Rusty just looked at her through his contorted brows. Freya was getting used to not being able to tell whether he was smiling or grimacing at her. He was a hard person to read, even though she considered herself a bit of an amateur psychologist. She didn’t want to admit it, but it was one of the reasons she found him so intriguing. With his distorted features and penchant for silence he was a challenge, a mystery, but it wasn’t a forced concealment. There was a difference between secrecy and privacy. He was a private person and Freya could respect that. Knowing Rusty was like studying fine literature; you had to work but it could be done and the rewards for doing so were manifold.
“Keep your guard up and watch your step,” he said as he turned his inscrutable face back toward the darkness. “And be sure you stay on the path. This morass could hold any number of untold dangers.”
He held out his hand to Freya and she slipped her hand in his without any hesitation. She considered herself a strong woman but it was nice to know she didn’t have to walk the dark path ahead of them alone.
Cautiously they began the last part of their journey to Baba Yaga’s house. It took them only a few minutes to move beyond the faint circle of light cast by the last street lamp at the edge of the abandoned town. They were left with only the greenish glow of Baba Yaga’s home in the distance to guide them, a ghostly beacon cutting through the gathering gloom.
“We should have brought a flashlight at least,” Freya said, as she nearly twisted an ankle on a loose rock. “And did either of us think of carrying a weapon of some kind? That might have been helpful too. I mean who goes traipsing into a godforsaken bog in the pitch black without at least a bare minimum of preparation. Apparently we do. Not our most bri—”
“Quiet,” Rusty hissed. “Do you hear that?”
Freya quit talking. Her ears strained to pick up the sound that Rusty had heard. She peered hard into the darkness, desperately trying to see anything in the pitch black.
It took her a moment to distinguish it at first from the pounding of her heart, but then it grew louder and more distinct, the steady, heavy beat of hooves on the wet-packed ground.
“What the hell,” said Freya in a low voice. “Is that a horse?”
“Sounds like,” Rusty replied. His grip tightened on her hand.
The steady thump of hooves grew louder, echoing through the underground world so that it sounded more like thunder than a galloping horse. Then Freya’s light-starved eyes picked out a white-hot glow moving swiftly through the street they had just walked down. It illuminated the buildings as it passed, bathing them in a brightness that blanched the old bones of the tumbledown town before moving on and returning them to Stygian obscurity.
The mobile glow had almost reached the edge of town, and Freya held her breath as she waited to see what kind of mad sight would greet her eyes when it moved beyond the rickety Skid Row canyon and into the open darkness of the marshland. The pounding grew more intense and then there it was, a giant steed, white and luminous as the moon, driven forward by an equally incandescent rider dressed like a medieval knight in full armor. In one hand he grasped the white reins of the galloping stallion; in the other he held tight to a wickedly sharp lance.
Freya and Rusty stood frozen on the little rocky path in Baba Yaga’s putrid fen. The horse was nearly upon them, such was the speed at which it approached, and there was no room to maneuver without tumbling into the stinking mud on either side of their little jetty. The horseman gave no sign of slowing; indeed Freya saw him dig his sharp spurs into the great beast’s flanks. He stood up in the saddle and, dropping the glinting lance so that its spiny point ran parallel to the ground, urged his horse on.
“Jump,” Rusty shouted, his baritone barely audible above the deafening roar of the horse’s mighty gallop.
“What?” Freya yelled. “Where?”
“Into the marsh.”
Freya took a faltering step toward the edge of the path but then stopped. The glow of the knight and his charger cast a spectral light across the murky marsh on either side of them. Freya could see that they were surrounded by black water, thick with foul sludge and the decaying remains of plants, their rotting thorns and vines ready to entrap them in the depths of the quagmire. The horseman would be upon them in mere moments. He and his fearsome steed took up the entire width of the narrow track. It was either jump or be crushed under the relentless charge of the radiant horse or skewered on the pitiless point of the knight’s lance.
