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

The water is freezing cold. The centipede on my arm reacts immediately, trying to unwrap itself from my arm. But I hold on tight. I’m going to need it if I escape the river.

As I’m swept away, I look back and see that a few of the centipedes have fallen into the water. They writhe and then slip beneath the waves. Drowned and dead. The rest pile up along the shore, heads tracking me as I’m carried away. Behemoth might be dead, but Tartarus has a new guardian.

I lose sight of them as I’m pulled into the cavern’s sidewall and plunged into darkness.





11



After being pummeled by miles of racing rapids that twist through the underworld, I manage to scramble out of the widening waters and pull myself up onto a slab of gray stone. The centipede on my arm has long since drowned, but it’s still attached in a death grip. As my energy wanes, I unravel the creature from my arm and tug each mandible out of my flesh. I barely feel it thanks to the numbing cold of the river, but my blood flows freely. As I sense unconsciousness looming, I unhitch Whipsnap from my belt and use the mace end to bludgeon the centipede’s head. There’s no way to know if the centipede’s physiology was affected by consuming Behemoth and I don’t want to risk it reviving while I sleep.

I glance down at the twin wounds in my forearm. The blood is dripping onto the stone and running into the river. I should really take care of it. The scent of blood will draw predators to me. But my exhausted body gives me no choice. I lie down as my vision fades and place my head on stone ground.




“Have a cookie,” Aimee says to me. She’s standing in her room at Asgard, but there is a modern oven. She pulls out a tray of steaming cookies and holds it out to me. The cookies are centipede heads. “They’re just as sweet as brown sugar. Just don’t tell anyone I gave one to you or they’ll slit my throat.” The words are spoken with a broad white grin, as though everything is just dandy.

“Can I have one?” asks a small voice that I recognize.

I look at myself sitting in the corner. I’m six years old. And hungry. So hungry. I watch myself pick up a centipede head cookie and eat it with gusto. The cookie disappears in three bites and then the boy-me licks his fingers. “Thank you, Mrs. Clark.” Then, strangely, he notices me. How can I notice myself in a dream?

I look confused. Then, with a flash of wide-eyed excitement, the boy-me says, “Solomon? Is it really you?”

Now I’m confused. I’m talking to myself?

“Solomon, don’t you recognize me?” the boy says. “It’s Luca.”




“Luca!” I sit bolt upright, wide awake. I’m in the cave by the river.

Was it really Luca? In the past, the six-year-old version of me has seen events through my eyes. Usually moments of high emotion. But that bond has been broken for three months while I was in Tartarus. Perhaps being chased by the centipedes retriggered that connection, but it was delayed so that it occurred during my dream, instead of during the actual high stress event? That’s my best guess, anyway.

Pain pulses up my arm and begs for my attention. The wound is caked in dry blood, as is much of the stone upon which I lay. Strange, I think, a predator should have found me. I was an easy meal, and easy meals in the underground are essentially unheard of. Not that I’m complaining. Not being eaten in my sleep is a good thing. I just don’t understand it.

Several needs strike me all at once. In the three months I spent in Tartarus, I neither ate nor drank. Sustenance was not required there. I slide down to the water’s edge, dip my good arm into the frigid water and cup several mouthfuls to my lips. While I’d like to dunk my head in the water and drink until my belly distends, I remember my hunter discipline and ration it out, careful not to shock my dehydrated system. After drinking, I wash the dry blood from my arm. The river sweeps the red powder downstream. A predator is eventually going to come calling.

Momentarily sated, I slide back up the bank and turn my attention to the centipede. The small knife I carry is quite sharp. It’s the perfect tool for separating the sinewy flesh that holds the centipede’s shell together. I carve along both sides, and then reach under the base of the carapace, which was severed from the head when I crushed it. With a quick yank, three feet of segmented centipede carapace peels away, revealing a row of segmented dollops of rank, white flesh. At first glance, the meat looks solid, like lobster, but when removed from the body, it turns to something like pasty oatmeal slathered in lard.