The night’s incident had awoken a scared little squirrel that now seemed to be turning a cold wheel inside Iryna’s chest, sending ripples of fear through her entire body. She could not forget her daughter’s terrified eyes; her ears were still ringing from Anya’s long, reverberating scream.

First thing in the morning, she dialed Marina, her old college friend, and wrote down the number of “an amazing man” who was “sure to help.”

That was Marina’s typical way of describing any healer or psychic she used to see. But this time, Iryna’s skeptical attitude was swept away by her overwhelming anxiety. She would give anything to know what had affected Anya.

A curse? A hex? An evil eye? Or—oh my God, please not that!—drugs? No. Anya couldn’t have taken anything on her birthday without being noticed; she was never out of sight. Maybe it was a mental health issue?

Hesitating for a moment in front of an old apartment block surrounded by fruit trees, Iryna cast another glance at the address scribbled on a scrap of paper and entered the door marked with the number two. Climbing to the third floor, she stopped at the brown faux-leather upholstered door bearing the metal apartment number—twenty-two—and pressed the doorbell.

The lock clicked open. Standing on the threshold was a short, stocky man with a disfigured face. A nasty, yellow-brown burn scar covered the whole left half of his face like a layer of wax.

Oh my God. That’s creepy. He looks like Freddy Krueger. Thanks a lot, dear Marina.

“Good afternoon,” Iryna said slowly.

“Good afternoon,” the man replied.

In the awkward silence that followed, Iryna couldn’t take her eyes off his disfigured face. Stop staring at him, she told herself angrily. Haven’t you seen a burn before? No, never this bad...true...but you’re being rude. Say something. Anything!

“I called you this morning because of my daughter,” Iryna said hastily, shifting her gaze from his face to the tiny crocodile on his shirt pocket. “I got your number from Marina. Marina Primachevska.” The crocodile was sewn in green and outlined in black on a white field. “She’s an old friend of mine. We went to college together. Oh. That doesn’t really matter, I suppose.” The crocodile’s open jaws had a few white and red threads, a thick black stitch zigzagging along the animal’s side. “She’s told me you can—”

“Yes.” The man interrupted. “Please, come in.”

Iryna blushed as she realized she could not remember his name. Valery? Vitaly? Valentine? So damn awkward. I only wrote down his address.

“Valery.” The apartment owner introduced himself, offering a hand, his waxen face contorting into something that could pass for a smile.

“Iryna.” She breathed with relief, shaking his hand warily. It was firm and warm.

“Glad to meet you, Iryna,” he said. “Please come in. I’ll make us some tea.”

Entering the living room, Iryna perched on the sofa’s edge, looking around.

The apartment was a far cry from what she’d imagined a psychic’s dwelling would look like. However, there could still be a pentagram hidden beneath the carpet on the floor. The thick frame of that painting on the wall possibly contained a few powerful charms, and the computer desk drawers could be crammed with voodoo dolls and melted candles matching the color of his burn scar.

Valery entered. In his broad-striped Lacoste shirt, with a teapot in his hands, he looked nothing like the Hollywood-style wizard she had expected.

“Need some help?” Iryna asked.

“Sure,” he agreed quickly, handing her the pot.

It was a huge relief to have something to busy her hands with; it broke through the awkwardness.

Valery walked away to the window, leaving her to pour the tea into the two cups on the coffee table. “Anya. Anya. Anya,” he said, gradually lowering his voice.

The pot froze in Iryna’s hands as she cast an inquiring look at the wizard.

“Your only child. Your love and purpose.” Valery continued, staring out of the window. “You live to make her happy. That’s absolutely normal.”

The pot in her hands trembled...

“You feel like you’re not doing enough.”

…moved across the coffee table…

“You wish you could be her mother and father.”

…released the fragrant, steaming stream of liquid…

“You’re afraid she might fall in with a bad crowd at school.”

…into one cup and moved to the other…

“This fear is totally futile.”

Turning its spout up, the teapot silently landed on the table.

Iryna’s lips curved slightly as she listened to Valery. She was not surprised by him knowing that much about her and Anya; Marina could have told him that much and more. Her concerns were common for single mothers, easy to guess even for a stranger.

