"Art is a step from what is obvious and well-known toward what is arcane and concealed."

― Kahlil G.

River can't help but feel paranoid. The tribe she has seen loitering around the streets were elders wearing capes with silver wolf insignias over their leather tunics. And they were all looking wary at her.

Terror gripped her hard at their guarded looks, wishing she hadn't seen one too many thriller movies. A strange foreigner walking among their tribe, what could go wrong?

She suppressed a shudder, remembering that no one actually wanted to see her dead. Far from it, actually. They wanted a gift. But if she made one wrong step, one misstep that indicated that she might not be what they thought she would be, then would they call her a witch and punish her for fraud?

U'tu led her down the avenue and upon reaching the end of the block, it opened up to a clearing paved with wide open space and pale-brown rocks were tiled together on the floor in a manner that resembled a giant sun. It was close to looking like a central square park where few tribe elders were out in the sun doing lectures to enraptured students. Without missing a beat, the boy strutted down the pavement with the unmatched moxie of a king. No worries pulling him down or even fear holding him back. For a kid, he radiated confidence.

She had always wondered what it was like to live without fear. Therapy, independence, and a stable job didn't do it for her. Each day would bring new worry, new questions — did I do enough for the day? What do I have to worry about tomorrow? Is there something I need to remember?

Her smartphone is blown up with reminders, due dates, and organized lists that lived rent-free in her mind everyday, its shadows never brooking vacations. There was always something to be worrying about.

Even now, new worrying questions were forming in her head. Am I really what they think I am —a behagthi?

U'tu made a beeline towards the entrance of the grandest tent in the entire village. It was seated at the heart of the whole tribe and its sheer size was colossal enough as if it might pierce the heavens itself. Circling around the massive main tent were tons of smaller tents adjoining it. The architectural style reminded her of a milky way in space where a singular giant center has hundreds of smaller planets circling around it like a full-blown galaxy.

Then, the cocky kid greeted an obnoxiously tall guy standing guard at its entrance "Early morning to you, warrior. Have you done something new with your hair?"

"Who are you here for, U'tu?" the guard asked.

He shrugged, "It's my business to know."

He sighed, opening the flaps with a sweep of his arm, "Put her hood up, I can smell her from a mile away."

"I'm called River." she said point-blank to him, entering through the door.

His jaw was set, determined to look in the distance like he hadn't heard her.

"Good seeing you, warrior." U'tu called out from afar then gestured for River to follow.

"Unbelievable." she muttered as she raised her hood "The guy talked about me as if I wasn't right in front of him. Whose duty is it to teach about manners around here, anyway? They aren't doing a very good job."

The boy's steps didn't falter as he kept on walking forward, leading her to a long winding hallway with a series of open-arched doorways, "It is not for us to be speaking to anyone outside the tribe. Keep your hood down, teh?"

She saw and heard elders keen on hashing out lectures from every doorway they passed, voices of kids murmuring questions and strangely the noise didn't echo like an overlapping crow of a racket.

She licked her lips, tension thrumming on the back of her neck. It was strange how their voices aren't echoing in the empty spaces like it would in a normal building. Maybe it's because the walls are made of fabric? Was she in a normal building?

Or worse, this building could be a serious hazard for disaster.

"Where are you taking me?" she asked, her mouth dry and feeling like the building could collapse at any moment.

"I wanted to see the wolf, my sun prince."

"Why?"

"They are taking him away to the Snow tribe later. This might be the only chance I'll be getting to see him."

"Should we be doing this? I mean, won't we get in trouble for this?"

"Do not worry so much about that. The sun tribe is a teaching culture. The worst thing they can do to you is have you write scrolls of texts or listen to an hour long lecture about rules."

"That is a punishment? We used to do that everyday for 18 years called school —by force or else we starve and die on the streets." she said, remembering the lecture she received from her grandpa about taking school seriously.

"I'm so sorry to hear that." he said, "That must have been hard. I can't even imagine having to do it everyday. I'll go mad."

"But, isn't this a school too?" she asked, looking up and up and up. The sight took her breath away. It was like being in a grand cathedral where ceilings stretched upwards in grand heights but instead of stone and marble, the ceiling was an upward dome of a tent made with a thick stretch of beige fabric. And sunlight from outside brightened the wall fabrics of the tent making it glow in golden light.

