by Max Candee
“And I’m thirteen!” I called after him.
Lauraleigh and I were alone.
Chapter 3
Dear Diary,
An orphan learns to enjoy being alone. Even when we're surrounded by other orphans and our caretakers, we are somehow alone. The fact that we have no families makes us little islands in the sea of ordinary people.
Other kids gripe about their brothers or sisters. They complain when their parents ground them for staying out too late. They moan about spending the holidays with boring cousins again. Orphans watch all this from our islands, mystified that anyone could take the treasure of family for granted.
Every step I take through this forest brings me closer to my unknown family and to my beloved Uncle Misha. Nothing will stop me from finding them, not bears or wolves or even our cranky one-eyed guide — who betrayed us.
I don't know what I'll find when I get there. My father may not even welcome me. But I have to try. Who knows, maybe while I'm here, I'll even find my grandmother, the witch: the Iron Queen.
* * *
We stood alone in an ancient forest with night creeping up on us like a thief. Gavril was long gone. My tired muscles chilled and grew stiff.
“Should we turn back?” I asked.
Lauraleigh chewed on her lip. “I don’t know. How far are we from your Uncle Misha’s cabin? Does anything look familiar to you?”
I gazed around at the enormous trees. One looked much like the next. I clasped my fingers around my dream stone, hoping for inspiration. The stone was warm and vibrated in my hand, but as usual, I didn’t know what it was telling me. Sometimes, I wished for an instruction manual to understand at least some of this stuff.
“I think we’re close,” I said. “But you’re the adult and in charge. If you think we should turn back, we will.” That was the deal I had made with Monsieur Nolan: Lauraleigh was in command. I hoped she would decide to stay. My father was in trouble, somewhere up the mountain. My father, who I didn’t even know existed a few weeks ago.
Besides, I didn’t think I could drag my sore butt back into that saddle again.
“We’ll stay,” Lauraleigh said. “But let’s get this tent set up and some wood collected before dark.”
First, we took care of our horses. Dushá and Kísa deserved our attention after that long ride. We took off their saddles and bridles and rubbed them down with a cloth before tying them to a tree near a stream.
For the next hour, we kept busy with chores, setting up the tent (somewhat crookedly) and building a fire. Recent rain had dampened the wood; our fire smoked and fizzled but refused to light. Night came quickly under the trees. We needed that fire for warmth and protection from predators who would come out after dark.
“I could … uh, zap it,” I suggested. “You know, with magic.”
I didn’t usually flaunt my magic. The mystery of it still made me nervous. I had all this power but very little control. And if I used magic with bad intentions, a bit of darkness would creep inside me. It was a horrible feeling to know such evil could lurk inside me. After the last time, when the shadow had almost made me kill André and Marie Montmorency, I had sworn I would never use magic for the wrong reasons again.
The problem was that the wrong reasons sometimes disguised themselves as right reasons.
“Magic is part of you,” Lauraleigh said, “isn’t it? You shouldn’t be ashamed to use it.”
I nodded. Lauraleigh had seen me struggle with the decision to let the Montmorencys live, even after they’d hurt our friends. She had never doubted I’d make the right decision. I hoped I could live up to her faith in me.
Shadows filled in the spaces between the trees. Soon it would be pitch-dark, and we’d be easy prey for any of the animals who roamed in the darkness. If I wanted to act, now was the time.
I gathered my will and centered myself in my stomach. That’s where I imagined the magic started, where it felt like it resided. It was a pool of energy that I drew from. I held out my hands and concentrated. The pool gurgled and tingled inside me. I felt the humming energy flow up my chest, around my shoulders and down into the tips of my fingers. A hot, white light burst from my hands, blasting the damp sticks and setting them on fire.
I listened to myself. Had I become just a little darker? It didn’t seem so.
“Much better,” Lauraleigh said with a smile.
