The Inquisition had not been mean with the detainees. The hotel was a perfectly decent one and, while Igor was not in a deluxe accommodation, he had a suite with two good rooms.

Anton hesitated for a second before he walked toward Igor.

How he had changed...

Igor had always been an operational agent. He'd joined the Watch during the years after the war¡ªthere had been a lot of work to do then. On the one hand there was an upsurge of Light emotions, and on the other hand, during the difficult war years all sorts of petty riffraff had multiplied. And with the general atheistic mood in the country, it wasn't easy for anybody to accept that he or she was an Other. But it had been easy for Igor to accept his true nature; he had been glad to. He didn't really see much difference between parachuting in behind the fascist lines to blow up bridges and catching vampires and werewolves on the streets of Moscow. His Power was an honest third level, with little chance of advancing to anything higher, but even the third level is fairly substantial, if it's reinforced with experience, courage, and good reactions.

Igor had all of those in abundance. Perhaps he was just a little bit short on experience, but then he had worked in the Watch at a time when you could easily count one year as three. Perhaps he wasn't as well-read or erudite as Ilya or Garik, and he hadn't taken part in as many impressive operations as Semyon, but there weren't many who could match him out in the field. And there was one other thing that Anton had always liked¡ªIgor had stayed young. Not just physically¡ªthat was no problem for a magician of his level¡ªbut in his soul. Who was it who would gladly accompany fifteen-year-old Yu-lia from the analytical department to some place in Tushino for the launch of the album "A Hundred Fifty Billion Steps" by the fashionable band Tequila Jazz? Who was it who was happy to spend time coping with a teenager riddled with complexes who'd just realized he was an Other? Who would enthusiastically devote five years to extreme parachuting simply in order to verify the theory about the high numbers of Others involved in extreme sports? Who was always first to volunteer to take a colleague's watch or take on the most boring assignment (there was no lack of volunteers for the dangerous ones)? Maybe it was a mistake, but for some time already Anton had felt that it was safer to have your back covered by a partner who was reliable and cheerful, rather than powerful and worldly-wise. A powerful and wise partner could always be distracted by a more important job than covering someone else's back...

But the Other standing in front of Anton now didn't look either powerful or cheerful. Igor had lost a lot of weight. There was a strange, dull, hopeless yearning in his eyes. And he didn't seem to know what to do with his hands... sometimes he put them behind his back, sometimes he clasped them together.

"Anton," he said after a long silence. Without a smile, with only the faintest trace of gladness. "Hello, Anton."

On a sudden impulse, Anton stepped forward and put his arms around Igor. He whispered: "Hello... Now what are you doing in such a state..."

Witezslav, who was standing by the door, said quietly, "I shan't issue any official warnings about associating with detainees... since you're Light Ones. Shall I wait for you, Gorodetsky?"

"No, thank you," said Anton, stepping back from Igor, but leaving one hand on his shoulder. "I'll make my own way back."

"Igor Teplov, the session of the Tribunal to consider your case will convene tomorrow evening, at seven o'clock local time. A car will come for you at six thirty; be ready."

"I've been ready for a long time," Igor said quietly. "Don't worry."

"All the best," the vampire said politely as he went out.

The two Light Ones were left alone together.

"Do I look damned awful?" Igor asked.

Anton didn't lie: "Worse than that. I've seen corpses that looked better. Anybody would think you were being kept on bread and water."

Igor shook his head seriously. "Oh no, I've been kept in good conditions."

There was a hint of irony in his words, as if he were talking about some animal sitting in a cage in a zoo.

"I've got a parcel here for you," Anton replied in the same tone of voice, clutching at that weak thread of life. "Is feeding the animals permitted?"

"Yes, it is," Igor said with a nod. "I just... I just can't eat, you know? I can't read books, I don't want to get drunk... or see anybody either. I switch on the television and watch it until three o'clock in the morning. When I get up I switch it on again. You know, I've already mastered the Czech language. It's very easy to understand."