“What you’d better take seriously is last night’s incident.”

These words scared the smile off of her face.

“Two sugars, please,” he said, nodding at the sugar bowl.

Dropping the sugars into the wizard’s cup, Iryna looked up at him anxiously. “But what exactly was it? Couldn’t she have just been having a bad dream—a nightmare? I wouldn’t have come to you about it if it weren’t for her scream. It sounded…not human at all. I jumped straight out of bed when I heard it. And her eyes…they were…glassy?”

“Do you play chess?” he asked suddenly.

“Chess?” Briefly arching her brows in surprise, she frowned. “Why do you ask? What does it matter?”

“It will be easier to explain if you are familiar with the game. Please have some tea, Iryna.”

She took an obedient sip. “Yes. I played it as a child, then with Anya. But what’s her problem?”

“Good. Very good.” With a pensive nod, Valery stepped over to the coffee table, took his cup, and walked to the opposite wall. Stirring the sugar in, he continued. “Yeah. It looks pretty much like ‘just a bad dream.’ But it’s far more serious. It’s a game of chess, though not a traditional one. The first move here...playing against themselves. On several boards at once. Some pieces can move between boards… and only one pawn can become a queen. And she must do it step by step.”

Iryna firmly set her cup down on the table. “Excuse me, Valery. What does this have to do with Anya?”

“I understand you want to sort it out as soon as possible,” the wizard said. “But please be patient.”

“Fine.” She pursed her lips. “Sorry.”

“Last night’s incident was the first move in this game. It's Е2–Е4. The timer’s button was pressed and the count started.”

“The count?”

“Of the time we have to make our move. We have twenty-four hours.”

“And if we don’t…?”

“Regardless of whether we make a move or not, the other side will make theirs tonight at midnight, attacking our pawn.”

“Our pawn? Is it…Anya?” The words escaped Iryna’s lips before she fully realized their meaning.

“Yes.”

The cold wheel of fear made another slow turn in her chest. “Is she in danger?” she uttered with numb lips.

The dozy squirrel in the cage looked up, stretching its small body, and raced, stirring the heavy metal structure into motion.

“The game will end having barely begun. In this particular kind of chess, Anya is the key piece.”

The squirrel’s tiny limbs moved faster and faster as it raced, speeding up the wheel. A humming sound came from the shiny metal spokes.

“Is she in danger?” Iryna asked again, staring into the wizard’s eyes.

“She is fourteen,” he said, ignoring the question. “Isn’t she?”

“She is. So what?”

The flashing spokes of the squirrel wheel blended into a transparent wall. Behind it, the tiny creature raced for its life, the black beads of its eyes gleamed maliciously. The wheel’s humming sound rose to a howl.

Valery’s flat voice cut through the howl. “Twenty-seven years ago, when you were fourteen, you got into an ugly situation. A lot of time has passed since then. You’ve almost forgotten about that night…or so you believe. But you still remember it. Don’t you?”

Coming close to her, he touched her shoulder gently. Looking into her eyes, he said, “Oh. Of course you do.”

The racing animal inside the howling wheel finally broke free, smashing the loathsome cage. Scattered metal spokes rained down to the floor, showering Iryna in a torrent of images, sounds, and smells that she’d been desperate to escape for many years.

***

The year was 1986.

It was summer in a small, seaside town.

Fourteen-year-old Iryna was on vacation with her mother.

Her skin was tanned chocolate-brown.

She could feel men stare at her slender legs wherever she went, their intense gazes making her heart race and her mind long to find a hiding place. It had only begun recently; she couldn’t remember anyone looking at her like that in May.

There wasn’t really much to do in their cheap hotel, The Pearl, except take long walks to the beach and back, or chat with other guests—most of whom were seniors.

Bored to death after just a few days, Iryna finally talked her mother into hitting the dance floor of the hotel down the street, The Crystal. They began going there every evening, although most of the time they just stood on the edge of the room and watched the dancers.

Before long, Mom would start yawning and yearning for her hotel bed, but Iryna would beg her to stay for five more minutes. She just couldn’t take her eyes off the young couples swaying to the beat. This mysterious, adult world, full of love and passion, was like a magnet.

