Chapter Seventeen
Sage
The guttural yell calls me from within my dreamless sleep and my eyes shoot open.
I’m staring at a ceiling of old wood covered in dangling objects—feathers, crystals, bird feet?
For a brief moment, I thought I was back in the shop, looking up at the dreamcatchers and windchimes, until yet again, reality comes flooding in.
I sit up, the memory of what happened before I fell asleep—passed out—has me squeezing my eyes shut and rubbing them.
It’s possible I’ve gone totally insane and been having some serious hallucinations.
When I open my eyes again, I’ll be in a white room, on a comfortable bed, probably with padded walls.
Nope.
I’m still in a cottage that belongs to Baba Yaga. Clutter crowds every surface and this bed is anything but comfortable. In fact, it’s not even a bed. It’s a wooden crate with blankets.
I hear the yelling again, and I think I can make out my name. The sound travels straight to my core and vibrates through every organ, almost painfully, and I wince, clutching at my stomach.
“Dear child, are you ailing?”
It takes me a moment to figure out that the old woman now standing against the door jamb is asking me about my health.
With her hunched over stance, I initially expected to see her using a walking aid or something, but she’s a lot stronger than she looks, it would seem.
I only think this because I’m in a room I definitely didn’t pass out in and she’s the only other person here.
I have a bone-deep feeling that Hack hasn’t made it back to the cottage after he disappeared, so I know he didn’t help her.
“I’m fine, thank you. Do you know where my…er…friend is?” The word friend doesn’t sit right, probably because he’s actually not my friend, but I don’t know what else to call him.
“Oh yes, dear. You won’t be seeing that demon anymore, don’t worry.
I made sure that trash stayed out upon his return.
” She shuffles toward the makeshift bed and whips the blankets from my legs.
“Come on, child. Up. I have a stew cooking and you need to eat. You slept the day away.” As quickly as she entered the room, she leaves in a flurry of cloak and skirts.
Looking toward the window, I see that she’s right. Darkness surrounds the cottage and I have, indeed, slept the day away. The scent of some kind of hearty meat and vegetables wafts through the room and my stomach grumbles, so I stand and make my way to the main room.
If I didn’t know the whole supernatural thing was real, then Baba Yaga would pass for a ninety-year-old woman stuck in the past. Everything about her and the cottage would fit right into a Brothers Grimm fairy tale.
I’m not even surprised to see her spooning her stew into bowls from a cauldron she had heating over the fireplace.
Just as I sit down on a beat-up wooden chair with my bowl, the sound of my name being yelled makes the walls vibrate. I look at Baba Yaga with wide eyes, concerned that this whole place is going to fall apart, but before I can voice anything, she shakes her head and sighs.
“That demon is relentless.” She tuts and begins eating her stew, pausing to glare at me. “I bet he told you that you were his chosen or soul mate. You can’t trust demons, child.” She goes back to eating, slurping up the juices from the lip of the bowl.
“Oh my goddess, he did say that!” Forgetting my rumbling stomach, I place my bowl on one of the many small tables in the space.
“So he was lying? This whole time? Why would he help me, though?” The questions tumble out, one after the other, while my mind whirs with the possible answers.
With the pure hatred I feel toward him, what she’s saying rings true, but on the other hand, he seems so sincere.
Well…I guess I’m wrong there because…demon.
“Eat, child.” Baba gestures toward my bowl and narrows her extremely hooded eyes until I pick it back up. I still don’t eat though, I can’t. I bet there never was a hex to make me hate him.
I feel stupid for being so na?ve and trusting—well, semi-trusting—of his introduction into this whole new world. A hate hex doesn’t even sound like a real thing now that I know he’s been lying.
“Zelos told me that you were my mother in my first life. Was that true?” It seems as far-fetched as the hate-hex, but she didn’t confirm it when I called myself her daughter back in Lympini…Lymp-something that’s really Olympus.
Finishing off her bowl of stew, she stands and places it beside the sink before slowly waddling back to her dusky-pink armchair that has definitely seen better days.
“Ah, he did tell you a truth.” She smiles, nodding as if playing out memories in her mind.
“You were my child. You are my child. But your soul has been cursed to live many lifetimes, never settling. It’s because of your strength, you see.
” A rustling from the corner grabs her attention and she pats her lap. “Come, Liliana.”