Freya glanced at Rusty and then they leapt, narrowly avoiding the knight’s attack. They hit the water hard, and Freya lost her grip on Rusty’s hand. She tried to swim but the water was like quicksand. She could barely move her limbs and it took all her strength to wrench her head out of the suffocating slurry. She was starting to panic as she looked rapidly around her for something, anything to grab onto. It was still dark but a residual glow from the horseman seemed to bathe the space with the thin white light of dawn.
She felt herself sinking again. Her arms were too tired to keep up their ineffectual treading and her legs were already stuck uselessly in the thick muck far below the surface. She brought her aching arms to a rest. She didn’t want her final moments to be spent frantically fighting a losing battle. As she slowed her breathing and relaxed, her left arm sank into the dense slime of the marsh and brushed up against a lump in her pocket. It was the doll that Vasilisa had given her. She wrapped her fingers around it wishing that her life wouldn’t end in a vile bog underground. Then she threw her head back, her face just visible above the encroaching water, and laughed at her foolishness and the futility of requesting aid from a ragdoll.
She felt a sharp pain and realized that a thorn from a black bramble bush had caught the side of her face. It was growing in the way only a stubborn weed could, straight out from the rocky and inhospitable ground of the little jetty.
Freya summoned all her strength and thrust her arms up and out of the choking quicksand, grabbing for the tenacious bramble. She caught hold of the end of it, the black thorns piercing her skin, but she didn’t even feel them so focused was she on getting her body out of the deadly muck. She forced her other arm free of the sludge and pulled with all her might. For a moment she thought it was all for naught, that the little weed was just a cruel joke, a vine of false hope planted by Baba Yaga as part of her cruel machinations. But then she felt first her left foot and then her right foot shift forward ever so slightly. She pulled harder, the thorny shoot lodged in the flesh of her hands. Finally, with a sickening squelching noise her upper body broke free and she was able to haul herself up onto the slimy stones of the little path.
She breathed deeply, but the relief that flooded her exhausted muscles lasted for only a brief moment when, with a jolt of dread, she remembered Rusty. She quickly scanned the swamp for any sign of him. In the milky light of the false dawn she could see the marshy land more clearly with its patches of sparse dry grasses, hoary shrubs and occasional dense thickets of black nettles, gorse, and thistles. In between the scrubby vegetation were pools of the viscous sludge that had almost taken her life.
Her heart began to beat more wildly as the seconds ticked by without a sign of Rusty anywhere.
“Rusty!” she called, “Rusty, where are you? Rusty!”
Tears sprang to her eyes. She was paralyzed with fear, locked to the spot where she’d pulled herself free. A creeping horror started to seep in at the edges of her consciousness. It had been too long. But she pushed the thought from her mind. She wasn’t ready to face this distorted reality without him by her side. She shook her head hard, muck flying, and looked again, crawling on her hands and knees and raking the murky waters with her mud-caked hands.
More seconds ticked by and the terror of losing him came raging to the surface. The tears that had sprung to her eyes became full-fledged sobs and she pressed her head into her filthy hands. She wanted to scream, but her throat was choked with so much emotion that nothing came out but a strangled cry. In a rage she thre
w her hands down and was surprised when one of them hit something soft. Freya looked down and there was the doll, sprawled in the dirt, its pristine apron caked with grime. One of its arms was bent behind its back but the other one pointed out into the bog. Freya followed the gesture with her eyes. Less than a yard away she spotted Rusty’s hand poking out of the black depths of the marsh.
Without thinking she grabbed hold of the same vine she had used to pull herself out of the sucking quicksand, and with her feet firmly planted on the jetty, stretched out as far as she could. At first she only managed to brush his fingers but then she leaned forward a bit more and was able to grab his wrist. She turned herself back around so that she faced toward the rocky path and pulled for all she was worth. Her feet began to slip back into the water and the vine in her hand ripped and tore at her already mangled flesh, but she was determined to get him free. She shifted her feet to find better purchase and let go of the vine in favor of a half-buried rock on the trail. Then, with her arm still stretched out behind her, holding on tightly to Rusty, she engaged every muscle and lunged forward with all her might.
