Invasion

At dawn, a satisfied kite was returning from a hunt. His day had begun extremely well: some heedless old man, God knew why, had tied all his chickens to the biggest hen. It would’ve been really stupid of the kite not to steal them away from the yard. The old man yelled some angry words at the kite’s retreating back and then quickly escaped to do some fishing while his wife was still at the market.

A boy and a girl came out of the forest, holding the baskets in their hands. The kite knew that their parents had died six years ago during the epidemic and that the children were now living alone, somewhere on the outskirts of the city. At the age of seventeen, Alena was doing an excellent job of keeping their house clean and raising her younger brother, who had just turned eleven. The old blacksmith Sarek, who went by the name Babak and lived on the other end of the village, helped her out with those tasks she couldn’t do herself.

There was nothing unusual about this because after the plague that had been ravaging this area, many houses stood empty and abandoned. In the attempts to prevent the epidemic from spreading, people tended to simply burn the deserted villages down, but some of them remained untouched. In less than six years, the villagers managed to recover from all the tragedies, and now only a cemetery filled with gravestones reminded everyone of what had occurred.

The boy became thirsty, and every now and then, he would rush to the closest puddle for a drink. Luckily, his sister managed to pull him away each time. Firstly, people just didn’t do things like that, and secondly, at the center of every puddle, there was an imprint of a hoof, a secret warning sign of Yaga herself. According to the unwritten rule of professional warlocks, each person had the right to a small clue that could help them avoid getting into trouble. The boy, unlike his wary sister, could care less about caution.

The kite was listening carefully to their conversation. During his long life, he had learned to decipher human speech. The boy once again crawled away from his sister and bent over a large puddle.

“Don’t drink that, Ivan, or else you’ll turn into a goat!” his sister cried out belatedly, but Ivan quickly took a few sips and stuck out his tongue at her. For a brief moment, he was engulfed by black smoke. Once it dissipated, the boy was gone, and a small goat was left standing by the puddle. The kite’s beak fell open in astonishment. Only now did he realize why Baba Yaga was working on each puddle so diligently.

“Oh!” Alena exclaimed, pressing her hands to her chest. “You goat! I warned you, didn’t I?”

The kite couldn’t help but wonder how he could steal the potion from Yaga. The drops she mixed into the water were amazing. He wouldn’t have to hunt for fat prey. He could just catch a mouse, throw it in the water, and the next second, a well-fed, fat goat would appear. This was a gift from the heavens!

Alena picked up the goat and ran to the local healer for help.

The kite was lost in his daydreams about turning a brood of mice into a herd of sheep. He was torn from his stupor only after noticing the faint black dot on the horizon with the corner of his eye. He shuddered. Now was not the time to daydream! The kite turned around abruptly and flew away in fear.

The castle that stood high and lonely was barely visible from the distance. It belonged to Kashchey the Immortal. Nobody, not even the most psychotic of psychos ever risked crossing paths with him. Kashchey always came up with ideas so vile that even the worst of the vermin acknowledged him as the ultimate evil. Luckily for every living being on this planet, Kashchey rarely flew into extreme fits of rage, but sometimes boredom drove him up the wall and he would pit evil forces against one another. The echoes of their battles terrified humanity and caused a strong headache among the evil forces themselves. At such times, those who knew what’s good for them had to find a new place for the living, somewhere as far from the battlefield as possible. Preferably, at the other end of the world.

However, Kashchey’s plans for today were surprisingly peaceful and concerned Princess Maria, the daughter of the local King Nicodemus, who was often depicted on various portraits. Exactly three weeks ago, Kashchey had taken a trip on his ghostly horse in search of troubles he could put someone in.

Fortune smiled on him when he saw a caravan of travelers from the distant kingdom. Kashchey joined the main carriage in all the glory of his fighting armor. He wore a black hauberk made of metal, which gleamed whenever he moved, a black raincoat, and a gilded helmet. Politely, he asked how far the much-respected travelers intended to go and whether they wanted to continue traveling at full health and strength.

If the travelers were uncertain whether it was in fact Kashchey standing before them, the sight of the legendary magical sword Kladenets eliminated all their doubts. In unison, the travelers pulled out purses with gold coins and were very surprised when Kashchey did not even look at them. Instead, he was interested in the portrait of Princess Maria. Kashchey had managed to overhear the caravan discussing how King Nicodemus called his daughter Maria “My golden treasure”, and so he headed to the leader of the caravan for details. And for the portrait itself.

The travelers had no desire to give up the precious cargo, but they also didn’t want to try their luck by fighting the Kladenets sword with their weapons. Life was something they all valued much more than the things they were carrying. After some loud but brief protests, the travelers quickly agreed that Kashchey needed the portrait more than they did. They turned out to be so kind that they presented him with a cart to carry the portrait in and asked for as little as their own lives in exchange. After mutual consent was achieved, the travelers rushed off into the sunset.

A small portrait occupied the area of only two meters wide and three meters tall in a folded state, and, upon closer examination, it turned out to be hand-made embroidery. Kashchey, after hanging this unique tapestry on the wall of the main hall of his castle, respectfully removed the crown that he wore specifically for such an occasion from his head.

And then the troubles began. For a long time after that, Kashchey stared intently at the image of the princess, frowning, trying to figure out which parts of her body consisted of gold. Eventually, he was forced to come to the conclusion that he simply couldn’t answer this question on his own. Kashchey couldn’t even imagine that the king called his daughter “his golden treasure” because of her personality. All his life, Kashchey preferred real gold, not the figurative one, so he failed to comprehend the psychological subtleties of his favorite word.

In the portrait, the princess was smiling mysteriously and nicely, and that irritated him the most. When Kashchey got tired of guessing, he decided it was time to find the answers in person. He would fly to the capital, ask the princess what it was all about, and return home. Just in case, Kashchey had prudently prepared a few surprises for the residents of the capital. After jumping on his ghostly horse, he rushed off to Slavnograd, to return his luck to its rightful place.

The clock on the main square struck six when he landed in front of the city gates, which were decorated with precious stones. The time was still young, but the gates were closed, and the gloomy sentries were guarding the city. Kashchey was amused that they had managed to miss his appearance. Strange sounds were coming from behind the walls, reminiscent of the convulsive sobs of a gusli that was being tortured by an inept guslar.

“You’re having a celebration!” Kashchey realized. He was delighted. “I arrived right on time, then!”

He jumped off the horse and banged against the gates. With a crackling sound, the heavy oak bolts were pushed from their hinges. The gates opened easily and without any squeak. They crashed into the wall loudly, forcing the numerous guards to tear themselves from their meaningless chatter and curse angrily at the manners of the sassy stranger, already promising him a painful future. It didn’t last long.

“Howdy, fellas!” Kashchey greeted them happily. The cheerfulness on the guards’ faces didn’t get brighter. “Don’t you see who has come to you for a visit? Don’t you recognize me? It’s me, Mister Good Sinister!”

The guards stared at him wide-eyed, then woke up from the stupor and seized their weapons.

“Straight to the fun?” Kashchey was surprised. “Without even enjoying a pint of beer to celebrate our meeting? As you wish!”

He snatched his magic sword from the scabbard and ran right at the pikes and spears in front of him. The guards turned out to be quite brave as it took no less than a minute before he managed to turn them to flight, urging those who lagged behind to run faster by swinging his sword and yelling like a madman.

The watchmen on the walls gazed helplessly at the turmoil below. Not only had they shamelessly missed the appearance of the unplanned guest, but they also couldn’t shoot as there was a risk of hitting their mates. After some delay, two-thirds of the guards finally did descend and rushed at “Mister Good Sinister.” The double pursuit continued until the guards who were moving through the narrow lanes crashed into each other, leaving Kashchey far behind. He studied the pile of fallen guards and then rushed to attack them, swinging his sword in a frenzied excitement.

When the guards who he kept goading sprinted past the royal stables and sped off in an unknown direction, Kashchey stopped. A huge cluster of carriages decorated with emblems drew his attention. It became clear why there were so many guards around and where the travelers had wanted to deliver the portrait of the princess. Monarchs and princes of all kinds had arrived for the annual ball. They were arranged every year in different states to introduce princes to princesses, develop diplomatic relations, and settle some personal scores. The appearance of Kashchey could bring a lot of confusion and surprises to the traditional routine of the high society, so he decided to take advantage of that. He would paint the town red!

The ball was in full swing when an old peasant with a long beard entered the hall and stopped near the balcony where the orchestra was playing a cheerful melody.

“Hey-ho!” he shouted so loudly that the couples closest to him went temporarily deaf, and the music turned into a blood-curdling cacophony before stopping. The dances of the monarchs of the world turned into a Brownian movement of particles and ended as well. Those present focused on the noisy stranger in disbelief.

“I don’t hear anything!” the old man yelled. “What the hell is happening?”

He put his finger in his ear and after a few twists, pulled out a small white ball.

“Guards! Get this idiot out of here!” a cheeky-looking prince shouted, his strong accent distorting his voice.

“Argh, they’ve pushed this damn cotton wool in my ears again!” the old man rumbled angrily and threw a piece of cotton at the disgruntled prince. Then he smirked, enjoying the way everyone was palpably shocked by his manners. Then he spat out the pebbles that made him lisp, tore off the country clothes he had worn over his battle suit, and pulled off his beard. “And here is me, The Great and All-Mighty, standing before you with all my modest strength and minor capabilities!”

The crowd blinked, puzzled. Kashchey spat out the last pebble and coughed, breaking the dead silence.

“Don’t you recognize me?” he addressed the confused king. “Me, the Great, the All-Mighty, the Evil Kashchey the Immortal? Well, what do they say? If one is not recognized, one is going to be rich!”

The crowd began to back away.

“Or you do recognize me?” Kashchey added. “Where are you going? You’re going to make me poor again! Wait! I’m not poisonous!”

The area around him was becoming increasingly free of people.

“And what about dancing ‘til you drop?” Kashchey appealed to them. No volunteers stepped forward.

“Who wants to dance with the greatest villain of the universe? Be reasonable, don’t make me choose my own partner!” Kashchey threatened. It seemed that his urging had been noted because a moment later, a significantly magnified number of armed guards ran into the ballroom.

“I don’t dance with men!” he protested, putting down his sword and drawing a circle around him with it. The guards obviously liked dancing with their sabers. Just give them the opportunity and they’d be up for it. “Whoever crosses this line will abruptly increase in quantity and decrease in quality!”

The guards did not heed the advice and stupidly rushed forward to attack him. Loud screams ranging from “Hurray!” to “Save yourselves while you still can!” rocked the walls of the palace.

“Haven’t they told you that attacking all together is bad for one’s health?” Kashchey exclaimed, eagerly chopping the spears and axes of his opponents who kept rushing into the battle, colliding with one another. Nothing but tiny pieces of metal were left afterward. Upon seeing it, the guards went berserk, but as they lost their weapons, too, they backed away, reigning in their fury. The guests fled to the corners, all but several crazy princes who rushed to help the guard. It took a while before Kashchey realized that he was fighting not only just the guards. Only after noticing that some of them had uniforms of strangely peaceful colors did he understand that civilians liked to fight, too.

“I wasn’t expecting that!” he called out, feeling genuinely surprised, so much so that he punched some annoying offspring of a monarch away from himself. “How about a fair one-on-one battle?”

“You have an unfair advantage!” the offspring parried.

“Such as?”

“You’re immortal!”

“Well, yes,” Kashchey agreed. “But what would you have me do? Search for an immortal opponent? I’d die before I found one!”

Kashchey looked around the room, hoping to see the princess. She was peeking from behind the throne and seemed tremendously unhappy with the situation. It was useless to ask her questions at this time. Clearly, he wouldn’t get a straight answer. He’d have to go the hard way, then.

“Don’t I always?” Kashchey muttered. He was momentarily distracted from the fight and almost missed the blow. This infuriated him, so with one powerful swing of the sword, he destroyed the opponents’ tiny weapons. Then he rushed towards Maria like a hurricane, scattering the guards and the guests as if they were bowling pins. The space around the bewildered princess emptied instantly. Prince Yaroslav was the only person who remained nearby. He stepped in front of Maria and raised his sword in defense. Still running, Kashchey threw several bomb-spheres around him, and the hall was shrouded in a sleeping purple gas. Kashchey knocked the sword out of the prince’s hands. Yaroslav attacked with his fist, but Kashchey ducked and the punch whistled over his head. Using the brief pause, Kashchey picked up the now-sleeping princess and rushed towards the window.

He jumped on the windowsill, turned to the guests and shouted, “I dare the bravest of you to fight me! May he defeat me in a fierce combat and free the princess! If he manages to do it, that is!”

Kashchey grinned, and the most impressionable guests fainted even before getting to the land of dreams because of the gas.

“Have a nice nightmare!”

Kashchey whirled on his heels. His boots blazed with rocket flames and lifted him promptly to the upper windows. Kashchey looked down one last time, noticed the king shouting threats at him, and waved his hand. Then he pulled a remote fuse from his sleeve, pressed a button, and covered himself and the princess with a cloak. Explosions thundered outside while multicolored fireworks began flashing in the sky. The glass shattered with a plaintive sound. Frightened people dropped to the ground, shouting in panic, while the ghostly horse flew towards the palace. Kashchey jumped out of the window and fell towards the ground. Had the horse come even a second late, Kashchey would have committed a murder-suicide without knowing the princess’ secret, as the ground was about a 15-meter drop. The horse picked them up right before they hit the ground, and, once the passengers were safely on, it flew up into the clouds.

After a brief moment of collective panic, the palace plunged into a strong and healthy artificially induced dream.

A miserable fox was moving along the path slowly, fruitlessly ignoring the rumbling of her empty stomach. Ever since dawn, she had wanted to steal a chicken from the village, but the rooster had turned out to be so healthy, lively, and cunning that he attacked her almost before she had a chance to sneak into the coop. After being pecked in the nose repeatedly, the fox rushed back to the forest but ran into a dog that had been dozing off by the fence. Because of the rooster’s cries, the dog opened his eyes. It hadn’t immediately realized what the red creature running at him even was, but it still deftly snapped his jaws, chopping off a piece of the foxtail. The fox howled in pain and jumped over the fence, chased by the ferocious barking that kept echoing in her ears.

A sparrow flew by, quick as an arrow. The fox shivered and stopped, waiting for the sparrow to fly next to her nose again. She wouldn’t miss her chance. She would fill her stomach with food this time. But the sparrow wasn’t going to tempt the fate twice. It settled comfortably on the branch and said, “Hey, fox, you have really lost some weight here! How did you do that? Share your secret!”

The fox looked around.

“People have been searching for this secret for thousands of years, and you want me to spill it out? Just like that?” she grumbled.

“So what?” the sparrow looked surprised. “I’m not a human. Don’t be so greedy!”

“Well, I suppose I can whisper it into your ear. Fly over here.”

The sparrow giggled.

“Aye, I know all about your secret tricks!” it said. “You’d swallow me whole, tail and all! So no, thank you!”

The sparrow hopped from branch to branch, chirped goodbye and got away, almost colliding with Yaga who was flying about her business. The fox sighed. Yaga was so lucky! Even her hut had chicken legs. The fox’s belly, on the other hand, was basically eating itself at this point. Where was the fox’s happiness? Behind what mountains was it hiding?

Come out, come out, wherever you are!

In the evening, Baba Yaga was watching the farthest house in the village through a telescope. She didn’t care much about the house. Her attention was focused on the goat Ivan who was running about the yard. Yaga watched him until she heard a wild neighing echoing in the sky.

“What are those strange sounds?” she marveled, angrily directing the telescope up and looking for the celestial laughter. “I wonder which of them is laughing, the horse or Kashchey? I can bet he has arranged that lighting show of his again! And who are they transporting? Is that… is that Princess Maria? What an idiot! Doesn’t Kashchey know what he’s gotten himself into? Little children caused more problems than they were worth, and an angry princess will bring him to his grave, immortal or not!”

“And soon, he may be the only living person left on the planet… Cat Bayun, the lulling cat that lived in the distant western forests, had brought the terrible news of a new invasion of vampires. They had all been allegedly destroyed five thousand years ago, but apparently, some cunning wretch had managed to hide in a secluded corner. While the vampire was in hiding, humanity appeared and played right into his hands. People lacked immunity against the vampires, and after being bitten, they themselves turned into lovers of fresh blood. And now the vampire decided to get even for all the insults he’d endured by wiping out the distant descendants of those who had destroyed his kin.”

“Fight those beasts yet again and at the end of it, we’ll have to say goodbye to all our nerve cells,” Yaga muttered. “The amount of blood they’ll suck out of you, it’s downright scary!”

There had been no news from the old warriors. Yaga seemed to be the only one left. Over thousands of years, many of them had scattered around the planet. Some had died a long time ago, and there was no time to gather the remaining living ones. The vampires would destroy humanity a lot quicker.

Yaga would have to fight alone, unless Cat Bayun found somebody from the old crowd. But first, she needed to protect her back. The potion for temporary mutations had been created thousands of years ago would have been most welcome, but the recipe was long lost. Before, it had been used against the vampires by changing their form and turning them into sedentary creatures that were easy to kill. Vampires developed an immunity against it very quickly, and the potion had to be “buried” in the depth of time. Yaga doubted that anything had changed in the past 5,000 years. Vampires were pernicious and could outlive even cockroaches. But that potion could be given to people to turn them into animals whose blood the vampires didn’t drink. To restore the formula, Yaga had to carefully combine all the components and conduct tests on volunteers that actually had no idea they were volunteers. They just wanted to drink some water from a puddle.

And now, she needed to catch that goat, study the effects of the restored potion on the human body, and, on the basis of that data, derive the formula of the potion for long-term transformation of a person into a beast. Preferably into a savage and ferocious one. If the vampire army was to be replenished with people, it was vital to make them impossible to find. It would be easy to catch the goat by flying into the village on the broom, but Yaga dismissed this idea immediately. There had already been rumors that the disappearances of people, animals, and birds were her doing. A volunteer was needed.

Their dog, maybe? A nice dog loved to play and hunt, so it would gladly chase a goat. So, her plan entailed the following: to sic the dog on the goat, lure them both into the forest, then capture the goat and fly away as fast as possible to the hut. The dog would be free to run and hunt freely in the woods… until it met its wild ancestors, that was. That would be something to remember if it managed to escape from their hospitality.

But there was a problem: the goat wasn’t really a goat, so it wouldn’t be scared off by a familiar dog. Well… Yaga would have to take Alena’s house by storm, then.

“I don’t like it…” Yaga mumbled, folding the telescope and stuffing it in the pocket. “Where did these vampires even come from? And how did these people show up out of the blue.”

She sighed. There were more and more mysteries appearing every year. And then a sudden thought popped up in her head… What if she hypnotized the dog? What if she persuaded it that it adored bringing small goats directly to Yaga’s house!?

It wasn’t a bad idea at all. It was at least worth trying.

Kashchey hadn’t been flying on his ghostly horse for long, but he got so tired from having to hold the princess and fight the oncoming gust of wind along with turbulence that he almost fell from the saddle when the horse landed. It stopped in front of a hidden entrance to the castle on the flat roof of one of the four allegedly decorative turrets. The secret doors opened, and Kashchey entered the spacious turret and pressed the button. A high-speed elevator crossed the distance of forty meters in one swoop and stopped at the second floor, which was used mainly for storage of various stuff. Upon opening the door to the ever-vacant guest room, Kashchey put the sleeping princess on the bed and quietly walked away.

