CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
It is a misconception that Therianthropes always manifest as animals. While the Feral—complete transformation into an animal form—is the most common, there are five distinct manifestations. The second most common form is the animal head mounted atop a human body. The human head mounted on an animal body is an extremely rare manifestation but not unheard of. Anthromorphic Therianthropes retain a human body but with animalistic head and limbs are also quite rare. Probably the most misunderstood form of Therianthropy leaves the suffering looking completely human but possessed by an animal spirit. Such manifestations are often misdiagnosed as Wendigast, Wütend, or even Wahnist.
—Aufschlag Hoher, Previously Chief Scientist of the Geborene Damonen
Night fell like a bucket of black tar. The rain slackened but did not let up. Erdbehüter was beginning to think she might never again see the sun. Her Geborene robes, pristine when she left Selbsthass, were unrecognisable. Ungeist, crawling around in the muck, hunting out stones and tossing them aside to clear a comfortable spot to sleep, looked no better. On all fours, hair thick with muck and jutting in every direction, he looked every part the animal. In the last two days they ate anything but bugs and twigs, and what few root vegetables they could dig up.
Their relationship, tenuous after leaving Selbsthass, awkward after she rutted him in the mud, ultimately devolved to seething hatred. At least on his part. She couldn’t summon the energy to hate him. He was pathetic.
Ungeist stopped tossing stones around and stared at her with hungry, feral eyes. Already brittle when they left Selbsthass, unleashing the inner demons of all those farmers cracked him wide open. He made no effort to care for himself and did whatever she commanded. He doesn’t trust himself to make his own decisions. He did, however, whine continually about whatever task she set him.
Ungeist, sprawled in the mud like it was the most comfortable bed, watched the skies. “If Drache drops a cow,” he said, “I’ll eat it raw.”
The Therianthrope reminded Erdbehüter of a cat. A huge, evil cat. Drache liked to play with her food, sometimes dropping it several times before it died. The sound a horse made after being dropped from a half-dozen strides off the ground was terrible.
Ungeist giggled and picked at the scabs covering his arms, opening fresh wounds. He’d crawled through a bramble bush, chasing a rabbit he had no chance of catching, and torn long wounds over most of his exposed flesh. Erdbehüter watched as he eyed a scab, licking his lips. She watched hunger and disgust do war. Hunger won. He ate the scab Ungeist noticed her scrutiny and flashed a bent grin. “Meat,” he said.
Worm. She looked forward to watching him devour himself. He clawed at his chest, teeth bared in pain, leaving red rents in the flesh. He frees the inner demons of others, but his own are trapped.
“Dig deeper,” she said.
Ungeist stopped pawing at his chest and stared dumbly at his bloody fingernails before sucking them clean. Cleaner, she corrected.
He watched the sky, blinking away the rain pooling in his sunken eyes. She couldn’t tell if he was crying. He pointed east and she saw a monstrous shape streaking toward them.
“She’s coming to eat us,” said Ungeist. He didn’t sound scared, didn’t even bother sitting up.
Drache flew past at maybe twice the height of a man, the powerful downdraught toppling Erdbehüter into the mud. Ungeist laughed as she wrestled with the torn remnants of her Geborene robe before once again regaining her feet. She ignored him and stared west.
“She’s seen something,” she said, squinting into the dark.
Without warning, all the rocks, from the smallest pebble to man-sized boulders, headed west, following the Therianthrope.
“The Earth Spirit wants us to follow,” said Erdbehüter.
“Rut the Earth Spirit.”
Again she ignored him and set off after the stones. Ungeist swore as a fist-sized stone ran over one of his hands. He scrambled to his feet to follow after her.
The two Geborene Geisteskranken blundered about in the dark, tripping over themselves and each other until Drache lit the world with the twisting chaos of her breath.
“What the hells?” said Ungeist.
Erdbehüter blinked away purple after-images sketched hard on her eyes. Hell inscribed on steel, she’d never forget that vision. She struggled to make sense of what she saw. The world has gone mad.
“There are thousands of them,” said Ungeist.
“That’s the Gottlos army,” she said. In the brief moment Drache’s madness lit the world bright she saw thousands of tents and men. There has to be at least five thousand people in that camp. No chance Gottlos could muster much more than that. This has to be their entire army, geared for war and marching north. “They’re marching on Selbsthass.”