The Twilight Watch (4 page)

'In our watch I'm the only person who knows their address.
In the Day Watch, I presume Zabulon is the only one. So where
does that leave us, Gorodetsky?'

'You sent the letter. Or Zabulon did.'

Gesar only snorted.

'And is the Inquisition really uptight about this?' I asked.

'Uptight is putting it mildly. In itself, the attempt to trade in
initiations doesn't bother them. That's standard business for the
Watches – identify the perpetrator, punish him, and seal the
leak. Especially since we and the Dark Ones are both equally
outraged by what has happened . . . But a letter to the Inquisition
– that's something really exceptional. There aren't very many
Inquisitors, so you can see . . . If one side violates the Treaty,
the Inquisition takes the other side, maintaining equilibrium.
That gives all of us discipline. But let's just say somewhere in
the depths of one of the Watches a plan is being hatched for
ultimate victory. A group of battle magicians who have come
together and are capable of killing all the Inquisitors in a single
night – that is, of course, if they happen to know all about the
Inquisition – who serves in it, where they live, where they keep
their documents . . .'

'Did the letter arrive at their head office?' I asked.

'Yes. And judging from the fact that six hours later the office
was empty, and there was a fire in the building, that must have
been where the Inquisition kept all its files. Even I didn't know
that for sure. Anyway, by sending the letter to the Inquisition, this
person . . . or Other . . . has thrown down the gauntlet. Now the
Inquisition will be after them. The official reason will be that security
has been breached and an attempt is being made to initiate
a human being. But in reality, what's driving them is concern for
their own skin.'

'I wouldn't have thought it was like them to feel afraid for
themselves,' I said.

'Oh yes, and how, Anton! Here's a little something for you to
think about . . .Why aren't there any traitors in the Inquisition?
Dark Ones and Light Ones join them. They go through their
training. And then the Dark Ones punish Dark Ones severely, and
the Light Ones punish Light Ones, the very moment they violate
the Treaty.'

'A special character type,' I suggested. 'They select Others who
are like that.'

'And they never make a mistake?' Gesar asked sceptically. 'That
couldn't happen. Yet in the whole of history, there has never been
a single case of an Inquisitor violating the Treaty.'

'They obviously understand too clearly what violating the Treaty
leads to. There was one Inquisitor in Prague who told me: "We
are constrained by fear".'

Gesar frowned:

'Witiezslav – he's fond of fine phrases . . . All right, don't bother
your head about that. The situation's simple: there's an Other who
is either in violation of the Treaty or taunting the Watches and
the Inquisition. The Inquisition will conduct their investigation,
the Dark Ones will conduct theirs. And we are required to send
a staff member too.'

'May I ask why me in particular?'

Gesar spread his hands expressively again:

'For a number of reasons. The first is that in the course of the
investigation you'll probably come up against vampires. And you're
our top specialist on the lower Dark Ones.'

He didn't seem to be making fun of me.

'The second reason,' Gesar went on, opening the fingers of his
fist as he counted, 'is that the investigators officially appointed by
the Inquisition are old friends of yours. Witiezslav and Edgar.'

'Edgar's in Moscow?' I asked, surprised. I couldn't say that I
actually liked this Dark Magician who had transferred to the
Inquisition three years earlier. But I could say that I didn't really
dislike him.

'Yes, he is. He completed his training course four months ago
and flew back here. Since this job means you'll be in contact with
Inquisitors, any previous personal acquaintance is useful.'

'My acquaintance with them wasn't all that enjoyable,' I reminded
him.

'What do you think I'm offering you here, Thai massage during
working hours?' Gesar asked cantankerously. 'The third reason why
I particularly wanted to give this assignment to you is . . .' He
stopped.

I waited.

'The Dark Ones' investigation is also being conducted by an
old acquaintance of yours.'

Gesar didn't need to mention the name. But he did anyway.

'Konstantin. The young vampire . . . your former neighbour. I
recall that you used to be on good terms.'

'Yes, of course,' I said bitterly. 'When he was still a child, only
drank pig's blood and dreamed of escaping from the "curse" . . .
Until he realised that his friend the Light Magician burns his kind
to ashes.'

'That's life,' said Gesar.

'He's already drunk human blood,' I said. 'He must have! If he's
in favour in the Day Watch.'

'He has become a Higher Vampire,' Gesar declared. 'The youngest
Higher Vampire in Europe. If you translate that into our terms,
that means . . .'