With no cooking pots, we ate more sandwiches from our packs and drank from the stream. It was an incredible feeling, drinking from the stream and knowing the water was cleaner than what we had back in our very civilized Geneva.
After dinner, we sat beside the fire to keep warm. Even in summer, nights grew cool this high in the mountains. We were exhausted, but neither of us wanted to sleep yet.
The fire was so bright it hurt my tired eyes. I looked into the cool shadows of the forest and froze. Something white and ghostly was flitting from tree to tree.
“Did you see that?” I asked Lauraleigh, pointing into the forest. But the vision was already gone.
“See what?” She strained to look into the shadows.
“Nothing. I just thought … for a moment … something was watching us.”
Lauraleigh shivered.
“Do you really think there are bears and wolves in the forest?” she asked.
“Bears, for sure,” I said. “But we don’t have to be afraid of them.” I wasn’t so sure about the wolves.
“Maybe we should sleep in shifts. You know, to keep a lookout.”
“I’ve got a better idea.” My backpack, with my mother’s precious letter, was never far from my side. I pulled out a small carved statue of a hand, smaller than my own fist. I held it over the fire, letting the flames tickle the smooth stone.
The hand jerked. It exploded in size and came to life, zipping around the fire like a comet; then it dove and tickled my ribs.
“Squire! Stop it.” I laughed, and pushed him aside.
Squire floated in the air before me. If he’d had a mouth, he would have been grinning. I scratched him on his hairy knuckles and he leaned into my touch.
“I missed you,” I said.
He made a fist and bobbed up and down — Squire’s version of a nod.
Lauraleigh watched us with wide eyes. She had seen Squire the night we stopped the Montmorencys, when we were all shocked and tired. But never before had she seen him up close or animated from stone.
“Squire, meet my friend, Lauraleigh.”
Squire tilted to the side and held his fingers straight. Without flinching, Lauraleigh reached out and grasped him in a handshake. Did I mention that Lauraleigh is amazing?
“Nice to meet you, Squire,” she said. “We’re on a big adventure. Will you help us?”
Squire bobbed up and down, nodding.
“Do you recognize this place?” I asked.
Squire bobbed up and down; then he twisted from side to side. I guessed that meant he wasn’t sure. “Will you keep a lookout for us tonight? There may be wolves in the forest.”
Squire saluted with two fingers and zoomed off into the woods.
I felt better knowing that Squire was watching over us.
I looked at Lauraleigh to make sure she was still okay and not just pretending. Magic still had to be pretty weird to her, after all. But she didn’t look weirded out. She looked thoughtful.
“You know,” she said after a moment, “there’s an old Russian myth about a witch who has pairs of animated hands as servants.”
That made sense. Squire had told me about his friend Knight. They were a pair. I wondered if Knight lived somewhere in this forest.
“Her name is Baba Yaga. And she has three henchmen: the Black Horseman, the Red Horseman, and the White Horseman.” Lauraleigh eyed me carefully, waiting for my reaction. We’d both met a man called the Black Horseman back in Geneva. He had tried to kidnap me and other children from the orphanage. And Uncle Misha’s letter had mentioned the Red Horseman.
“You don’t think she�
��s real, do you?” I asked. I vaguely recognized the name Baba Yaga, but she was just a fairy tale creature.
“Didn’t Squire say that you’re a witch?”
“Yes,” I said, still doubtful. “And he said my grandmother is a witch too. He called her the Iron Queen.”
The fire flickered over Lauraleigh’s face. “Did you know Baba Yaga’s teeth are made of iron? Apparently, she likes to eat people, and the teeth help her chomp through the bones.”
“Oh, great.” I tried to hide the chill that had just gone through me. “You’re telling me my grandmother is some kind of cannibal witch with a bad dental plan.”
Lauraleigh held up her hands. “I’m just telling you what I remember from my classes in Russian literature. But … the animated hand. The Horsemen. Iron. The details kind of fit. And you can’t tell me you don’t believe in such things. Not anymore.”
