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“Give him time,” the girl said. “His soul had to go into hiding, or the ravens would’ve picked it apart.”
She plucked a thistle growing next to the door and filled Fox’s hand with its prickly harvest. Then she pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve. “Scatter the thistle seeds behind you when you hear the raven’s scream. If the raven keeps following you, spit into the handkerchief and throw it behind you. And now go! You have to reach the gate by yourself. She knows when I leave the hut.”
The fence with the skulls looked so close, but Fox could barely hold on to Jacob, and every step made the gate seem more distant. She kept whispering his name for fear he might leave it behind. Chanute was waiting with Sylvain under the trees. “Stay where you are,” Fox pleaded with her eyes. The vixen often had to speak without words. Chanute took Sylvain’s arm and pulled him back.
Just a few more steps.
Fox looked over her shoulder.
The Baba Yaga’s granddaughter was standing in the doorway, looking at the surrounding trees as though she could hear her grandmother’s approach.
One more step. Just one more, Jacob. But he was so far away, and Fox was worried he’d never find his way out of that dark hut even if they managed to escape the Baba Yaga.
Her fingers found the gate. She kicked it open, wrapping her arms so tightly around Jacob she could feel his heartbeat.
The girl was still standing in the doorway, but when Fox pulled the gate shut behind her, the child vanished into the carvings as if she’d never been anything but a slender figure between a carved old woman and a carved raven.
Chanute’s brow was damp with sweat, but he waited until Fox reached the trees. Without a word, Sylvain lifted Jacob onto his shoulders.
They turned northeast, toward where the woods thinned out. Soon enough, they heard the raven. Fox scattered the thistle seeds behind her, and they instantly grew into a thorny hedge as tall as the trees. They could hear the Baba Yaga’s angry screams. They pushed on, through creeks and morass, across meadows where lush green circles marked the dancing grounds of the Rusalkas. Fox had once seen one of those creatures at a village fair in Lotharaine. Its captor had put a bucket of water in the cage, but the naiad’s green skin had been brittle like wilted leaves. Fox’s stepfather had poked a stick through the bars, but Fox had torn it from his hand and run away, away from the caged naiads, matagots, Woodmen, and the half-starved follets.
Onward. Through the strange forest, pursued by the angry screams of the Baba Yaga.
Jacob was still unconscious. Fox couldn’t shake the terrible thought that she’d left his soul in the hut and Sylvain was carrying nothing but an empty shell.
The raven found them a second time, just as the Baba Yaga’s granddaughter had foretold. Fox spat into the handkerchief and threw it behind her, and it turned into a vast lake. The raven tried to fly over it, but its mistress called it back. The Baba Yaga was standing on the shore in a dress as colorful as the rushnyk that had saved Fox’s life. She looked at them, then turned away, the raven on her shoulder, and disappeared into the trees. Maybe she’d seen her granddaughter in that lake, and the reproach on her little face.
Fox kept going until they’d left the woods well behind. Only when there was nothing but fields and meadows around them did she let them stop. Chanute was coughing so badly, he dropped on his back like a bug. And Jacob slept. And slept. And slept, while around them the farmers came and went. Fox sat next to him, wondering whether that forest had taken everything from her.
The fields lay deserted in the moonlight. Sylvain was cursing in his sleep when Jacob finally opened his eyes. At first Fox didn’t dare look him in the eyes, fearing she might find nothing there. But they’d brought him back. Maybe his eyes now contained a little more understanding of the darkness of this world. Maybe the Baba Yaga had kept a few years of his life, but she hadn’t kept his soul, as she supposedly so often did.
With trembling fingers, Jacob pulled a feather from his jacket. Fox recognized it, though the white down was covered in blood: It was a Man-Swan feather.
She herself had stolen it from its nest a few months back. And had paid for it with a scar on her shoulder.
Jacob put the feather in her lap.
The fur dress appeared as though conjured by her deepest wish. With one hand, Fox stroked the fur that felt so much more familiar than her own skin; the other hand wiped the tears from her face.
All lost. And all gained.
“You never should have gone back,” she said. “It’s just a dress.”
Jacob rubbed the cuts on his cheek.
“Sure!” he said. “Just a dress.”
Fox could’ve kissed him on the mouth just to taste the smile on his lips. Forbidden. She’d almost forgotten.
Gone
The Dark One was gone. Without a trace. As though swallowed by the river she’d just filled with dead Cossacks. It was like she’d never crossed the border to Varangia! But after two days of fruitless searching for her trail, a stagecoachman whom Nerron asked swore, just like the blacksmith in the last village and the river boatmen they’d met that morning, that the Dark One was on her way to Moskva to give the Tzar an army of bears—and Wolfmen. Varangia was going to defeat the Goyl, and greedy Albion, and the crooked King of Lotharaine. Oh, golden times! The gout-ridden coachman turned into a happily babbling child as he described it. Even the boatmen, squatting by the river with their shoulders scraped raw, half dead from the strenuous work of dragging barges across the sluggish waters, looked rapturous as the coachman described the glory the Dark Fairy would bring to their motherland.
They said...One heard...Supposedly...Nerron would’ve preferred actual evidence that the Fairy was indeed on her way to Moskva, but Seventeen was getting more and more impatient, waking him every damn morning before sunrise. Nerron’s shoulders already had permanent silver spots from the Mirrorling’s fingers.
The stagecoach disappeared between the trees. Will was staring down the empty road. The Pup was very quiet this morning, even more so than usual. He must’ve been having hot dreams. Sixteen still sat with him every night. One could’ve almost felt jealous. He was again carrying the sack with the crossbow under his shirt sometimes, and sometimes in his jacket pocket. His brother had obviously not told him about the devious temperament of magic weapons. An onyx lord had once stabbed his two children with a magic dagger. But Nerron didn’t tell that to the Pup, nor did he talk about the magic sword that had quartered the wife of an Albian count. He was trying to stick to his own resolution not to get too soft toward Milk-face. Instead, he amused himself by picturing how he’d tell Jacob Reckless that, thanks to the Bastard, his brother was back in his jade skin. It was quickly becoming his favorite daydream. Closely followed by the one where he presented the brother as a silver statue.
“I don’t think she’s going to Moskva,” the Pup finally said.
