There had also been an unwelcome discovery when he awoke. The pistol he’d been carrying since Talas and the burner phone he’d purchased in Shymkent were both gone. He was beginning to get a bad feeling that the roles had reversed and that Baba Yaga was no longer his prisoner. Rather he was hers.

He made his way back to Baba Yaga. The seat was reclined as far as it would go. The male nurse was checking the pulse in her remaining wrist. Franny laid the wet, cool cloth on Baba Yaga’s forehead. She gasped, tried to sit up, and cried out in pain.

He eased her back down. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“Where are we?”

“Somewhere over the pole. I think.”

“Good. Good,” she sighed. She stared at him. It was like being studied by an ancient dinosaur. “What is your name, boy?”

“Francis Black.”

“Francis.” She drew it out as if rolling it across her tongue, tasting the name.

“Only my mother calls me Francis and only when she’s mad.”

“So what do they call you?”

“Frank, but the people I work with call me Franny.”

“A girl’s name.”

“Yeah, cops. They like to think they’re funny. They’re not.”

He lifted the nearly dry towel from her forehead, went back to the bathroom, and soaked it with cold water again. The nurse was switching out an IV bag. When he returned he asked, “So, what’s your name?”

“You know my name.”

“I’ve heard the legend of Baba Yaga. It’s a handle like Curveball or The Turtle.”

“And you don’t think it fits?” she asked, and the wrinkled lips quirked, the briefest flicker of a smile.

“A creepy, scary old woman who eats children and decorates with skulls…” Franny pretended to consider. “Nah, don’t see the similarities at all.”

She responded to his ironic tone with another wintery smile. “Watch yourself, boy.”

“I thought I had graduated to Frank now.”

That seemed to amuse her and she gave a chuckle that quickly became a paroxysm of coughs that shook the thin body. She moaned and tried to guard the broken shoulder and the stump of her arm. Franny knew she was a monster who had kidnapped jokers, forced people to fight to the death for pleasure and profit, but she was also a suffering old woman. He held her close, trying to steady the bones in her shoulder while the nurse held the stump of her arm to keep it still.

Eventually the spasm passed, and he laid her back down. She was panting in pain, and sweat slicked her face. He wiped it away with the towel and went to get her a cup of water. The withered lips closed on the edge of the cup as he held her against his shoulder, and guided the cup to her lips. After a few sips she nodded and he put her down again.

“My name is Mariamna. Mariamna Solovyova.”

Thursday

THURSDAY