her. There would be few traps inside, she knew, because even Baba Yaga wouldn't want to be bothered with her slaves constantly getting caught in her defenses. Still, there might be talismans that betrayed her presence, calling out to Baba Yaga: Come. An intruder has passed this way.
Or perhaps Baba Yaga was so confident she didn't need such things. She would sense an intruder herself, would never be taken by surprise as long as she was home. And if she was away, then upon arrival she would sense that someone wrong was here.
No use speculating. If she had any traps or warning talismans, Katerina did not detect them. Either she would be caught or she would not.
What mattered now was to find the heart of the magic in this place. Even that was easy enough. There was nothing subtle about the layout of the place. Baba Yaga's house was the central building; her most precious places were below the ground.
The halls were lined with shelves of charms and amulets and talismans, stored to be able to equip an army - and these were only the extras, after the army had been equipped! So grandiose were Baba Yaga's dreams that she imagined someday she'd need all these devices.
Katerina was tempted to take some, to study them. But no, the artifact would always serve its maker, so if she tried to use one, it would work against her. These would burn when the house burned.
Where did she make these things? Where were her ingredients? And where were all her prisoners?
She found them together, in the most obvious place. A large round room, with a fire and a cauldron and many pots, for mixing what she mixed; tables, mirrors, and a large bed. Around the room, chained to the walls, the passengers of the hijacked flight, sleeping as best they could, though only those chained to the lowest rings on the wall could lie down to sleep, and many had to stand. Some of them eyed her incuriously as she came in. She could see that they had eaten little during their confinement.
She hurried to the nearest set of chains and tried to see how they were fastened. Soon enough she saw that powerful spells of binding had been used, so powerful that she could not see a way through them.
How were they made? The spells had to be constructed here. Some of it was done with voice and hands, and there was no hope of guessing the word of unbinding; but if she could see how the spell was made, she could figure out a way to unravel it, or at least could try.
Someone spoke to her, but she didn't understand him. It was English that he spoke. So she answered him in her own language, lacing it with every Ukrainian or Russian word that Ivan and his parents had taught her. It didn't work for the man who had spoken - apparently he knew only English - but several others understood and translated for her. "Watch out," they said, in Russian. "Watch out for the bear."
A bear? Ivan's bear from the chasm?
She turned to see the hulking animal shamble into the room on all fours. Seeing her, it rose to its feet, a huge beast that had to be at least twice the height of even as tall a man as Ivan.
So here she was, having accomplished nothing, already caught.
But the bear did not roar or threaten her, unless simply standing there was something of a threat.
"My wife is not at home," the bear said.
Said! In human speech! She had heard old tales, of course, but had never heard real language from an animal before.
"You'll have to come again later if you wish to kill her," he said. "You are here to kill her, aren't you? You didn't come all this way just to rattle these people's chains."
This was not at all the tone that she expected from Baba Yaga's husband.
"Speechless?" said Bear. "I understand. The sight of me can take a woman's breath away. Baba Yaga fell quite in love with me the first time we met. I was here to kill her; she thought I had come because she called me. I found, too late, that here was one human who knew spells that could bind even me, who had never been bound. So if you happen to fall in love with me as well, be sure to unbind me from Baba Yaga before you expect me to run