by Raye Wagner
Vasi stumbled, trying to catch her balance, but the sudden release and forward momentum sent her sprawling into the grass. Vasi lay panting as she cradled her wrist to her chest and stared up into the cloudless afternoon sky.
“Who dares enter my forest?” the witch snarled, her voice reverberating through the meadow and out into the trees.
Vasi sat up and leaned one way and then another as she angled to see into the tree line. A moment later, three men stepped out of the trees and into the clearing. One of them brandished a broadsword, another a double-sided ax at least four feet in diameter. The third man had a sword strapped to his back, but he held the leashes for a half-dozen snarling hounds pulling at their leather bindings.
The fair-skinned men were practically giants, each a head taller and twice as thick as any man Vasi had seen before. Their broad chests were bare except for one man who wore a shaggy animal-pelt vest. They had black markings on their bulging arms, and angry red scars crisscrossed their faces as if they’d been cut repeatedly and the wounds had festered too long before being attended. Their white-blond hair was twisted into thick ropey locks that hung loose.
As Vasi stared, the scars on their faces disappeared though all else stayed the same. The three men’s eyes widened as they faced down the witch.
“Release the girl! She doesn’t belong to you,” the biggest one growled as he pointed the tip of his broadsword at Baba Yaga. “She is to return with us.”
The witch laughed, a grating, cackling sound that made Vasi’s stomach roil. The man’s hands shook, the sword dipping as the hag gnashed her teeth and said, “Fools! Do you think you have any power here?”
The witch screamed obscenities at the men, and Vasi’s heart thudded in her chest. Forcing her attention away from the witch seemed absurd, for even an idiot would know the witch was brutal and deadly, but one look at the men was enough to confirm they were not here to help. Vasi stared into the darkening Ctyri forest and contemplated escape. If she crawled away while they fought each other, perhaps the men wouldn’t notice; the witch certainly didn’t need Vasi’s help. Vasi shifted onto her knees.
“We—we need to bring her with us,” the man holding the dogs yelled, but the quiver in his voice ruined any attempt at sounding fierce. “She ran away from the Duke of Strasny, and we can’t leave this forest without her. Give her over. We want no trouble.”
Vasi froze with the mention of Lord Baine, her hands and feet tingling with anxiety. She stared at his men, her mouth dry and heart pounding with fear.
“Yeah,” the biggest one said, smacking his sword to the ground. “No one steals the duke’s possessions. He’ll kill you.”
The ax-man added, “He’ll kill all of us.”
The giant with the sword swung his massive weapon in a terrifying display of power and then bellowed at the witch, “Give her over now, and we’ll leave you unharmed.”
Baba Yaga sniffed the air, narrowing her eyes as she breathed. Pointing a gnarled hand at the three men, she curled her lip and spat, “You’ve betrayed the tenants of the Malas. You’re nothing more than slavers now.”
Vasi startled at the name of the northern tribe, but with the mention of slavers, her skin crawled with disgust, the same repulsiveness she always felt in Lord Baine’s presence. Her desperation to escape the men heightened, but when she put weight on her wrist, blinding agony shot up her arm, spotting her vision as her stomach turned. Vasi sobbed, barely holding back the tears as she inched her way across the meadow on three limbs. She couldn’t stay to see the end, and she darted a glance at the others. The witch did not look back, nor did the men seem to notice, and a sliver of hope pushed Vasi onward.
Go back. Stay with the witch.
Stunned, Vasi halted, unable to accept the impossible. Stay with the witch?
Yes.
Why? The idea was absurd.
Because Baba Yaga has what you need.
Vasi sat back in the grass, blinking at the afternoon’s rays. The voice responded as if it had heard Vasi’s thoughts. The voice answered her. She must be going crazy, or perhaps she was hallucinating because of the berries . . . or the stress. But something deep in her soul told her she wasn’t crazy or hallucinating.
“We’re warning you, old woman,” one of the men bellowed, and the dogs’ barking increased. “Give us the girl or we’ll—”
Vasi glanced back, shock driving the air from her lungs. She sucked in a breath and shook her head to clear the hallucination. Because that couldn’t be . . . right.
