The Last Immortals: Dawn of the Axolotl
Read the first chapter from The Last Immortals: Dawn of the Axolotl
Abandoned at birth, Ace the axolotl struggles to survive both human and animal predators in his quest to save himself—and his entire species—in this epic middle grade fantasy for fans of Warrior Cats, with 24 black-and-white illustrations throughout.
“A captivating series starring today’s trendiest amphibian… Themes of chosen family versus blood ties give emotional weight to Ace’s journey from helpless hatchling to determined hero.” —Kirkus Reviews
PROLOGUE
Dappled sunlight shone down on a cluster of translucent eggs. They were hidden among swaying green tendrils of pond weeds, deep on the bed of the lake.
Within each egg—of which there were at least eighty—new life was stirring. One by one, the encapsulated creatures broke free, creating a swirling vortex of arms, legs, tails, and feathery gills, leaving nothing behind but the soft, battered shells of their eggs.
A single egg remained intact. This egg was different from the others because it held not one but two axolotls. They clung to each other tightly, sleeping soundly in a tangle of limbs, until one was awoken by the flurry of activity outside their cozy cocoon.
“Wake up, Ace! Wake up!” the little axolotl shouted. “It’s time. Our siblings are hatching.”
Ace opened his eyes slowly, blinking at his twin brother, Jasper. He peered out from the warm, calm safety of his egg toward the newborn axolotls, who swam and spun and zipped this way and that, exploring their new world. Ace gulped. There were so many, and even though they were only hatchlings, they were all so much bigger than he was.
“Maybe we should stay here for a little longer,” Ace suggested. “Until we are really ready.”
“We are really ready!” Jasper replied. “Don’t you want to get out there in the wide open? Don’t you want to explore?!”
Ace frowned. He wasn’t sure he wanted to explore the wide open. The wide open seemed vast and scary and full of dangers.
“It will be fun!” Jasper urged. He tickled Ace’s tummy, making his brother squirm. Then he gently pulled at Ace’s tail with his jaws.
“Gotcha tail!” he said, his voice muffled.
Ace laughed and tried to grab his brother’s tail, but Jasper was bigger and quicker. He spun, so that his tail was out of reach.
“Come on!” Jasper said. “We will be fine as long as we stick together. We can’t stay cooped up forever in this little egg.”
Ace looked up at his brother’s excited face staring back at him. Although they were twins, they had slightly different coloring—Jasper was a coppery, golden brown, while Ace was a darker blue, with speckled patches of blacks and grays.
They both had an identical mark on their heads, right between their gills. A white, diamond-shaped birthmark. Jasper always said that it was a sign they were the same. That they would always be together no matter what.
Ace’s stomach grumbled, and he felt a rush of Jasper’s excitement along with the primal urge to hunt and eat.
Jasper was right, Ace thought. No matter how safe and cozy it felt, they couldn’t stay in their egg forever. Besides, he was starting to feel very hungry.
“All right, let’s head out. Together,” he said to Jasper with a grin.
Jasper smiled back and began clawing and biting at the jellylike wall of the egg. Ace helped until they tore through, emerging into the cool, open water. Ace followed his brother, his feathery gills breathing in the sweet scents and sights of their home. The earthiness of the mud, sand, and silt floor, and the shadows cast by lily pads and bullrushes floating on the surface or swaying in the wind on the banks of the lake high above them.
Jasper swam eagerly on, darting this way and that to catch up with their siblings.
“Hurry, Ace!” he called back. “We’re going to miss out on the feast.”
Ace paddled his arms and legs, swishing his tail to help him go faster. Finally, he and Jasper got caught up among the herd.
Ace was completely overwhelmed by the sheer force of his siblings. They pressed in around him, until he found it difficult to breathe inside the maelstrom. He got lost in the flurry, and all he could see were arms and legs and tails, which bashed against him, knocking him around.
“Jasper!” he called out desperately. “Jasper! Help!” He glanced frantically all around him, trying to catch sight of his brother or of any small gap to escape from the crowd.
The other axolotls closed in. They began nibbling playfully at Ace’s tail, legs, and arms, testing to see whether he was prey…something to be devoured. Most of them only gave a small nip, ultimately deciding there were probably tastier things to eat. But one of his larger siblings eyed him hungrily. He pushed his way toward Ace, then bit him on his back leg. Hard.
