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Chapter 7
Baba Yaga
 

Weapons. Knights spend far too much time thinking about weapons, as though it's the sword that prevails—the sword, the bolt, the spear, the ram, the catapult—and that it's merely a matter of having more and better weapons.

And there's some truth to that. You could have asked the Duc d'Artois if was Thomas II's bowmen that stopped him at Crecy in 1246. Was it? Yes, the battle was decisive, or so the histories say, but was it the weapons, or was it the will of Good King Thomas, who promised death and destruction on one hand, and pardon for the Capétien Rebellion on the other?

I'm not suggesting an answer. I do suggest that you think on it. And make up your own mind, have your own opinions. But it is not a matter of opinion, but of a matter of history, that when Phillipe rejected Good King Thomas' terms, it was his son Louis who cut his own father down, surrendered to King Thomas, and insisted on being tried and hanged as a parricide, quite properly, under Artois law.

Is it the weapon, or the man?

And who won that battle? Could it be both?

The French have not rebelled since Crecy, true—and it's also true that more than half of the queens since then have come from d'Artois lines.

One thing you can say about the Pendragons is that they remember.

—Cully

"Sit down," she said, and like the others, Cully sat. He would have fought the command, but there was nothing to fight. His body was simply under her control, not his.

She threw back her hood, but didn't let the dark robe fall from her skinny shoulders.

Beneath the hood, her face was preposterously ordinary. Her hair was a mare's nest of gray, her face lined and withered, and her thin nose was a sharp knife over thin lips that smiled only at the edges.

The smile didn't reach her eyes.

"Ach," she said. "I'll have to give you a little freedom, won't I?" A withered finger, the knuckles swollen with age, raised in admonition. "But I'll have no nonsense," she said, pointing the finger not at Cully, but at Guy. "You're to keep your hand off the hilt of your sword—of both of your swords. You're not to throw anything at me, or move so much as an inch closer toward me than you are now—and that goes for the rest of you, too."

She aimed a thin-lipped smile at Penelope. "And if you think to try one of your pitiful little cantrips or glamours against me, feel free—but feel even more ready to suffer the consequences." She smiled more broadly, and her withered lips revealed teeth that, at first glance, looked dark as to be almost rotted away. But, no—they were made of iron, vaguely rusted. "I can promise you that you won't care for the consequences," she said.

Cully found himself able to move, at least a little. He planted his feet on the floor, and his hands against the arm of the chair. When she turned past him toward Guy, again, he could be able to move—

But no. She did just that, the witch, the bitch turned past him toward Guy . . . 

. . . and his traitor body refused to obey him. To move out of the chair would be to move toward her, and she had forbidden that, in a way that he couldn't so much as lift a finger to disobey.

Inside, the hut appeared to be much larger than it was outside. The floor was not the dirt that he had expected, but freshly strewn straw, although the sputtering ashes and flinders from the open hearth died the moment that they touched it, without a hiss of quenching.

An ancient stone bathtub, of all things, stood in one corner, the water steaming slightly, and curled up against one of the thick legs of it, a black cat watched a mouse hole with intent interest.

A waist-high pile of bones lay in one corner, up against the pillar, all of them bleached white. There was no question about what kind of bones at least many of them were; the human skulls were distinctive.

She dropped her robe about her feet, in a gesture far too reminiscent of an Order Knight. Beneath the robes, she wore peasant clothing, but not local peasant clothing—a blouse and long skirt, rather than a shift.

Her neck was decorated with a multilayered necklace that at first glance looked like raw pearls. But, no—they were teeth, bleached as white as the bones.

"So, now, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode," she said, addressing him, as though the others weren't there, "you've found me. But you don't seem to recognize me. Curious," she said.

"I don't," he said. Talking seemed to be one thing he could do. No reason not to, he supposed.

"Jenn would have." Her smile was neither cruel or gentle, just amused. "She would be of the opinion that she killed me, although quite some time before you and she were joined." She cocked her head to one side. "What's it like being married to a sword?"

He didn't answer. It wasn't just stubbornness, although it was that, too. There just wasn't an answer, and while he had long since given up his White Sword, that didn't mean that he had given up all longing for it, just as Gray, perhaps, still missed his right hand.

Or Sir Guy his brains, for that matter.

"You'd best release us," Guy said.

It was when he turned his head away from Guy that Cully finally really noticed the corner pillars of the hut. They weren't wooden uprights, although that's what he had assumed that they were when he had only seen them out of the corner of his eyes.

No. They were vaguely cylindrical and rippled, and familiar-looking, like the legs of a bird.

A witch who lived in a hut supported on chicken legs.

No wonder nobody had returned from this part of Izmir.

"Oh, had I best?" She started to sit, and a wicker chair quickly whisked itself across the hay-strewn floor and was under her before she had finished sitting. "You hardly seem to be in a position to make threats, any more than demands." She gestured at Cully. "He, at least, has worked that out. And has probably figured out who I am, as well."

Cully nodded. "Baba Yaga, I assume," he said. "You're rather far south of where you should be. And apparently somewhat more alive than you have any right to be."

She should be dead. Back when Jenn had been carried by Sir Edward, he had killed her. That's what the Annals said. Sir Edward Williams—known as the Horseman, although Cully didn't know the origin of that nickname—had hunted her down, and killed her.

Cottage witches were one thing, and toleration of them had gradually increased over the centuries. But wherever the Crown ruled, magic of the blackness of that of Baba Yaga, or the Kaliites, or the Ghost Dancers, or zerostiva was wiped out, mercilessly, whenever it surfaced. It had taken generations to wipe out the hezmoni, but they were finally gone.

As Baba Yaga should have been. But even if she wasn't dead, she shouldn't have been here—she should have been up north, in Vezalukis, near the southern border of the Zone.

"Not only less dead, but rather more alive than I should be, am I not?"

"That, too."

"Well, I can tell you in truth that that's as much a surprise to me as it is to you. Not the being this far south, of course—things near the Zone are far too . . . interesting, these days, for even the likes of me." She shook her head. "But I'm neglecting my duties of hospitality. You've come a long way to find me, and you're all quite filthy. Time to clean you up." She turned to the girl Penelope. "You'd best bathe yourself, my dear. Now, if you please."

Without a word, the girl rose from her own chair and walked over to the steaming tub, dropping her clothing about her as she did.

Guy averted his eyes, as though looking away would make any difference. Cully had seen a naked young woman or two in his time, and while under other circumstances, he would have found himself aroused by the sight of the remarkably full young breasts, crested by nipples that were darker than he would have expected. He was, of course, an old man, but he wasn't a dead one.