'Third or fourth level of power,' I whispered. 'Five or six lives
destroyed.'

Kostya, Kostya . . . I was a young, inexperienced Light Magician
back then. I just couldn't make any friends in the Watch, and all
my old friendships were rapidly falling apart . . . Others and
people can't be friends . . . and suddenly I discovered that my
neighbours were Dark Others. A family of vampires. The mother
and father were vampires, and they'd initiated their child too.
There was nothing really sinister about them, though. No nocturnal
hunting, no applications for licences, they respected the law and
drank pig's blood and donors' blood. And so, like a fool, I let my
defences down and became friends with them. I used to go round
to see them and even invited them to my apartment. They ate
the food I'd cooked, and praised it . . . and, idiot that I was, I
didn't realise that human food is tasteless to them, that they are
tormented by an ancient, eternal hunger. The little vampire kid
even decided that he was going to be a biologist and discover a
cure for vampirism . . .

Then I killed my first vampire.

And after that Kostya joined the Day Watch. I didn't know if
he'd ever graduated from his biology faculty, but he'd certainly
shed his childish illusions.

And he'd started receiving licences to kill. Rise to the level of
a Higher Vampire in three years? He must have had help. All the
resources of the Day Watch must have been brought to bear so
that the nice young lad Kostya could sink his fangs into human
necks over and over again . . .

And I had a pretty good idea who had helped him.

'What do you think, Anton?' said Gesar. 'In the given situation,
who should we appoint as the investigator from our side?'

I took my mobile out of my pocket and dialled Svetlana's number.

I
N OUR LINE
of business you don't often get to work undercover.

In the first place, you have to completely disguise your nature as
an Other, so that nothing gives you away, not your aura, or any streams
of power, or any disturbances in the Twilight. And the situation is
quite simple – if you're a fifth-grade magician, then you won't be
discovered by magicians weaker than you, those who are sixth- and
seventh-grade. If you're a first-grade magician, then you're concealed
from the second grade and below. If you're a magician beyond classification
. . .well, then you can hope that no one will recognise you.

I was disguised by Gesar himself, immediately after speaking to
Svetlana. The conversation was brief, but painful. We didn't quarrel.
She was just very upset.

And in the second place, you need a cover story. The simplest
way to provide a cover story is by magical means – people you
don't know will gladly believe you're their brother, their son-in-law's
father or the army buddy they drank home brew with when
they went absent without leave. But a magical cover story will
leave traces that any reasonably powerful Other can spot.

So there was no magic involved in my cover story. Gesar handed
me the keys to an apartment in the Assol complex – a hundred and
fifty square metres of floor space on the eighth floor. It was registered
in my name and had been bought six months earlier. When I
opened my eyes wide at that, Gesar explained that the documents
had been signed that morning, but backdated. For big money. And
the apartment would have to be handed back afterwards.

I got the keys to a BMW just to add substance to my story. It
wasn't a new car, or the most luxurious model, but then my apartment
was a small one.

Then a tailor came into the office, a mournful little old Jewish
man, a seventh-grade Other. He took my measurements, promised
the suit would be ready by the evening, when, he assured us,
'this boy will start to look like a man'. Gesar was extremely polite
to the tailor, opening the door for him and seeing him out into
the reception. As he said goodbye, he asked timidly how his 'little
coat' was coming on. The tailor told him there was no need to
worry. A coat worthy of the Most Lucent Gesar would be ready
before the cold weather set in.

After hearing that, I wasn't as delighted as I had been at first
with the decision that I could keep my suit. The tailor clearly
didn't make genuine, top-quality garments in half a day.

Gesar himself provided me with ties. He even taught me a
particularly fashionable knot. Then he gave me a wad of banknotes
and the address of a shop and ordered me to buy everything else
to match, including underwear, handkerchiefs and socks. I was
offered the services of Ignat as a consultant, one of our magicians
who would have been called an incubus in the Day Watch. Or a
succubus – he didn't really care much either way.

The expedition to the boutiques – where Ignat felt right at home
– was amusing. But the visit to the hairdresser's, or rather the 'Beauty
Salon', left me completely wrecked. Two women and a young man
who tried to make out he was gay, although he wasn't, took turns
inspecting me. They sighed and made uncomplimentary remarks
about my hairdresser. If their wishes had come true, the hairdresser
would have been condemned to shearing mangy sheep for the rest
of his life. And, for some reason, in Tajikistan. This was clearly the
most terrible curse for hairdressers. I even decided that after my
mission I'd drop into the second-class hairdresser's where I'd been
getting my hair cut for the last year, just to make sure they hadn't
left an Inferno vortex hanging over the man's head.