“Ouch!” Ace yelled.
Ace cried out to his twin. He kicked at the bigger axolotl with his free leg until the axolotl let go, then he ducked beneath the throng and headed down to the very bottom of the lake, kicking up sand and dirt as he went.
Ace caught sight of the white diamond on Jasper’s head a little way ahead.
“Jasper, wait!” he called out.
Ace kicked his arms and legs hard, to get the other axolotls to give him a little space.
It worked. He saw an opening and took it, chasing after Jasper until his lungs burned and his legs ached, and he finally caught up.
“Why did you take off so fast? I thought I’d lost you!” he puffed.
“Look at all the food!” Jasper said, finally noticing Ace beside him.
All around, their siblings chased and hunted tadpoles and shrimp and small fish as they broke free from the tangle. They snapped and sucked up writhing worms from the lake bed.
Ace’s eyes widened. His tummy grumbled again, and his struggle was quickly forgotten as he grinned back at his brother.
“Let’s hunt!” he said.
Jasper took the lead, chasing after a school of newly hatched tadpoles. But just as he got close, another, larger axolotl swooped in and gobbled them up in one gulp.
“Too slow!” the axolotl laughed.
Ace scowled. It was the same axolotl who had bitten him earlier. What a jerk.
Jasper glared back at Ace.
“You need to swim faster,” he said. Jasper’s tone had an edge.
Ace paddled his legs as hard as he could, but he was half the size of the others. Despite his best efforts, he couldn’t close the gap.
“I’m swimming as fast as I can!” he called back, desperately trying to keep up with Jasper.
Time and time again, as soon as the twins got anywhere close to some prey, another axolotl would swim in from out of nowhere and gobble it down. This pitiful cycle went on for hours, maybe even days. Their siblings were getting fatter and stronger, while Ace and Jasper became hungrier and weaker.
“I…need…to…rest,” Ace gasped, sitting on a crop of rocks.
Jasper sighed, visibly annoyed.
“We don’t have time to rest! We must find food if we want to keep up and get stronger. We have no other option. This is life or death.”
Ace scanned their surroundings, narrowing his eyes as something began to move on the moss-covered rock beside him. It sent up little puffs of dirt as it crawled across the rock’s surface.
“Snails!” Ace whispered. “We can catch those—they’re not too fast.”
Jasper turned his nose up at the sight of the small snails, pridefully thinking he was “better than snails,” but then he sighed and swam over.
“It’s something, I suppose,” he said. “Let’s eat a few, then go after the bigger prey once we’ve got our strength back. We can’t survive on mollusks alone.”
They stalked closer to the snails, trying to sneak up behind them, but at the last minute their prey retreated into their shells.
Jasper cried out in frustration and grabbed one of the snails, banging it against the rock to try to force it out of its shell. He tried to bite it, but the hard shell was too tough for his small teeth to break into.
Ace grabbed another one and tried shaking it to see if that worked.
Just then, a dark shadow loomed overhead, followed by a low, gruff laugh. It was a gray-colored axolotl, medium-sized. He was with one of the twins’ largest siblings—a patchy dark-blue-and-black axolotl, the one who had bitten Ace.
“Look at that, Milo!” The gray axolotl laughed, pointing at Ace and Jasper as they clung on to the snails. “They can barely hunt snails! These two don’t stand a chance.”
More axolotls came to watch, laughing and jeering as Jasper and Ace tried to get to the snails, but it was no good—they couldn’t pierce the thick, hard shells. The larger the crowd, the worse their stomachs ached with emptiness.
“Just ignore them,” Ace whispered. Already, he missed the cozy shelter of their egg, of a place that belonged only to him and Jasper.
Jasper glanced at Ace, his face getting redder and redder as he threw the snail to the rock angrily.
“You and the little runt won’t last a day in these waters,” Milo taunted. “Only the strongest survive down here.”
He eyed Ace. “In fact, you look more like prey than predator to me. It’s a shame your egg didn’t just get eaten. Would’ve been a much tidier ending.”
Ace gasped and turned to Jasper, defiant. “We can do this. Together, remember? We’ll be okay.”
