The Twilight Watch:

  * See The Day Watch, Story Three

  'Please refrain from sarcasm, gentlemen,' said Gesar. 'I could say a few things on my own account . . . to you, Zabulon, and to you, Edgar . . . How powerful is he?'

  'Very powerful,' said Edgar, still looking at Zabulon. 'The guy was already a Higher . . .'

  'Vampire,' Zabulon said with a contemptuous laugh.

  'Higher Vampire. Without much experience, of course . . . far less than you. But then he used the book, and became stronger than Witiezslav. That's already serious. I'm inclined to believe that Witiezslav was at the same grade as you, Great Ones.'

  'How did he finish Witiezslav off?' Zabulon asked. 'Do you have any theories?'

  'I do now,' Edgar said. 'Vampires have a hierarchy of their own. The boy challenged him to a duel for pre-eminence. It's not very . . . spectacular. A battle of minds, a duel of wills. Rather like a crude stare-out. After a few seconds one backs down and submits totally to the other's will. Whenever the Inquisition came up against vampires, Witiezslav always subdued them easily. But this time he lost.'

  'And was killed,' said Zabulon, nodding.

  'That's not necessarily the outcome,' Edgar observed. 'Kostya could have made him his slave. But either he was afraid of losing control or he decided to see it through to the end. Basically he ordered Witiezslav to dematerialise. And Witiezslav had no choice but to obey.'

  'A talented boy,' Gesar said ironically. 'I won't lie, Witiezslav's final destruction doesn't exactly upset me . . . Okay, so Konstantin has become more powerful than Witiezslav. Just how powerful, what's your assessment?'

  Edgar shrugged.

  'How can I assess that? He's more powerful than I am. I assume he's more powerful than either of you. Maybe more powerful than all of us put together.'

  'Don't start panicking,' Zabulon muttered. 'He's inexperienced. Magic isn't arm-wrestling, magic's an art. When you have a sword in your hand, the important thing is to strike a precise blow, not just swing wildly with all your might . . .'

  'I'm not panicking,' Edgar said in a soft voice. 'It's just hard to assess his level of power. It's very high. I used the "crystal shield" – Kostya very nearly broke through it.'

  The Great Ones exchanged glances

  'The "crystal shield" can't be broken,' Gesar observed. 'And anyway, how could you . . . all right, I understand. More artefacts from the special vault.'

  'He very nearly broke through the shield,' Edgar repeated.

  'And how did you manage to survive?' Gesar asked me. Maybe I imagined it, but I thought I heard a note of sympathy in his voice.

  'Kostya didn't want to kill me,' I said simply. 'He went for Edgar . . . at first I hit him with the "grey prayer"' – Gesar nodded in approval – 'and then I found some vodka and I splashed it in his face. Kostya went wild. But he still didn't want to kill me. Then the Inquisitors distracted him, he tore them to shreds, and left.'

  'A purely Russian approach – solving a problem with a glass of vodka,' Gesar said morosely. 'What for? Why did you provoke him? He's not a novice. It must have been obvious you couldn't handle him. Was I supposed to present Svetlana with your remains afterwards?'

  'I got carried away myself,' I admitted. 'It was all just so unexpected. Then Kostya started saying "Come with me, I don't want to hurt anyone . . ."' 'He doesn't want to hurt anyone,' Gesar said bitterly. 'A vampire reformer. A progressive lord of the world . . .'

  'Gesar, we have to decide what to do,' Zabulon said quietly. 'I can have the fighters from the military airport scrambled.'

  Neither magician spoke for a while.

  I imagined jet fighters screeching through the sky in pursuit of a bat, blazing away at it with their rockets . . .

  A phantasmagorical vision.

  'Helicopters then . . .' Gesar said thoughtfully. 'No. That's nonsense, Zabulon. He'll just brush any humans aside.'

  'A bomb after all then?' Zabulon asked curiously.

  'No!' Gesar shook his head. 'No. Not here. And it's too late for that . . . he's on the alert. We have to strike at him with magic.'

  Zabulon nodded. Then suddenly he started giggling.

  'What's this?' Gesar asked.

  'All my life . . .' said Zabulon. 'Would you believe it, my old enemy? All my life I've dreamed of working in harness with you! Well, now I really am . . . from hatred to love . . .'

  'You really are an absolute goon,' Gesar said in a quiet voice.

  'We're all a little touched,' Zabulon chuckled. 'Well then? You and me? Or shall we bring in our colleagues? They can pump in power, and we can be the spearhead, striking the blow.'

  Gesar shook his head.

  'No, Zabulon. We shouldn't go near Konstantin. I have a different suggestion . . .'

