A Question of Magic

by E. D. Baker

  Serafina was so excited that she almost blurted out the command, but even as she opened her mouth, she recalled what had happened the last time she told the cottage to move. This time she remembered to say, “Chicken hut, chicken hut, take me home, but do it gently!”

  The cottage rose so smoothly that she barely felt as if it was moving at all. The door was already open when the fence came apart, and the bones flew into the cottage, bringing the skulls with them. Yowling, Maks followed them into the air and through the doorway, landing on the bed.

  “What are you doing?” demanded the cat. “You made me drop a nice juicy mouse!”

  “We’re going home,” said Serafina.

  “You could have given me some warning! You look good, by the way. I guess you found the tea.”

  “No thanks to you,” Serafina told him.

  “What can I say? I’m a cat. What did you mean when you said we were going home? We already are home.”

  “I mean my hometown, Kamien Dom. Wait until you meet my family! They’ve never met a talking cat before. And Alek—”

  “I doubt we’re going to your hometown,” said Maks. “Old Chicken Legs is a cottage of habit. It likes to go to the same places and rarely goes anywhere new. Most of the places it visits now meant something important to the first Baba Yaga. That was so long ago that whatever was there might be gone by now, but it goes there anyway. Something pretty powerful is needed to make this hut go someplace different; just asking isn’t going to do it. What did you say to it?”

  “I told it to take me home,” Serafina said, no longer feeling quite so excited.

  “Then I bet it’s taking us to Mala Kapusta. That’s where it picked you up. It’s probably the closest stop to your village.”

  “I live in a large town, actually,” Serafina said.

  “Well, there you have it! This cottage never goes to large towns. Too many people around. Even in the villages, the cottage times its arrival for after dark so it’s already in place when people get up in the morning. Fewer terrified villagers running and screaming that way. The villagers are used to seeing it, just not the way it walks around on chicken legs. Departures can be a different story, though. Sometimes we have to leave in a hurry, and everyone gets riled up.”

  “Chicken legs?” asked Serafina.

  Maks gave his paw an experimental lick. “Uh-huh,” he said. “I’m surprised you haven’t noticed its footprints. Of course, they are big. Look more like ruts than the footprints of a chicken.” The cat gave his paw another swipe with his tongue, then glanced up at her. “I told you that the first Baba Yaga was a nasty old witch. Long before the fairy put the curse on her, she got into trouble with some villagers. She heard that they were coming to burn her hut, so she grabbed the only animal she could find at the time and used it in a spell. It was a scrawny old chicken, too tough even for the old witch to eat. The spell put the chicken legs on the hut and made them big enough to carry the hut around.”

  “So that’s why it lurches the way it does,” Serafina said. “I guess it’s a good thing she didn’t find a frog, or we’d be hopping everywhere.”

  Maks licked his shoulder, then glanced up at Serafina again. “Hey, I’m glad I wasn’t living with her then, or it might have been my legs that were hauling this thing!” Turning to look over his back, he twitched his tail when he noticed that his fur was ruffled and dirty. “Promise me one thing. The next time you want to pick up and leave, tell me first!”

  It was still dark when the cottage settled to the ground. Woken from her sleep, Serafina climbed out of bed and slipped into her prettiest gown. Her heart sang as she brushed her hair until it shone. She was going home today and would see Alek and her family!

  Maks watched from the bed while she pulled on her shoes, and she half expected him to try to talk her out of going. He didn’t, though, and when she bent down to pet his head, he stood and stalked away.

  The sun was just starting to come up when Serafina stepped outside, the few coins she possessed in her pocket. It had been dark the last time she was there, but as far as she could tell, the cottage had come back to the very same place she and Viktor had found it.

  “Where are you going so early?” called one of the skulls as Serafina headed for the gate.

  “To stretch my legs,” she replied, not wanting to tell them that she was leaving for good. She liked the skulls, but she didn’t feel like explaining herself to anyone; she certainly didn’t want to argue about it.

  “Hurry back,” Boris said as she closed the gate behind her.

  Serafina patted the shiny skull and turned toward the Bialy Jelen tavern. If anyone could tell her how she could get a ride to Kamien Dom, it would be a tavern keeper.

  Although it was still early, the day promised to be beautiful. The sky was clear and a gentle breeze already carried a hint of warmth. Serafina felt more lighthearted than she had since the day she received her great-aunt’s letter. Grinning, she started skipping down the road, something she hadn’t done in years. She stopped, however, when she heard someone chuckle.

  A man leading a horse from behind the tavern tipped his hat to her and said, “Good morning, miss. And how are you today?”

  “Very well,” Serafina said, and went rigid when she realized that she’d said it in her Baba Yaga voice.

  The man nodded and continued on, but Serafina didn’t budge. She had felt her clothes tighten just as they had when she first became Baba Yaga. There was no getting away from what had happened to her. Even simple questions made her age. If she went home, people were bound to ask her questions; they would just slip out, unintentionally. She would age then, surrounded by her family and friends. It would be impossible to hide what was happening to her unless she drank the tea every day, and she doubted she had enough to do that for long.