The collective wisdom of the beauty specialists was that my
only hope of salvation was a short comb-cut, to make me look
like one of those small-time hoods who fleece traders at the
market. In consolation they told me that the forecast was for a
hot summer and I'd feel more comfortable with short hair.

After the haircut, which took more than an hour, I was subjected
to a manicure and a pedicure. When Ignat was satisfied, he took
me to a dentist, who removed the scale from my teeth with a
special fitting on his drill and advised me to have the procedure
repeated every six months. Afterwards my teeth felt somehow
naked, and it was unpleasant to touch them with my tongue. I
couldn't think of what to say in reply to Ignat's ambivalent
comment: 'Anton, you look good enough to fall in love with!'
and just mumbled something incomprehensible. All the way back
to the office I served as a defenceless target for his unsubtle wit.

The suit was waiting for me. And the tailor too, muttering
discontentedly that sewing a suit without a second fitting was like
getting married on impulse.

I don't know. If every marriage made on impulse was as successful
as that suit, divorce rates would be reduced to zero.

Gesar spoke to the tailor about his coat again. They had a long,
heated argument about the buttons, until the Most Lucent Magician
finally capitulated. I stood by the window, looking out at the evening
street and the small blinking light of the alarm system in 'my' car.

I hoped no one would steal it . . . I couldn't set up any magical
defences to frighten away petty thieves. That would give me away
more surely than the parachute trailing behind the Russian spy
Stirlitz in the old joke.

That night I was due to sleep in the new apartment. And I had
to pretend it wasn't the first time I'd been there. At least there was
no one waiting for me back at home. No wife or daughter or
dog or cat . . . I didn't even have fish in an aquarium. And it was
a good job I didn't.

'Do you understand your mission, Gorodetsky?' Gesar asked. The
tailor had left while I was daydreaming at the window. My new suit
was amazingly comfortable. Despite the new haircut, I didn't feel
like a thug who terrorised market traders, but someone a bit more
serious. Maybe a collector of protection money from small shops.

'Move into Assol. Meet with my neighbours. Look for any signs
of the renegade Other and his potential client. When I find them,
report back. In dealings with the other investigators behave civilly,
exchange information, be co-operative.'

Gesar stood beside me at the window. He nodded.

'All correct, Anton, all correct . . . Only you've missed out the
most important thing.'

'Oh yes?'

'You mustn't cling to any theories. Not even the most likely
ones . . . especially the most likely ones! The Other might be a
vampire or a werewolf . . . or he might not.'

I nodded.

'He might be a Dark One,' said Gesar. 'Or he might turn out
to be a Light One.'

I didn't say anything. I'd been thinking the same thing.

'And most important of all,' Gesar added, 'remember – "He
intends to turn this human being into an Other" could be a bluff.'

'And maybe not?' I asked. 'Gesar, is it really possible to turn a
human being into an Other?'

'Do you honestly think I would have hidden something like that?'
Gesar replied. 'So many Others with broken lives, so many fine people
condemned to live only their short, human lives . . . Nothing of the
kind has ever happened before. But there's a first time for everything.'

'Then I'll assume it is possible,' I said.

'I can't give you any amulets,' Gesar advised me. 'You understand
why. And you'd better not use magic. The only thing that
is permissible is to look through the Twilight. But if the need
arises, we'll be there quickly. Just call.'

He paused and then added:

'I'm not expecting any violent confrontations. But you must be
prepared for them.'

I'd never parked in an underground car park before. It was just as
well that there weren't many cars, the concrete ramps were flooded
with bright light and the security man sitting there watching the
monitors politely pointed out where my parking spaces were.

Apparently it was assumed that I had at least two cars.

After parking, I took my bag out of the boot, set the car alarm
and walked towards the exit. The security man was amazed, and
he asked me if the lifts were out of order. I had to wrinkle up
my forehead, wave my hand around and say I hadn't been there
for about a year.

The security man asked which floor I lived on, and in which
block. Then he showed me the way to the lift.

Surrounded by chrome, mirrors and conditioned air, I rode up
to the eighth floor. I actually felt rather insulted that I lived so low
down. I hadn't been expecting the penthouse exactly, but even so.

