Last Watch

by Sergei Lukyanenko

  “No, not in Moscow,” Egor said, frowning. “Do you know how hard it is to get into the circus back home?”

  “I can guess.”

  “If you’re not from a circus family, if you haven’t been jumping around the circus ring since you were five years old and you haven’t got any contacts... And if you get an offer to perform abroad...” Egor frowned. “To hell with them! Next year I’ll be performing in a French circus, I’m just negotiating the contract, then they’ll really be jealous.”

  We sat down at a table outside the nearest café. Egor ordered a glass of juice and I asked for a double espresso. I was feeling sleepy again.

  “So are you here because of me or not?” Egor asked abruptly.

  “I had no idea that you were flying to Edinburgh. My assignment here has nothing to do with you!”

  Egor looked into my face suspiciously. Then he sighed and relaxed.

  “Then I apologize. I got a bit heated in the plane. I don’t like the outfit you work for... I have no reason to like it.”

  “That’s OK,” I said, gesturing with my open palms toward him. “No offense taken. You don’t have to like our outfit, it doesn’t deserve it.”

  “Uh-huh,” said Egor, staring pensively at his glass of orange juice. “Well, how are things there? Still Gesar, is it?”

  “Of course. He was, he is, he always will be.”

  “And how about Tiger Cub and Bear?” Egor asked with a smile, as if he’d just remembered something good. “Did they get married?”

  “Tiger Cub was killed, Egor.” I actually was taken aback when I realized he didn’t know about it. “It was a very bad business... we all suffered.”

  “Killed,” Egor said thoughtfully. “A pity. I liked her a lot. She was so strong, a weretiger...”

  “A shape-shifting magician,” I corrected him. “Yes, she was strong, but very emotional. She attacked a Mirror.”

  “A Mirror?”

  “Yes, well that’s a type of magician. A very unusual type. Sometimes, if some Watch starts winning, a Mirror Magician appears to help the other side. They say they’re created by the Twilight itself, but no one knows for sure. A Mirror Magician can’t be defeated in ordinary battle; he absorbs his opponent’s Power and parries every attack. We really took a beating that time... and Tiger Cub was killed.”

  “What about the Mirror? Did you kill him?”

  “Vitaly Rogoza was his name... He dematerialized. Of his own accord, that’s their destiny. A Mirror is originally a weak, indeterminate magician who loses his memory, then travels to the place where one Power is gaining a serious advantage over the other and takes the side of the one that’s losing. And afterward the Mirror disappears, dissolves into the Twilight.”

  I said all this in a monotone, thinking about something else.

  There was a painful, cold lump growing in my chest.

  A weak, indeterminate magician?...

  “Serves him right,” Egor said vengefully. “I feel sorry for Tiger Cub... I often used to think about her. And you, sometimes.”

  “Really?” I asked. “I hope you weren’t too angry with me.”

  To be quite honest, I really couldn’t have cared less right then just who Egor used to remember and how.

  A weak, indeterminate magician...

  He travels to the place where...

  He dissolves into the Twilight...

  “I was a bit angry,” Egor admitted. “But not too much. It wasn’t really your fault. That’s the way your job is... lousy. But I resented it, of course. I even dreamed once that you were really my father. And I was going to become a Dark Magician and work in the Day Watch in order to spite you.”

  So he hadn’t lost his memory, had he? I couldn’t draw such a simple comparison between Rogoza and Egor after all.

  “That’s a funny dream,” I said. “They say some dreams are an alternative reality breaking through into our consciousness. Maybe somewhere, somehow, that’s the way it was. You shouldn’t have gone over to the Dark Ones, though...”

  Egor said nothing for a moment, then he snorted. “Oh, no. A plague on both your houses. I don’t like the Dark Ones, and I don’t like the Light Ones. But you come round anytime, Anton! I’m staying just near here. In the Alex City Hotel. I’ll introduce you to the rest of our crew, they’re all great guys!”

