References to Current Events

The wizard glowered. His thick fur coat hung close about his thin, battered body; where he was not concealed by further layers of clothing, used to protect against the biting cold, his bones were readily visible, pressing against his thin flesh. In one hand he held a long, gnarled staff; in the other, a silver hammer, customized with a blade extending out from its back. His beard, grey and tangled, hung to the ground, where it grew ever-whiter with snow and frost.

His six comrades appeared essentially similar.

"You think you can stop us?" the wizard asked, speaking to the woman standing several feet away. "You, the Sarah, think you can do this thing?"

"Ah don't think ah can," the Sarah replied. "Ah know ah can. Now, if you boys know what's good for you, you'd best be scuttlin' back to yer little hidey-holes, before ah get really angry." Her face was set in determination; in her right hand she held a fetish, and runes of seven colours drifted in a ring about her, pulsing faintly.

"Ha!" the wizard replied. "Смешно - it is to laugh! We have plotted this thing for centuries now. Our founder, Rasputin, was tragically crippled, driven into hiding before the work could be finished - but still we continued! Our plots were delayed, again and again - Tannenberg, Barbarossa, Cyclone. But then we staged the collapse of the Советский Союз, the Soviet Union, to buy us time - and it worked! Distracted from your true foe, you foolish Americans weakened yourselves, putting your moneys and troops into expensive foreign wars. And now we - we - will inherit the Earth!"

"Ya'll'll have to go through us first," the woman said resolutely. "Ah don't think that'll happen."

"And who will stop us?" the Russian wizard asked. "You? I hardly think so. You're all tied up! You have commitments, after all. Political aspirations. An ongoing... ethics investigation! A ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" The other Russians joined in the laughter.

"Ah threw all that away," the woman replied, standing straight. "Ah knew Ah had to stop you - because Ah'm the only one who can see you. It's down to me - and Ah will not fail!"

The Russian wizard dropped into a fighting stance. His followers did the same. "Well, then," he said, beckoning with a hand. "Have at you!"

The power of the Russian wizards - inherited from the dark sorceror Rasputin - was strong indeed. Their dark cants and hexes flew into the air like foul creatures of the night, glowing with dark malevolence. Wheresoever as they struck, they sent snow flying into the air and left scars upon the earth - but they never struck their target. For the woman who stood against them, alone, was more than their equal; and she sent them running home, to cower once more in their dark hiding-places beneath the earth.

So when your children ask you, "Why are we still free today?" you may tell them the truth. That they are free because of that battle, fought on the frozen plains of Alaska, not far from a small town called Wasilla. Because one woman, by her own strength and determination, fought the invisible Russian wizards that only she could see -

- and saved us all.