The Last Hunter - Lament (Book 4 of the Antarktos Saga) Page 5

  “Are you part gatherer now?” she says, oozing sarcasm. “Did you read his mind?”

  “I don’t have to read his mind, Em.” I step away from her, standing without help. “He’s a hunter. Think about it.”

  She understands after just a moment of thought. “Fine.”

  Hunters do not run from a fight. They don’t back down against insurmountable odds. And they would never, even in the face of death, run for help. Death would be preferable. They wouldn’t even call for help. That this hunter saw me, recognized me and then bolted can mean only one thing, and before I can explain it, the man returns, saying, “There he is.”

  There are five of them, three men, one woman and a girl around my age, which is to say she looks eighteen, but could be forty for all I know. All are strangers to me, but Em says, “Zuh?”

  The younger girl steps forward. “Emilee,” she says. “What are you doing here, you—” She sees the cages and her eyes go wide. Her mouth clamps shut for a moment and then she says. “Where are they?”

  “Wait,” I say. “Don’t answer that.” They might not be attacking us, but that doesn’t mean I’m a fool. “Let me see your hair.”

  It’s a vague request, but they all understand what I’m getting at. Zuh, whose dark black skin would make her nearly impossible to see in the darkest recesses of the underground, steps forward. Her blood red hair is like a pom-pom around her head. It’s the first bona fide afro I’ve seen on a hunter, but it fits her. She’s scantily clad, wearing brown leathers, but also has a menagerie of chains crisscrossing her waist and chest. It’s her weapon, I think, but I can’t identify it.

  “Like what you see?” she says with a smirk.

  My cheeks instantly flush.

  She chuckles. “It’s a kusarigama.” She turns so I can see the sickle blade attached to the end of the chain. “He’s as innocent as they say,” she says to Em. Then she takes some of my hair and rubs it between her fingers.

  I recover from her teasing and do my best to sound nonplussed. “Now yours.”

  She gives me a wicked grin that’s full of mischief, but then tilts her head down and parts her pom-pom of hair. At the core is a dark bundle of black hair that she has curled up tight and tied down so that it cannot be seen. I nod and step past her. One my one, I inspect the others and see their carefully hidden shocks of untainted hair.

  When I step back, I ask a question none of them are expecting. “How is this possible? None of you have met me. None of you have been with Kainda or Em.”

  “Word is spreading,” says the man who first discovered us. “At first, we doubted. Then we heard that you had returned from Tartarus.”

  “But the underworld is full of hunters seeking me out,” I say.

  He smiles, but seems confused by the genuine nature of it. “Not all of them are your enemies. There are those still loyal to the masters. The oldest generations. But many of those seeking you out simply wish to follow you. And others are guiding the masters on false trails.”

  “They are no longer your masters,” I point out.

  He concedes the point with a nod.

  “We would like to join you,” Zuh says.

  It’s a tempting offer. Having five more hunters along would make us a formidable force. But I really don’t know these people and the mission we are on, and currently being distracted from, is too important to risk telling them about. I remember Xin’s warning, to trust no one. One of these hunters could be a shifter, a shape-changing child of trickster demons like Lucifer, the most famous of them all. I don’t think so, given the nature of our chance encounter, but I cannot risk the mission.

  “Actually,” I say, “I could use your help with something else.”

  Zuh nods, speaking for all of them, and I lead them down the hall. When we round the corner, we’re faced with a fully armed human army. Kainda, Wright and Kat stand at the front of the two hundred strong group. Elias is with them, discussing the best route out of Olympus.

  Kainda tenses when she sees the hunters following me, but she draws her hammer when she sees Zuh. Great.

  I hear a rattle of chains and turn to find the sickle end of Zuh’s kusarigama in her hand.

  “Seriously?” I say. “Are you two for real? Look, whatever issues you two have had in the past, suck it up and get over it. You’re not those people anymore.”

