6. Six

The demon remained while Ryurikov inspected the limp form lying by large roots. Her tunic, now tied down by sashes and other fabric, was hiked over her knobbly knees, the silver pile of hair strewn across her face, hiding the wrinkles and enormous nose. An unflattering position to have died in, to be sure.

DREAM FOR ME,Awimak snarled behind him, sending shivers down Ryurikov’s spine.

All the same, he faced the demon. “I will dream as much as you want for killing her.”

SHE IS NOT DEAD.

Ryurikov raised his eyebrows. “No? I know a remedy for that.”

He collected the broom off the ground and spun it in his hands, trying to decide which end to use on her, then heard faint whispering off to his left. “Good fucking grief.”

The five spirits flanked him. “Immoral.”

“You’re joking, right? She killed me. Twice!“ And it really hurt the second time. He jabbed her flabby belly with the end of the broom handle. “She’ll be lucky if all I do is ram this down her throat. I ought to cut her head off, parade it around the cities!”

“Murder is immoral.”They peered up at him with those umbrageous, owl-like faces.

Ryurikov growled, then regarded Awimak. He’d not yet moved. “You’re the one who got her. What say you, demon? Let her live, or—”

THE HUT WILL DIE WITH HER.Awimak’s distorted voice wasn’t loud, but it was encompassing in the worst way.

Ryurikov suppressed a shudder. He slung his focus back to the unconscious form. “Fuck.” He lowered the hood to run fingers through jaw-length hair, raking it out of his face. “Fuck! Okay, fine! She gets to live to try and kill me a third time.”

Crouching, he tugged free the sash around her head, rolled her lumpy form over and tied gnarly hands together at her back. The fingertips were stained green. “But I swear, if she does try, you can break every bone in my body and I’ll still kill her.”

The spirits exchanged looks with one another, then whispered, “Fair.”

With a grunt, Ryurikov hoisted Jezibaba’s diminutive body up and over his shoulder, grateful that despite all the fabric and beetles weighing her down, she wasn’t particularly heavy.

“Suppose I should thank you for resurrecting me.” He looked at the spirits, watched their odd, shapeless bodies shift like concentrated blizzards. “Anyway, I’ll see you around.”

He ignored their hissed anger, approaching Awimak and craning his neck to look up into his eyes. They burned like fire. “Don’t suppose you’ll show me to her hut?”

ONLY THE WITCH CAN.

Ryurikov flattened his lips. “Unfortunate. Well, you didn’t kill her, but I suppose I owe you a…dream?”

GOOD.

With the broom, he motioned for… Well, for Awimak to show him what he wanted, exactly. “After you?”

Awimak’s hooves were heavier than tree trunks as he stomped through the forest, leading him to goodness knew where. Ryurikov didn’t think it would be to his demise, although whether the demon would release him again was still up in the air.

They walked deeper into the forest, the silence broken by bird songs and the morning breeze combing through leaves. The number of young trees slowly dwindled, large, ancient ones with thick roots curling around mossy boulders casting all in darkness.

Hopping over a stream, Ryurikov faltered as his surroundings leapt upside down like an onslaught of vertigo. They were still in the forest, but beneath it, he thought.

Roots resembled bare trees, the underside of rockery trickling with dirt and crawling with insects. Looking up, it startled him to see the stream flowing above him. Through its ripples he made out the canopy of green and hints of a bright morning sky. The air here was damp, the scent of earth heavy, and the light peculiar. It had a yellow tinge to it, even though the dirt and network of roots—the ceiling—blocked most light.

COME.

Ryurikov snapped his attention back to the demon. “I’m coming.”

Since they stopped in an area that essentially looked the same as everywhere else in this place, he wasn’t sure why they had bothered to go further. With a tired sigh, he dropped Jezibaba as hard as possible to the ground and stretched his aching body. His stomach still troubled him, and he rubbed an open palm across it.

Awimak was watching, something that didn’t bother him. Not at first. But he kept watching, and Ryurikov quickly ran out of things to do, so he dropped the broom and cleared his throat.

DREAM.

“You understand, to do that I need to sleep.”

Awimak nodded. There was an eagerness to it that Ryurikov wasn’t fond of.

“Right, well I don’t—where?” He gestured around him. “And anyway, I’m not taking my eyes off that witch.” Or the demon, for that matter.

I WILL WATCH HER.Awimak lowered to his haunches. He held out a giant claw just above the damp ground, fingers flexing as roots slithered out from the soil, snaking around Jezibaba’s limp form.

