With nary a thought for the team, Aiden flowed back through the trees, a wraith in the night. Within moments, other werewolves materialized out of the trees to quietly surround him. Aiden had brought his M4, and he felt the animosity of the other werewolves, but he did not engage them. The concentrated scent called to him.
Then she stepped out of the shadows. Aiden immediately knew that she was the source of the smell. What shocked Aiden was that she was a huge, silver wolf. Not a werewolf, but an honest-to-goodness wolf.
The big wolf padded up to him, then stared into his eyes. Aiden had always heard that animals could not meet a human’s eyes. That obviously did not pertain to wolves as it was Aiden who broke contact. She turned and started walking off. Somehow, Aiden knew he was supposed to follow her. If he hadn’t known, he would have guessed pretty quickly as the other werewolves, the ones like Aiden, started closing in on his side—whether an honor guard or an execution escort, he didn’t know. There were 12 of them, and Aiden knew he couldn’t take on that number. He wasn’t sure he’d want to, anyway. He was anxious to find out more about the wolf, and following her seemed to be the most logical option.
The wolf broke out into a run, and Aiden had to work hard to keep up. He was getting winded when she stopped in what looked to be a natural amphitheater in the rocks and spun to face him. Aiden wasn’t sure how far they’d run. He knew he should be with his team, and leaving them could have severe consequences, but it was almost as if his will was not his own.
The rest of the vargs were gathered in the amphitheater, surrounding the two of them. Aiden thought they had a more aggressive air about them.
The wolf stalked up to Aiden and stared once more into his eyes. Then with a flicker, she shifted into a werewolf. Immediately, the feeling of compulsion disappeared as Aiden stepped back in shock.
A wolf-werewolf?
The other werewolves crowded up closer, a blood lust beginning to permeate the air. Aiden started looking for an escape route, but nothing was evident.
The wolf-slash-werewolf put her muzzle just inches from Aiden’s and said something that sounded like Pashto. Aiden hadn’t learned more than a few words and phrases of the language as of yet.
“Za na poheegum,” he said, meaning “I don’t understand.”
She switched to another language, one Aiden didn’t recognize as anything he’d heard before.
“I don’t understand you,” he said, this time in English.
She seemed puzzled and looked around at the other werewolves. One stepped forward and approached them.
“You are British?” he asked.
“No, American,” the wary Aiden answered.
“American?” the werewolf asked, obviously confused.
“Yes. American. USA, you know?”
Aiden found himself thinking that the werewolf did not know.
What century have I landed in? he wondered as the varg spoke to the leader, the one who had been a freaking wolf.
Several of the others got into it, holding what sounded to be a spirited conversation. Aiden understood none of it. With his lack of Pashto and the werewolves’ less-than-articulate enunciation, it was beyond him. The vibe was not good, though, and he nervously fingered the trigger on his M4. The weapon probably wouldn’t do much good against so many werewolves, though. He wished he had something with more punch with him.
Finally, it seemed like some sort of decision was made—and not a good one for Aiden. The pack’s attention focused laser-like on him, and almost as one, they stepped forward. Aiden lowered his M4 and aimed it at them. Backwards or not, they had to recognize a rifle.
The queen bee shifted back to wolf form, and immediately Aiden felt his resolve start to melt. He forced himself to focus. He didn’t know what he’d done to earn their ire, but if he was going to go, he’d be damned if he wouldn’t take some of them with him. His own throaty growl joined the chorus from the others.
When the other wolf burst on the scene, Aiden almost shot it. But it jumped in front of Aiden and then turned to face the others, pure evil intent emanating from deep within its throat. The werewolves stopped in their tracks, suddenly unsure.
The ragged brown wolf slowly turned its head to glare at the queen wolf, completely ignoring Aiden. The pressure that hammered at Aiden’s will faded. He had no idea who or what this wolf was, but it was keeping the others at bay. Aiden took a step closer to the brown wolf, weapon swiveling to cover the rest.