She was right. In the past month, since my thirteenth birthday, I’d learned that anything was possible. The possibilities, however, left me with little but questions.
If Lauraleigh was right, and Baba Yaga existed, and we were dealing with her, and even if she was my grandmother, why did she send her Black Horseman to find me? And what connected him to my father? Who was my father? Uncle Misha might know the answers, but he was still at least a day and a night away.
“Tell me what else you remember about this Baba Yaga character,” I said.
“Well, let’s see. She’s not really considered good or bad, just powerful. Like an avalanche that doesn’t care who it buries. She likes to trick people. And she’s very private. She lives alone in a very peculiar house.”
I swallowed. “Let me guess. It’s a house on chicken legs.”
“Exactly!” She looked surprised; then she smiled. “But of course you know. You’re Russian.”
I didn’t answer. From my backpack, I took out my mother’s letter and the carefully folded picture inside. I glanced up, worried that the moonlight would bring the image to life, but the moon was hiding behind the thick canopy of trees. The picture stayed lifeless as I handed it to Lauraleigh.
“Be sure to keep it out of the moonlight.”
Holding it so she could see it in the fire’s glow, Lauraleigh examined the old drawing. It showed a cabin perched on spindly chicken legs, surrounded by a fence topped with skulls. In the background, an old woman with a big nose and vicious teeth rode in a mortar. She carried the pestle and a broom.
“That’s her. Look at those teeth! I wouldn’t want to floss those.”
“Why do you think she carries a broom?” I asked, although I knew the answer from my own experience.
“If I remember correctly, she uses the pestle like a paddle in the air, and the broom to sweep away all traces of her passing. Weird, if you ask me. I always thought witches flew on their brooms.”
“Not as easy as it looks. Trust me.” The one time I had tried to fly on a broom had been an epic fail. Like my grandmother — and I was becoming pretty sure that Lauraleigh’s guess was right — I was better at flying in a vessel. In my case, I’d used a bucket. Not the most glamorous vehicle, but it worked for me. I said, “To be honest, I’m not even sure we need something to fly on. Or in. But it feels kind of safer to do so.”
Lauraleigh smiled, shaking her head. This conversation probably sounded too out there for her.
“Isn’t it crazy?” I asked. “I should be able to fly without toting that extra weight. But I can’t. I need a bucket to stand in.”
Lauraleigh looked like she was struggling between laughing and admitting that this was all too weird. In the end, she just shook her head and didn’t say anything.
She looked at the photo again.
“What’s so interesting about it?” I asked.
“Well, come on. I’ve studied her. There are all sorts of paintings and drawings of her. And now I can compare with the real thing. What’s not interesting about that?” She suddenly brought the picture much closer to her face. “Huh,” she said, “so that detail’s true.”
“What?”
“Well…” She handed the photo back to me and pointed at the fence. “You see there? If you look closely, you’ll notice something weird with the fence.”
“I don’t see anything weird. I mean, aside from the skulls.”
“No, not that. Right at the end of the fence, there’s one fence post that doesn’t have a skull on it.”
I peered. She was right.
“It’s another part of the myth,” said Lauraleigh. “There’s always one empty fence post, just in case you show up and don’t mind your manners, or it’s the wrong time to bother her, or whatever. So she always has a place to put your skull when she’s done with you.”
“Let me get this straight,” I said, putting the photo back into my back. I didn’t feel like looking at it any longer. “You’re telling me that Baba Yaga eats humans, tricks people, kills you just because she’s feeling cranky and then uses your skull to improve her home decor — and people don’t necessarily think she’s evil?”
Lauraleigh grinned. “If you’re polite and it’s the right time of day, she may let you go or even help you,” she said. “It takes a lot to get called evil, you know.”
