The Path of the Four

The boat was wide, and sturdy.

Voh-Heem stood in the front, holding a torch, pointing left or right as he had to.

Behind him, Ariana Orlando and Peter Hargrove rowed.

In the back sat Joe, his finger on the control ring of the nerve cuff that Hargrove still wore.

And so through the night the boat went.

“I’m supposed to be ‘The One Who Will Complete Us’?” Hargrove grunted as he brought the oar up and back into the water. “Anyone want to explain that to me?”

“Why should we explain anything to you?” Joe’s voice had an unnerving calm that Ariana didn’t believe in.

“I don’t know, Hargrove, if I can explain it,” Ariana said as she rowed. “Something about how the human idea of evil contrasts with the--”

“I told you. I’m not evil.”

“Shut up and listen to the lady, Pete.”

“--With the Zah-Gre idea of ’out of balance.’” Ariana hesitated. “I just found out that Corridor One wasn’t a surprise to the Zah-Gre.”

Voh-Heem shot her a quick scowl over his shoulder.

“You’re shitting me,” Hargrove said.

“No. We’ve never been that big of a disruption to them. It’s just a question of knowing how we need to fit into what they’re doing.”

“Yeah, right, swell.” Hargrove grunted again from the rowing. For a traveling assassin, he had an awful disregard for physical labor. “In-door plumbing is exotic to the Zah-Gre and we have to big fit in with them. That makes tons of sense. Hey, no offense up there.” Hargrove was looking at Voh-Heem. “Right, buddy? Right?” Hargrove glanced at Ariana. “Did he go deaf or something?”

“He’s ignoring you, Pete,” Joe said. “Smart guy.”

The assassin wasn’t done with his questions.

“How can he even see where to go out here? There aren’t even any stars out, that we can see, to navigate by.”

“You want to take that one, science lady?”

“Sure, Joe. One or a combination of factors. Voh-Heem might be sensitive to a smell or smells coming from the Center Land.” Ariana felt odd talking about Voh-Heem as if he wasn’t there. “On Earth, certain ancient sites of worship have been found to have extraordinary, unusual high concentrations of electromagnetic energy. It’s possible that’s one of the elements that drew ancient worshipers to those sites, since that would affect the chemical and electrical aspects of the Human organism. The Center Land might be giving out that type of energy and Voh-Heem, since he lives here, is sensitive to it and we aren’t, like with smells. Or --”

“Or what?” Hargrove asked.

Ariana was getting as sick of Hargrove’s question as Joe was.

“Or maybe it’s magic,” she said.

Ariana was tired. Very tired. She tried to calculate how much sleep she had gotten since Hargrove had assassinated Ab-Druh, but gave up after a few minutes.

After several hours, a beach came into dim and shadowy view.

About a hundred yards up from the beach was a line of boulders that stretched in both directions as far as the eye could see.

Ariana couldn’t see anything behind those boulders.

Voh-Heem signaled her and Hargrove to slow down as the boat came closer to the beach. It took Ariana a moment to realize that the light that was allowing her to see all this couldn’t just be coming from the torch Voh-Heem carried. There must have been other light, coming from just beyond those boulders.

The boat continued to coast in until it settled on the edge of the beach.

Ariana wondered how to carry out the next part of her plan, the part that involved contacting the Lower Clan.

A spear hurtled over the wall of boulders and landed, deep and hard, in the sand by the boat. Joe just had time to mumble, “Well hi right back at ya, guys,” when other spears, identical to the first one, came hurtling over the wall of boulders and landed in the sand all around the boat, putting the boat in a type of cage.

Ariana wished she had an opportunity to examine the construction of one of these spears. They appeared, more than possible, to ground themselves in the wet sand.

From out behind gaps in the wall of boulders, they appeared.

There were thirty of them. A dozen carried torches. The rest carried spears. Some dressed in loincloths, and some in robes. The black dot in a circle insignia of the Lower Clan appeared here and there on them, on clothing in, jewelry, and so on.