‘Who would have thought!’ he told himself. ‘I’ve had quite a powerful effect on them all!’

No objections followed. And where would they come from, anyway? Kashchey stretched, squared his shoulders, and headed toward the viewing room. He was very curious to know how the king reacted to the kidnapping of his daughter. The impact of the sleeping gas had to last a rather long time, but Kashchey was hoping that the royal family members had already woken up.

It was time for a documentary. The one shown in a five-foot plate with a golden rim. Unfortunately, he had no magical Apple. Kashchey had eaten it by accident as he was watching some tumultuous event happening on the screen. The image didn’t get worse, but it became impossible to turn off the plate. Now, it was broadcasting events all day and all night long, occasionally stopping to produce strange repetitive videos of questionable things that Kashchey knew nothing about. The creatures that were promoting the efficiency of these things didn’t look all that good themselves, so Kashchey didn’t really believe their moving speeches about the newest wonders of the world. Instead, he was wistfully recalling a time when the apple was still rotating, following the usual plate trajectory.

The numerous attempts to replace this Apple with others didn’t bring about the desired results. The pieces of fruit quickly shrank and turned dry. He needed a de-aging apple, a special one, one that retained its form for literally thousands of years. It was perfect for the mysterious “signal filter” that was written about in the document that came with the plate. Kashchey sometimes cursed himself for knowing how to read, especially when it came to the most disgusting tales that poisoned his eyes. Kashchey suspected that there was some complex story behind these apples. He also knew that they were still growing on a single tree someplace in the middle of nowhere. This tree had an incredibly long lifespan, and for growing, all it needed was sand in large quantities. It lived by its own internal schedule, regardless of the seasons. For the apples to grow and ripen, three hundred years had to pass. These fruits grew in a small quantity, which was why they were protected better than anything else in the world. During each of the clips, Kashchey was thinking about conquering the impregnable fortress, but arranging the apocalyptic light show (also known as overly strong protection) just to watch the plate in peace wasn’t necessary. Not yet.

Currently, the plate was reflecting the marvelous city of Slavnograd. The image was colored but without sound. Kashchey could determine the content of conversations of those present only by observing their hectic emotions. The most interesting thing wasn’t the transmission itself, but the way he could watch the objects of his interest. Kashchey couldn’t grasp how events made their way into the plate. Someone had to watch the audience to shoot them from different angles and sides. As they say, before you leave, you need to enter. And how all these people entered remained an unsolved mystery. Once, Kashchey turned on the stream and nearly lost his mind after seeing his own face up close. He’d spent ages on trying to find who had been spying on him. The empty air in front of him didn’t seem like a suspect, but nothing else was in the vicinity. Actively waving his hands in front of him also didn’t bring the expected results. The image didn’t change one bit. Kashchey had to admit that everything around him was under the control of some unknown forces and their long, curious noses.

“Long noses, huh? Well, I’ll cut them down to size!” Kashchey promised firmly, and for the sake of reassuring himself, he pushed the idea of continuously monitoring the far depths of his subconscious. Reading dictionaries in the library of the castle after seeing the obscure recommendations wasn’t in vain, and Kashchey learned a lot of strange terms. He had to bring the castle to order a long time ago, but he comforted himself with the thought that for an immortal, time wasn’t an issue, so the day for research would come. Around the end of the next millennium, most likely.

In the empty and seemingly endless hall, Prince Yaroslav stood in front of the depressed king, along with his younger brother Artem. The rest of the guests, who didn’t have time to actually wake up and get over their excruciating headache, suddenly remembered about some urgent things they had to complete, so they rushed off in the middle of the night. In this particular case, considering what had happened, time was meaningless. Everyone knew about Kashchey and his doings, so they understood one thing clearly. Any fool could try to rescue the princess from trouble, but luck would smile only for a sheer madman. Or someone in love. And Prince Yaroslav fit both criteria perfectly. The guests wished him good luck whole-heartedly, apologized to the king, and quietly disappeared from sight.

“Cowards!” Kashchey shouted into a plate. Unfortunately for him, the transmission was one-sided. “How about coming at me altogether? Where is the mutual assistance you monarchs are so proud of? Or is it ‘the two of you fight, the rest of us doesn’t mind’ thing?”

The desire to throw something heavy at the royals had almost led to catastrophic consequences. At the last moment, Kashchey realized that he was attacking a plate with one-way communication, so a copper statuette flew just above the target.

“I am ashamed of you,” he announced harshly, but then brightened again. “Then again, what am I going on about? Hurry up, you lazy bastards! Time waits for no man! There is so much more to come, and you’re fixated on some sleeping princess? Good riddance! Eat ‘til you burst!”

The princes who decided to look for Maria held his interest. They were clearly crazy if they decided to wage a local war against him. He remembered one of them well. It was the man that had been trying to protect the princess with all his might, and he almost succeeded. The second prince was just like the first but younger.

“Looks like recklessness runs in their family,” Kashchey muttered. “To die in the prime of their lives! And for what?”

The grief-stricken king said something to the princes, who answered confidently. Then he rose from his throne and embraced them. Kashchey chuckled. He could easily guess what was going to happen now. The princes didn’t waste any time. They jumped on their horses and rode toward his castle.

“The showdown begins,” Kashchey declared loudly, rising to his feet. Only deep silence answered him, silence that had become so familiar over the years. Kashchey cast a parting glance at the plate. The king was sitting on the throne, his head lowered as he stared at a small portrait of his daughter. The servants crowded a good distance away from him, not risking disturbing His Majesty.

“You were much more cheerful when you were young, Nicodemus,” he murmured.

In the old days, the king himself would have rushed off to save his daughter, but the years took their toll. The kingdom required his constant presence and right now, he understood that he’d put himself in a solid and complex trap. He could only hope for the help of the young princes. Heavy thoughts came into his mind. The king had heard the terrible stories about the antics of Kashchey back in his childhood, and with all his heart, he hoped that the princes would be able to save Maria.

The door closed behind Kashchey with a quiet click.

Near outer space.

Distance to Earth: two hundred thousand kilometers.

The captain of a small interstellar ship that looked in accordance to its cheapness and simplicity while also resembling a hazelnut was desperately trying to slow down and not collide with the approaching planet. Otherwise, he might end up turning it into a radioactive, contaminated lifeless desert.

Arriving at the edge of the Galaxy, the captain was very surprised when he stumbled upon an inhabited world that wasn’t known to the scientists of the Galactic Union of Astronomers. And he did that on his first try. The captain had lost himself in staring at the bright, colorful colors of the atmosphere. It was nice to see something different from the widespread gray of many lifeless planets. However, it wasn’t as nice when he forgot to hit the brakes in time. Now, he was watching the monitor in despair. The timer displaying how many seconds were left before the collision with the planet was flashing red. The captain tried to turn sharply and steer the ship away from the planet one last time but instead of succeeding, he ended up breaking the wheel.

The ship entered the dense atmosphere and began to heat up rapidly. The captain was hastily trying to remember everything starting with his birth, and his attempts were richly spiced with the monotonous gut-wrenching thuds of his very heart. In other words, he was screaming hysterically, staring at the wrecked wheel in his hands, and wasting his precious time.

The ship, having ceased receiving instructions from the pilot, belatedly switched to autopilot. The captain had no idea that such a thing existed on his vessel since he had purchased the ship during a firesale of old space technology, and it came without a user manual. The seller gave a 30% discount off the cost solely because of this, and the dazed captain bought it with joy, like the idiot he was.

“In your case,” he recalled a phrase from an old joke, “idiocy is a vast improvement!”

“Not funny at ALL!” the pilot shouted for the sake of diversity. The next moment, a bunch of boxes fell on him from the shelf. The pilot stopped yelling in fury and switched to screaming in pain. Only then did he deign to pay attention to the monitor. His shouts were cut off abruptly. Although the speed of the ship didn’t decrease, the distance to the planet ceased its rapid decline, and soon, it froze completely. The autopilot had managed to change course and fly at a tangent. The temperature of the outer surface of the ship stopped at eight hundred degrees and slowly went down.

The ship trembled as it commenced landing procedures, still on autopilot. The captain leaned back in his chair weakly, closed his eyes, and didn’t open them until he felt a slight jolt from the contact with the surface.

Being a part-time navigator, co-pilot, cook, mechanic, flight engineer, and cleaner allowed him to spend an impressive amount of his salary on something more pleasant than the payment of the crew. So, the captain gulped a liter-deep mug of sedatives, enough for an entire crew, and wiped the sweat from his forehead. He supposed he could congratulate himself on the most successful landing in his life… a life that had almost ended. Still, firstly, no one was killed, and secondly, an unknown planet on the edge of the Galaxy proved to have oxygen and was inhabited by highly developed forms of life! Perhaps even slightly intelligent ones!

Blue sky, white clouds, green grass… it was the ultimate dream of any space traveler! To receive such a gift from fate was like catching a black cat in a black room, especially if this cat had never been there in the first place. It was like discovering an oil field while digging a cellar, like the simultaneous death of a dozen of billionaire relatives, like losing a win-win lottery…

“The last comparison is somewhat unfortunate,” the captain reproached himself, without taking his fervent gaze off the planet before him. “The locals, like all the natives of other discovered planets, are terrible cowards for sure. They’ll gladly give me power over them as soon as I show them a couple of cheap tricks!”

The computer’s analysis showed that there were six continents on this planet. One of them was covered with an impressive layer of eternal ice. The others had no industrial technology or air pollution, and the largest continent was located in the northern part of the planet. No dangerous viruses present, as it would seem.

“Well, we won’t be wasting our time on trifles! Let’s start with the conquest of the largest continent.” The captain glanced at his reflection. “Nothing’s wrong with that, right?”

But first, he had to replace the steering wheel and drink a couple of more liters of sedatives. And not necessarily in that order.

But he didn’t manage to relax properly. An hour later, the monitor began to flare in alarm, indicating that the natives were approaching the ship. The captain blew the dust from his new helm and eagerly waited for the local residents. He was curious to see how scared they would be and how they’d run from the ship as if the devil himself was chasing them. How hilarious that would be!

Three minutes later, the captain was staring at the screen silently, tension vibrating in his body. Instead of fleeing from the incomprehensible (and frightening, damn it all to hell, it was frightening!) object, the crazy natives began to throw knives at it. They used stones, too, as well as some handy garbage, and they did it with visible pleasure. Protective laser beams leveled these objects into atoms before they could reach the ship surface, and it looked like this process was the one that the natives liked most.

And well, the captain could tolerate such antics of the wild forms of local life. After all, they couldn’t damage the ship in such a manner. But when the natives drew the swords from their scabbards and began to cut down a tall massive tree, pushing it directly toward the ship, the captain grew restless.

“Who is scaring whom here?” he asked indignantly, hurriedly sitting down in the pilot’s seat and fastening the seat belt around himself. “Vandals!”

“Cut it down!” Yaroslav shouted, brandishing his sword in excitement. A few strong blows, and the three hundred-year-old birch bent, hanging over a huge brown stone. The stone roared angrily and suddenly soared into the skies, throwing up a wave of wind that blew away all the dust, leaving a thick, long, hazy trail behind. The princes coughed, the horses backed away anxiously, and the birch finally fell on the road.

“Flying rocks!” Artem’s surprise knew no bounds. “Is that a joke!”

Yaroslav followed the strange stone with his intense gaze and said, “Maybe it’s a beast and not a rock? Like a dragon?”

“Maybe an evil Kolobok who swallowed Nightingale the Robber? It’s too much, don’t you think?”

“After a meeting with Kashchey, I wouldn’t dare say as such.”

The princes knew the local area well. They had been in the capital many times before and hunted the wild boars in its woods. And Yaroslav had been friends with Princess Maria since his childhood. Yesterday, he had been planning to officially ask for her hand in marriage, but Kashchey’s appearance sent all his plans down the drain.

There had never been any huge rocks on this road, so the appearance of this obstacle left the princes quite puzzled. Six meters high, it was blocking traffic, and the ground around it was scorched and covered with a layer of grayish ash. Artem jumped off his horse and approached the barrier. He touched it and was surprised to note that the stone was warm, humming strangely, as if a swarm of bumblebees had made it their home.

Yaroslav took his mace and went to the stone to test its strength. He swung and heard a long howl in response. A red lightning hit his mace, spraying it into a dazzling shower of sparks. The horses reared back while Yaroslav jumped and shielded himself so that the sparks didn’t touch his face. Artem shut his eyes tightly, covering himself with his hands. When the silence came and nothing terrible happened, the brothers looked at each other and decided to repeat the attack.

As soon as the stone disappeared into the clouds, they managed to push the birch to the side of the road. They had to cut almost all the branches off but, in the end, it worked. They couldn’t leave such a mess for other travelers to see.

As a clever proverb said, “If you want to dance, you have to pay the piper,” and only now did Artem realize the depth of its meaning. Until he died of old age, his tutor had always liked to repeat another phrase: “For three minutes of fun, we have to pay for years.” Sometimes he added that many people understood it only after the above-mentioned years disappeared into eternity. After hearing these words, the head of the guard nodded dejectedly and said a slow, “Yea-a-ah…”, though Artem didn’t understand why.

When the last beam was removed, and the branches flew after them, the princes took some time admiring their still-sharp swords, sheathed them, and jumped on their horses. It was time to do the main task, which was saving the princess.

It was nearly midnight. The dog, who was dozing in his small cabin, was tossing around and clicking his teeth. He was dreaming about a big sugar bone and his attempts to grab it. But the bone constantly flew away, stopping an inch from his jaws. Finally, it escaped to a distance that didn’t allow the dog to reach it just by craning his neck, so he had to get up. The dog marveled at the vividness of this dream. Just in case, the dog wagged his tail and then made a sharp jerk towards the bone. Frustratingly, it was once again quicker. Flying far to the side, it hung at the level of the dog’s eyes, slowly rotating around its axis. The dog growled with displeasure.

The bone stopped and then moved smoothly, making an insulting circle around him. The dog was turning after the brazen bone but didn’t risk pouncing, instead waiting for the best moment to attack. However, his patience didn’t last long. When the bone made the tenth circle, the dog’s control snapped. Making a fraudulent leap, he grabbed the hateful bone and was about to turn in into chips when a huge shadow rose behind his back. The dog felt someone’s hard stare and froze in fright.

The shadow came closer and turned into Baba Yaga, who said in a measured, hypnotic voice, “Face the forest… ugh, damn it to hell… look at me!”

The dog opened his jaws. The bone fell to the ground.

“Look at me!” Baba Yaga repeated, simultaneously unhooking the collar from the chain and waving the ball in front of the dog. “Now watch the toy! On the count of three, you will obey me completely!”

The last one wasn’t necessary. The dog was willing to perform any Yaga’s request one hundred and fifty percent as it was, anything to be left alone.

“One!” Yaga counted. “You feel warmth all over your body.” With her right hand, she grabbed her head and mumbled, resigned, “I can’t believe I’m doing it… Hypnotizing dogs now.”

The hypnotized subject tilted his head to the side in surprise and raised his right ear. Yaga cleared her throat and repeated, “The heat spreads through your body, from head to tail. Your eyes are closing, your eyelids are slowly getting heavier… Two! You’re falling asleep. You’re getting sleepier and sleepier, you want to sleep for the whole day! And while you’re sleeping and dreaming, you’ll be doing what I tell you. Attention! My first order is that you will bring an old beast-friend of yours who will decide to play with you into the woods to my house. On the count of three, you’ll start waiting for this beast to appear. On my next command, you’ll wake up, and you won’t remember anything about what happened to you… THREE!”

The dog twitched in surprise. He thought that Baba Yaga had just held a swinging ball in front of his nose but there was no one here right now. The yard was empty. The dog turned to pick up the bone and stopped halfway.

‘What bone?’ he thought, puzzled. ‘Why would there be a bone?’

And there was no Yaga. No sign of her anywhere. It must have been just a nightmare.

The dog lay down on the mat, yawned, closed his eyes and instantly fell asleep. Immediately after that, his body shuddered, and his eyes snapped open again. Only this time, they glowed green, and a light angry growl was coming from the dog’s mouth. Completely under Yaga’s influence, the dog began to wait for an old friend who wanted to play with him. There was no one in the yard, and his eyes closed again. To an outsider, it could seem that the dog was sleeping deeply, but it wasn’t like that at all. His ears were quivering faintly, picking up on the slightest noise, and he was ready to jump up at any moment to complete the task given to him.

The fox clung fiercely to the branch and shook it with all her strength, spilling out the anger that had accumulated in her over the day.

‘This isn’t life, this is a curse! I couldn’t even catch chickens! How terribly shameful! I’m a red embarrassment, nothing else!’ she thought. ‘Man up, you weakling, we can’t leave food to chance! It won’t eat itself! I have to take revenge! I have to punish someone! To bite the dog’s tail off. To eat it! To eat the dog!’

At this very moment, a harmless bush began dreaming of becoming a cactus or a rose to take revenge on the fox. But there was no cure against genetics — except for genetic engineering, of course, but that was still hundreds of years away from being invented! This fact hurt the bush to the roots.

The abuse of the bush ended unexpectedly. Yaga dashed by at lighting speed, blowing the fox far away. The frightened fox barely managed to suppress the tremors running through her paws. What the hell had just whistled past her?

“Why is everyone running around?” she growled, shaking. “As if they’re in a hurry… And where was she going to anyway?”

The fox considered it, trying to stop her paws from trembling so much. She did so quickly, but her long tail continued to shake like a leaf.

And then it dawned on her, as if lightning struck!

“Yaga is flying to the village to steal chickens! There’s no other reason for it! What is going on in this world?! I have to go there right now before all the birds get stolen by someone else!”

Forgetting everything, the fox ran towards the chicken coop.

The people who lived in the house opposite of it were asleep. The fox understood this simply by observing that all the lights were off in the windows. But she still didn’t understand why people always settled near the chicken coop. Apparently, this was fate: wherever the delicious birds went to live, people inevitably followed and constructed almost unapproachable fences around them. Or maybe people were the servants of the chickens. And at night, as they were sleeping, the dogs stood guard. There was no way in as the chickens were under 24-hour protection. Only a sneak attack would do.

The fence was nothing, since it was built for the protection from the cattle. Any little thing could easily slip through it, akin to how the water slipped through a sieve. The dog, as usual, would be snoring in his house, but he could wake up from the cries of the rooster. So, she needed to sneak with minimal noise to keep from disturbing him.

The fox grimaced from yesterday’s memories. The tail wasn’t hurting any longer, but the wounded self-esteem demanded bloodthirsty revenge. If she was lucky, the fox thought, she could put the remnants of the eaten chicken in front of the dog’s house, so that in the morning, the creature would be in some serious trouble. She’d eat to that! Or rather, she’d drink to that. To revenge. To food, mostly, but to revenge as well. So long as the rooster didn’t wake up. Otherwise, the bloodthirsty revenge would turn into a particularly sophisticated suicide, and next time, the fox would be able to get into the chicken coop painlessly only in three or four months. During that time, the fox’s weight would drop to a full zero, and she would quietly withdraw from this miserable life. She couldn’t let that happen. No way.

