•••

YAGA SLICED THROUGH THE AIR with her hands, fingers curved and knuckles white with effort. Darkness engulfed them as the terrified villagers attempted to flee, taking their lanterns with them, but the trees were too dense, pushing in on them from every direction, allowing a select few to escape the scene. People knocked each other over, candles falling to the ground, trampled underfoot in the swarm, and Yaga forced her way through the horde, coming to a stop in the middle of them with her arms spread out around her.

"Stop. Stop." She bit her lip, ideas swarming in her head. She had to get out, knowing that if she stayed, she'd be dead long before the sky began to bleed red with smears of sunrise. After all, the night was still young, as long as it had already felt, which meant two things - more time to escape and therefore more time to be caught. To be tied to the pyre and forced to watch the flames roar beneath her. Maybe they would catch onto her dress first, and she'd be lucky enough to have the smoke in her lungs immediately. Or maybe, she'd stand there for hours on end, flesh boiling, waiting to die, unable to even writhe in agony.

Yaga had never liked fire, as much as she enjoyed playing with it.

It was then that she realised the villagers had fallen into terrified silence.

Waiting.

"I don't want to hurt you," she announced, keeping her voice level. It was true, as much as she knew everyone would villainise her. In the corner of her eye, she saw a figure she recognised as Dimitri get on his horse, a lantern in his hand, attempting to try and control the crowd, but there were too many people. Yaga closed her eyes as hands pulled at her clothes and hair, villagers crushing each other in an attempt to get to the witch, to spit on her or deliver a punch or a slap somewhere.

She cleared her throat, but this time, no one paused to listen, continuing their screaming and roaring.

"She's got me!" a woman shouted, and Yaga resisted the urge to pierce a tree through the woman's guts, marvelling at her stupidity. The lady was nowhere near her, instead having brushed against a jutting root of one of the many trees around them.

Shut up.

A few more people shouted the same thing, looking around, wide-eyed, for danger - inviting it to them with every movement - weak, hunted animals.

As someone scraped some sort of blade across the exposed skin of her arms, her cloak having been trampled underfoot, Yaga decided that enough was enough.

"No-one move."

Salovo's residents froze in fear as Yaga unclenched her fists, a burst of movement from the edge of the clearing drawing their attention. A mighty oak, withered with age and towering over them all, began to move, its roots unfurling from the ground and lashing out like whips, striking a few unlucky people with a sickening crack. For a moment, Yaga watched it unfold, before smoothly slicing through the air with her other hand, bringing a row of smaller, younger oaks to a position that almost resembled a bow.

They met the ground with a loud thud, and Yaga bit back a smirk as she made the old oak do the same, causing people to run out of the way, screaming. Lanterns were trodden into the dirt or discarded in the river as the crowd attempted to get out as quickly as they could, some pausing to search for family members and others just running for their lives. Knocking down a few more trees to distract everyone, Yaga commended herself for not being caught, listening to the sound of wails and screams for a moment longer as she sank into the cover of darkness.

She'd thought that this night would be her last, but as she looked out into the waiting mouth of the forest, Yaga felt more alive than she'd ever before.
•••

THE TREES COULD TALK, she was sure of it. Whispering, sighing, groaning. Not just silently obeying, but going on and on, mirroring the bubbling flow of the river in their rushing pace - but beneath that, there was something else, something cast warmth into her numb body and sent the blood flowing through her black veins.

A lullaby, like a mother would sing to a child.

It drifted into Yaga's ears, delivering an influx of memories that hurt just as much as the bruise on the jaw, which she'd been forced to rest on, her head propped against a small rotten stump. Moss pressed in her hair, but her weak state disallowed her from worrying about the bugs possibly swarming in the wood.

In a low voice, Yaga began murmuring the melody, her voice hoarse and rough, unlike herself. But, after all that had happened, Yaga knew that she would be forever unlike herself. Unlike the girl that worked at the tailor's, unlike the girl that forced smiles on her face and laughs out from her lips while hatred brewed in her heart. But as much as she'd hated them all, Yaga couldn't help the twinge of regret at her actions of - she supposed as she looked around - the night before. She still had a house in Salovo, a family to go home to, as much as she resented her father for making her mother a shell of the person Anya had once been. The reason she'd stayed so long was to protect her mother, but now that Anya had almost certainly left Salovo, there was nothing to pull Yaga home.

She couldn't even go to Dimitri, and that stung the most. He'd seen how Yelena treated her, but still sided with his mother. When given the choice between the two women he loved the most, he'd made the wrong decision - and that would cost him.

Yaga would make sure of it.

But first, she had to discover herself, find out how exactly to use her power freely. To put it simple, Yaga had no idea how she'd managed to do what she'd done. Now, she flexed her fingers weakly, half-expecting the ground to swallow her up, but nothing happened. With a sigh, she set her head back down on the log as nausea rose in her stomach, head spinning. She forced herself to think about the events of the night before.

It was completely different to anything that she'd ever heard of - earlier, with Yelena, her fury had challenged itself into a power, Yaga gathered. But in the forest - by the Saints, it was the stupidest thing she'd ever done. Things like that happened to reckless people, people who acted on impulses, people who didn't think ahead. Yaga Izeva was not a reckless person, instead preferring windowless rooms and careful planning, never any witnesses. It was how she'd managed to keep her reputation intact for so long, despite being undeniably rotten to the very core.

This girl that she'd become, she was something else. Something darker than she would've ever let herself become - but she had. All Yaga wanted was to gather everything in her life, every mistake and broken promise and taunt and secret kiss, and watch it burn.

She laughed drily, realising what she was doing.

Her mind was already gone.

There was no use trying to keep it intact.

It was only a matter of time until her life was, too. After all, she was in the heart of the forest with no allies, no supplies, no home and a harsh winter to look forward to. In somewhere like Nova Kaznya, she could've perhaps rented a room in a tavern, one stinking of cheap beer and other things she didn't want to even think about, or maybe found a lady to work for. But Yaga knew that in the city, witch-hunting was a form of entertainment to them - it seemed so far away from reality to the Kaznyans that they didn't even see the collateral damage, the lives lost and the children turned to ash.

No, it was a good story, and good stories sold. People loved reading the gory parts, envisioning what they would've done, perhaps the witch themselves, magicking up fantasies, or the killers, the executioners of the Gods.

Once she could gather the strength to move, she'd throw herself into the river. That was supposing that the wild dogs hadn't gotten to her before that. Perhaps the riot had scared them away - unfortunately so.

Maybe she could channel her power into another tree and have it crush her. Her fingers tingled with power, and suddenly she found herself thinking back to Baba Jana's words, clearer and more ominous than ever in her mind.

"I am not a mage," Yaga had said. And the wise woman had held up the tarot card, the remaining hairs left on her brow arching with scepticism.

"Are you sure of that, Iskra?"

Yes, Yaga thought indignantly. But now, she realised that Jana was right. The old woman had attached her sinking boat to Yaga's, and the load had borne too heavy. Now, the sea had swallowed them both.

She exhaled, slow and weighted, and let unconsciousness take over.

•••