Nearly cried 3 times trying to write this but I did it it's on time for once oh my god
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Impossible Tasks Part 2
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There was always a catch. Especially when the person who gave you the job blatantly said they wanted to eat you. When he'd given in and gone around the back of the house in search of the chicken coop, Jack hadn't been able to figure out what that catch might be. He just knew there absolutely was going to be one.
So far, though, it seemed pretty straight forward. There was a chicken coop. There were also chickens. Put the chickens in the coop. Don't get eaten by a little old lady. Simple. The hardest part was probably just going to be actually catching the chickens.
There were three of them loitering directly outside the little coop, all brown feathers and beady eyes. They lifted their heads to watch him warily as he moved closer.
"Hey there, chickens," Jack greeted quietly, inching closer. "I'm not gonna hurt you. I just want to get you back into your coop."
The chicken closest to him clucked once. The other two took a rapid two steps backwards. Jack immediately stopped walking.
"No, no, it's okay." He crouched down, so he wasn't looming over them so much. They backed up further. Okay, time for a new plan.
Leaving the chickens alone for the moment, Jack wandered over to the coop. It was small, with a wire-mesh door locked with a small padlock – presumably the reason the old woman had given him the key. Inside, there was a blanket of hay, and a perch covered in nests.
...It did not look big enough to fit eight chickens. And come to think of it, if the latch was still locked, how had they even gotten out?
Jack fished the key out of his pocket, and deftly unlocked the latch.
"How am I going to fit eight chickens in here?" he muttered. It was barely big enough for four. There was always a catch, huh.
The sun had only just peaked over the horizon. By his estimate, that gave him about five or six hours to work a miracle. He glanced back over his shoulder. The chickens had retreated closer to the house, still watching him. He wished he still had his staff.
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North stared down at Jack's staff, and found himself filled with dread. It had been washed up in the mud further down the river, caught by some weeds growing on the bank. Jack was nowhere in sight. It was a decidedly Not Good sign.
Brushing off a few dried clumps of mud, North continued down the river.
Maybe this wasn't an omen that something terrible had happened to Jack. Maybe he'd just lost his grip on it, and hadn't made it this far up to find it yet. They'd probably run into each other as they both walked along the bank. Everything was fine.
Right?
(A feeling in his belly contradicted that. His belly had never been wrong before. But there was a first time for everything.)
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This was not working. Somehow, chasing the chickens into a corner and grabbing them like they were footballs and he had a dozen other players ready to jump him had actually worked, but so far that was the only thing that had. Jack was starting to find it hard to maintain any kind of optimism.
He could catch the chickens. He could even get them back in the coop. But the second he turned his back, they managed to escape again.
How? How were they getting out? Was there some kind of secret exit? Were they spy chickens, utilising a hidden tunnel under one of the nests? At this rate, he wasn't even going to have one caught by the time midday came. And no matter how closely he inspected the coop, he couldn't figure out what the problem was.
With a defeated sigh, he slumped against the side of the coop. If North was here, he'd know what to do. At least he was free. And hopefully safe. The thing they'd been chasing – a Bubák, North had said it was called; like a cross between a scarecrow and a skeleton who had a taste for kids – hadn't come after Jack, which meant it had probably targeted North, but if anyone could hold their own against it, it was him.
"Boy!"
Jack turned back towards the house. The old woman was bustling towards him, a steaming bowl in her hands and a scowl on her face. She stopped at his feet, and snickered when she noticed the coop was still empty. Yeah, she'd definitely planned this.
"Eat!" she commanded, thrusting the bowl at him. "Too skinny! Not enough meat on bones!"
Jack took the bowl on reflex. It was filled with some kind of porridge-stew hybrid. "Uh..." The polite thing to do would be to thank her for bothering to feed him at all, but it was kind of hard to do when he knew she was only doing it because she was fully planning on eating him.
If she wanted a thank you, she didn't wait around for it. With a 'pah' and a wave of her hand, she hustled back towards the ladder leading up to the house. Probably to prepare the side dish for the main course she was intending to make him.
