“House, run!” Baba Yaga cried, and the house took off at a clip. Everyone inside bounced around like they were inside a popcorn machine.
Baba Yaga darted to her window and shouted a few screeching threats out at Mirror and Atticus. Then she reached over her head and a spear made from magic and smoke appeared in her hand. She hurled it out the window, followed by another, and yet another. Bunny took the other window, letting fly long tendrils of lightning from her fingertips. Despite their efforts, a massive explosion rocked the house, knocking everyone off their feet.
“Now do you see what we’re up against?” Bunny demanded
“You have my power at a price, poison maker,” Baba Yaga said.
“A price?” Morgan cried.
“What is in it for the Old Mother?” Baba Yaga croaked.
Sabrina was incensed. “You get to live in a world that isn’t ruled by a maniac.”
Baba Yaga laughed. “The world is always ruled by a maniac.”
“Fine, Old Mother. You want payment for your services. Name your price,” the Wicked Queen said.
“Your eyes.”
No one in the house spoke, and for a moment all they could hear were the explosions outside. Had Sabrina heard the old witch correctly? Had Baba Yaga just asked Bunny Lancaster for her eyes? She glanced around the room. On a table nearby was a jar of what she had previously hoped were hard-boiled eggs. Now she realized that had been wishful thinking.
“Her eyes?” Henry repeated.
“A witch’s magic is in her eyes,” Morgan explained. She looked distressed.
“Every spell I’ve read, every experience I’ve lived through, every vision that has ever come to me are held in them. In essence, giving her my eyes is giving her my power,” Bunny said.
“That’s my deal, Your Majesty. This coven requires a crone—unless you want to dig up Frau Pfefferkuchenhaus’s worm-eaten corpse.” Baba Yaga cackled.
Another blast slammed into the house, and this time the structure could not stand its ground. It stumbled forward and crashed face-first into the forest floor. Sabrina grabbed her sister’s hand just as everyone slid with an orchestra of groans into the windows in a mess of legs and arms. Elvis got the worst of the weight and whimpered at the bottom of the pile.
“Get up, house!” Baba Yaga screeched, and the house obeyed. Unfortunately, its efforts to regain its footing sent the people inside bouncing and tumbling again. It was a miracle that no one was killed, especially when the house rocked back and forth like a prizefighter shaking off an uppercut. It lumbered onward, only to be blasted and fall yet again.
From outside, Mirror called to them. “Is there really any point to the running? What I’m asking for is such a small thing! You’ll only suffer by refusing.”
“Don’t listen,” Atticus shouted. “The suffering is my favorite part.”
“We have to fight them,” Puck said, pulling his sword from his belt.
“That thing out there has access to all arcana. We don’t have the magic. We need the power of three if we stand a chance,” Bunny Lancaster said.
The house was rocked by a third massive assault. When Sabrina righted herself, she saw Baba Yaga extending her hand to the Wicked Queen.
Morgan gasped. “Bunny, don’t do it.”
“I have made bigger sacrifices,” the queen said as she reached out and took the crone’s hand. “Very well, Old Mother. We have a deal.”
Baba Yaga smiled a ghastly smile. There was a flash and a rumble and to Sabrina’s shock and disbelief it looked as if their hands turned to stone—like the hands of a statue in a sculpture garden. Then the rocky flesh cracked as if filled with red-hot magma. Both witches then extended their hands to Morgan, who joined them. Her hands went through the same eerie change until they all looked toward the ceiling and said, “We are bound by coven.”
The electricity in the air made everyone’s hair stand on end. The trio faced the open windows and chanted an incantation in an ancient language. A wave of tremendous magic exploded out of their chests and flowed out the window. Sabrina raced to the window just in time to see the magic transform into a massive giant, a hundred feet tall, made of mist and wind. The mist giant attacked Mirror and Atticus, snatching them in its unearthly fists. Atticus fought with his sword and Mirror launched into a barrage of spells, but their efforts could not stop the creature.
“Crone, you’ve got them occupied for the time being, but we need to get this house out of here,” Henry shouted.
Baba Yaga ordered her house to run, and it got back up on its legs and dashed away, leaving the villains far behind them. As they left Mirror and Atticus in the distance, Sabrina watched the two villains—one with a face of evil and one with a face of love. She quietly prayed that the next time they met she would know how to stop them both.