Except the Queen

by Jane Yolen

  It was short-lived, however, drowned in the deluge of Baba Yaga’s instructions. “Do this,” she would say, “don’t do that.” “Go here. Stay away from there.” My head throbbed with so many rules, so many obligations and prohibitions, so many new expectations. How was I to remember all of this? Tears burned behind my eyes, but I blinked them away, not wanting to show any weakness that might cause Baba Yaga to withdraw her help.

  12

  Meteora’s Home

  It was dusk when Baba Yaga finally stopped in the middle of a block of houses. I was exhausted, my feet throbbing in the new shoes, blisters bubbling at my heels and toes. We had eaten a noon repast, an entire cooked chicken for Baba Yaga and a wedge of soft cheese and brown bread for me, purchased at a different grocery shop—this one brightly lit and humming with music from its walls. But now my stomach rumbled and gurgled.

  “There is my home,” Baba Yaga said, pointing a gnarled finger across the street to a squat, three-story house half hidden behind a pair of tall pines. Partway down the walkway, the flickering leaves of a silver birch shimmered, luminescent in the dimming light. The house walls were a deep red brick with gray shutters bordering every window. I shivered for it reminded me of a baker’s oven.

  “Where are the chicken legs?” I asked. I had heard enough tales about her traveling house to be curious.

  “They are there, at the bottom of the stairs, though most would not think to look for them.”

  A light turned on in a small dormer window jutting out below the eaves of the roof. It was then I noticed the gutters; they ended in downspouts shaped like chicken heads, the open beaks ready to disgorge excess rain.

  “Good.” Baba Yaga nodded. “They are waiting,” she said to the lit windows. Then she grinned at me and I drew back, uncertain as firelight bloomed in her eyes. “Listen,” she commanded, “I am not done traveling, but you may stay here and mind my house while I am gone. You will live up there, on the top floor, where there is light in the window. Below you, children—students—rent the rooms.”

  “You are too generous, Mother of the Forest,” I murmured, relieved that I might have shelter, even if for a little while.

  “Nonsense,” she scoffed. “You will work. Keep the children from breaking things. And see to my garden.”

  “Of course,” I answered, wondering how difficult could that be?

  Baba Yaga guffawed. “I read your thoughts, you know. Not so hard with a poppet like you. I tell you, these children are your trial. They do things that bring police—nosy, snoopy people who ask too many questions and want to see your papers—”

  “Papers?”

  “You don’t have any. So you must be sharp as the axe and not let them succeed in throwing you in the oven.”

  “Agreed,” I said, thinking how much easier it would be if only I could spell them into toads or dogs, anything small and manageable.

  “And one thing more . . .”

  I waited, worry and hunger gnawing at my rumbling stomach.

  “You will have help. There is a girl on the second floor. She collects the rents. And my personal servants will assist you, but only when they wish to, so remember your manners.”

  “Yes, Gracious Mother,” I said humbly.

  “Here is the key to the top floor. It is silver, so you may safely hold it. But do not lose.”

  “Gracious Mother, I am forever in your debt,” I said meekly.

  She clapped a heavy hand on my shoulder, her nails digging a warning into my flesh. “Yes, you are. Remember—take care of my house and don’t fuck up.”

  * * *

  I CROSSED THE STREET ALONE, but only after Baba Yaga snapped at me to remember to look both ways, or else “be splattered.” Although I was grateful for her help, I was still very afraid of her, and even more afraid of her house. It loomed dark and forbidding in the early twilight. Walking down the little stone path to the stairs, I tensed at the sight of a skull’s head embedded in the dirt near the steps. A cannibal’s home, I reminded myself. The bottom step rested on a pair of carved chicken feet and I could imagine that the back of the house had another door and steps resting on chicken feet just like it.

  At the top of the stairs I paused, surveying the huge porch that had been hidden by the pines. Light from a first-floor bay window illuminated a collection of lumpy, stained furniture along with a few spindled chairs. Empty bottles, cups, and soiled paper plates cluttered the porch wall. A small brazier held the remains of charred meat and burned corncobs. I wrinkled my nose at the pungent odor of stale beer and rotting food.