  Serafina could only imagine what having someone like her in the household would do to her family. They didn’t believe in magic, so how could they accept what had happened to her? It was likely that her parents would think she had some awful aging disease and want to find her a cure. If she insisted that it was due to magic, any doctor they called in would probably label her crazy and suggest that they lock her away somewhere.

  And what about Alek? Even if he did believe that magic was behind it, once he saw how she aged after answering a question, he wouldn’t want to marry her anymore. The thought of losing Alek’s love was more than she could bear.

  Serafina turned around and headed back to the cottage, her footsteps slow and dragging, as miserable now as she had been happy just minutes before.

  It took her longer to return to the cottage than it had to reach the tavern, and her footsteps slowed even more the closer she drew. She had stopped in front of the gate when a cardinal darted past, the flash of red catching her eye so that she turned to watch it. The bird flew to the opposite side of the road where an old apple tree stood, its branches gnarled and drooping. Landing on a branch near a large, rounded hole in the trunk, the cardinal began to tug at something. It was a ribbon, dangling from the hole, and Serafina realized with surprise that it was the same unusual shade of blue as a ribbon that Alek had given her. “He always liked that color on me,” she murmured, taking a step closer.

  The cardinal flew off at her approach, having pulled the ribbon further out of the hole. Serafina could see that the ribbon was attached to something. Curious, she tugged on it, and a withered bouquet fell to the ground. The flowers were roses, faded and dried, but she could tell that they had been pink. Pink roses were her favorite. When she picked up the bouquet, a note fell out, and she reached for that as well. She gasped when she read the single word on the back of the note. Written in familiar handwriting, it said “Fina.”

  She opened the note and her gaze flew to the bottom of the message. Her breath caught in her throat when she saw Alek’s signature.

  “What you got there?” called one of the skulls from across the road.

  “A note for me,” she said.

 
; At the sound of an approaching wagon, Serafina hurried to the gate, the bouquet and note clutched in her hand.

  “Aren’t you going to tell us what it says?” asked Krany.

  “It’s her business, not yours,” Yure told him. “She’ll share it with us if she wants to, and since we’re all friends—”

  “Maybe later,” Serafina told them, opening the cottage door.

  “Back so soon?” Maks asked as she stepped inside.

  “You need to go out,” she told him. Placing her finds on the table, she picked up the cat and carried him to the door. He was squirming and protesting when she set him down, and he tried to run back in, but she pushed him away long enough to close the door behind him. “Sometimes a girl needs privacy,” she murmured to herself, and turned back to the table.

  Serafina carried the note to the bed and sat down. Tears welled in her eyes as she read Alek’s words.

  My darling Fina,

  After Viktor came home without you, telling a crazy story about a house that had carried you off, your father and Yevhen went to look for you and returned home heartbroken. when I finally heard about it, I hurried to Mala Kapusta to look for you myself. There was no trace of any house save for strange nuts in the ground, but the villagers swear that the house belonged to Baba Yaga, a woman who is sometimes old and sometimes young, who comes and goes in a house with chicken legs and who will tell you the truth when you ask her a question. No one had any idea why the old woman would carry you off, but they say that she will return someday. I do not know if you are still with the old woman, but I hope and pray that she is keeping you safe and well and that you will find this note.

  I love you, Serafina, and will never give up my search for you. We will be together again someday, I promise you.

  Love,

  Alek

  Serafina sat for a time, reading the note over and over. When a headache began to form behind her eyes, she folded the note and tucked it in her pocket. Alek said that he still loved her, but then he had yet to learn that she was the new Baba Yaga. She wasn’t the same innocent girl he had known. If he found out what had really happened to her, he would want to do something about it, and there was nothing anyone could do. It would be better if she left and never saw him again.

  Serafina thought about writing Alek a note but couldn’t bring herself to do it. Then the first visitor came to the door, and she spent the rest of the day answering questions. By the time night fell, all she wanted to do was leave, so once again she asked the cottage to stand up and walk away, which it did, leaving only its footprints behind.

  Chapter 10

  The next morning, Serafina opened the door to see where the cottage had settled. It was perched at the edge of the forest, high enough above the floor of a long valley that she could see for miles. Farmland blanketed the emerald-green valley all the way to the far end, where a city surrounded a castle bristling with turrets. Even from so far away she could see that something was going on. The road that passed in front of the city gates was congested with travelers. Light reflected off the polished armor of knights, and there seemed to be more people on horseback than she had ever seen in Kamien Dom. It was a beautiful view, but Serafina had no idea where she was.

  A road that was little more than a goat path wound out of the forest, looping in front of the cottage and back into the forest a few hundred feet away. Serafina doubted that it ever saw much traffic, but even so, she soon had her first visitor. After that, a steady stream of people coming to ask her questions kept her occupied for the rest of the day. A visitor woke her early the next morning, and the second person arrived soon after the first one left.

