Twilight Watch

by Сергей Лукьяненко

  "Aha," I said with a nod. "If there's planning involved, let's put it all on Gesar."

  "I didn't mention any names," Edgar said quickly. "I don't know any. And allow me to remind you that at that time the highly respected Gesar was working in Central Asia, so it would be absurd to charge him with anything…"

  He sighed-maybe he was remembering recent events at the Assol complex?

  "But you want to uncover the truth?" I asked.

  "Absolutely," Edgar said resolutely. "Thousands of people were forcibly turned to the Light-that is a crime against the Day Watch. All those people came to harm-that is a crime against the Night Watch. The social experiment authorized by the Inquisition was disrupted-that is a crime…"

  "I get the idea," I interrupted. "I must say, I find this story extremely unpleasant too…"

  "You'll help me to uncover the truth?" Edgar asked. And he smiled.

  "Yes," I said, with no hesitation. "It's a crime."

  Edgar reached out, and we shook hands.

  "Do we have to tramp much farther?" the Inquisitor asked.

  I looked around and was glad to recognize the familiar features of the clearing where I'd seen that incredible bed of mushrooms the day before.

  Today, however, there wasn't a single mushroom left.

  "We're almost there," I reassured the Dark Magician. "Let's just hope the lady of the house is home…"

  Chapter 5

  The witch Arina was brewing a potion-just like any self-respecting witch is supposed to do in her little house in the forest-standing by the Russian stove with the oven-fork in her hands, holding a cast-iron pot that was giving off clouds of greenish fumes, and muttering:

  Spindle tree, white furze-a pinch, Rocky cliff sand-quite a sprinkling Heather branch and skeleton of finch Pustule squeezings-just an inkling.

  Edgar and I went in and stood by the door, but the witch didn't seem to notice us. She carried on standing with her back to us, shaking the pot and chanting:

  More white furze and spindle tree,

  Three tail feathers from an eagle…

  Edgar cleared his throat and continued:

  Kneecaps from a bumble bee,

  And the collar from my beagle?

  Arina started violently. "Oh, good heavens above!" she exclaimed.

  It sounded perfectly natural… but somehow I knew for sure that the witch had been expecting us.

  "Hello, Arina," Edgar said in an expressionless voice. "Inquisition. Please stop working your spells."

  Arina deftly thrust the pot into the stove and only then turned around. This time she looked about forty-a sturdy, full-fleshed, beautiful countrywoman-and very annoyed. She put her hands on her hips and exclaimed peevishly, "And hello to you, Mr. Inquisitor! But why interfere with the spell? Am I supposed to catch the finches and pluck the eagle's feathers all over again?"

  "Your ditties are no more than a way of remembering the amounts of the various ingredients and the right sequence of actions," Edgar replied imperturbably. "You'd already finished brewing the light footfall potion-my words could not possibly have interfered with it. Sit down Arina. Why not take the weight off your feet?"

  "How's that supposed to improve things?" Arina replied sullenly and walked across to the table. She sat down and wiped her hands on her jolly apron with its pattern of daisies and cornflowers. Then she glanced sideways at me.

  "Good morning, Arina," I said. "Mr. Edgar asked me to act as his guide. You don't mind, do you?"

  "If I did mind, you'd have ended up in the swamp," Arina replied in a slightly offended tone. "Well, I'm listening, Mr. Inquisitor Edgar. What business is it that brings you here?"

  Edgar sat down facing Arina. He put one hand in under the flap of his jacket and pulled out a leather folder. Where had he managed to fit that under there?

  "You were sent a summons, Arina," the Inquisitor said in a soft voice. "Did you receive it?"

  Arina started thinking hard. Edgar opened his folder and showed Arina a narrow strip of yellow paper.

  "1931!" the witch gasped. "Oh, all those years ago… No, I never received it. I've already explained to the gentleman from the Night Watch that I went to sleep. The secret police were trying to frame me…"

  "They're not really the most terrible thing in the life of an Other," said Edgar. "Very far from it, in fact… So, you received the summons…"

  "I didn't receive it," Arina said quickly.