"Vella Kiniste Mue," he said, "It means "Meeting of the minds" in our first language. No one is here by force."

"Unless they are being punished?"

He laughed, nodding "Yes."

"I imagine you get punished a lot?" She teased.

"I do not mind it so much. I get better every time. It makes me the best."

She rolled her eyes, "The trouble you must find yourself in."

"It is not my fault." he said lightly. "Trouble has a way of finding me."

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"Yeah. They all say that."

"Who?"

"Trouble-makers."

"Not a trouble-maker." he said, disappearing into a double door open archway.

Inside it was the center of the domed tent where the top-most point of the tent shot up at a towering height, she had to crane her neck way up to see it and she marveled how the glow of the sun outside had brightened the paintings up on the ceiling.

"A gift from a behagthi." the boy explained as she followed where her gaze went. Then he disappeared as he slipped right in between rows of bookshelves "Come on, they're right over there."

She came to discover that the central area of this massive tent was a library and within it were the trappings of a classic museum;more ceiling paintings, white marble statues and display boxes filled with miniature jewelries.

Following U'tu, she found him in another fire-hazard campfire. Inside a freaking library. The grouchy Bla'keh was sitting on a log bench next to the fire, a large book sprawled on top of his thigh.

U'tu crept up behind him without making a sound.

Bla'keh made no move to look up from his ancient book, "We are to be left alone."

"I hear you need help." U'tu said plainly, waving a greeting to the giant wolf who emerged between bookshelves.

Bla'keh grunted, scribbling a note in his smaller book that sat on his other thigh, "How much help does it look like I need?"

"I offer a second opinion and as it turns out it is a behagthi's specialty."

The shaman poring over his book curled his upper lip at the wolf's direction, "As you desire, my sun prince."

Without saying a word, he moved to River in a single flash of a second and pushed his book against her chest with the boy nodding to her with encouragement.

She peered down to see the book was browning on the edges. It had looked smaller in his hands but its weight was equal to a bag of bricks. She smiled, trying to seem nonchalant at the sudden massive weight of burden on her arms. Raising her chin with as much dignity as possible, she slowly shifted to the nearest log bench and placed the book on it.

It was filled with notes and translation written in English.

U'tu took a peek and whistled, "You do a lot of this by yourself?"

"Scarcely any stone left unturned. I've checked every possible interpretation. There is no denying the accuracy for my work."

"How about linguistic homonyms?" she asked, noticing the prophecies were structured like free-form poetry. "Double meanings?"

Bla'keh crossed his arms, "Explain yourself."

"Back in my world, a single word can have double meanings to it."

He snorted, "Impudence. Why aren't words themselves sufficient to convey meaning? Have you ran out of words in your universe? Words are made up, why even settle for double meanings? Foolish."

She shrugged, "It might have to do because our language is constantly evolving and there isn't a language we use that is set in stone. It changes, the word changes, and sometimes the meaning changes as it evolves through the exchange of dialects and colloquialism. That way we humans evolve our language on a constant and ever-expanding basis, but, some experts might be in the opinion of saying that we're devolving into our pictographic language roots. This from our archaic use of memes, gifs, and emojis to convey meaning." she mumbled.

Squinting his eyes, he asked. "You call yourselves 'humans' as a species?"

"Yes. What do you call yourself?"

"As a species, we call ourselves 'tribe'. Simple as that. Nothing as foolish-sounding as humans."

She shrugged off his comment. One good takeaway about being a professional internet blogger was developing a thicker skin for criticism and even more so, for food bloggers. Tons of food critics used to swarm over her work like salivating hyenas with mocking vendettas. Bla'keh's snippy attitude was nothing compared to the most ruthless, vindictive critics of the internet. Instead, she pointed out a line in the book, "This says, 'Champion of the Age' what does it mean?"

"It translates to 'War Hero'." said the shaman elder.

River read the whole passage on the sun prince prophecy, "How would you define War Hero?"

"Someone who has made most of the kills in wars."

