Dreaming Anastasia by Joy Preble Page A

behind me. “Run!”
    She hesitates for only a second, then follows me. I can hear the thumping of her backpack as it slams into her while we sprint across the playground, leaving a wake of scattered gravel behind us.
    I know I shouldn’t slow down to look, but I can’t help myself. Behind us, just as I’d expected, two men clad in black dusters are advancing on us at a swift pace.
    We zigzag through the park, Anne’s dancer’s legs pumping to keep up with me, then sprint down the tree-lined street in the opposite direction of the school. I can see my car not too far down the block.
    â€œOver there!” I shout as I half-guide, half-drag her the last few steps to the Mercedes. With my other hand, I search my jacket pocket for the remote. My fingers find it, and I press the top button. I yank open the passenger door and shove Anne inside. Then I race around the car to the other side.
    One of the men is completely unfamiliar to me. But the other—the other is someone I haven’t seen in a long while. And unfortunately, it doesn’t look as if he’s interested in having tea and getting reacquainted.
    This time, when I reach my arms out, I don’t fumble for the words. My brain clears of everything but the spell. I can feel the power surge through me as the magic does its work.
    The air around me crackles, and I watch with a solid satisfaction as the thin blue flames fly from my fingertips and meet their mark. In front of me, the two men—the one I know and the one who is a stranger—kneel on the street, doubled over in pain. On the ground next to the stranger, a pistol lay, glowing a deep red.
    I yank open the driver’s door, climb in, turn the key in the ignition, and throw the car in gear. This is not good, I tell myself. Not good at all.
    Next to me, Anne inches up from where she’s been crouched on the floor and settles herself into the passenger seat. She glances briefly behind us, then at me.
    â€œOh my God,” she says. “Oh my God. They were trying to kill us. Do you know them? Why were they—? And you? What did you just—I mean, are you—?”
    â€œWe need to get out of here first,” I say. “I need to keep you safe. And you’re not safe until we put some distance between us and them.”
    She nods and looks behind her another time.
    As for me, I breathe in deeply, trying to slow my heart from slamming its way out of my chest. Then I steer the car around the corner and head west.

The Forest, Late Afternoon
    Anastasia
    The hands crawl swiftly and steadily across the shining wooden floor. Auntie Yaga sits in her rocker, waiting. She holds out her arms, the sleeves of her brown dress empty and limp. She gestures to the hands, the ends of her sleeves flopping up and down as she does so.
    Obediently, as I have seen them do many times before, the hands continue their passage. Up, up Baba Yaga’s skirt they climb, up her legs, over her lap, and then, with a twisting motion, back into her sleeves. She smiles her hideous, gleaming smile. Her eyes glow deep and black, like two coals.
    The house settles around us, its two hen’s legs shuffling for a foothold amid dead leaves and piles of twigs and branches, curved and knotted like so many broken fingers.
    â€œI let them compel me,” Auntie Yaga says. “I let myself fall prey to their magic. Gave my power to men who dabbled in spells—men whose pride let them believe they could alter what no man should alter.”
    She stands, and with an odd grace, drifts across the room to me. My pulse skips a beat as she rests one of her hands—the same hands which have just returned to her from wherever they have traveled—on my head.
    â€œBut how could I do otherwise?” she says as she gently strokes my hair. “You are safe here. You are alive. And they are coming for you now, Anastasia. I did not believe he would keep his part of the bargain. But he