The fox jumped over the hedge and crawled across the carrot bed. Then she ducked behind a tree and cast a quick glance at the dog’s house. The dog was sleeping recklessly, almost snoring with bliss. Maybe he didn’t guard anyone at all, but simply lived in the neighborhood?

With utmost care, the fox crept towards the henhouse. Yesterday’s tunnel was still there when she approached it. Not surprising. Who would have time to fill it if only young human children, Alena and Ivan, were living there? It was impossible to say.

The dog’s abilities, which were enhanced by Yaga, helped him, so even with his eyes closed, he knew what was happening. The peasants went to bed. Happy crickets were chattering loudly. Alena was trying to make her brother drink some useless stuff she was given by a local healer. The goat, having learned the lesson from his bitter experience, refused to drink any water at all. At least until his sister drank it first. The struggle had made them both tired, so now they were sleeping peacefully. Far, far away, strange things were happening at the old mill, and strange creatures were calling the insomniac miller for conversation. These creatures were very similar to humans, and they were emanating the sense of true death. If not for Yaga’s order, the dog wouldn’t pretend to be sleeping, he would rush to the miller to help him. The miller always treated him to something tasty when he ran by, and the dog didn’t want to lose such a good friend.

“Your playful beast-friend is about to come!” Yaga’s command rang in his head, and the dog obediently tucked his tail between his legs.

The restless frogs were croaking in the distant swamps. The nervous rooster was walking around the chicken coop, probably fighting an imaginary fox, looking for a way to peck her so painfully that she would leave this place forever.

Someone’s eyes flashed behind the fence for a moment, and the dog became alert. The fact that this was a beast was immediately apparent. The old, red, familiar beast. All the dog had to do now was to figure out if she wanted to play and then send her to Yaga. And the sooner, the better, because the dog really didn’t like whatever was happening at the old mill.

The fox examined the yard carefully. After making sure that there were no strangers and that the locals were deep in their dreams, the fox quietly walked past the dog’s house to the chicken coop. The dog opened his eyes slightly, slowly watching how the events developed.

‘She’s playing hide and seek!’ he guessed. ‘That means she’s the right beast!’

It was a strange time for games… Although hiding could be done more effectively exactly at night.

After looking around, the fox slipped into the tunnel. Everything had to be done very quickly. She had to catch the chicken while the rooster and the dog were sleeping and then quickly retreat. The fox jumped in front of the ruffled chickens and was about to bite the closest one with her teeth when she suddenly saw the menacingly raised comb of the huge rooster right in front of her. She froze in shock.

“Cock-a—” the cock had no time to finish the battle with an imaginary fox as the real one turned up right in front of him. As soon as he moved, the hen flew in one direction and the fox went in another one. Cock voiced his fury loudly, at the full power of his lungs.

“Damn you,” the fox muttered. “I’m left without food once again!”

She jumped into the street and saw a dog slumbering just an inch away.

“I think this has happened to me before. When did he get out of his house?” the fox asked herself, and suddenly, the dog’s eyes opened. “Ouch! No, this definitely hasn’t happened!”

The dog’s fur stood on end. Shining green eyes without pupils stared at her with wild hatred. It seemed if the fox moved even the tip of her tail, the worries about her food would become a thing of the past along with her life.

“Calm down, fangy, I got the wrong address!” the fox said.

The dog growled. The angry rooster jumped in pursuit but froze at the sight of the dog. The battle cry sticking in his throat, changing into a pathetic chicken squawk. The rooster slipped back into the coop, leaving the dog to decide what to do in this situation. He didn’t fall asleep until the morning, trembling in fear. It was the first time he didn’t let out a sound when the sun rose.

The dog stepped forward and the fox broke into a run. Yesterday’s exhausting jaunt seemed easy to her now, like an unhurried walk in the moonlight. The dog didn’t lag behind, and his growl was like an invitation to visit Death. Something like, “Come! We have enough space for one more soul.”

‘What kind of monster was pretending to be a mongrel? Where did it come from? What does it want?’ the fox wondered feverishly. ‘I’m too young to die! I haven’t even eaten anything! Why me?’

“HELP!” the fox screamed, but a terrible laugh was her only response. It sounded like a howl of a whole chorus of savage wolves rather than something coming from a single dog. Those who woke up from the cry for help preferred to fall back asleep as soon as they heard the chilling howl of the pursuer.

The fox raced through the fallen trees, not seeing the road, while the dog howled a little behind. They flew into the forest together, covering a dozen of miles in their haste, plowing through the thorny bushes, jumping over the woodpile near the royal hunting lodge, running on its roof… With a distant sense of surprise, the fox noted that she could climb the walls no worse than a cockroach, but worst of all, the dog was not far behind still! In a panic, the fox almost ran into a chimney and rolled down it.

Barely recalling her name from fear, the fox rushed towards the first tree she saw. She already had some experience with it, and so she instantly soared to its top. The trunk tilted under her weight and then sprung, hurling her forward. The dog was seated lower and barely had time to cling to a branch as the tree swayed from side to side. Without a moment’s hesitation, the dog unhooked himself from the branch, grabbed the top of a nearby tree, and flew forward as well. The resulting acceleration was enough to ensure that the dog was thrown with the same force that the fox had just experienced.

The landing was swift. The fox was flying like a proud red bird, so very high in the sky, but suddenly, the lovely picture was replaced with a rapidly approaching earth. Flying turned out to be interesting, and it was especially interesting to fly with the help of her own tail. Falling, on the other hand…

The dog was lagging behind now. The fox felt it based on his departing howl. She refused to turn her head to look at the creature and check his location. She was too scared to see THAT kind of dog, particularly as he was still flying. Watching nightmares for a whole year would feel better than that.

Plopping into the water in the middle of a large river, the fox began to quickly work her paws, running as if she was doing it across the ground. A loud splash behind told her that the dog hadn’t managed to repeat her success.

The fox had time for a short break, but she felt that if she stopped, she wouldn’t be able to move again. So, she continued on without slowing down.

The wolf pack through which the fox had unceremoniously slipped by was left behind with a feeling of great bewilderment. It was replaced by fear and fury, though, when a small wet mongrel with green lights instead of eyes brazenly jumped on their backs and dared to bark at them, spitting obscenities.

The elderly leader shook his head incredulously, apparently deciding that he’d gone a bit crazy in his senior years. However, similar behavior in half of the wolves in his pack showed that his health was perfectly fine. And if he did experience temporary glitches, it wasn’t happening here and now.

“Follow that little mongrel!” the leader growled fiercely, launching in pursuit. The pack howled in excitement. There was only one way in which the dog could pay for his insults, and that was by offering his soul to God. And the wolves intended to provide fervent support and assistance in this difficult task.

Upon noticing a lonely house ahead, the fox rushed straight to it. Whoever lived there, they would hardly be scarier than the green-eyed monster stalking her. Flying through the open door, the fox’s sixth sense helped her determine that the house had a spacious cage inside, so she dived into a narrow passage and slammed the door shut.

“Try chewing on this!” the fox screamed hysterically, breaking into a wild laughter that ran through her with a huge sense of relief. But the dog didn’t even attempt to enter. Making sure that the playful animal was delivered to the final destination, the dog lost all interest in the fox at once and rushed to help the miller. From here, it was impossible to understand what was happening at the mill, but the dog hoped that he would have enough time to get there. But instead, it ran right into the wolves.

At the first glance, the miller was as old as the mill itself. He was slowly grinding the flour, the blades spinning, the flour falling into the sack. He didn’t want to sleep, and sitting around doing nothing wasn’t a particularly thrilling idea either, so instead, he was working.

It was past midnight when he heard someone’s call through the familiar rustling of the millstones. This surprised him. No one came to the mill at night, fearing wolves. And not without reason. After the epidemic, the wolves grew bolder. So, if someone came here, it could only be because of some extreme necessity or emergency. And neither promised anything good. The miller had to check, though.

Two completely unfamiliar men were looking at the mill doors blankly. They had no weapons, but their clothes betrayed them as foreigners. And travelers without weapons were like a windmill without the wind.

“What happened?” the miller asked. The men were obviously expecting that the gates would open, not the window, so they began to look around, puzzled, before accidentally noticing the miller.

“Let us stay the night!” they demanded in a tone that tolerated no objections.

“What for?” the miller inquired. He didn’t like these travelers. Were they bandits? But if so, why didn’t they have any weapons? “Where did you come from?”

“None of your business, old man!” one of them spoke, glaring as if everything was already obvious.

“Wolves are wandering about here, so you’d better leave,” the miller advised. The meaning of the foreign word was unknown to him, but considering how it was uttered, it was clearly an insult. Good guests didn’t behave like this.

“Your wolves, you save them,” the second guest grumbled, dissatisfied. “Will you open the gates or not?”

The miller shook his head.

“Look, old man, we asked you nicely!” The foreigners looked at each other and the miller realized that he wouldn’t be allowed to sleep peacefully tonight after all. Not to mention that their confident demeanor started to make him angry.

“Better go home now,” he offered. “I would so hate to make a meaty and bony kind of flour again… It takes ages to clean the millstones afterwards.”

“Without food?” the guests looked at each other again. “Not. In. This. World.”

They were definitely bandits. They had come to steal some flour.

“Leave!” the miller warned them. “You won’t be getting anything here. Apart from black eyes. Take this as a warning.”

“This is a moot point!” the second one stuttered, but the first one interrupted him.

“Open up!” he snarled, grabbing the handle and yanking it hard. The windmill suddenly shone with a piercing blue light, making the man jump back with a cry, pressing his scorched hand to his chest. The mill went dark.

“Told you so!” the miller announced. He was just as puzzled as his guests but decided not to miss the opportunity and pretend that this was intended.

The second guest turned out to be smarter and avoided direct confrontation. Cautiously approaching the door, he touched it with the back of his hand and immediately withdrew it. Nothing happened. Chuckling, he tried again. And again, nothing happened. Then he boldly grabbed the handle and paused in anticipation. There was no glow.

“I’ve got grandfather for our lunch!” he shouted happily. “Come on! Let’s open this stupid door and drink the old man’s blood!”

The miller was taken aback.

“What the hell have you been smoking?” he exclaimed.

The tension on the second man’s face gave way to a victorious smile, and he grabbed the handle with both hands. There was a roar and the mill went alight with sparks, shining so brightly that the miller briefly ceased seeing anything but bright spots in his eyes. A booming snap threw the second man far to the side. The two men cried out against the unbearable light, showing the fangs that were sticking from their mouths.

“What nonsense is this?” the first of them shouted. “Why can’t we come inside?”

“I’m going to get you, old man!” the second one shouted, forgetting about his role as a peacekeeper. “I’m not leaving until I drink your blood!”

“Good luck with that,” the miller said and closed the window. He had noticed that the upper canines of his guests were longer than usual, and he didn’t want to test the strength of their bites. “Filthy scum!”

The vampire gritted his teeth and looked at his partner.

“Think! What’s helping him? I’ve never dealt with windmills before!”

“Well, I haven’t, either!” the first one argued. “I prefer to drink the blood of the townspeople!”

“And where do you want me to find townspeople in the village at one in the morning?”

The miller heard this, opened the window, and asked in an innocent voice,

“You still here?”

“We sure are!” the first man lifted his head to stare at the sky. “Oh, I’ve got it!”

The second one sent him a puzzled look.

“You’ve got what?”

“Why the mill doesn’t strike every time! Look at it! What do you see?”

He received a puzzled look once again.

“The same thing as before.”

“It’s a windmill!”

“So?”

“Nots and crosses,” the first one said. “When the blades become a cross, we turn into a not!”

The second man stared at the mill. The blades were rotating slowly. They made a quarter turn after that and stood under a straight angle in relation to the ground.

Another quarter turn, and the cross appeared. The curse of vampires and a protective amulet for people.

“To hell with that!” the second man barked. “We’ll stop the blades and that’s it!”

The window at the top opened, and they heard the miller’s voice, “Why the hell are you so obsessed? Go away!”

The window slammed back shut with a demonstrative thud.

The indignant vampires gave a long speech and raged until they remembered that their main goal was not inventing the worst insults for the miller but using his blood for gastronomic purposes. Spitting loudly, the vampire went to the nearest birch and struck it hard. The birch couldn’t resist the powerful blows and collapsed soon. The vampire exhaled, tired, and blew on his hands. His fists ached desperately, and if not for his dream to turn the miller and his mill into a pile of dust, he would have dropped everything and gone in search of a village. The second man picked up the birch with his tremendous strength and propped it up against the mill, not allowing the blades to rotate.

When they froze, the miller froze as well. The flour stopped spilling out of the groove, leaving the sac half-full. A wild laughter came after that, accompanied by the sound of blows on the door, a crashing of the planks, and the footsteps of the bloodsuckers that began to quickly approach the miller’s room. Soon, they burst into the it. The miller grabbed his stool.

“Got you, old man!” the second vampire cried out, looking mockingly at the miller’s attempts to defend himself. He quickly approached, pulled the stool out of the miller’s hands, and grabbed him by his clothes. But the vampires’ goal was not about to come to fruition. There was an incomprehensible monotonous sound behind, the surprised cry of the second vampire, and the glazed glance of the miller who was staring not at his attackers but at something else. The bewildered vampire turned and dropped the miller to the floor in fright. The creature standing in the doorway could have been called an ordinary dog if it wasn’t covered in blood from head to tail and didn’t have bloodied teeth along with eerily glowing green eyes. The vampire gulped. He had never seen anything like this before. The miller crawled to the wall while the creature growled with triple force.

“Go away!” the second vampire clapped his hands, intending to scare the dog, but in response, it rushed to him and bit into his leg. The vampire roared in pain. The dog jumped to the miller, stopped in front of him, and turned to the vampires, making it clear that it would protect him.

A quiet screeching sound came from the street. The first vampire tried to kick the dog but received such a painful bite in response that he lost his ability to think straight. Furious, he jumped on the dog. It leapt, and he found himself face to face with the miller again. The vampire reached out to strangle him. At this point, he didn’t even want to eat the man. He just wanted to avenge humiliation, but the dog jumped on his back and clung to his neck with its sharp teeth. The vampire howled, but then his partner approached and kicked the dog aside. The dog growled so loudly that the vampires lost their hearing for a while. The miller had little idea as to what was going on. His hands were searching for any object to protect himself from the enemies.

The screech sounded again. The birch that was leaning against the mill couldn’t resist the blades for long, so it slowly tilted to the side. The millstones twitched slightly. The vampire grabbed the miller and shook him violently. The latter spread his arms, and his open palm passed under the groove just as some flour fell from it. The miller’s hand clenched around it automatically, and he threw a handful at the vampire’s face. The vampire shrieked piercingly in unbearable pain. The flour glowed with a ghostly blue light and burned right through his body. The vampire dropped the miller, jumped up, and spun around, still shrieking loudly.

The dog attacked the second vampire, who grabbed it by the throat and tried to keep it at a safe distance. The bloodied fangs clanked, grabbing the air right before his nose, and only now he understood what all victims of vampires felt before death.

The screeching turned into a continuous noise, the blades swirled, the birch fell to the ground, and the miller followed its example, feeling absolutely exhausted. The first vampire was filling the forest with his pained cries. The second was fighting the dog, and then the blade stopped at the sign of the cross, sending the mill ablaze.

The explosion shook the mill and pushed it toward the logs.

The silence brought the miller back to his senses. The last thing he remembered before falling briefly unconscious was a blinding glow that engulfed the mill and the vampires who exploded at same time.

He opened his eyes. The vampires were gone without a trace, just like the mill. He himself was lying on the grass, weighed down by a part of the log, and the dog was wagging its tail next to him. It was covered in blood, with wild green eyes, and it was whimpering anxiously, looking at the miller. The man stared more closely, and then the realization hit him. The dog seemed vaguely familiar, and if not for the blood on its fur… and the weird eyes… it looked like…

“Hunter?” the miller asked quietly. The dog almost stood at his full height from happiness. Wildly wagging his tail, he licked the miller’s cheek with a bloody tongue and yelped in excitement. Then he squinted at the miller, saw he was smiling faintly, and began to yelp happily again.

And then the dog turned, wagged his tail for the last time, and ran away. The miller carefully pushed the log aside and stood up, checking whether his bones were still intact. It looked they were, but he still hurt a lot. “I’m too old for this,” he grumbled.

Early morning. Yaga’s house.

The plate with an apple was glowing, the apple rolling on its rim. The image of a cow chewing grass appeared. The cow raised its head and bellowed lowly. Yaga jumped up from the stove in fright and stared at the plate.

She spat, feeling vexed, yawned, and said, “Stop!”

After a quick breakfast, Yaga rushed to the village to check whether everything was going according to her plan. She flew to the oak tree with the observation tower, took out her telescope, and peeked into the open window of Alena’s house. The goat was asleep.

“Damn.”

What about the dog?

“Hey, dog!” Yaga called, staring at the darkness of the kennel and vainly trying to see something. “Dog! What a dog you are! You didn’t follow my plan at all. Barbarians! You sent my plan down the drain! Is the leash the only thing left from that creature? Everything had to be different!”

Wait… Come to think of it, this was exactly what was meant to happen. Given the fact that the leash was not in the kennel, but rather lying on the street, the dog had managed to locate the playful beast… But was it someone else?

“Which idiot decided to play in front of this house last night?” Yaga asked herself nervously. One hundred and forty countries, thousands of towns and villages, tens of thousands of homes, millions of animals and birds on this Earth, and some fool decided to play with this particular dog! Did he or she lack enough free space or something?

Who had the dog decided to chase instead of the goat? And where was he now?

She had to come up with the likeliest version quickly. For example, the dog could go for a walk in the neighborhood to show off his updated eyes. No, absolutely not. The hypnosis wouldn’t allow him to escape from the yard before doing his job. What else could be there?

Yaga dived into her thoughts.

So maybe someone had broken into the courtyard and the dog mistook the actions as a game. If so, who was that evil, vile, disgusting, terrible being? A stray thief? The locals know there’s nothing to steal here. Apart from Ivan, but why would anyone but Yaga be interested in him? This version didn’t seem suitable as well, then. Maybe the neighbor’s dog barked at the moon? But this was a normal nightly habit of all the dogs of this village. Running out from the yard for this wasn’t necessary. So that theory was out, too. What, then?

Yaga took another look at the yard. A ruffled rooster fell out of the chicken coop, walking on wobbly legs. Apparently, it was the last creature who’d seen the dog alive and well. Otherwise, why would he be so nervous?

That’s it! The chicken coop! The guest who was crouching in the darkness of the night, as if it was some game of hide and seek, the dog who was waiting for him or her, the collision… and the whole plan fell apart! Well, of course! The only one who could do such villainy was a red-tailed cunning beast who adored chicken and sneak attacks to the point of obscenity. The fox! Probably the same one that had Yaga had spotted twice recently.

That meant…

“The dog is gone,” Yaga sighed. How could that dog compete with a red cheat? It had probably brought the poor dog to the middle of nowhere, thrown it to the wolves, and was now sleeping in a quiet and secluded place somewhere.

She had to come up with a new plan. Of course, she could always hypnotize another hound, but if the fox decided to hang around every night, very soon, the supply of dogs in this village would end. And for an absolutely fruitless reason.