Jack sighed again, twirling the spoon around the bowl absently. Even if he'd been hungry, he wouldn't have eaten it. A weak protest, but beggars can't be choosers and all that. He pushed himself back to his feet, and started in the direction the woman had gone.
The dog was still lying near the ladder. If it had moved at all since Jack had last seen it, it wasn't much. Given how skinny it was, that wasn't all too surprising. Jack approached warily, but it did little more than lift its head to watch him.
"Good dog," Jack told it, as if saying it would make it true. He slowly stooped down so it could see the bowl. "You hungry?"
It was. It was salivating just looking at it. But even as Jack set the bowl down in the grass just in front of its paws, it didn't make a move to eat.
"It's okay," he tried. And to prove the point, he retreated back towards the chicken coop. Maybe it would feel safer eating if it wasn't being watched.
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It was easy to get lost in this forest. It almost felt like he was going in circles, if not for the minute changes in the scenery he passed – a rock here, a rotten log there. North had left the river upon finding the remnants of what had at one point been footprints. Bare footprints. Which meant Jack. The prints had faded the further into the trees North had followed them, but they were the only indication of which direction Jack had gone.
He tried to think like Jack. Which directions would call to him? Would he find enjoyment in traversing that mountain of rocks? Or would the circumstances that led him to being forced to travel on foot keep him firmly on the easiest path? Had there been something he was following? A sound, perhaps? Jack's attunement to nature wasn't something North shared. If the wind had been guiding him, North would never be able to guess which way it had taken him.
The bad feeling in his belly hadn't gone away.
This place was too quiet. He'd been walking for at least an hour now, and he hadn't caught sight of a single living thing beyond plants. He hadn't even heard any birdcalls.
North kept his guard up, and kept walking.
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Jack had found the problem. The bottom of the wire in the coop's right-hand wall had broken free of the staples holding it in place, and the chickens were squeezing themselves out through the gap. He'd tried blocking it with a piece of firewood, but the chickens were apparently smart enough to figure out how to move it. The only way to properly seal the hole would be to resecure the wire, but that would require tools. Tools he didn't have.
But maybe the old woman did. If she was willing to let him use them – his failure was to her advantage, after all. Still, it was worth a shot, right?
The dog was sitting up when he reached the ladder again. The bowl was empty. Jack smiled at it as he stepped onto the first rung and started climbing.
The first thing he noticed when he reached the top was the distinct lack of the giant mortar and pestle. He stared at the empty space where it had previously been, lost. It had been too big to fit through the doorway, so she couldn't have taken it inside, and he highly doubted she would have carried it down the ladder. So where had it gone?
Focus, he shook his head. Yeah, it was weird, but he had more important things to worry about.
There was no response when he knocked on the door. He tried again, but no sounds from inside indicated she was even home. Had she gone out somewhere? Surely he would have seen her leave through the gate?
Jack tried the knob. It turned easily; wherever she was, she'd left the door unlocked. He paused just long enough to wonder whether trespassing was a terrible idea or not, and then decided he didn't really care. Letting him in while she wasn't there to borrow some tools was the least she could do, all things considered.
The fire was still burning in the hearth (which felt like a safety hazard but okay), but the pot, full of the same porridge-stew he'd been given, had been set aside. There was no sign of the old woman. The cat was sniffing at the rim, but froze when it spotted him enter.
"You're hungry too, huh," Jack said gently.
The cat bolted to the other side of the room, disappearing behind the loom. Jack grabbed a bowl from the table and ladled some of the stew into it, leaving it on the floor where the cat could get it.
"Tools," he muttered, turning his attention back to the whole reason he'd come back up here. There were no obvious places where she might keep them – not even a cupboard or a set of drawers. Maybe in another room? There was only one door besides the entrance. Jack meandered over to it.
