The Twilight Watch (10 page)

He walked out, but I sat at the table for a while longer, finishing
my beer. The owner of the café – who was also the waiter, the
chef and the barman – never even looked in my direction. When
Semyon came in, he had hung a magical screen round the table.

What had I been thinking of, really?

There were two Inquisitors beavering away. The talented vampire
Kostya was circling the Assol complex in the form of a bat. They'd
figure it out, they were bound to discover who had wanted to
become an Other. And they'd either find the individual who had
sent the letters, or they wouldn't.

What difference did that make to me?

The woman I loved was an Other. And more than that, she had
voluntarily abandoned her work in the Watch, a brilliant career as
a Great Enchantress. All for an idiot like me. So that I wouldn't
get hung up about being stuck for ever at my basic second grade
of power.

And Nadiushka was an Other too. I'd never have to go through
the horror suffered by an Other whose child grows up, grows old
and dies. Sooner or later we would reveal Nadienka's true nature
to her. She would want to be a Great One, no doubt about it.
And she would be the very Greatest. Maybe she would even do
something to make this imperfect world better.

But here I was playing at spies, like a little child. Worrying
myself sick about succeeding in my mission, instead of dropping
in on my friendly neighbour in the evening or relaxing – strictly
for purposes of camouflage – in the casino.

I got up, put the money on the table and walked out. In an
hour or two the screen would disperse, the owner of the café
would see the money and the empty glasses and remember a
couple of ordinary-looking guys drinking beer there.

I
SPENT HALF
a day doing things that were strictly off limits and
no use to anyone. Kostya would probably have pulled a wry face
and informed me what he thought of my naïvity.

First I went back to Assol to change into jeans and a simple
shirt, and then I set off in the direction of the nearest normal
courtyard – towards the dreary, nine-storey prefabricated buildings.
There, to my delight, I discovered a football pitch, with senior-school-
age loafers kicking a ball around on it. There were a few
young men there as well, in fact. Even though the recently
concluded World Cup had been, to put it mildly, an inglorious
one for our team, it had still had a positive effect. In the few
courtyards that still survived, the spirit that had seemed lost was
reviving.

I was put on a team. The side that had only one adult – with
an impressive paunch, but extremely agile and frisky. I'm not a
very good player, but these guys weren't World Cup material
either.

For about an hour I ran around on the dusty, trampled earth,
yelling and shooting at the goal made out of rusty wire mesh,
even scoring a few times. Once a huge senior-school hulk deftly
dumped me on the ground and gave me an amiable smile.

But I didn't take offence or get upset.

When the game tailed off – of its own accord, somehow – I
went into the nearest shop, bought some mineral water and beer
and – for the very youngest footballers – Baikal fizzy drink. Of
course, they would have preferred Coca-Cola, but it's time we
stopped drinking that foreign poison

The only thing bothering me was the realisation that excessive
generosity would arouse all kinds of suspicions. So I had to be
moderate in my good deeds.

After saying goodbye to the players, I walked as far as the river
beach and enjoyed a swim in the water that was dirty, but cool.
The pompous palace spires of the Assol complex towered up into
the sky on one side.

Well, let them . . . I didn't care.

The funniest thing of all, I realised, was that in my place any
Dark Magician could have done exactly the same thing. Maybe
not one of the really young ones still into pleasures previously out
of reach, like fresh oysters and expensive prostitutes. But a Dark
One who had already lived a bit and come to understand that
everything in the world was nothing but vanity, the vanity of vanities,
in fact.

And he would have scampered round that pitch, yelling and
kicking the ball, and hissing at the teenagers' clumsy attempts to
swear: 'Hey, watch your lip, kid!' And afterwards he would have
gone to the beach, and splashed about in the muddy water, and
laid on the grass, looking up at the sky . . .

Where was it, that dividing line? Okay, with the lower Dark
Ones, everything was clear. They were non-life. They had to kill
in order to survive. And there was nothing any verbal gymnastics
could do about that. They were Evil.

But where was the real boundary?

And why did it sometimes seem on the part of dissolving? Like
now, at a time when the only problem was one single human
being who wanted to become an Other? Just one, that was all!
But just look at the resources that had been thrown into the search.
Dark Ones, Light Ones, the Inquisition . . . And I wasn't the only
one working on this business, I was just a pawn who had been
advanced, carrying out local reconnaissance work. Gesar was wrinkling
his brow, Zabulon knitting his eyebrows, Witiezslav scowling
and baring those teeth. A human wanted to become an Other –
hunt him down, get him!