“There’s no time for doing nothing!” Yaga barked, jumping on her broom. “Let’s go home!”

High above her, the kite was flying, sated and wildly pleased with himself and with his public success. This week turned out to be unusually successful! So successful that he was thinking about tearing a decent piece of the cheese he’d planned to stock for later and throwing it to the doggies to make them fight for it. But who to throw it at? What fun it would be!

The frozen sparrow fluttered out of the cloud, hoping to warm up, and swept right in front of the kite’s beak, brazenly chirping and rushing down the slide. The kite flinched, shouted a couple of insults in the heat of the moment, then took aim and launched some cheese at the brazen bully. Soon, both of them became mere dots and disappeared from sight. And then the sparrow’s feathers flew in all directions from an invisible point.

“Got him!” the kite exclaimed and flew on. It really was a great week.

“I want to eat! I’m hungry!” the crow croaked wistfully, swinging on a branch near her nest. The bones in the nest had been repeatedly chewed on, so they acquired a translucent look. Hunting season had turned into a season of dieting and suffering, and whose fault was that? The suffering was so profound that the crow even heard words of sympathy from her potential food as it darted into the burrow before she had time to catch it.

The sparrow flew down vertically, stunned by the adrenaline pumping in his blood and the impact of the cheese that hit him right under his tail. This cheese, smelling incredibly tasty, continued falling as well. Cheese! The stunned crow inhaled the alluring smell, but the second after the cheese fell to her eye level, it disappeared, and the crow fell out of reality for a long time, frozen in complete astonishment.

One could understand the real reasons for her astonishment only if they saw the scene of the cheese falling at a very slow speed. Because in this case, something interesting would become apparent. Here was a crow sitting on a branch. The sparrow passed her by slowly, very slowly, with his open beak and bulging eyes, and a piece of fresh village cheese was falling down unhurriedly nearby. Here it reached the eye level with the crow. Her beak opened suddenly, her neck rapidly extending as she grabbed the cheese. Then she turned around, hiding the cheese in the nest, returned to her original state, and only then did she begin to look surprised.

The feeling of unexpected happiness that overfilled her was so strong that it spilled out in a long, loud, and incredibly enthusiastic cry of “Caaaaa… (only four hundred and forty-three letters long and a hundred and twenty decibels high)… aaawww!”

By accident, the cry went straight into the ear of a caterpillar that was chewing the leaf in melancholy, and his ears along with the leaf immediately withered. For the crow, such an outcome had no value. Unlike for the caterpillar and his descendants who never had ears ever again after this.

The wish that came true so suddenly had improved her mood up to the heavens. The crow exhaled, inhaled, and began to sing a self-created song cheerfully, scaring those who weren’t frightened by her enthusiastic scream earlier. From the raucous caw, the caterpillar had temporarily lost its mind, slipping down the wilted leaf and freefalling to the grass where he remained before turning into a neurotic butterfly with a thin little body.

Yaga, in a spoiled mood because of recent events, returned home and pondered over the details of a new plan. This time, she took into account all the possible troubles. She became so immersed in her thoughts that she nearly collided with the half-crazed sparrow that jumped out from behind the trees.

“Hitting me! With cheese!” the sparrow was indignant. “I will—”

“Look where you’re going!” Yaga abruptly changed the course and flew into a tree. The trunk became uprooted and the tree fell to the ground. A crazy squirrel with a nut jumped from a tree and stared at the cause of the accident angrily. Then she threw a nutshell at Yaga and the sparrow. “If you ever crash into my tree again, I’ll turn you into a wet place on a shirt! One that will never get dry again!”

The sparrow looked at the sky anxiously, breathed a sigh of relief and said, “Well, I, personally, haven’t crashed into you.”

Yaga followed his gaze and saw a kite soaring high in the sky.

“Are you bothering the king of birds again?” she asked. “How come you’re still alive? I’d eat you if I were him. Bones and all.”

“I’m already dead!” the sparrow boasted ominously. Then he pulled out the mask looking like a skull from under his wing and put it on his head. “I just rose from my grave! I’m a vengeful spirit of hellish revenge! I’m a crow-like spa… rring. Uhm… A sparrow… Oh, who cares? Everyone should fear me!”

“You’re one crazy…,” Yaga replied, but the bird already flew away. “Well, I’ll see you later, if you’re not strangled by then… Stop throwing shells at me!”

Yaga returned to her hut, put the broom near the threshold, went to the table, and pushed the apple with her finger gently. The apple rolled on the plate and the plate itself began to glow.

“Call the wood goblin for me!” Yaga ordered. The fox that was sleeping in a cage stretched in delight and opened her eyes. Yaga was surprised by the appearance of God-knows-what in her own house. She looked away from the plate and stared at the cage.

“What the hell is that?!” she demanded.

Only now did the frightened fox notice whose hut she had chosen when fleeing from Hunter! Damn it. Instead of escaping from the frying pan, she went directly into direct fire!

“Do you think this is a shelter for homeless foxes?”

The fox had been dreaming quietly about the owners of the hut turning out to be a nice old couple who would treat her to some chicken, so she was as discouraged as Yaga was. Chicken, of course, became an unreachable dream once again. It’d be good if she didn’t end up in a chicken soup herself. She didn’t know if Yaga ate foxes or preferred to make collars out of them, but regardless of that, it was clear that she was in a grave danger.

“Get out of here! Now!” Yaga ordered, but the fox didn’t even try to comply. Yaga couldn’t touch her in a cage, so it was much safer there than it would outside. Putting her muzzle on her front paws, the fox looked at Yaga plaintively and sighed.

“There is no happiness in life,” she muttered.

Yaga sighed, grabbed the cage, and carried it outside.

“Get out of my sight!” she said again and slammed the door to her hut shut. The dog had followed her orders and took the playful beast as intended. Why were there so many playful beasts anyway? Who was going to work? But her plan hadn’t progressed one bit. Which was very bad.

The fox looked at the hut incredulously. Yaga had just let her free? It was incredible! Or was this some kind of elaborate revenge?

“Dog?” the fox looked closer, checking whether the nasty four-legged creature that had been masking itself for a regular mongrel over the years was hiding nearby.

It didn’t seem like it.

Slowly, fearing a trick, the fox escaped from the cage and froze for a moment, waiting for the thunder from heavens, wild victory cries, or angry growls coming from the monsters who were lurking around, waiting to ambush her. But nothing happened, so the fox immediately broke into a run.

Exactly at eight in the morning, Kashchey walked over to the bedroom and began to wait next to the door. The princess had to wake up soon. The effects of the gas had ended a long time ago, but for some reason, she was still asleep, like some spherical cat that just had lunch. Kashchey listened to the silence and trusted his ears. Apart from the measured ticking of an ordinary cuckoo clock, there were no sounds. That didn’t seem like royal behavior. Any royal offspring was obliged to enter a stage of noisy awakening that would turn into violent craziness due to kidnapping. Especially if there were no gag and ropes involved. Kashchey had been planning to hear a lot of sophisticated threats, unspeakable insults, and poetic sobs, but this mean-spirited girl kept stubbornly silent! Was she so afraid that she didn’t want to remind him of her presence? And what if… No, it couldn’t be! No corpses in his house!

“Can you break the plates or something? I’ve left a hundred of them for a reason,” Kashchey muttered.

Yeah, the whole operation had gone wrong. He’d made a run across the country and fought the best guards of the kingdom, put to sleep all the royals at once, sliced through hundreds of swords and spades, made a bunch of impressive explosions, and for what? To nervously walk about his own castle and wait for one young person to open her mouth and speak the words that she would naively believe to be curses?

“I give up! If the mountain won’t come to Kashchey, Kashchey will explode this mountain! Princess, get up!”

Kashchey unlocked the inner lock with his key and pushed the door forward. He expected that the girl would throw something heavy at him, but the door didn’t budge and didn’t open. Well, the Princess was certainly alive and in full mind — otherwise, it would have never occurred to her to prop the door with something.

“Are you building barricades?” Kashchey asked. “It’s practical. But useless!”

He had nothing to be afraid of, considering that he was immortal, so Kashchey took a few steps back and crashed into the door, slamming it out of the hinges and making it fall to the floor. It touched the edge of the table, and hundreds of plates and dishes were catapulted straight in Kashchey’s direction. The tabletop itself fell on the top. The clatter of the dishes made Kashchey’s ears ring.

“Oops!” he exhaled. “At least they’re smashed now.”

Stepping out of the wreckage, Kashchey shook off the shards from his clothes and started looking around. He didn’t find the princess.

Strange.

“She’s gone?!” he exclaimed, puzzled. “She just left?! What kind of people are these princesses?! I didn’t give her permission to run away!”

This was a complication. Kashchey didn’t expect that the princess would be able to pick the lock on the door. And who could expect such a thing from a princess? Was she learning how to pick the locks between the dances? Did she have nothing better to do at home?

What was this world coming to? This was the end of everything! Oh, to hell with humanity. What was the princess coming to? And the most interesting thing was, where was she going now, and where did she get the lockpicks? No. The most interesting thing was how did she leave the room and then barricade the door?!

The princess couldn’t leave the castle. She would never be able to open the gate. She hadn’t passed by, or else Kashchey would have definitely noticed it. So, the princess went to wander around the castle, which no one had seen for a few thousand years. But why? Was she looking for a back door?

‘What childish play is this?’ he thought. ‘Has she heard the tales of secret passages and thinks that palaces and castles are built based on the same model?’

There will be so much dust! The horror! Of course, she wouldn’t get lost. The footprints would stay on the thick layer of dust for millennia… unless some bore obsessed with cleaning made this place his home in the future. But this was unlikely because Kashchey didn’t plan to relocate.

He didn’t like to wander through an abandoned part of the castle. He didn’t want to get lost in the countless turns and mirroring corridors. He had no idea who built the castle. Nor did he know why all his memories began with him being all alone in the vast forests just before he appeared in the castle. As if he had materialized out of thin air, an addition to this abandoned building.

Kashchey spent several centuries on trying to find at least some traces of the castle’s previous owners or its builders, but he came to the strange conclusion that it had never been inhabited before. At the same time, many rooms were filled with objects whose purpose was even more mysterious than the existence of their mythical owners. Kashchey gradually fell into a depression because he couldn’t answer these vital questions.

Depression turned into anger, and anger eventually grew into a morbid sense of humor. He even tried to commit suicide but found himself coming back to life time and time again. Convinced that death wouldn’t accept him under any circumstances, Kashchey realized that he had to live and cope with boredom. Since then, he began to live life to the fullest, exploring the world and enjoying the diversity of his existence. Sometimes he arranged tours across the castle and found a lot of convenient gadgets. Capsules with sleeping gas, fireworks, flying boots… it all came from there. At some point, his life became quiet and measured. That is, until Kashchey heard about a partially-golden Maria.

He quickly found a dusty corridor with footprints leading to the escaped princess. Kashchey stopped and said loudly into the void, “Princess! I’m in no hurry. You, on the other hand, will be hungry soon. I know that princesses are scrupulous in this regard and prefer to lose weight to become more attractive, but you risk swelling up with famine if you go on like this! Does it sound like something you want? Maria! Hey!”

Nothing but silence answered him. Naturally. What else? His position was not to be envied. The princess wouldn’t return by herself. She’d keep wandering around the castle until her last breath in search of salvation. On the one hand, who cared? But on the other hand, how would he find the answers to his questions if the princess got lost completely in these webs with dead spiders and flies? And then the prince would ride up, kill Kashchey, and perish in the depths of the castle as well. The king wouldn’t get to see the youth again, so he’d discard the kingdom and storm Kashchey’s castle because he would have nothing else to lose. He would also kill Kashchey and he would also get lost in the castle along with his army. This place was really much bigger on the inside.

It was exciting but not what Kashchey needed.

“Maria! Come back and forgive me!” Kashchey called. His lonely voice echoed in a deserted castle. The words, in turn, echoed off the walls and raced into the distance in numerous repetitions. “I’m leaving! Those who are hiding have only themselves to blame!”

Silence.

“I’ll repeat for the deaf!” he shouted so loudly that bits of petrified dust fell from the walls. “I’m leaving!”

Leaving! Leaving! …ing. …ing.

The echo made Kashchey frown.

“As you wish!” he waved his hand. “In a month, my castle will get its very own ghost. We shall pass the centuries with the ghost of the princess, reminiscing about the old glorious days and scaring lone travelers on warm moonless nights… Oh, to hell with you.” It’s time to save that crazy lady while she still hadn’t turned into a walking mummy. He’d never be able to prove his good intentions afterward.

“The wood goblin is listening!” the voice replied reluctantly right from the plate situated across the wood goblin’s portrait. He seemed to be in a bad mood. “What happened? Who are you planning to roast this time?”

“The fox spent the night in my cage and refused to leave,” Yaga complained. “She must be depressed.”

“I’m also depressed,” the wood goblin pointed out. “Ask the fox if she has some additional space in your cage. We can howl from anguish together.”

“Not in my hut, you can’t. Go to the clearing and howl all you want. What’s the matter with you?”

“Never mind,” the goblin sighed. “What is this about?”

“I need a dog,” Yaga explained.

“No poaching!”

“Me? Poaching?” Baba Yaga nearly choked on the little air she consumed. “Are you out of your mind?!”

Goblin cleared his throat.

“Sorry, my nerves are getting the better of me.” His apologetic voice warmed slightly, but with its generally icy tone, the temperature rose from two hundred and two degrees below zero to two hundred and one. “It’s just that there are vandals in my forest! Barbarians! Monsters!”

“All at once or separately?” Yaga asked.

“Are you joking?”

“What have they done?”

“Look at it!” the plate finally brightened and produced an image that made Yaga’s hair stood on end — or it would stand on end if not for the kerchief on her head. “Well?”

“Who did this?” Yaga asked, her heart frozen from the terrible premonition. The speed with which she had to devise the new formula to create a were-being depended on this answer.

“The survivors say that a dog did it… by the way, is it by any chance the one you’re asking about?”

“Not at all,” Yaga waved her hands. “My doggie is peaceful. It won’t lay a paw on anyone. And here it looks like a three-headed Cerberus has paid you a visit. You should check with the authorities. Maybe he has actually escaped?”

“I’ve already asked them,” the wood goblin said, frowning. “They politely hinted to me that if he had escaped, the planet would be up to its ears in the ghosts of the ancient Greeks. So, what’s up with your dog?”

“The mongrel. A quiet, timid thing. It gets scared in the woods if it’s off the leash. And with the leash, just give him someone to bark at and he’ll fall all over himself in excitement! Yesterday, he escaped from the yard and disappeared. He is extremely important to me.”

“I’ll walk through the woods and see if I can find your fugitive. Do you need it urgently?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Well, I can’t promise it’ll happen that soon, but I’ll try,” the goblin said. “Meanwhile, do you want me to lend you a wolf for a day? Can he help?”

“Which of the two?” Yaga clarified. “A one-eyed cyclops with no tail or that other one with lacerations all over his back?”

“Yeah…” the wood goblin sighed. “When I find out who did that, I’ll skin them myself!”

“Better bury these ones and get new wolves. In the southern forests, there is an abundance of them. So help them out with overpopulation.”

“Deal,” the goblin nodded. “I’ll contact you soon.”

“See you.”

The plate darkened.

Yaga began to think. What was she supposed to do now? She couldn’t find a way to carry out the kidnapping elegantly and gracefully. And the dog! Did he have bloodthirsty dinosaurs in his family? To destroy a swarm of angry and hungry wolves. Normal animals couldn’t do it. So much for hypnotizing peaceful mongrels!

She’d have to work on her own, then. She had to ignore her mind-control abilities and return to the old rude but effective method. The vampires were close, and there was almost no time left. They could attack any day now, and there was nothing she could do to oppose them yet.

“Stupid, stupid fox,” Yaga muttered reproachfully. “If you only knew that soon, because of your antics, there will be no one to raise the chickens. Only chicken vampires will be running around. Though that would be one interesting view…”

The culprit that caused Yaga such a vicious headache was wandering through the forest, talking to all who would listen, which meant, in essence, that she was talking to herself. After escaping from Yaga safely, the fox calmed down and even remembered what enjoying life felt like, but now hunger was reminding her of its presence again.

“It seems like everyone’s already been eaten,” she muttered. “By whom? Who is this greedy glutton?”

The sparrows looked at her from the tree branches they were sitting on.

“If you have no luck hunting, you’ll have good luck in sticking to a diet!” one of them said.

The fox looked up. The sparrows were right. Well-fed and plump. Hundreds of them were perched on a huge oak tree, noisily discussing the fresh gossip. Suddenly, she was overcome with the desire to be rude. Maybe it’d help her feel better? But there were so many birds… These parasites could make a mess so fast that she wouldn’t have time to even blink, especially considering their sheer number. A peaceful chat it was.

“This one’s talking about a diet, too,” she grumbled. “Fools. Being fat is more fun. When there’s just skin and bones, there’s nothing to gnaw at.”

“The lighter we are, the higher we fly!” the sparrows said.

“Yeah,” the fox agreed. With this diet, she, too, would start flying soon. If the wind blew any harder, she’d go up the air for sure. “I, for once, want to stand on my feet! I have no wings.”

“So what’s stopping you?” the sparrows looked surprised. “There’s an oak, there are some acorns. The boars go there frequently. Catch one, eat them, and stay on your feet until they break under your weight.”

Well. That was actually a great idea! She could set up a trap!

The fox rushed to collect the acorns in a pile. She had to attract the attention of a small boar and then catch him or her while the mother pigs were munching on acorns. The main thing was to avoid catching their eye, but the fox was pretty confident in her abilities to be stealthy. She had to run at extreme speeds so often that the probability of another run did not scare her any longer. Big deal, embarking on yet another run.

A bully with a skull on his head sat on a tree with other sparrows, peering at her. Then he chirped ominously, “Hey-a-a-a-a-a-a-a! I’m a horror flying on the wings of a zombie!”

The sparrows turned their heads toward the bully.

“Zombies, zombies, zombies!” he chirped again threateningly.

The sparrows squeaked in surprise. Then they began to faint one by one. The fox had just pushed another acorn to a big pile when a brown, soft lump fell right onto her head, bounced off it and flopped into the grass. Just in case, she jumped back and warily looked at the sparrow that was lying with his feet up.

“Breakfast! Hurray! I actually lived long enough to get one!” the fox exclaimed happily, but then another sparrow dropped nearby. And another one. The puzzled fox raised her head, and her eyes turned into saucers. The oak was bombarding her with unconscious sparrows. “An epidemic!” she exclaimed hoarsely, breaking into a frantic run. “To hell with you, I don’t want to be infected!”

The bully-sparrow watched in amazement as half of the other birds fell in a single motion while the rest of them went wild right before his eyes.

“Zombie, you say?” the leader asked. However, he was clearly not expecting an answer. “How about you take off your mask?”

The sparrow’s sixth sense let him know that he shouldn’t expect gratitude for his creative joke.

“Are you crazy?” he muttered, scared. “Calm down! I’m just joking! Everyone, relax and disperse!”

“Oh, we’ll disperse all right,” the leader promised him. “Grab him, guys!!!”

The bully jumped back, flapped his wings wildly and took off. The pack rushed after him with violent chirps.