The two wolves faced each other down, then as some unknown signal to Aiden, shifted into vargs. Suddenly, it became clear to Aiden. He recognized the brown werewolf standing in front of him. Hozan had come to his rescue.
Only, it didn’t seem to be a done deal.
The queen tried speaking to Hozan in Pashto, which Hozan didn’t seem to understand. Hozan tried Kurdish, then Arabic, and while the female varg was able to repeat some of the Arabic words, it was evident to Aiden that she really wasn’t fluent in the language. She tried one more, and to Aiden’s relief, Hozan seemed to understand it.
The two conversed, sometimes heatedly, while Aiden kept his weapon ready to engage any of the others. None of them seemed to be ready to attack, however. The bloodlust that Aiden had sensed before had faded, and now they seemed willing to let Hozan and their leader figure out what was going to happen.
At last, some sort of decision seemed to be reached. The other werewolves turned and started to move off.
Hozan leaned over and quietly said, “We are going with them. Put your rifle up and try to hold back any aggression.”
“I can’t go. My team is back there somewhere, and I’ve got to get back,” he protested.
“You are going, or you are dead. I was able to convince her to delay any action, but you are not saved yet. We are going to their village now,” Hozan said in a brook-no-argument tone.
“To their village? Don’t Muslims have to treat visitors as guests?” Aiden asked.
“That, or kill them so they can’t give the village’s location away,” was the curt reply.
“How long will this take? I’ve got to get back.”
“It will take as long as it takes.”
They sped up into a steady run that effectively kept the two from talking. Aiden had a thousand more questions, not the least being what the fuck with the wolf thing? Aiden thought he’d grasped just what it meant to be a werewolf, but now that had been turned upside down again.
They ran in silence for almost 20 minutes before entering a tiny box canyon high in the mountains. Small houses hugged the rock walls, and a spring bubbled up from the cliff face and formed a pool in the center of the village. It seemed that most of the village, possibly 60 people, were up and waiting for the group to return. If they were surprised at two more vargs showing up, they didn’t show it.
As the group came to a halt, the others shifted back to human. All of them were naked, including their leader, a 40-ish-looking woman. Seeing naked Afghans was odd, especially females, but none of them seemed the least bit embarrassed.
“Shift,” Hozan hissed at him.
Aiden quickly shifted back to human as the others were handed their khet partug. Hozan was handed the typical Pashtun clothing as well. Within a few moments, several of the older men were seated on the ground with their leader, and Hozan and Aiden were offered seats. It seemed odd that their village head was a woman. Aiden had never heard of that in Afghanistan, but there was no mistaking that she was the top dog in the village.
Shomleh was served, and to Aiden’s surprise, he liked it. He’d learned of it back during one of their pre-deployment briefs, but this was his first time to taste the minty yogurt drink.
He tried to will whatever was going to happen to happen quicker. He was probably 40 minutes or more from his team, and he had to get back before anyone missed him. Luckily, they would be lying as motionless as possible so as not to give out their position, but that wouldn’t last forever.
Hozan did all the speaking, at least from
what Aiden realized was “their side.” It seemed surreal that while sitting there in the dark around a small fire, sipping yogurt, his fate was being decided. His fate and Hozan’s he realized. If they decided against Aiden, then Hozan could not be allowed to leave, either.
There was none of the intensity as when the two were going at it back in the amphitheater. Now, one would say something, sip some shomleh, then listen as the other offered something back. Once in awhile, one of the older men would interject something. Aiden desperately wished he could understand what was being said. He wished he could speak up for himself.
Aiden was about to explode when finally, everyone stood up. Smiles were evident, and Aiden felt a surge of relief. A few of the older men came up and shook his hand, western style. They chattered away in Pashto, and Aiden nodded and smiled back. He didn’t shake the leader’s hand. Head of a village or not, it had been drilled into them by the Corps that you didn’t shake a woman’s hand in the ’Stan, and now that they were seemingly about to be let go, he didn’t want to enrage anyone with a cultural faux pas.