The room beyond was clearly the old woman's bedroom. There was a rickety bed, a nightstand, and a tall wardrobe. All looked handmade. None looked like a place anyone would store tools. He tried the wardrobe anyway, and was rewarded with rows of hanging dresses, and a pile of shoes on the bottom. But, as suspected, no tools.
What were his other options, he wondered, heading back out into the main room. A rock would make a semi-decent hammer. All he'd really need to find was something that could substitute for a staple. Even a bent nail would probably work. But if there weren't any tools, what were the chances he'd find something like that?
Unless...
Maybe the solution wasn't to fix the wire. Maybe it was to pull it out entirely.
He'd already realised that the coop wasn't going to be big enough to fit all eight chickens. Not unless it suddenly got bigger. Or he made it bigger.
An idea already forming in his mind, Jack ran from the house, all but throwing himself down the ladder.
The woodpile around the far side of the house wasn't overly high, but there were more than enough small logs and thick branches for what he needed. It took three trips to cart what he needed back to the coop, and a forth to go back for the axe he'd found buried behind the pile. The dog by the ladder watched him through the gap between the giant legs.
Removing the broken wire was harder than he'd been expecting it to be. He ended up needing to use the axe to lever the remaining staples free, being careful not to further damage the wire; he'd be needing it later.
He then began layering the logs in a U-shape like a deformed Jenga tower, using the axe to cut off small sections to support the side touching the coop. It was unstable, but it left enough space between the logs for airflow and light without risking the chickens being able to climb through the gaps. When the top was as high as the rest of the coop, he settled the wire on the top, and weighed it down with four large sticks.
Now all he had to do was ensure it wouldn't topple over the moment one of the chickens decided to try their luck. A single touch was all it took to ice the connections solid. It wouldn't last forever, but, then, he really only needed it to stay together until just after midday.
Jack stood, dusting off his hands and staring down proudly at his handiwork. It had taken the better part of an hour, but he still had plenty of time. "Time to catch some chickens."
The three chickens from earlier were still loitering around. But after being continuously caught time and again, they were getting smarter. And more evasive. Jack didn't like to think that chickens were smarter than him, but it was really starting to feel that way. He managed to catch the first one by cornering it against the fence, and when he snagged the second by the woodpile, he was relieved to find that, when he returned again to the coop, the first one hadn't managed to find a way out through the renovations.
The third one... took longer. It was much smarter than the other two, and refused to let itself be cornered. After chasing it in circles around the house for ten minutes, Jack took the hint and stopped to think of a Plan B.
"Too bad I don't have some corn or something to lure it with," he told the dog.
The dog scratched at its chain. It was one of those choke collars that tightened the more they struggled, and was pinned down by a wooden stake in the grass.
And it gave Jack an idea.
"You mind if I borrow this?" he asked, crouching down in front of the dog. It didn't pull away when he reached for the collar, so he carefully loosened it and slipped it up and over the dog's head. It immediately stood, shaking out its fur, and wagging its tail as it enjoyed its newfound freedom. Jack left it to it, pulling up the end staked down, and went off to catch his third chicken.
It took five painstaking minutes of chasing it again before he managed to slip the collar around its neck like a lasso. Its own frantic running was all it took to secure it, and finally, finally, Jack hoisted Chicken #3 up into his arms and marched it back to the coop.
Three down, five to go.
If he could even find them.
He'd been around the entire yard over a dozen times now. And he'd only ever seen those three chickens. A quick check of the sun's position told him he only had a few hours left until midday.
A loud bark from near the gate made him turn. The dog had wandered over to the fence line, and was intermittently peering through the gaps between the bones and looking to Jack.
"What is it?" Jack asked, slowly making his way over.
The dog barked again.
"I can't let you out," he apologised, stopping just behind it so he was well and truly out of the fence's reach. "The fence doesn't... uh... like me."
Another bark.
And then, from beyond the yard, a cluck.
Oh.
Oh no.
With insurmountable dread, Jack looked over the fence. Five chickens stared back.
"You have got to be kidding me."