With a pop Rusty’s head and torso emerged above the surface and Freya was able to grab hold of him under his arms. A few more mighty tugs, this time with her feet braced against the tangled roots of a dead shrub, and he slid out of the marsh and onto the narrow path.
Freya bent over his face. Mud caked his mouth and nose. She put two trembling fingers on his neck and checked for a pulse. There was nothing at first and then a soft flutter, so faint that she wasn’t sure if it was his heart or just wishful thinking. She waited and there it was again, weak but she could feel it. She shook him, gently at first and then harder, unsure of how to bring him around. She screamed and even slapped his face, but he remained unconscious. Finally, she put her head down on his chest, exhausted and near tears again. She didn’t know what to do. Her mind was racing but it offered her no solution.
She lay there, her head over his heart, listening for the reassuring thump of muscle pumping blood, and she let her body go slack. She realized she was still clutching the doll that Vasilisa had given her back at the shop. She lifted her head and brought the little toy up to her face.
“Now what?” she asked.
The doll didn’t respond.
“What am I supposed to do now?”
She sounded desperate. Freya clutched the doll in both hands willing it to show her the way, to give her some direction. It stared back at her, its pretty glass eyes shining. The pleasant smile sewn on its face remained unchanged.
“Please, just wake him up. Make him come back to me. Help me out just one more time,” she pleaded.
Freya stared at the doll a moment longer and then tucked its dirty body into the chest pocket of Rusty’s sweater. Nothing happened. Then the tears came in earnest, silent, hot tears. She was angry and scared and frightened that Rusty might actually be dead. She reached out and cradled his face with both her hands, running her thumbs gingerly over the hard ridges of misshapen bone that distorted his peaceful expression. Then she bent down and kissed him, light and soft and quick. Almost immediately he stirred and his eyelids fluttered open. He rolled over on his side and coughed dark mud and black water.
“What happened?” he groaned. He sounded unsure and groggy but very much alive.
“I think I just saved your life again,” Freya said. “You really need to stop getting yourself into these situations. I might not always be here to save you, you know.”
She said it with a smile on her face and relief in her voice.
“I remember narrowly avoiding Baba Yaga’s horseman and then getting caught in the bog. I couldn’t keep my head up. How did you get me out of there?”
“A lot of pulling and a little help from our dolly friend there.” Freya pointed to the ragdoll in Rusty’s pocket.
Rusty looked reassured but not surprised.
“Thank you,” he said. “I am humbled by your assistance and in your debt.”
“You’re welcome,” Freya said. She didn’t mention the kiss. She wasn’t sure how to bring it up, and they had more important things to worry about. A kiss that woke the gentle giant; she really was living a fairytale.
Freya stood and offered Rusty her hand. He grasped it and she helped haul him up to his feet. It seemed odd to continue on their journey after they’d both almost died, but they still had business to attend to with Baba Yaga. They exchanged a look and then turned in unison back in the direction of her hut at the end of the rocky path. It was easier to see now in the pale light of Baba Yaga’s artificial daybreak and Freya estimated that they were about halfway across the malodorous swamp.
“Not too much farther,” Freya said.
“No, but we must still be on guard. You never know wh—”
Rusty paused in mid-sentence. Freya had heard it too. The thunder of hooves. Again.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Freya said, but she knew that anything was possible in this nightmarish underworld. She looked over her shoulder and a red-orange light seemed to set the old clapboard houses of Skid Row on fire. The chimerical fire tore down through the street and a whinny, cold and cruel, echoed out from the wooden gully like a vengeful ghost. It made Freya’s hair stand on end.
“Let’s go!” she exclaimed and without waiting for Rusty’s reply she grabbed his hand and set out at a sprint. They ran hard down the stony path, their feet skidding across damp stones and slick mud. Freya’s chest was on fire and her legs felt like lead but she pushed forward, willing herself to go faster. She looked back and saw Rusty, his arms pumping and his breath coming fast and ragged. For a moment he leaped to the side to avoid a craggy stone and Freya saw the thing that was following them. A rider like the last, but this time he and his steed were red-hot like molten lava. His armor glowed like the tip of a poker set into a fire, and he swung a blazing morning star about his head so that the air sizzled around him. The horse snorted steam as it ripped across the jetty. It was gaining on them easily.