"That's terrible," said Anton with a nod. "All right. As you can understand, when I left I was given confidential instructions¡ª to give you back the will to live."

Igor actually smiled at that. "I understand. That's to be expected... well, get the things out."

Anton put a thick pile of letters on the table. There was just one name on each envelope¡ªthe name of the person who had written the letter.

"These are from all our gang. Olga said you had to read her letter first. But Yulia and Lena said the same thing. So you choose for yourself..."

Igor looked at the letters thoughtfully and nodded. "I'll throw a dice. All right, get out the rest. I don't mean the letters."

Anton smiled as he took a bottle wrapped in paper out of a plastic bag.

"Smirnoff No. 21," said Igor. "Right?"

"Right."

"I knew it. Carry on."

Anton carried on, smiling in embarrassment as he took out a small loaf of Borodinsky black bread, a stick of salami, salted cucumbers in a polythene vacuum pack, several purple Yalta onions, and a piece of pork fat.

"Why, you devils," said Igor, shaking his head. "Everything the way I like it. Semyon advised you, did he?"

"Yes."

"The customs officers must have thought you were insane."

"I made them look the other way. I'm on official business¡ª so I have the right."

"I see. Okay, I'll just get everything ready. And you tell me what's been going on back there. I've been kept informed... but it's better coming from you. About Andrei, about Tiger Cub... about that whole damn mess."

While Igor was making the snacks, rinsing the glasses and drying them carefully, and opening the bottle, Anton told him in brief about the recent events in Moscow.

Igor poured vodka into four glasses without speaking. He covered two with slices of bread, set one in front of Anton, and took the last one himself.

"For the guys," he said. "May the Light show them compassion. For Tiger Cub... for Andriukha."

They drank without clinking glasses, and Anton looked at Igor curiously. Igor began coughing and looked at his glass, perplexed.

"Anton... wait... this vodka's fake!"

"Of course!" Anton confirmed happily. "Absolutely genuine fake vodka¡ªpure alcohol diluted with tap water. I chose it specially. You wouldn't believe how hard it is nowadays to buy fake vodka in the shops!"

"But why?" Igor exclaimed.

"What do you mean, why? Why did I bring you Borodinsky bread? I could have bought a loaf of fresh, tasty black bread in any shop in Prague! And the salami too, and the pork fat. The onions would have been the only problem..."

"So this is a greeting from the motherland, is it?" said Igor, still wincing.

"Precisely."

"Oh no... I want to greet my last morning without a headache," Igor said seriously. He frowned and passed his hand above the bottle and the two full glasses. The liquid glimmered a lemon-yellow color for a moment. Igor explained in a slightly guilty voice: "I'm allowed to use lower magic."

"Then pour another glass."

"Are you in some kind of a hurry?" Igor asked, squinting at Anton as he poured the transformed vodka.

"No, where would I be going?" Anton replied. "I'd rather sit here with you and have a chat. Do you know why I changed the bottle?"

"So you're the perpetrator?"

"Yes, it was me. Semyon brought the real thing. But I wanted to remind you that a beautiful bottle doesn't always contain good stuff."

Igor sighed and his face went dark: "Gorodetsky... don't moralize with me. I was in the Watch before you were even born. I understand everything. But it's my own fault, and I'll take my punishment."

"No, you don't understand a thing," Anton shouted angrily. "You adopt this grand pose of yours: 'It's my fault, I'll take what's coming to me,"" he said, mimicking Igor. "But what are we supposed to do? Especially now, without Tiger Cub and Andrei? You know that Gesar's decided to give the girls who do the programming intensive training?"

"Oh, come on, Anton! There aren't any irreplaceable Others. The Moscow Watch has hundreds of magicians and enchantresses in its reserve!"

"Yes, of course. And if we whistle, they'll come running. Leave their families, drop their jobs and their usual concerns. They'll take up arms, of course they will. If the active members of the Watch have disgraced themselves and given up..."

