Waging War (30 page)

My second thought was to jump down and run
for it. But even though that was probably my best option from a
safety standpoint, I wasn’t willing to cut bait just yet. I wanted
to see who was coming.

I could hear men’s voices, but not what they
were saying, and as I settled back against the tree for stability
and comfort, I was able to make out two people. They weren’t
exactly in stealth mode, but they did move carefully, and I got the
sense that they’d had some training – which meant they were likely
either hunters or killers.

When they were close enough for me to
actually understand their speech, I also caught my first glimpse of
a military uniform, and I realized I could understand most of what
they said because my high school language training was
automatically translating the German into English in my head.
Killers, then.

According to Nancy, this area was part of
the free zone, which meant these guy weren’t supposed to be
here.

“It’s as good a place as any to get away
from the radio chatter.” It came out in a grunt, as if he was
speaking from a toilet. I thought Grunty might have been the big
one in the lead.

I shifted again, very slowly and carefully,
until I could see Grunty clearly enough to memorize his uniform. He
wore basic olive drab combat fatigues with the same round green
helmet I’d seen in every war movie. There were a couple of patches
sewn on one shoulder though, and I searched for identifying
features.

The other guy threw off his pack and dropped
to his knees in front of my waterfall to splash his face. I was
irrationally annoyed when he spit into my spring.

“Now they’ll think they need the pig-dog to
clear the way.” Loogie’s voice was thin and whiny, and fine
tendrils of Mongerness wafted up to wrap around my gut. Pig-dog was
one of those insults that sounded so much nastier in German,
especially since
Schweinehund
was almost always pronounced
with a leer.

It didn’t surprise me that Loogie was a
Monger, just like it didn’t surprise me that I’d felt so many
Mongers among the French Maquis. But being only a few feet from a
German Monger armed with what looked like a sniper rifle sitting
under my tree in occupied France wasn’t an ideal scenario in which
to find myself. Since I operated under the assumption that they
tend not to give sniper rifles to guys who suck at shooting, I made
myself relax into my aerie perch and wait them out.

“We can’t kill him. Karl’s like a little
weiner-dog, always on the lookout at his back. And the place the
Schweinehund
sleeps is like a damn fortress.” Grunty
said.

“We’ll lure him out. Or stir up the French
pigs to do it for us.” Loogie pulled out a huge knife and began
whittling a stick as he sat back against my tree. If he looked up,
he’d see me high above him. I didn’t like it, but I couldn’t
move.

Grunty threw a rock into the spring with a
curse. “We trained to make trouble, not to go hunting to feed men
too lazy to steal what they need.”

Loogie hawked up a big wad of phlegm and
spit into my spring again. Ew. “Maybe I should climb a big tree and
start sniping actual
Schweine
, what do you think?” Loogie
tapped the trunk of my tree with the butt of his rifle, and I
closed my eyes. The little girl that believed in invisibility
cloaks took over for a second, even as fear surged like ice up to
the surface of my skin.

“Sounds like good fun, but instead we should
go hunting Maquis. The rat said they emerge at nightfall, and with
the 2
^nd
Division on the move, they’ll be out for sure.
The roads around Limoges have some nice cover for sniping.” Grunty
sounded excited at the prospect, and I very badly wanted to know
who “the rat” was.

Loogie wiped his face with a rag and got to
his feet. “
Ja
, let’s do it. Maybe we can pick off a few
French pigs, and who knows, if the
Schweinehund
gets lucky
and actually infiltrates, we can pick him off too.”

Grunty picked up his rucksack as Loogie
shouldered the sniper rifle. Of course he had to spit one last time
into my spring, and I just barely held back from throwing a stick
at him. As they trudged off through the woods toward their vehicle,
I suddenly knew what I had to do.

Slowly and carefully, I pulled off my
jacket, then my boots, and I stashed them securely in the crook of
the tree. Then, when the two men were out of sight of my tree, I
quickly shed the rest of my clothes and stuffed them up against the
trunk.

My hand went to the Shifter bone around my
neck, I closed my eyes, and allowed
her
to surge up.

I felt the shimmer of a thousand pinpricks
as my body became the Cougar, and I could feel her stretch
languorously in my mind.
Are we stalking, or can I hunt?
she
said, with the edge of a purr in her tone.
Stalking
, I told
her firmly. I was absolutely not interested in bloodshed if I could
possibly help it.

The drop to the forest floor was easy and
felt a little like flying. The stink of sweaty wool uniforms and
unwashed bodies hung in the air around where the German soldiers
had sat, and I sneezed the stench out of my Cougar’s very sensitive
nose. I took off at a silent sprint through the forest, following
the scent trail that was about as subtle as if it had been painted
neon pink.

I practically skidded to a stop just outside
the clearing where their vehicle was parked. The soldiers were
already seated inside with the engine running, and just as Grunty
drove away, I finally caught a glimpse of the insignia on his
uniform. The ends of the sideways Z jagged with the sinister angles
of Hitler’s Werwolves.

The boxy tank-like jeep picked up speed down
the dirt road, and I ran along the edges of the forest behind it
until I was out of forest to hide in. They were far enough ahead of
me that I knew I’d soon lose their scent if I continued, and the
likelihood of being spotted was too high, even in the dusky light
of early evening.

I reluctantly turned around to make my way
back to the tree that loomed over my spring. My Cougar was
strangely silent in my head as I loped through the woods at a
steady pace, and I felt quite comfortable in my animal form. My
Cougar was stronger than my human body was, with more endurance,
and my senses were more automatically in tune with the sights and
smells of the forest around me.

