Mira stops in front of the door and looks back at me. “You ready?”
I nod. I’m too nervous to speak.
She knocks.
“Coming,” a voice shouts in reply. I nearly break down in tears right then. The last time I heard this voice, it was being impersonated by a Nephilim creation, birthed by a breeder, and I was forced to kill it. My own mother.
The door swings open and there she is. Her hair has grayed, but only partially, and it’s just as wavy as I remember it. “Oh,” she says in surprise when she sees the large number of people standing outside her door. Then she notices Mira and her face lights up. “Mira, dear! How are you? We’ve been following your journeys. Mark keeps a box full of your photos. Seems like we have to add to it nearly every day.”
Mira embraces my mother. “Thank you, Beth. May we come in?”
My mom looks at the group again, this time meeting my eyes and showing no recognition. Her memory of me has been blocked, just as Merrill’s and Aimee’s were. The Clarks are living in Antarctica now, in what Merrill has deemed Clark Station Three. They’re studying the ancient human cultures that lived on the continent before it was buried beneath the ice. Merrill nearly passed out when he saw the paintings inside the nunatak.
“Sure,” my mom says. “I’ll get you and your friends something to drink.”
“Did I hear Mira?” my father says, rounding the corner into the hallway. His hair is still black and curly, but it’s receded to the sides and back of his head. He’s healthy and hale. His face lights up when he sees Mira. After giving her a big bear hug, he stands back and looks at the group. Once again, I’m not recognized. Though he is excited to see us. “You must be her friends from Antarktos! Come in, you have to tell me everything.”
Kainda puts a gentle hand on my shoulder. She knows how hard this is for me.
My dad leads the way through the front hallway. This house looks nothing like the one I grew up in. The style is all Southwestern. In fact, I can’t find a single relic of my past life. That is, until we pass the living room.
I stop in the doorway, staring.
The painting looks out of place. The lighthouse, and seascape are in stark contrast to the New Mexico feel of the home.
My father notices my attention on the painting when everyone else enters the kitchen with my mother.
“What is it, son?” he asks.
My heart skips a beat, but then I realize he’s using “son” as a generic term. He stands next to me. “It’s an ugly thing, that painting. But Beth likes it. Reminds her of the old house.”
“Why did you move?” I ask.
“I—I really don’t know.” He shrugs. “One day...it just didn’t feel like home any more.”
I turn to my father and ask, “Do you know who I am?”
He shakes his head, no.
“My name is Solomon.”
After a moment, his eyes widen. “The Solomon? The...the king?”
“Yes,” I say, exasperated by this response. “My full name is Solomon Ull Vincent.”
“Vincent?” he says, confused. “My last name is—”
“Vincent,” I say. “I know. I’m—” I stop. Trying to convince him is pointless. Even if he believed me, it wouldn’t change anything. I take his hand and recite a random sentence, spoken by my father in the past. “Summer in Antarctica begins in about seven weeks.”
He looks at me, dumbfounded. “Isn’t it always summer in Antarctica now?”
It didn’t work.
I had two fears about this trip. The first is that it wouldn’t work here. That I’d have to somehow get my parents to Antarctica to restore their memories. My second fear is that it wouldn’t work at all, no matter where we were. Xin gave me that ability to restore memories erased by the Nephilim, but maybe that gift only extended to the Clark family.
While my father is still impressed enough by my celebrity to not be worried about my strangeness, I say, “Mr. Vincent, can you have your wife join us? I’d like to ask you both something.”
“Uh, yeah, sure.” He heads for the kitchen.
While I’m waiting, I turn around and look at the painting again.
The painting!
I rush over to it, and pull the painting from the wall, revealing a safe. The same safe!
I turn the dial left and right, entering the combination: 7-21-38.
“Hey,” my father says, more confused than angry. “You can’t open that. It needs a combin—”
The safe door swings open silencing my father.
“Mark, what is he doing?” my mom asks.