But even when she bent over to grip the edge of the tub, he found himself utterly unmoved, in any sort of sexual sense.

Guy was blushing, even as he kept his head turned, and Kechiroski watched the girl with a visible hunger, something that he should have been too scared to feel, and the sight of which should have disgusted Cully.

But Cully found himself utterly, surprisingly, devoid of any sensation, any emotion, even any feeling of horror at the pile of bones in the far corner, and as the girl began to wash herself, he watched the witch trimming carrots and turnips and tossing them into the bathwater with a strange sense of detachment.

She was going to eat the girl. And she was going to make the three of them watch, until it was their turn.

"Quite so," she said, responding to either his head movement or his thoughts. "And a tasty morsel she'll be indeed." She smacked her lips. "Do you know how hard it is to find a virgin hereabouts?" She sighed. "Oh, for the old days, when I could get a stepmother to send one to me, when I was able to at least tolerate some daylight."

The cat looked up at her. "If you asked me, I'd say to just eat your food, and not play with it first," the cat said.

She snorted. "And a fine one you are to talk, and you with your mousies."

"That's my nature." If a cat could shrug, it would have. "It's not that I care much, one way or the other, but there's something to be said for a clean kill and a quick meal. It's not like you're teaching kittens how to hunt, you know."

She walked over to where the girl was bathing and brushed at her hair with a bristly brush that Cully had not seen her produce. "But it isn't just the meat. Can you feel her fear?" She seemed to grow larger in the confines of the hut. "Tasty. Powerful."

"Not nearly as much as that last English fellow, though." A pair of small eyes peeked out of the mouse hole. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got my own kill to attend to."

"Do as you please." She laughed, and turned back to the girl. "Scrub yourself thoroughly, my dear," she said, as she walked over to the fireplace. She took a buried stone from the ashes with a preposterously ordinary set of tongs, then carried it over. "I think that the water is chilling you—let me help with that," she said, plunging the stone into the water.

It burbled and steamed, and when the girl started to scream in pain, the witch laid a withered finger across her lips, and all she could emit was a whimper, although her eyes were wide in terror.

She eyed Cully. "It would be much more of a pleasure right now if you still had Jenn with you. Hurts, doesn't it? More than if it were your own flesh scalding?"

"I've seen pain before," Cully said. "And felt it."

"Oh, very brave, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode—when it's another's pain. We'll see how you fare when it's you in the pot."

"Why don't you tell me what's going on?" he asked. Anything to delay, and besides . . . 

She laughed again, as she busied herself with adding another stone, and yet another, to the water. "And just after I've been chastised by Bubastis for playing with my food? I think not."

It was all wrong.

This shouldn't be Baba Yaga; she was supposed to have been dead for almost three centuries, and almost a thousand miles away.

Talk, he thought to himself. Stall.

"I don't think you're really Baba Yaga," he said. "I've read the Annals. Sir Edward wrote that he killed her, and he was a knight of the Order."

"And knights of the Order never lie?" She was amused. "You, of all people, should know better than that, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode. Collect up your silly sins; sort them as you please, and you knights have committed far larger than simply bearing of false witness."

The girl was still unable to open her mouth, but she was more screaming than whimpering behind her sealed lips, as the water simmered about her.

"I don't know very much about Order Knights," Kechiroski finally said. "Or about Baba Yaga. Although I have heard it said that the greatest of all the witches was Circe, of course, but perhaps that's just—"

"Circe." The witch practically sniffed in disgust. "You might as well bring up the litae—those tired old biddies, who can do no more than bind a wound or two."

Kechiroski was thinking, although to what effect—

Yes. Keep her talking, get what information that they could from her, and bide their time, waiting for an opening to do something, something useful. Like flee.

Of course. He was compelled by her words, in combination with whatever spell she had worked on them. When her mouth was full, perhaps they could flee, and he could put his hands over his ears to keep the words out.

All Cully would have to do was watch as the witch boiled the girl alive, and hope and pray that he was the last, and not the next—that he could find a moment to break away.

It was all sensible, and cold-blooded, and the right thing to do. Whether this really was Baba Yaga, or something else, that was important, and getting word of it out far more important than the lives of all four of them, or more than that. Darklings south of Aba-Paluoja; new live swords; an attempt on the Wise in Pantelleria—those were all pieces of a puzzle, and this game of puzzles was being played for high stakes.

And, besides, there was nothing that he could do except wait and watch.

Bile rose in his mouth, and spewed out over his chest.

No. There might be a way. He might be able to—

The witch was opening her mouth to say something. The right thing to do, the only thing to do was to wait and listen, and if he survived this, the muffled screams of the girl would haunt his dreams, but they'd have company aplenty, after all.

And—

The witch turned away, ever so slightly, to drop another slice of carrot in the stew pot.

Sir Cully of Cully's Woode kicked himself backward and sideways out of his chair, not toward the witch, where his traitor body would have refused to go, but toward Guy, tearing at his own tunic as he did, to give his hand at least some protection.

Sir Guy of Orkney, bearer of the White Sword Albert, sat wide-eyed.

Faster, old man, faster, before—

She was turning, murmuring something, as he reached Guy's side.

The right thing to do, the safe thing to do would be to clamp Sir Guy's hand on the hilt of Albert, and force him to draw it, but Sir Guy was decades younger than Cully, and stronger, and even Cully's desperate strength might not be enough to overcome Guy's obedience to the witch's command. Willing spirit could not always overcome stubborn flesh, after all.

So it was simple.

He snatched up the scabbard and drew the sword himself.

Sir Guy had averted his eyes, although there was nothing that could be done about his ears, and the calmness of the witch was even more frightening than the screams of the cooking girl.

His hand ached for Albert's hilt, and he cursed himself for the weakness of his body and spirit that kept his hand away from the hilt.

And not just to kill this witch, although he hungered to do so with a passion that astonished even himself.

It was the fear. Yes, he had made confession that evening when they had finished their work, and for once Cully had had no complaint. Surely whatever sins he had committed since then were of a venial nature, easily forgiven. He had, after all, averted his eyes from the disturbing sight of the naked girl.

But it was the fear of dying that had turned his bowels to water. Not the fear of pain; pain was a frequent companion.

But of dying.