The fox’s unfinished trap worked, but the fox herself was too far away to hear the boar’s satisfied chomping. However, quite unexpectedly, she found something just as good.

The crow pulled the cheese out of its hiding place, put it in front of her and stilled, enjoying the wonderful, maddening smell emanating from it. She wanted to enjoy this unexpected gift as much as possible.

“Cheese!” she sang, and the nearest neighbors grimaced at the creaking sound. “Yum-yum!”

“What was that? Yum-yum?” the fox echoed unwittingly, stopping and looking up at the crow. “Oh, cheese! Yum-yum indeed!”

The crow saw the fox and held the cheese tightly in her beak. Fox walked around the tree, observing it. It was impossible to climb as the branches were too high. Rightfully considering herself an expert in climbing trees, the fox knew that without the help of the ferocious barking of a dog chasing her, she’d never get to the top. And there was no dog. This was a good thing. Or rather, a bad one. Well, it depended on the side from which you approached this issue. But what could she do now?

There was a rapidly growing noise, and a moment later, a sparrow with a skull on his head dashed under the nose of a crow at a cosmic speed. She shrank on the branch, startled. After the first sparrow, a huge bunch flew by in fury, eliminating all the obstacles that could be eliminated on their path. The crow closed her eyes in horror, and when she opened them again, she found that she was covered in fallen leaves up to her head.

She tried to touch the cheese with her wing but found nothing but a microscopic piece that was still left in her beak. Everything inside her went cold. She scattered the leaves, still hopeful. But there was nothing, so she shouted in despair, “Caaaaw!”

“Yum!” an enthusiastic sound came from the ground. The crow choked and looked there. The fox. She was chewing something. She looked so happy with herself! What was she eating anyway? The crow took a closer look. Two small gnats that had fallen into the crow’s nest during the disaster felt terribly cold, so they hurried to get out before they froze completely.

“Cheese!” The crow’s despair knew no bounds.

“Yeah!” the fox nodded happily. “It’s sooo delicious! Thanks for the treat, crow! And, well, don’t be too angry with me. You just got unlucky. It happens to everyone.”

The fox picked up the rest of the cheese, waved her tail goodbye, and disappeared from the crow’s sight. The crow spat after her grimly.

“I hope you burst!” she grumbled.

“Foxes do not burst. They take the form of a sphere,” a response came from somewhere.

“Whatever! Got it?” the crow cawed. Then she frowned and fell silent.

“What genius told me he has the situation under control?” Artem looked at Yaroslav questioningly before glancing down. An angry bear was there, standing under the birch. “Do you remember saying this?”

“Nope!” Yaroslav responded, cautiously squinting at the nest of wasps that was hanging an inch to the left from their temporary shelter. “But if I did say it, I did so without thinking.”

“I’m glad we are on the same page about this. Next time, please be so kind not to bother the inhabitants of the forest for no reason. Because if you do, the horses won’t be the only thing we’ll lose here.”

“How was I supposed to know the horses would leave? “ Yaroslav was indignant. “I turned my back for just a minute! I look, and instead of them, there are two bridled goats!”

“And the third goat standing right before them,” Artem uttered pointedly, prompting Yaroslav to respond with a rude gesture.

“Don’t make me hit you,” he warned. “Or you’ll have to forget about ever riding a horse again and learn how to jump rope instead!”

Artem stuck out his tongue.

“How did it even occur to you to enrage the bear?” he continued calmly. “And to run from it by climbing a tree where wasps live!”

“I thought some horse thieves were hiding in the bushes,” Yaroslav tried to explain.

“Yeah, and there were goat thieves there instead,” Artem quipped.

The bear began to climb the tree.

Yaroslav whispered to his brother, “Don’t ever do that again!” Carefully, he grasped the nest, and with all the precautions he could muster, separated it from the tree. “And here is a gift to our dear guest!”

The nest flew right at the bear. A part of the nest began to swarm around discontentedly, and on top of that, a sparrow wearing a skull flew next to Yaroslav.

“Sparrow’s Death!” the prince gasped. “What creatures you get a chance to see in this middle of nowhere!”

The wasps had already noticed the princes and almost flew to attack them when suddenly, a crowd of sparrows swept past them like a hurricane. The men and the bear were blown off the tree, and they went crashing down, breaking the branches on their way to the ground. The bear fell first, and the princes landed on it. They jumped up as quick as they could, beginning to run faster than the sparrow pack. The bear, the buzzing wasps, and a troubled flock of birds growled behind them in annoyance. The princes raced forward until the noise of the animal world subsided and became distant.

“Enough!” Yaroslav exhaled wearily. Artem stumbled on the level ground in agreement and fell on the grass. “We need to take a break for a bit.”

Artem leaned back against the tree, feeling that the mentioned time wouldn’t be enough for him. Why were there so many troubles surrounding them? One after another, or even overlapping.

“Excuse me, could you help me find my basket?” a voice came from the forest. The princes turned and saw a girl with a goat. All three of them flinched. The princes from surprise and Alena from seeing the mark of a neighboring state on their clothing. That meant these were no ordinary people standing in front of her.

A small silence engulfed them.

“A basket?” Artem asked again. He couldn’t believe that such beautiful girls even existed in this world. “What kind of basket?”

“With berries. I was picking them, but someone took the basket from me.”

“The bears, perhaps,” Artem suggested. “We’ve just met them.”

“Where?” Alena was surprised.

“Near the curved river.”

“But that’s two hours away from here!” Alena exclaimed.

The princes looked at each other.

“For how long have we been running?” Yaroslav asked. “About ten minutes?”

“Less.”

“So who are you, speedy people?” Alena asked. The goat at her feet jumped cheerfully and then fearlessly approached Artem.

“Oh! We forgot to introduce ourselves!” Yaroslav blurted out. “I’m Prince Yaroslav, and this is Prince Artem, my younger brother. We are running… that is, we are riding to rescue Princess Maria from Kashchey the Immortal.”

“Strange folks you are, princes,” Alena noted. “How are you riding without horses?”

“We *are* riding!” Yaroslav protested. “The horses just… fell behind.”

“Wait… Kashchey has kidnapped the princess?” Alena was horrified.

“Not just that,” Artem said. “He chased away the guards, put a lot of people to sleep, scared away the future kings, and knocked out all the windows in the palace. And he didn’t give my brother a chance to ask for Princess Maria’s hand in marriage!”

“You didn’t have to say that!” Yaroslav pushed Artem with his elbow.

“You should definitely meet Babak!” Alena exclaimed.

“Who?” the princes looked at each other incredulously. “Isn’t he a character from a fairy tale?”

“Kashchey is also from a fairy tale but that doesn’t stop him from hurting people,” Alena noted reasonably.

“Why should we see him?”

“He knows a lot about these places, and he’ll be happy to tell you how to quickly get to Kashchey’s castle. Come, I’ll show you the way!”

“Is it far?” Artem asked, feeling that his legs didn’t want to obey him.

“No, it’s just behind the hill!” Alena waved her hand.

“Great!” Artem was delighted. ‘If I end up having no strength to move forward, I’ll just roll down,’ he decided. “We gladly accept your invitation, dear stranger!”

“Oh!” Alena was startled. “I forgot to introduce myself! My name is Alena, and this small goat is Ivan. He’s my younger brother. He’s been enchanted.”

“How is that?” the princes were surprised.

“He drank some water from a puddle,” Alena explained. “So he became a goat.” The brothers looked at each other.

“Right!” Yaroslav cried out. “So that’s where the goats came from! They drank water from the puddles as well.”

“Stupid goats! To drink from the puddle…”

“This is exactly what I meant.”

“Who are you talking about?” Alena asked.

“Our horses, who else?” the princes sighed.

“Princes, I adore you! You came here just at the right moment!” Yaga was excited, watching them from behind the bushes. She was the one who had stolen Alena’s basket. Someone else’s food is always tastier than your own, especially when you yourself have none. “The farmers will all gather together to check the news and I’ll have a chance to steal Ivan.”

Kashchey was standing in the middle of the dusty hall, shouting, urging the princess to return to the habitable part of the castle. As he feared, wandering around the abandoned site turned out to be deathly boring. Kashchey tried to understand how the princess had passed through thousand-year layers of dust without disturbing them and without sneezing to the point of exhaustion while he himself failed. After sneezing for half an hour, Kashchey decided that enough was enough. This torture was one of the most brutal ones, so he decided he would use it when necessary. But now he dreamed of one thing — for the dust to remain on the floor. Otherwise, the next death of his would be the most agonizing and savage one in all his miserable life.

The princess turned out to be a particularly tricky person since the tracks led into the hall from all three doors. It was as if she had entered through all the entrances at the same time, walked to the center of the hall, and disappeared there. Kashchey spread his hands in turmoil. The princess proved that smart people could be encountered even among the royals.

“Very clever!” he grumbled. At this point, it was a challenge. The game he had started was accepted and played much better than he had ever expected. A smart opponent meant a long game. He had to be careful, or he’d get lose himself!

“Princess! Consider the following. The king won’t have any money left in the treasury for your salvation! He will have to fight with the neighbors to collect the full amount! Do you really want to start a world war? Hey!”

No results.

“Oh, that damned royal arrogance and self-confidence!” Kashchey raised his fingers to his mouth and whistled briefly. A ghostly horse rose from under the ground without raising any dust. “Find the princess and bring her to me!” Kashchey ordered, and the horse flew into the hallway, not worrying about not raising the dust at all. Kashchey coughed. “Waa…wait! Stop!!!”

The horse came back.

“I’d better do that myself,” Kashchey said hoarsely, covering his mouth with a sleeve. “Or you will find the princess and smother her with dust! Go get some rest. You’re free! But walk slowly!!!” And gently…”

The princess opened her eyes and tried to understand where she was. She failed. How weird.

Maria sat up and stared at the floor. It was smooth, not wooden. And a bed with an unusual design. Maria got angry then. The ball was about to happen, and someone decided to pull these stupid jokes. And then she went cold. The ball had already happened! Had she been wearing her ball gown for nothing?

Wait… If the ball had already happened…

And then she remembered everything.

“Kashchey!” she screamed desperately. “What have you done?!”

No one answered. Mister Good Sinister was resting on the first floor, away from the bedroom of the princess.

“I have to get out!” she decided and walked to the exit. The door was locked tightly. And there was a keyhole there. It was flat, not like the usual ones. But it was worth trying it. No harm in trying. The faithful lockpick that Maria had been carrying with her since she became interested in locked rooms in the palace and the secrets they stored didn’t disappoint. It’d been given to her by a thief she caught secretly. He owed her a favor because she persuaded the king to send him away rather than execute him.

Five minutes of agony, and the door surrendered.

Maria quickly rushed to the exit of the castle but the sight of Kashchey sitting with his back to her made her stop on time. Tiptoeing out of the dangerous place, she decided to find another way out. As far as she knew, every castle had a back-up or a secret exit in case of unforeseen disasters like siege, earthquake, or big cleaning. She felt that the castle had managed to avoid the last trouble, and the last time it was cleaned happened before its construction. And Kashchey alone failed to cope with keeping it clean since the thickness of the dust was startling. To live normally in such a castle, a crew with about two or three hundred cleaners had to be present. The magi were right: the castle was deserted and abandoned since its creation. According to their stories, it appeared that it was erected by six gods in ten days, and before flying to heaven, they warned everyone against approaching it, animals and people both. No one knew when Kashchey appeared, but everyone knew that he held a special place even among the evil.

People said someone had visited him once and told him about the gods’ ban. But whether that someone was a weak speaker or whether Kashchey was more stubborn, the plan ended with nothing. The brave man remained alive and even received a coin for his efforts — after a good kick under a place known to many, of course. No one managed to achieve any other result. And maybe it was for the better.

On her way, she constantly came across the doors with readable but completely incomprehensible inscriptions. It seemed that the letters were written in a random order and stuck to the door as they wished, not caring about the meaning they created. Whenever she tried to enter, the words appeared on the transparent stone with the first clear meaning, “Opens with the help of the Central console!” Maria tried to recall all the ways of legal and illegal opening of the doors, from rough blows with a club to the application of lockpicks, but there was nothing similar to the inscription in her memory. So she decided to do the break-in later, if the main quest failed.

She passed through many corridors and soon lost count of turns and closed doors. Finally, she found herself facing a small dead-end with a single door on which the following words were engraved: “Central console.”

She found it! Maria was delighted. The door opened under her light touch. Numerous lights flashed on the strange-looking table, and sounds she’d never heard before filled her ears. After a brief hesitation, the princess went inside, approached the table, and touched one of the lights that was hidden in a matte square cube. The cube gave way and fell open to an extent. Numerous graphs and a disturbing flashing writing appeared on the vertically standing square stones. It said:

The “Cleaner” key began to flash, and a smaller key appeared beneath it, labeled as “Auto mode.”

Maria mentally said goodbye to her life and pressed the buttons.

Exhausted by sneezing, Kashchey angrily pounded his fists against the wall, and at the same moment, he heard a furious buzz from its depths, a buzz that kept gaining power. Kashchey quickly jumped away from the wall a decent distance — out of tactical considerations, and not at all from fear. He saw how the invisible dampers opened in the wall, and his stunned gaze fell on numerous windows. The frames swung open, too, and the wind that came from nowhere raised the dust from all over the castle. It rushed into the hall through the open doors, and from there, it jumped through the windows and slipped outside. Kashchey barely managed to cover himself with a cloak as he was enveloped in a dense gray cloud.

From the outside, it looked like the castle suddenly burst in an explosion of dust, its volume that huge. The gray pillar rose up to the skies and frightened the witnesses who were already scared of Kashchey even more. Animals and birds began to stumble in their panic, not knowing what villainy he was planning this time and whether they should escape in advance. At this point, Kashchey was trying unsuccessfully to inhale, thinking that the only death scarier than from sneezing was the one from inhaling dust. What if the princess was a member of the mythical society of witches? How could she conjure something like that? There were never any windows in the hall, and now they were like pips in a watermelon! And the wind…

Maria heard a growing noise and removed her fingers from the button, scared. It stayed pressed. The princess pulled herself together and carefully repeated the attempt. Nothing worked this time, too. Moreover, during her attempts to make the unknown force subside, she accidentally pushed some other buttons as well, and as a result, the overall noise became louder. In utter confusion, she stared at the remote until the buzzing sound from the hallway returned her to her senses. After a moment’s hesitation, she decided to go out and look. A smaller corridor was slowly moving through a bigger one. This was where the buzzing came from. As it reached the entrance, it released a steamy cloud, hit the wall, buzzed some more and drove off. The dust-free corridor turned into a work of art, something of indescribable beauty.

A small thing with suction cups and dusters popped up from the base of the Central console. It spun around the axis and cleaned the floor from the water droplets thoroughly. The princess was no longer surprised. It just wasn’t possible. Instead, she simply stared at the unknown animal in front of her. A little later, she realized that the animal was actually an ordinary magic duster. Maria tried to take it into her hands, but the duster moved aside and answered with a dissatisfied hum.

“Come-come-come,” the princess tried calling to it. The duster didn’t react and continued to sweep the floor. “Come here! I command you!”

The duster froze, rolled to the delighted Princess, and, unexpectedly for her, quickly slipped into the base of console. The metal flap behind it clanged down, almost hitting the princess’s fingers in the process. Maria didn’t like it, so she began to press all buttons in a row indignantly. She wanted the duster to come back. The remote blinked rapidly and the sirens blared from the hissing speakers, replacing the forest sounds.

Those watching Kashchey’s castle saw how misty rays flew out of the towers and spread in all directions, turning the space into tornadoes. After that, the protective forcefield appeared. It expanded, mowing down all the vegetation around the castle for a distance of two miles like a knife. The castle became crystal clear and echoing copies of it materialized here and there. Then it turned mirror-like, and the sun glares flashed throughout the forest. And when the wind blew the dust into the street, something even more unimaginable happened. The castle began to emanate the air waves that repeated its shape flawlessly, and then everything subsided at once.

Kashchey sensed that both the dust and the wind were gone, so he opened his eyes. He realized that he should probably clean his home at least once in a thousand years. For example, only now did he see that his floors were actually made not from stone but from gold! And not just the floors. Free of dust, the ceiling turned out to be covered with amazing patterns that spread around a sparkling chandelier. They were flashing with myriads of stars before falling apart in the shapes of colored comets.

The pile of gold collected by Kashchey over the centuries looked depressingly dull in comparison.

“Burum, Burum,” Kashchey murmured in complete confusion. Did this mean he now had to throw away his collection of coins and start gathering castles and palaces? But how to carry them?

The castle brightened. The ceilings flared with yellow and the air became filled with the freshness following a thunderstorm since the ozone synthesizers turned themselves on automatically. The castle turned from black and white to emerald green, with golden tips decorating the roofs of the towers and the battlements. The windows acquired a brown tinge, weakening the glow of the sun and mimicking the shadows of the evening hour.

“I thought I was dying,” Kashchey muttered thoughtfully. “Turns out I haven’t even lived yet.”

The stars under the ceiling were extinguished. Gradually, the walls began to shine, changing the color to purple, and the ceiling flawlessly mimicked the view of the night sky that stretched above the castle. Kashchey felt the need to immediately sit down. Otherwise, he would fall over from admiration. The abundance of other bright emotions and pride filled him to the brim, and it all stemmed from the knowledge that all this beauty belonged to him!

Suddenly, he was struck by the strange thought that if everything went like this, no one would have to pay him. On the contrary, he would be obliged to pay the princess an astronomical sum of money!

“That wasn’t part of the plan,” he mumbled.

The research spacecraft came under one of the beams from the castle and made an emergency landing directly at the place over which it’d been hanging. The sensors froze, as if they had been “photographed,” and the captain fell back into depression. First the shock from his encounter with the humanoids and now this! Calling the strange planet a whole bunch of colorful metaphors, he tried to improve the situation. Eventually, he discovered that the devices seemed to be working, but they were doing it in such a slow mode that the execution of the simplest command would take several hours. It was like the rays had paralyzed the equipment. Such weapons were rarely encountered even in the most highly developed worlds. They were that expensive and classified. To fall under the power of such weapons on a backward planet at the edge of the Galaxy? Impossible! There were centuries of development to go before the locals could achieve such a level!

This led to far-reaching delusions of grandeur.

“I’ll create an interplanetary commission to intervene in the internal affairs of this planet,” he decided. “A grandiose interplanetary scandal is coming!”

He’d receive a lot of money that he could use to buy a new, cutting-edge spacecraft.

The captain was enthusiastically pulling the high-quality wool over his own eyes, forgetting that his ship was hanging on the branches of old trees, ready to fall with the first strong gust of wind.

Time flew like a bullet on normal days, but Yaga was eagerly awaiting nightfall and the passing hours mockingly stretched to infinity. Yet the laws of physics couldn’t be argued with, so the time allotted for waiting eventually came to an end.

“Finally!” Yaga exclaimed as the last ray of sunlight disappeared in the darkness of the night. The flying broom rushed toward its target, nearly breaking the sound barrier. Yaga stopped at Babak’s house and looked in the window. As expected, the princes sat surrounded by half of the village, sharing the latest gossip that covered ten years of capital life. Yaga giggled. How little the people needed to feel happy! She flew to the window of the attic that Babak had rebuilt into a room. Ivan was sleeping quietly on the bed there, having no idea who had come to interrupt his dreams.