The enormous man holding the dogs was shorter. Much shorter.
Vasi shook her head again, but the scene remained. The man was buried in the ground all the way up to his calves. The man bellowed and jerked wildly, pulling at the dogs’ leashes. The hounds yelped and barked, tugging against their master. A loud snap was followed by a brief silence, and the animals’ bindings hung no longer attached to beast and master. Tails tucked, the dogs fled into the forest, abandoning the men.
Vasi looked back at the giant and had to drop her gaze.
The man screamed, pushing against the earth that seemed to be swallowing him whole. His arms strained as he tried to free himself, but the earth held him all the way to his thighs. He shouted at his companions in a language Vasi had never heard before, and as if their companion’s cry was a call to battle, the remaining two warriors lifted their swords and ran to his aid.
The biggest man charged four strides toward the witch, his sword held overhead, and then he was gone in the blink of an eye, disappearing into the ground. The earth closed around him like a mouth gobbling up a treat.
The other warrior staggered, slowing his charge, and Vasi watched, her mouth gaping in disbelief.
Time seemed to slow. With his ax still aloft, the man stumbled forward. The grassy meadow split, a small fissure expanding like vibrant-green lips opening into a dark maw that swallowed him into its dark abyss. Just like that, they were both gone. And then again, the ground knitted itself closed.
“You can have the girl!” the third yelled as he sunk deeper. The grassy earth held him all the way to his waist now. His scarred, rough-hewn features were a mask of terror. “Let me go—I’ll—I’ll tell the duke she died in the forest, and he won’t send anyone else in. But if you don’t let me go, he’ll send more men after her. He’s obsessed with his possessions. But . . . I can make him stop. I can make him—” His eyes widened as he stared at the ground and screamed.
Vasi pushed up onto her knees, grotesque curiosity and intriguing terror pulling her attention like a magnet to where the man’s gaze was fixed in wide-eyed horror. What could be worse than being swallowed whole . . . by the ground?
Emerging from the meadow’s carpet, slipping out of the earth as if it was being regurgitated, was a broadsword and fresh pile of bones. Picked-clean. Beside the first pile, a second emerged with an ax, rising from loose dirt that solidified and knit closed as soon as the bones were freed.
Vasi knew what she was seeing, and yet her mind refused to believe it. The men had been eaten, picked clean by the ground. Acid filled Vasi’s mouth, burning her nose, and she retched, emptying her stomach of the berries she’d eaten.
The witch cackled again as the final man slipped into the earth, his screams cutting off abruptly. Baba Yaga’s stringy gray hair whipped around as she spun again to face Vasi.
“You’re still here?” the witch asked as her firelight eyes met Vasi’s blue ones. “Then you’ll be next.”
Vasi scrambled to her feet as the witch bore down. Pathetic resignation stabbed Vasi as she realized she’d now lost any possibility of escaping.
Baba Yaga glanced up at the sky and muttered, “Running out of time.”
This time as the witch hauled Vasi by her arm, Vasi ran so as to not be dragged. Her entire focus became the forest floor as she sprinted alongside the hag, and within minutes, Vasi was too winded to yell. Not that it mattered. Whatever magic Baba Yaga had was stronger than those men, which meant Vasi didn�
��t have a chance.
The witch slowed her pace, and Vasi panted beside her, sucking in greedy breaths of the cool forest air. Her heart rate slowed, and she noticed the trees thinning ahead. As Vasi and the witch approached the forest’s edge, Vasi saw the sun plunging toward the horizon. Night would fall soon, and being this close to civilization would surely mean capture.
Panic seized her, hot desperation and need, and Vasi sucked in lungfuls of air, preparing to release one final rash and violent plea. With lightning speed, the witch cleared the tree line, dragging Vasi through to an embankment over a familiar country road. Before Vasi could scream, the witch thrust Vasi over the edge. A great gust of wind slammed into her back, propelling her into the air.
And then she was falling.
24
Vasi stumbled over the soft sediment on the steep edge as she scrabbled for purchase. The ground gave way, and she tumbled, rolling end over end as she hit tree roots and fallen branches on the way down. When she stopped on the packed dirt of the road below, the wind ceased.