Igor sighed and began speaking abruptly and energetically, almost like the old operational agent: "Anton, I understand all this. You're a bright guy, and you're doing the right thing now by making me angry. You're trying to inspire me with the will to live. You're trying to persuade me to fight... But understand one thing¡ªI really don't want to fight! I really think I am guilty. I really have decided to... withdraw. Into nothingness, into the Twilight."

"Why, Igor? I understand that anyone's death is always a tragedy, especially if it's your fault, but you couldn't have foreseen..."

Igor looked up at him with eyes full of pain and shook his head. "No, Antoshka. It's you who doesn't understand a single thing. Do you think I'm punishing myself because that kid drowned? No."

Anton picked up his glass and drained it in a single gulp.

"I feel sorry for the boy," Igor went on. "Very sorry. But I've seen all sorts of things in my time... there have been times before when people died. And it was my fault. Children, women, old men. Have you ever, for instance, had to decide who to run to first, who to save¡ªan uninitiated Other or an ordinary person? I have. Have you ever had to draw all the Power from a crowd¡ªdrain it completely? Knowing there's a ninety percent probability two people in the crowd won't be able to bear it and they'll kill themselves? I have."

"I've had to do a few things too, Igor."

"Yes, I understand. That hurricane... Then why are you talking such nonsense? Can't you believe it's not all about that unfortunate kid? That I fell in love with a Dark One?"

"I can't," said Anton. "I just can't! Gesar said that too, but..."

"You'd better believe Gesar," Igor said with a bitter smile. "I love her, Anton. I still love her, even now. And I'll go on loving her¡ªthat's the real tragedy."

He picked up his glass.

"Thanks at least for not setting a glass out for her on the table..." Anton could feel the fury beginning to seethe inside him. "Thanks..."

He broke off and followed Igor's glance to the glass-fronted cupboard, where there was a glass half-filled with vodka and covered with a stale piece of bread standing among the other glasses.

"You've lost your mind," Anton muttered. "Completely lost your mind! Remember, Igor¡ªshe's a witch!"

"She was a witch," Igor agreed with a faint, sad smile.

"She provoked you... okay, she didn't enchant you, but she still made you fall in love with her."

"No. She fell in love herself. And she didn't have the slightest idea who I was."

"Okay. Let's accept that, you ought to know. But even so, it was provocation. By Zabulon, who knew everything that was happening..."

Igor nodded. "Yes, very probably. I've thought about that a lot, Anton. That fight in Butovo was obviously prepared well in advance by the Dark Ones. At the very highest level, just Zabulon and another one or two Dark Ones. Lemesheva probably knew. Edgar and the witches didn't."

He didn't even think it worth mentioning the vampires and shape-shifters.

"Well, if you agree..." Anton began.

"Wait. Yes, it was a deliberately planned operation. One of Zabulon's intrigues. And a successful one..." Igor lowered his head. "Only what difference does that make to the way I feel about Alisa?"

Anton felt like swearing angrily. So he did, and then he said, "Igor, you've looked at Alisa Donnikova's file. You must have looked at it!"

"Yes."

"So you must understand how much blood she has on her hands! How much evil she has done? I've clashed with her myself several times! She's been responsible for ruining our operations, she... she served Zabulon loyally..."

"You forgot to add that she was Zabulon's broad," Igor said in a dull, lifeless voice. "That the head of Moscow's Dark Ones enjoyed having sex with her in his Twilight form, that she took part in covens when there were human sacrifices and in group orgies. Why don't you say it? Say it, I know it all anyway. Gesar gave me the full file... he tried really hard. I know all that."

"And you still love her?" Anton asked incredulously.

Igor raised his head, and they looked into each other's eyes. Then Igor reached out and gently touched Anton's hand. "Don't be angry with me, brother Light One. Don't despise me. And if you can't understand, you'd better go. Take a walk around Prague..."

"I'm trying to understand," Anton whispered. "Honestly, I'm trying. Alisa Donnikova was a perfectly ordinary witch. No better and no worse than all the rest. A clever, beautiful, cruel witch. Who left evil and pain in her wake wherever she went. How can you love her?"

