Chapter 4: The House on Chicken Legs

Ivan hit the ground hard enough to taste blood and pine needles. The impact drove the air from his lungs, leaving him gasping on a carpet of moss that glowed faintly with its own inner light. Above him, twisted branches formed a canopy so thick that only fragments of sky showed through, and even those glimpses revealed stars in unfamiliar configurations.

"The Iron Forest," he whispered, recognizing the metallic tang in the air and the way shadows moved with predatory intent. "You actually brought us here."

Zorya landed beside him with considerably more grace, her silver light flickering as she oriented herself to their new surroundings. "Dimensional coordinates are..." She paused, her expression shifting from professional assessment to genuine alarm. "This place doesn't exist on any approved charts."

"That's because it's older than your charts," Stasik said, materializing in his ferret form atop a fallen log. His blue fur was dim here, as if the forest's ancient magic was dampening his chaotic energy. "The Iron Forest predates most of your celestial bureaucracy by several millennia."

Ivan pushed himself upright, every muscle protesting. The portal journey had felt like being squeezed through a keyhole made of lightning, and his body was reminding him that humans weren't designed for interdimensional travel. "Where exactly are we?"

"Grandmother's front yard," Stasik replied with apparent cheer. "Welcome home, Ivan Kozlov."

The forest around them was beautiful in the way that apex predators were beautiful – perfectly designed for its purpose, which appeared to be making visitors deeply uncomfortable. The trees weren't quite the right color, their bark shifting between silver and black when observed directly. The moss beneath their feet whispered when stepped on, and the air itself seemed to watch them with invisible eyes.

"This is a restricted dimensional space," Zorya said, her voice tight with the kind of control that came from rigorous training. "Accessing it without proper authorization is—"

"A death sentence, usually," Ivan finished. "The Iron Forest doesn't like uninvited guests. It has a tendency to... digest them."

As if responding to his words, the nearest tree creaked ominously. Its branches had too many joints, and Ivan could swear he saw faces in the bark patterns – expressions of people who had wandered into the forest and never left.

"Comforting," Zorya muttered, but she was already weaving protective barriers around herself. The silver light made the shadows dance in unsettling ways.

"Stay close," Ivan warned, helping her to her feet. "And whatever you do, don't step off the path."

"What path?" Zorya looked around the seemingly random forest floor.

Ivan closed his eyes and reached for memories he'd spent years suppressing. His grandmother's voice, patient and implacable: The forest knows its own, little star. You just have to remember how to listen.

When he opened his eyes again, he could see it – a thread of intention woven through the moss and fallen leaves, leading deeper into the woods. Not a physical path, but something more fundamental. A way through the maze that existed on the border between the physical and spiritual worlds.

"There," he said, pointing. "Can you see it?"

Zorya frowned, then her expression cleared as her celestial training kicked in. "Metaphysical structure. Reinforced with... is that soul magic?"

"Among other things." Ivan started forward, following the invisible thread. "My grandmother doesn't believe in making things easy."

They walked in tense silence, with Stasik ranging ahead and occasionally doubling back to report on what lay ahead. The forest seemed to approve of their presence – barely – but Ivan could feel its attention like a weight on his shoulders. Ancient magic pressed against them from all sides, testing their intentions and finding them... adequate.

"This place is alive," Zorya said after they'd been walking for twenty minutes. "Not just magically active. Genuinely sentient."

"Everything here is alive," Ivan replied. "The trees, the moss, the shadows between the branches. They're all extensions of my grandmother's will, shaped by centuries of her magic." He paused to help Zorya over a particularly gnarled root. "She doesn't just live in the Iron Forest. She is the Iron Forest."

"And if she's dying..."

"Then this place dies with her." Ivan's throat tightened. "Along with everything it's been protecting for the past thousand years."

They walked on, the forest path winding through increasingly surreal landscape. They passed clearings where the ground was made of polished obsidian, groves where the trees grew in perfect geometric patterns, and a stream that flowed uphill while singing lullabies in a language that predated human speech.

"There," Stasik called from ahead. "The clearing."

Ivan's heart lurched as they emerged from the trees into a circular space dominated by a structure that had terrified and fascinated him throughout his childhood. Baba Yaga's hut stood in the center of the clearing, but it wasn't the dwelling of folklore – a simple wooden cabin on chicken legs.