  "You didn't receive it," Edgar corrected himself. "Well let's accept that. The messenger never came back… I suppose anything could have happened to a civilian employee in the bleak Moscow forests."

  Arina didn't say anything.

  I stood by the door, watching. I was curious. An Inquisitor's job is like any watchman's but there was something special about this situation. A Dark Magician interrogating a Dark Witch. And one who was far more powerful than him-a fact that Edgar couldn't fail to appreciate.

  But he had the Inquisition standing behind him. And when you're faced with that, you can't count on any help from your "own" Watch.

  "Let us consider that you have now received the summons," Edgar went on. "I have been instructed to conduct a preliminary interview with you before any final decisions are taken… so…"

  He took out another piece of paper, glanced at it, and asked, "In the month of March 1931, were you working at the First Moscow Bread Combine?"

  "I was," Arina said, and nodded.

  "For what purpose?"

  Arina looked at me.

  "He has been informed," said Edgar. "Answer the question."

  "I was approached by the leaders of the Night Watch and the Day Watch of Moscow," Arina said with a sigh. "The Others wished to verify how people would behave if they attempted to live in strict conformity with communist ideals. Since both Watches wanted the same thing, and the Inquisition supported their request, I agreed. I never have liked cities, they're always…"

  "Please stick to the point," Edgar told her.

  "I carried out the task I was given," Arina said, and finished off her story in a rush. "I brewed the potion, and it was added to the fine white bread for two weeks. That's all! I was thanked by the two Watches, I left my job at the bakery, and went home. And then the secret police started going absolutely…"

  "You can write about your difficult relations with the organs of state security in your memoirs," Edgar suddenly barked. "What interests me is why you altered the formula."

  Arina slowly got to her feet. Her eyes glittered with fury and her voiced thundered as loud as if she were King Kong's mate. "Remember this, young man! Arina has never made any mistakes in her recipes! Never!"

  Edgar remained absolutely unimpressed. "I didn't say you made a mistake. You deliberately altered the formula. And as a result…" He paused dramatically.

  "What as a result?" Arina asked, outraged. "They checked the potion when it was ready. The effect was exactly what was required."

  "As a result, the potion took effect immediately," said Edgar. "The Night Watch has never been a collection of fools and idealists. The Light Ones realized that all 10,000 experimental subjects would be doomed if they made an instant switch to communist morality. The potion was supposed to take effect gradually, so that the remoralization would peak at full power ten years later, in the spring of 1941."

  "That's right," Arina said soberly. "And that's the way it was made."

  "The potion had an almost instantaneous effect," said Edgar. "We couldn't work out what was happening at first, but after one year the number of experimental subjects had been reduced by half. Less than a hundred of them survived until 1941: the ones who managed to overcome the remoralization… to demonstrate moral flexibility."

  "Oh, what a terrible thing," Arina exclaimed, throwing her hands up in the air. "Oh, how awful… I feel so sorry for the poor people…" She sat down. Then looked across at me and asked: "Well, Light One, do you think I was working for the Dark Ones too?"

  If she was lying, it was very convinc
ing. I shrugged.

  "Everything was done correctly," Arina said stubbornly. "The basic ingredients were mixed into the flour… do you know how difficult it was in those years to carry out any subversive activity? The retardant in the potion was plain sugar…" She suddenly flung her hands up in the air and stared at Edgar triumphantly. "That's what went wrong. Those were hungry years, the workers at the bakery stole the sugar… That's why it worked too fast…"

  "An interesting theory," said Edgar, shuffling his pieces of paper.

  "I'm not to blame for any of this," Arina declared firmly. "The plan for the operation was agreed. If the wise men of the Watches failed to think of a simple hitch like that-then whose fault is it?"

  "That would be all very well," said Edgar, lifting up another sheet of paper. "Except that you conducted the first experiment on the workers at the bakery. Here's your report-recognize it? After that, they couldn't have stolen the sugar. So there's only one explanation left-you deliberately sabotaged the operation."