"She was different with me," Igor replied. "A nervous and unhappy girl who really wanted to love someone. Who had fallen in love for the first time. A girl who, unfortunately for us, the Dark Ones spotted before we did. And for her initiation they chose a moment when there was more Darkness in her soul than Light. That's not too difficult to do with teenage girls¡ªyou know yourself. And after that it was all very simple. The Twi-light drained all the goodness out of her. The Twilight turned her into what she became."

"It's not Alisa herself that you love," said Anton, failing to notice that he was speaking about Donnikova in the present tense. "What you love is her idealized... no, her alternative image! The Alisa that never existed!"

"She certainly doesn't exist now. But you're still wrong, Anton. I love her the way she became when she lost her powers as an Other. When she was freed for just a moment from that sticky gray cobweb. Tell me, have you never had to forgive somebody?"

"Yes, I have," Anton replied after a pause. "But not for something like that."

"You've been lucky, Antoshka."

Igor poured more vodka.

"Then tell me this..." Anton wasn't trying to spare Igor's feelings, but he still found it hard to get the words out. "Why did you kill her?"

"Because she was a witch," Igor said very calmly. "Because she caused evil and pain. Because 'a member of the Night Watch always protects people against Dark Ones everywhere, in any country, regardless of his personal attitude to the situation." Have you never wondered about why the Regulations include that specific phrase? About our personal attitude to the situation? It ought to read 'personal attitude to the Dark Ones," but that sounds rather pitiful. So they used a eum... euph..."

"Euphemism," Anton prompted him.

"A euphemism." Igor laughed. "Exactly. Remember when we caught the girl vampire on the roof? You were about to fire at her point-blank, but then your vampire neighbor turned up. And you lowered your gun."

"I was wrong," Anton said with a shrug. "She had to be tried. That was why I stopped."

"No, Anton. You would have shot her. And any other vampire who came running to help the criminal. But you were facing a vampire who was your friend, or at least one that you knew. And you stopped. But imagine if the choice had been between shooting and letting the criminal escape."

"I would have shot her," Anton said abruptly. "And Kostya too. There wouldn't have been any choice. I'd have felt very bad about it, I agree, but I..."

"And what if it hadn't just been someone you knew well, but the woman you loved? A human woman or an Other enchantress from either side?"

"I would have shot..." Anton whispered. "I would have shot anyway."

"And then what?"

"I wouldn't have allowed such a situation to arise. I just wouldn't have allowed it!"

"Of course. The very idea of loving never enters our heads if we see the aura of Darkness. It's the same for the Dark Ones if they see the aura of Light. But we were caught by surprise, Anton. We'd lost all our powers. And we didn't have a choice..."

"Tell me, Igor..." Anton paused and took a breath. The vodka hadn't done the trick, and even though the conversation was certainly intimate, it wasn't bringing any relief. "Tell me, why didn't you just throw Alisa out of the camp? Why didn't you ask Gesar for help and advice? That way you would have protected people and at the same time..."

"She wouldn't have gone," Igor said sharply. "After all, she had legitimate reason to be there at Artek. You know what's the most terrible thing about this whole business, Anton? Zabulon extracted the right for her to restore herself from Gesar in exchange for the same right for a third-level magician! Me, that is! Do you see how everything was all tied up together?"

"But are you sure she wouldn't have gone away?" Anton asked.

Igor lifted up his glass without speaking. For the first time that evening they clinked glasses, but no toast was proposed. "No, Anton, I'm not sure. That's the terrible thing, I'm not sure. I told her... I ordered her to clear out. But that was the very first moment, when we'd only just realized who was who. When my brain still hadn't kicked in, I was running on pure adrenaline..."

"If she loved you," said Anton, "she would have gone. You just needed to find the right words..."

"Probably. But who can say for certain now?"