  He put a few coins on the table and stood up. “I’ll go back to work. My number’s the highlight of the show; the lads won’t take in much money without me.”

  He had hardly even touched his juice.

  “Egor!” I called to him. “How did you happen to come to Edinburgh? Was it your own idea?”

  The young man looked at me in surprise. “No, it wasn’t. A company invited me, Scottish Colours. Why do you ask?”

  “I thought I could give you a hand, if necessary,” I lied without a moment’s hesitation. “Find you an agent.”

  “Thanks,” said Egor, and the warmth in his voice made me wish the earth would open up and swallow me. “No need, but thanks anyway, Anton.”

  I sat there, looking at the dregs in the bottom of my cup. Were there still not enough coincidences for me? Maybe I should use the coffee grounds for a bit of fortune-telling?

  “Scottish Colours,” I muttered.

  My chest was feeling so cold now that it didn’t hurt anymore.

  .

  .

  COMMON CAUSE

  Chapter 4

  There’s nothing more absurd than to arrive in a new city and spend your time in a hotel room. That’s OK for the red-hot afternoon of the Spanish siesta. Or for newlyweds on their honeymoon, when the size of the bed is far more important than the view out the window.

  So Valeria was caught in a hopeless situation. The police had told her not to leave the city. And she simply didn’t have the strength to go out into that crowd of merrymakers, that swirling mass of tourists.

  She opened the door immediately, as if she had been waiting just behind it. Although, of course, no one could have warned her, since I’d walked past the receptionist under the protection of a Circle of Inattention.

  The girl was wearing nothing but shorts and a bra. Well yes, it was quite hot outside, of course. Even the good hotels here didn’t have air-conditioning; the climate in general didn’t really require it. But it was quite hot—especially if you were drinking.

  “Yes?” Lera challenged me drunkenly.

  Her black hair was styled in a blunt bob. She was attractive, thin, quite tall.

  One of her hands was on the handle of the open bathroom door. I had arrived just as she was on her way to the toilet.

  “Hello, Lera,” I said politely. I wasn’t exactly looking super-respectable, just shorts and a T-shirt, but I still chose the “representative-of-the-authorities” tone of voice. “Can I come in?”

  “Why not?” Lera said in surprise. “Come”—she hiccupped—“come on through. Only... I’ll just be a moment.”

  She went into the bathroom without even bothering to lock the door behind her. I shook my head, walked past the un-made bed, and sat in an armchair by the window. It was a small room, quite comfortable in a formal sort of way. There was a bottle of Glenlivet whisky on the coffee table. It was more than half empty. Glancing at the door of the bathroom I sent a simple spell in Lera’s direction.

  I heard the sound of coughing in the bathroom.

  “Need any help, Lera?” I asked, pouring myself two fingers of whisky.

  Lera didn’t answer. She was being sick.

  I found some cold mineral water in the mini-bar and poured a little bit into Lera’s glass to rinse it out—it smelled strongly of whisky. Then I splashed it out straight onto the carpet and poured in more water.

  “I’m sorry... ,” said the girl as she emerged from
the bathroom, looking a lot livelier. “I... I’m sorry.”

  “Have a drink of water, Lera,” I said, holding out the glass.

  A good-looking girl. Very young. And with very sad eyes.

  “Who are you?” she asked, and drained the glass avidly. “Hell... my head’s splitting.”

  She sat down in the armchair opposite me and took her head in her hands.

  We’d never be able to make conversation like that.

  “Can I help?”

  “Do you have any aspirin? Something for a headache...”

  “Ancient Chinese massage,” I said, standing up and going around behind her. “The pain will soon be gone.”

  “Oh, sure, I believe in massage, all the guys say they can do massage, anything to get their paws on you... ,” Lera began, but stopped talking the moment my hands started taking away the pain.

  Of course, I don’t really know how to do massage. But I can disguise healing magic as massage.

  “That’s really good... you’re a magician... ,” Lera murmured.