  "Why don't we consider some other explanations?" Arina asked plaintively. "For instance…"

  "For instance-your friend Louisa's report," Edgar suggested. "About how, during the operation, she happened to see you in the company of an unidentified Light Magician near the stand at the racetrack. About how you argued and haggled for a long time, until finally the Light One handed you some kind of package, and you nodded, and then you shook hands. Louisa even heard the words: 'I'll do it, and in less than a year…' Let me remind you that for the duration of the experiment you were forbidden to have any contact with Others. Weren't you?"

  "Yes," said Arina, bowing her head. "Is Lushka still alive?"

  "Unfortunately, no," said Edgar. "But her testimony was recorded and witnessed."

  "A pity…" Arina muttered. She didn't say exactly why it was a pity. But it wasn't too hard to guess that Louisa was fortunate not to be around any longer.

  "Can you explain which Light One you met with, what you promised to do, and what you received from him?"

  Arina raised her head and smiled bitterly at me. She said, "What a muddle… I'm always getting in a muddle… over little things. Like that kettle…"

  "Arina, I am obliged to deliver you for further questioning," said Edgar. "In the name of the Inquisition…"

  "Try it, second-ranker," Arina said derisively.

  And she disappeared.

  "She's withdrawn into the Twilight!" I shouted, tearing myself away from the wall and looking around for my shadow. But Edgar still delayed for a second, making sure that the witch hadn't averted our eyes.

  We appeared at the first level almost simultaneously. I was a little wary of looking at Edgar-what would the Twilight world transform him into?

  It wasn't too bad. He'd hardly changed at all. His hair had just thinned out a bit.

  "Deeper!" I waved my hand insistently. Edgar made a movement of his head, raised his open hand to his face-and his palm seemed to suck all of him in.

  Impressive. Inquisitors' gimmicks.

  At the second level, where the house turned into a log hut, we stopped and looked at each other. Of course, Arina wasn't there.

  "She's gone down to the third level…" Edgar whispered. His hair had completely disappeared and his skull had stretched out, like a duck's egg. But even so, his face was still almost human.

  "Can you do it?" I asked.

  "I managed it once,'' Edgar answered honestly. Our breath turned to steam. It didn't feel all that cold yet, but there was an insidious chill in the air…

  "And I managed it once," I admitted.

  We hesitated, like over-confident swimmers who have suddenly realized that the river in front of them is too turbulent and too cold. And neither of us dared take the first step.

  "Anton… will you help?" Edgar asked eventually.

  I nodded. Why else had I come dashing into the Twilight?

  "Let's go…" said the Inquisitor, gazing down intently at his feet.

  A few moments later we stepped into the third level-a place where only first-level magicians were supposed to go.

  The witch wasn't there.

  "Well that's inventive…" Edgar whispered. The house of branches really was impressive. "Anton… she built this herself… she stays down here for a long time."

  Slowly-the space around us resisted sudden movements-I walked over to the wall, parted the branches, and looked out.

  It was absolutely nothing like the human world.

  There were glittering clouds drifting across the sky, like steel filings suspended in glycerine. Instead of the sun there was a broad cloud of crimson flame way up high in the sky-the only spot of color in the hazy gray gloom. And on all sides, as far as the horizon, there were low, contorted trees, the same ones the witch had used to build her house. But then, were they really trees? There were no leaves, just a fantastic tangle of branches…

  "Anton, she's gone deeper. Anton, she's beyond classification," Edgar said behind me. I turned and looked at the magician. Dark-gray skin, a bald, elongated skull, sunken eyes… But still human eyes. "How do I look?" Edgar asked and bared his teeth in a smile. He shouldn't have, his teeth were sharp cones, like a shark's.

  "Not great," I admitted. "I suppose I don't look any better?"

  "It's just the appearance," Edgar replied casually. "Are you holding up okay?"

  I was holding up. My second immersion in the lower depths of the Twilight was going more easily.

  "We have to go to the fourth level," said Edgar. His eyes were human, but there was a fanatical gleam in them.

  "Are you beyond classification then?" I asked him. "Edgar, it's hard for me even to go back!"