It was extremely easy to open the closed window. Yaga bent down to avoid hitting her head on the frame and approached the bed with a goat. The linen bag opened its mouth in a warm welcome and in a second, Ivan was inside. Yaga abruptly turned around and her broom kicked the wooden toys from the shelves. Not on purpose but solely because of the tightness and darkness reigning in this room. The figurines of animals, people, and birds dropped to the floor and went silent. Alena spoke then,

“Ivan, why aren’t you sleeping?” Footsteps could be heard coming up the stairs.

Cursing the universal law of meanness and no longer caring about staying quiet, Yaga rushed to the window and heard the frightened cry of the girl. The broom went sideways from a sharp turn. Something else fell from the shelves and broke. Yaga hurt her forehead by colliding with the window. Ivan woke up and began yelling so loudly that even the cockroaches behind the stove felt sick. The princes with the swords burst into the room suspiciously quickly, as if they’d been dreaming of leaving the crowd of grateful listeners for a while. Yaga flew out into the street and gained height so abruptly that she almost fell off the broom, nearly dropping the bag in the process.

“She stole him! She stole my brother!” Alena shouted somewhere from below. She and the princes watched as Yaga swept past the moon, rubbing her bruised forehead.

“That hag!” Yaroslav muttered. Artem gritted his teeth.

“Who is that witch?” he asked angrily.

“Baba Yaga,” Alena said.

“Who is that Baba Yaga?” Artem corrected himself. Alena looked at the prince.

“I don’t use insults for anyone,” she explained. “This was the real Baba Yaga.”

“I’ll chop her legs off!” Artem threatened without looking at anyone. “That’ll teach her a lesson!”

“Too late,” said Babak, who had just entered the room. The peasants poured out into the yard and were now watching Yaga’s flight under the starry sky. “Her leg has already been chopped off,” Babak added.

“Then the other leg!” Artem said stubbornly.

Sobbing, Alena ran to Babak and buried her face in his shoulder. Artem quickly went down to the first floor and put on a helmet and his chain mail.

“Yar, stay here in case she comes back!” he said and turned to the peasants. “How can I find her? Does she come here often?”

“She won’t come back,” Yaroslav said. “She took what she needed already. I’ll come with you.”

“It’s dangerous!” the peasants warned, before gladly explaining how to find the hut in a dense forest and how not to get lost. So many events, and all of them in just one day! The memories would be enough for the next three hundred years, for them, their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren as well.

“And what if she needs someone else, not just Ivan?” Artem said. “Maybe this was a feint, and her main goal is to kidnap Alena?”

“Too deep,” Yaroslav replied. “Strategic objectives of any enemy primarily concern bringing as much panic as possible and pushing the thoughts of the enemy in the wrong direction.”

The peasants kept thoughtfully silent. Then they looked at each other and nodded their heads. The prince had a point… probably.

“Nevertheless, I beg you to stay!” Artem looked at his brother intently, and when Yaroslav realized what was happening, a barely noticeable smile stretched the corners of his lips.

“Be careful!” he warned. “I don’t want two families to be missing a brother.”

“Do you know where to go?” he asked the villagers

The peasants first described the place where Yaga was sent during her raids, but they quickly realized that this address was too blurred in space and time. After that, they pointed out a more or less accurate place, and the prince rushed off to rescue Ivan.

When the prince rode away into the darkness of the night, the peasants slowly went home.

“This is strange,” Babak said thoughtfully. “Yaga has never touched children before. What’s gotten into her?”

“So she doesn’t eat them?” Yaroslav asked in a whisper, cautiously glancing at the stairs.

“Do you think she lacks food in the woods?” Babak replied in the same low voice, glancing in the same direction. “No, it’s something else… The prince won’t get killed alone, will he?”

“What could Yaga possibly do to him?” Yaroslav waved this concern away dismissively. “He’s a better warrior than I am. He’s like an animal when in a battle.”

“I was like this, too,” Babak nodded. “A long time ago.”

“You were a warrior?”

“I was everything,” the old man chuckled. “Are you interested in legends? Then sit down. I’ll tell you a lot of interesting things. The sleepiness is gone anyway.”

“Babak, why are you called this way?” the prince asked suddenly. “You don’t look like a decrepit, grumpy old man.”

Babak smiled.

“I was quite vicious when I was young. It’s difficult to attack bears while being gallant and all. So people used me as a scarecrow. They told their children that I would come for them one dark night, with a bag on my shoulder, and that I’d take the disobedient ones to a dark, very dark forest. To frighten the children even more, they called me Baba Yag, and then shortened the name to Babak. That’s how I got my nickname. Babak. And what you said about being an old man, it’s just horror stories. I’m like a children’s version of Kashchey. He’s a thousand and I’m a hundred years old.”

So the legendary children’s “Kashchey” began to tell stories from his life, one more terrible and exciting than the other. The bearskins that filled the hut convincingly proved that Babak could do more than simply talk. Yaroslav looked at him and thought, ‘No wonder children are afraid of his name. Such a person can fight an entire army and win.’

‘But where did he get such strength and knowledge about military affairs, if he’s a great commander?!’ the prince thought. ‘I know all the generals, but I’ve never heard about Babak!’

The old man went on speaking, and his slightly sly look vaguely revealed that Yaroslav’s unsuccessful attempts to figure out his origins didn’t go unnoticed. But he wasn’t going to reveal his secret.

The clock owl announced that it was three when a scream came from upstairs, interrupting Babak’s stories. Alena emerged.

“There’s someone outside!” she said worriedly. “He’s looking in the window!”

Yaroslav’s eyebrows shot to the sky when he imagined the size of this peeping Tom. His first thought was that a big-eyed owl had looked into the window, but the peasants must have seen owls before, right? Could Alena have confused the silhouette of a man with the shadow of a tree? No, there were no trees nearby. Or did some of the jokers decide to stand on each other’s shoulders?

Curious peasants? But what’s so interesting about a dark room? He was puzzled.

Babak frowned. The good-natured expression on his face faded away, replaced by the expression of a predator who’s preparing for an attack. He was always ready for trouble.

“Did you take a good look?” he asked. Alena nodded.

“He… he… he had strange eyes. They were glowing in the dark, and they were so terribly angry!”

“Probably he got hit in the face,” Babak suggested. “So he had huge black eyes as a result.”

Yaroslav shivered. The number of evil spirits grew rapidly as he got farther away from the capital. Among the educated and progressive residents of the capital, ghosts were non-existent. They were too scared they’d get kidnapped, dissected, and studied for the benefit of science. But the rural places… they were home to all evil. And if the real and legendary Baba Yaga lived here somewhere, then there had to be even more nightmarish creatures around here.

“This is something new,” Yaroslav muttered. “What a strange place. Evil forces are all around us! And in the palace, no one had ever mentioned such horrors.”

Outside the window, a silhouette flashed quickly. Yaroslav blinked, but the flash was gone. Had he imagined it or was it an attempt to add horror to the story of the alleged witness?

“Just great,” Yaroslav said, taking the sword from the sheath. “I don’t understand the varieties of these evil forces here, or if this is Yaga or some goblin who’s suffering from insomnia. I have no idea who it could be. I don’t even know whether my sword will work against this creature if it attacks, but I’ll fight ‘til the end. Mine or his.”

Babak nodded, and Alena asked,

“Are all princes so… verbose?”

“We talk more simply,” Babak said, glancing at the girl in surprise. “The enemy will die from his own weapon! Help me move the table to the wall. When they break in, we should have plenty of room for maneuvering.”

“They?” the Prince clarified. Babak nodded again.

“Here it is again!” Alena pointed at the window. The creature must have realized that it was useless to hide and make others panic, so it stopped and stared at them. Long fangs peeked out from the open mouth and flashed in the light of a dozen of candles.

“Does he polish them or something?” Babak wondered.

In the eyes of the monster, there was a seething, unquenchable rage.

“What a face you’ve got there, mate! I haven’t seen such before,” Babak said calmly, taking up his club. “We should fix it a little.”

The vampire blinked in surprise. Someone banged on the door.

“Hide upstairs!” Babak ordered Alena. “Close the door and let no one in. Shut the window and the shutters! Light the oil lamp. There are three on the shelf unless they were thrown to the floor. If anyone breaks in, throw something at them, and do it as strongly as you can!”

The vampire repeated his futile attempts to scare people, growing more and more confused, and the door and the walls continued to shake under the force of blows. The air was filled with cutting, creaking, and howling sounds specifically to achieve the same psychological effect.

“Well, come in, uninvited guests!” Babak offered, holding his club.

The knocking suddenly stopped. Yaroslav looked out the window incredulously. The monster had disappeared.

“Have you noticed that the frame flared with blue light?” Yaroslav turned to Babak in astonishment. “Or am I imagining things?”

“I have,” Babak said. “I can assure you that I have never seen anything like this outside my windows before… Have our uninvited guests grown exhausted?”

“They want us to open the door ourselves and check the street,” Yaroslav suggested. “Expect us to buy the calm before the storm?”

“Many would have bought even the idiotic ‘Give me some water!’ said by the man who has just tried to break into the house and kill the tenants.”

A battering ram made with improvised means crashed into the door.

“Ah, so you went to retrieve a battering ram? Why make everything so complicated?” Babak asked curiously and unlocked the deadbolt. Six running monsters crashed into the house with a thick log in their outstretched hands. With shouts of intimidation, the vampires galloped around the room excitedly, hit the table away, then rammed into the wall with the window and pushed it outside for some reason. Only then did they realize that something went wrong.

The flame of the candle flickered but didn’t go out.

“Fangy ones, where are you from?” Yaroslav asked. Not saying a word, the vampires turned and rushed to attack them, but they slowed down halfway to throw away the useless ram.

“Very funny,” Babak uttered grimly. He twisted the club, and before the first vampire could approach properly, he got hit on his forehead and collapsed lifelessly on the floor. Yaroslav raised his sword. The vampires bounced off, and the slowest of them clutched at his dissected chest, hissing angrily.

“Oh, at such pace, we’ll have them down in a minute!” Yaroslav exclaimed happily, but the smile slipped off his face when he saw how a wound that would be deadly for an ordinary person tightened and closed on the vampire’s body, leaving no traces. “Got another club?”

“No.”

The vampires were getting ready to attack again but something flared dazzlingly behind the prince’s back, so they jumped and covered their eyes. The prince broke the main commandment of the warrior that stated, ‘Never lose sight of the enemy.’ He turned his head to see what was crackling and burning behind him. Why was there no smoke?

The monster crushed by the club was burning. Judging by the faces of other vampires, they didn’t expect such a thing from someone of their own kind.

“The wood!” Babak realized quickly. “Only wood can kill them!”

Yaroslav jumped to the table in one single motion, swung his sword and cut off the wooden leg. The vampires rushed after him. Babak’s club whistled through the air, and the second vampire, who was already badly deformed, found his eternal peace. Babak hit the vampires several times while the Prince stabbed the nearest with a side of the severed table leg, punching another one in the jaw. The vampire replied with his fists, so Yaroslav was thrown back. The dead vampires were engulfed by the blue flames. The attacker jumped on the prince and grabbed him by the throat, but Yaroslav managed to put the tip of the wooden leg in front of him. The vampire was pierced by it and right away, he flared with bright flame. Yaroslav pushed the leg again. The vampire fell to the floor and quickly burned to a crisp.

The survivors retreated, their faces clearly reflecting their bewilderment at what was happening. Yaroslav shook his head and got to his feet. Everything was swimming and he was seeing double from the vampire’s powerful strike, but nothing was broken.

“You ok there?” Babak asked, not taking his eyes off the vampires. “Well, which of you is brave?”

“Not the dead one for sure!” Yaroslav said. “Though he was strong like a bear.”

“I’m used to fighting bears!” Babak whirled his club, and the vampires backed away. “Ha, look at that. They’re scared!”

“I’m coming!” Yaroslav stepped to the wall, leaned against it, and shook his head. The surroundings stopped doubling, but the hut seemed to be immersed in a storm of some kind.

The vampires were glaring at the club furiously, ready to pounce on Babak any moment now. The prince tore the wooden chair leg from the burning vampire’s body and noted to himself that the enemies burned locally, without spreading the fire across their surroundings. Staggering, he approached Babak.

“Strong, but stupid,” he concluded.

“Agreed,” Babak said.

The vampires began to wave their arms and jumped once, twice, thrice. The surprised prince and Babak looked at each other. The last jump was the highest. The vampires didn’t fall, but instead, they hung in the air and turned into huge bats.

“Werewolves!” Babak exclaimed in surprise. “The real ones!”

“It’s my turn!” Yaroslav stepped forward. The pain left at once, leaving only a cold fury behind. The bats flapped their wings hard and flew at the prince. It was clear that they didn’t know how to fly properly. They probably had neither the place nor the time to gain experience. Yaroslav, in turn, had an abundance of combat experience.

Soon, they were standing over the dead bats. The light of rage in their eyes took long to fare after death. Yaroslav waited for them to burn as well, but the corpses remained lying in a puddle of blood. A light breeze penetrated the room through the hole in the wall, and Yaroslav heard the quiet chirping of the grasshoppers. The silence was peaceful, as if nothing had changed. Just a usual quiet night.

“What are these things?” Babak asked thoughtfully. There were too many questions and too few answers.

They heard soft sighs coming from the darkness and immediately grabbed their weapons. A gray spot appeared in the blackness. As it approached, it became more distinct, more like a man, but Yaroslav didn’t rule out the chance that this was another night guest coming for their soul, so he didn’t lower his sword.

“What have you done?” the mysterious stranger spoke in a mournful voice. “I’ve barely managed to train them how to hunt, and you ruined two months of my work.”

“And what kind of creature are you?” Babak was curious.

The man came close enough to be easily seen but not close enough for a successful sword strike. After glancing at the butchered corpses, the stranger muttered, “Yeah, yeah, they made bad bats…”

“Who are you?” Yaroslav raised his voice.

The man looked up at him with sad eyes.

“Why would you want to know? You’ll die anyway. You will all die. Everyone is going to die.”

“Do you know any other words?” Babak wondered.

“I do,” the stranger replied, and then mumbled monotonically, “Think of the death. You will die. Think of the death.”

Yaroslav turned to Babak.

“A nut case of some kind.”

Babak shook his head, keeping his eyes on the vampire.

“He’s trying to distract us. Trying to show himself as weaker than he really is. Did you hear what he said about training?”

Yaroslav nodded.

“He’s stronger than them.”

“It’s logical,” Yaroslav agreed and turned to the vampire. “I don’t advise you to appear here again.”

“It won’t work,” the vampire noted without changing his tone. “You can’t kill everyone. You will drown in your own blood. Think of the death. You’re all mortal. Think of the death. I can spare you from it. You can become vampires. You can become the eternal beings, and I will become your teacher.”

“Think of the toothache!” Yaroslav mimicked him. “You all have huge teeth! Think of the toothache! You’ll lose your teeth! Think of the toothache!” He thought for a second and added, “Oh! I can help you get rid of them. You can become toothless. You will find your rest and go into eternity… Deal?”

The vampire disagreed with such an offer.

“You’re losing your chance at eternal life,” he said. “Tomorrow, you’ll die.”

“What’s stopping us from killing you right now?” Yaroslav asked straightforwardly. Instead of answering, the vampire turned into a bat and quickly soared to an unattainable height.

“We’ll be back!” he said as a good-bye. “And you will die.”

“Fly while you can!” Yaroslav said his own good-bye. Then he looked at Babak. “What shall we do?”

“Warn the others.”

“It won’t help,” the vampire told them. Yaroslav grabbed the bow, pulled the string, and before the vampire could disappear in the darkness, he fired. A pierced bat hit the ground with a light thud.

“I’m a good shot even when nothing can be seen,” Yaroslav boasted.

“Too many of you started wandering around here flapping your wings,” Babak muttered. “Who do they think they are?”

Yaga wearily shook Ivan out of the bag, and he turned into a human even before he hit the floor. It’d be fine, but the weight of the boy was heavier than that of the goat. Ivan fell to the floor and shouted something indignantly, but then he met Yaga’s eyes and fell silent.

“That’s how it’s going to be,” Yaga began without an introduction. “I’ll speak for a while, but every word will be important, so listen to me carefully!”

Ivan blinked. During her monologue, Yaga cut three holes in the bag, turning it into a kind of shirt. When it was done, she threw it to the cowering boy. He somehow pulled the huge bag over his naked body and started resembling some primitive child version of Batman.

“I am reconstructing the ancient composition of a potion by memory alone, and you volunteered to help me in this matter! Shut up, no objections are accepted. The vampires are coming for us from the west. They drink human blood and turn their victims into the same creatures they are. When they arrive here, no people will remain. The human race will cease to exist, and the world will be doomed to extinction because of the unimaginable hordes of vampires who’ll keep spreading around! So you will drink the water I’ll give you, a new glass every day, and I’ll make a comparative analysis of data. This way, I’ll derive the exact proportions of the components in a potion used for the transformation of a human into an animal! Vampires don’t drink the blood of animals and birds. It’s poisonous to them. We need to hurry. They’ll attack your village any day now. You don’t want your sister to become a dinner for some monster, do you?”

Ivan shook his head in fright.

“You’ve made the right choice!” Yaga exclaimed, happy now. “Now drink this.”

Ivan muttered quietly, “Not like I had a choice,” but he drank the water from the glass. Only one thing pleased him at that moment, and that was the fact Yaga wasn’t going to eat him. How did she put it? ‘Dinner for some monster’? Good lord!

What were those terrible creatures if even Yaga called them monsters?

Black fog enveloped Ivan again.

Yaga marked down the time and started preparing weapons for the protection of the hut. A mechanism that functioned as a steam weapon was built into the foundation of the house. It was created a few thousand years ago by a wood goblin in cooperation with a blacksmith. The steam gathered in a special compartment and created pressure on the rods with a metal base, as well as on a sharp wooden tip of the nickel pipes. Initially, the weapon was adapted for repelling the “gifts” from evil sorcerers and wild chimeras that occasionally wandered into the areas populated by people. The largest population of the surviving monsters was hiding in the Quirky forest lakes, occasionally rising to the surface and scaring the rare fishermen. Instead of a normal fish, they pulled out a huge monster with “huuuuge fangs”!

It was time to use it again though. The vampires were sure to get to the hut because the remaining survivor had vowed to kill Yaga and her team. Yaga knew for sure that vampires died after being hit with the stakes and from the sunlight. Maybe they could die from something else, too, but she had no such data.

The lever activated the system of unmasking and extending the weapon. The pot with water had been boiling on the stove for several days already. Another lever activated the weapon itself, causing it to fire and automatically create new rods.

Yaga aimed at the first tree and fired. The rod was spat from the barrel with a hiss. It split the target like a knife would cut butter.

“Great!” Yaga rubbed her hands. “They won’t know what fate has in store for them. You’re either the villain or the hero. Like in a fairy tale.”