They were outside the yard. And when the dog next barked, all five of them turned tail and disappeared between the trees of the surrounding forest.
Five chickens left – five chickens he had three hours at best to catch – and they were in the one place he couldn't go.
"What do I do?" he murmured, the dawning horror that this really was impossible slowly sinking in. He couldn't get past the fence. Could he lure them back in somehow? With food maybe? There was still some stew in the house. Did chickens eat stew?
The dog whined. Jack dropped a hand to pet it.
"When your owner cooks me, I hope she at least gives you the leftovers," he said grimly.
With a brief lick to his fingers, the dog slipped between a small gap in the fence and sprinted for the woods, out of sight in seconds.
"Or not." It was probably for the best, though. At least one of them would be free.
There was... a chicken.
The first living creature North had seen all day, and it was a chicken. Probably a domesticated one, too, given how it seemed utterly unfazed by his presence. Did that mean there was a house nearby?
A second chicken darted out from under a bush. North blinked.
His chicken was a little rusty, but maybe one of them had seen Jack. It never hurt to ask.
A loud bark from somewhere in the distance stopped him before he could try. The chickens immediately stood at attention. When the bark came a second time, closer than before, they vanished back into the surrounding shrubbery. Less than a minute later, a painfully skinny dog skidded to a halt in front of him.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other.
"Chickens," said the dog.
North wordlessly pointed in the direction they'd gone.
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It was getting painfully close to midday. Jack had sat down in a defeated heap close to the fence, hoping he'd somehow spot the chickens as they miraculously let themselves back into the yard where he could catch them. But wherever they'd gone, they weren't coming back.
The old woman hadn't come back yet from wherever she'd disappeared to. So far that was the only silver lining to the horrible storm cloud his day had become.
He supposed he could just forget about the deal. Try his luck finding a way past the fence. He still had the axe. Would trying to chop his way through work? Finding out couldn't be worse than sitting here waiting for midday.
A minute saw him back again with the axe in hand. He hoisted it up, took aim at the place where the gate was hinged to the rest of the fence (by a hand, of all things) and swung. A limb reached up, grabbed the point where the axe head joined the handle, and flung it straight out of Jack's hand and off towards the trees.
"Oh."
He hoped he wasn't going to regret that.
A screaming chicken raced out from where the axe disappeared.
Jack stared, bewildered, as it fluttered up over the bone fence and into the yard.
"Did I do that?"
A second chicken followed the first, and then a third and a fourth. He could barely believe what he was seeing. The chickens had come back? On their own?
Then the dog was back, whole body shaking with the intensity of the way it was wagging its tail. There was a limp chicken hanging from its mouth. It came back through the fence the same way it had gotten out, and danced around Jack's feet excitedly.
"You brought them back?" Jack asked.
It barked around the chicken, and started towards the coop, stopping every few steps as if to urge Jack to follow.
Right. The coop. The deal. He didn't have long left.
As soon as he took the chicken from the dog (thankfully still alive, just terrified), it sped off after the remaining four. Jack carefully set the poor bird inside the coop, and turned back just in time to see the last four chickens careening towards him. All he had to do was hold the door open, and they ran in all by themselves.
"Oh thank god," Jack breathed as he finally swung the door shut and relocked the latch, all eight chickens caught and secured. He pressed his face into the dog's neck. "Thank you."
The dog licked him.
"You should probably make a break for it, though, before she gets back."
"It's midday," said the old woman, as if summoned by his words. "Chore finished?"
Jack slowly lifted his head to stare up at her. From the expression on her face, she expected him to have failed. Her gaze drifted briefly to the dog, shifting into a scowl, and the dog inched back, head lowered submissively. Jack quickly stood, drawing the attention back to him.
"All eight chickens back in their coop," he told her smugly.
She frowned at him, and stepped closer to the coop to see for herself. "What is this?" she demanded, gesturing to Jack's 'addition'.
"The coop wasn't big enough for eight chickens so I fixed it."
