War Cry

by Brian McClellan

  The entire transformation takes seconds, and I can see Rodrigo fighting with Benny to accommodate the weight of my sorcerous form. He flashes five fingers at me. Four. Three. Two. One. Benny’s right wing dips slightly and I let go of the straps to slide down the wing and tumble through the air. I land on the cargo plane’s roof with a thud, my talons scrabbling for purchase, scratching at the metal until I’m able to arrest my sliding fall by digging into the seams between rivets.

  Every muscle strains as I try to hold on, my heart hammering in my chest, my eyes blurry. It’s several moments before I realize that I am perfectly secure and think to wave the okay to Rodrigo above me. He lays off the throttle and Benny slips back behind the cargo plane so my friends can watch my progress.

  I dig claws into the rivets, shearing them out like children digging for the meat of a walnut. I get on my knees, using what leverage I can to cut away the metal sheeting with my claws, and then bending back the corners with the strength that only a Changer possesses. Metal squeals as I peel it away.

  There is a popping sound. At first I think it’s a rivet, then maybe the cargo plane’s engine. A second pop is more familiar, and by the third I see the bullet holes in the roof. I’m able to see an enemy: a bright-faced, scared-looking man with a pistol, shouting frantically toward the cockpit. I reach through the hole and snag him through the wrist with a single claw, jerking upwards to slam him against the roof of the plane, and then dropping his body. My claws come back slick with blood. I finish carving an opening and drop down inside.

  The plane is loaded to the ceiling with supplies. I take a moment to wonder at all the medicine and gas and rations, my stomach letting out a gurgle despite the adrenaline rushing through my veins.

  There are five men inside. One is already dead, his neck bent at an unnatural angle, his arm bleeding all over a tin labeled “desert rations.” A second draws his pistol and fires at me. My ears ring from the sound of the shots. Bullets slam into my chest, driving me back a half step but having no more lasting effect to my sorcerous skin than a toy pellet gun.

  I cut off his gun-hand at the wrist with my claws while the copilot unbuckles. Through the ringing in my ears I can hear the pilot screaming into the radio. There’s a sudden gust, nearly knocking me off my feet as the third guard opens the side-loading cargo door. I spin to him, only to receive the heavy end of a fire extinguisher to the bridge of my nose. Dazed by the sound of the gunshots I clutch for some kind of purchase as the copilot kicks at my legs, trying to get me to fall back through the cargo door.

  I rise to my full height, bracing myself against the roof, and snatch the copilot by the head, his face fitting neatly in the palm of my hand, and fling him out the cargo door behind me. The third guard struggles to load a submachine gun, and I take it from him and grapple him toward the door. We both slip and slide on the blood, but I dig into the metal with my talons and throw him after the copilot.

  I catch sight of something outside the cargo door and see that Rodrigo has brought Benny up beside me. I realize the change of plans as Selvie unbuckles and shakily gets to her feet. I move quickly to the cargo door, setting my talons and one clawed hand, and reach out with the other. In a burst of courage I know I would lack, Selvie lets go of the securing straps and sprints down the wing, leaping toward me. I snag her one-handed from the air, careful not to dig in with my claws, and bring her safely inside.

  She pats my chest, her face flushed, as I set her down. Outside the cargo door I can see Rodrigo cackling like a fool, and Bellara peeking up from the cockpit beside him. Benny pulls away and blinks out of existence as Bellara’s sorcery conceals her.

  “There’s still the pilot!” I shout into Selvie’s ear, pointing toward the cockpit. She reaches for her pistol, but I see a sudden panic in her eyes. I toss her deeper into the cargo plane, turning to face whatever gunfire the pilot is about to unleash on me, but am suddenly slammed into from the side.

  The pilot is a big man, muscled and fat, and clearly used to a brawl. His punches do less to me than the bullets from his comrades, but he leans his weight into me, bullheaded. I stumble back, my talons no longer catching purchase on the floor, and reach for something to steady myself.

  There is nothing there.

