Babayaga

diesel’s thick cloud of exhaust trailed behind the boat, dimming the stars, one by one, as their course bore them deep into the comfort of the coming winter’s darkness.

Sleepily, her thoughts drifted back to Will. She had not wanted to leave Paris. She had taken the girl back into the city with her and found them a place to stay. She thought they could be there for a while, perhaps she had hoped to stalk him. Both curious and protective, she wanted to watch her rabbit try to find his way. But instead it was he who had flushed her out, the way the shock of gunfire frightens fowl from the brush.

It was only a few days after she had last seen him, when she and Noelle were holed up in the Bercy Hotel. She went into a baker’s shop to pick up a baguette, and there she heard the song. It caught her ear right away, as if it were hunting for her, calling to her. She had glanced around the shop until she found the little transistor radio the baker had perched up in the corner. The song came out of the little speaker, tinny and rough with static:

Zoya, Zoya, Zoya,
the girl with the forever fragrance,
the girl with the magical style,
come back to me,
come back, I need to be near
Eglantine, Eglantine, Eglantine.

It was a jingle for a cheap perfume, but she knew it was really a message for her. He was trying to lure her back. She recalled the way he had described advertising, like a campaign in a war. So he had sent the song out riding the invisible airwaves, raining down all over the city to find her. It was as good a trick as the most skilled witch could concoct. She could sense his desperation: he would use all the weapons he had mastered, everything he could muster. This was merely the first shot from his cannonade.

She went back to the small hotel, got the girl, packed up, and left. She knew there would be no rest for her in Paris. She had to take the girl and go.

Offended and shaken, she knew, too, that Will would never stop trying to find her. Once he had tried and failed with every tool in his arsenal, he would begin to search for her on foot. He would sense that she was gone and then he would go out searching blindly. He would run down endless trails to stone-cold dead ends, he would look for her in empty hotel lobbies and sun-bleached squares, he would wander through twisted warrens of uncountable cities and sleepy port towns, he would stumble across the jagged terrain of a thousand torn horizons. Perhaps the owls would lead him back to her, but probably not. It was for the best if they let him go, for he should never stop, he should always be running the wrong way. Yes, she thought, never slow down, Will, keep searching, fruitlessly, endlessly, let this be your punishment, for my heart burns, like the stinging, raw palm of some lost and drowning sailor when the storm has pulled the last rope from his grasp. Who knows if I will heal or if I will ever be whole. You have softened me, made me vulnerable, creating a weakness here in my heart where I can afford none. You asked a lioness to be a lamb, you asked a crocodile to help you ford the river, you lay with the viper and dared to ask her not to bite, and the sad thing is, I tried, with every fiber, every muscle, I tried, Will. But now, I will live forever and this pain shall never perish, and that is why I curse you. I have made you heroic, and you will stay strong for a long time, broad-chested and sharp-eyed, and my curse will drive you onward, she thought, until, finally, you are broken, like a blind and ruined horse tearing through the briars. Maybe the owls will guide you back to me, maybe not, but I hope with my whole heart they keep you running the wrong way. I hope they make you suffer through it all. It is the oldest and most simple curse on earth, and when properly applied, no cure can be found. Some might call it love.

“Zoya, Zoya, Zoya…”

HISTORICAL NOTE

The Central Intelligence Agency’s infiltration of various European literary movements centered in Paris has been vigorously documented. The agency’s influence on global, especially European, advertising during the same era is more anecdotal, though any serious research would possibly reward the diligent. While popular mythology dates the decline of Detroit as coincident with the ’67 Twelfth Street Riot, in fact the “Paris of the Midwest” began losing its sizable population more than a decade earlier (see Time magazine’s article “Detroit in Decline,” published in 1961). As for the immigration of various castes of Russians into Western Europe following the 1917 revolution—including White Russian nobility, Orthodox clergy, and other curious figures—this too has been the subject of both history and speculation.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to acknowledge the coven who coaxed & encouraged, first Liz Boone and my mom & sis and also Stephanie Cabot, Sylvie Rabineau, Jennifer Barth, Carolyn Mugar, Audi Martel, Sophia Rzankowski, Catherine Bull, Kat Hartman, Helen Ectors, Shannon Cobb, Valerie Elbrick, Susanne Hilberry, and the two stars who guide me through the dark, Nora Montana & Carolina Rose.

Much gratitude too to my ever-bemused editor Sean McDonald & the crew at FSG, to Lorin Stein & the gang at The Paris Review, and special thanks to Ambassador Hartman for leading me to his tailor.

ALSO BY TOBY BARLOW

Sharp Teeth

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