"This is not-"
"There are eight chickens confined to the coop, as asked. You never said I couldn't expand it."
She narrowed her eyes. Jack stared back, daring her to contest it.
"Fine," she spat. "Then you get started on next chore, yes?"
He would really prefer not to – it was probably going to be worse than the last one – but what choice did he have?
At her beckoning, he followed her across the yard, gesturing behind his back for the dog to make a break for it. She stopped at the wood pile, and Jack had a sudden very bad feeling he knew what was about to happen.
"Chop this wood into kindling," she ordered, and the grin on her face told him she knew exactly what had just happened to the axe. "Three hours."
Jack turned back to the coop. The dog was gone. There'd be no retrieving the axe.
And there was the regret, right on cue.
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Following the path he'd thought the dog had come from was the right decision, North declared to himself. It had been about as confusingly monotonous as everywhere he'd been so far, but by the time the sun was completely overhead, he knew he'd come the right way. The trees were starting to thin, and through them he could just see what looked like a clearing. The perfect place for someone living in the woods to build their house.
But it wasn't relief he felt when he finally stepped out from the cover of the trees.
There was a house, alright, but not a normal one.
"Baba Yaga," he cursed. No one else would have a house that stood on legs like that. And if Jack had ended up caught by her...
North inched closer to the fence (made of bones, of course, because Baba Yaga was nothing if not a woman of poor taste), trying to spot anyone in the yard beyond. There was no sign of the woman herself – either she was in the house or she wasn't home – but there was a figure hunched over by the woodpile. A very familiar figure.
Oh no.
He worked his way slowly around the side of the yard, sticking to the shadow of the trees until he was out of sight of any of the house's windows, just in case. Jack was crouched on the grass, a log in front of him. He appeared to be hacking at it with a piece of ice, but it didn't seem to be having much effect.
"Jack!" he whisper yelled.
Jack's head shot up. "North?"
"Over here!"
Their eyes met. The relief North felt was reflected on Jack's face.
"Oh, thank MiM," Jack breathed. His attention darted to his staff, but to North's surprise he said nothing of it. "North, I need you to go get that axe for me!" he pointed out towards the trees on the far side of the yard. "I have less than three hours to chop this into kindling."
So it was as he feared. Baba Yaga had forced him to complete her impossible tasks. He didn't ask why the axe was on the other side of the fence, or why Jack didn't just jump the fence and get it himself. He retrieved it, and when Jack refused to get close enough to take it from him, he simply tossed it the short distance. Jack wasted no time snatching it and starting to hack at the log he'd previously been working on.
"The Bubák?" he asked, not looking up.
"Escaped," North confessed. "Are you alright, Jack?"
"Other than having an old lady wanting to eat me? I'm fine."
North grimaced.
"I'm one chore down, though," Jack continued, sparing him a quick smile. "Only this and one more to go."
"And what did she agree to give in return?" Because she might have been unsavoury, but Baba Yaga always kept her deals.
"A lift back to town; I was hoping I'd be able to hail down Sandy for help." He paused chopping, a frown settling on his face. "But I don't really need it now, huh? Reckon she'd let me go?"
North shook his head. If only it were that easy. "Deal has been struck," he replied regretfully. "You must see it through." But that didn't mean he had to do it on his own. And, in fact, trying to do it on his own would almost guarantee failure. "Throw me log."
Jack turned to him quizzically. "What?"
North drew his sword with a conspiratorial grin. "I will help you finish task."
A sword wasn't exactly the best thing to split wood with, but North's brute strength more than made up for it. Between the two of them, they'd meet Baba Yaga's deadline with time to spare.
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One task to go. One more stupid, deliberately impossible chore, and he'd be free at last. And with North's help, it would be a breeze for sure. No one could problem solve quite like North. Jack had been beyond relieved to see him, especially when he realised that he'd managed to find his staff. As much as he wanted it back, though, for now leaving it with North, who had hidden in the trees as soon as the old woman – Baba Yaga, according to North – had made an appearance, was the safest option. He had a very strong suspicion that no matter how high he tried to fly, the fence would find a way to stop him. And if Baba Yaga caught him with it, she would wonder where he'd gotten it, and if she knew that he was getting outside help, it was possible she'd make the last chore something far, far worse. If that was even possible.