Artem struggled through the thick bushes, cursing at every step. But he still stuck to the set path. The peasants said that Yaga’s house was located in the most impassable wood thicket. Once or twice, it seemed to him that he was being followed by shadows, but perhaps it was just the wind moving the bushes. Maybe he only thought that someone was sneaking behind him. The prince reassured himself that it was unlikely that a normal person would go for a walk at such a time and in such a place unless there was a strong need for it. Unless he was a total jerk who didn’t have enough common sense to be afraid.

Accepting the idea that he was going to Yaga, accompanied by some idiots who had emerged from nowhere, didn’t sit well with him, but the prince would still be very surprised to learn that his senses didn’t lie. He was indeed being followed by some creatures. The vampires barely controlled their desire to attack the prince. Some bright mind had suggested they track him down. It was no accident that he went on a trip at night! Probably someone was hiding in the woods, and the prince thought it would be nice to surprise that “someone”.

For some reason, their lord had a pathological, weird, and inexplicable interest in these places, which was why he’d sent forward a small detachment of scouts to clarify the situation. The more information they obtained, the better.

Artem came across a hut early in the morning. He got to the clearing and discovered the shape of the hut in its center.

“Finally!” the prince rejoiced. Clearing his throat, he came closer and spoke the phrase from the famous children’s tales,

“Hut, hut, turn your back to the forest and face me!”

The hut creaked. Yaga noticed the movement and grabbed the levers. The hut hadn’t done such tricks for a long time. Either one of the princes or some fool who had somehow learned its secret could make it turn. Those idiots constantly appeared with their problems at the wrong time and in the wrong place! Did they think it was a consultation center or something?

The hut turned and froze. The door, with a hideous creaking sound that could rattle someone to the very depth of their soul, opened. Artem, who ran inside, almost vomited in disgust. Yaga recognized her evening guest, but first, she looked to check whether he had fangs. He didn’t. Good. Now she could quarrel a bit.

“Prince!” Her indignation knew no bounds. “Not only did you show up in the middle of the night, you also forced this decrepit hut to spin!”

Artem shook his head.

“Where’s Ivan?!”

“He’s here. Who are you, anyway?!”

Ivan, who was awakened by the creak of the door, perked up with interest.

“I came in Alena’s stead.”

“Why didn’t she come herself?” Yaga put her hands on her sides. “Or are you her errand boy?”

Artem was taken aback.

“Are you kidding me? What kind of idiot lets a girl go into a dense forest with the wolves?”

“Red Riding Hood’s Mom.”

“Who?”

The door squeaked again, and three vampires stormed into the hut, holding their ears and staring at Yaga wide-eyed. All three of them vomited at the same time. Artem flinched so hard that he became covered in sweat. The vampires opened their mouths and hissed, showing their fangs.

“What the hell is this? No one visits me for centuries and then half of the planet drops by,” Yaga said with annoyance. As soon as the vampires took a step in her direction, she found herself standing near the wall with the stakes attached to it. She grabbed one and launched a counterattack. Artem jumped out of her way and drew his sword. Ivan was alive, and whoever the newcomers were, nothing good could be expected from them. And if Yaga armed herself, then the situation was serious.

The vampire that had been stabbed by the spear shrieked and burst into flames. Artem made a quick lunge and cut off the head of the second vampire. He didn’t die, though. Instead, he began to frantically run around the shaking hut, following his head that was rolling from one corner to another. The head was also hissing silently, snarling, but it failed to bite anyone. Yaga closed the door, locking a powerful bolt. She wouldn’t be surprised if other vampires came for a visit!

“What craziness is that?” the bewildered prince exclaimed.

“Vampires!” Yaga claimed, striking the last opponent with a series of surprisingly swift and strong blows. A fire blazed, and the monster turned into a pathetic pile of ash. “Fight them with the help of stakes. Nothing else will work!”

The headless vampire collapsed to the floor, but his hands kept twitching, grabbing, and breaking whatever came his way. Artem pierced him with a spear and recoiled from the flames. With a kick, he sent the head with viciously rotating eyes into the oven as it screamed.

“Disgusting!” Then he covered the hole with a flap. There was silence.

“Is that all of them?” he asked, hoping for a positive answer. “Do you have some more enemies?”

“I wish!” Yaga said. “But I’m not…”

The hut shook from the blows to the floor, walls, and ceiling. The door was shaking, and someone was pounding violently on the only window with impenetrable diamond glass that wasn’t closed by the shutters.

Yaga rushed to the chair and pulled the levers. The gun went off, and the first shell hit the vampire.

“How many of you have run up here?” Yaga was amazed. “Well, no matter. Welcome!”

The hut resembled a small cosmodrome with the missiles that were soaring continuously. Yaga was shooting, the vampires were bursting into flames one after another, and it became clear how many of them had come after the prince.

“What are you hoping for, dimwits?” Yaga muttered sarcastically, pressing the trigger and shooting without really aiming.

The hut was shaking, Artem and Ivan were being tossed from corner to corner, and the chairs were flying. The dishes that Yaga had thoughtfully locked in the cupboard were clinking, and the stove was buzzing like a herd of elephants. The angry vampires shouted menacingly at the whole forest, and the unintentional witnesses of the battle huddled in the cracks, choosing to be silent to remain on the safe side.

The glow of the fire rose to the heavens, and in many villages and towns, people were pouring out into the street, awakened by an incomprehensible rumble. They looked around, puzzled, wondering what it could be, not knowing that soon, they would find themselves in the center of a terrible disaster.

Yaroslav and Babak fell silent and looked at the glow.

“It seems Artem has found Yaga,” the prince suggested.

“And what, those screams are her friendly greeting?” Babak asked. “No, that’s not her voice, trust me on this.”

“It’s not Artem’s voice, either,” Yaroslav shrugged. “It’s more like…”

“…he led most of the vampires away with him,” Babak finished. Yaroslav turned pale.

“I’ll come to his rescue!” he decided. “Why the hell did I listen to him?”

“Don’t lose your mind! You still won’t be able to get there on time, no matter what happens there,” Babak replied. “It’s too late.”

Yaroslav closed his eyes.

The fox twitched from fear and woke up. She dreamed about a huge crow that was towering up to the skies, whistling in a disgusting manner and belching streams of fire. It was terribly scary, but the remains of the cheese dispersed all the nightmares and inspired the radiant memories of yesterday’s operation that she had carried out so successfully together with a couple of the unsuspecting sparrows. Something strange started happening with them recently. They fell down the ground out of blue, then they began to fly around like crazy. Because of them, the trap she’d been preparing had to be abandoned. And now it was absolutely impossible to find acorns or even an oak there. It was such a good trap, though. Just gather a bunch of acorns and someone would approach to start munching on them until they choked from greed.

“What beast has graced our forest with her presence!” the fox heard, jumping in shock. A wolf. Scratched beyond belief. Grinning. That was suspicious.

“Any problems?” she asked.

“A crow whispered to me that you brought some chickens to her.”

“She’s lying. I didn’t bring anything, I took it from her, and it was not chickens but some cheese. What’s it to you?”

“I’m here for revenge. I don’t care about the crow, but I want two chickens lying in front of me tomorrow for breakfast. If you don’t bring them, you’ll become lunch yourself.”

“Are you out of your mind?”

“No, fox, I’m not. Decide for yourself. Either you bring me breakfast, or you become breakfast. There’s not much meat on you, but I like to chew on the bones. And if you run away, I’ll find you and give you to people so that they would make some hats out of you. Any questions?”

The wolf let out an angry snarl goodbye and ran away. The fox was bursting with fury. If she could flush, she would have gone a dark cherry shade a long time ago. The remains of the cheese lodged in her throat. The crow that was hiding in the branches of a tree burst into hysterical laughter, and just from these cackling sounds, the fox was ready to spin like a whirlwind from the rage engulfing her.

After catching her breath, the fox shouted, “Got you, red! It’s as easy as plucking chickens!”

The fox gritted her teeth but failed to say anything intelligible. Her jaw was cramped up with fury. Who could expect such cunning from a crow? Who would have thought that she’d send this voracious wolf-avenger!

“Don’t go around stealing cheese,” the crow added.

The crow laughed, jumped into the air, and made a circle of disrespect around the fox. The fox threw the rest of the cheese around herself in an enraged frenzy. How greedy the crow was, not even wanting to give her a slice! “You can choke on it! But I’m warning you, it’s been bitten!”

Grimacing, the fox ran away.

‘If not for the dumb sparrows, I would be eating those boars now, not making troubles with the wolf!’ She was incredibly angry, and the horrifying plans of bloody revenge against the whole bird family were twirling in her head. She’d cut down the oak, feed them some poisoned millet, not let them sleep, and soak them in a week-long rainfall!

The skull of a sparrow fell from the tree that the enraged fox was passing by. She paused and slowly raised her head, intending to erase the impudent creature with her gaze. But suddenly, she realized who was throwing those skulls around and felt a completely unjustified surge of strength. On a branch, a familiar ball of feathers was perched wearily. The skull had clearly rubbed his neck raw. From the far side of the forest, a growing murmur of birds was coming. The sparrow dived into the hollow like a bullet, and a moment later, there was a desperate flapping of the wings. A whole flock of sparrows descended upon the tree. Feverishly looking around, they noticed a single sparrow flying in the distance, so they soared and rushed after him, confident that this was their mysterious joker.

The fox remembered where the Sparrow was now living, so she picked up the skull and ran away. Fortunately, nobody was interested in her discovery. She didn’t know for sure how and why to use it, but she still had time to figure it out. The right thoughts would come, she was sure of it. For example, she could blackmail the sparrow, making him carry out her wishes, or she could promise the pack that under certain conditions, she would tell them where the one they needed to find was. And it would be just perfect to use both options at the same time.

‘It seems,’ the fox thought, “I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, after all.’

A weak and ghostly light, but still.

The fox raised her head to let out a victorious cry and choked. Directly above her, a huge light-colored walnut of an unprecedented size hung. Weird. Too many things had moved to the upper floors of the forest. And then the fox realized that the plan of salvation from the wolf was ready. Everything was just within her reach. Hanging above her head. The only thing she had to do was use the means at hand properly. Then she could reap the fruits of her righteous labors.

Barely holding the giggling back, the fox crept up to a non-too-attentive sparrow and whispered, “Hey!”

The response to this whisper was so powerful, as if a bird had been shot from a cannon. Flinching and fluffing his feathers so that he would look twice as big, the sparrow suddenly returned to his previous size and then dropped dead. Puzzled, the fox stared at the corpse. A huge beetle landed on her muzzle, sitting insolently on her nose, and began to calmly clean its wings. The fox shook her head, the beetle flew up, buzzed all over her and slowly went away. Cursing like the crow had done once, the fox ran past Baba Yaga’s hut. It wasn’t as scary as it was at night. But something strange was happening here. Different pieces of iron were sticking out everywhere, the bushes were burned, numerous footprints were near the hut, as if there’d been dancing the whole night. What could that mean?

Nothing good came to mind. Only nonsense. For example, that a hungry Yaga was trying to make a steak out the hut’s chicken legs but failed every time. Why else would there be so many footprints? The ground was so trampled that it was astonishing.

But these traces did not belong to Yaga as the size wasn’t the same! It was probably the hunters who had been trying to make a steak out of the hut’s feet. They kept missing because the hut was galloping across the meadow while Yaga was chasing the hunters. Foolish, of course, but very relatable. There had to be a huge bunch of hunters! Why?… Oh, who cared!

The fox ran up to the oak where a flock of sparrows usually gathered and found that the hogs had eaten the acorns she’d collected. Oddly enough, the bodies of the sparrows who’d become victims of an unknown epidemic were not present. The hogs didn’t eat sparrows, therefore…

‘I can see why he was being chased by a whole pack now!’ the fox guessed. ‘Nice prank.’

But how inconvenient! Had it not been for the story with the crow and the cheese, there would be no need to run and save her soft red fur now. The pack had already returned, and judging by their disgruntled chirping, the search for the impudent brat had not been successful.

‘Luck is on my side!’ the fox thought happily.

It chuckled and then shouted to the pack, “Hey, sparrows!”

“What?” the sparrows asked shortly, squinting at her with indifferent eyes.

“I know where the skull-head that scared you is hiding!”

“Where?” the sparrows began to fuss, fluttering to the lower branches.

“Not far. But I’ll reveal this place to you in exchange for a favor.”

“No!” the sparrows tweeted together, knowing that the fox would lie as if it was nothing.

“What?! Do you have any idea what you’re giving up?” The Fox was dumbfounded. “What if he comes back and scares you again?”

“He won’t!” The sparrows waved her words away decisively.

“Idiots.”

“We’ll fly above you and drop all over you,” the sparrows threatened.

“You don’t believe me, do you?” the fox asked. “I have proof.”

She spat out the skull. The sparrows gasped in unison. She wasn’t lying!

“Did you eat the villain?” the pack asked.

“No. I stole his mask. You have to take revenge on him yourself. It’s in your best interests, Right?”

“Logical. What do you want in exchange?”

‘Now we’re talking,’ the fox thought with satisfaction, and then explained in detail what the sparrows had to do.

The most important thing remained, which was stealing a couple of chickens.

’You’ll be surprised when you see my counterargument!’ the fox’s thoughts turned to the wolf, and she chuckled.

The village appeared from behind the hill, but for some reason, the people weren’t visible. Just in case, the fox wandered around for a while, then steadied herself and rushed to the chicken coop. The utter desolation provoked vague, uneasy thoughts, but right now, the fox had no time for them.

Most of the chickens were roaming about the garden. The rooster was standing among them like a towering castle. The fox took a big detour and got into the chicken coop from the opposite side. With unfathomable ease, she pushed the horrified meek birds into the sack and prepared to run out when suddenly, the rooster came in, disturbed by the sudden noise and ensuing silence.

“Damn you all to hell!” the fox growled. The rooster took on a fighting stance, ruffled his feathers, straightened his scallop, and crowed menacingly. The fox backed away, not knowing what to expect in the next moment. Motivated by fear rather than by conscious thought, unexpectedly even for herself, the fox spat out the bag she was holding clamped between her teeth, jumped on the rooster, and pinned him with her front paws. The rooster tried to escape but only mussed his feathers. The fox hit him with her paw, scratched his scallop, and pulled out two feathers from his tail. Then she grabbed the bag and leapt out from the coop. The chickens in the yard scattered to the corners with a loud hen-like “SOS”. The dogs in the neighboring yards barked happily, pleased that something was happening.

The fox hid the chickens, covered the place with branches, and went to the Bully to have a soul-saving conversation. The Bully was bravely hiding in a small nest and he was clearly in no hurry to go out into the light. Fox had been waiting for a good half an hour before she realized that the favors from nature weren’t coming. It was better to take them by force or by cunning. Depending on one’s strengths.

“Bully! Bully!” the fox called. “Come out!”

The sparrow looked out of the hollow.

“What do you want?”

“I heard that your brothers want to eat you.”

“What’s it to you?”

“I’d like to see it!” the fox replied joyfully. “This isn’t some common miracle, after all.”

“Forget it, red!” the bully jumped out from the tree. “No one’s going to eat me! I can eat who I want to eat myself!”

The fox laughed.

“I don’t believe you!” she said. “You’ll burst!”

“Well, maybe I can’t,” the Bully agreed reluctantly. “But I can do something even better than that!”

“I bet you can’t do it,” the fox said. “You only know how to brag!”

“I’ll take you on!” the sparrow agreed. “I bet the sparrows will go mad after my trick!”

“And if you lose?”

“Then you’ll eat me!” the sparrow declared bravely.

The surprised fox grunted.

“Fine!” she said and quickly disappeared among the bushes. She didn’t want to wait until the sparrow came up with what she should do if he won the dispute.

The hours passed quickly. The atmosphere was wonderful, but reality reminded Maria about itself by causing an unpleasant grumbling in her stomach.

‘How can I get to the kitchen without running into Kashchey?’ she thought desperately. ‘I wonder if he already knows I’ve escaped? Or is he still guarding the room?’

The best thing would be if Kashchey was blown outside together with dust, but this was a miracle she shouldn’t hope for. But together with dust, her footprints disappeared, too, so she had to go back based on her beliefs as to the correct direction. Maria had been walking for several hours until she found the entrance to the main hall. She gasped in amazement at the sight of the beauty which the dust-free room presented.

“Impressive, isn’t it?” she heard.

“It’s incredible!” Maria said admiringly before freezing in fear. Slowly, she squinted and saw Kashchey. He was standing nearby and was clearly enjoying the effect he’d produced. Maria woke up from her stupor and immediately broke into a run.

“Stop!” she heard a command, but she only sped up. “Stop, you foolish girl!”

Kashchey caught up with her and grabbed her shoulder. Maria spun around and raised her hand to slap him.

“Bad idea!” he managed to say. There was a loud slap, and Maria gasped. Her hand hurt as though she had slapped a wall, not a face. “I did warn you!”

The princess knew some harsh words not suited for someone in her position, but instead of saying them, she sent Kashchey the most murderous look she was capable of. Her guilty subjects often dropped dead at the sight of such a look and came back to life only after her departure. But Kashchey was one nasty immortal, so he refused to even pretend to die.

It was fortunate for the princess that her eyes weren’t really deadly. Otherwise, she would have remained alone in an empty castle in the middle of nowhere and without any chance of returning to her native land.

“The princes will kill you!” Maria stated, tired of drilling Kashchey with her eyes. “They’ll come and kill you!”

“Perhaps,” Kashchey agreed. “But which ones? Those who have been making strange movements all evening. I believe they’re called dancing mistakenly? The ones who refused to pay the ransom for you and left the kingdom quickly after my departure? Out of the whole crowd, no prince wanted to part with a small… well… all right… with a big sum of money. An indecently big one! None of them!”

Maria’s face turned so upset that Kashchey felt scared for a moment. Did she have a stroke or something? He had to back off, and urgently at that.

“Calm down, calm down!” he said conciliatory. “Two idiots volunteered to save you! I mean, one is saving you and the other one is assisting like a proper brother. They are already galloping here at full speed, probably tearing me apart mentally. But are you sure you’d have picked them out of that crowd of dancers? Think about the vicissitudes of fate at your leisure. And before you do that, explain something to me. How did you manage to do this to my beloved dark castle?”

“Do what?” Maria asked dully, her head in the clouds.

“That general cleaning thing… Oh, forget about those cowards already, or you’ll never lose this dumbfounded, stupid look on your face. They’re trying to save you. Your crazy dance partner… Hey, do you hear me?”

“I don’t know,” Maria started when Kashchey snapped his fingers in front of her face for the third time, repeating his question. “I was pressing the buttons in one of the rooms… What, don’t you know what’s in your own castle?”

“I didn’t have much time,” Kashchey waved his hand. “Can you find it again?”

“I think so. I’ll tell you only if you invite me to a humble villainous dinner, though.”

Kashchey smiled a little. The princess was setting the conditions. She was coming to her senses, then! Now they could have dinner properly, pleased and satisfied.

“Lunch is served!” Kashchey declared, setting the tray before the princess. He had to discard the thought that the princess, because of her way of life, would hang a noose around his neck painfully quickly. At least for a while. The princess looked at her plate.

“I can see why you’re so skinny now. You’re supposed to put food on the plates.”

“I did.”

“You smeared it.”

“Get some bread, collect the food with it, and eat!” Kashchey advised. “And I’m not skinny. I just move a lot.”

