It felt foreign and unnatural at first, but some part of me now feels rejuvenated. “Yeah, I think I’m done.”