Vasi scrambled to her feet. “I’m not giving up! I’m coming back in there—”
The witch leaned out over the edge and said, “You’re not my problem now. Better flee, girl. Someone rides this way.”
How dare she? Vasi’s anger flared. The witch had delivered Vasi to be captured, but she refused to lie down and wait. Ignoring the throbbing from her wrist, Vasi clambered up the embankment on hands and knees. As she climbed, dirt and leaves rolled down beside and beneath her, but she refused to give up. She grasped a tree root and heaved herself several feet up the incline, muttering, “I’m not giving up.”
The pounding hooves of a horse and rider approached, scraping Vasi’s panic raw. Her hands moistened and grip slipped as she pleaded to any djinn listening that the rider would pass. That somehow he wouldn’t notice her.
The horse slowed and then stopped.
Kicking wildly, Vasi found a foothold and gained several more feet up the steep incline.
“Fetch,” Lord Baine said.
His horribly familiar voice bludgeoned her, and Vasi gritted her teeth to stop the scream of frustration. She glanced back, and despair called for her as five massive hounds bounded up the hill. Spittle sprayed from the beasts’ snapping jaws, and the shift in pressure on the soft ground caused the earth to crumble and slide out from beneath her.
Vasi screamed in rage as she tumbled down the dirt slope, even as the dogs barreled after her.
Vasi landed on her hands and knees on the road. She sucked in a breath, and a dog attacked, biting only Vasi’s skirts as she scurried away. The other dogs bared their teeth and growled, lunging and snapping as they herded her all the way to their master.
“Heel,” Lord Baine commanded, much closer now, and the dogs stopped their assault and hurried the short distance to him.
Vasi stood, brushed off her skirt, and then glared at Lord Baine.
His dark brows rose as a predatory smile spread across his lips. “I’m so glad I found you, my wife.”
“I am not your wife,” she snapped. “Nor will I ever be.” She stepped back. “I despise you.” With the next step, Vasi backed into the dirt wall of the embankment. She had nowhere to go. Burying her hands into her apron pocket, she clenched the hilt of the knife. “I loathe you.”
Lord Baine tilted his head, his intense gaze roving over her from head to toe. Finally, he met her eyes. “Ah, Vasilisa. I don’t actually care how you feel. All that matters is how I feel. You will soon come to understand, my wife; pleasing me is all that will matter to you . . . for the rest of your life.”
He pulled out a length of rope and began working on the knot holding it coiled. While he worked, he continued, “Ever since I laid eyes on you, I’ve wanted you.” He glanced up at her, his eyes bright with lust. “But the wait just made the prize sweeter.”
Vasi’s mind spun with incoherent revulsion. “Stop,” she panted. “Don’t you dare come any closer.”
Lord Baine merely chuckled.
Vasi unsheathed the knife and brandished it toward him. “I’m not joking. Stay away from me.”
Amusement lit his features, and he looped the rope before knotting it and then did it again. “I remember the exact moment I realized you would be mine. I came to your house on your stepmother’s invitation, and you were standing over your mother’s ivy-covered grave. Your fiery hair whipped in the wind, and tears glistened on your cheeks. Your eyes were so haunted with pain, and I knew. You were mine for the taking—”
“I will never be yours,” she snarled.
“Wrong.” He laughed. “You are mine. Everything about you . . . is mine. I’ll possess you, Vasilisa, and become all you ever think about. You will eat, drink, sleep, and move only when I allow it. I will own you.”
In a fluid thrust, Lord Baine whipped the loose end of the rope at her with a crack. The first strike made her stumble forward with a cry. A moment later, the rope touched her again, this time, a loop wrapped around her body, lassoing her around her arms. Lord Baine yanked, tightening her arms to her chest. He dismounted his horse and strode forward.
Vasi lifted the knife to the rope, and the moment the blade touched the rough cord, it split. There was no time to think about the sharpness of her blade, for Lord Baine charged.