As it was, Jack found himself staring down at a loaf of bread in stupor.
"You want me to what?"
"Unbake it," Baba Yaga repeated. "I need ingredients for dinner."
"Unbake a loaf of bread."
"Are you deaf, boy?"
This was... this was really, truly impossible. You couldn't unbake something. It just... It didn't work like that.
If he could find the ingredients that went into it, he could pretend he'd unbaked it, maybe. But he didn't know what recipe she'd used, and she would almost certainly be able to tell.
"You have until sundown," she concluded, and then disappeared outside, leaving Jack alone in the house.
He sat down heavily in one of the chairs by the dining table, and dropped his head into his hands. The cat curled itself around his ankles and purred.
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Jack had been gone a while now. North continued to watch from his hiding place just inside the woods, waiting for any sign he was coming back out from the house. Baba Yaga flew overhead in her mortar and pestle, but still Jack did not come out. He was tempted to climb the fence and go check on him, but given how Jack hadn't tried to escape the entire time North had been there, it was possible that she had enchanted the fence to stop guests from leaving. And he would be more help to Jack if he retained freedom of movement.
Then, several minutes later, he spotted the telltale blue of Jack's hoodie as he descended the ladder, and made his way over to the woodpile. North stepped out of his hiding place and met him by the fence. But one look at Jack's resigned face told him all he needed to know.
Jack held up a loaf of bread.
North waited.
"I have to unbake it."
Ah. Well. That was problematic.
"Throw me my staff?" Jack held out his free hand. "Escape might be my only option here."
If Jack had to be a fugitive from a powerful witch for the rest of his life, so be it, North thought. He threw the staff over the fence, and watched as Jack easily caught it, frost lighting up along its length. A far better sight than the dull piece of wood it had been the entire time North had held it.
For a moment Jack simply stood there, eyes closed. When he opened them, the resignation was gone, replaced with determination.
"Here goes," he said, and shot into the air.
He went high, well and truly above the house, before starting towards the woods. On the ground, the fence began to move. The bones started locking together, stretching upwards, until half the fence had been pulled apart to make a long skeletal rope. It snaked up into the air faster than North could follow, and the next thing he knew, Jack was lying on his back on the grass inside the yard, the fence restoring itself to its former shape.
"Jack!" North cried. "Are you alright?!"
Jack let out a pained wheeze. "That's about what I expected," he managed.
So he'd been right. The fence was enchanted. There would be no escape until Jack completed the last task. And if he failed, well, it wouldn't be an issue anymore.
"Any ideas?" Jack slowly pushed himself up.
Unbake a cake. Unbake a cake. There had to be a way. Surely.
Think, think, think.
"Idea!" North crowed. Jack flinched at the sudden outburst, but a smile quickly took the place of his surprise.
"I'm all ears, North!"
North held up a finger, still thinking through the logistics. "How much time do you have?"
"Till sundown. Why?"
Yes, this could definitely work. North pulled out his last snow globe, and whispered a destination to it. To Jack, he said, "I will be back soon." And smashed the globe against the grass.
.
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Father Time did not look up from his notes as North barrelled out of a portal directly into his study. He'd probably already known he was coming. What was it like, he wondered, to experience time in such a non-linear way?
"Father Time," he greeted, when he continued to ignore him. The room echoed with the ticking of countless clocks.
"Nicholas St. North," Father Time returned. He removed his glasses and set them down on the desk as he turned disdainful eyes on North. "Back again?"
The last time North had been here, from his perspective, had been a while ago. From Father Time's was anyone's guess.
"And I suppose this, once again, has to do with that infuriating little winter spirit you remain confusingly attached to?" Father Time shook his head wearily.