  Kainda opens her mouth to object, but I speak over her. “The men behind you are from countries that have been warring since before any of us were born. Their feuds go back hundreds of years, if not more. Yet they stand here, united against a common enemy. I expect the same from you.” Kainda backs down, though she’s clearly not happy about it. I turn to Zuh. “Both of you.” She puts her weapon away.

  I wave Elias over and introduce him to Zuh and the four other hunters, whose names are Jozz, Felix, Pietr and Kaleb. “These five, are hunters, like Kainda, Em and I.” Elias nods in understanding. “They know the land, and the enemy as well as I do.”

  To the hunters I say, “These men are capable soldiers. They know how to kill the Nephilim. But they can also reach the outside world and get a much larger army. I want you five to lead them out of Olympus and to the coast. Elias will point the way and lead the men. You five do what you can to protect them and mask their progress.”

  Zuh doesn’t look pleased with the assignment, but then asks. “Can I train them?”

  “You can start with me,” Elias says, flashing a winning smile.

  Zuh returns the smile, but her mischief is impossible to hide.

  “Gently,” I tell her. “We need them to survive the trip.”

  She chuckles. “I will not lose a single man, my king.”

  King? What the? I’m about to object, but Zuh claps Elias on the shoulder and starts giving orders, which he relays to the other English speakers and they translate for the rest of the group. Soon they are all moving, swarming into a tunnel leading down.

  Elias pauses at the rear and says, “We will wait for you.” He grins and adds, “my king.” Then he’s gone with the rest and our number is back to five.

  I know Elias was teasing, but I’m really uncomfortable with this king thing. Honestly, I don’t really want this leadership position and think that if some kind of higher power selected me for the job, like Cronus believes, then it made a poor choice in me. I can put on a good show now. Flex my muscles. Bend the wind. But I’d still rather be in my parent’s living room eating Captain Crunch and doodling with Justin.

  Before I can join Kainda, Wright and Kat, Em takes my wrist and squeezes hard enough to get my attention.

  “Ouch,” I say. “What’s wrong?”

  “Zuh,” she says in a tone that makes me wonder if I shouldn’t have sent the woman after all. “You should know about her past.”

  I wait for more.

  “When the Nephilim became aware of your return to the continent, they held a match between the top hunters, and their daughters. The winning father would break and train the last hunter, vessel of Nephil. It was the greatest honor a hunter could have. The winning daughter...”

  I see where this is going. “Could marry me.”

  She nods. “Zuh and Kainda were those daughters.”

  “And Kainda won,” I finish.

  “No,” she says. “They nearly killed each other, but their fight was a draw when neither could stand. It was the fathers who decided the fight.”

  Ninnis was the man who broke and trained me, so I already know who won that fight, but the details are a revelation.

  “Ninnis killed Zuh’s father,” she says, “but he didn’t stop there. He drank the man’s blood. It is the gravest of insults.”

  I shake my head. Ninnis. I called the man a friend once. If not for Aimee, I could have become just like him.

  “So Zuh wants revenge for her father?” I ask.

  “Not at all,” Em says. “He lost the fight. Ninnis was the better hunter. She would respect that. The problem is she and Kainda never finished their fi
ght. Kainda’s claim to you, while no longer relevant to you or me, is still disputable to Zuh and Kainda. They never finished their fight. And I can tell by the way Zuh looked at you, she wouldn’t mind a rematch.”

  I look up and see Kainda keeping an eye out for trouble, though I can see she’s flexing her arms, crushing the handle of her hammer.

  “Thanks for telling me,” I say to Em and then make my way to Kainda. She hears me coming and glances in my direction. Tension radiates off her like heat from a stove.

  I put a hand on her shoulder and feel the muscles beneath tense. Then I lean in, kiss her cheek and whisper, “I am yours,” before moving on. She says nothing in reply, but a moment later, she snaps at the others and says, “Get moving. Hades awaits.”

  8

  Em takes the lead again and we head deeper into the citadel. Every step feels like a walk down a plank over shark infested waters. We killed a gatherer and a warrior, and we saw a man killed, but those horrors feel like gentle distractions compared to facing a Nephilim renowned for his loathing of mankind and a reputation for collecting souls. According to Cronus, Hades is the best of them. To Em, he’s the worst.