The others have gathered around them. Nearly losing my mind, I rifle through the safe, spilling its contents on the floor until I find it. The pouch. Immediately, I know that something is different. There had been a photo inside, of my parents and the Clarks. It was inscribed with a note from Merrill, congratulating my parents on my birth. The Nephilim who erased me from history were thorough.
But the small, hard lump remains. I shake the stone out of the pouch. When it hits my hands, I feel a surge of power, not unlike the first time I held this stone, this fragment of Antarctica.
“Are...you okay?” my father asks.
Regaining my composure, I hold the stone up. “This is a part of Antarktos, a part of me.” I walk to my dumbstruck parents. The King of Antarktos has just broken into their safe and retrieved a small chunk of granite. “Just as the both of you are.”
Holding the stone beneath one thumb, I hold my hands out to both of them. “Take my hands.”
They look at each other, confused by the request, but Mira encourages them, saying, “It’s okay.”
They tentatively take my hands. I swallow, take a deep breath and then speak the words my parents said to me exactly seven thousand five hundred and thirty one times during the thirteen years I was with them, “I love you.”
Epilogue 2
Belgrave Ninnis stepped into the chilly darkness. His skin rose with goose bumps, and his bare limbs shivered. It had been a long time since he felt the biting chill of the underground. But it was not yet entirely foreign to him. A hunter never forgets these things. Of course, Ninnis wasn’t just a hunter. He was a husband. A father. And a man of honor.
He was also old, a fact that he was reminded of with every step of his upward journey. He walked without stopping, spurred onward by anticipation. Remembering his own training, he pushed through the pain until at last, he felt warm sunlight on his face. He stepped from the cave and found himself surrounded by lush green in every direction.
Without a location in mind, he set out, eating fruit from the land and drinking greedily from the clear flowing waters that he seemed to find whenever he grew thirsty. He walked for days like this until he found a stone path winding through the jungle. He looked in both directions, unsure of which direction to follow.
A distant thrumming grew louder. He recognized the sound and searched for a place to hide. But it was upon him too quickly. He turned to face the predatory dinosaur, but there was no need to fight. The dinosaur had a rider—a man with thick dark hair. The man gave a nod and removed his dark tinted sunglasses.
“You’re pretty far from anywhere useful,” the man said. “You want a ride?”
“On that?” Ninnis said.
“Are you new to Antarktos?” the man asked. “Are you lost?”
“No, but I’m afraid, yes.”
Accepting the man’s offer, Ninnis climbed onto the dinosaur’s back, finding a vacant second saddle waiting for him. They rode in silence for a long time, and Ninnis admired the jungle, the lushness of it, and the life. It reminded him of the place that had been his home for the past year.
As the sun began to set, the man finally said, “I never asked you where you were going?”
After a pause, Ninnis said, “To see the King.”
“You’re in luck, then,” the man said. “So am I.”
Not ten minutes later, a mountain citadel came into view. It was unlike anythi
ng Ninnis had ever seen before, in his time before Antarctica, as a hunter in the underworld or during his time in Tartarus. It occurred to him then, that far more than a year had passed. Nervousness swelled as he feared he was too late. “How many years has it been?” he asked, as they rode through the city gates, and were greeted with friendly waves from an assortment of people. “Since the war?”
The man looked back and said to himself, though Ninnis heard him clearly, “Man, I hope my memory doesn’t go some day.”
“Please,” Ninnis said. “How long?”
“Twenty years,” the man said.
Twenty years. Thank God.
The man tied the dinosaur to a post where several others were drinking from a fountain. “This way,” he said, leading Ninnis past a graveyard. Ninnis glanced at the stones. Some names meant nothing to him: Brigadier General Kent Holloway, Lieutenant Elias Baker, First Lieutenant Victor Cruz, Zok, Vesuvius. But others plucked at his heart, threatening to return a burden he had managed to leave behind in Tartarus. He read their names, one by one: Xin. Tobias. Cerberus. Hades. Zuh. Adoni. Men, women, and Nephilim who fought for what was right, against him, and sacrificed everything.