But who wouldn't want it?

Not the eternal hunger of the vampires, not the insane fits of
the werewolves, but the full, complete life of a magician. With
everything that ordinary people had.

Only better.

You're not afraid anyone will steal the expensive stereo from
your car when you leave it unwatched.

You don't get sick with flu, and if you come down with some
vile incurable disease, the Dark Sorcerers or the Light Healers are
at your service.

You don't wonder how you're going to survive until pay day.

You don't feel afraid of dark streets at night or drunken bums.

You're not even afraid of the militia.

You're certain your child will get home safely from school and
not run into some crazy maniac in the front hallway . . .

Yes, of course, that was where the real problem lay. Your nearest
and dearest were safe, they were even excluded from the vampire
lottery. Only you couldn't save them from old age and death.

But after all, that was still a long way off. Somewhere in the
future, far ahead.

On the whole it was far better to be an Other.

What's more, you wouldn't gain anything if you refused initiation,
even your human relatives would be right to call you a fool. After
all, if you became an Other, you'd be able to help them out. Like
that story of Semyon's . . . someone put a hex on a peasant's cows,
and his Other son had an investigator sent in to help him. Blood
is thicker than water, after all, your own flesh and blood is dearest.
Nothing to be done about that . . .

I jerked upright as if I'd been electrocuted. I jumped to my feet
and stared up at the buildings of the Assol complex.

What reason could a Light Magician have for making a rash
promise to do absolutely anything?

There was only one reason.

That was it, the lead.

'Have you come up with something, Anton?' a voice asked
behind my back.

I turned round and looked into the black lenses of Kostya's glasses.
He was wearing just bathing trunks – appropriate attire for the beach
– and a child's white panama hat perched on the back of his head
like a skullcap (no doubt he'd taken it away from some toddler
without any qualms of conscience) as well as the dark glasses.

'Finding the sun hot?' I asked spitefully.

'It's oppressive. Hanging up there in the sky like a flat-iron . . .
Why, aren't you feeling hot?'

'Sure,' I admitted. 'But it's a different kind of heat.'

'Can we manage without the sarcasm?' Kostya asked. He sat
down on the sand and fastidiously tossed aside a cigarette butt
from near his feet. 'I only go swimming at night now. But this
time I came . . . to have a word with you.'

I felt ashamed. The person sitting in front of me was a moody
young man, it made no difference that he was undead. And I still
remembered the gloomy teenager hovering uncertainly at the door
of my apartment. 'You shouldn't invite me in, I'm a vampire, I
could come in the night and bite you . . .'

And that boy had held out for a pretty long time. He'd drunk
pig's blood and donors' blood. He'd dreamed of becoming alive
again. 'Like Pinocchio' – he must have read Collodi or seen the
movie
AI
, but anyway he'd found the right comparison.

If only Gesar hadn't detailed me to hunt vampires . . .

No, that was nonsense. Nature would have taken its course. And
Kostya would have been given his licence.

And in any case I had no right to scoff at him. I had one huge
advantage – I was alive.

I could approach old people without feeling ashamed. Yes,
without any shame, because Witiezslav hadn't been honest with
me. It wasn't fear or revulsion that had made him avoid the old
woman.

It was shame.

'Sorry, Kostya,' I said and lay down on the sand beside him.
'Let's talk.'

'It seems to me that the permanent residents at Assol have
nothing to do with it,' Kostya began gloomily. 'The client is only
there occasionally.'

'We'll have to check them all,' I said faking a sigh.

'That's only the start. We have to find the traitor.'

'We are looking.'

'I can see the way you're looking . . . Realised that he's one of
yours, have you?'

'How do you make that out?' I protested indignantly. 'Some
Dark One could quite easily have blundered . . .'

We discussed the situation for a while. We seemed to have
reached the same conclusions simultaneously.

Only now I was just half a step ahead. And I had no intention
of helping Kostya out.

'The letter was posted with the heap of letters that builder
brought to the post office,' said Kostya, not suspecting how cunning I was
being. 'Nothing could be easier. All those
Gastarbeiter
live in an
old school, they use it as a hostel. They put all their letters on the attendant's
table on the ground floor. In the morning someone goes to the post office
and posts them. It would be no problem for an Other to get into the hostel
and divert the attention of the attendant . . . or simply wait for him to
go to the toilet. Then drop the letter into the general pile. And there you
go! No leads.'

'Simple and effective,' I agreed.

'In the Light Ones' style,' Kostya said with a frown. 'Get someone
else to do the dirty work for you.'