Jasper gave Ace a strange look, his cheeks turning red, then he swam off angrily without saying a word, kicking up a big flurry of sand into Ace’s face.
Ace scowled at the brutish siblings who taunted him, then he spun to chase after his brother.
He found Jasper stalking a fish that was almost as big as he was.
Jasper clocked Ace and gave up the attack, huffing angrily. “If we can’t hunt, we can’t eat, and if we don’t eat, we’ll die!”
He paused, giving Ace that strange look again. “You’re too slow, Ace,” he started. “Maybe we should split up for a while, to hunt?”
“But you said we’d stay together,” Ace said, his voice starting to wobble as he fought back tears.
“We won’t survive if we stay together!” Jasper shouted, then he sighed and sat beside Ace.
“I’m so hungry, Ace. I need to eat. I have to eat!” He looked at Ace with the same hungry look Milo had given him, and Ace moved back a little. His twin brother didn’t seem menacing, but Ace no longer felt completely safe.
Jasper smiled a slightly crooked smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Gotcha tail!” he growled, pouncing at Ace. Ace spun away to get out of Jasper’s reach.
Jasper narrowed his eyes. “You’re getting faster,” he said. “But still not fast enough to escape me!”
Again he lurched at Ace, and Ace scrabbled back, using his legs to push himself along the lake bed.
Jasper snapped at Ace’s tail but missed again. “Almost got you that time!” Jasper said. “Stop it! I don’t want to play,” Ace cried.
Jasper’s eyes softened for a moment. “It’s just a silly game,” he said. “Like we used to play in our egg together. Just you and me, Ace.”
Ace started to smile, but Jasper attacked. He caught hold of Ace’s tail between his jaws.
“Gotcha tail!” Jasper said.
Ace started to laugh, relaxing into his brother’s playfighting, but then Jasper bit down, harder.
“Ouch!” Ace yelped. “Jasper, you’re hurting me!”
He wriggled, trying to break free from Jasper’s grip, but Jasper held on tight. He let out a low growl deep down in his throat as he bit down even harder.
Tears sprang to Ace’s eyes as searing pain spread through his tail and up his whole body.
He screamed and Jasper finally let go. A cloud of red from his tail bloomed in the water.
“Jasper!” Ace whimpered weakly.
He turned to face his brother, finally free from his grip, but could only stare in horror as he saw what Jasper now held in his mouth.
It was his tail. Completely detached from his body.
Stolen, like a hunting trophy.
As the pain and exhaustion hit him, Ace felt his eyes start to close as he sank to the lake floor. He barely recognized his brother as Jasper devoured Ace’s tail hungrily. Jasper gave Ace one final look, his face caught between sadness and anger, then he swam off without looking back.
There’s danger lurking in the depths of the lake. Ace learns this early—when his twin brother cruelly devours his tail and leaves him for dead. Separated from his family, Ace is cast into a perilous waterway. He is wary of trusting others, but his survival will depend on it as he navigates treacherous algae blooms and hunts for food while he waits for his tail to regenerate. And when he stumbles upon a glowing green axolotl named Ariel, he learns that, with training, axolotls can develop an incredible power: immortality. With high rewards come unspeakable risks, and Ace has been hurt before. But the potential to cheat death might be too hard to resist.
This action-packed adventure explores the strength that develops through adversity as Ace confronts bullying, betrayal, poisoned waters, and vicious predators, all while forming lasting bonds with the courageous axolotls he meets along the way.
Zephyr isn’t out to make friends. After a grueling escape from an axolotl breeding facility, all he cares about is being reunited with his sister, Luna. He places his trust in Neptune, a wise tiger salamander who promises to look for her. But the search is fraught, and Neptune refuses to venture above the surface at nightfall.
Feeling betrayed, Zephyr sets off on his own and soon encounters Jasper, an ambitious axolotl hungry for power. Zephyr quickly finds himself embroiled in a fight between some axolotls who believe regeneration is the key to survival and others who want to evolve into salamanders and roam free. The struggle for power is vicious, and there are many more dangers waiting for them around the lake.
This thrilling adventure is complete with legendary battles, incredible alliances, and a moving search for belonging at the heart of it all.