After two quiet nights in the woods, Vasi was confident she’d lost the duke and his men. Even so, she carefully picked her way through the foliage, holding the branches as she passed and glancing behind to ensure they snapped back into place to hide her trail. She moved forward on her toes, stepping as lightly as she could, trying to minimize any traces of her presence. She’d slept in a log one night and up a squatty tree the second. She could ill afford to have risked so much only to be caught again.

Vasi’s stomach rumbled, and her skirt caught on a barren blackberry bramble almost as if to mock her. Fresh water had been easy to find, but she hadn’t found a single bite to eat, and the little food she had was gone. Time ticked, precious seconds spent to extricate herself without breaking the branch or tearing her skirt, and Vasi’s frustration mounted. When she was finally free, she lifted her skirt, pulling the back lower hem to the front, and tucked it into her belt, creating makeshift trousers. Able to move a little faster, Vasi ducked under branches, twisted between trees, and threaded her way deeper and deeper into the thick woods of the Ctyri forest.

Even with the rising sun, this deep in the woods the air nipped her skin with its chill. Vasi's fingers tingled uncomfortably, feeling thick and wooden. She tucked one hand under her arm until her fingers warmed and then switched sides.

Frustration and anger bubbled in her chest, and Vasi glared at the woods around her as she stomped sensation back into her toes. She was lost, parched, starving, damp, and cold. She cursed Marika, the tsar, and even Prince Nikolai for her current predicament. With an additional curse for Lord Baine, Vasi kicked the trunk of a large tree.

An injured foot will only slow you.

“Shut up,” Vasi snapped in response. She shook her head a moment later as she realized the progression of her insanity. “I’m talking to myself and telling myself to shut up.”

Sunlight broke through the canopy above, and the scent of jasmine wafted in on the warmer air. With a heavy sigh, Vasi reminded herself the djinn could help if she found them, so she best take care of her body and what was left of her mind. She studied the shrubs and then the ground, searching for edibles to sustain her. By late summer, the wild strawberries were gone as were the huckleberries and currants. She continued her search, head bowed as she examined the ground for mushrooms.

Something tugged on her hair from above, and Vasi glanced up and grinned with triumph. Heavy-laden with fruit, glorious blackberry canes leaned over the decaying tree they’d used as a trellis, the dark-purple berries begging to be picked. Vasi plucked one and popped it into her mouth, the juice bursting across her tongue with wonderful sweetness. Ignoring the thorns scratching her skin, Vasi ate berry after berry, first by the handful then as her hunger abated, one at a time, savoring the delicious fruit.

Vasi ate and ate and ate, but the more she ate, the more berries seemed to appear on the fruited canes. Her fingers darkened, stained purple by the juice, and she grimaced, her lips involuntarily puckering from a particularly tart berry. With a sigh of satisfaction, Vasi wiped her hands, wincing when her coarse cloak rubbed against her scratched skin.

“Come to eat my fruit, pretty girl,” rasped a woman.

Vasi whirled and gasped, unable to scream as shock stole her voice. Her mind blanked, and she forgot all about the thorny briar behind her. Vasi continued to suck in short bursts of air as she stepped back into the canes of blackberries, desperate to escape the hag in front of her. The rotted trunk crumbled underfoot, and Vasi stumbled. Thorns tore at her clothes, hair, and skin, and she lost her balance and landed on her butt.

But the pain from the thorns barely registered as Vasi stared, open mouthed, at the hideous old woman standing before her. The crone extended a gnarled hand, but Vasi somehow knew the pain of the blackberry bushes was less than what she’d endure at the hands of the witch.

The myths of djinn seemed like happy tales compared to the frightful appearance of Baba Yaga. The witch’s lower jaw extended well past her upper lip, and instead of teeth, triangular pieces of metal, much like the serrated edge of a knife, protruded from her gums in a grotesque grin. Stringy gray hair fell about her face, and her mottled skin had splotches of red, purple, and brown as if repeatedly stained, but the soap was not strong enough to clear the spill. Her nose hooked like the beak of a hawk, except instead of being smooth, the witch’s nose was marred with warts and moles. Like her hands, her body was twisted and stooped, her right shoulder much higher than the left, and the curve of her spine forced her into a bowed position of faux humility.