How could a good Christian knight not go to meet his maker with eagerness? Yes, suicide was a sin, but there was nothing that he could do here. He had carried Albert for years; surely, the calmness of the saint should have rubbed off on him enough to treat this, his end, as fitting. It wasn't as though he was some stumblebum like Cully, after all, who had made a life of doing what he pleased, whether it was leaving the Order when it suited him, or tricking Sir Joshua—and the king himself!—into bringing him back into service.

No. Sir Guy was, after all, on mission, and knights of the Order of Crown, Shield, and Dragon died on mission all of the time.

So why was he trembling in fear? Why? It was absurd, but it was.

And there wasn't a thing he could do about it, or about—

And suddenly Cully was at his side, a scrap of cloth hastily wrapped about his hand, reaching toward his waist and drawing Albert.

Cully was trying to turn away, as though to hack away at the witch, but . . . 

But it was all wrong. Cully? Yes, if he touched flesh to metal, Albert would burn not only his flesh but whatever Cully had left of a soul.

But it was preposterous. Cully had no right to a live sword in his hand, be it the reddest of the Reds or one as White as Albert.

Yes, they were all to die here, but that was the way of it, and for a moment his fear was washed away with fury at the wrongness of it all, and he reached out to stop the indecency.

Cully's face was twisted into a mask of agony, and he didn't resist. But as Guy reached for him, he clapped his hand—the hand with Albert in it!—to Guy's.

It was all pain.

It was always pain, and worse, and, as always, they could remember it only when they were joined.

Two souls, welded into one for the moment—how could it not be agony? How could Guy's insufferable arrogance and pride not grind painfully against Albert's sharp, grating humility? How would it not be possible that each wrong that each of them had done would not be laid bare before the other, disgusting the both of them?

Touching his hand to Albert was a reassurance; taking him in hand was something that they would both blot out of their memories.

Later.

They had heard that for some of the others of the Reds and the Whites, the world became gentler, laid out in pristine black and white or in deep, rich colors, with the light of the sword a beacon of clarity. They hoped and they prayed that story, that myth was true for the others, and surely that was possible—but it never was so for them.

It was all ugly. It was always ugly. Not just in sight, but in touch, smell, and taste. The foul stench of their own sweat was overpowering, reeking of ancient, unforgivable sin, and they could feel every tiny foot of every single one of the lice burrowing through their body hair.

The witch was the worst, perhaps, but the best was still awful.

Still, the power, the fire was there, the purifying fire that had Cully's hand still afire, still smelling like a pig on a spit. It hadn't been enough to purify that spawn of Hell, but that would be a simple matter.

It was all a simple matter, after all: all life was sin, all life was foul, and they had the power to cleanse it.

The witch, though, was worst of all. The sweat dampening her armpits stank not just of humanity, but of human flesh, and the fire burning within her was no cleansing flame, like the white flame that burned within them, threatening to consume their own sins.

It was a dark and ugly fire, a smouldering reeking.

She was far more fire than flesh; he could see that now, and it was all that they could do not to recoil in horror from the hellfire that clung to her bones. She stank not only of human sin, but of sulphur and brimstone, beyond any power to cleanse, but only possible to destroy.

So they lowered the part of them that was the burning sword toward her flame, and met it head on.

But it all stank. They brightened their flame, careless of the damage it was doing to Guy's body.

There was no heroism. There was no dignity, nothing ennobling about it.

It was just a matter of fighting the stench.

Stavros's mind had been spinning—but no, he wasn't Stavros here, he was Nissim. He had to sound like Stavros, but not act like him. Sir Stavros Kechiroski, OC, was a hero, and that he had earned the Order of the Crown trying to do what Nissim al-Furat would have been doing was merely a coincidence.

Here, a hero of the Crown would have stayed and fought—and died.

He wasn't afraid of death; that would be as Allah willed, as it always had been. It was the notion of failure that frightened him—failure of service.

When the White Sword flared into brightness that dazzled not only his eyes but his mind, he kicked himself out of his own chair, and out through the door into the night. Let the knights win or lose to the witch; that didn't matter as much as him getting away. The nearest place that he knew he could make a report was Pironesia, and he would work his passage there, no matter what he had to do in order to get that done.

What did this all mean?

He didn't know, and it wasn't his to know. It was enough to know that this was important—this wasn't a matter of some Tikritzian village crone who made vile potions that probably did a little more harm than good, for she would always end her supposed spells with inshallah, as was only proper.

No. This was a witch like something out of the old fables, the sort of power that the Caliphate, just as much as the Crown and Empire, had hunted down, and for much the same reasons that the afrits and djinni had been killed and confined by Suleiman the Magnificent.

There was no living with such as these—except that there she was: alive.

The caliph and the sharifs, of course, had their own court wizards, in much the same way that the Crown had its College. Those were different, working along the boundaries of magic and alchemy to cure lesions, or clarify sight, and if some dabbled in the Black, well, such things always happened, and the officers of the Caliphate were always firm in their resolve, and the headsman's sword was always thirsty.

But this? You could bargain all you would with one of these, but it was like bargaining with shaitan—the bargaining in and of itself was impious, and a repudiation of faith. The best thing, of course, would be to kill her, but doing that was beyond the abilities of Nissim al-Furat and Stavros Kechiroski alike.

So he ran.

The girl was screaming in pain, her hands scrabbling at the rim of the stewing tub, unable to find any purchase, while Sir Guy and the witch stood locked, her darkness warring with the light of the live sword.

Cully's legs tried to refused to support him, and his right hand was useless, but he forced himself to his feet, barely able to keep his balance, as though the hut itself was rocking from side to side.

Ignore the pain, he told himself. It was important that he ignore the pain.

It didn't matter how much it hurt. Even with Albert in hand, Guy was by no means the superior of Baba Yaga—not in her place. The walls, which had seemed preposterously far away, began to close in on them, and the hut itself rocked back and forth, splashing the witch even more than Cully with the scalding water from the stewing-tub, splashing him from leg to hip in agony that seemed to exceed that of his hand.

But his body was his own again. Concentrating on Guy and Albert had caught the witch's attention, or distracted her power, turning it away from him.

The right thing to do would be to launch himself at the witch, and ignore the dying girl in the boiling water. Even if the sword had not lit up the hut with its actinic brightness, he could see that Penelope's skin was all blistered and broken; she'd die anyway.

So he reached his good hand into the boiling water and yanked her free from the tub. Her skin was blistered and burned, and she couldn't stop screaming, but as he turned to leap upon the witch's back, she was at his side.