In the center of this line of Lower Clan was a native who held neither torch nor spear, and wore a robe. Ariana assumed he was some type of leader.

The slender, narrow face, the sharp cheekbones, the bulging eyes, the Lower Clan logo as a scar on his forehead -- This was the Lower Clan native who had come out of the passing crowds and confronted her that first day on Zah-Gre.

The Lower Clan natives all came together a few feet in front of the boat. They all kept their eyes trained on the boat, on Ariana and her companions, on the visitors.

She laid down her oar in the boat. Hargrove saw this, shrugged, and did the same thing.

She made the smallest possible nod, directed toward Voh-Heem.

Voh-Heem spoke, the message he, Ariana, and Joe had agreed to, and for the first time Ariana heard the Lower Clan language. So Ariana didn’t know the words, but knew the meaning:

“My fellow Zah-Gre. Some of you know me. I am Voh-Heem, of the Al-Crow Ro-Wil Am-Kay Morg-Zah. I am Side Clan, and I was the attendant to Ab-Druh of the Ard-Lo Ev-Kul Mar-Bru Morg-Zah, and Inner Clan of the North Land. Here is the one who removed him from shell.”

Voh-Heem gestured to Hargrove.

The Lower Clan Zah-Gre murmured and mumbled, and the apparent leader silenced them all with a gesture.

“Here is Ariana Orlando, Human, of the Orlando and Rivera ‘families’ of Camden, New Jersey, the United States of America, Earth, and of the Carne-Tischler Corporation. Now Inner Clan of the North Land.”

Voh-Heem gestured at Joe. Joe nodded at the Lower Clan natives.

“A friend of Ariana Orlando’s. Joseph Whitney, of the Whitney and Briggs ‘families’ of New Albany, Mississippi, of the United States of America, Earth, of the Universal Resistance League, and of the Carne-Tischler Corporation.”

Voh-Heem gestured at Hargrove again.

“Ariana believes that this human is ‘the One Who Will Complete Us’ of Center Land prophecy. She cannot compel you but, with respect, asks that you respect her judgment.”

The group in the boat waited.

Ariana heard the sound of the lapping tide, the wind, the crackling torches, her breathing, and her beating heart all mix.

The leader of the group on the beach strode forward. He gripped one of the spears that circled the boat and broke it off near the bottom, and tossed it aside. He did the same thing to the two next to it.

Joe stood, keeping his finger on the control ring of the nerve cuff Hargrove still wore.

“OK, Peter. On your feet. Time to meet your new friends and neighbors.”

Hargrove frowned, his mouth twisted in contempt, but he winced, and got up and stepped through the new gap in the spears surrounding the boat.

Commanded by a few exotic gestures of the Lower Clan leader that he made so fast Ariana would never be able to describe them, five of the Lower Clan moved forward, and surrounded Hargrove.

Joe manipulated the control ring.

The nerve cuff popped off Hargrove’s wrist and plummeted into the sand.

Hargrove’s eyes darted back and forth but hope for escape seemed to drain from his face.

Compelled by how close they had him boxed in, Hargrove walked with the five Lower Clan as they rejoined the rest of the group, and then the whole group retreated behind the boulders.

The Lower Clan leader stayed with the boat.

That confused Ariana. The purpose of the visit was to fulfill “the One Who Will Complete Us” prophecy and stop the invasion before it happened. Was there something else the Lower Clan leader wanted to do--or say to Voh-Heem?

When it was clear that Hargrove and the Lower Clan had disappeared deep into the heart of the Center Land, the Lower Clan leader turned to the ones who remained on the boat.

He looked at Joe and Ariana, reached into his robe, and pulled out a medallion he had been wearing that displayed the symbol of a huge black dot.

“I am Faz-Gar, Inner Clan of the Center Land. Joseph Whitney passed his test earlier. I am pleased, Ariana Orlando, you just passed yours.”