  I windmill once, managing to snag the pilot by the front of his shirt as we both tumble out the cargo door. My confidence is suddenly undone. There is nothing solid beneath me, beside me, or above me. I am falling, trembling, with only an enemy to hold on to.

  The last thing I see before I hit the ground is Selvie’s stricken face poking out of the cargo door.

  * * *

  A few-hundred-foot fall does not kill a Changer. It hurts. It hurts like hell. I am frozen with indecision and fear as my brain regains control of my body. I can still hear the drone of the cargo planes in the distance, so I have not been unconscious long. I twitch a finger, experimenting, then move my wrist.

  My pelvis is shattered, I think, but I can still turn at the waist. I am convinced I have broken an ankle, but it bears my weight without wrenching a scream from my mouth. Slowly my body begins to obey my commands again.

  I lie halfway in one of the small fissures that crisscross the plains, and I am covered with blood. For several minutes I worry it’s mine and search for my wounds. It isn’t long before I find the enemy pilot nearby. Or what’s left of him. The fall killed him instantly, I am glad for that, because I have had to put men out of their misery before.

  Unsteadily I gain my feet, searching the horizon. I spot two cargo planes in the distance, watch as they turn lazily through the air, heading back to the air base, no doubt worried about another enemy attack. I do not see Benny or the captured cargo plane, and wonder if Selvie has managed to take her home. There are no plumes of smoke in the sky, so she has not crashed. I can only assume that everyone has done their jobs well.

  Everyone except for me. I try to clean myself with the tattered remains of my shirt, but give up when I realize that the enemy cargo planes will come back overhead. I climb back into the fissure and lie still, hoping that they take me for dead and report the loss.

  I lie caked in the blood of the pilot for most of the afternoon. Enemy aircraft crisscross overhead. They are looking for the stolen cargo plane, I tell myself, though there is a small part of me that is certain they are looking for me. I hope they do not bother to send a ground scouting party and pass the time by thinking of all the supplies in that plane and the look on Aleta’s face when she gets some proper food to cook.

  The patrols leave off by seven in the evening, and I allow myself to clean off the dried blood. I know I should leave the pilot where he fell, but I am struck by his bravery. Not a lot of men would charge a Changer barehanded, and for that I bury him in one of the fissures and cover his body with rocks. Though I am in pain from the fall, it is a simple enough task in my Changed form.

  I even say a prayer from my childhood, though the words mean little to me.

  Using the mountains as guideposts, I estimate that I am some thirty miles away from our little guerilla runway. The plains are not easy to cross on foot, even for a Changer, and I know it will take me several nights to return home without a motorbike. I wonder if Rodrigo will come looking for me, and dismiss the notion.

  Even if he could spot me, he would not be able to land to pick me up.

  I begin the long trek as night falls. I head west, toward the mountains, until I have reached foothills that will shelter me from searchlights and patrols. These few miles are all I can manage this first night. It will take me much longer to reach camp than I thought. I am not dead. My body is not irrevocably broken. But not even a Changer can fall from a plane and come through unscathed.

  For two nights I limp north through the foothills. Everything hurts. During the long periods of darkness, eyes focused on the ground in front of me to keep my footing, I am assailed by doubt. What if Selvie never made it back with the cargo plane? What if Rodrigo and Bellara were shot down on the way home? W
hat if the whole platoon has written me off, said a few words, and moved the camp?

  It would be smart of them to loot the cargo plane and then retreat farther into the mountains. They could regroup and regain their strength, and be ready to fight again within weeks. It’s the intelligent option, and I know that if they take it I may never find them again. Bellara’s skill at illusions works both ways—if the enemy cannot see them, then I will not be able to track them down, either. I will make it back only to return to an empty camp.

  My Changed form protects me from the elements and lets me travel faster than a human, but I grow weak from hunger by the fourth night. There are tiny foods along way: edible scrub grass and tubers. They are not enough. I find the recent corpse of a llama and eat my fill, not daring a fire.

  I vomit it all back up half a mile later.

