Chapter 3: A Portal in the Pantry

The celestial agent's name was Zorya, and she had the kind of righteous fury that could power a small city. Silver light cascaded from her hands as she advanced through Ivan's destroyed living room, her business suit somehow remaining pristine despite having just blown through a magically warded door.

"Ivan Kozlov," she repeated, her voice carrying harmonics that made the remaining glassware vibrate. "You will surrender yourself for processing."

"Processing?" Ivan backed toward the kitchen, his grandmother's knitting needles warm in his hands. "That sounds ominous."

"Standard procedure for rogue practitioners. Magical lobotomy, memory adjustment, relocation to a dimension where your bloodline can't cause further cosmic disruption." Zorya spoke like she was reading from a manual. "It's for the greater good."

"Hard pass," Ivan said, just as Stasik materialized on the kitchen counter with his fur standing straight up.

"Celestial bureaucrat," the ferret hissed. "I can smell the paperwork from here."

Zorya's silver eyes flicked to Stasik, and her expression shifted from professional annoyance to active alarm. "Unregistered chaotic entity. This is worse than the reports indicated."

"Oh, you have no idea," Stasik said with a grin that showed far too many teeth.

Ivan felt the familiar tingle that meant his familiar was about to do something catastrophically helpful. "Stasik, don't—"

Too late. The ferret's form began to blur and expand, reality bending around him like heated glass. What had been a small mammal became something that hurt to look at directly – a living tear in space that whispered of distant worlds and impossible geometries.

"Dimensional breach!" Zorya raised both hands, silver fire roaring to life. "Unauthorized portal manifestation!"

"Unauthorized?" Stasik's voice now seemed to come from everywhere at once. "Lady, I've been opening doors between worlds since before your precious Celestial Court learned to count dimensions."

The apartment shook as competing magics clashed. Zorya's disciplined light slammed into Stasik's chaotic spatial distortion, creating feedback that made Ivan's teeth ache. Pictures fell from walls, books tumbled from shelves, and somewhere in the distance, he could hear car alarms wailing again.

"This is insane," Ivan muttered, dodging a bolt of silver fire that left a smoking hole in his refrigerator. "I'm being attacked by cosmic law enforcement while my ferret turns into a portal. This is not how I planned to spend my Tuesday."

"Your Tuesday is about to get worse," Zorya called out, weaving protective barriers around herself as Stasik's distortion field expanded. "The Shadows of Koschei have triangulated your location. They'll be here in minutes."

Ivan froze mid-dodge. "How do you know about—"

"Because they're not subtle!" Zorya gestured sharply, and Ivan suddenly found himself wrapped in bands of silver light. "Soul magic leaves traces, especially when practiced by untrained amateurs. You might as well have sent up a flare."

The binding spell was expertly crafted, but Ivan had grown up learning to escape his grandmother's far more creative restraints. He poured intention into the knitting needles, transforming them into tools of unraveling. The silver bonds frayed like cheap yarn.

"Untrained?" Ivan stepped free of the dissolving magic. "Lady, I've been running from this power my entire life. I know exactly what I'm doing."

"Then you know you're making it worse!" Zorya's professional mask cracked, revealing genuine frustration beneath. "Every spell you cast, every ward you break, it's all feeding into their ritual. They're using your own magic against your grandmother!"

The words hit Ivan like a physical blow. The scrying vision flashed through his mind – his grandmother's heart on the altar, the slow drain of her power, the high priest's terrible awareness. He'd thought the cult was hunting him for his blood, but what if they needed him to keep using magic? What if every defensive spell was actually helping them kill Baba Yaga?

"You're lying," he said, but the certainty was already crumbling.

"Am I?" Zorya advanced again, but now her silver fire was controlled, precise. "Why do you think they sent that creature to your shop? Why make such an obvious attack when they could have taken you quietly?"

Behind her, Stasik's portal form pulsed with agitation. "Ivan, she's not entirely wrong. The timing is suspicious."

"Not helping," Ivan snapped.

"Actually, I am helping. The cult signature is getting stronger. They're not minutes away – they're seconds away." Stasik's voice carried urgent warning. "And they're bringing friends. Lots of friends."

As if summoned by his words, the temperature in the apartment plummeted. Ice crystals formed on the windows, and shadows began moving in ways that defied the laws of physics. The attack at the yarn shop had been a single scout. This felt like an army.

"Move!" Zorya shouted, abandoning her attempt to arrest Ivan in favor of survival. Silver barriers sprang up around the apartment as the walls began to crack under supernatural pressure.

But the barriers wouldn't hold. Ivan could feel it in his bones – the same instinct that had kept him alive during his grandmother's most dangerous lessons. The Shadows of Koschei weren't just breaking in; they were rewriting local reality to suit their needs.

"Stasik," Ivan said quietly, "how big can you make that portal?"

"Big enough. But you won't like where it goes."

"Anywhere is better than here."

The ferret's laugh was pure chaos given voice. "Famous last words. Fine, but don't blame me when you end up somewhere that makes the shadow realm look cozy."

The apartment walls began to buckle inward as pressure built beyond them. Through the cracks, Ivan caught glimpses of writhing darkness and eyes like dying stars. The cult hadn't just found him – they'd brought a piece of their master's realm with them.

"This is madness," Zorya said, but she was already moving toward Stasik's expanding portal. "Unauthorized dimensional travel, consorting with chaotic entities, fleeing cosmic law enforcement—"

"Add it to my tab," Ivan said, grabbing her arm as the front wall collapsed entirely. Shadow-things poured through the breach, their forms shifting between human and nightmare. "Right now, we have bigger problems."

The lead creature was the high priest from Ivan's vision, but somehow even more terrible in person. Where the scrying had shown him robes and shadows, reality revealed something that was mostly teeth and malevolent intention held together by spite and ancient magic.

"Grandson of the Iron Witch," the thing said, its voice like grinding glass. "You cannot run from what you are."

"Watch me," Ivan replied, and dove headfirst into Stasik's portal.

The sensation was indescribable – like being turned inside out while falling through a kaleidoscope made of lightning and regret. Ivan felt rather than saw Zorya being dragged along beside him, her silver light flickering wildly as competing magical fields tore at her celestial nature.

Behind them, the high priest's roar of fury shook dimensions, but the sound was already growing distant. Stasik's portal was collapsing, sealing them away from the immediate threat but carrying them toward something that might be worse.

"Where are we going?" Ivan managed to shout over the cosmic wind.

"Home," Stasik's voice echoed around them, filled with anticipation and dark amusement. "We're going to see Grandma."

The last thing Ivan heard before darkness claimed him was Zorya's string of celestial curses, inventive enough to make even Baba Yaga proud.

Then they were falling through spaces between spaces, carried by a ferret-shaped chaos entity toward a confrontation Ivan had spent seven years trying to avoid. The Iron Forest was calling him home, whether he wanted to go or not.

And somewhere behind them, in the ruins of his apartment, the Shadows of Koschei were already planning their next move. The hunt was far from over – it was just changing locations.

The grandson of the Iron Witch was finally going home.