Page 18 of Cry of the Firebird

"Don't get lost," he said, and Anya saw the flash of his smile through the gloom.

"Don't lead me into any ditches," she replied. Her fingers tightened around his, and she followed Yvan into the darkness without looking back.

Lookthrough the autumn meadow to where two exhausted travelers sleep. A fox pads silently through the leaf litter towardsthem. He is curious; humans are rarely seen in this part of the forest.

The fox sniffs the woman cautiously. She smells strongly of Mir. Colors swirl around her brightly. Strong, raw magic is inside her, but it is buried deep.

He sniffs the man and smells a bird. Curious, he sniffs further towards the opening of the man's shirt. A bird leaps out and pecks the fox's nose with its sharp beak.

"Gods!" the fox curses as it jumps out of harm's way.

Be gone, a voice touches the fox's mind. With his tail standing on end, the fox turns and bolts from the meadow.

He knows who would pay for such a shocking revelation. A firebird has returned to Skazki!

See the old bent crone standing before a bubbling cauldron in a cottage made of rotting bones. She is stirring her soup slowly, humming with pleasure. It had been a long time since a child wandered through to Skazki and across her path. It had been a petulant creature, and she had to cackle that Mir people had stopped telling their children the old stories about her. Hopefully, more unsuspecting children would come, and she would grow fat on their dreams before getting fat on their flesh.

Baba Yaga could never have such fun in Mir; too many rules and people watching her. She had dreamed of fire, the bloodline, the game starting again. She had come home to Skazki from Mir, needing to be where her magic was most potent, to see if she could discover more accurately a time of the war's beginning and what destiny pushed into her path. The coming battles deserved a celebration and a forbidden meal.

"Hey, Old Iron Teeth!" a voice calls up to her. "I have information for you! Let down your house, and I shall share it with you."

Baba Yaga continues to stir before finally relenting. The cabin wobbles as it lowers its chicken legs and rests on the ground.

The shiny black nose of a fox appears through her door before the rest of it steps tentatively across the wooden floor to where she's cooking. A pile of children's clothes lay discarded in the room's corner. The fox holds back a shudder. There are some things even foxes know better than to eat.

"What is it you wish to tell me?" Baba Yaga asks. "Be warned, little fox, if you lie to me, I shall eat another of your cubs."

"There are Mir visitors in the forest," he says quickly.

"And?"

"There is a woman, and she has power." The fox licks his lips nervously as the old witch stops stirring. "And there's a man from Skazki with her, and he's split in two."

"How is he split in two?" she asks and turns to face him.

"He shares his body with a firebird," mumbles the fox. Baba Yaga stares intently at him, and he feels her moving in his mind, searching for the lie in his tale. He thinks of the bird and how it bit his nose.

She laughs hysterically, knowing that her carefully laid plans are coming to fruition. "Finally! He has been reborn and brings the girl to me at last."

"My debt?" asks the fox, hopefully.

"It has been paid," the witch snaps. "Now leave before I change my mind and add you to my stew."

The fox doesn't need to be asked twice. He bolts through the door as it snaps shut, taking part of his tail.

Baba Yaga shuffles over to her loom and checks through her weave again. Her gnarled hand strokes the lid of a wooden crate, and she feels the game board's power inside it.

Yes, it was almost time for it to begin again.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Back in the meadow, Anya was caught in a nightmare she couldn't escape. Like the one when she brought the dog back to life, it didn't feel like a dream but a memory.

An army was camped in a snowy forest around her, the smell of iron and horse sweat in the air. Warriors stamped their feet to keep them warm, their eyes looking expectedly at her. She turned to where a small black goat was waiting on a blood-stained altar, its liquid pupils wide from whatever drug it had been given.

Anya pulled a knife from her belt, its handle carved like a snarling bear. She cut the goat's throat, its fresh blood warming her frozen fingers as she smeared it on her rune stones.

"Shamanitsa…" a deep voice said behind her, a warning to hurry.

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