The girl meets her husband, who gives her oil, lard, needles and pins, as well as a comb, a tablecloth, a brush and a ring.
Baba Yaga's sister enters the house and, noticing the girl's absence, complains that the female servants, the cat, the dogs and door have not stopped her, and flies away on her mortar behind her.
Realizing that she is being pursued by the witch, the human girl throws behind herself the comb, the tablecloth, the brush and the ring to create magic obstacles to hinder the pursuit: the comb becomes a dense forest, the tablecloth a river, the brush a steep mountain and the ring a brickwall.
Baba-Yaga's sister manages to traverse the first three obstacles, but is finally deterred by the last barrier, and leaves the girl be.
[2] Russian scholarship classifies the tale as type SUS 428, "Девушка на службе у ведьмы" ("The Girl in the Witch's Service"[3] or "A girl serving a Witch"),[4] of the East Slavic Folktale Classification (Russian: СУС, romanized: SUS).
[6][7] The East Slavic Folktale Catalogue, last updated by Russian folklorist Lev Barag [ru] in 1979, registers 12 variants.
Their son marries a girl and the youth's mother sends the daughter-in-law to shear the sheep (actually, bears), then to milk the cows (who are wolves), and finally to her own sister to get a reed for weaving.
[11][12] Ethnographer Dmitry Zelenin collected a tale from Vyatka Governorate which he titled "Коровы-медвѣди, волки-овцы и баба Яга" ("Cow-Bears, Wolf-Sheep, and Baba Yaga").
An old woman appears to warn the maiden the cows are bears, and advises her to climb an oak tree, throw them bread and let them milk themselves.
The third task is to fetch clay from the seashore: advised by the same old woman, the maiden asks the help of a nest of ravens and magpies.
On the way there, the maiden ties a ribbon around a birch tree, feeds geese and chickens with peas, smears the hinge of a door with butter and gives bread to a dog and a cat.
Baba Yaga welcomes her, goes to another room to sharpen her teeth, and invites the maiden to spend the night, because the witch plans to eat her.
After the three nights, the cat gives her the weaving supplies and tricks its mistress Baba Yaga, allowing the girl to escape.
[13] In a Russian tale from White Sea teller Matvei M. Korguev [ru] with the title "Бархат чаревич" ("Velvet Prince"), a rich merchant has three daughters.
One day, when the man goes to buy goods, the elder daughters ask for clothes or scarves, and the youngest, named Vasilista requests a bed with four doves.
The birds then tell her that, if they are not fed, they will fly and take her to Barkhat Tsarevich (Velvet Prince), but the other two doves refuse to do so.
On the third year, the woman orders Vasilista to go to a cabin in the woods to check on a pot of cabbage soup, and to turn down the fire.
On saying this, the soup boils up and burns the witch's eyes, the cat attacks her, she tries to make a run for the gates, but they crush her, and the dogs finish the job.
In the first tale, the heroine marries the prince, but she is subjected to the mother-in-law's tasks, e.g., milking her "cows" (which are bears), carrying clay across a river of fire.
[17] In a tale from Zaonezh'ya [fr] titled "Как свекрова невесток переводила", a rich merchant talks to his wife that their son needs to be married.
The third time, the mother-in-law sends the girl to her sister's house on the seashore and ask for an iron reed.
The old man warns her that at the house on the seashore lives Yaga-baba or someone else, and gives her fishes, meat, grains, a brush and an egg.
Before the girl leaves, she oils the door hinges, gives meat to dogs and fishes to cat, and flees.
The old woman wants her son to find a wife and has an idea: she sends her pigeons to fly beyond the seas and bring her a girl named Anna.
Ivan gives a piece of meat, a silk ribbon, a kalach, a needle, a water chestnut and a brush.
After Anna flees, Egipecha's sister chases after her, but the girl throws behind her the brush (which becomes a forest) and the water chestnut (which creates a lake between them).
[32] In a tale titled "Девушка ростом с веретено" ("Girl tall as a spindle"), first collected from a Komi source in 1935, a couple has a daughter, when a Yoma (witch) appears and suggests they marry their children together, lest the witch locks up every chimney in the couple's house.
The creature goes to another room to sharpen her teeth, and, while it is distracted, the girl oils some door hinges with the resin and escapes the house, when a flock of birds descend on her.
The yoma's aunts goes to check on the girl and chastises her servants (the doors and the birds) for not stopping her, then flies away on a mortar to catch her.
[33] Russian scholar Nikolai P. Andreev [ru], who developed the first East Slavic Folktale Classification in 1929, classified the tale, numbered 34 in the Komi publication, as East Slavic tale type 428, "Tsarevich-volk": heroine serves a witch and is forced to perform dangerous tasks.