  He looked at me.

  I felt at the broken stump of a tooth with my tongue. That was a real drag.

  'I'm ready, Gesar.'

  'Yes, there's a chance,' Zabulon said, with a nod of approval. 'Since Kostya still allows sentimental considerations to influence him . . . the only thing is, will you be able to strike at him, Anton?'

  I paused. I had to think about it seriously.

  There was no question of an arrest. I'd have to strike swiftly and surely and kill him. Become the spearhead, the focus of the power that would be pumped into me by Gesar, Zabulon, Edgar . . . maybe other magicians as well. Sure, I was less experienced than the Great Ones. But there was a chance I could get close to Kostya without a fight.

  On account of those 'sentimental considerations'.

  The alternative was simple – the Great Ones would gather all their power into a single fist. Even Nadya's power would be required – and Gesar would demand that Svetlana initiate our daughter . . .

  There was no alternative.

  'I'll kill Kostya,' I said.

  'Wrong,' Gesar said in a low voice. 'Say it right, watchman!'

  'I'll subdue the vampire,' I whispered.

  Gesar nodded.

  'And don't get all introspective about it, Gorodetsky,' Zabulon added. 'None of your intellectual snivelling. That nice boy Kostya doesn't exist any more. He never did. Maybe he hasn't killed anybody for blood, but he's still a vampire. Non-life.'

  Gesar nodded in agreement.

  I closed my eyes for a moment.

  Non-life.

  He was lacking that thing that we call a soul.

  A certain vital component that even we Others can't define. From early in his childhood – thanks to his parents. As the boy grew up, the doctor in the local clinic had listened to his heart and admired his robust health. He had turned from a boy into a man, and no girl had ever said his lips were cold when she kissed them. He could have had children – perfectly ordinary children with a perfectly ordinary woman.

  But it was all non-life. It was all borrowed and stolen, and when Kostya died, his body would instantly crumble to dust . . . because it had already been dead for a long, long time.

  We're all condemned to death from the moment we're born.

  But at least we can live until we die.

  'Leave me alone with Anton,' Gesar said. 'I'll try to prepare him.'

  I heard Zabulon and Edgar stand up. They went out into the corridor. There was a rustling sound – Gesar had evidently shielded us against observation. And then he asked:

  'Are you suffering?'

  'No.' I shook my head without opening my eyes. 'I'm thinking. Kostya tried not to behave like a vampire, after all . . .'

  'And what conclusions have you reached?'

  'He won't be able to hold on.' I opened my eyes and looked at Gesar. 'He won't be able to hold on, he'll lose control. He's managed to subdue the physiological need for living blood, but as for all the rest . . . he's non-life among the living and that's a torment to him. Sooner or later Kostya will lose control.'

  Gesar waited.

  'He's already lost control,' I said. 'When he killed Witiezslav and the Inquisitors . . . one of the Inquisitors was a Light One, right?'

  Gesar no
dded.

  'I'll do the right thing,' I promised. 'I feel sorry for Kostya, but there's nothing to be done.'

  'I have faith in you, Anton,' Gesar said. 'Now tell me what you really wanted to ask.'

  'What keeps you in the Night Watch, boss?'

  Gesar smiled.

  'When you get right down to it, we're all tarred with the same brush,' I said. 'We don't fight the Dark Ones, we fight the ones that even the Dark Ones reject – the psychopaths, the maniacs, the lawless ones. For obvious reasons there are more of them among the vampires and the werewolves. The Dark Ones do the same . . . the Day Watch hunts the Light Ones who want to do good to everyone all at once . . . in other words, the ones who might reveal our existence to human beings. The Inquisitors supposedly stand above the fray, but what they actually do is make sure the Watches don't take their functions too seriously. Make sure the Dark Ones don't attempt to gain formal control over the human world and the Light Ones don't try to wipe out the Dark Ones completely . . . Gesar, the Night Watch and the Day Watch are just two halves of a single whole!'

  Gesar just looked at me for a while without saying anything.

  'Were things . . . deliberately arranged that way?' I asked. Then I answered my own question. 'I guess they were. The young ones, the newly initiated Others, might not have accepted a single Watch for Light Ones and Dark Ones: I can't do that – go out on patrol with a vampire! I would have been outraged by that myself . . . And so two Watches were set up, the lower ranks hunt each other fervently, the leaders plot and intrigue – out of sheer boredom – just to keep up appearances. But it's a joint leadership.'

  Gesar sighed and took out a cigar. He cut its tip and lit it.