For some reason I didn't take offence. I just smiled mockingly
and turned over on to my back, looking up at the sky and the
glorious yellow sun.

'Okay, we do the same . . .' Kostya muttered.

I didn't say anything.

'Come on, tell me, haven't you ever used people for your operations?'
Kostya asked crossly.

'Sometimes. Used them, but never put them in danger.'

'And in this case the Other has done exactly the same,' Kostya
said, forgetting his comment about the 'dirty work'.

'What I'm wondering is . . . does it make any sense to follow
this trail any further? So far the traitor has covered all his tracks
thoroughly. We'll end up chasing a phantom . . .'

'They say a couple of days ago two security guards at Assol
thought they saw something ghastly in the bushes,' I said. 'They
even opened fire.'

Kostya's eyes blazed.

'Have you already checked it out?'

'No,' I said. 'I'm shielded, undercover, there's no way I can.'

'Is it okay if I check it out?' Kostya asked eagerly. 'Listen, I'll
mention that it was you . . .'

'Go ahead,' I said magnanimously.

'Thanks, Anton,' said Kostya, breaking into a broad smile and
giving me a hefty punch on the shoulder. 'You're a decent guy
after all. Thanks.'

'Do a good job,' I couldn't resist saying, 'and maybe you'll jump
the queue to get another licence.'

Kostya fell silent and his face turned sour. He stared hard at the
river.

'How many people did you kill to become a Higher Vampire?'
I asked.

'What's that to you?'

'I'm just . . . curious.'

'Check out your archives some time and take a look,' Kostya
said with a crooked smile. 'Is it really that hard?'

Of course, it wasn't that hard. But I'd never looked at Kostya's
file. I didn't really want to know . . .

'Uncle Kostya, give me my hat!' a squeaky voice demanded
nearby.

I glanced sideways at the little girl, about four years old, who
had come running up to Kostya. So he really had been teasing a
child, and he'd stolen her hat . . .

Kostya obediently removed the panama from his head and gave
it to her.

'Will you come again tonight?' the girl asked, glancing at me
and pouting. 'Will you tell me a story?'

'Uhuh,' Kostya said with a nod.

The girl beamed and ran off to a young woman who was
collecting her things together a little distance away. The sand kicked
up from under her heels.

'You've lost your mind!' I roared, sitting up. 'I'll reduce you to
dust right here!'

My expression must have been pretty terrifying. Kostya was
quick to answer:

'What is it? What's wrong with you, Anton? She's my niece!
Her mother's my cousin! They live in Strogino, and I'm staying
with them for the time being, so I don't have to drag myself all
the way across town.'

That brought me up short.

'What, did you think I was sucking her blood?' Kostya asked,
still looking at me warily. 'Go and check. There aren't any bites.
She's my niece, understand? For her sake I'd take out anyone
myself!'

'Pah!' I said and spat. 'What else could I think? "Will you come
again tonight?", "Will you tell me a story?" . . .'

'A typical Light One,' Kostya said more calmly. 'Since I'm a
vampire I must be a bastard, right?'

Our fragile truce wasn't exactly over, but it had reverted to the
normal state of cold war. Kostya sat there fuming, and I sat there
cursing myself for jumping to conclusions. They didn't issue licences
for children under the age of twelve, and Kostya wasn't such a
fool as to hunt without a licence.

But it had just slipped out . . .

'You've got a little daughter,' Kostya said, suddenly catching on.
'The same age, right?'

'Younger,' I replied. 'And prettier.'

'Obviously, your own are always prettier,' Kostya laughed. 'All
right, Gorodetsky. I understand. Let's forget it. And thanks for the
lead.'

'That's okay,' I said. 'Maybe those security men didn't see anything
after all. They'd been drinking vodka or smoking dope . . .'

'We'll check it out,' Kostya said cheerfully. 'We'll check everything
out.'

He rubbed the back of his head with his open hand and stood
up.

'Time to go?' I asked.

'It's getting to me,' Kostya answered, squinting upwards. 'I'm
disappearing.'

And he did just that, disappeared, after first averting the eyes of
everyone there. There was just a dim shadow left hanging in the
air for a second.

'Show-off,' I said and turned back over on to my stomach.

To be honest, I was feeling hot too. But I decided on principle
not to leave with a Dark One.

I still had a few things to think through before I went to the
Assol security office.

Witiezslav had done a really good job. When I turned up the head
of security broke into a broad, friendly smile.

'Oh, look who's come to see us!' he declared, shoving some
papers off to one side. 'Tea, coffee?'