"Igor, I'm really sorry," Anton whispered. "I don't feel sorry for the witch Alisa, of course... don't even ask me. I can't shed even a single tear for her. But I feel terribly sorry for you. And I really want you to stay with us. To get through this and not let it destroy you."

"I've got nothing left to live for, Anton," said Igor with a guilty shrug. "You understand, nothing! You know, I probably fell in love for the first time in my life too. I had a wife once. I became an Other in 1945... I came back from the front, a young captain with a chest full of medals, and not a single scratch on me... and I'd been lucky in general. It was only later I realized it was my latent abilities as an Other that had kept me safe. And then I learned the truth about the Watches... It was a new war, you understand? And an absolutely just one, it couldn't have been more just. I didn't really know how to do anything except fight, and now I realized I'd found myself a job for life. For a very long life. And that I wouldn't have to face any of those human afflictions and annoying illnesses, those lines for food... you can't even imagine what perfectly ordinary hunger is like, Anton, what genuinely black bread tastes like, or genuinely bad vodka... what it feels like the first time you laugh in the fat, well-fed face of a special agent from SMERSH and yawn lazily in response to his question: "Why did you spend two months on enemy territory if the bridge was blown up on the third day after you parachuted in?"

Igor was beginning to get carried away now. He was speaking quickly and furiously... not at all the way the young magician from the Night Watch usually spoke...

"I came back and I looked at my Vilena, my little Lenochka-Vilenochka, so young and beautiful. She used to write me letters every day, honestly, and what letters they were! I saw how glad she was that I'd come back¡ªI wasn't hurt, I wasn't crippled, and I was a hero as well. Very few women were so fortunate then. But she was very afraid that her envious bitches of neighbors would tell me about all the men she'd had during those four years, that my officer's warrant wasn't the only reason she'd been getting by quite comfortably... even now you don't understand half of what I'm saying, do you? But I suddenly saw it. All of it at once. The longer I looked at her, the more I saw. All the details. And not only all her men¡ª from lousy speculators to others like me, soldiers who hopped over the hospital fence and went absent without leave... And the way she whispered to one colonel, "He's probably been rotting in the ground for ages...'¡ªI heard that too... And by the way, that colonel turned out to be a real man. He got up off the bed, slapped her across the face, got dressed, and walked out."

Igor poured himself some vodka and drank it quickly, without waiting for Anton, then filled the glasses again. He said, "That's when I became what I am. When I left my home, with my medals jangling and Vilena roaring, "It's all lies what they told you, the bitches, I was faithful to you!" I walked along the street, with something burning away in my soul. It was May, Anton. May 1945. Immediately after Germany capitulated, Gesar pulled me back from the front and told me: "From now on your front line is here, Captain Teplov." And back then people were... they were different, Anton. Their faces were all shining! There were plenty of foul Dark creatures around, I won't deny it, but there was a lot of Light as well. And as I walked along the street the little kids darted round me, look-ing at my chest full of medals, arguing about which one was for what. Men shook my hand and invited me to take a drink with them. Girls came running up to me... and kissed me. Kissed me like their own boyfriends, who hadn't come back yet, or had already been killed. Like their own fathers, like their own brothers. Sometimes they cried, kissed me, and went on their way. Do you understand me? No, how could you... You worry about our country too, you think how bad everything is right now, what a lousy hole we're all in... You suffer because the Light Ones won't all get together to help Russia. Only you don't know what it's like to be in a real hole, Anton. But we do!"

Igor drained his glass again. Anton raised his glass without speaking and nodded in support of the toast that had not been spoken aloud.