  “Yes, I am,” I agreed. “A fully qualified Light Magician.”

  Right... stop the blood vessels cramping... draw the alcohol out of the blood... OK, pass it through the kidneys... neutralize the metabolites... balance the serotonin and adrenaline... restore the pH of the blood to normal... OK, and at the same time we’ll reduce the output of hydrochloric acid in the stomach...

  Of course, I’m nowhere near as good as Svetlana. She could have done all this with a single touch. I labored away for about three minutes. I had the Power, but I lacked the skill.

  “Miracles like that don’t happen,” Valeria said nervously. She turned around and looked at me.

  “Oh, yes, they do,” I said. “You’ll want to go to the toilet now. Don’t be embarrassed and don’t wait; you’ll pass water every fifteen minutes. Until you get all the garbage out of your system... . Stop. Wait a moment... .”

  I looked at her closely. Well, would you believe it!

  “Don’t drink any more alcohol,” I told her. “Not at all.”

  I went to the bathroom to wash my hands. The running water carried away the fatigue from my fingers and the imprint of an aura distorted by suffering. I could have used Power to clean myself, but the old folk methods are still the best.

  “Why are you ordering me about?” Lera said darkly when I got back. “But thank you, the massage was good... I’ll just be a moment!”

  I waited for her to come back from the toilet. She was clearly shocked by the speed and efficiency with which her body was being purged. Once she had sat down, I explained.

  “You’re pregnant. You shouldn’t drink now.”

  “My period is due to start tomorrow,” Lera retorted so furiously that I realized she could sense it. Through sheer feminine intuition, without any outside help, she had realized she was pregnant. Then she had rejected the idea and started binge-drinking.

  “It won’t start.”

  She didn’t argue. She didn’t even ask how I knew. Probably she put it down to the wonders of oriental medicine. She asked, “Why would I want a child without a husband?”

  “That’s for you to decide,” I said. “I’m not going to try to persuade you either way.”

  “Who are you?” Lera finally asked.

  “Gorodetsky. Anton Gorodetsky. I’m from Moscow. I... I was asked to investigate the circumstances of Victor’s death.”

  Lera sighed and said bitterly, “Vitya’s father is using his contacts... What’s the point... now?”

  “To find out the truth.”

  “The truth...” The girl poured herself some water and drained the glass in one gulp. Her body was driving her blood through her kidneys at a furious rate, removing the alcohol and its metabolic products. “Victor was killed by a vampire.”

  “Vampires don’t exist, Lera.”

  “I know. But what do you do when a guy says, ‘There’s someone drinking my blood,’ and then they find him with a bite mark on his throat and no blood left in his body?”

  There was a subtle note of hysteria in her voice.

  “I checked the channel the boat was sailing in,” I said. “There’s blood in it. A lot of blood. Calm down, Lera. Vampires really don’t exist. Someone killed your friend. He bled to death. That’s terrible, it’s cruel, but vampires don’t exist.”

  She said nothing for about a minute. Then she asked, “Why didn’t the police tell me that?”

  “They have their reasons. They’re afraid of leaks of information. Perhaps they even suspect you of something.”

  That didn’t frighten her at all. In fact it seemed to make her angry.

  “The bastards. I can’t get to sleep, I get sloshed on whisky in the evenings. Yesterday I almost dragged some guy into bed. I’m afraid to be alone, understand? Afraid. And they don’t tell me anything... . Excuse me, I’ll just be a moment.”

  I waited for her to come back from the toilet and said, “I must have overdone it a bit with the massage. But I’m not a professional, I’ve just picked up a few moves.”

  “The things they teach your crowd,” Lera said, and I realized she was as certain that I worked for the KGB as the young Frenchman in the Dungeons had been. We’re all children of mass culture. We all believe in its clichés. You don’t even need any documents if you behave like a secret agent in an action movie.

  “Lera, I want to ask you to make an effort to recall all the circumstances of Victor’s death,” I said. “I know you’ve told the story over and over again. But please try.”

