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

We live like subterranean Neanderthals for a time, getting to know each other—two men living off the land—like hunters. I enjoy this time of bonding, of camaraderie. Ninnis is as good a friend as I’ve ever had.

I sleep and dream of egg-monsters. They dance around me. They fall at my feet, worshiping me, chanting the name, “Nephil.”

The vision fades as I’m nudged awake. Ninnis stands above me, his belongings slung over his back in a bundle of skin. “Time to go,” he says. “There’s something I want to show you.”

I gather my things, bundling food, scooping water in a skin and donning my climbing claws (Ninnis was impressed by them, but only recently told me so). He leads me through a tight passage. It’s tall enough to stand in, but very narrow. On the other side, Ninnis says, “Keep track of the small spaces you see. Remember them and they will save your life.”

I nod, but am not sure what could threaten Ninnis’s life. He seems a King in this underground realm. The tunnel beyond the tight fissure is vast, carved out by the river that falls into what was our living space. Erosion has smoothed out the river bed, but a sea of boulders skirts the eight foot wide waterway. It’s over these giant stones that we travel. Crystals glitter from the cavern ceiling and from many of the boulders. Ninnis stays in the darkest parts of the tunnel. He’s following a path I think he has traveled many times in the past.

After several hours I realize that we have been heading steadily up, but it’s not until the first hint of daylight strikes me that I realize how far up we’re going. The distant light is really just a speck, but feels intense on my eyes.

“Here,” he says, holding something out to me. I take the strange thing and look at it for a moment. Then I remember what they are and what they’re for.

“Sunglasses,” I say.

“Got them from a gatherer.”

I stop. He hasn’t mentioned gatherers before. In fact, he has said very little of the world in which I now live. “A gatherer?”

“Later,” he says. “Put them on when the light becomes unbearable, but you will eventually have to operate in daylight without them.”

“We go outside?”

He nods. “Occasionally. If ordered.”

“Like when you got me?” I ask.

“Exactly.”

I follow him over a line of stones that looks like a ruined wall. “What are we called?”

He looks back at me, confused by the question. I explain. “If there are gatherers, then there must be names for everything else in this world.”

A smile stretches across his face. “You’re quick. I can see why they chose you, Ull.”

Ninnis has been calling me by my middle name all along. So much so that I’m not sure what my first or last name was. I know I had them, but like everything else down here, my memory of them is a fog. All that remains is Ull. And when Ninnis finally answers my question, I know why he chose to use that name.

“There are gatherers, warriors, seekers, feeders, breeders, thinkers, and us.”

I lean forward expectantly.

“The hunters.”

I smile wide. Ull, the Norse god of the hunt. This pleases me.

One hundred yards from the tunnel exit, I can no longer bear the light. I put on the sunglasses and find they only offer partial relief. Ninnis is squinting but requires no artificial aid. The exit is a small hole dug into a wall of blue ice. Through the tunnel is a circle of blue sky. The tunnel is horizontal, so I realize we must be high up. Inside a mountain perhaps.

Ninnis pauses by the exit and reaches into his pack. He pulls out a small device and holds it out to me. I take it and flip the copper cylinder in my hands. For a moment, I don’t recognize it. Then, in a flash, I do. I take hold of one end and pull. The telescope expands.

I think I’ve used one before. Maybe even had one of my own.

“You like it?” Ninnis asks.

“Very much.”

“Good.”

“It’s for me?”

Ninnis nods. “A gift.”

“For what?”

Ninnis chuckles like I’m silly for asking. “For your birthday, of course.”

Some part of my brain, perhaps the part in charge of numbers, isn’t totally blurred out and I think, I’ve been here for eleven months.

“How is that possible?” I ask.

He understands what I’m asking. To me, and possibly him, it feels like a month, two at the most, has passed.

“Time is different here,” he says. “Outside, time moves faster. For us, we only met weeks ago. In that time outside, several months have passed. If I were to tell you how long I have lived here, I might say ten years. But in the outside world, perhaps one hundred years have passed.

“You’re one hundred years old?” I ask, eyes wide.

Ninnis grins. “I was thirty-four when I arrived.”

“One hundred and thirty-four years old...How is that possible?”

“A gift that now belongs to you. Your body will age as though it were still in the outside world despite your perception of time being different. But your body will resist the deterioration of age with uncommon resilience.”

“And when I reach your age, I will train my replacement?”

Ninnis shakes his head. “From what I understand, you are to be the last hunter.”