His fingers reached out into the blackness that wrapped itself about the witch, and in that there was surcease from the pain, at least in his hands. They were numb and insensate, and he wasn't even sure that he was reaching into anything at all, except for the cold darkness.

Which popped like a soap bubble, and he found himself astride the old woman, his hands around her neck, the hut motionless, and with a whimpering girl at his side, Kechiroski gone, and Sir Guy passed out on the straw floor.

"Wait," she managed to choke out. "Please stop." Was he hearing her with his ears or his mind? He wasn't sure. He was gripping her throat as hard as he could, and she shouldn't be able to croak out anything more than a gasp. He wouldn't have waited, but his hands just weren't strong enough to wring the preposterously thin neck, although he tried, as hard as he could.

Was it that her neck was too strong, or that he was too damnably weak?

Her fingers clawed at his face, trying for his eyes, and shook them off, leaning harder on his hands, ignoring the pain as her nails clawed his forehead and cheek, until they fell away; and when he opened his eyes her lips continued to work, and he could still hear her—not with his ears, in which the rush of his own blood would have drowned out her whispers, but in his mind.

The roaring grew louder and louder, and it deafened him. It was all he could do not to take his hands from that neck and clap them about his ears, but no.

Not while I breathe, he thought.

I know something, some things you need to, Cully. And you've won—I'll tell you. Just let me have the girl. I need her—that, that sword did me in almost as much as your Jenn did Mother.

So she wasn't really Baba Yaga?

Yes, I'm Baba Yaga, daughter of Baba Yaga, herself the daughter of Baba Yaga, and your beloved Jenn and that horrible Sir Edward killed Mother, but they didn't get me, and—

What do you want?

What do you want? It's yours for the asking. Anything. You have but to ask, Cully.

She raised her withered hands to touch at his, and at first he thought she was trying once again to break his grip, but, no: the blistered flesh from his injured hand sloughed away, leaving pink, fresh skin behind.

I can do more than that, much more. Make love to me, Sir Cully, and with your manhood touching my womb and my tongue in your mouth, I'll lengthen your life. The aches, the pains that you wake with will be gone. I can make you forty again. Or twenty, even. No seeming; it's just a matter of adding life to life.

And all you want is me to mount you, and hold my nose while I do?

No, no, you fool—I need the girl. I'll cook the life out of her, as I must; I'm badly hurt—but I'll share that life with you. Drink of her broth, with me. She's young, and of a strong spark, and a virgin; she's not just a tasty meal, like what I've been living on, but prepared properly, she's a banquet. You can share at that banquet. It will fill you beyond your imagining.

Not a chance.

But there's more—I know. I know what you're looking for; I listen to the wind, and it brings me many tidings. I'll tell you. After. Just give me the girl.

Tell me now, and I'll let you live—for now. I swear it on my soul.

Pfah for your soul; you'd sacrifice that in a heartbeat. Would you swear it on Joshua's? Would you swear it on your love for him, or for Her?

Yes, I'd swear on all that and more—tell me, and I'll let you live this day.

Yes, he would let her live—and then he would hunt her down, and kill her.

She seemed to laugh at that possibility.

I'm unworried about that. But you'll give me the girl? It's of little import; she'll probably die anyway, burned as she is, and if not today or tomorrow, soon—you ephemerals live such short lives. Give me the girl—help put her back in the pot, and I'll tell you. I need the girl.

Tell me first.

And then I can have the girl?

"Of course," he said. "I swear it on my hope of salvation," he said.

And you swear it by Her? By Joshua's soul? Do you bind yourself by the hope of his salvation to help me in this?

Of course he would have lied; She would have forgiven him the lie, and Gray would have forgiven him the truth. Lying had always come easily to Cully; it was the truth that was hard for him to see, to speak, to accept.

She could have produced a stack of Bibles, and he would have sworn on them, without regret, and then betrayed the devil's promise in a heartbeat.

But what if his oaths had power here and now? What if his word could bind his body as tightly as her magic had, moments that felt like days ago? No need to worry about what She would do, or feel—She was far more powerful than he was, and his words could touch Her only if She so chose.

No. If words could bind his body, his body would now be bound.

But . . . but what if his words could bind Gray's soul? A just God would not have permitted that, save by Gray's own choice, perhaps.

But Cully knew full well what Gray would have chosen, for it was a choice Gray had already made.

For himself, by God, he could solve this if needs be, for while his life was not always in his own hands, his own death was. And if God would hold him accountable as a suicide, that was His choice, not Cully's.

But for Gray? What of the risk to him? Could Cully's oath breaking endanger Joshua's soul? It was against all sense and logic, against all his training as a priest—but so much in life went against all that.

What if it was true?

It was a risk Joshua would have insisted he take. Put it all in the hands of God, and trust to His mercy. Perhaps he would not condemn Gray for Cully's impiety, Gray would say, and it mattered not a whit if He did, Gray would have said, for he was already damned, and it didn't matter if he were not.

He knew what Gray would have said, were he here: As you love me, Father: say you what needs be said, and then do you what needs to be done.

As you will, Joshua.

"I so swear," he said. "I swear it on Joshua's soul; I shall do as you say."

Liar. You'll kill me the moment I tell you.

"Of course," he said, for he could bear no more, and if all it would take to compel the Baba Yaga were his hands on her throat and his words in his mouth then it would already have been done.

But, no, he would not sacrifice the brave girl. He loved her too little, and too much, for that.

He tightened his hands and bore down, his hands clenching with all the strength that they had, more than he would have thought he was capable of.

Cully bore down for a long time, until he noticed that he could hear again, and that the wind was whistling through the trees.

Sir Cully of Cully's Woode found himself kneeling on dead, wet leaves, with Sir Guy passed out beside him, and the girl whimpering in pain as she writhed on the ground.

Kechiroski was nowhere to be seen, but that was understandable; they were no longer on the hill that they had climbed, but in a clearing, hills and mountains rising in the distance.

How far away from the hilltop? He couldn't recognize any landmarks, not in the dark, and the moon and stars overhead were no clue at all. The hilltop could have been among the dark mass rising off in the distance to the north, but he wouldn't swear to it.

Maybe. The familiar smell of the sea was strong in his nostrils. He must be much closer to the sea than the hilltop had been.

The only thing in his hands was a scrap of cloth, and of all that had been in the hut of Baba Yaga, the only things that remained were four preposterously ordinary chicken legs, stuck upright in the dirt, and over by the trees were the eyes of a cat, reflecting the moonlight.

For just a moment.

And then it was gone in the dark, and he was alone with the screaming.