Maria put the first spoonful into her mouth and almost spat it back out. But this time, the feeling of hunger was stronger than disgust, so in the end, she swallowed the food.

“Do you cook yourself or do you steal food?” she asked. “If you steal, then change your sources. This is disgusting.”

“Of course, I steal it. The chefs know in advance that they won’t get a piece, so they aren’t trying at all, those jerks!” Kashchey complained.

Maria giggled.

“The truth is,” Kashchey added, “the meals are prepared by a machine. I order what I want and it cooks it.”

“That’s a strange name for a cook,” Maria noted. “Is he from abroad?”

“This is not…” Kashchey hesitated. “You wouldn’t understand.”

Maria opened her mouth indignantly, but Kashchey stopped her angry chattering on time.

“Don’t argue. You’re smart, I know! I’ve seen it firsthand. It’s just beyond your comprehension. A machine is a device. Well, I don’t know how to describe it… you can think of it as my magical assistant, like a magic wand.”

“Like that duster?”

“Exactly!” Kashchey nodded, although he had no idea what she was talking about. Nevertheless, the princess was satisfied with the answer.

“Make it follow the orders properly,” Maria advised. “Then the food will taste better.”

“I’ll do it tonight,” Kashchey promised.

“Tell me, is this your castle?” Maria changed the subject.

“Yes,” Kashchey responded shortly. He didn’t want to tell her the whole history of his appearance in this place. It was too long, dreary, and required too much effort. Only Scheherazade could talk for three years in a row to save her life.

“So why don’t you know where to go?” the princess insisted, and Kashchey gave up. Maria clearly wouldn’t back off. She had nowhere to hurry, after all, and nothing to do. Besides, girls liked to chat.

‘She did put a noose around my neck, subtly as it was,’ Kashchey thought.

“I know the castle stores a lot of strange things,” he said aloud. “But I’ve been too busy to explore them. They aren’t gold, and I’m collecting gold right now. As soon as I decide that it’s time to focus on the castle properly, I’ll look through everything here.”

“Who put these things in your castle?” Maria asked.

“I have no idea! I don’t know who lived here before me, or if anyone lived here at all. I’ve heard legends about the mysterious builders, and I think that the castle was built specifically for me.”

“Why?”

“Because no one has tried to get it for themselves. All the guests wanted to strangle me in particular. They didn’t care about the castle. But I have no idea what these things are for.”

“How can you live next to millions of puzzles and completely ignore them?!” Maria was astonished. “I would have died from curiosity a long time ago!”

“Die as much as you want!” Kashchey allowed. “But only after the prince comes. No sooner than that.”

“No, seriously! Why?”

“Because my past is the biggest mystery to me. I’m a mystery. And all around me is a mystery. Wherever you go, you’ll see mystery upon mystery upon mystery. And I just want to collect gold.”

“I think you’re depressed. It’s wrong. You should enjoy life.”

“Me? Depressed?” Kashchey was surprised. “The whole world is reeling from my forms of entertainment!”

“The world, yes,” Maria agreed. “While you’re sitting here alone and depressed.”

Kashchey wondered about it. In some ways, Maria was right. Collecting gold century after century wasn’t that boring, but it was kind of… monotonous? It was high time to focus on something else.

“All right!” Kashchey said decisively. “You’ll find me the room I need, and as a reward, I’ll allow you to study the exhibits in this vault until the princes come. Agreed?”

“Agreed!” Maria nodded. “And how long should I wait for their appearance?”

“A few weeks,” Kashchey replied. “Or months. Or years.”

“What?” Maria cried in astonishment, almost choking.

“Who knows what these princes of yours have in mind? Maybe they’ll ride past the castle and then it’ll take them years to find the right path… “ Kashchey noted philosophically. “Don’t worry so much! Time’ll fly as we’re exploring the castle. And we will know for sure whether the princes are worthy of you or if they’re just keeping up the appearances.”

“You’re so sneaky,” the princess retorted.

Kashchey nodded.

“Pray tell,” he said, “why did the king call you his golden treasure?”

“I won’t tell you.”

“Then don’t. I know it myself. He’s put a lot of money in you.”

“In me?”

“Well, not in me for sure! Let’s start the search, shall we?”

“He didn’t put anything in me. And yes, let’s start.”

In the village, no one believed that the night strangers were deadly creatures with a penchant for sucking blood. Fear mistook molehills for mountains. That’s what everyone thought. They’d never met a creature like that before, ergo, they didn’t exist. And the reality wasn’t all that scary, not like what the prince and Babak were trying to describe.

“You’ve dreamt it all up!” the peasants in the village were saying when Babak called them to a meeting at the little bell tower and told them about the battle in the hut.

“What, all three of us had the same dream?” the prince snapped. “Did you not hear the battle?”

“They were just goblins being naughty. It happens sometimes!” the farmer replied confidently. “You city folks aren’t used to it, but here, anything can happen! No wonder Baba Yaga lives here!”

“So what?” How does her existence prove that we are mistaken?” the prince exclaimed. The peasants blinked in bewilderment.

“What?” one of them asked in surprise.

“If there is Yaga here, you think there can’t be any other monsters?”

“Who knows?” the peasants responded vaguely. “But where are the slain monsters? Have they melted or something?”

“They were burned.”

“Where are the ashes?”

“Blown away. But we still have bat corpses.”

“Where?”

“Here!” the prince nodded at the small pile. The peasants obediently looked in this direction.

“That’s it?” they shouted in astonishment. “Six huge beasts have left only three small corpses behind?!”

“It’s unbelievable, I know,” Yaroslav said. “But since these creatures burn without a trace, that should be taken into account. By the way, they are able to break through the door and get into your fortified homes.”

“Children’s tales!” someone scoffed.

“Yeah?” Babak entered into the dispute. “You go to my house and look at the hole in the wall. The monsters made it. And the noise that you took for the merrymaking of the goblins? It was Prince Artem fighting them!”

“Where’s the convincing evidence?” the grim bearded man stepped forward. “Every fool can break a wall. In fact, this is what fools do.”

“Do you even hear yourself?” Babak interrupted him, but the man didn’t notice it.

“I think there was a storm. A hurricane. A blizzard. So who knows what happened? Don’t go around telling us these tales!” the bearded man raised his voice. “This is just outrageous! There are no monsters! Got it? And this,” he pointed at the bats, “is not proof.”

Yaroslav stepped forward.

“I don’t know what will happen tonight,” he said. “Maybe nothing. Maybe they were the only living monsters. It’s possible. But just in case, I suggest you fortify your homes.”

“It won’t hurt anyway. The robbers pay us a visit sometimes, don’t they?” the woman added.

The peasants began talking all at once, shouting and interrupting each other. The general opinion was not in favor of the speakers.

“By the way,” Babak said, “we have an outside witness. Early in the morning, the miller came to me and told me some interesting things. The day before yesterday, his mill was attacked by two vampires. They were foreigners.”

“And what, did they manage to break in? Did they get into the mill?”

“They’ve dismantled it log by log.”

“And where was the miller last night?”

“He was badly hurt by the explosion.”

“He came to warn you, you stupid idiots, about what’s coming! And you…”

The peasants stared at the prince. There was a tense silence.

“Flour doesn’t explode,” the bearded man said stubbornly. “It’s a fairy tale, all of it.”

Yaroslav waved his hand.

“To hell with you,” he uttered. “Ignore us if you want. But don’t complain later. I wish you all the best! Dig your graves and wait for the enemies to come! I don’t wish to remain in this society of voluntary corpses.”

“It’s all because of you!” an old woman shouted. “Before you came here, we all lived quietly and peacefully! Then you showed up and the troubles started! Get out of here!”

Yaroslav turned away.

“Of course,” he said quietly. “I’ll leave as I arrived. I wish you a pleasant and painless death.”

“Wait!” Babak called him. “I’m going with you. Disperse, dead, I have to leave!”

“So it’s true, then?” someone asked timidly.

Babak let out a strange sound.

“Is it true what?”

“My God,” Babak looked up at the sky, “close your ears, I have to say some very unsavory things!” The sky rumbled.

“You want to talk, too?” Babak asked. “I understand.”

“How do I protect people now?” Yaga asked Artem. “As you see, these vampires are quite wicked!”

“I understand perfectly, but I can’t help you. I promised to return Ivan,” Artem said. “And I think this plan of turning people into animals won’t have much success.”

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Yaga replied. “And the vampires have their own set of rules. They don’t drink animal blood. It either causes their allergies to act up or it’s poisonous, I don’t remember. But they start feeling tremendously bad, foaming at the mouth, bleeding from the ears, stuff like that. So it’s either experiment with one boy or a sea of blood and mountains of corpses.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Artem said. “Did I understand it correctly that the chief vampire has a grudge against you?”

“Two grudges,” Yaga confirmed.

“So they’ll attack again?”

“Definitely!”

“So they’re here to stay?” Artem clutched at his head. “They’ll wipe everyone out! I have to get back to Slavnograd and tell everyone about the impending disaster. How many vampires will there be?”

“I don’t know,” Yaga said honestly. “A lot, I guess.”

Cat Bayun was quietly having breakfast in the corner of the hut, together with Ivan. When he heard the question, he replied, “Several thousand. Or dozens. They’re coming from all sides and I don’t know how many states they’ve already destroyed. The trouble is that the person bitten by a vampire often becomes a vampire themselves. I know one thing for sure, though. All vampires obey their leader. If he commands it, they’ll appear all at once and destroy the enemies.”

Ivan, currently in his human form, was listening to the talking cat with his mouth agape. The boy had felt amazed when the cat poured his own milk and put food on his plates, and now it turned out that he also knew how to talk!

“We have a good weapon against them!” Artem pointed at the spear.

The cat snorted contemptuously.

“How many of them will you have time to stab before you’re caught, slashed, and left to bleed out? One will die, ten will follow. By the way, Yaga, the vampires today aren’t like they were before. If they used to drink only people’s blood, now there are just too many of them. Not the best breakfast conversation but they gut everything they see. I thought the idea with the potion would work, but now I understand we were wrong.”

Yaga slammed her fists against the table.

“I have nothing else to use against them. One hut cannot deal with hordes of vampires. I don’t even have that many shells!”

“I think they won’t touch you,” Artem noted. “Since the leader needs you, the others won’t dare spoil his revenge.”

“It’s a small comfort,” Yaga smiled sourly. “After his death, there will be no one to hold them off.”

“We’ve got to go.” Artem stood up. “We should warn the villagers.”

“All right, all right,” Yaga sighed. “I’ll make a path for you. Don’t fear the animals. I will tell the goblin to see you off. Besides, someone killed all the wolves in the woods, so there’s no one left to be afraid of.”

“And what about this ‘someone’?” Artem asked. “Isn’t he dangerous himself?”

Yaga hesitated for a moment.

“He’s disappeared. Without a trace.”

Ivan stroked the cat one final time. The cat melted into a ball of purring.

There was a soft click.

“What was it?” the prince went on the alert, clutching his sword.

“It’s our people. They’re with us!” Yaga waved her hands. “The goblin has come. He’ll take you to the village.”

“I should take them to the village?” the invisible goblin asked. Artem nodded and tried to see the interlocutor, but there was nothing among the branches. The goblin laughed good-naturedly at his naive attempts, coughed and said, “Follow the tracks!”

“Whose tracks?” Artem was surprised.

“Here!” Ivan pointed at the ground.

There were clearly visible traces of small feet. The unknown creature was trampling the path with obvious pleasure. Ivan ran after the mysterious animal first. The prince thanked the goblin.

“Don’t mention it!” the goblin told him. The prince still didn’t see him. The travelers walked over half a mile and looked back. Yaga’s house disappeared behind the trees, and the distinct footprints melted like the snow in the sun along with a narrow path.

The animal chirped, dragging the people forward, and in an hour’s walk, he never lost his pace. He led Artem and Ivan to the clearing before the village, stopped, said something unintelligible, and disappeared completely. The travelers didn’t believe their eyes. The village was abandoned! The windows and the doors were boarded up, and there were no living beings except some dogs and chickens.

“Is it the right village?” the prince asked. “Do you live here?”

“Yes, but it never looked like that!”

“The peasants couldn’t just drop everything and quickly ride off into the sunset…” Artem muttered. “It’s not possible.”

They heard the faint sound of an axe falling.

“I think someone is still here!” the prince rejoiced. They ran toward the sound and stopped near a small house. Boards were being nailed to it, giving it the appearance of an ancient, abandoned ruin. Artem took a moment to ponder over it and then he knocked on the door. Nobody responded. The owners, frightened by the vampire stories, decided not to open the door to anyone in general.

“Let’s go to my house,” Ivan suggested.

“To Babak!” Artem corrected him. “Alena is there. If we’re lucky, we’ll find out why the village has suddenly lost its hospitality.”

They reached a familiar house on the outskirts and saw the exact same picture of devastation. In complete bewilderment, they stopped before a huge hole in the wall and looked at each other.

“I don’t understand,” Artem said. “Where did this hole come from? Was Babak’s house attacked by some woodpeckers?”

Artem walked inside and noticed a dark spot on the floor.

“Blood!” he gasped and pulled out his sword with lightning speed. “Stay where you are,” he whispered, turning to Ivan.

The manhole covering the attic opened slightly, and Alena’s voice asked, “Who’s there?”

“Alena!” Ivan ran into the house, relieved. His sister quickly climbed out.

“Ivan! You’re a boy again!”

Artem lowered the sword.

“You’re all alive,” he exhaled with relief. “Great.”

His heart ached upon seeing such a genuine and excited reunion between the relatives. Trying not to disturb them, he went outside and sat down on a log that served as a ram for vampires. He was torn from his thoughts when a kiss landed on his cheek, accompanied by a joyful voice, “Thank you, Prince Artem!”

He turned his head. Alena was standing next to him, shining with happiness.

“You’re welcome,” he murmured, suddenly embarrassed.

“We fought the vampires!” Ivan said proudly and at a very bad moment.

“Oh!” Alena immediately became serious. “So did we. The fanged and bloodthirsty ones?” Ivan nodded.

“Then they’re the same ones.”

“How long?” Artem wondered.

“After you left.”

Artem sighed. Whatever plans Yaga was making to save the villages, she was very wrong in thinking that the vampires would come to her first.

Yaroslav and Babak came out, looking so gloomy and angry that Artem felt worried. They seemed ready to kill anyone who got in their way. However, they brightened considerably when they saw Artem and heard Ivan’s cheerful voice. Yaroslav seemed to forget about all his troubles. He ran to Artem and embraced him with such strength as if they hadn’t seen each other for a thousand years.

“Take it easy,” Artem murmured, embarrassed. “It’s all right…”

“I thought you were dead,” Yaroslav muttered. “There was such a racket from the forest!”

“And you decided that someone was celebrating my defeat by roaring?” Artem was bewildered. “Nope, I wouldn’t give up so easily! And I had a powerful partner! I can’t say his name, though… Not yet.”

“Why?”

“He’s… He’s not on the good terms with the locals and he doesn’t want to change anything.”

“And you rescued Ivan from Yaga together?”

“Well… How do you say it… Not quite.” Artem squinted at Babak. He was chatting with the boy amiably, occasionally throwing half-amazed, half-respectful looks at the prince. “He must have told them everything anyway.”

“Who? Ivan?”

“Ok, listen,” Artem sighed. “But it’s a secret. I fought the vampires together with Baba Yaga.”

Yaroslav stared at him in complete amazement.

“After the battle, she let Ivan go. You know, she’s a real and powerful ally against those monsters. She kidnapped the boy to create a potion that would deceive the vampires and save people.”

“What a terrible idea!” Yaroslav was indignant. “Couldn’t she find a volunteer?”

“What do you think?” Artem snorted. “Do you think she’d be allowed to come to the village on a rescue mission and hold a contest among the likely volunteers?”

“But why Ivan?”

“Children love adventures and are more or less loyal to supernatural forces. But overall, it’s just a matter of chance.”

“The most important thing is that he’s alive and well,” Yaroslav summed up. “I think we’ll be fine on our own. The vampires will surely appear at night, so we’ll kill them and move on to save Maria.”

“Don’t get carried away,” Artem remarked gloomily. “What makes you think we’ll kill them all?”

“There can’t be many of them. Otherwise, they would attack in large groups,” Yaroslav explained. “And we would have heard about them a long time ago. Who is their commander? What country are they from?”

“They…” Artem remembered Yaga’s lecture. “How did she put it… ‘They’re not human anymore. They aren’t mages. They aren’t a brigade of crazy warlocks. They’re vampires. And we ran into scouts, who aren’t the smartest of the vampires. They’re newborns. Their task is to sow panic and deprive people of the ability to think rationally.’”

“Really?” Yaroslav felt a rock plummet in his stomach.

“Absolutely!” Artem said. “There are really lots of them. Thousands. And they’re all heading this way.”

“But why?!” Yaroslav asked in shock.

“Ask them,” Artem replied.

Yaroslav was plunged into a stunned silence, pondering over the information. Soon, Babak approached them.

“Well done, prince!” he praised. “With warriors like you, we won’t lose!”

“Ivan told you about Yaga?” Artem wondered.

“He sure did. Right away. Did you really recruit her into our ranks?”

“In a way. But that won’t help.”

“Why?”

“There is one actual story that fits our situation,” Yaroslav began thoughtfully. “A warrior rode up to Dobrynya Nikitich once and said, ‘Dobrynya! We have a great army coming to attack us! What should we do?’ ‘Give me two weeks. I’ll make a new shield, take a new sword, and go to war.’ The warrior rode to Alyosha Popovich next. ‘Alyosha! A great army is approaching us to declare war! What should we do?’ ‘Give me a week. I’ll collect the weapons, patch up my mail, and go to the war.’ The warrior rode to Ilya Muromets after this. ‘Ilya Muromets! A great army is approaching us to declare war! What should we do?’ Ilya Muromets abandoned everything he was doing and jumped on his horse immediately. ‘Are you not planning to get ammunition?’ the warrior was surprised. ‘What’s there to get?!’ Ilya shouted. ‘Time to flee!’”

Babak chuckled.

“What are you leading to?”

“I have just been informed,” Yaroslav said dryly, “that we are complete idiots. And that we’re about to die. Artem, tell that tale again.”

Artem did. Babak whistled.

“We must run,” Yaroslav said. “We should gather people in the cities and fight from there. Three warriors cannot stand against an army of thousands. If we stay here, we’re doomed!”

“In that case, we should take the good advice of Ilya Muromets and follow it,” Babak said. “But we’ll need to warn the others before that.”

“You think so? They won’t believe us again.”

“I’ll explain it to them myself!” Artem volunteered. “They know that I have gone to fight against Yaga, so they’ll listen to my words.”

“They’ll listen to their inner voice only,” Babak retorted, “and this voice will tell them to send you to… well… to where you were heading in the first place.”

“Am I a prince or not a prince?” Artem was indignant.

“I mean, no one cares,” Babak clarified. “And as long as the mayor refuses to use his brain, which is smooth and untouched, no one will lift a finger.”

“Who’s the mayor here?” Yaroslav was trying to recall the right face. “I don’t remember him.”

“He went to the capital on some business. He wanted to see the crowned people.”

“Right. Then we’ll do it this way. Babak, you take Alena and Ivan and ride to the capital to warn the king about the vampires.”