  Moving toward the main door, I was searching for the lock when the door was thrown open from inside, revealing a tall scantily clad girl, all arms and legs, standing in a dimly lit hallway. She was looking over her shoulder, shrieking at someone in the house. I stepped quickly out of her way and saw her tearstained face, red and white with rage. Music howled behind her in the hallway and I covered my ears at the sound.

  “Fuck you, I’m leaving. I’m tired of cleaning up your shit, you stupid prick!” She turned, and bolted from the door without a look in my direction.

  “Babe, wait, don’t be like that.” A young man followed, trying unsuccessfully to grab her by the arm.

  She twisted away and continued down the porch steps, her long white legs scissoring into the night.

  “Fuck,” the man said despondently, and I added a new shade of meaning to the word.

  “Aw, let her go, dude. She’s a bitch,” called another male voice from a doorway down the hall. “Fergit her. Come on, Nick, it’s party time, man.”

  Nick leaned hard against the doorway, seeing me now for the first time. His boyish features hardened as he frowned. Barefooted, wearing only short pants, his soft pudgy body was like a little child’s. His hair was clipped close to his head, and he ran his hand through the bristles until they stood up, slick and damp. He swayed unsteadily, his sweat reeking of hard spirits. He looked me up and down and sneered as the harsh music railed around us.

  “Suppose you gonna call the police,” he snapped at me.

  I took my hands from my ears. “Not if you remember your manners,” I said, wondering if I sounded anything like Baba Yaga, and then guessing I didn’t because he kept on sneering.

  “So—what are you doing here?” he challenged.

  “I live here.”

  “No you don’t. All the apartments in this house are rented already, so I know you don’t live here.”

  The other man had come out to join Nick, and I was well aware that both men towered over me. The friend was broad in the chest and broader still across his belly. He was wearing a torn black shirt with the words HOW ABOUT A NICE CUP OF SHUT THE FUCK UP? in white letters across the chest. Like Nick, he was drunk, and from the dull look in his eyes, stupid too.

  “Third floor,” I said, pointing a finger upward.

  They both stepped back, chastened and studied their feet.

  “Sorry, I thought you were, you know, gone for a year. That’s what the rental agent told us,” Nick mumbled.

  “I’m back,” I announced emboldened. If they didn’t know who Baba Yaga was, then I could play the role of the Mistress. “And furthermore, clean up your shit out here immediately or you will not live here anymore.” I stood as tall as I could manage and glared at them.

  Their response was immediate. Deflated, they lumbered across the porch, one holding open a bag while the other dumped in garbage, bottles, and the rotten remains of their earlier meal. Watching them work, I reflected on how useful it was to be able to speak the local dialect.

  I entered the hallway and walked up the stairs. A door cracked open on the second floor and I got a glimpse of improbable caterpillar green hair and the ghost of a face. A girl, I thought, not wanting to get into a mix with the young men. Before I could say anything, the door closed.

  Just beyond the second floor, I cursed my aged body for its trembling muscles and the breath that would not come easily into my laboring lungs. But I
kept going up and on the third-floor landing, I stood in front of an oak door, a brass skeletal hand as a knocker and a heavy lock shaped like a mouth with teeth beneath the doorknob. I inserted the key, my pulse fluttering. What would I find on the other side? Chairs of bones, lamps of skulls, pillows stuffed with the hair of the dead?

  Standing on the threshold of Baba Yaga’s home, I was suddenly relieved enough to break into the tears that I had denied myself during the long day.

  Then the door creaked open and I peered in.

  No bones, no scent of decay or rot. Instead, the rooms were very neat and cozy if a bit small. The whitewashed walls had been painted with scrolls and flowers over the windows and along the edge of the ceiling. The oak floors gave off the sweet scent of beeswax polish. In the sitting room was a rug of finely knotted wool in a beautiful pattern of imaginary flowers. Two embroidered chairs waited by a little potbellied fireplace. On a side table, covered in a linen cloth finely cross-stitched with red silk borders, a candle flickered in its silver holder.