It took at least 15 agonizingly slow minutes while farewells were made. With one last wave, the two men shifted, and with Hozan leading, the two vargs ran through the forests and back to the team. After 35 minutes, they stopped less than 500 meters from the ambush site.
“I will talk to you when you get back,” Hozan said as he turned to run back to the FOB.
“What about the full wolf shift,” Aiden asked, still burning with questions.
“Later,” Hozan said as he ran off.
Aiden watched him for a few moments, then started to swing around to come up into the team. It wouldn’t do to get caught coming back. He stayed in varg form and slowly slipped back into position. He could sense Cree over to his right, awake and alert. He shifted back and put back on his clothing and gear.
The night had been totally unexpected, and Aiden had to digest what had happened. But he needed more information from Hozan on just what the fuck that was all about. Hozan had almost assuredly saved his life, but he had a lot to answer.
Within an hour, dawn started lightening up the sky. Even in human form, Aiden could almost feel the tension in the air as the Marines waited for the muj to show up. That faded when by another three hours, nothing had happened. The intel was probably wrong again. They would have to stay in position until nightfall before extracting. They didn’t want any observers to know they knew about this trail complex.
At about 0900, Mike crept down the line, checking on everyone with hand and arm signals. Aiden gave him a thumbs up then reverted back to his thoughts.
Thirty minutes later, the mountainside 500 meters away opened up with the sound of gunfire. Hosni’s element was in contact. The fire intensified for a minute or so, and then started to die off. Aiden wanted to know what was happening, but they had to maintain their position and in silence.
The firing up ahead stopped. Well, they wouldn’t be staying until nightfall now, Aiden knew. Their position was blown. He started to relax when the SAW opened up 40 meters away from him. Aiden swung his own M4 around to cover the trail as most of the rest of the element opened fire.
Aiden couldn’t see anything, and he rose up to give himself a better view, but the trail directly below his position was empty. The fighting was at the other end of the element’s ambush site.
“Cease fire,” was passed over the net, the first time since they’d arrived that a word was spoken.
Aiden waited for orders but kept his eyes open for anything from below them. Three mujahideen were lying dead in their kill zone. Two were carrying packs filled with opium. Up with Hosni’s team, five had been killed and one was slightly wounded and now a PUC.[85] Two of them had been opium mules, the other three fighters. This had been a righteous ambush.
Their position was too rugged for helos, so they were going to have to hump it out just as they had humped it in, but this time carrying almost 120 kilos of raw opium. Aiden was given one of the mujahideen packs.
From human to werewolf and now to opium mule, this had been an amazing 18 hours.
Chapter 10
Rustam Nabiyev surveyed the scene, taking deep drafts of the mountain air into his lungs. He could pick up the faint odor of gunpowder. This was the spot where the group had been hit. Besides the odor, the dirt of the trail was still stained with blood, and some of the rocks and tree trunks around it showed signs of fighting. Rustam had lost 120 kilos of opium here, and he had to find out why.
To be more precise, the opium hadn’t belonged to Rustam, but to Nikolai Borisov, his boss, who was sitting back in his guarded estate on the outskirts of Samarkand. Nikolai did not know of the lost shipment yet, but he would soon enough, and he would not take kindly to it—and the blame would fall squarely onto Rustam’s shoulders. This was something Rustam desperately wanted to avoid. Getting onto Nikolai’s bad side was not conducive to a long and happy life.
His guide, a Pathan[86] from the local village, was acting like he could actually glean some information from the ambush site. These mountain primitives were worthless other than as mules, no matter on which side of the Afghan-Pakistani border they lived. Rustam was angry at the loss, angry that he would have to inform Nikolai that the shipment was gone. He wanted to take out that anger on the fool who was trying to act as if he could actually decipher the scene. He wondered if the man knew how close he was to dying right then and there. But Rustam was practical, if nothing else, and these mountain villagers had their pride and misplaced sense of honor. If Rustam needed their help in the future, then this idiot would have to get back to his hovel and wrinkled wife unharmed.