  A week after her arrival she was sitting at her table, mending a torn sleeve, when she heard the tread of many feet. Peeking out her window, she saw that a mounted knight had arrived at her gate with a dozen foot soldiers. She wondered for a moment if she was in trouble or in some sort of danger and was reluctant to respond when the knight called out, “Baba Yaga!” It wasn’t until he’d called a second time that she opened the door and stepped outside.

  “What do you want of me?” she asked.

  “If you are Baba Yaga, the woman who answers questions with the truth, answer ‘yes,’” said the knight.

  “Yes,” she replied in her own voice. She expected him to come inside, but he turned his horse and rode back the way he had come, his soldiers following in his wake. “That’s one way to get an answer without posing a real question,” she murmured as he rode away.

  The next morning, she had just finished her breakfast of oatmeal when she heard a distant rumble. Thinking that it was thunder, she glanced outside and was surprised to see that it was a beautiful day with only a few puffy clouds scudding high in the sky. She also saw that the skulls were all looking toward the city. Curious, she opened the door. The rumbling was suddenly much louder.

  “What is it?” she asked the skulls as she peered at the cloud of dust crossing the valley floor.

  “A small army is coming,” Boris replied.

  “I was in the army back when I was alive,” Krany told them. “For a few weeks after, too. My buddies dragged me around with them until they found a good place to bury me. They finally dumped me in a hole when I got too ripe. That hole sure was cozy.”

  “Look at the crimson banners,” said Boris. “That’s the color of the kingdom of Vargas. I bet that’s the king’s own guard. We’ve been watching them ever since they left the castle.”

  “The king must be with them,” said Yure. “Otherwise there wouldn’t be so many.”

  “Tell me when they come out of the trees,” Serafina told the skulls, and hurried back inside to tidy the cottage. After cleaning up her dishes, she made her bed and changed into the best gown she could find in the trunk. Her hair was thick with only a touch of gray, so she plaited it in a long braid like her mother usually wore. She was soon outside again and was waiting with the skulls when mounted men riding single file emerged from the forest carrying banners attached to long poles.

  Although the king wasn’t wearing a crown or clothes of state, she knew who he was by the respectful way the soldiers looked at him. Guards surrounded the king as he approached the cottage, and two came to the gate ahead of the rest.

  “His Royal Majesty, King Borysko of Vargas, has come to speak with Baba Yaga,” said the larger of the men, both of whom were dressed as officers.

  “Only the person asking a question may enter,” she told them.

  “The king goes nowhere without his guard,” said the officer as he set his hand on the finger-bone latch.

  Serafina straightened her back and held her head high. A king had come to see her. As Serafina Divis, she would have been happy to usher them all inside, but he hadn’t come to see Serafina. He had come to see Baba Yaga, a very special person who was also due respect.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “It is one of my rules.”

  Serafina had turned as if to go back into the cottage when a deep voice said behind her, “I will enter by myself.”

  Serafina glanced back at the gate. The king had come forward and was eyeing Boris, so she hurried to let him in before the skulls could say anything. Letting the king walk in front of her, she closed the gate, which made a loud click, and left the guards and the skulls watching one another.

  “You’re awfully young to be Baba Yaga,” the king told her as she showed him to a seat at her table. “I expected to find an old crone, not a lovely woman.”

  “Sometimes I am older, sometimes I am younger,” Serafina said, taking her normal seat. Although she knew that one was never supposed to sit in front of a king without permission, she figured that only Baba Yaga’s rules applied inside the cottage.

  The king nodded as if her statement made perfect sense, even though Serafina knew her explanation was lacking any logic.

  “May I offer you some tea or cider?” she asked, trying to think of what her mother would do in this situation. When she thought of what her mother’s face
would look like if she knew her daughter was playing hostess to a king, she almost laughed out loud.

  The king shook his head. “I just want my question answered,” he said, and proceeded to stare at his hands without speaking for so long that Serafina began to wonder what was wrong. “My advisors told me to be careful what I say in front of you,” he finally said. “I must not ask you any questions until I ask the one I came to have answered. My wife’s cousin is sheriff of Vioska, a minor post, but one good enough to test the mettle of an up-and-coming young man. He sent word of what you had done to help him rid the world of a particularly nasty witch. It occurred to me that I might make use of your ability as well. My question is simple enough, but much depends on your answer. If I declare war on my enemy, will I win?”

  Serafina sat back and let the voice speak for her. “You will defeat your enemy, but in so doing will lose many of the people you hold most dear. Much of your kingdom will be destroyed, and you will be left the king of ruins.”

  The king looked solemn when he thanked her and bade her farewell. He left a sack of gold coins on the table when he stood and strode outside. Serafina overheard him talking to his officers who’d been waiting by the gate. He told them that he knew what he had to do; he would declare war as soon as he reached the castle.

  Serafina stayed in her chair, too numb to move. She heard the gate open and close, then the king and his men ride away. Of all the terrible things she had had to tell anyone, she thought that this was the worst. The king had heard what she had to say, but her warnings had made no difference. He would win, that was all that mattered, even though many of his subjects would die in the war and his kingdom would be changed forever. Serafina had never felt so awful.