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Seven hundred. Eight hundred.
Jacob rubbed the bluepowder on his scorched skin. It masked his smell. The skulls had fine noses, and meeting them unprepared could make the difference between life and death.
Nine hundred and fifty.
A thousand.
And there they were. So far, the fairy tales were right. Fence posts with skulls on top appeared between the trees.
The fence surrounded a hut adorned with carvings: leaves, flowers, animals, human faces. They reminded Jacob of the woodcuts found in old fairy-tale books. Or maybe those woodcuts were reminiscent of this hut.
He stopped, waiting for his breathing to slow and the weariness to leave his poisoned limbs. In his first years with Chanute, he’d dreamed of finding one of the famous glowing skulls of the Baba Yaga all by himself. He’d wanted to give it to Chanute as a night-light. Fool. Back then he’d been always on the lookout for ways to prove his courage to himself and the world. That had changed. “Has it?” he could hear Fox jeer.
A gold bunting in a nearby oak stopped its song. A brittle branch snapped under Jacob’s boots. The air was heavy with the scent of woodruff and damp wood.
A toad sat between the fence posts, peering at him through golden eyes. A short croak and the hut began to rise from the wet grass, exposing two spindly, leathery legs. The fairy tales of his world were true, though Jacob do
ubted they’d gotten the animal right. Chicken legs? Those blood red legs looked more like a lizard’s.
The hut slowly turned around a few times. Then it settled back into the grass, now with the door facing Jacob. The toad hopped away, but its mistress took her time. Maybe she wanted to give the skulls enough time to take a good look at him.
But then the Baba Yaga appeared out of the wood next to the door. A bony face. Flowers became a patterned dress; carved branches turned into arms and legs. The dress gained color as she moved toward Jacob, dozens of colors in embroideries depicting the magic of the world and the Baba Yaga. The dress was not clean. Its owner obviously liked to rub forest earth on her skin, but the colors still would have put the most precious royal robes to shame. Ukrainian villagers traditionally imitated the dresses of the Baba Yaga, embroidering patterned blankets that were passed from generation to generation to wrap their newborns and their dead. There were as many stories about the Baba Yagas here and in Varangia as there were carvings on their huts. It was said that their noses sometimes grew all the way into their attics, and their fingers ended in raven claws. They could probably make these stories all true, if they felt like it. Like all Witches, Baba Yagas could make themselves look any way they liked.
On this young morning, this one showed herself to Jacob as old as she was, older than the forest she lived in, older than the house that had been her home for centuries. Her skin was as furrowed as the walls of her hut, her hair as gray as the smoke drifting out of its chimney, and her eyes as red as the wild poppies growing behind the skull-fence.
“Look at what you’re bringing me.” She snapped her fingers, and the silver evaporated off Jacob’s skin like steaming sweat. “I thought Alderelves had all been caught! Incarcerated in bark, silent and blind, smothered with leaves, their fleet feet tied by roots.” She made the silver dance in the air until it settled on her skulls. “Did one of them escape? And you made him your enemy? That’s not good. Not even I can take them on.”
Jacob approached the fence, but he stopped one step short. Beyond it all time and memory would cease. They said the Baba Yaga ate time like bread.
“I will not tell them that you helped me. I have brought you something very precious to trade for one of your rushnyky.”
Witches appreciated it when you got straight down to business. The smile spreading on the haggard face confirmed that Baba Yagas were no exception to the rule.
“Ah. A trade. Why don’t you come in?”
“You know why.”
The smile now spread through all her wrinkles.
“Too bad,” she purred. “Your face would make a wonderful addition to my wall.”
Jacob counted more than a dozen faces among the carved flowers and birds. One of them looked familiar. It looked like a treasure hunter he’d known, a greedy fool who’d enjoyed feeding Heinzel to his wolfhound. What had he tried to steal from the Baba Yaga? One of her magic eggs? The hen that laid them? Or had he been after the same woven magic Jacob had come for?
The Baba Yaga raised a bony arm, and one of the carved birds flew off the wall. It was a raven. Its feathers turned black in flight. It dug its claws into Jacob’s head and began to pick at his skull as if it wanted to drive out his thoughts. Not a pleasant feeling. Then the raven flew to its mistress’ shoulder and pushed its beak into her ear. Its caws sounded like an old man’s whispers.
“So you don’t want the rushnyk for yourself?”
The rustling through the surrounding woods sounded as though the trees themselves were impressed by such selflessness.
“No. I need it for a friend.”
The Baba Yaga squinted as if to see more clearly. “So show me what you have.”
The red eyes widened with desire as Jacob pulled the fur dress from his backpack.
“Oh yes,” she whispered. “Now, there is one dress that could compete even with mine.”
She leaned over the fence and held out a hand. “You smell strange,” she said. “As though you’ve come from far away.”