  What I took to be the cooking place was small, but functional. A maroon oven rubbed shoulders with wooden cupboards whose doors were carved with acorns and oak leaves. Scrubbed plates and cups sat waiting in a rack above a basin. A table and two chairs occupied a narrow space by another window. I peered out, but could see nothing in back of the house except a large expanse of land and other buildings huddled around it.

  The bedroom was almost entirely filled with a sturdy wooden bed, piled high with feather quilts. The pillows were covered in fine linen cloth made of the same stuff as the sheets and decorated with cutwork embroidery. At the foot of the bed, I opened the lid on a fragrant chest smelling of cedar and found more clothes, shoes, woolens, and scarves. A window opened to a small wrought iron ledge and I could just make out narrow stairs leading down to the ground below.

  Off of the bedroom was an even smaller room containing a white tub perched on clawed feet. There was also a basin like a chair filled with water, and a taller basin with brass handles and a spout. I may have lived my immortal life Under the Hill and in the Greenwood, but even I had heard about these little rooms from brownies who often visited human houses. I turned the brass handles of the tub and basin, delighted as water spurted out, some hot, some cold. As for the chair-basin, I toggled the handle, until it too whooshed, drained and then refilled. I guessed at its purpose, confirming my suspicions when I checked under the bed and found no pot de chambre.

  I returned to the sitting room, kicked off the painful shoes and sat heavily in one of the generous chairs. Closing my eyes, I drifted into a light sleep, my body gratefully releasing the memories of my terrifying flight through the storming forest, the rattle of the dragon-train, and the terrible weight of all I had to learn in order to survive here.

  A tap on my shoulder startled me and I lunged forward like a breached trout. A pair of hands—just hands and not matching either though they were right and left—floated in front of my astonished face, waiting for me to fully wake.

  “Are you . . . are you Baba Yaga’s servants?” I asked.

  Gracefully, the hands turned themselves over, palms up in a gesture of supplication. One hand raised a finger to signal “Wait,” and then both hands winked out of sight, only to reappear a moment later with a tray, on which were a steaming pot of Russian caravan tea, a mug, milk, sugar, and a plate of thick slices of buttered black rye bread. The hands settled the gift on the side table next to the candle and then beckoned me forth.

  Remembering my manners, I whispered, “Thank you,” and bowed my head before them. The left hand crossed over the right hand and they disappeared, leaving me to my evening meal. When I had finished eating, I dragged myself to the bedroom. But before I lay down, I tore a thin strip of my Dam’s white silk and tied it to the railing outside the window for protection. It fluttered in the dark, soft as a feather.

  * * *

  LATER THAT NIGHT, LYING NAKED between Baba Yaga’s linen sheets, I woke from an exhausted slumber to hear the boys of the first floor thumping like trolls, perhaps dancing to their loud raucous music. From the second floor, someone ran down the stairs, and pounded on the door, while a dog barked, agitated by the uproar. A girl shouted, “Shut the fuck up or I’ll call the cops!” The noise subsided and the door must have been opened because I heard the angry voices of the boys protesting. But the girl was adamant in her threat, repeating it over and over, while the dog continued to bark. Finally, the door slammed, the music was silenced and I heard the girl’s footsteps on the stairs. She shushed the dog, who obeyed at once, and the house grew still.

  I was almost asleep again, when the plaintive cries of a cat outside the bedroom window woke me once more. Slipping from bed, I opened the window and a scrawny black cat with a white throat darted inside. After a quick glance my way with yellow eyes, it promptly made itself at home at the bottom of the bed.

  Finally, all the chicks were tucked in, and the house settled like a hen at roost.

  13

  Sparrow’s Tattoo

  Sparrow groaned, folding the pillow around her aching head as sunlight poured into the window through the torn shade. Her temples throbbed and she could feel a wave of nausea in her complaining stomach. What had she tried this time? Tequila? It tasted like acid on her thick tongue. It hadn’t worked of course. The old nightmares always found her no matter how deeply she tried to bury them in different spirits.