  And Kainda agrees. “Nothing good can come from this.”

  “We can’t beat the warriors in outright battle,” I say.

  “But we—”

  “Em,” I say, cutting her off. “Killing a single warrior bound in place is not the same as facing them in battle. In the open. Right now, our army consists of several hundred men—trained men, sure—but they’re malnourished, frightened and by the time they reach the coast, they’ll be exhausted. The Nephilim warriors number in the thousands. The high thousands. And when they are free to act, and move, and attack, they will not be so easy to kill. We need help.”

  Em stops. She’s led us to the lowest finished level of Olympus. The true underworld begins just below. We stand before a tall black door that looks similar to the gates of Tartarus, only much smaller—just fifty feet. “I don’t question the need for help. Only that this—” She motions to the door, “—is the last place you should go for it.”

  I ignore her fears, not because I don’t value her counsel, but because if I acknowledge the foolishness of what I’m about to do, I might not do it. Especially with Kainda agreeing with Em. While Em is often the voice of caution, Kainda pretty much never backs down from danger. She’d normally take out that hammer and knock on the door while we stood here debating. But she seems nearly as concerned as Em.

  Wright sighs and puts a hand on my shoulder. When he speaks, I can tell by the tone of his voice and the distant look in his eyes that he’s quoting someone. “The time to take counsel of your fears is before you make an important battle decision. That’s the time to listen to every fear you can imagine. When you have collected all the facts and fears and made your decision, turn off all your fears and go ahead.”

  “General Patton,” I say, recalling the quote from one of many history books.

  Wright nods. “No one fought or won battles like Patton. He captured more land and killed more enemies faster than anyone in the history of mankind. The point is, you made this decision already. It’s time to turn off your fear.”

  “In other words,” Kat says. “Man up.”

  I haven’t heard the phrase ‘man up’ before, but I understand the intent. I’m not sure if they’re speaking from true bravery—it’s hard to imagine someone being braver than Kainda—or simply from ignorance. They can’t yet fully understand the depravity of the Nephilim. But their advice is sound.

  I’m doing this.

  It’s time to let go of my fear.

  Man up, I tell myself, and walk to the door. When I’m within arm's reach of the black metal, I pause. What do I do? Knock?

  Cronus’s words about passing through the gates of Tartarus return to my mind, “For the worthy, all that separates this world from the other is a door. And you, Solomon, were deemed worthy at birth. All you need do, is push.” Maybe the similarity between this door and the gates of Tartarus isn’t a coincidence? Maybe only someone who has been inside that strange realm and exited again would understand the significance?

  I don’t have any better ideas, so I push.

  The door opens as easily and as quietly as those massive gates of Tartarus did. But the sight on the other side is far more horrific than the barren landscape of Tartarus.

  The room, if it can be called that—lair seems like a better word—is fifty feet tall, a hundred feet wide and perhaps two hundred feet long. By Nephilim standards, its average sized. By human, it’s an auditorium. But it’s not the size of the room that’s shocking, the fact that it’s lit by hundreds of glowing red crystals embedded in the ceiling or that it smells like a fresh corpse. What holds my eyes and fills me with dread is that skulls coat the walls, from top to bottom.

  Human skulls.

  Crap.

  But that’s not the worst of it. A thick viscous liquid oozes out of the wall where it meets the ceiling. It rolls over the skulls, sliding through eye sockets and out of jaws spread in a perpetual scream. The odor, deep maroon color and thickness of the fluid reveals what it is: blood.

  A lot of blood.

  It pools at the bottom of the wall, filling a foot deep moat before flowing away through some unseen drainage system. Hades has surrounded himself with the sight and smell of human death.

  “Still think this is a good idea?” Kainda whispers to Wright.

  “I never said it was a good idea,” Wright replies. “Only that he needed to overcome his fear and push forward.”