It was a weird thought that you could get away with doing truly horrible things if you balanced them with some good ones, but in a way, I supposed it was also somewhat comforting. After all, I’d come pretty close to doing some horrible things myself. Maybe I didn’t have to worry quite so much that I might turn evil if I wasn’t careful.
By now, we really were tired. The fire had faded a little, so we built it up again until our little clearing had brightened. Hopefully, the light would keep away the wolves. Our snug tent had just enough room for the two of us. We slipped into our sleeping bags, and I lay awake listening to the crackle of the fire.
“Lauraleigh?” I hoped she was still awake, even if we had a long ride tomorrow.
“Yeah?”
“What do you think my father will be like?”
Lauraleigh didn’t answer right away. She was an orphan too. Maybe she was thinking about the few memories she had of her own father.
“I guess he’ll just be your dad, you know? There won’t be anyone else like him.”
I fell asleep with that thought in my mind. I dreamed of ice cream. Strange, I know. But I’d always thought that if I’d had parents, they’d have taken me for ice cream. Sister Constance never let us have ice cream. She didn’t approve.
I awoke to Squire tugging urgently at my shoulder and the sound of wolf howls echoing through the forest.
Chapter 4
Dear Diary,
Suppose you see someone about to get hurt. Say a bully is about to throw a rock at another kid. If the only way you can stop the bully is to use magic, is that good magic or bad magic? Your intentions are good, right? So that’s good magic. But what if you hurt the bully while saving the kid? That’s bad magic, isn’t it?
I just don’t know. Does the dark shadow come only when my intentions are bad? The first time it happened, I set André’s handkerchief on fire. It wasn’t a terribly bad thing to do; he only got a burn, and anyway he deserved it for what he’d done to me and the other children. But my life wasn’t in immediate danger when I did it. I set his handkerchief on fire out of spite — and it could have been worse if he hadn’t managed to put it out so soon. Is that why the shadows seeped into my heart? What if the rest of his clothes had caught fire too?
Sometimes, when the night is really quiet and I can’t sleep, I can feel the darkness shifting around inside me. It feels like heartburn — only oilier.
Let’s get back to the kid about to be hit by a rock. What if the bully didn’t throw it? What if a toddler, who didn’t know any better, threw the rock? What if I hurt the toddler while trying to save the other child? What if I didn’t mean to hurt anyone? What if I just tried to move the rock, but I didn’t notice that others were in the way and it hit them? Does that still leave the door of my
heart open to the shadows?
I just don’t know. And not knowing might be my most dangerous weakness.
* * *
The fire had gone out during the night. Glancing at the small patch of open sky above us, I guessed dawn was near, but the forest was still dark. A wolf howled and another answered the call. Dushá and Kísa stomped their hooves. Their eyes glowed white all around.
“It’s okay,” said Lauraleigh. “We won’t let those big bad wolves hurt you.” She patted Dushá’s neck and soothed the ponies with her singsong voice. I wasn’t so sure we could protect the horses — or ourselves — from a pack of wolves.
The howls echoed through the trees again, sending shivers up and down my spine. They seemed to come from all around us now, and there was a deeply disturbing edge to their voices: sour, unsettled. I remembered a line from Uncle Misha’s letter: Unsettled spirits watch my every move.
Then a scraggly black wolf stepped out of the shadows.
“Quickly, move to the fire!” Lauraleigh shouted, and ran into the small circle of light from the glowing embers.
Squire and I joined her. Another wolf stepped into our camp right beside Dushá. The mare screamed and reared, tugging the rope that tied her to the tree.
More wolves poured out of the dark. Sleek and savage, they ran through our camp, two of them tearing up our tent with their powerful teeth. Lauraleigh screamed as a wolf knocked her over. I tried to gather my magic to strike them but there were too many of them, and trying to keep them all in sight made it impossible to concentrate enough to summon anything. They dashed madly from shadow to shadow so that even if I could have used my powers, I would have been afraid to hurt either Lauraleigh or the ponies.