“Faster,” she shouted, but she wasn’t sure how much more speed she could muster from her weary body.
Baba Yaga’s house drew near. The blood pounded in Freya’s ears, her lungs burned, her muscles tightened, near fatigue. Still the horse and rider pursued them. They were so close now Freya could feel the heat ripple off of them, singeing her skin. The pounding of hooves was almost upon them, the whir of the morning star filled the air. Still they pounded on, flying down the narrow path with all the energy they had left.
Baba Yaga’s shack was within reach, just a few more steps and they would be there. The air was sweltering now and the ground shook from the fiery horse’s charge. Freya turned to look behind her once more and was horrified to see the knight had drawn nearly even with them. He seemed to stare down at her through the slit in his crimson visor. He swung the morning star up, preparing to bring it crashing down on top of them, when suddenly Freya felt herself dragged to the side. She lost her footing and rolled erratically across the rocky ground. Rusty had grabbed her by the waist and twisted her out and away from the path of the blazing knight just as the horseman reached the gateway to Baba Yaga’s hut. She felt the hot wind generated from the morning star blow angrily across her face as the spiked ball narrowly missed her head. Then, the air sizzled, there was a flash and a spark and the terrifying cavalier disappeared as it hit the fence surrounding Baba Yaga’s yard, leaving only shimmering waves of heated air in his wake.
Freya had come to a rest on her stomach and she rolled over now, drawing in deep breaths of the swamp air, happy to fill her lungs with the stale atmosphere after coming so close to a violent death twice, mere moments apart from each other. She wasn’t sure how much more punishment her body could take, and they hadn’t even met the witch yet. These Verge creatures meant business.
“Why are we doing this again?” Freya asked.
Rusty was sprawled on the muddy ground nearby. He looked pale and he was breathing hard, but Freya was glad to see
his chest rising and lowering. She smiled at him. She saw the little doll had survived their wild dash and hung like an enchanting if somewhat soiled marionette from his sweater pocket, and her smile deepened.
“I think it’s because your life is at stake,” Rusty said and then he laughed. It was the kind of half-sane giggling that happens only when you’re not sure whether to laugh or cry, and it caught in his throat so that spasms of voiceless mirth shook his body.
Freya couldn’t summon the energy to do anything but grin sardonically at the sad irony of Rusty’s words. She looked up at the sky and noticed that the red knight seemed to have heralded a counterfeit daybreak, and she could now see their surroundings clearly although they weren’t much to look at, just stinking marsh stretching far into the distance and Baba Yaga’s curious hut crouched on the little island of solid ground amid the steaming bog.
Freya rolled onto her knees so she could see the witch’s house more clearly. It was surrounded by the fence that had broken the knight’s charge. In the light of day she could see that it was no ordinary picket fence but a barrier made of bones. Long tibias and femurs, yellow with age and jutting out of the ground at strange angles, formed a formidable barricade to the barren yard beyond. But it was the skulls set at regular intervals along the top of the barrier that sent a chill down Freya’s spine. Like so many heads skewered on pikes they clearly announced what would await trespassers foolish enough to call upon Baba Yaga.
“Well, we’ve come this far,” Freya said. “Let’s go meet this Baba Yaga.”
Rusty had stopped laughing and was crouching low, his hands on his knees, studying the hut. It was an imperfect circle constructed of thick black sticks of charred wood held in place by a slipshod arrangement of rope, mud and twine. A cap of crooked branches and scraggly dry brush acted as a roof although it was uncertain how such a haphazard arrangement of twigs and bracken would keep out the elements or protect the occupant from whatever creatures might wander out of the swamp. Indeed the entire place appeared more like the coarsely made nest of some overgrown marshland raven than a proper house.
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