  “Quiet,” Em says, still the voice of caution.

  But even I’m not sure silence is necessary. The room contains a large stone bed, covered by a feeder skin blanket. My first thought upon seeing the blanket is that it must have taken a lot of feeders to form a cloth so large. But when I see no seams, I realize this skin was taken from a massive feeder, one that would have grown to the size of Behemoth had it been allowed to grow further.

  A stone table and large boulder that must serve as a stool are the only other objects in the room. If you ignore the gore-fest covering the walls, the room is rather plain. What does he do in here?

  That’s when I notice an aberration on the back wall. Some of the skulls look strange. Smaller. Distant.

  There is a doorway. The smaller skulls are a wall that’s further away. I start across the room without a word, but notice the footfalls of the others keeping pace. I pause and say, “You don’t need to come.”

  No one replies. Their strident stares say enough.

  They’re coming.

  The cautious walk across the room takes nearly a minute. In that time, I become aware of a subtle sound. There is a hum, like a motor, somewhere behind the walls. The blood is not flowing as supernaturally as it appears to be. It is being pumped, like a fountain in a coy pond. As I near the open doorway, I move closer to the wall and wave the others to me.

  Putting my lips close to Wright’s ear, I whisper, “Flashlight.”

  He takes the flashlight from his pocket and hands it to me. The small device casts a bright beam thanks to its LED bulbs, which require very little power. I kneel down close to the trough of fluid by the base of the wall and shine the white light on it. The liquid is brown.

  Not blood. The red glow from the ceiling gives it that appearance. It’s an illusion. I stand and place my hand against one of the skulls. “Stone,” I whisper.

  It’s all an illusion. The room is designed to look like hell. It’s horrible enough to intimidate even hunters. Perhaps even fellow Nephilim. But it gives me hope. Hades might not be as bad as everyone believes.

  I turn around to tell the others and find them lying prone on the ground.

  Not one of them is moving.

  I was so wrapped up in my discovery that I didn’t even hear them fall.

  I rush to Kainda’s side, whispering her name. I check for a pulse and find it in her neck. The beat of her heart is steady, but not as powerf
ul as it should be. I check Em next, then Wright and Kat. All the same. Without wound, but unconscious, as though sleeping. Then I see the residue of purple powder on the floor around them. It’s a potent sedative, but not life threatening.

  Knowing the others aren’t in immediate danger, I tune my senses into the world around me. I am not alone. I know that now. But who is here with me, and how did they subdue the others without being detected?

  A scent, previously masked by the stench of death, tickles my nose.

  A Nephilim.

  Hades is here.

  The sound of splashing echoes from the next room. He’s no longer concealing himself. “Come Solomon.”

  The voice is ragged, like a smoker’s, but deep and powerful. That doesn’t intimidate me nearly as much as the giant knowing my name. And it’s not lost on me that he could have subdued me with the others, but chose not to.

  I free Whipsnap from my belt and walk to the next room, ready for an attack. But my bravery seeps from my body as I round the corner and see the horrors on display. Bodies, very real bodies—human and Nephilim—litter the floor. At the center of the carnage, lounging in a pool of purple blood, is Hades.

  He’s worse than I could have possibly imagined.

  9

  The giant uses his two six-fingered hands like a ladle, scooping the thick, purple fluid over his head. It oozes over his face. Rivulets of supernatural plasma flow down his forehead, over his closed eyes and around his mouth, which is turned up in a grin. But the blood bath doesn’t hold my attention nearly as much as his bald head. I’ve never seen a bald warrior before. In fact, he’s more than bald, he’s hairless. No beard. No chest hair. No arm hair. The warriors are generally covered in blood red hair. But Hades has the smooth skin of an Olympic swimmer.

  More surprising than the lack of hair on his head is the missing golden ring that should be covering his weak spot. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Nephilim warrior without one unless it was forcibly removed. That he’s not wearing one means he’s either supremely confident, ready to die or insane. Given the setting, I’m thinking door number three.