A ball of gray-brown fluff shoots from beneath a pile of goddess-knows-what, settling on Baba Yaga’s knees.
“This is my familiar, Liliana. Liliana, do you remember Aiyana?” The hare on her lap lifts its head and sniffs the air in my direction before bounding to the wooden floor and looking up at me expectantly.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” Baba Yaga chuckles and it sounds as though she has smoked a hundred cigarettes a day for the last two thousand years.
I kinda want to get back to the whole strength thing and my soul never settling, but I’m trying to not be rude so I bend and fuss the hare behind its ear. It leans into it, almost purring, then bops its nose onto my palm before leaping back toward Baba Yaga.
I don’t see anything wrong with this familiar, so Hack must have also been lying about them being a bad thing.
“You should rest, we can talk about all this tomorrow. The moon is almost at its highest and I have some foraging to do.” She peers into the bowl I’m still holding and scowls. “If you don’t eat, you won’t have any energy for tomorrow.”
“What’s tomorrow?” I take a large spoonful of the broth, and it’s rich, flavorful, but I can’t place it.
“You came to me to learn your magic, yes?” She strokes her hare like a Bond villain. It’s actually quite a comical image.
“I thought there was a whole age thirty thing for abilities?” That part can’t have been a lie, it was confirmed by my best friend. A twinge of pain shoots through me at the thought of Danika, but I push it aside because I’m trying desperately to compartmentalize everything.
“Ah there is, but not for you, child. You’ve spoken to spirits? Created good luck charms? Can read a person’s aura?”
“Super specific, but yeah, all of those things. Well, I don’t know if the good luck ladybugs actually worked, but the intent was always there…
” I trail off because she doesn’t look interested in the slightest. “Are you asleep?” Her eyes are closed and her head is bobbing slowly, as if she’s nodding.
“No, child. But I have to go. I have a spell book in the study we can start with in the morning.” She stands, the hare leaping to the floor as she does, and they both head toward the small wooden door out of the cottage.
Before going outside, Baba Yaga turns and stares me in the eye.
“That demon is nothing but trouble. Eat your stew, go to sleep, and think nothing more of him.” Without waiting for a reply, she’s gone, a thick cloak magically appearing over her back and head to shield her from the cold wind.
It’s quiet inside the cottage, like I could hear a pin drop from another room if I listened closely enough, then my name screams through the walls again, this time making them shake harder. I swear, this place could come down with one big huff and a puff from the big bad demon.
Ignoring him, as instructed, I pick up my spoon and take a small bite of stew. It's okay, but nowhere near as good as it smells. Before I can have any more, the gurgling croak of a raven, rising in pitch, has me pausing. I haven’t heard my raven for what feels like days. How is he here?
What if the raven is my familiar? More questions to file away for later…
Ooh, spell books!
Forgetting the food, and the raven, I place down my bowl and go in search of the study. I think I have found the correct room; the walls are laden with shelves and books upon books, and there’s a comfortable-looking armchair beside a small oak writing desk.
Taking my time, I read through all the book titles, hoping there’s an obvious “Witches First Spells” so I can get a head start. I’m almost halfway through the first wall of books, and nada. They’re all in other languages that I don’t know and I don’t have my cell to use my translator app.
On the bottom shelf of the second wall, a deep-purple leather-bound book with no title calls to me.
Okay, so it doesn’t, but the color is so pretty and there are tiny diamonds glittering around the top and bottom edges.
I open it, realizing that it, too, is in another language, but wait… I can understand the words.
“To heal a snakebite…Good fortune…woah…how to wield lightning and create a storm.” I read the tops of the pages aloud as I flick through, my smile growing with each one. I don’t care how I understand the language, because this is the jackpot right here.
I head over to the emerald-green armchair, ready to dig into this beauty.
I have no doubt I’ll be up all night devouring the contents.
Curling my feet beneath me, I crack open the book, conveniently finding a truth spell.
Apparently, all it takes are a few words while maintaining eye contact. Surely, it can’t be that easy?
Another yell rattles the cottage, and even if I did want to sleep tonight, there’s no chance of it happening with the demon constantly yelling my name.
Hmm…truth spell. I would thank the Goddess Hekate for helping fate put this in my path, but I get the impression she doesn’t like me very much after meeting her.