I was watching my dinner guests with a smile and listening to their discussions. The storyteller Dennis replied to my letter as soon as he got it and hopped on the next plane to come for a visit, because he was so excited to share his stories with new people and to learn new stories from them. He also brought his apprentice and wife Emma, who he found while visiting Australia. She was a beautiful Maori woman full of secrets and knowing looks while Dennis paled in comparison, and I mean that literally. He was a pale looking man, with pale blond hair and bright blue eyes. Opposite them sat Tim and they were just making plans on when to introduce Dennis to the Native assembly and what he could expect.

Mia refused to be a part of the conversation, saying that I invited guests without asking her and she would have refused, because she didn’t want strangers in the apartment especially when strangers bring their own guests without saying anything. She has decided to go to New Orleans for vacation, admitting that recent events have been too much and she needs some time off for herself, away from me.

After more than two decades of being bound by magic it was an adjustment for me, but she would send me daily messages that she was doing fine and she would even send a picture or two so that I didn’t worry too much. I was relishing my new found freedom and I didn’t think Mia appreciated it quite as much as I did.

It was after dinner and I was washing dishes, trying not to impose on the conversation when I heard something odd. It was a hissing noise. I looked up through a window that was above the sink and almost had a heart attack. Right beside my reflection, there was a reflection of an older woman with a mouth too big for her face. I turned next to me and exhaled in relief. It was only our Domovoi, the spirit that protected our house from evil.

The relief didn’t last long. Domovoi usually looks like a nice old lady, wrapped in several layers of clothes, always smiling with mouth and eyes half closed. The only way we knew that she was a Domovoi and not just an ordinary spirit was because her face was disproportionate. Her mouth was too big with too many teeth for her small wrinkled face, and her eyes too small. However at that moment, her lips were pulled back in a grimace of rage and her small eyes were abnormally large. I recoiled, thinking she was looking at me, but on closer observation she was most definitely looking outside.

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Cold sweat ran down my back. I turned toward the window again, looking through, wanting to see what made the old Domovoi so upset. I wish I hadn’t looked.

The sun was setting so there was still some light, but shadows in the forest made it hard to see clearly. There was something in the forest, something big. Way too big to be a wendigo or any other kind of monster. It had legs that looked more like tree trunks with twisted knees and something was wrong with how it moved. Eventually I gave up and looked up. It was shaped like a house. My heart stopped beating for a second.

I took a step back, trying to take it all in. The last ray of sun shone on the forest floor and as soon as I saw that I knew what I was looking at.

It was a cabin made out of stone like material with long chicken legs that supported and carried it. The chicken legs were made out of tree trunks thick and sturdy, but the house itself did not look that big. The house had a little turret window on top, and as soon as my eyes went that high I saw one big eye, blinking at me. The window was the eye. The house then turned around, somehow not getting damaged by the trees, as if all of the trees moved out of its way, and walked away a chicken like manner..

I swallowed the lump that formed in my throat and looked at the spirit next to me. The Domovoi slowly went back to its proper form, but no longer smiling. It was watching the outside as if it did not trust the house not to come back. I wanted to turn around and to tell them what I saw, but what would that do?

Baba Yaga was here and there was nothing we could do about it.