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Framed

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Chapter 7
Baba Yaga
 

Weapons. Knights spend far too much time thinking about weapons, as though it's the sword that prevails—the sword, the bolt, the spear, the ram, the catapult—and that it's merely a matter of having more and better weapons.

And there's some truth to that. You could have asked the Duc d'Artois if was Thomas II's bowmen that stopped him at Crecy in 1246. Was it? Yes, the battle was decisive, or so the histories say, but was it the weapons, or was it the will of Good King Thomas, who promised death and destruction on one hand, and pardon for the Capétien Rebellion on the other?

I'm not suggesting an answer. I do suggest that you think on it. And make up your own mind, have your own opinions. But it is not a matter of opinion, but of a matter of history, that when Phillipe rejected Good King Thomas' terms, it was his son Louis who cut his own father down, surrendered to King Thomas, and insisted on being tried and hanged as a parricide, quite properly, under Artois law.

Is it the weapon, or the man?

And who won that battle? Could it be both?

The French have not rebelled since Crecy, true—and it's also true that more than half of the queens since then have come from d'Artois lines.

One thing you can say about the Pendragons is that they remember.

—Cully

"Sit down," she said, and like the others, Cully sat. He would have fought the command, but there was nothing to fight. His body was simply under her control, not his.

She threw back her hood, but didn't let the dark robe fall from her skinny shoulders.

Beneath the hood, her face was preposterously ordinary. Her hair was a mare's nest of gray, her face lined and withered, and her thin nose was a sharp knife over thin lips that smiled only at the edges.

The smile didn't reach her eyes.

"Ach," she said. "I'll have to give you a little freedom, won't I?" A withered finger, the knuckles swollen with age, raised in admonition. "But I'll have no nonsense," she said, pointing the finger not at Cully, but at Guy. "You're to keep your hand off the hilt of your sword—of both of your swords. You're not to throw anything at me, or move so much as an inch closer toward me than you are now—and that goes for the rest of you, too."

She aimed a thin-lipped smile at Penelope. "And if you think to try one of your pitiful little cantrips or glamours against me, feel free—but feel even more ready to suffer the consequences." She smiled more broadly, and her withered lips revealed teeth that, at first glance, looked dark as to be almost rotted away. But, no—they were made of iron, vaguely rusted. "I can promise you that you won't care for the consequences," she said.

Cully found himself able to move, at least a little. He planted his feet on the floor, and his hands against the arm of the chair. When she turned past him toward Guy, again, he could be able to move—

But no. She did just that, the witch, the bitch turned past him toward Guy . . . 

. . . and his traitor body refused to obey him. To move out of the chair would be to move toward her, and she had forbidden that, in a way that he couldn't so much as lift a finger to disobey.

Inside, the hut appeared to be much larger than it was outside. The floor was not the dirt that he had expected, but freshly strewn straw, although the sputtering ashes and flinders from the open hearth died the moment that they touched it, without a hiss of quenching.

An ancient stone bathtub, of all things, stood in one corner, the water steaming slightly, and curled up against one of the thick legs of it, a black cat watched a mouse hole with intent interest.

A waist-high pile of bones lay in one corner, up against the pillar, all of them bleached white. There was no question about what kind of bones at least many of them were; the human skulls were distinctive.

She dropped her robe about her feet, in a gesture far too reminiscent of an Order Knight. Beneath the robes, she wore peasant clothing, but not local peasant clothing—a blouse and long skirt, rather than a shift.

Her neck was decorated with a multilayered necklace that at first glance looked like raw pearls. But, no—they were teeth, bleached as white as the bones.

"So, now, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode," she said, addressing him, as though the others weren't there, "you've found me. But you don't seem to recognize me. Curious," she said.

"I don't," he said. Talking seemed to be one thing he could do. No reason not to, he supposed.

"Jenn would have." Her smile was neither cruel or gentle, just amused. "She would be of the opinion that she killed me, although quite some time before you and she were joined." She cocked her head to one side. "What's it like being married to a sword?"

He didn't answer. It wasn't just stubbornness, although it was that, too. There just wasn't an answer, and while he had long since given up his White Sword, that didn't mean that he had given up all longing for it, just as Gray, perhaps, still missed his right hand.

Or Sir Guy his brains, for that matter.

"You'd best release us," Guy said.

It was when he turned his head away from Guy that Cully finally really noticed the corner pillars of the hut. They weren't wooden uprights, although that's what he had assumed that they were when he had only seen them out of the corner of his eyes.

No. They were vaguely cylindrical and rippled, and familiar-looking, like the legs of a bird.

A witch who lived in a hut supported on chicken legs.

No wonder nobody had returned from this part of Izmir.

"Oh, had I best?" She started to sit, and a wicker chair quickly whisked itself across the hay-strewn floor and was under her before she had finished sitting. "You hardly seem to be in a position to make threats, any more than demands." She gestured at Cully. "He, at least, has worked that out. And has probably figured out who I am, as well."

Cully nodded. "Baba Yaga, I assume," he said. "You're rather far south of where you should be. And apparently somewhat more alive than you have any right to be."

She should be dead. Back when Jenn had been carried by Sir Edward, he had killed her. That's what the Annals said. Sir Edward Williams—known as the Horseman, although Cully didn't know the origin of that nickname—had hunted her down, and killed her.

Cottage witches were one thing, and toleration of them had gradually increased over the centuries. But wherever the Crown ruled, magic of the blackness of that of Baba Yaga, or the Kaliites, or the Ghost Dancers, or zerostiva was wiped out, mercilessly, whenever it surfaced. It had taken generations to wipe out the hezmoni, but they were finally gone.

As Baba Yaga should have been. But even if she wasn't dead, she shouldn't have been here—she should have been up north, in Vezalukis, near the southern border of the Zone.

"Not only less dead, but rather more alive than I should be, am I not?"

"That, too."

"Well, I can tell you in truth that that's as much a surprise to me as it is to you. Not the being this far south, of course—things near the Zone are far too . . . interesting, these days, for even the likes of me." She shook her head. "But I'm neglecting my duties of hospitality. You've come a long way to find me, and you're all quite filthy. Time to clean you up." She turned to the girl Penelope. "You'd best bathe yourself, my dear. Now, if you please."

Without a word, the girl rose from her own chair and walked over to the steaming tub, dropping her clothing about her as she did.

Guy averted his eyes, as though looking away would make any difference. Cully had seen a naked young woman or two in his time, and while under other circumstances, he would have found himself aroused by the sight of the remarkably full young breasts, crested by nipples that were darker than he would have expected. He was, of course, an old man, but he wasn't a dead one.