But her most terrifying feature was her eyes. Where her irises should be a beautiful blue or green or warm brown, the witch had live flames crackling between her pupil and sclera.

The witch cackled, the sound akin to breaking a chicken’s neck, and then with unnatural speed, she grabbed Vasi’s arm and pulled her from the thorny bramble. “Had your fill now, have you?”

Language eluded Vasi, words disappearing faster than they were formed, and she nodded and then shook her head.

Baba Yaga pursed her lips, a seemingly impossible task with her gruesome teeth, and she studied Vasi from her head to her toes and back up again.

“What are you doing in my woods?” the witch asked, breaking off a thick blackberry cane with her bare hands. She narrowed her eyes then stuck the end of the cane between her lips and gnashed on it with her serrated teeth. Pieces of green fell from her lips in a fearful display. The witch finished all but a dirt-encrusted stump of the plant then pointed it at Vasi and said, “I’ll not be making a love potion for you, and I won’t help you find a husband.”

Vasi shook her head. “I . . . I don’t want a husband.”

“I’ll not help you get rid of a babe neither, so don’t be asking for that.”

Vasi’s indignation was stronger than her fear, and she straightened. “I’m not asking you to. I’m looking for the djinn. I need them to help me stop the war.”

The grin that spread over Baba Yaga’s face was truly horrifying. Pieces of the blackberry branch were stuck between her teeth as well as shreds of other things.

Vasi didn’t want to think about why there might be a scrap of leather or a piece of red cloth in the hag’s mouth. The stories of Baba Yaga feasting on the bones of men suddenly didn’t seem metaphorical, funny, or far-fetched, and Vasi’s knees wobbled.

Baba Yaga leaned toward Vasi and, grabbing the front of her tunic, pulled her face close. “What will you get if you stop the war?”

Vasi grimaced from the putrid stench of the hag’s breath but didn’t pull away. Looking into Baba Yaga’s flaming eyes, Vasi said, “My papa.”

Baba Yaga released Vasi, and the cruel sneer the witch wore dissolved into a furrow of confusion. “You want your father back?”

A lump of emotion formed at the back of Vasi’s throat. Tears pricked her eyes, and her vision blurred, and she tried to blink away the burning emotion. Unable to speak, Vasi just nodded.

Pointing a gnarled finger at her, Baba Yaga said, “You will come with me.”

Hope, followed by gratitude, sprung into Vasi’s chest. She clasped her hands to her heart and let the tears fall. “Thank you. Thank you so much for helping me.”

Baba Yaga threw her head back and cackled with raucous laughter. When she met Vasi’s gaze, the hag wrinkled her nose and shook her head. “You’re a fool.”

Vasi furrowed her brow as confusion doused her hope. “Then where are we going?”

Baba Yaga lunged forward and grabbed Vasi’s wrist; the witch’s gnarled hand was like a vice. “Yer leaving my forest, thief. If you’re lucky, I won’t kill and eat you on the way out.”

Vasi froze, her heart skipping a beat before thundering to life. Her vision tunneled, and Vasi turned her head side to side, searching for a path of escape.

As if sensing Vasi’s response, the witch tightened her grip.

Vasi pulled, uselessly, trying to break free as she stammered, “I-I’m no thief; I-I only took a few berries, and there’s so many left. I need to find the djinn. I-I need to save my papa.”

Baba Yaga yanked Vasi forward. “There’s no djinn in this forest—never has been. Let’s go.”

The words slapped Vasi, puncturing holes into her chest, and her hope poured out, pooling on the ground at her feet. She stumbled forward after the witch, her mind reeling.

If there were no djinn, there was no hope.