They like to say that Maryushka was a quiet, modest, and gentle maiden, but that was mostly because she behaved like one. If you saw the fine sashes, shirts and robes she embroidered, there was nothing quiet, modest or gentle about them. They shone and sparkled with glass beads and bright silk threads, and drew greedy, amazed merchants from beyond the sea.

"Come with us," they said to her, "you'll be famous in the cities and rich beyond all telling! Why waste your life in this small-minded village of old gossips and nags?"

"Riches I do not need and I shall never leave the village where I was born. But of course I will sell my work to all who find it beautiful." She would say, with her eyes lowered modestly. And the merchants ate it up and bought her beautiful work and returned year after year so that she never wanted for anything. And all the villagers who profited from the foot traffic and the gifts she sometimes made for them, said: what a quiet, modest, gentle maiden she is, so kind and unassuming.

And so, Maryushka remained in her small village, and the years went by, and the village girls married the village boys, and the moon waxed and waned, until one day Koschei the Deathless heard that a country girl's work was such beauty in the world which he, the great sorcerer, had never seen or done. And he was jealous of her skill.

So Koschei travelled beyond the hills, beyond the seas, but not as far as the sky, until he came to the cottage where Maryushka lived, and there he disguised himself as a handsome youth, the likes of which one could only dream of being.

He knocked at the door and bowed low to her, as was the custom. Then he asked to see the needlework she had completed. Maryushka set out shirts, handkerchiefs and veils, each more beautiful than the other. "Kind sir," said she, "whatever pleases you, you may take. If you have no money with you, you may pay me later, when you have money to spare. And if my work should not find favour in your eyes, please counsel me and tell me what to do, and I shall try my best."

And then Koschei the Deathless got more angry, as her work was indeed beautiful and Maryushka was just as quiet, modest and gentle as everyone else had said. But his very handsome face never showed a glimpse of the thunder of his thoughts, and he said with an affectionate smile that made even Maryushka blush, "Masha, if I may call you that, I have heard of your wonderful work in places far and wide, but no one ever told me that you were so lovely."

And Maryushka, who was used to the flattery of merchants, shrugged lightly and said, "Thank you, it must be the clean mountain air."

So Koschei tried again with half-lidded eyes and seductive charm: "Come with me, Masha, my dear, don't you get lonely in this place? Come live with me and drink of passion. You will never sleep in a cold bed again."

Maryushka looked at first at his fine silk shirt, then his muscled arms, then his legs. Then she looked full into his very handsome face and said, "I sleep on top of the stove and am as warm as can be."

So Koschei tried a third time. "Come with me, Maryushka, and I will make you Queen. You will live in a palace built of precious jewels. You will eat off gold and sleep on eiderdown. You will walk in an orchard where birds of paradise sing sweet songs, and golden apples grow."

But Maryushka was made of sterner stuff, and she answered, "Do not speak so! I need neither your riches or your strange marvels. There is nothing sweeter than the fields and woods where one was born. Never shall I leave this village where my parents lie buried and where live those to whom my needlework brings joy. I shall never embroider for you alone." 

At this, Koschei the Deathless was furious, and his face darkened. "So be it. Since you wish so much to be with your kin, turn then into a bird, and be no more a maiden fair."

And where Maryushka had once stood, a firebird hovered in the cottage. Its plumage was the colour of a bonfire, and a single feather could have lit the whole room.

He snatched the firebird and hid in under his cloak, and then he turned into a great black falcon and held the firebird between his steel talons.