Chewy cussed and took the wipe, patting himself down. When Chewy was done and his weapon was again in place, Eli accepted the wipes. He found burned places on his arm and hand and wiped his head and neck.
Liz continued checking all their gear, wiping it here and there too. When she was satisfied, she pulled one of her battery stones out of the stone pack and placed the amulet necklace on it to recharge. Scrubbing her hands into the soil, she closed her eyes and blew out a breath. He knew she was reaching down for rocks below the surface, reaching deep. She frowned, which meant she wasn’t finding undisturbed stone, a bad thing for a stone witch looking for untapped power.
Her words quiet, she said, “We know several things about it and its power. It’s not moon called, because we’re close to the new moon, which makes it harder for were-creatures to achieve animal form. It isn’t any single animal we’ve seen before, but rather an amalgam of at least three: wolf, bear, and human, or possibly also something like chimpanzee. Its shoulders were built for swinging from trees. It’s carnivorous. It has fangs but also grinding teeth.” Casually she added, “I got a good look inside its mouth as it fell on top of my ward.”
Eli knew that meant they would likely have been dead or seriously wounded had herhedge of thornsward not gone up in time.
She continued, “Its saliva and blood are caustic. It’s not cleaning itself. Its claws were caked with filth, and so was its hair. It’s been in this form for a while. It’s sick. It can control wind, so the primate part of it—” She stopped. “Her? There were four visible teats but it was wearing pants, so external genitalia was hidden.” She shrugged, but she was frowning as she watched her cell.
Eli glanced at Chewy, who repositioned for a full range of cover fire. He moved behind her to watch the video.
Eli had no idea why the gender of the creature should matter. Unless… He studied the creature as it fell. Again. Mouth open, raging. The teats were stretched across its chest, but they didn’t lie flat, like on Chewy’s chest.
It was feeding… “Pups,” he said. “Probably weaning. Old enough to not need mother’s milk, but young enough to still need to be fed.” He cursed inside. “Pants, so the primate part was likely human. Chimps don’t wear pants.
Liz nodded. “Its human part is potentially an air witch. That downdraft was full of power. And I can’t reach significant stone here until I hit the outcropping at the base of the mountain, which is very strange. I’m getting scree and rounded pebbles and larger rock, but nothing tied to bedrock. Sand mixed with clay. It feels like a huge embankment, like sand piled up from a river.”
“There’s dirt like that in the Carolina foothills,” Eli said, “probably the result of the massive floods at the end of the ice age.”
“This ain’t no hill, Hoss.”
“No,” Eli said. “This is the top of a low mountain ridge. Which means the river that created it had to be huge.”
Chewy indicated downhill. Way downhill. “There’s a small river down there. If my internal compass is right, it’s part of the Broad River Basin. But it’s a tiny thing. No way it reached up here.”
“Maybe the entire Broad River basin once came through here for a while,” Liz said. “Then changed course, leaving only one small tributary. Doesn’t matter why. I’m going to be nearly powerless up here.”
“Our weapons didn’t seem to hurt it much, Hoss.”
Eli finally located the drone. The wind had smashed it into scrap. He took in the rolling crest of the hill, down the way they had come, along off to both sides, and then over territory they hadn’t covered yet—the direction the Dwayyo had vanished in. There were no screams, yowls, howls, or other sounds of fighting, so he figured Brute had not engaged the enemy. Or had been ambushed and was dead.
As if he had conjured the werewolf, Brute appeared, the grindy again on his back. The wolf was unbloodied and there were no burrs in his fur, so where had he gone?
“Brute,” Liz said. “The female Dwayyo. Does it have young?”
The wolf gave a slow nod, his eyes on her.
“Damn, damn, double damn,” his girl said. “How many? And are they mobile and able to hunt and fight?”
Brute
Finally someone was askingthe right questions. His eyes on the witch, Brute shook his head yes and then no. An ‘I don’t know,’ answer. He hadn’t managed to see the pups but he’d smelled them on her.
“Is the Dwayyo’s nest or home close?”
Nod.
“Are there any big rocks near the nest, like boulders buried in the dirt?”
Brute chuffed and nodded. He whirled and considered the faint scents on the breeze, nose in the air. Then he adjusted his angle and stuck his tail out straight, pointing his nose in the exact direction.Like a damn pointer dog.
“You are brilliant,” Liz murmured.
His ears flicked. Compliments went a long ways to assuaging his ego, but he’d be glad when his penance and his jobs in this form were over.
“Brute,” Eli said. “Can you get me up close and personal without us being scented or seen?”
Brute shook his head no. That thing knew they were close, and it was now in full on mama-beast-protective mode. Even as he thought that, the wind changed, blowing uphill, hard and fast. Overhead, limbs cracked. Leaves shot up at them in a whirlwind.