  'And like a fool,' I muttered, still looking at Gesar, 'I always used to wonder how we managed to survive at all. The watches of Samara, of Novogorod Veliky, of little Kireevsky village in the Tomsk region. All supposedly independent. But basically, when there's any kind of problem, they come running to us, to Moscow . . . Okay, the arrangement's not de jure, it's all de facto – but the Moscow Watch runs all the Watches in Russia.'

  'And in three of the newly independent states . . .' Gesar added. He blew out a stream of smoke, which gathered into a dense cloud in mid-air, rather than dispersing throughout the compartment.

  'So what comes next?' I asked. 'How do the independent Watches of Russia and, say, Lithuania, interact? Or Russia, Lithuania, the USA and Uganda? In the human world what happens is clear enough, whoever has the biggest stick and the thickest wallet calls the tune. But the Russian Watches are stronger than the American ones. I even think . . .'

  'The strongest is the French Watch,' Gesar said, sounding bored. 'Strong, but extremely lazy. An amazing phenomenon. We can't understand what the reason is – it can't just be a matter of consuming massive quantities of dry wine and oysters . . .'

  'The Watches are run by the Inquisition,' I said. 'It doesn't settle disputes, it doesn't punish renegades, it runs things. It gives permission for one social experiment or another, it appoints and removes the leaders . . . it transfers them from Uzbekistan to Moscow . . . There's one Inquisition, with two operational agencies. The Night Watch and the Day Watch. The Inquisition's only goal is to maintain the existing status quo, because victory for the Dark Ones or the Light Ones means defeat for the Others in general.'

  'And what else, Anton?' Gesar asked.

  I shrugged.

  'What else? Nothing else. People get on with their little human lives and enjoy their little human joys. They feed us with their bodies . . . and provide new Others. The Others who are less ambitious live almost ordinary lives. Only their lives are more prosperous, healthier and longer than ordinary people's. Those who just can't live without excitement, who long for battles and adventures, and struggle for ideals – they join the Watches. The ones who are disillusioned with the Watches join the Inquisition.'

  'And? . . .' Gesar asked, encouraging me to continue.

  'What are you doing in the Night Watch, boss?' I asked. 'Aren't you sick of it yet . . . after thousands of years?'

  'Let's just say that after all this time I still enjoy battles and adventures,' Gesar said.

  I shook my head.

  'Boris Ignatievich, I don't believe you. I've seen you when you're . . . different. Too weary. Too disillusioned.'

  'Then let's assume that I'd really like to finish off Zabulon,' Gesar said calmly.

  I thought for a second.

  'That's not it either. In hundreds of years one of you would have finished off the other already. Zabulon said that fighting with magic is like swordplay. Well, you're not fighting with swords, you're fencing with blunt rapiers. You claim a hit, but you don't really wound your opponent.'

  Gesar nodded and paused before speaking. Another dense stream of tobacco smoke joined the blue-grey cloud.

  'What do you think, Anton, is it possible to live for thousands of years and still feel the same pity for people?'

  'Pity?'

  Gesar nodded.

  'Precisely pity. Not love – it's beyond our power to love the entire world. And not admiration – we know only too well what human beings are like'

  'It probably is possible to pity them,' I said. 'But what good is your pity, boss? It's pointless, barren. Others don't make the human world any better.'

  'We do, Anton. No matter how bad things still are. Trust an old man who's seen a lot.'

  'But even so . . .'

  'I'm waiting for a miracle, Anton.'

  I looked at Gesar quizzically.

  'I don't know exactly what kind of miracle. For all people to acquire the abilities of Others. For all Others to become human again. For a day when the dividing line won't run between Other and human being, but between good and evil.' Gesar smiled gently. 'I have absolutely no idea how anything of the sort could ever happen, or if it ever will. But if it ever does . . . I prefer to be on the side of the Night Watch. And not the Inquisition – the mighty, ingenious, righteous, all-powerful Inquisition.'

  'Maybe Zabulon's waiting for the same thing?'

  Gesar nodded.

  'Perhaps. I don't know. But better an old enemy you know than a young, unpredictable freak. You can call me a conservative, but I prefer rapiers with Zabulon to baseball bats with a progressive Dark Magician.'

  'And what would you advise me to do?'

  Gesar shrugged and spread his hands.

  'What advice would I give you? Make up your own mind. You can get out and have an ordinary life. You can join the Inquisition . . . I wouldn't object if you did. Or you can stay in the Night Watch.'

  'And wait?'

  'And wait. Preserve the part of you that's still human. Avoid falling into ecstatic raptures and trying to impose the Light on people when they don't want it. Avoid relapsing into contemptuous cynicism, imagining that you are pure and perfect. That's the hardest thing of all – never to become cynical, never to lose faith, never to become indifferent.'