"He has been caught by Baba Yaga," North confessed, choosing to ignore the slight against Jack. If he made Father Time mad, the last thing he would do was help. "She has tasked him with unbaking a loaf of bread. It is his final task."
North had never seen a more exasperated expression on anyone's face in his entire life.
"I cannot simply break the laws of the universe because your ward cannot keep himself out of trouble! You already owe me more than your fair share of favours on his behalf," Father Time snapped. "Unbake a loaf of bread. Pointless."
"If he does not complete the task, Baba Yaga will eat him," North pressed. "I will not let this happen."
"Then make a deal with the witch yourself!" Father Time stood, stalking over to a shelf on the other side of the room, his back to North.
"And what happens when I, too, cannot complete her tasks?"
"Not my problem."
North narrowed his eyes. He normally wasn't one for threats, but in this instance, he figured he could make an exception. "You are concerned with the laws of nature, yes?"
Father Time pulled a book down and started absently flipping through it. "Yes. We must all obey them."
A sly smirk crept its way onto North's face. "And what of those laws when Seraphina discovers what has happened to her youngest?"
Father Time stilled, page halfway turned.
"She will take out her rage on Baba Yaga," he said at length.
"And if she discovers that you refused to help?"
The book snapped shut. Father Time whirled with a glare. And North knew immediately that he had won. Even to a being as otherly as Father Time, Seraphina could become a threat.
"If I help you," Father Time warned, "this will be the last time. Am I understood?"
"Thank you, my friend."
An unseen clock tolled the hour. North's vision swam, and the study faded away.
When he next dared open his eyes, he found himself standing at Baba Yaga's gate. A cursory glance of the area showed no signs of Father Time, or Jack, for that matter. He made to push through into the yard before he remembered the risks and stopped himself.
An angry shriek from the house had his gaze darting up to the top of the ladder. Baba Yaga came storming out of the house, and even from that distance, North could tell the exact moment she spotted him. She was already halfway down the ladder before Jack appeared at the top. He glanced down at her, then quickly disappeared back inside.
"You!" she pointed furiously at North, storming across the yard to the gate. "You are cause of time magic!"
North crossed his arms, meeting her glare with one of her arm. "I do not have power over time."
"No," she agreed. "But you have connections. Boy should not have been able to unbake bread!"
A gust of wind signalled Jack joining them. He balanced on the tip of his staff, and made no effort to hide the cheeky grin on his face. "To be fair, you never said I wasn't allowed to have help."
She turned her fierce glare on him.
"A deal is a deal, Baba Yaga," North reminded her. It was high time she held up her end and let him go.
"Fine," she spat. "I will give you ride to town, as promised."
Jack looked from her to North and back again. "Can I cash that in any time or does it have to be right now?"
Baba Yaga narrowed her eyes. "I thought you wanted to get out of woods."
He turned towards the west, where the sun was starting to sink in the sky. "Yeah, but there's one last thing we need to take care of first."
.
.
They were well and truly out of sight of Baba Yaga's house before either of them broke the silence. Jack was simply glad to finally be free, and having his staff and North back by his side was only an added bonus. North made no attempts to hide that he felt the same way, one large arm wrapped around Jack's shoulders as they walked deeper into the woods. It would be a few hours yet before they could expect the Bubák to show itself again, but they had plenty of time.
"Father Time, huh?" Jack asked quietly. It had been a serious case of déjà vu when he'd returned to the house after North left and found him waiting there for him, muttering angrily about North and favours. It hadn't been difficult to put two and two together. It wasn't the first time North had begged a favour from him to help Jack, but he really hoped it would be the last; whatever Father Time eventually called him to return was going to be big, he was sure.
"Only one who could unbake cake," North shrugged. He wasn't the least apologetic. Jack wasn't sure what he'd expected.
"Thanks, North."
North tugged him closer. There was a beat of silence, then, "What are you hiding in your hood?"
A small black face popped up from said hood, and let out a quiet 'mrow'. Jack snickered. "Baba Yaga's cat."