"Not today. Go. And take the blessing of the Widow and the Motherland with you, young man."

"Thank you again, Baba. The tea was excellent," he says, and turns to leave and return to his horse.

He takes two days to gather what supplies he needs, and three of the younger lancers from the rota volunteer to escort him. He accepts but tells them he will leave them behind at Sanyza and go through the forest alone. They protest, until he reminds them that he is following instructions from a hag, at which point they reluctantly agree that deviating from her words is unwise and they will wait at the tirsa.

He doesn't even have to explain why he's going or what, exactly, he's looking for. "I asked the hag about a problem and she said to do this" gets grumbling acceptance from everyone, even his father. (Well, his grandmother seems to have worked out that it's about him having witch-sight, from her vaguely smug looks, but she doesn't say anything about it.)

And then they set out, with spare horses carrying food (and coins to buy more along the road). Northwest over open ground to Belava, where he opens the bag in the white moon's light as ordered. Then north along the East Road, cross the Lynsk at Baiyn and ask better directions. Which are to turn east at Yvegka, and then over open ground again to Sanyza. Two and half weeks of travel, three-quarters if you count the two days preparing, and they arrive at the home of the local druzhina with ten days left before Teodor fails his quest.

"What brings you to our little tirsa, honored cousin Kamarev?"

"A task from a hag, alas. A personal one; I must go deep into the forest by the next dark of the white moon."

"I can find you a hunter to ride the good paths to the river. But be careful - in those woods, there is a hag most fearsome. Baba Ostankya is not a children's tale, not in Dukhlys Forest."

"I know. It is her I must seek. I would not ask any to ride with me - my comrades who came with me will stop here."

The local headman turns very serious, and even sets down his kvas. "Fell tasks, then. But if your hag told you it must be done, it must be done. What the cost if you fail?"

"I will bear it myself. If I am not back by the next dark moon, my comrades will carry the bad news home to my father. I am sure they can make themselves useful while they are here - we brought denga to pay, but I know there is not so much coin can do, this far from the nearest market."

With a grim expression, he nods and drains his mug, then refills both of theirs. "As befits a druzhina and an ataman's son. You will be a fine successor for him, I am sure. Tomorrow, I will lead you to the river myself. But tonight, while it is warm - we drink!"

"We drink!"

The paths from the tirsa to the river are not used enough to be obvious, but they pick their way along them and the horses don't complain. Twice they pause the travel to take a deer with their bows and get venison to eat.

The third night, the man musters the courage to ask Teodor about his task.

"What is it that you had to do, that needs you to find the hag of all hags?"

Teo is silent for a few moments, then decides that his help has earned the truth, or something close to it.

"I have the witch-gift. A strong one. And you know what the Ice Witches do to men with the gift. Our hag, she said she could take it away, but it would be rough. I seek Baba Ostankya because I was promised that she could remove it cleanly, leaving me with all my senses."

"You may die. Most who intrude on the Hag Mother do."

"Well, that's what this trinket is for," he says, waving the horn that's been hanging on a leather cord from his neck, "Shows that our Baba Sonya thought I should come here, and will help me walk through Baba Ostankya's traps. If I am lucky."

"Brave young man, you are."

"That or foolish. I'm not sure which - perhaps I'll wish I'd let the Ice Court take me, if I'm unlucky."

"Either way, I'll drink to that." They didn't bring much kvas along, but there's enough for a couple little mugs.

He parts ways at the river, after asking for any landmarks he should be able to see that he's approaching the hills. He makes somewhat better time along the bank, but it's still several days, and he's thankful for the leftover venison. It has a bitter taste, like most meat smoked this far north, but it's filling and he doesn't need to stop to hunt more - the moon is down to a thin crescent, and he's regretting taking two whole days to prepare.

But on the fourth night, he feels the horn shake northward as he is making camp. Three nights hence, if he's counting right; four if he can do without a second try. Soon, he'll face Baba Ostyanka - or else face Ursun in his own caves.

Through this last part, he's leading his horse, and going slowly. The horn guides him, but there is no path, and often he has to backtrack around a particularly treacherous-looking gully. He wishes he could leave Lovkiya behind for this, but there was absolutely no safe place to pasture her for multiple days, and probably isn't anywhere in this forest.

But he does get there. He walks around a rise and finds a goat path, and the horn shakes vigorously. Thank you for the clear warning, he does not say because the hag told him not to. He then berates himself for thinking it too loudly, because he has witch-gift, that might work. He sets up camp and hangs the horn outside his tent.

He's really doing this. Preparing to navigate a path of traps by the Old Mother Hag, Baba Ostankya, the subject of a thousand scary children's stories and maternal threats.

Because he doesn't want to have to stop seeing the winds of magic.

He lied four nights ago. He knows perfectly well this is foolish. And he won't even get a flying ship out of it.

...To be fair, if there's anyone living who could give the fool his flying ship it would be Baba Ostankya.

Not that he can ask.

He rests most of the day - it's been hard travel, and he does want to be sharp. He prepares snares in the morning, and cooks a small rabbit stew as the sun starts to sink. He eats and reads what notes he wrote, when he had gotten home from Baba Sonya's hut and found spare parchment. But he is watching for the moment of sunset, and then he stands, takes the horn in hand, and peers ahead at the path, with both of his sights.

He does not think he could actually describe to anyone else what he sees on that path. It's magic, but magic applied to hide itself, even from witchsight. There are specific steps he can see are safe by the light of the moon that isn't there, and he's not sure if that's his witchsight, his normal sight, or something the spirit in the horn is doing. The spirit surges and swirls and sometimes gestures for him to move in a direction, and he does. At one point her almost steps into a snare, but the snare is made of magic and it's not tensed in any of the normal directions, but another one at a right angle to reality. He walks along the top of a log with a nasty pool of something that 'sounds' boiling to either side, and only a warning from the horn's spirit prepares him before a terrifying vision of what he'd guess is the Ancient Widow angry charges at him from nowhere and he has to struggle to keep his balance.

His eyes are sharp. His mind is level and calm. And he still has to get lucky, at least three times that he notices.

But, as the foul green moon rises over the World's Edge Mountains... he reaches the cabin. The hut - and the only way it could be more of a child's story of a hag's hut is if it rested on chicken legs.

And he reaches out with the horn, and knocks on the door, two sharp raps.

"Who visits my home on the night of dark moon?", says a voice through the door.

"Teodor Kamarev, Baba Ostankya. Baba Sonya sent me to you."