Verena's Whistle: Varangian Descendants Book I by K. Panikian (top android ebook reader txt) 📕

Its mouth gaped open and it said, in Owen’s voice, “What’s happening?”

I stared at its face, then looked down its body and realized under the torn shirt, it was wearing torn jeans as well.

“Owen?” I asked faintly. “Is that you?”

The wolf said, “I feel funny,” and then crashed to the floor. It let go of the sword and turned back into an unconscious man.

“Owen!” I screamed.

Chapter 20

He sat in a chair in his tent, a map spread out before him. He could hear the sounds of the camp outside, bladed weapons clashing, fire crackling, and low voices growling. He smelled meat roasting. There was a scratching at the door and he boomed out, “Enter.”

A small, brown, and hairy bes slipped inside the tent flap and knelt on the ground in front of him. “Lord Abaddon, the scouts have found Orus and what remains of his cohort,” it said.

“And what remains?” Lord Abaddon asked.

“Three todorats and one balachko, the one called Femor, sire.”

“Bid Orus come to me immediately,” Lord Abaddon demanded and turned back to his map. His sharp fingernails bit at the table where he sat and smoke curled from his large nostrils. He scraped his hooves against the ground in agitation before deliberately calming himself. He was not an animal.

A few minutes later a hulking bes with tall horns entered his tent. He knelt and waited.

“Stand,” Lord Abaddon told him. “Report.”

“Sire, we were on the trail of a Varangian scout party. They were half a day ahead of us. Suddenly, there was a giant blast of power that shook the earth. I went immediately to where it originated and there was no sign of the scout party; there was only this rock.” He held up his sword, hilt first, and pointed to the rock embedded there.

“I picked up the rock and I vanished, along with my cohort, and reappeared in a strange forest. I didn’t recognize the trees or the mountains. I feared that the Varangians would fall on me in my confused state, so I took my cohort away from that place. We found a cave and we hid.”

Orus bent his head further. “I sent some of the besy out of the cave to find food and to scout. Some did not come back. The azhdaya broke her chain and escaped. I took the todorats and Femor and we tracked her to a lake, where we found her blood but no body. On our way back to the cave, another huge blast shook the earth. When I reached the cave, I found it destroyed and my cohort gone. There were four humans there.”

“Varangians?” Lord Abaddon asked.

“I do not think so, sire,” Orus answered. “They were not in mail and their clothing was odd. They had lights emanating from their heads.

“At that point I decided that I had to risk returning to the place where we entered the strange forest, even if the Varangians were there waiting with more peculiar magic. We went to that space and the rock in my sword began to glow. A door opened and I returned here, just a few miles from the encampment.”

“This is a very strange story,” Lord Abaddon mused. “I must think.” He rose from his chair, his horns scraping the tent ceiling.

“Go now and recover your strength from your ordeal. I will seek counsel with the Black God.”

“Thank you, sire,” Orus said as he backed out of the tent, bowing. He caught one last glimpse of the lord’s giant bull head, before the tent flap closed.

Abaddon stood for a long moment. If he was going to call Chernobog, he would need a sacrifice.

He called back the small, hairy bes to his tent, and said, “Bring me the balachko, Femor.”

Part II

Chapter 21

Owen lay on his back on the living room floor, his clothes in tatters around him and his wolf sword by his right hand. I kicked the sword away and knelt by his head.

“Owen,” I whispered. I felt the pulse in his neck beating steadily. His chest rose and fell in even breaths.

“Julian!” I yelled in the direction of the kitchen.

“What’s all the racket?” he said, coming around the corner with a beer in one hand. “I heard a crash,” he stopped when he saw Owen on the floor, then hurried to my side. “What happened?”

“He turned into a wolf-man, and then he fainted,” I stated succinctly.

“A wolf-man? And I missed it! Darn it,” Julian answered. I gave him a flat look. “Like what do you mean by wolf-man?” he asked.

“He had the head of a wolf and the body of a man. He spoke to me in his own voice, out of the mouth of a wolf. He turned back into a man when he dropped the sword.”

Julian eyed the sword on the floor a few feet away warily and moved closer to me.

Owen groaned and we both focused on him. His eyes blinked open slowly and he stared at the ceiling for a beat, before rolling his eyes around the room. He saw Julian and me on the floor next to him.

“Did I faint?” he asked. “I felt really strange for a minute. My vision was weird. My body felt stretched or something. Then everything went black.”

“You turned into a wolf-man!” Julian answered, excitedly, and then added, “I missed it.”

Owen looked very confused so I told the story again. He looked at the sword near his foot and gingerly slid his body away from it.

I sighed heavily and then explained. “Obviously, this is your power from Mesyats. You’re a wolf berserker. Your trigger is your wolf sword.”

“What’s a berserker?” Owen asked, sitting up.

“A berserker is a warrior who fights in a frenzy of rage. Some of them turn into bears, or wolves,” I added, gesturing at Owen. “In battle they go mad, feeling no pain and striking with super strength.”

Owen started to smile, looking excited.

“They go mad,” I repeated. “They rage, they bite their shields, they howl, and