"That was when I became what I am," Igor repeated. "A magician. A field agent. Eternally young. Who loves everybody... and nobody. I'd already made up my mind that I would never fall in love. Never. Girlfriends were one thing, love was something quite different. I couldn't love a human being, because human beings were weak. I couldn't love an Other, because any Other was either an enemy or a comrade-in-arms. That was the principle I adopted for my life, Antoshka. And I stuck to it as closely as I could. It seemed like I was still the same young man who came back from the front, who still had plenty of time to think about falling in love. It's one thing to take a whirl with a girl on the dance floor..." he said, and laughed quietly, "or leap about in cool threads under the ultraviolet light at the discotheque... what difference does it make if it's jazz, rock, or trash, what length the skirt is and what the stockings are made of... It's all good. It's the way things ought to be. Have you seen that American cartoon, about Peter Pan? Well, I became like him. Only not a stupid little boy, but a stupid young man. And I felt just fine for a long time. Supposedly I've outlived the time granted to a man, and it would be a sin to complain¡ªI haven't had any helpless old age or other problems. So don't you torment yourself unnecessarily, Anton."

Anton sat there with his head in his hands, not speaking. It was as if he'd opened a door and seen something behind it... not something taboo, and not something shameful either... Just something that had absolutely nothing to do with him. And he realized that behind every door, if¡ªmay the Light forbid!¡ªhe was able to open it, he would see something equally alien and... personal.

"I've reached the end of my road, Anton," Igor said almost tenderly. "Don't be so sad. I understand that you came here hoping to shake me up, to get all this nonsense out of my head, to carry out your instructions. Only it won't work. Like a fool, I really did fall in love with a Dark One. I killed her. And it turns out I killed myself too."

Anton didn't say anything. It was all pointless. He was overwhelmed by someone else's anguish, someone else's grief. Instead of simply bringing a parcel to a sick friend, here he was sitting with him at his own wake...

"Anton, don't go away today," Igor said. "I won't sleep anyway... soon I'll catch up on my sleep forever. To be honest, I've got another three bottles of vodka in the refrigerator. And there's a restaurant five floors down."

"Then we'll fall asleep at the table."

"We'll be okay, we're Others. We can take it. I want to talk. To cry on someone's shoulder. I've started feeling afraid of the dark. Can you believe that?"

"Yes."

Igor nodded. "Thanks. I've got my guitar here, we can sing something. Or I'll sing. You know, singing for yourself is just the same as... well, you understand. And apart from that..."

Anton looked at Igor¡ªhis voice had suddenly become more focused. Stronger.

"I'm a watchman, after all. I haven't forgotten that, you can be quite sure. And it seems to me that in all this mess, I'm no more than a pawn... no, probably not a pawn... A rook who has taken one of the other side's pieces and occupied a square in the line of fire. Only unlike the other pieces, I can think. I hope you haven't forgotten how to do that, either. I don't care about myself anymore, Anton. But I do care who wins this game. Let's think together."

"Where do we begin?" Anton asked, feeling amazed at himself. Surely he hadn't accepted what Igor had said and agreed to think of him as a piece who had already been removed from the board... or who at least was already doomed as the invisible player reached out his hand for him...

"With Svetlana. With the Chalk of Destiny," said Igor, watching carefully to see how Anton's face changed. He laughed smugly. "Well, have I guessed right? You've been having the same thoughts?"

"And so has Gesar..." Anton whispered.

"Gesar's a clever one," Igor agreed. "But we're no fools, are we? Anyway, why don't we try thinking with our heads and not our hands for once?"

"Okay, let's try," Anton said with a nod. "Only..."

He fumbled in his pocket for the amulet that Gesar had given him. He crushed the little ball in his hand and felt the bone needles prick his skin. There was never any gain without pain... He said:

"Now for twelve hours no one will be able to see us or hear us."

"Are you sure?" Igor asked. "Won't the absence of information alert the Inquisition?"

"There won't be any absence," said Anton. "As far as I understand it, if they have any observational devices here, or if they've cast any tracking spells¡ªthey'll provide false information. It's a quality scam."

"Gesar's a clever one," Igor repeated with a smile.

Edgar sat by the window, smoking and slowly sipping a glass of flat champagne. It still tasted good.

His girlfriend was sleeping peacefully in the next room, satisfied and happy. She had turned out to be a fine girl. A German student with some Scandinavian blood, reasonably passionate and reasonably cheerful. But a bit too fanciful in sex for Edgar's taste. Unlike most of his colleagues, Edgar was very conservative in such matters. He didn't take part in orgies, he didn't have underage girlfriends, and out of all the possibilities he preferred the classic missionary position.

