The Last Hunter - Collected Edition (81 page)

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.

When we finally reach the massive cavern containing the doors to Tartarus and I suggest a rest, Kainda and Em both sit without saying a word. I’m tempted to point it out, but I don’t want them to feel any regrets about their freedom. There are other kinds of strengths that can replace the darkness that was removed, they just need to discover them.

We gather near one of the cavern’s entrances, but don’t enter. I can see the bone mounds clearly, and though I neither see nor smell any danger, that doesn’t mean it’s not there. Part of me wants to return to the location of our last battle with the warriors and see what happened with the bodies of Hades and Cerberus, but we’re actually miles away from that scene and the distraction would waste time, energy and quite possibly lead us into a trap.

The more I think about it, the more I’m certain a trap is unlikely. Now that I have the Jericho shofar, the Nephilim and their hunters will be at a severe disadvantage in the underworld, where sound carries and numbers are limited by the size of the tunnel you’re in. No, I suspect we’ll find our path to the surface all but empty. It’s on the surface that the real danger lies. With all that empty space, the shofar, for all its supernatural power, won’t be able to turn away thousands of Nephilim warriors.

“I’ll be right back,” I say, stepping into the giant chasm.

“Where are you going?” Kainda asks. She might be tired, but she’s still vigilant.

I sigh. She won’t believe any answer but the truth. “I have to pee.”

She couldn’t care less. Hunters are accustomed to pretty much dropping their pants and doing their thing wherever and whenever the urge strikes, unless they’re trying to conceal their scent or in one of the citadels. “Don’t go far.”

“I won’t,” I mutter. It’s a lie. I might be a fellow ex-hunter, but I’m still me. Even when I had access to a bathroom with an actual door, I couldn’t go if someone was standing outside the door. My solution was to turn on the fan, if one was available, run the water and sit on the seat, rather than standing. When I confessed all this to Justin, he laughed and teased, but when I pointed out that he had to run home every time he had to go number two, he dropped the subject.

I walk maybe fifty feet away and stand behind an outcrop of rocks. They won’t see me, but all three women have good ears. I’m going to have to angle this against the wall just right, I think, and then I spread my feet apart so the ensuing puddle doesn’t reach me.

After one last look around, I start to pee. I close my eyes in relief. I’d been holding it for a while.

“Solomon!” The voice is so loud, so close, that I shout out and stumble back, stepping in the little river of urine. I look back, but no one is there.

“Are you okay?” Kainda shouts. I can hear her running toward me. Actually, I hear three sets of feet coming quickly. I rush to put myself back together, momentarily forgetting about the voice.

“I’m fine!” I shout back. “No worries. No big deal.”

I finish cinching my leathers around my waist just before Kainda arrives. She’s got her hammer out and ready, looking for an enemy to smash. All she finds is me, glowing red from embarrassment.

“What happened.” It’s not a question. It’s a demand.

That’s when I remember the voice. I replay the sound in my head, remembering it perfectly, and recognizing it instantly. “Xin.”

“Where?” Em asks, coming into view, knife in hand.

I look around, but I already know the answer. “In my head.” I turn my thoughts outward.
Where are you
?

Coming
, Xin replies. He sounds casual. Almost friendly. Not that we’re not friends. We are brothers. I trust him more than most. But he’s serious. He knows what’s at stake and he’s been actively pursuing our mutual cause on his own despite not being accepted or trusted by the other hunters who have pledged themselves to me.

Why did you frighten me
?

Apologies, Solomon
, he says.
I found it...humorous
.

I can’t help but smile. That Xin finds anything funny is in itself, funny.

“What...are you doing?” Kat asks.

“Huh?” I say.

“You’re just standing there,” she says. “And you’re making faces like you’re talking to someone or hearing voices.”

“I am,” I say.

“Which one?”

“Both. Xin,” I say aloud and think at the same time, “say hello to Katherine Ferrell.”

Hello Katherine
. I hear the voice, and I know that the others do too because they all jump and look around.
Greetings Kainda, daughter of Ninnis. Greetings Emilee, daughter of Tobias
.

“Where is he?” Kainda asks, sounding irritated.

Look to the north
.

Despite being in a sunless cave, Kainda, Em and I all turn to the right, instinctually knowing the direction.

Kat turns with us. Though she lacks our subterranean sense of direction, she can see much further in the well-lit cavern. “I see something, just beyond the large pile of bones.”

For a moment, I see nothing, but then a shaky line of green emerges. The line grows bigger, stretching across a large portion of the cavern.

“What the hell is that?” Kat asks.

“No idea,” I say.
Xin, should I be worried
?

Only if you are against us
.

The line collapses, bunching up, and then slips behind the bone mound.

A vibration reaches my feet. The floor is shaking.

A mass of green bodies round the bones and the truth is revealed.

Cresties. A herd of them. No, not a herd, an
army
. There’s a few hundred of the subterranean apex predators. A large male leads the pack and as the others slow to a stop, the big one pounds forward. The green and red cresty is a giant. The crest on its head, just behind its eyes, is nearly a foot tall on its own. It’s at least thirty feet long from snout to tail, easily as big as Alice, if not bigger.

Kainda shifts uncomfortably. Alice nearly killed her, after all.

“It’s okay,” I tell her. “I recognize him.”

Kat looks surprised. “You do? Just so you know, a pack of these guys nearly killed us.” She’s got her hand on her holstered pistol.

I nod. “They like to eat people. But this one won’t.”

She points to the rest of them, lining up next to each other like soldiers in formation. “And them?”

I shrug.

The big cresty stops with a final stomp of his foot, sending a vibration through my body. I reach a hand up. “Hello, Grumpy.”

The big dinosaur lowers his head until my hand rests on his snout, just between his eyes.

“It’s him?” Kainda asks. She was present the first time I petted Grumpy like this. Alice nearly killed Kainda, but she terrorized her own hunting pack. After I killed her, Grumpy became the pack leader.

I just look at her and smile. She steps up next to me and places her hand on the dinosaur’s snout. He sniffs her. She says, “hello.” It’s not exactly a Kodak moment, but hunters and cresties are bitter enemies. This is big.

A clicking sound comes from behind the dinosaur. I glance to the side and notice that it actually has reigns around its neck. The dinosaur rears up and turns to the side. Sitting on the dinosaur’s back like some kind of alien cowboy, is Xin. But he’s not alone. Clinging to his back is a second rider.