  On the fifth night I am overcome by thirst. I know the high plains as well as anyone raised on the Bavares, but even I have a hard time finding water. I begin to see flashes of light in the mountains, and know that the delirium has set in. I decide I can push myself another two nights before I am unable to continue on, and I console myself by imagining the feast that must have accompanied Selvie’s return. It is a cruelty to my stomach, but the thought of my friends’ celebration helps calm my pangs of doubt.

  I sleep by day—what sleep I can get on the cold ground—by huddling in the broken valleys of the foothills. A snake joins me for warmth, and I manage to kill it and have my first real meal in days. I keep it down. The blood is warm, the flesh tender.

  During the long nights I reflect on my nature. I have been Changed for days, longer than I’ve ever maintained this other form. I am a reptilian monstrosity crawling across the scrubland. Am I even human anymore? I wish had gone to a university. The universities are all but gone, of course, but ah, how would it have been to study philosophy? To stare up at the sky and ponder on the source and essence of what makes me what I am, to Change and observe that Change, to study myself and others like me. Now there are almost none of me left.

  I wonder if Bellara will ever bring joy with her illusions, and if she’ll think of me when she learns to dance.

  I am halfway through the eighth night, still traveling on a belly of raw snake meat, when I decide that the lights in the mountains are not a delirium. The feeling of being watched, that sixth sense that animals have had since creation, hits me like an enemy jeep. My skin crawls and if I had hair on the back of my neck in my Changed form, it would have stood on end. I stop to sniff the night air for some hint of humanity. I pick up a whiff of gas, but I cannot be certain.

  For the next couple of hours, the feeling of being followed grows within me. My Changed sight is not a perfect night vision, but I see figures on the ridges. Wolves? There haven’t been wolves in this part of the Bavares for thirty years. Mountain lions do not hunt in packs.

  As daybreak approaches I realize that I am closer to my platoon’s hidden runway than I could hope. Six, maybe seven miles by air? Overland is a range of mountains between me and my friends. If they are still there.

  I pause at a crossroads only I can see. The shorter way is through the plain. If I push myself, I think I can be back to camp in less than two days—but that would require traveling by day across the open plain, where I would be obvious to enemy flyovers.

  I hear the droning of their bombers every day, see the cargo planes passing overhead. The cargo planes have escorts with them now, and I tell myself it’s because our raid was successful, but my happiness at the thought is short-lived. They are still moving forward, setting up their air base and creeping closer to Bava.

  The longer way back to camp is to go over the mountain. It is a shortcut, as the crow flies, but the terrain is rough. It will take me three days or more, but I know where to find water and wild mushrooms.

  I make camp, my mind still not made up, sleeping restlessly through the day, worried about being seen. When night falls I make my decision and head into the mountains.

  My unseen followers seem to flank me as I navigate the crags and slopes of the goat trails. Sometimes I think I spot them by the light of the moon—human-like figures, a little too large and grotesque—but I do not trust my own senses after so much effort on so little food and water.

  I now think they are Changers, but the idea makes no sense. I have seen at least three separate creatures, and Changers do not gather in such numbers, not since far earlier in the war. They are too valuable, spread out across squads like mine in both our forces and the enemy’s.

  Could they be runaways? Some sort of war-weary coalition hiding here in the mountains? Are they enemy Changers, come together to hunt my friends? The first thought exhilarates me. Both scare me.

  I try to move quietly, to somehow lose them, but my talons drag along the rocks. My body sags. I wonder how much of a fight I can muster if they decide to attack. I have no hope against three Changers, but I have fought my kind before, and decide that I can take one of them with me even if they come en masse.

  Considering strategy helps me focus, pushing onward up the narrow trail. Rocks tumble from a ridge to my left as a figure maintains my flank.

  They know I am here. They must know that I know they are also here. Am I being herded toward an ambush? Am I being observed? Am I being escorted out of their territory?

  I shake my head at the last. It is too feral. I am a Changer, not an animal. Perhaps I have been Changed for too long, back hunched, legs elongated, traveling only by night.