But there was no denying that in that position he had achieved perfection.

Edgar stretched sweetly and carefully opened the window. He stood up and breathed in the cold, frosty air. The new day had begun and perhaps the Tribunal would give its verdict that very evening. Then he'd be able to relax and enjoy the festive season, without worrying about all these intrigues.

But who was behind this intrigue, after all... the Day Watch or the Night Watch?

And most important of all¡ªwhat role had been assigned to him?

Could Yury's hint really be right, was he supposed to be sacrificed, just like Alisa?

"Here, look..." Igor spread out a large sheet of paper on the table and took a pack of felt-tip pens out of his pocket. "I've already drawn a few diagrams... and some things fit together. This is Svetlana."

Anton looked thoughtfully at the circle drawn with a thick yellow line and said, "It doesn't look much like her."

Igor laughed. "All right... very witty. But look at the way things shape up. We and the Dark Ones had a balance, a precarious one, but still a balance... Here are the magicians with first- to third-level powers on our side... here are their equivalents on the Dark Side... Both the ones in active service and the others who can easily be mobilized."

The paper was quickly covered with small circles. Then Igor divided the sheet in two with a sweeping gesture. At the top of one side he wrote "Gesar," and at the top of the other, "Zabu-lon." He explained: "They're not really in the game. They're the players, but we're interested in the pieces. Look at how things changed with Svetlana's appearance."

"It depends what piece we decide she is," Anton said cautiously. "Right now she's a first-level enchantress... or rather, she was."

"And what does that mean? Just look how many magicians there are at about the same level as her."

"She's a pawn," said Anton, feeling surprised at his own words. "Svetlana's no more than a pawn for years and years to come! While she nurtures her Power, learns to control her abilities, acquires experience... She's more powerful than me... or she was. But I'd have been able to handle her if I'd been on the other side."

"Precisely, Anton," said Igor, deftly pouring himself a glass from the second bottle of vodka¡ªthe first was already standing empty under the table. "Precisely! Svetlana made the Night Watch significantly more powerful. And in the future she could easily reach the same level as Gesar. But that's a matter of decades, or even hundreds of years."

"Then why all this activity by the Dark Ones? They almost violated the Treaty, simply in order to get Svetlana out of the game."

"Think," said Igor, glancing into Anton's eyes. "Let's take the chess analogy all the way..."

"A pawn that reaches the far side of the board..."

"... becomes any other piece."

Anton shrugged. "Igor, that's obvious anyway. We're all pawns, but some of us have a chance to become queens. Svetlana has. You don't, I don't, Semyon doesn't... but it's a long way to the far edge of the board, and the Dark Ones don't need to be in such a hurry to eliminate Svetlana."

"The Chalk of Destiny," said Igor.

"What about it? Gesar wanted to use Egor, the boy without any destiny to make him into..."

"Into what?"

Anton shrugged. "A prophet, a philosopher, a poet, a magician... I don't know. Someone who would lead humanity toward the Light. Or perhaps a Mirror? Another Mirror, like Vi-taly Rogoza, only he would be on our side?"

"But Svetlana didn't want to interfere," Igor said with a nod. "The boy Egor was left with just his own destiny."

"But then..." Anton began and stopped short. He didn't know if he had the right to tell Igor the truth he had discovered, even under the protection of the amulet.

"But then Olga rewrote someone's destiny with the other half of the Chalk," Igor said with a laugh. "That's an open secret already. The important thing is that the operation was successful anyway. Svetlana didn't do it, but Olga did. And incidentally Gesar managed to have Olga rehabilitated."

"Incidentally?" Anton queried, shaking his head. "Okay, let's say incidentally... But that's the second layer of the truth. I'm sure there's a third layer too."