  "We can combine our powers, watchman!"

  "How?" I was perplexed. Both the Dark Ones and the Light Ones have the concept of a "Circle of Power." But it's a dangerous thing, and it requires at least three or four Others… and anyway, how could we combine Light Power and Dark Power?

  "That's my problem!" said Edgar, and began shaking his head about. "Anton, she'll get away. She'll get away on the fourth level. Trust me."

  "A Dark One?"

  "An Inquisitor," the magician barked. "I'm an Inquisitor, do you understand? Anton, trust me, I ord-" Edgar stopped short and then continued in a different tone: "I ask you, please!"

  I don't know what made me do it. The excitement of the hunt? The desire to catch a witch who had destroyed thousands of people's lives? The way the Inquisitor asked?

  Or maybe a simple desire to see the fourth level? The most mysterious depths of the Twilight, which even Gesar visited only rarely, where Svetlana had never been?

  "What do I do?" I asked.

  Edgar's face lit up in a smile. He reached out his hand-the fingers ended in blunt, hooked claws-and said: "In the name of the Treaty, by the equilibrium that I maintain, I summon the Light and the Darkness… and request Power… in the name of the Darkness."

  He gazed insistently at me and I also held out my hand-and I said: "In the name of the Light…"

  In part this was like the swearing of an oath between a Dark One and a Light One. But only in part. No petal of flame sprang up in my hand, no patch of darkness appeared on Edgar's open palm. It all happened on the outside-the gray, blurred world around us suddenly acquired clarity. No colors appeared; we were still in the Twilight. But shadows appeared. It was like a TV screen with the color turned down, when you suddenly turn up the brightness and contrast.

  "Our right has been acknowledged…" Edgar whispered, gazing around. His face looked genuinely happy. "Our right has been acknowledged, Anton."

  "And what if it hadn't been?" I asked cautiously.

  "All sorts of things could have happened… But our right has been acknowledged, hasn't it? Let's go!"

  In the new "high-contrast" Twilight it was much easier to move around. I raised my shadow as easily as in the ordinary world.

  And found myself where only magicians beyond classification have any right to go.

 
The trees-if they really were trees-had disappeared. All around us the world was as level and flat as the old medieval pancake Earth, supported on the backs of three whales. Featureless terrain-an endless plain of sand… I bent down and ran a handful of the sand through my fingers. It was gray, as everything in the Twilight was supposed to be. But there were embryonic colors discernible in its grayness-smoky mother-of-pearl, colored sparks, golden grains…

  "She's gotten away…" Edgar said right in my ear. He stretched out an arm that had become surprisingly long and slim.

  I looked in that direction. And I saw, way off in the distance- so far away that you could only ever see that far on a flat plain- a gray silhouette dashing along at great speed. The witch was moving in immense leaps, soaring into the air and flying over the ground ten meters at a time, throwing her arms out and moving her legs in a funny sort of way-like a happy child skipping across a meadow in spring…

  "She must have drunk her own potion!" I guessed. I couldn't think of any other way she could take leaps like that.

  "Yes. She knew what she was doing when she brewed it," said Edgar. He swung his arm and flung something after Arina.

  A string of small balls of flame went hurtling after the witch. A group fireball-a standard battle spell for the Watches-but in some special Inquisitors' version.

  A few charges burst before they reached the witch. One accelerated sharply and actually reached her, connected with her back and exploded, shrouding the witch in fire. But the flames immediately went out and, without even turning around, the witch tossed something behind her-a pool of liquid that glimmered like mercury spread out at that spot. As they flew over the pool, the remaining charges lost speed and height, plunged into the liquid and disappeared.

  "Witches' tricks…" Edgar said in disgust. "Anton!"

  "Eh? What?" I asked, with my eyes still fixed on Arina as she disappeared into the distance.

  "Time for us to be going. The Power was only granted in order to catch the witch, and the hunt's over. We'll never catch up with her."

  I looked upward. The crimson cloud that had shone at the previous level of the Twilight was gone. The entire sky was glowing an even pinkish-white color.