But even when she bent over to grip the edge of the tub, he found himself utterly unmoved, in any sort of sexual sense.

Guy was blushing, even as he kept his head turned, and Kechiroski watched the girl with a visible hunger, something that he should have been too scared to feel, and the sight of which should have disgusted Cully.

But Cully found himself utterly, surprisingly, devoid of any sensation, any emotion, even any feeling of horror at the pile of bones in the far corner, and as the girl began to wash herself, he watched the witch trimming carrots and turnips and tossing them into the bathwater with a strange sense of detachment.

She was going to eat the girl. And she was going to make the three of them watch, until it was their turn.

"Quite so," she said, responding to either his head movement or his thoughts. "And a tasty morsel she'll be indeed." She smacked her lips. "Do you know how hard it is to find a virgin hereabouts?" She sighed. "Oh, for the old days, when I could get a stepmother to send one to me, when I was able to at least tolerate some daylight."

The cat looked up at her. "If you asked me, I'd say to just eat your food, and not play with it first," the cat said.

She snorted. "And a fine one you are to talk, and you with your mousies."

"That's my nature." If a cat could shrug, it would have. "It's not that I care much, one way or the other, but there's something to be said for a clean kill and a quick meal. It's not like you're teaching kittens how to hunt, you know."

She walked over to where the girl was bathing and brushed at her hair with a bristly brush that Cully had not seen her produce. "But it isn't just the meat. Can you feel her fear?" She seemed to grow larger in the confines of the hut. "Tasty. Powerful."

"Not nearly as much as that last English fellow, though." A pair of small eyes peeked out of the mouse hole. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got my own kill to attend to."

"Do as you please." She laughed, and turned back to the girl. "Scrub yourself thoroughly, my dear," she said, as she walked over to the fireplace. She took a buried stone from the ashes with a preposterously ordinary set of tongs, then carried it over. "I think that the water is chilling you—let me help with that," she said, plunging the stone into the water.

It burbled and steamed, and when the girl started to scream in pain, the witch laid a withered finger across her lips, and all she could emit was a whimper, although her eyes were wide in terror.

She eyed Cully. "It would be much more of a pleasure right now if you still had Jenn with you. Hurts, doesn't it? More than if it were your own flesh scalding?"

"I've seen pain before," Cully said. "And felt it."

"Oh, very brave, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode—when it's another's pain. We'll see how you fare when it's you in the pot."

"Why don't you tell me what's going on?" he asked. Anything to delay, and besides . . . 

She laughed again, as she busied herself with adding another stone, and yet another, to the water. "And just after I've been chastised by Bubastis for playing with my food? I think not."

It was all wrong.

This shouldn't be Baba Yaga; she was supposed to have been dead for almost three centuries, and almost a thousand miles away.

Talk, he thought to himself. Stall.

"I don't think you're really Baba Yaga," he said. "I've read the Annals. Sir Edward wrote that he killed her, and he was a knight of the Order."

"And knights of the Order never lie?" She was amused. "You, of all people, should know better than that, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode. Collect up your silly sins; sort them as you please, and you knights have committed far larger than simply bearing of false witness."

The girl was still unable to open her mouth, but she was more screaming than whimpering behind her sealed lips, as the water simmered about her.

"I don't know very much about Order Knights," Kechiroski finally said. "Or about Baba Yaga. Although I have heard it said that the greatest of all the witches was Circe, of course, but perhaps that's just—"

"Circe." The witch practically sniffed in disgust. "You might as well bring up the litae—those tired old biddies, who can do no more than bind a wound or two."

Kechiroski was thinking, although to what effect—

Yes. Keep her talking, get what information that they could from her, and bide their time, waiting for an opening to do something, something useful. Like flee.

Of course. He was compelled by her words, in combination with whatever spell she had worked on them. When her mouth was full, perhaps they could flee, and he could put his hands over his ears to keep the words out.

All Cully would have to do was watch as the witch boiled the girl alive, and hope and pray that he was the last, and not the next—that he could find a moment to break away.

It was all sensible, and cold-blooded, and the right thing to do. Whether this really was Baba Yaga, or something else, that was important, and getting word of it out far more important than the lives of all four of them, or more than that. Darklings south of Aba-Paluoja; new live swords; an attempt on the Wise in Pantelleria—those were all pieces of a puzzle, and this game of puzzles was being played for high stakes.

And, besides, there was nothing that he could do except wait and watch.

Bile rose in his mouth, and spewed out over his chest.

No. There might be a way. He might be able to—

The witch was opening her mouth to say something. The right thing to do, the only thing to do was to wait and listen, and if he survived this, the muffled screams of the girl would haunt his dreams, but they'd have company aplenty, after all.

And—

The witch turned away, ever so slightly, to drop another slice of carrot in the stew pot.

Sir Cully of Cully's Woode kicked himself backward and sideways out of his chair, not toward the witch, where his traitor body would have refused to go, but toward Guy, tearing at his own tunic as he did, to give his hand at least some protection.

Sir Guy of Orkney, bearer of the White Sword Albert, sat wide-eyed.

Faster, old man, faster, before—

She was turning, murmuring something, as he reached Guy's side.

The right thing to do, the safe thing to do would be to clamp Sir Guy's hand on the hilt of Albert, and force him to draw it, but Sir Guy was decades younger than Cully, and stronger, and even Cully's desperate strength might not be enough to overcome Guy's obedience to the witch's command. Willing spirit could not always overcome stubborn flesh, after all.

So it was simple.

He snatched up the scabbard and drew the sword himself.

Sir Guy had averted his eyes, although there was nothing that could be done about his ears, and the calmness of the witch was even more frightening than the screams of the cooking girl.

His hand ached for Albert's hilt, and he cursed himself for the weakness of his body and spirit that kept his hand away from the hilt.

And not just to kill this witch, although he hungered to do so with a passion that astonished even himself.

It was the fear. Yes, he had made confession that evening when they had finished their work, and for once Cully had had no complaint. Surely whatever sins he had committed since then were of a venial nature, easily forgiven. He had, after all, averted his eyes from the disturbing sight of the naked girl.

But it was the fear of dying that had turned his bowels to water. Not the fear of pain; pain was a frequent companion.

But of dying.

