Koschei

The tale of Koschei the Deathless

Every child in the old Slavic lands knew that Koschei could not be killed, and every child knew why. His death was not inside him. Long ago he took it out and hid it: a needle, in an egg, in a duck, in a hare, in an iron chest, buried under a green oak on the island of Buyan, an island that no map remembers. While the needle is whole, a sword passes through Koschei like wind through a dead tree.

So he does as he likes. He is a gaunt old sorcerer, more bone than man, with a crown on his skull and a black horse that can outrun the wind. He rides into kingdoms and rides out with their brides. In the best-known telling, the warrior queen Marya Morevna keeps him hanging in twelve chains in a locked room of her castle, until her new husband, Ivan Tsarevich, opens the door out of pity and gives the thirsty prisoner three buckets of water. With each bucket Koschei grows stronger. With the third he snaps his chains, seizes Marya Morevna and is gone.

How the hero beats him

Ivan follows, and Koschei cuts him to pieces and throws them into the sea in a barrel. The falcon, the eagle and the raven who married Ivan's sisters bring the water of death, which joins the pieces, and the water of life, which wakes them. Ivan learns that Koschei's horse came from the herds of Baba Yaga, and he crosses a river of fire to serve her for one. The animals he spared on the road help him keep her mares, and he takes the poorest foal, which grows into a horse faster than Koschei's own.

In other versions the hero goes after the needle itself. The animals he once spared dig up the chest, catch the hare and the duck, and bring the egg out of the sea. The hero squeezes it, and far away Koschei falls ill. He breaks the egg, and Koschei grows weak. He snaps the needle, and the Deathless dies at last.

Koschei in Battle of Myths

Koschei is a cost 4 Slavic assassin and warrior. He does what he always did: he goes behind your lines and takes what you protect most. His ability, The Needle's Edge, makes him appear behind your weakest hero and strike, and every wound he deals stitches a little of his own flesh back on. Once a fight, when he falls low, his hidden death keeps him standing a moment longer than anyone expects.

With other Slavic heroes he shares the Cycle of Morana: the first time a Slav dies, they rise again as a spectral spirit. For a sorcerer who has already cheated death once, it is only fair.

Did you know?

• His name is often spelled Kashchei or Kaschei, and the epithet "the Deathless" (Bessmertny) is part of almost every telling.
• Stravinsky's ballet The Firebird (1910) ends with the hero breaking the egg that holds Koschei's soul.
• The chain of hiding places (needle, egg, duck, hare, chest, oak, island) is one of the oldest "nested soul" stories in European folklore.