On the landing – if you can a hall with thirty square metres of
floor space a landing – I wandered from one door to another for a
while. The fairy tale had come to an abrupt end. One door was
completely missing, and behind the blank aperture there was a gigantic,
dark, empty room – concrete walls, a concrete floor, no internal divisions.
I could hear the faint sound of water dripping.

It took me a long time to choose between the three doors that
were in place – none of these had numbers. Eventually I found
a number someone had scratched on one door with a sharp object,
and the remains of some figures in chalk on another. It looked
like my door was the third one. The most unprepossessing of them
all. It would have been just like Gesar to put me in the apartment
that didn't even have a door, but then the cover story would have
been shot to pieces.

I took out a bunch of keys and opened the door fairly easily.
I looked for a light switch and found an entire array of them.

I started switching them on one at a time.

Once the apartment was flooded with light I closed the door
behind me and looked around thoughtfully.

Maybe there was something to this after all. Maybe.

The previous owner of the apartment . . . okay, okay, according
to the cover story, that was me. Anyway, when I started the finishing
work, I'd obviously been full of truly Napoleonic plans. How else
could I explain the custom-made patterned parquet, the oak
window frames, the Daikin air conditioners and other distinctive
features of a truly sumptuous residence?

But after that I must have run out of money. Because the immense
studio apartment – with no internal dividing walls – was untouched,
virginal. In the corner where the kitchen was supposed to be there
was a lopsided old Brest gas cooker, which could well have been
used for cooking semolina in the days of my infancy. Nestling on
its burners, as if to say 'Do not use!', was a basic microwave oven.
But then there was a luxurious extractor hood hanging above the
appalling cooker. Huddling pitifully alongside it were two stools and
a low serving table.

From sheer force of habit I took my shoes off and walked over
into the kitchen corner. There was no refrigerator and no furniture,
but there was a big cardboard box standing on the floor, full
of supplies – bottles of mineral water and vodka, cans of food,
packets of dry soup, boxes of crispbreads. Thanks, Gesar. If only
you'd thought of getting me a saucepan as well . . .

From the 'kitchen' I walked towards the bathroom. Apparently
I'd been clever enough not to display the toilet and the jacuzzi
for everyone to see . . .

I opened the door and looked round the bathroom. Not bad,
ten or twelve square metres. Nice-looking turquoise tiles. A
futuristic-looking shower cubicle – it was frightening to think
how much it would have cost and what fancy bits of technology
it was stuffed with.

But there wasn't a jacuzzi. There wasn't any kind of bath at all
– just the blocked-off water pipes sticking up in the corner. And
in addition . . .

I looked frantically round the bathroom and confirmed my
terrible suspicion.

There was no toilet there either!

Just the exit pipe to the drains blocked off with a wooden plug.

Great, thanks, Gesar!

Stop, no need to panic. They didn't put just one bathroom in
apartments like these. There had to be another one – for guests,
for children, for servants . . .

I darted back out into the studio space and found another door
in the corner, right beside the entrance. My premonition had not
deceived me – it was the bathroom for guests. There wasn't supposed
to be a bath here, and the shower was simpler.

But instead of a toilet, there was just another plugged pipe.

Disaster.

Now I was really screwed!

Of course, I knew the genuine professionals didn't take any
notice of such petty details. If James Bond ever went to the bathroom,
it was only to eavesdrop on someone else's conversation or
waste the villain hiding in the flush tank.

But I had to live here!

For a few seconds I was on the point of calling Gesar and demanding
a plumber. And then I imagined what his reply would be.

For some reason in my imagination Gesar smiled. Then he
heaved a sigh and gave the order – after which someone like the
head plumber of all Moscow came and fitted the toilet in person.
And Gesar smiled again and shook his head.

Magicians of his level didn't make mistakes in the detail. Their
mistakes were cities in flames, bloody wars and the impeachment
of presidents. But not overlooked sanitary conveniences.

If there was no toilet in my apartment, then that was the way
it was meant to be.

I explored my living space once again. I found a rolled-up
mattress and a pack of bed linen with a cheerful design. I laid out
the mattress and unpacked the things from my bag. I changed into
my jeans and the T-shirt with the optimistic message about clinical
death – I couldn't wear a tie in my own home, could I? I
took out my laptop . . . Oh yes, was I supposed to get onto the
internet via my mobile phone?

I had to make yet another search of the apartment. I found a
mains connection in the wall of the large bathroom on the 'studio'
room side. I decided that couldn't be accidental and glanced into
the bathroom. I was right – there was another mains socket beside
the non-existent toilet.