Ninnis looked up at the tower above. Its smooth surface, lacking any ornate décor, reflected the late day sun, glowing orange. The tower was surrounded by walls lined with trees, staircases and walkways. A flag blowing in the wind caught his attention. White, with an image of Antarctica, a single gold star at its core. He remembered seeing it on the battlefield, a symbol of mankind’s unity. Everywhere he looked, he saw people, living their lives in safety.
The sacrifices of the men, women and creatures lain to rest in this graveyard were not made in vain, Ninnis thought.
He paused by the last two sets of gravestones. He only knew one of them, but he knew who the others were and what they meant to Solomon. Dr. Merrill Clark and Aimee Clark, beloved parents who fought for us all. And then, Mark Vincent and Beth Vincent, beloved parents returned to the King. Wiping tears from his eyes, Ninnis noticed the dates and found all of them to be more recent than not. It wouldn’t make up for the years he’d stolen from the boy, but it was something.
“Can you handle a few stairs?” the man asked.
Ninnis nearly laughed. He’d already climbed out of the depths of the underworld. A few stairs wouldn’t hurt. But there were more than a few. He had to stop twice to rest.
“Need some help?” the man asked, sounding genuinely concerned and less sarcastic.
Ninnis sighed. “If you wouldn’t mind.”
They climbed the rest of the stairs together. “Where are we going?” Ninnis asked when they reached the top flight of stairs. Before them stood a pair of large wooden doors, arched at the top. Over the top of the arch was a capstone engraved with the words, None Shall Remove.
“To see the King,” the man answered.
“You can just walk in and have an audience with the King?” Ninnis asked. It didn’t sound logical or safe.
The man smiled. “No. I just happen to be his constable.”
“But...” Ninnis said, “I’m just an old man you plucked from the side of the road.”
The constable stopped with a hand on one of the doors. “Actually, he sent me to get you.”
“Sent you? Who?”
“The King, of course.”
The man shoved the door open and Ninnis froze. There before him was the last thing he expected to see. It was a banquet. An enormous bounty. But it was the people...hundreds of them, standing, staring at him.
The constable smiled and waved him inside.
Ninnis took an unsure footstep. Then another, lost in the sea of faces, until he stopped on one he knew. Solomon. The boy stood just ten feet away. But he looked so young, as though little time had passed. “S—Solomon?”
“No,” the boy chuckled. “I’m Luca. Sol is up there.”
Ninnis followed the young man’s finger to the center of the room, where a strong man with long blond hair, broad shoulders and a full beard stood smiling. Beside him was a woman whose strength radiated like the sun. Beside them sat several children, a veritable brood of them. As his eyes scanned to the side, he saw other faces he knew, aged, but living. These were Solomon’s friends, the ones who helped him save the human race.
Solomon cleared his voice and nodded to the constable, “Thank you, Justin.”
Solomon turned to Ninnis and smiled. “Welcome home, father,” he motioned to the children beside him. “Grandfather.”
Ninnis stared at the children, his grandchildren.
The emotion of it all weakened his weary legs. He feared he might fall, but a strong grasp held him up. He turned to find the blazing eyes of his daughter, Kainda, the Queen, who had left her spot by the King. She held him up like he weighed nothing at all. “I have you, father, and I will not let you go.”
He smiled at her, tears in his eyes, and said, “Nor I you.”
With a loud voice, Solomon proclaimed, “Tonight we celebrate the return of Belgrave Ninnis, who was dead, and is alive again. Who was lost, and is now found. We welcome him not just as father and grandfather, but as the man who lost his life, who endured torture, the breaking, and enslavement, and in the end, when the world was on the brink, managed to find a strength that is impossible to comprehend. He bound the darkness and removed it from our world.”
Cheers and clapping erupted around the dining hall.