“Right.” Ryurikov paused, then lowered to sit. “So, I’ll just…lie here and fall asleep long enough to dream?” At the demon’s nod, he laid down and covered himself with his ragged cloak. “Dare I ask why?” When Awimak said nothing, he sighed. “If you’re going to kill me, do me the courtesy of not waking me beforehand.”

He closed his eyes, trying not to let the chilled earth get to him, and folded an arm under his head. When he heard heavy hooves shift, Ryurikov adjusted the hood over his face, enough to peer out from under it undetected. Awimak had merely moved further away.

This was very unsettling.

Ryurikov focused on getting to sleep, regardless.

His mind wandered to the Mirror of the Lost, how all he’d seen was himself. Inwardly, he scoffed. He wasn’t lost, but his sister was.

He hadn’t seen Valka in so long, having parted ways thirteen years ago. That day was as fresh on his mind as a crisp winter night. Ryurikov remembered the cerulean light filtering in through the dense forest, how it had graced his sister’s face, illuminating the expanse of rusty freckles.

Valka’s smile was the happiest he’d seen in ages, yet her hazel eyes were bright with unshed tears. The knowledge that they might never see each other again hurt, but she would be free.

He would make sure of that.

She wrapped her arms around his neck to pull him close. Ryurikov knew she would tease him about being shorter than her, that he should stop feeding his vegetables to the dogs.

“You’re going to fail us all.”

A frown pulled his brows together. He opened his mouth to respond, but couldn’t.

“Our entire kingdom will burn, the lands will be ravaged, and it’ll be your fault.”

He leaned away, a scream lodging itself in his throat as Valka’s smiling face split itself across the centre, skin stretching, tearing. Top parting from bottom to give way to a protruding skull, elongated like a beak. Bone white streaked with blood, large teeth set in a grin, the two halves of his sister’s face now serving as scalp and chin.

Hollow eyes stared, rivulets of red trickling down the pallid neck and chest, forming a script he couldn’t read. Fingers long and knobbly extended toward him. They jabbed him in the chest, pierced skin, and twisted. Ryurikov stumbled backward, his foot slipped past an edge.

He fell.

His startled cry echoed. Wild-eyed, he took in his surroundings, blinking against the strange amber light, almost certain he was now awake. He lifted a gloved hand to his face and did a double-take.

He was trembling and sweating.

Ryurikov’s gaze shifted to the demon, standing in the same place as before, the last of glittering white smoke journeying into the nostrils of the deer skull.

“What the fuck?”

Awimak released a long, rattling breath. A sigh of relief. THANK YOU.

“You’re a fool. Even the village idiot would know better than to follow a demon into his domain.”

Jezibaba sat upright, legs crossed, looking decidedly more haggard than when they first met. Her arms were strapped to her sides by entwining roots.

Ryurikov smirked at her. “Alas, we can’t ask him, since he drowned in a well. You’re just pissed we beat you.”

He got up and strode over to Awimak, positioning himself next to the monumental being. Ryurikov often had the good fortune of being at least a head taller than others, but Awimak absolutely dwarfed him. He came up to the demon’s elbow.

He reached to rap his knuckles against an exceptionally muscular arm, prompting the spheres of Awimak’s burning eyes to flick down to him. Earth-chill clung to the demon’s skin, storm grey and soft under his touch, becoming increasingly more bark-like toward his forearms. The tattered cloth covering his hips resembled delicately woven wood with the drape of dupion, hiding whatever he might have for a cock.

“And what do you plan on doing with me?” Jezibaba jostled him out of his admiration.

He grabbed the broom from where it rested against dirt-trickling roots and gave it a spin. “First, you’re going to let me revisit that mirror.”

Jezibaba tutted. “I know a lost soul when I see one. Don’t need a mirror to show me that.”

“Get fucked, crone,“ Ryurikov snarled. He pointed with the broom, less than an inch away from her prominent nose. “You’re going to take me back to the mirror.”

“What if you still only see yourself?” Jezibaba’s lizard eyes narrowed. “What will you do then?”

Ryurikov ran his hand across the straw of the broom, and snapped one of the stems. The hag’s left eye twitched.

“I sort of had all my hopes pinned on that mirror.” He faced Awimak. “Don’t suppose you’re any good at finding lost people?”

The hag cackled, which made him whirl back on her.

“What’s funny?”

“Humans can’t be found if they don’t consider themselves lost, you saphead.”

Ryurikov stilled. Valka, if even alive, might not think herself lost. He’d not considered that possibility. “Wait, does that mean…she’s alright?”

Jezibaba scoffed. “Of course, it’s a woman.”

“No, you ancient prune,” he snapped. “I’m after my sister.”

At that, Jezibaba frowned. “Valka?”

And Ryurikov gaped.