How could a good Christian knight not go to meet his maker with eagerness? Yes, suicide was a sin, but there was nothing that he could do here. He had carried Albert for years; surely, the calmness of the saint should have rubbed off on him enough to treat this, his end, as fitting. It wasn't as though he was some stumblebum like Cully, after all, who had made a life of doing what he pleased, whether it was leaving the Order when it suited him, or tricking Sir Joshua—and the king himself!—into bringing him back into service.

No. Sir Guy was, after all, on mission, and knights of the Order of Crown, Shield, and Dragon died on mission all of the time.

So why was he trembling in fear? Why? It was absurd, but it was.

And there wasn't a thing he could do about it, or about—

And suddenly Cully was at his side, a scrap of cloth hastily wrapped about his hand, reaching toward his waist and drawing Albert.

Cully was trying to turn away, as though to hack away at the witch, but . . . 

But it was all wrong. Cully? Yes, if he touched flesh to metal, Albert would burn not only his flesh but whatever Cully had left of a soul.

But it was preposterous. Cully had no right to a live sword in his hand, be it the reddest of the Reds or one as White as Albert.

Yes, they were all to die here, but that was the way of it, and for a moment his fear was washed away with fury at the wrongness of it all, and he reached out to stop the indecency.

Cully's face was twisted into a mask of agony, and he didn't resist. But as Guy reached for him, he clapped his hand—the hand with Albert in it!—to Guy's.

It was all pain.

It was always pain, and worse, and, as always, they could remember it only when they were joined.

Two souls, welded into one for the moment—how could it not be agony? How could Guy's insufferable arrogance and pride not grind painfully against Albert's sharp, grating humility? How would it not be possible that each wrong that each of them had done would not be laid bare before the other, disgusting the both of them?

Touching his hand to Albert was a reassurance; taking him in hand was something that they would both blot out of their memories.

Later.

They had heard that for some of the others of the Reds and the Whites, the world became gentler, laid out in pristine black and white or in deep, rich colors, with the light of the sword a beacon of clarity. They hoped and they prayed that story, that myth was true for the others, and surely that was possible—but it never was so for them.

It was all ugly. It was always ugly. Not just in sight, but in touch, smell, and taste. The foul stench of their own sweat was overpowering, reeking of ancient, unforgivable sin, and they could feel every tiny foot of every single one of the lice burrowing through their body hair.

The witch was the worst, perhaps, but the best was still awful.

Still, the power, the fire was there, the purifying fire that had Cully's hand still afire, still smelling like a pig on a spit. It hadn't been enough to purify that spawn of Hell, but that would be a simple matter.

It was all a simple matter, after all: all life was sin, all life was foul, and they had the power to cleanse it.

The witch, though, was worst of all. The sweat dampening her armpits stank not just of humanity, but of human flesh, and the fire burning within her was no cleansing flame, like the white flame that burned within them, threatening to consume their own sins.

It was a dark and ugly fire, a smouldering reeking.

She was far more fire than flesh; he could see that now, and it was all that they could do not to recoil in horror from the hellfire that clung to her bones. She stank not only of human sin, but of sulphur and brimstone, beyond any power to cleanse, but only possible to destroy.

So they lowered the part of them that was the burning sword toward her flame, and met it head on.

But it all stank. They brightened their flame, careless of the damage it was doing to Guy's body.

There was no heroism. There was no dignity, nothing ennobling about it.

It was just a matter of fighting the stench.

Stavros's mind had been spinning—but no, he wasn't Stavros here, he was Nissim. He had to sound like Stavros, but not act like him. Sir Stavros Kechiroski, OC, was a hero, and that he had earned the Order of the Crown trying to do what Nissim al-Furat would have been doing was merely a coincidence.

Here, a hero of the Crown would have stayed and fought—and died.

He wasn't afraid of death; that would be as Allah willed, as it always had been. It was the notion of failure that frightened him—failure of service.

When the White Sword flared into brightness that dazzled not only his eyes but his mind, he kicked himself out of his own chair, and out through the door into the night. Let the knights win or lose to the witch; that didn't matter as much as him getting away. The nearest place that he knew he could make a report was Pironesia, and he would work his passage there, no matter what he had to do in order to get that done.

What did this all mean?

He didn't know, and it wasn't his to know. It was enough to know that this was important—this wasn't a matter of some Tikritzian village crone who made vile potions that probably did a little more harm than good, for she would always end her supposed spells with inshallah, as was only proper.

No. This was a witch like something out of the old fables, the sort of power that the Caliphate, just as much as the Crown and Empire, had hunted down, and for much the same reasons that the afrits and djinni had been killed and confined by Suleiman the Magnificent.

There was no living with such as these—except that there she was: alive.

The caliph and the sharifs, of course, had their own court wizards, in much the same way that the Crown had its College. Those were different, working along the boundaries of magic and alchemy to cure lesions, or clarify sight, and if some dabbled in the Black, well, such things always happened, and the officers of the Caliphate were always firm in their resolve, and the headsman's sword was always thirsty.

But this? You could bargain all you would with one of these, but it was like bargaining with shaitan—the bargaining in and of itself was impious, and a repudiation of faith. The best thing, of course, would be to kill her, but doing that was beyond the abilities of Nissim al-Furat and Stavros Kechiroski alike.

So he ran.

The girl was screaming in pain, her hands scrabbling at the rim of the stewing tub, unable to find any purchase, while Sir Guy and the witch stood locked, her darkness warring with the light of the live sword.

Cully's legs tried to refused to support him, and his right hand was useless, but he forced himself to his feet, barely able to keep his balance, as though the hut itself was rocking from side to side.

Ignore the pain, he told himself. It was important that he ignore the pain.

It didn't matter how much it hurt. Even with Albert in hand, Guy was by no means the superior of Baba Yaga—not in her place. The walls, which had seemed preposterously far away, began to close in on them, and the hut itself rocked back and forth, splashing the witch even more than Cully with the scalding water from the stewing-tub, splashing him from leg to hip in agony that seemed to exceed that of his hand.

But his body was his own again. Concentrating on Guy and Albert had caught the witch's attention, or distracted her power, turning it away from him.

The right thing to do would be to launch himself at the witch, and ignore the dying girl in the boiling water. Even if the sword had not lit up the hut with its actinic brightness, he could see that Penelope's skin was all blistered and broken; she'd die anyway.

So he reached his good hand into the boiling water and yanked her free from the tub. Her skin was blistered and burned, and she couldn't stop screaming, but as he turned to leap upon the witch's back, she was at his side.