King Solomon raised a glass in a toast. “To Ninnis! The man who saved us all.”
Fin.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Dear Reader,
You have just finished The Last Hunter – Collected Edition, a story that is close to my heart, and hopefully, now close to yours. I wanted to take a moment to thank you for reading. I hope you have enjoyed the journey and that you will come back for more adventures. I have plenty of other novels to entertain you before our hopeful, eventual, return to the realm of Antarktos. If you did enjoy the book, please show your support by posting a review online. Most online stores work on algorithms, meaning the more people review my books, the more those stores will recommend them to other readers. And the more people buy my books, the more I get to write them, which is a good thing for both of us (assuming you enjoyed the book). If you’d like to read more books in the Antarktos universe, be sure to say so in your review. Unlike other authors, I read every single one, and I pay attention to them. So head online and tell the world what you thought of this book.
To thank you for purchasing The Last Hunter – Collected Edition, I have included an exclusive short story, “The Children of Antarktos”, which creates the possibility for future Antarktos novels. I’ve also included an interview featuring questions from fans of the series. Thank you!
—Jeremy Robinson
www.jeremyrobinsononline.com
AN INTERVIEW WITH
JEREMY ROBINSON
What was your inspiration for The Antarktos Saga?
My inspiration for the Saga was actually my previously written novel Antarktos Rising, which parallels Book 3, Ascent. I created the world of Antarktos for that novel, and I decided I hadn’t explored it nearly enough. There was a whole civilization and thousands of years of history still to explore, not to mention the entire Antarctic continent and all the strange creatures that lived there. If we step back in time to when I first wrote Antarktos Rising, my initial inspiration was from the Biblical Nephilim. That these giants, who are recorded in many cultures worldwide, might have existed, is what initially captured my imagination. That they might still exist is what fueled my creative fires for Antarktos Rising, and subsequently for the entire Antarktos Saga and four years of writing. What would half-human, half-demon giants be like? What would they want? And more than that, where would such beings hide for thousands of years? The answers to those questions became Antarktos Rising and The Antarktos Saga.
The character of Solomon Ull Vincent seems so well rounded and real. How did you develop his personality and unique voice?
Solomon is based on two people I know very well. His childhood, growing up in the 70s and 80s, and living in New England, is basically me. The volcano he got for his birthday, drawing while watching Saturday morning cartoons, the root beer and pepperoni pizza party, even the layout of his house, are all straight out of my childhood. But his look and personality are based on the original Solomon, my son, who has the same hair, physique and intensity as Solomon in the story—well, he’s seven right now, so more like Luca. But most importantly, the fictional Solomon’s personality—his compassion, gentleness, curiosity and his capacity for forgiveness—is based on my son, who is the perfect example of those attributes. I started writing The Antarktos Saga when he was four, and I thought those parts of his personality might fade with age, but he’s even more gentle and compassionate now that he’s seven. So when I write Solomon Ull Vincent, it is very easy to get inside his head. In a very real way, he’s inside my head, and I’m probably a better person for it. He’s a good guy. I can only hope I’ll be as good.
The story draws from a lot of different source materials—the Bible, ancient mythology and modern conspiracy theories to name a few. What led to this strange amalgamation?
It’s not as strange as one might think. It was merely a process of connecting the dots. If we assume the Nephilim are real (which many people do) then we have to consider what they are. Not only are they described as giants, but they also sometimes have animal traits. This very quickly brings to mind humanity’s most ancient myths, where demigods—strange creatures and gods who mate with human women—are common. All of mankind’s ancient myths are very easily explained if the Nephilim are real, all the way back to the ancient Sumerians, who have their own Nephilim legends. Taking the description of the Nephilim and looking at cultures around the world, two things became apparent. There are recorded encounters with giants in nearly every culture on Earth. Similarly, those cultures also have global flood myths, which very nearly wiped the Nephilim out. But, as the Bible records, “there were Nephilim on the Earth in those days, and also afterward.”
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