He collided with her, the force knocking the wind from her lungs. She fell to the dirt, Lord Baine on top of her. He grabbed at her arms, and she kicked and swung wildly with her knife. She met brief resistance, and then Lord Baine was off of her. Vasi scrambled to her feet, heart racing. Before she could get her bearings, he lunged forward, seized her arm, and yanked her toward him.
Vasi’s vision exploded. Bright lights and vibrant colors blinded her, and she doubled over. Her heart pounded against her ribs. Lord Baine yanked on her again, and Vasi moved in one fluid movement, heaving all of her body weight into the upward swing of the knife. She screamed, opening her eyes, and buried the blade deep into Lord Baine’s neck.
Time stood still as if all of Ctyri held its breath, and Vasi stared as blood welled beneath the blade and dripped down his neck.
Vasi jumped back, yanking the blade out of the duke. The muscles and sinew gaped, and then the severed vessels gushed. Blood, black and viscous, spurted, spraying Vasi with inky droplets.
For a second, just like outside of the ball, Emeroi Baine’s figure morphed. The handsome duke no longer held her arms; he no longer existed, but a hulking monster made of oily mist in the shape of a man reached for her. Hundreds of chains, in a myriad of metals and alloys, snaked out from his transparent fingers. A rope of golden links danced around Vasi, swirling around her arms, and a golden cuff snapped around her wrist.
Vasi cried out, but then the image was gone.
But the dying man was not.
Lord Baine glared at her with rage-filled eyes. His hands clutched his neck where the wound now gushed, blood seeping through his fingers and soaking the collar of his shirt.
Vasi backed away, waving her hands as she whispered, “I didn’t mean to.” Her apology dried on her lips, and she returned his glare. “You. You were going to—”
Growls rent the air. Lord Baine’s hounds circled her, their eyes seeming to glow in dusk’s waning light.
“Stay back,” she cried, waving her knife at the animals, their master’s blood dripping to the ground in front of them.
The dogs bared their teeth, saliva dripping from their mouths.
Lord Baine slumped to the ground as he released a wet, strangled sound.
A loud hissing startled Vasi and the dogs, and she yelped as a snake, an impossibly large snake, slithered toward her on the road. The black serpent’s body was at least a foot wide and ten or fifteen feet long, and as it rose, it flattened its head, its tongue flicking out to taste the air.
Vasi backed away, crashing back into the wall of dirt, but the snake’s attention stayed on the hounds. The large reptile swayed and then lunged. Lord Baine’s horse screamed and gall
oped down the road. The hounds yipped and whined and followed the stallion’s cloud of dust. The snake rotated its head her way, and Vasi brandished her knife, but the creature turned and slithered up the road after the hounds.
Vasi sighed as her adrenaline waned and made her body feel limp and useless. She faced the steep embankment and stumbled forward, determined to return to the forest, but after two steps, her legs gave way, and Vasi sank to the ground.
Sweet djinn, Vasi had killed a man.
She glanced up. The setting sun made the duke’s slumped form appear to smoke and hiss with oily mist. She should feel bad . . . she should, but not one part of her felt remorse for having killed Lord Baine. He was a monster, and the world was better with him not in it.
A horse whinnied, and Vasi stood and spun toward the sound as a fresh wave of fear coated her. She waited, ready to scramble away from whatever rider would come upon Lord Baine’s body. Only, no one was there. With her next heartbeat, there next to the dead duke, a horse and rider appeared and stood motionless on the path.
“Prince Henryk?” Vasi gasped and sunk to the ground in shock. She balled her hands into fists, but there was no covering Lord Baine’s black blood. She glanced back up at the prince and frowned.
The man, dressed in fitted-black clothing, sat atop a stunning stallion, its coat as lustrous as polished onyx and just as dark. His build was similar to the younger prince as was his dark hair, but when he turned toward her, Vasi sucked in a breath, immediately knowing her mistake. From the top of his forehead to the top of his upper lip, the man’s features were covered in a mask of black mist. The bright white of his eyes shone through the darkness, but his irises, too, were the color of night.
“A djinni,” she gasped. Here, now. “I-I came into the woods to find you.”
The rider clicked his tongue, and his horse stepped closer.