  I stop and sniff. Petrol on the wind again. This time I am certain of the smell; just as certain as I am that I am being followed by wizards.

  A brief fear seizes me. If there are Changers in the mountains, there might be other wizards. If I am being tracked by a Smiling Tom, I might be a dozen miles off course and wandering farther into the mountains. I try to think of a motivation for leading me astray, and the explanation is easy: they want me dead without a fight.

  I try to recall what Bellara taught me about seeing through an illusion. The key, she has said, is to trust all of your senses together. The very best Smiling Toms can fool smell, sight, hearing, and even taste. They cannot fool touch, and even an expert will struggle at fooling all of the senses at once.

  The path I follow feels familiar. The smells—besides the distant whiff of petrol—are of the mountain flowers, the stone, and the dirt. I decide that I am not being led astray.

  I continue on for several hundred more yards before I crest a slope, only to spot a Changer standing some ways down the path. He—or she, I decide—is smaller than me. Her talons dig nervously at the dirt, and she has a hooked beak instead of a jaw, and spiraling horns that remind me a bit of fanciful art I once saw of a satyr. She seems startled to see me so close and scrambles behind a boulder.

  I stop, looking behind me. Another has been trailing me. I can’t quite place the third.

  I am tired. The moon is only a sliver, and I do not want to pass that boulder. She will be close enough to touch, a perfect ambush. A small part of me—the human part—wishes for a machine pistol, though I know by experience it will do little but annoy my adversaries.

  I stare hard toward the boulder the Changer is hiding behind and then limp over to a nearby rock. I close my eyes, focusing inward on my sorcery. I reverse the joints on my arms, force the claws to recede from my hands and the talons from my feet. Spines shrink and disappear. In a few moments I am human again, and immediately I feel the bite of the cold night air. I am all but naked, clothed in the tattered remnants of the pants I wore for the air drop mission. I sit on the rock and throw up my hands, trying to look relaxed.

  In reality, I am tense. I can Change in a moment, talons striking, teeth tearing. I hope that they cannot see that tension in the darkness.

  I wait for five minutes, then for ten. I hear stones turn in the darkness. It feels good to rest, but I can feel myself slipping away. A figure scrabbles across the scree to my right, just over the ridgeline. It passes me, going up
the path, and then I see it dash behind the boulder where the first Changer has hidden.

  If I strain, I think I can hear a whispered conversation.

  “Javiero!” a woman’s voice suddenly calls out from the darkness.

  I turn and watch as a Changer charges up the path from behind me. He reaches the top of the slope and, seeing me sitting less than a dozen paces away, stops. Like the first Changer, he is smaller than me. He has hooked spines on his elbows and leathery skin covered in old scars. I realize with a start that he is naked, and wearing a satchel on his back. I would laugh at the silliness of such a creature wearing a backpack, if it wasn’t such a good idea—a good way to keep your clothes from being destroyed every time you Changed.

  The Changer—Javiero—paces back and forth along the path, blocking my retreat and glaring past me. A few long moments pass and I hear the crunch of gravel under foot. Wary of Javiero, I glance toward his companions.

  I am surprised to see a man and a woman emerge from the darkness. They have Changed into humans. The man shrugs into his jacket, while the woman levels a submachine gun at me. Her face is thin, elfin, her features delicate. She looks like she’s in her thirties, but I can’t be sure in this light. Her finger floats around the trigger of her weapon.

  “What are you doing, Marie?” Javiero asks in a guttural tone.

  Marie does not answer him. Her submachine gun does not waver as they draw closer. The unnamed man is bigger than his companions, almost as big as me, and I spare a glance for their clothes. Both of them wear old, beaten leather jackets, but they are in good repair. The man’s has no emblems. Marie’s has the patch of the Bava city militia on her shoulder.

  Marie, Javiero: these are names that belong to my people. Her Bava city militia jacket confirms it, but I am still apprehensive. Three Changers up here in the mountains on their own could mean anything, and I wonder again whether they are runaways.