Rustam needed some privacy, though, if he was going to be able to find out who was responsible for this mess. He had to deflect Nikolai’s anger to someone, anyone else.
“Where was the first site?” he asked in accentless Pashto.
“Up there,” the old man said while pointing.
“I want you to see what you can find there. Meet me back here when you have something to tell me.”
He watched the useless man move off. He was chattel, nothing more, but Rustam had to control himself. He couldn’t let anger blind him.
When the man was well out of sight, Rustam let his pent-up anxiety speed his release as he shifted. For once, he appreciated the drab, loose Pashtun khet partug he had donned. While the traditional Uzbek ishton, with its wide legs and narrow ankles were suited to a shifting varg, the kulyak he normally wore could not be worn during a shift without being destroyed.
His pitiful human nose had only been able to pick up the faint whiff of gunpowder, but as a varg, it was as if a symphony of scents had sprung up around him. There was the blood in the dirt, the smell of urine, the smell of death. There were the scents of humans all around. He suddenly swung his head up as it hit him. It was unmistakable. It was varg, and more than that, it was lycan. A very powerful alpha lycan.
This put the incident into another realm, and one that might deflect Nikolai’s anger from him. There were rumors of ferals in these mountains, and it looked as if the rumors were not only true, but that these ferals were trying to take over Nikolai’s operations.
They would regret that. No one took on Nikolai and lived to tell about it. At least two other members of the Council had tried to take him on over the years, and both had conveniently disappeared. No dirty little feral tribe could hope to do any better.
For a moment, Rustam considered going after the tribe himself and recover the opium before Nikolai found out it had been taken in the first place. He could gather up a small army of Taliban. The idiots were easy to rile up, and all he had to do was to tell them that a tribe of harram werewolves were up there, and they would launch themselves in a religious frenzy in their efforts to eradicate the devil creatures. The irony that Rustam himself was such a “devil creature” was not lost on him.
He discarded that idea, though. Backwards little village or not, they could defeat a Taliban force, and then Ni
kolai would want to know why he hadn’t been told immediately. No, it was better to tell Nikolai now and let him take care of the little alpha and her feral pack.
He sniffed the air deeply, getting a bearing on which direction the ferals had taken to leave the ambush site.
Run, little feral cousins, run! Nikolai is coming!
Chapter 11
Getting some privacy anywhere in the FOB was pretty difficult. It was a small area and pretty packed with people and equipment. There was the entire Charlie Company and assorted support staff. There was a platoon of the ANA[87], which didn’t make the soldiers and Marines too happy, given the recent spate of green-on-blue[88] attacks. A squad of ANP[89] rotated in and out of the FOB. Then there were the various hangers-on whose job Aiden didn’t know nor really care, the civilian contract workers, and the MSOT.
There was nothing wrong with Aiden talking to Hozan, but still, neither one of them wanted to be completely open about it; however, attempting to hide and then getting caught would raise more flags. They finally settled for the motor pool, by the team’s GMVs.
Aiden immediately wanted to know about the entire wolf thing, the honest-to-goodness wolf thing, but Hozan pushed that aside for the moment, saying he would get back to it. First, he had to tell Aiden how close he’d been to getting himself killed.
The Leewekhel tribe was feral, not within the control of the Council. They weren’t really feral as Hozan had previously described the term to Aiden. They hadn’t reverted to a more animalistic mindset—they merely had opted out of the Tribe. They were well aware of the Tribe and its governing body, but they just chose to fade back into the mountains and live their lives as they would. As such, they wanted nothing to bring any attention on them, whether from the Council, the Taliban, the Afghan government, or the parangay. They were not aware of the Coalition or even the Soviet occupation before—to them, the parangay were the British, which was why they hadn’t reacted to Aiden’s claim of being an American.
The Werewolf of Marines Trilogy Page 28