"The third layer is the person whose destiny Olga rewrote. As soon as Zabulon heard she'd been rehabilitated, he realized he'd been duped. Taken in by a simple diversionary maneuver. And the Dark Ones started looking. They checked poor Egor a dozen times¡ªin case the Book of Destiny had been rewritten twice for him..."

"And how do you know that?"

"I was keeping an eye on the boy. Gesar told me to¡ªit was obvious the Dark Ones would start looking for a trick."

"And?"

"No, there were no tricks with Egor. It wasn't his destiny that was rewritten."

"Then whose was it?"

Igor looked into Anton's eyes without saying anything. As if he didn't have the right to say it himself.

"Svetlana's?" Anton exclaimed in sudden realization. And he suddenly thought that in his place any Dark One would have squealed, "Mine?"

"It looks like it. A brilliant and elegant move. There was such an ocean of Power raging around her that it was impossible for anyone to notice what was being done with her Book of Destiny. And the Dark Ones can't check her Book of Destiny¡ªthat would be as good as a declaration of war."

"Gesar wants to accelerate Svetlana's transformation into a Great Enchantress?"

"Out of the question. That's a violation of the Treaty. Dig a bit deeper."

Anton looked at the circles on the paper. He took a felt-tip pen and drew a bright scarlet line upward from Svetlana, then another circle where it ended. An empty circle.

"Yes," said Igor. "Precisely. You know what time this is now, don't you?"

"The end of the millennium..."

"Two thousand years since the birth of Jesus Christ;" Igor said with a laugh.

"Ieshua was a supreme Light magician," said Anton. "I don't even know if we can call him a magician... he was the Light itself... but... Gesar wants a second coming of the Messiah?"

"You said it, not me," Igor replied. "Let's drink... to the Light."

Anton drank a full glass in total bewilderment. He shook his head. "No, but this... Igor, this is playing with the pure powers. With the foundations of the universe! How could he take the risk?"

"Anton, I'm certain that's the way it was all planned. Judge for yourself¡ªthere's a boom in religious faiths everywhere, one way or another everybody's expecting either the end of the world or the Second Coming... but then, they're the same thing."

"Not everybody..." Anton protested. "Don't exaggerate."

"Not everybody, but enough people for the torrent of human expectations to start reshaping reality. And if you could just help things along a bit, if you could rewrite someone's destiny... Gesar went for broke. Gesar wants to add someone new to our ranks, an Other so powerful that none of the Dark Ones will be able to match him. Not Zabulon, not a certain modest California farmer, not the owner of a small hotel in Spain, and not a popular Japanese singer... no one."

"That might be true," Anton admitted. "But Svetlana's lost her Power now, and for a long time."

"And what of it? Does that prevent her from having a child?"

"Stop," said Anton, waving his hands in warning. "Now we're getting ahead of ourselves! We can believe any hypothesis, but first let's look at the other events. The Mirror, for instance."

"The Mirror..." Igor frowned. "A Mirror is created by the Twilight. Zabulon couldn't make use of him directly... but he certainly could bring those stupid sect members to Moscow with that artifact of theirs and feed Rogoza with Power. And the reason for doing that is obvious¡ªto destroy Svetlana."

"Rogoza didn't destroy her. He only drained her, but then that's..."

"One of us didn't play the game the way Zabulon had planned it," Igor replied. "Someone didn't make the move that would have led to the Mirror totally destroying Svetlana... as an individual. Maybe what saved her was the fact that Tiger Cub and Andrei had already died? A Mirror isn't exactly a Dark Other, and he isn't directly involved in the confrontation between the two Watches. You see, maybe he was expecting another blow of some kind? From you, for instance. From Gesar. But the blow never came... and he didn't strike back with all his strength."

"Then explain to me, Igor¡ªwhy did Zabulon set you and Alisa up?"

"That was an accident," Igor muttered. "I told you, Alisa..."

"Okay, so she didn't know. But Zabulon knew, believe me! And he sent her to her death¡ªhe swapped one piece for another. Why?"

"I wish I knew," said Igor with a shrug.

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