  “We got into that stupid boat,” Lera began. “I almost fell over; it was a very awkward step down, a long way, and I couldn’t see the bottom of the boat in the darkness.”

  “Tell me everything from the very beginning. Start from the moment when you got up that morning. Every detail.”

  Lera’s eyes glinted mischievously. “Well... we woke up at ten; we missed breakfast. Then we had sex. Then we went into the shower and we got a bit carried away in there...”

  I nodded and smiled benevolently as I listened to the girl’s story, which really did include all the details. And when she broke into tears, I waited for a few minutes without saying anything. The tears stopped and Lera shook her head. She looked into my eyes.

  “We went into a pub, the Oak and Ribbon, and had something to eat. We drank a pint of beer each. It was hot, and then we saw the sign for that damned tourist show. Victor thought it would be interesting. Or at least that it would be cool inside. So we went in.”

  Nothing. Not a single clue. I realized that Lera had been questioned by professionals before me; they had drained her, forced her to remember, asked the same questions ten times. What else could she possibly remember out of the blue now?

  She started describing the boat again, the awkward step down into it, and I raised my hand.

  “Stop there, Lera. That mirror maze—you said it was the most interesting thing. Didn’t anything odd happen in there?”

  I didn’t know why I’d asked that question. Perhaps because I was still thinking about Egor. Perhaps I’d remembered the old wives’ tale that vampires have no reflections in mirrors.

  “In the Maze of Mirrors...” Lera knitted her brows. “Ah! There was something. Victor started waving to someone. As if he’d seen someone he knew. Afterward he said he must have imagined it.”

  “How about you, Lera? Did you see anybody you knew?”

  She shook her head.

  “No. There are mirrors on all sides in there. You really get lost among all those faces, all those people. And it gets a bit annoying after a while... . I tried not to look.”

  “Can’t you even make a guess at who he might have seen?”

  “Could that be important?” Lera asked seriously.

  “Ye
s,” I replied with no hesitation.

  It was very important. It was a clear clue. If there was a vampire in the Dungeons and he was diverting people’s eyes, he could have been seen in the room of mirrors. And Victor hadn’t just seen someone—he had recognized him.

  So what was dangerous about being recognized? Someone had gone into the Dungeons—what of it? Why had the vampire panicked and killed the unsuspecting student?

  I didn’t know. Not yet.

  “I think Victor thought he had seen a friend of his... not someone from here,” Lera said after thinking for a moment. “Because he was very surprised. If he’d seen someone from the university, he would have waved to him and shouted ‘Hi.’ But he just waved and didn’t say anything. You know, the way you do when you’re not quite sure if you’ve seen a friend or made a mistake. And afterward, when he couldn’t find anyone, he really seemed quite upset. And he said it was all nonsense. As if he’d persuaded himself that it couldn’t have happened. Anton, did Vitya see his killer?”

  “I’m afraid he did,” I said, nodding. “It’s possible that was why he was killed. Thank you. You’ve been a great help.”

  “Should I tell this to the police?” Lera asked.

  “Why not? Only, if possible, don’t mention that I was here, OK? But you can tell them what you’ve remembered.”

  “Will you tell me if you find the killer?”

  “Definitely.”

  “You’re lying,” Lera said, shaking her head. “You’re lying... you won’t tell me anything.”

  “I’ll send you a postcard,” I said after a pause. “With a view of Edinburgh. If you get a postcard, it means Victor has been avenged.”

  She nodded. I was already at the door when she asked, “Anton, if I... What should I do about the child?”

  “That’s for you to decide. You must understand that nobody else should ever decide anything for you. Not the president, not your boss, not even a kind magician.”

  “I’m nineteen,” Lera said in a quiet voice. “I loved Vitya. But now he’s gone. Twenty years old with a child and no husband...”

  “You have to make up your own mind. But please don’t drink, in any case,” I said.