  Angry with herself for having spent another useless night alone with a bottle, Sparrow threw back her covers and willed her body upright, swinging her feet over the side of the bed. For a brief—though vertiginous—moment she thought she was all right. And then her head exploded in pain and her stomach clenched. Bolting from the bed, a hand cupped over her mouth, she fled to the bathroom. She vomited as she threw her body toward the toilet, grasping the rim in both hands to steady herself against the involuntary heaving. She had eaten very little along with the tequila, and now it tasted like brewed poison searing her throat as she retched. She flushed the vomit away, washed her mouth with tap water, and waited for the next wave. It hit soon after, leaving her gasping for air and groaning.

  “Wow, did you get fucked up,” her roommate Marti announced, leaning against the bathroom door and holding a steaming cup of tea. She was tall and willowy, dressed in a faded cotton kimono with a pattern of blue maple leaves. A long braid of fine brown hair hung over her shoulder, while stray tendrils framed the sleepy face. “Even the dog decided to give you some room. She slept out on the couch.” At Marti’s feet sat Lily, a white and liver-spotted pit bull, panting through a wide, tooth-filled smile.

  “I feel like death,” Sparrow moaned, knowing it was close enough to be true. She reached out and gave Lily’s velvety ears a quick rub.

  “I can’t imagine why,” Marti said dryly. “You know, that was my expensive bottle of Patrón you dusted last night? Just tell me you didn’t accomplish that all by yourself.” She blew cooling air across the surface of her teacup before taking a small sip.

  “I’m sorry,” Sparrow said, suppressing a wave of nausea. “I’ll replace it as soon as payday comes. I promise.” She sat back, balancing her buttocks on her heels, one hand on the toilet while she wiped her mouth with the back of her other hand. “I guess I just didn’t realize how much I was drinking.”

  Marti had put her teacup down on the rim of the bathtub and was running cold water over a washcloth. She squeezed out the extra water and handed it to Sparrow, who took it and laid it lightly over her face. The cool, damp cloth smelled fresh. “Thank you,” she murmured from under the cloth.

  “You want tea? Chamomile maybe? Settle your stomach,” Marti said.

  Sparrow smiled weakly. “Yeah, sounds good. Thanks.” She lifted the washcloth to show Marti a grateful expression.

  Alone again, Sparrow washed her face at the bathroom sink, swallowing mouthfuls of water and spitting it out to rid her tongue of the acrid taste. She ran the cold cloth across her neck and then stra
ightened up to confront herself in the mirror.

  Pretty bad. Sparrow took in the hollowed eyes, the bright green irises flecked with dots of blood. The purple bruises under her eyes from sleepless nights contrasted sharply with her dyed neon-green hair. She thought she looked like a battered doll with plastic hair and a paint-smeared face. Her head throbbed with a headache and she closed her eyes over the welling tears. When was the last time she had truly slept free of nightmares? Long ago, she thought, when I was lost among the deer in the forests. But that world was gone. And she was here.

  Sparrow opened her eyes, washed her face vigorously, and combed wet fingers through the short spikes of her green hair. Not for the first time she wondered what had possessed her to dye it such a garish color. Or why she had pierced her eyebrow, her nose, and ears.

  Maybe to fit in, to find solace in a tribe of other like-marked men and women. Maybe to hide in a crowd.

  Returning to her bedroom, she pulled off her nightshirt. She was thin, her clavicles rising sharply beneath the taut skin. Her small breasts bloomed above the corset of rib bones, while her waist arrowed into the soft curve of her hips. An old ragged scar marred the inside of one slender thigh. She searched quickly in a pile of mostly clean clothes and pulled out a red T-shirt she had picked up from a thrift store. Wriggling into a pair of tight, low-slung jeans, she grabbed a half-smoked pack of cigarettes and a lighter off her nightstand and padded to the kitchen in bare feet, hoping the tea was ready.