U'tu helpfully said, "You were watching championships yesterday, teh? Remember the warrior wearing silver steel as armor? Every tribe across the lands has officially dubbed him Champion of the Age because of his two trips to Fire Gulf Sea." he said, awe in his tone, "An estimate of 200 kills. Next to the black poisoning of last year, his kills are superior to none. He is a hero."

"Black poisoning?" she said, wondering about the familiarity to Europe's history.

Bla'keh sneered, fury darkening his eyes when it landed on her.

U'tu looked away when a blanket of quiet fell over the museum library. The wolf gave a mournful howl, his tail flicking.

The boy gulped and turned back to her. "The behagthi who came before you arrived 5 years ago. It was the snow tribe who welcomed him."

Bla'keh growled, "Snow tribe. Of all the tribes he could have landed. It had to be them."

Wrinkling his nose, the boy added "They are not known for their hospitality."

"Understatement, U'tu. Poison, all of them are poison. Soon as they got their claws on a behagthi, they poisoned him too."

"We can hardly blame them." he said, wryly.

"What happened?" she asked.

"What did you think happened?" the shaman's brows lowered, "They took advantage of the Great World's gift of behagthi and twisted him into a scourge upon this land. He himself created poisons, a rare god-given ability in our millennium, and wasted it away to sell it to the highest bidders."

"Behagthi's Poisons. That is what they are calling them. He took control of the snow mountain's poison and poisoned us all in return." the boy nodded.

"He is easily responsible for the deaths of thousands."

"Where is he?" River asked.

Bla'keh paced near the fire with his arms crossed, "At the snow tribe, right in their tower stronghold. It's where they imprison tribespeople for rehabilitation or death. Guess which sentence he falls into?" he scoffed "Serves him right to die in that tower to pay for his crimes. "

U'tu added, "In the snow tribe, no one who comes in ever comes out. It's why no one was able to rescue him when he arrived. Their mountains have some kind of poison in it that pollutes the air. It's way too dangerous for anyone."

"Isn't that where you're sending your sun prince?"

"He is Brumcia's Beloved." Bla'keh said with confidence. "Defeater of the Champion of Age. No harm will befall him."

"I don't understand. If he is the best out of everyone, then what does he need protection for?"

Bla'keh made a mocking sneer, "I figured you were here to help, not pester me with questions like a jangly student. Get out of my sight."

The wolf barked in succession, leaving the shaman pale-stricken.

U'tu grabbed for her hand and wrenched her aside, flinging worried glances back at the campfire. "He's protective of you. Best to get you out of harm's way."

"U'tu, I'm gonna go with him to the snow tribe."

"What part of 'getting you out of harm's way' don't you get? You can't. You won't be able to leave. You can't even run like normal, you walk in a glacial speed and—" he leaned in to whisper under his breath, "We can smell your stinking mortality"

She bent on her knees as she shrugged off his barbed words, leveling her gaze to his, "I think this War Hero the prophecy must be talking about is the behagthi from five years ago."

"He is no Hero. He is a stone-cold murderer, through and through. He has got no honor and no virtue. There's nothing heroic about him. He couldn't be."

"Look. I know that what I'm saying is different but where I come from, 'Champions' are conquerors who murder and pillage no matter what reason they do it for. 'Champions' are bullies who capitalize and take advantage of the weak. This guy is it, U'tu. I think he must be the reason why I'm here. To set right the wrong he has done to this world. To lead your sun prince into defeating him."

He grew quiet, a muscle under his jaw straining in pressure.

She continued "The sun prince is the wolf, am I right? If he is destined to defeat the champion, then I must be there to help him."

"The wolf says it is too dangerous for you." he said, his eyes growing unfocused.

She laughed nervously, "Hate to break it to you, but I was sent here to fix some unknown chaos of a problem. If what you said about the Red Spider story is true then I have a strong feeling that fixing something would bring me back home. So, tell that wolf, it doesn't matter what he thinks. Once I set my mind on something, I do it. And wherever trouble is, I'll be there. Because I'm gonna fix it."

U'tu grinned showing his fanged teeth, "Now who is the troublemaker?"

Her mouth curling up at the side, she teased his words back at him, "Trouble has a way of finding me."