After a couple of days, the faces of all the regular dancers had become familiar. A week later, she could tell which of the couples were a real couple and which were just in it for a summer romance.

The third week of their vacation was nearing its end. There were only a few days left in their stay.

Mom’s voice said, “Ira. I’m just so tired. I’m going to stay in tonight.”

The cool blow of a night breeze brought the sweet music, loud voices, and laughter from The Chrystal’s open-air dance floor.

“Mooom. Can I go alone then? Just for half an hour. Please? Please.”

“Okay. Half an hour exactly. I want you back at ten.”

Yes!

Iryna hurried down the sidewalk, wondering if that really tan girl in jean shorts had made up with the dark-haired guy in the white tee that she’d seemed to break up with last night.

He’d been emotionally telling the girl something, waving his hands and pointing at the sea, until he wheeled around and stormed away. The girl remained in the middle of the dance floor, weirdly motionless as the crowd danced to Afric Simone’s “Hafanana.” Paying no attention to this rough sea of dancers, she looked down, rummaging in her bag.

The song ended.

In the silence that fell, people started to call for the DJ to play a slow song. A few moments later, the loudspeakers streamed the guitar finger-picking of Scorpions’, “Still Loving You.”

The dancers started to pair off. A tall, bald guy approached the tan girl. As he whispered a couple of words, she looked up at him with the shimmer of tears in her eyes, forcing a smile. The bald guy extended a hand invitingly. She shook her head, but he spoke insistently, bending down to her ear. Suddenly she laughed and nodded.

As the opening chords faded, Klaus Meine whispered his first “Time, it needs time,” and the new couple rocked on the waves of a slow dance.

At that very moment, Iryna’s mother told her it was time to go home. Having already exceeded her limit of five-minute extensions for that evening, she had to follow.

Which guy will she dance with tonight? The dark-haired guy or the bald guy?

Liking the dark-haired guy better—he’s so hot!—Iryna still couldn’t help but admire the ease with which the bald one had won the girl over by whispering just a few words in her ear.

Iryna’s heart was racing to the beats and laughter coming from the dance floor. Breaking into a run, she rounded the abandoned construction site separating The Pearl from The Crystal. This hateful patch of wasteland, behind a half-destroyed wooden fence, looked a lot like an old cemetery with its shabby blocks of concrete, ribbed with rusty metal, rising from the tall grass like ugly gravestones. Leaving it behind, Iryna dashed inside The Crystal’s open gate.

She lingered on the dance floor.

It wasn’t until she heard someone say, “Relax, dude, it’s just half past ten,” that she gave a thought to the time.

Half past ten?! Mom will kill me!

Elbowing her way through the crowd and apologizing on the run, she rushed for the exit.

That abandoned site again! No time to run around it!

A few days earlier, Iryna had discovered a shortcut: a dirt path running across the site and into a gap in The Pearl’s fence. Now she turned into the dark, following a dirt path leading onto the site, and hoped it was the same one that would lead to her hotel.

Maybe she wouldn’t be late enough to make Mom really angry.

Iryna could already see the brightly lit hotel over an overgrown mound of sand when the ruby eye of a blazing cigarette popped into her sight.

“Well, well, well.” A heavily drunk male voice came from the darkness ahead. “Why in such a hurry, babe?”

Iryna stopped, paralyzed by fear.

“Here!” The man’s voice commanded her. Then his big hands grabbed her.

Reeking of sweat, alcohol, and cigarette smoke, he whispered into her ear, “Don’t you dare scream, bitch. I’ll kill you if you do.”

She froze in terrified obedience.

That smell…

She was about to faint when her mother’s voice came, barely cutting through the loud chorus of cicadas. “Her name’s Iryna. In a white polka-dot dress.”

Other voices, male and female, answered. “Oh, a dark-haired girl? She’s just run past us. There, into the construction site.”

Their voices broke the spell. Recovering from the shock, Iryna yelled at the top of her voice, “MOOOOOM!”

Blurting a curse, the man let her go, escaping into the dark.