Which was why my heartbeat quickened as I
approached my tree.
Mine
, my Cougar said firmly. The scent
of him in the air marked his presence as well as if I’d already
seen him.

I leapt to the top of a boulder, from which
I could finally see down to my spring.

There was Archer.

And oh boy, did he look pissed.

Stake Out

I startled Archer with my jump to the rock,
and smug satisfaction helped calm the instinct that had sent the
hair on my Cougar’s spine straight up when I saw the expression on
his face. An instant later he recognized me, and it was like his
whole body sighed in relief.

My clothes fell from the sky, and then Ringo
jumped down out of the ash tree holding my boots and looking, if
possible, more angry even than Archer had.

“Ye couldn’t wait to go lookin’ fer trouble,
could ye?” Ringo spat. I’d never seen him so fierce, and I
hesitated up on my rock. It seemed safer in my animal skin, maybe
because I knew it was the only way I could outrun him.

Archer hadn’t taken his eyes off me, but he
spoke to Ringo behind him. “She’ll have an explanation.” His voice
sounded reasonable, and not at all as disappointed as I thought
he’d be.

“Ah, she always does.” Ringo was still
spitting mad, and he turned his back. “Go ahead – Shift so ye can
explain.”

I’d never seen Ringo act like this – usually
he was an ally, or at least a neutral party when Archer got angry
at me for being reckless. Archer gave me a small, wry smile, then
turned his back too.

My clothes had fallen between Archer and
Ringo, which Archer realized only when I jumped down off the rock
and walked around in front of him to Shift back to my human form.
His eyes widened suddenly, and he turned his back to me again, but
not before he got the full show, and I was perversely delighted to
make him uncomfortable.

I did throw my clothes on quickly though,
because the sun had gone down and there was already a chill in the
air. I’d barely gotten my feet in my boots when Ringo turned to
glare at me.

“So? Did ye lie to Marianne or lose track of
time?”’ he growled.

“Neither. And since when are you my keeper?
Did you follow me here?” I threw my best glare back at him.

“Ye left a trail a mile wide, and when ye
didn’t come back in an hour like ye told Marianne ye would, of
course we came to find ye.”

I fought the urge to stick my tongue out at
him, because I’m not twelve. I wanted to though, so I bent to tie
my shoe and said nothing instead.

“Who was wittlin’ ‘ere?” Ringo kicked at the
wood shavings Loogie had left under the tree.

I looked up at him defiantly. “A German
soldier – Werwolf, if I had to guess, based on the Wolfsangel
rune.”

Archer exhaled sharply behind me. “In case
the date has escaped you, Operation Overlord has gone into effect.”
He knelt down to brush a leaf off my jacket, then sat beside me on
the ground. “Tell us.”

The only thing I could detect in his voice
was concern, and it siphoned a little of my defiance away. Ringo
was still standing, arms crossed, a few feet away, so I ignored him
and spoke to Archer.

I told him about walking in town with
Marianne, about Mother Goose, and meeting Rachel, the girl
mechanic. I told him about the village priest who made Jewish kids
disappear, the villagers who turned in their neighbors, and the
children singing at the old winery. I gave him the kind of details
I would have saved up to tell my modern Archer, who always wanted
to hear full retellings of conversations, and words that painted a
picture of the experience. And I spoke to empty my head of all the
things that I struggled with about being in this time, and this
place, in these circumstances.

And when I finally got to the part about the
German soldiers and the spitting and the grunting and the horrors
of their conversation, Ringo had moved closer and squatted down to
watch my face, and every bit of Archer’s attention was tuned to me.
I could feel their interest sharpen and hear their breath catch at
the part when Loogie tapped my tree with the butt of his rifle. I
had a storyteller’s audience, and I felt them take ownership of my
experience as they invested themselves and made it their own. I had
followed the plot, unfolded suspense, and shared my own emotional
journey as if Archer and Ringo had been right beside me. I allowed
no stinginess in my words, and even as I felt myself beginning to
unburden, I could see my truths settle in and become a part of
them.

“I’d ‘ave done the same, I s’pose.” Ringo
nodded to himself as if that was that.

My gaze had been caught by Ringo’s words,
but then my eyes slid to Archer for his reaction. He was watching
me thoughtfully when he spoke.

“When you didn’t return, Marianne became
frantic. She woke Ringo with her worry that perhaps Madame Bouchard
– the one you call Mother Goose – had raised suspicion about your
identity and had you detained. He woke me when he confirmed the
signs that you’d gone into the woods, and with every cairn we
found, I feared there wouldn’t be another.”

My chest constricted at the thought of
Marianne’s worry, but Archer’s calm, quiet voice was somehow at
odds with his words. “And here, where it was clear you hadn’t been
alone, I was moments away from donning the armor and grabbing the
sword to ride into the fray to rescue you.”

I smiled a little at the image. “Find a
white horse and you’re good to go.”

A twinkle in his eye was the only thing that
knocked some of the dust off his dry tone. “The Prince of Darkness
rides a bold, black steed. I hardly fit the Prince Valiant
archetype, which is, perhaps, my point. I was set to rescue you,
willing to throw regard for safety, secrecy, and good sense
straight out the window in my quest to be your savior. And then
there you were, perfectly unharmed and entirely capable of minding
yourself.”

Something went
clunk
in my brain –
that thing that Millicent had said about the differences between
men and women. I spun toward Ringo.

“Is that why you were so mad? Because you
were all set to rescue me and I didn’t need it?”

Ringo looked uncharacteristically grumpy.
“Ye don’t usually need it, so that wasn’t a surprise. I s’pose I
was afraid.”

I waited for the sentence to go on, but it
didn’t. “Afraid of what?” I finally asked.