“The berserker,” Mikhail heard him whisper. The birds sang in the treetops, happy and unaware. All around were uncovered graves and fragments of skeletons, both infant and adult, human and wolf. Franco spun toward Mikhail, and the boy saw his face-the flesh drawn tight around the bones, the eyes glassy and bulging. The pungent reek of rot wafted past Mikhail’s nostrils. “The berserker,” Franco repeated, his voice thin and quavering. The man looked around, his nostrils flared and sweat gleaming on his face. “Where are you?” Franco shouted; the bird song instantly ceased. “Where are you, you bastard?” He took a step in one direction, then a step in another; his legs seemed to want to pull him in two halves. “Come out!” he shrieked, his teeth bared and his chest heaving. “I’ll fight you!” He picked up a wolf’s skull and hurled it against a tree trunk, where it shattered with a noise like a gunshot. “God damn you to hell, come out!”
Flies battered into Mikhail’s face and spun away, disturbed by Franco’s turbulence. The man seethed, bright spots of red in his sallow cheeks and his body trembling like a taut and dangerous spring. He screamed, “Come out and fight!” and his voice sent the birds flying from their branches.
Nothing responded to Franco’s challenge. The grinning skulls lay like mute witnesses to a massacre, and the dark curtains of flies closed over the red infant flesh. Before Mikhail could move to defend himself, Franco rushed him. The man lifted him up off his feet and shoved his back against a tree so hard the breath whooshed from Mikhail’s lungs. “You’re nothing!” Franco raged. “Do you hear me?” He shook Mikhail. “You’re nothing!”
There were tears of pain in Mikhail’s eyes, but he didn’t let them fall. Franco wanted to destroy something, as the berserker had destroyed the bodies of his children. He shoved Mikhail’s back against the tree again, harder. “We don’t need you!” he shouted. “You little piece of weak-willed shi-”
It happened very fast. Mikhail wasn’t sure exactly when it happened, because it was a blur. A pit of flame opened within him, and seared his insides; there was a second of blinding pain, and then Mikhail’s right hand-a wolf’s claw covered with sleek black hair that entwined his arm almost to the elbow-streaked up and across Franco’s cheek. The man’s head snapped back, bloody furrows where the nails had slashed. Franco was stunned, and his eyes glinted with fear. He released Mikhail and jerked back, the blood trickling in crimson lines down his face. Mikhail settled to his feet, his heart slamming; he was as surprised as Franco, and he stared at his wolf’s claw, bright red blood and bits of Franco’s skin on the tips of the white nails. The black hair advanced past his elbow, and he felt pressure in his bones as they began to change their shape. There was a hollow pop! as the elbow went out of joint, and his arm shortened, the bones thickening under the moist, black-haired flesh. The hair advanced up his arm, toward his shoulder, and shone with dark blue highlights where the sun touched it. Mikhail felt throbbing pain in his jaws and forehead, as if an iron vise had begun to tighten around his skull. The tears broke from his eyes and ran down his cheeks. His left hand was changing now, the fingers snapping and shortening, growing hair and young white claws. Something was happening to his teeth; they crowded his tongue, and his gums felt ripped. He tasted blood in his mouth. He was terrified, and he looked desperately at Franco for help; Franco just stared at him, glassy-eyed, the blood dripping from his chin. It smelled to Mikhail like the red wine he remembered his father and mother drinking from crystal goblets, in another life. His muscles tensed and shivered, thickening across his shoulders and down his back. Black hair burst wild at his groin, under his dirty clothes.
“No,” Mikhail heard himself groan, the harsh rasping of a frightened animal. “Please… no.” He didn’t want this; he couldn’t stand it, not yet, and he fell to his knees in the leaves as the bending bones and thickening muscles freighted him down.
An instant later the black hair that had coiled over his right shoulder began to reverse itself, receding back down his arm. The claws of his fingers cracked and lengthened into fingers once more. His bones straightened, and his muscles thinned to those of a human boy again. His jaw and facial bones made little popping noises as they rearranged. He felt his teeth slide back into their sockets, and that was perhaps the worst of the pain. And less than forty seconds after the change had begun, it had completely reversed; Mikhail blinked, tears burning his eyes, and looked at his human, hairless hands. Blood was oozing from beneath the fingernails. The unaccustomed heaviness of new muscle was gone. His tongue felt human teeth, and blood tanged his saliva.
It was over.
“You little bastard,” Franco said, but most of the steam had gone out of him. He looked deflated. “Couldn’t do it, could you?” He touched his furrowed cheek and stared at his red-smeared palm. “I ought to kill you,” he said. “You marked me. I ought to tear you to pieces, you little shit.”
Mikhail struggled to rise. His legs were weak, and wouldn’t allow it.
“You’re not even worth killing,” Franco decided. “You’re still too much of a human. I ought to leave you out here, and you’d never even find your way back, would you?” He wiped blood from his oozing wounds and looked at his palm again. “Shit!” he said, disgusted.
“Why… do you hate me so much?” Mikhail managed to ask. “I’ve never done anything to you.”
Franco didn’t reply for a moment, and Mikhail thought he wasn’t going to. Then Franco said, his voice acidic, “Wiktor thinks you’re special.” He slurred the word, as if it were something nasty. “He says he’s never seen anyone fight to live as much as you did. Oh, he has high hopes for you.” He snorted bitterly. “I say you’re a weak whelp, but I’ll give you this: you’re lucky. Wiktor never hunted for anyone else before. He does it for you, because he says you’re not ready for the change. I say either you become one of the pack, all the way, or we eat you. And I’ll be the one who cracks open your skull and chews your brains. What do you think about that?”
“I… think…” Mikhail tried to stand again. Sweat was on his face. He started up, on willpower and bruised muscles. His legs almost went out from under him again, but then he was up, breathing raggedly, and he faced Franco. “I think… someday… I’ll have to kill you,” he said.
Franco gaped at him. The silence stretched; distant crows called to each other. And then Franco laughed-more of a grunt, actually-and the laugh made him wince and press his fingers against his slashed cheek. “You? Kill me?” He laughed again, winced again. His eyes were cold, and they promised cruelty. “I’m going to let you live today,” he said, as if from the grace of his heart; Mikhail guessed that it was because he feared Wiktor. “Like I said, you’re lucky.” He looked around, his eyes narrowed and his senses questing. There was no sign of the berserker except the uncovered graves and the broken bones: the scarred dirt and masses of leaves showed no tracks, there were no hanks of hair caught in the underbrush, and the berserker had rolled in the rotting flesh to mask his scent. This sacrilege against the pack had been done perhaps six or seven hours ago, Franco thought. The berserker was long gone. Franco walked away a few feet, bent down, and brushed flies away. He picked up a small, ripped arm, the hand still attached, and rose to his full height. He gently touched the fingers, exploring them like the petals of a strange flower. “This was mine,” Mikhail heard him say in a quiet voice.