This was architecture as cosmic statement. The building rose three stories, its walls made of what looked like petrified wood but felt like crystallized time. The chicken legs were the size of ancient oaks, their scaled surface gleaming with metallic highlights. The entire structure swayed gently, as if the legs were shifting weight from foot to foot in an eternal dance.

But something was wrong.

"It's dark," Ivan said, the words coming out strangled. "It's never dark."

Throughout his childhood, the hut had blazed with warm golden light, windows glowing like beacons in the forest's twilight. Now, every window was black, and the front door – which should have been standing open in welcome – was closed tight.

"Grandmother?" Ivan called out, his voice echoing strangely in the clearing. "Baba Yaga?"

Silence.

"The wards are still active," Zorya observed, her professional training overriding her obvious unease. "But they're... different. Automated. Like they're running on stored power rather than active will."

Ivan approached the hut with growing dread. The chicken legs didn't react to his presence, didn't lower the structure so he could reach the door. Instead, they continued their gentle swaying, as if the building was asleep or...

"There's a note," Stasik said, his voice unusually subdued.

Pinned to the door with what looked like a iron nail was a piece of parchment covered in his grandmother's spidery handwriting. Ivan's hands shook as he unpinned it and read:

Little star,

If you are reading this, then the Shadows have found their way to my heart, and the old protections have begun to fail. I am held, but not helpless – not yet. The ritual that binds me requires willing sacrifice, and I am many things but never willing to serve Koschei's purposes.

You have perhaps a day before they complete their work. When I fall, the barriers between worlds will crumble, and the Deathless One will walk free in forms both old and new. This cannot be allowed.

The tools you need are in the cellar. The knowledge you require is in your blood. The courage... that, little star, you must find for yourself.

Trust the chaos. Trust the light. Trust yourself.

The Iron Forest remembers its own.

— Your grandmother, who loves you more than safety

P.S. – The ferret knows more than he pretends. Make him tell you about the keys.

Ivan read the letter three times before the words fully registered. When they did, his knees nearly buckled.

"A day," he whispered. "We have less than a day to stop a cosmic apocalypse, and my grandmother expects me to do it with tools I don't understand and magic I've spent my entire adult life avoiding."

"The keys," Zorya said suddenly. "What keys?"

All eyes turned to Stasik, who was doing his best to look like an innocent woodland creature. The effect was somewhat undermined by his glowing blue fur and the way shadows bent around him.

"Stasik," Ivan said in a voice that would have done his grandmother proud. "What keys?"

The ferret sighed dramatically. "The Keys of Koschei. Seven artifacts that bind the Deathless One's power and keep him from manifesting fully in any single dimension. Your grandmother has been collecting them for centuries."

"And?"

"And I may have helped her hide them in various locations throughout the forest." Stasik's grin was apologetic but not particularly repentant. "She thought it would be safer if no one person knew all the locations."

"Including her own grandson," Ivan said flatly.

"Especially her own grandson. You have a tendency to worry about things."

Zorya stepped forward, her silver light flickering with what Ivan was beginning to recognize as barely controlled fury. "You're telling us that the artifacts needed to stop a cosmic horror are scattered throughout a sentient forest that's slowly dying, and our only guide is a chaos entity who thinks this is amusing?"

"When you put it like that, it does sound challenging," Stasik admitted.

Ivan stared at the dark windows of his grandmother's hut, feeling the weight of inherited responsibility settling on his shoulders like a lead cloak. Somewhere out there, the Shadows of Koschei were draining his grandmother's life force to power a ritual that would remake the world in their master's image. He had perhaps twenty-four hours to find seven hidden artifacts, master magic he'd been running from for years, and somehow rescue the most powerful witch in the known dimensions.

"This is insane," he said.

"Completely," Zorya agreed.

"Utterly," Stasik added cheerfully.

Ivan looked at his unlikely companions – a celestial law enforcement officer who'd been trying to arrest him six hours ago, and a ferret-shaped chaos god who treated cosmic catastrophe like an amusing puzzle. Not exactly the allies he would have chosen, but apparently the ones he had.

"Right," he said, straightening his shoulders. "Let's go save the world."

Above them, the hut's windows remained dark, but for just a moment, Ivan could have sworn he saw a flicker of golden light in the highest window – his grandmother's study, where she'd taught him his first lessons in magic and responsibility.

The Iron Forest held its breath, waiting to see if Baba Yaga's grandson would finally accept his inheritance.

The hunt for the Keys of Koschei was about to begin.