His fingers reached out into the blackness that wrapped itself about the witch, and in that there was surcease from the pain, at least in his hands. They were numb and insensate, and he wasn't even sure that he was reaching into anything at all, except for the cold darkness.

Which popped like a soap bubble, and he found himself astride the old woman, his hands around her neck, the hut motionless, and with a whimpering girl at his side, Kechiroski gone, and Sir Guy passed out on the straw floor.

"Wait," she managed to choke out. "Please stop." Was he hearing her with his ears or his mind? He wasn't sure. He was gripping her throat as hard as he could, and she shouldn't be able to croak out anything more than a gasp. He wouldn't have waited, but his hands just weren't strong enough to wring the preposterously thin neck, although he tried, as hard as he could.

Was it that her neck was too strong, or that he was too damnably weak?

Her fingers clawed at his face, trying for his eyes, and shook them off, leaning harder on his hands, ignoring the pain as her nails clawed his forehead and cheek, until they fell away; and when he opened his eyes her lips continued to work, and he could still hear her—not with his ears, in which the rush of his own blood would have drowned out her whispers, but in his mind.

The roaring grew louder and louder, and it deafened him. It was all he could do not to take his hands from that neck and clap them about his ears, but no.

Not while I breathe, he thought.

I know something, some things you need to, Cully. And you've won—I'll tell you. Just let me have the girl. I need her—that, that sword did me in almost as much as your Jenn did Mother.

So she wasn't really Baba Yaga?

Yes, I'm Baba Yaga, daughter of Baba Yaga, herself the daughter of Baba Yaga, and your beloved Jenn and that horrible Sir Edward killed Mother, but they didn't get me, and—

What do you want?

What do you want? It's yours for the asking. Anything. You have but to ask, Cully.

She raised her withered hands to touch at his, and at first he thought she was trying once again to break his grip, but, no: the blistered flesh from his injured hand sloughed away, leaving pink, fresh skin behind.

I can do more than that, much more. Make love to me, Sir Cully, and with your manhood touching my womb and my tongue in your mouth, I'll lengthen your life. The aches, the pains that you wake with will be gone. I can make you forty again. Or twenty, even. No seeming; it's just a matter of adding life to life.

And all you want is me to mount you, and hold my nose while I do?

No, no, you fool—I need the girl. I'll cook the life out of her, as I must; I'm badly hurt—but I'll share that life with you. Drink of her broth, with me. She's young, and of a strong spark, and a virgin; she's not just a tasty meal, like what I've been living on, but prepared properly, she's a banquet. You can share at that banquet. It will fill you beyond your imagining.

Not a chance.

But there's more—I know. I know what you're looking for; I listen to the wind, and it brings me many tidings. I'll tell you. After. Just give me the girl.

Tell me now, and I'll let you live—for now. I swear it on my soul.

Pfah for your soul; you'd sacrifice that in a heartbeat. Would you swear it on Joshua's? Would you swear it on your love for him, or for Her?

Yes, I'd swear on all that and more—tell me, and I'll let you live this day.

Yes, he would let her live—and then he would hunt her down, and kill her.

She seemed to laugh at that possibility.

I'm unworried about that. But you'll give me the girl? It's of little import; she'll probably die anyway, burned as she is, and if not today or tomorrow, soon—you ephemerals live such short lives. Give me the girl—help put her back in the pot, and I'll tell you. I need the girl.

Tell me first.

And then I can have the girl?

"Of course," he said. "I swear it on my hope of salvation," he said.

And you swear it by Her? By Joshua's soul? Do you bind yourself by the hope of his salvation to help me in this?

Of course he would have lied; She would have forgiven him the lie, and Gray would have forgiven him the truth. Lying had always come easily to Cully; it was the truth that was hard for him to see, to speak, to accept.

She could have produced a stack of Bibles, and he would have sworn on them, without regret, and then betrayed the devil's promise in a heartbeat.

But what if his oaths had power here and now? What if his word could bind his body as tightly as her magic had, moments that felt like days ago? No need to worry about what She would do, or feel—She was far more powerful than he was, and his words could touch Her only if She so chose.

No. If words could bind his body, his body would now be bound.

But . . . but what if his words could bind Gray's soul? A just God would not have permitted that, save by Gray's own choice, perhaps.

But Cully knew full well what Gray would have chosen, for it was a choice Gray had already made.

For himself, by God, he could solve this if needs be, for while his life was not always in his own hands, his own death was. And if God would hold him accountable as a suicide, that was His choice, not Cully's.

But for Gray? What of the risk to him? Could Cully's oath breaking endanger Joshua's soul? It was against all sense and logic, against all his training as a priest—but so much in life went against all that.

What if it was true?

It was a risk Joshua would have insisted he take. Put it all in the hands of God, and trust to His mercy. Perhaps he would not condemn Gray for Cully's impiety, Gray would say, and it mattered not a whit if He did, Gray would have said, for he was already damned, and it didn't matter if he were not.

He knew what Gray would have said, were he here: As you love me, Father: say you what needs be said, and then do you what needs to be done.

As you will, Joshua.

"I so swear," he said. "I swear it on Joshua's soul; I shall do as you say."

Liar. You'll kill me the moment I tell you.

"Of course," he said, for he could bear no more, and if all it would take to compel the Baba Yaga were his hands on her throat and his words in his mouth then it would already have been done.

But, no, he would not sacrifice the brave girl. He loved her too little, and too much, for that.

He tightened his hands and bore down, his hands clenching with all the strength that they had, more than he would have thought he was capable of.

Cully bore down for a long time, until he noticed that he could hear again, and that the wind was whistling through the trees.

Sir Cully of Cully's Woode found himself kneeling on dead, wet leaves, with Sir Guy passed out beside him, and the girl whimpering in pain as she writhed on the ground.

Kechiroski was nowhere to be seen, but that was understandable; they were no longer on the hill that they had climbed, but in a clearing, hills and mountains rising in the distance.

How far away from the hilltop? He couldn't recognize any landmarks, not in the dark, and the moon and stars overhead were no clue at all. The hilltop could have been among the dark mass rising off in the distance to the north, but he wouldn't swear to it.

Maybe. The familiar smell of the sea was strong in his nostrils. He must be much closer to the sea than the hilltop had been.

The only thing in his hands was a scrap of cloth, and of all that had been in the hut of Baba Yaga, the only things that remained were four preposterously ordinary chicken legs, stuck upright in the dirt, and over by the trees were the eyes of a cat, reflecting the moonlight.

For just a moment.

And then it was gone in the dark, and he was alone with the screaming.

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