The Last Watch:

by Sergei Lukyanenko

  ‘What?’ Now it was my turn to gape in surprise.

  ‘I’m a conjuror.’ Egor chuckled.

  Well, would you believe it!

  But then, it was an excellent disguise for an Other. Even for an uninitiated one – they still have minor powers that exceed normal human abilities. They’re natural stage magicians and conjurors.

  ‘That’s just great!’ I said sincerely.

  ‘It’s a shame you’re going to London.’ Egor sighed. ‘I would have got you into the show.’

  And then I did something stupid. I said:

  ‘I’m not going to London, Egor. I’m going to Edinburgh too.’

  It’s not often that I’ve seen joy disappear from a face so fast, to be replaced by unfriendliness and even contempt.

  ‘I see. So what do you want from me this time?’

  ‘Egor, you …’ I hesitated.

  Could I honestly say that he had nothing to do with it?

  No.

  Because I didn’t believe it myself.

  ‘I see,’ Egor repeated. He turned round and walked to the middle of the cabin. There was nothing left for me to do but step into the toilet and close the door behind me.

  There was a smell of tobacco. Even though it was strictly forbidden, passengers who smoked still fugged up the toilets. I looked in the mirror and saw the crumpled face of a man who was short of sleep. Even though I am a lot more and a lot less than just a man … I felt like banging my forehead against the mirror, and I did, whispering silently to myself: ‘Idiot, idiot, idiot …’

  I had relaxed. I had believed that I was starting a straightforward work assignment.

  But how could that possibly be, when Gesar himself had sent me on my way?

  I splashed cold water on my face and stood there for a while, staring angrily at my own reflection. Then I took a leak, pressed the pedal to release the blue liquid disinfectant into the steel toilet bowl, washed my hands and splashed water on my face again.

  Whose operation was this? Gesar’s or Zabulon’s?

  Who had sent the boy Egor, who never became an Other, on the same route as me? What for?

  Whose game was it, whose rules and – most important of all – how many figures would there be on the board?

  I took Zabulon’s present out of my pocket. The bone was a dull yellow, but somehow I knew that the carver had depicted a black wolf. A large, mature black wolf with its head thrown back in a long, dreary howl.

  Contact, help, advice …

  The figure looked perfectly ordinary – you could find hundreds and thousands like it in souvenir kiosks. But I could feel the magic that permeated it. I only had to take it in my hand … and wish. That was all.

  Did I want help from the Dark Ones?

  I resisted the desire to flush the little figure down the toilet and I put it back in my pocket.

  There were no observers to appreciate the pathetic gesture.

  I rummaged in my pocket and found a pack of cigarettes. I don’t smoke so much that I suffer from withdrawal symptoms during a four-hour flight, but right then I felt like indulging some simple human weaknesses. All Others are like that – the older we get, the more petty bad habits we acquire. As if we are clinging on to the slightest manifestation of our natural being – and there is no anchor more reliable than vice.

  But then, having realised that my lighter was in my jacket pocket, without the slightest hesitation I ignited a high-temperature discharge arc between my finger and thumb – and lit up from the magic fire.

  Rookie Others try to do everything with magic.

  They shave with a Crystal Blade, until they lop off half a cheek or the lobe of their ear. They heat their lunch with fireballs, splashing soup all over the walls and scraping their meatballs off the ceiling. They check the probability lines before they get into a slow-moving trolley.

  They enjoy the very process of using magic. They’d use it to wipe their backsides if they could.

  Then Others get older and wiser and start getting more economical too. They realise that energy is always energy and it’s better to get up out of your chair and walk across to a switch than reach out to the buttons with a stream of pure Power, that electricity will cook your steak a lot better than magic fire, and you should cover a scratch with a plaster and only use the Avicenna spell for serious injuries.

  And then later, of course, unless an Other is doomed to stay at the very lowest levels of Power, genuine mastery arrives. And you no longer pay any attention to how you light your cigarette – with gas or with magic.

  I breathed out a stream of smoke.

  Gesar?

  Zabulon?

  All right, it was useless to guess. I just had to remember once and for all that everything was going to be a lot more complicated than I’d thought at the beginning. And I should go back to my seat – we would soon be landing.

  Over the English Channel we were thrown about a bit, as usual. But we landed softly and went through the normal passport control in the blink of an eye. The other passengers moved to collect their luggage (apart from the uninitiated Egor, I was the only Other on the plane) but I dropped back a bit and found my shadow on the floor. I gazed into the grey silhouette, forcing it to assume volume and rise up towards me. I stepped into my own shadow – and entered the Twilight.

  Everything here was almost exactly the same. Walls, windows, doors. Only everything was grey, colourless. Ordinary people in the real world drifted by like slow-moving shadows. Without even knowing why, they carefully skirted round an entirely unremarkable section of the corridor, and even started walking faster.

  It was best to approach the customs post for Others in the Twilight, in order not to make people nervous. It was shielded by a simple spell, the Circle of Inattention, and people tried very hard not to see it. But they might spot me talking to empty space.

  So I approached the desk in the Twilight, and only emerged into the real world when I was protected by the spell.

  There were two customs officers – a Light One and a Dark One. Just the way there ought to be.

  Monitoring Others when they cross borders doesn’t seem very logical to me. Vampires and werewolves are obliged to register with the local branch of the Watch if they stay in a town overnight. The justification for this is that lower Dark Ones too often give way to the animal side of their nature. That’s true enough, but any magician, whether he’s Dark or Light, is capable of things that would send a vampire running for his coffin in horror. Well, anyway, the tradition exists, and no one anywhere wants to change it … despite all the protests from vampires and werewolves. But what’s the point in monitoring the movements of Others from one country to another? That’s important for people – illegal migration, smuggling, narcotics … even spies, if it comes to that. But it’s fifty years now since spies used to walk through border control zones with elk hooves tied to their feet, and they don’t parachute into enemy territory at night now, either. A self-respecting spy flies in on a plane and moves into a good hotel. And as for Others – we have no immigration restrictions, and even a weak magician can obtain the citizenship of any country without the slightest problem. So what was this absurd counter doing here?

  It was probably for the Inquisition. Formally speaking, the customs posts belonged to the local Night and Day Watches. But another copy of the report was sent off every day to the Inquisition. And they probably studied it more carefully there.

  And drew conclusions.

  ‘Hello. My name is Anton Gorodetsky,’ I said, stopping in front of the counter. We don’t use identity documents, and that’s a good thing. There are always rumours going round that they’re going to start putting a magical tag on everyone, the way they do with vampires now, or else make an invisible entry in the ordinary human passports.

  But so far we still manage without bureaucracy.

  ‘A Light One,’ declared the Dark Magician. He was a weak magician, sixth level at the very most. And physically very feeble: short, skinny and
pale, with narrow shoulders and sparse blond hair.

  ‘A Light One,’ I agreed.

  My colleague from the London Night Watch was a fat, cheerful black guy. The only things he had in common with his duty partner were that he too was young, and also weak, only sixth or seventh level.

  ‘Hi there, bro!’ he said happily. ‘Anton Gorodetsky. Serve in a Watch?’

  ‘Night Watch, Russia, city of Moscow.’

  ‘Level?’

  I suddenly realised that they couldn’t read my aura. They could have read it up to the fourth or fifth level. But after that everything was just a blurred glow to them.

  ‘Higher.’

  The Dark One straightened up a bit. Of course, they’re all egotists and individualists. But they do admire their superiors.

  The Light One opened his eyes wide and said:

  ‘Oh! Higher! Coming for long?’

  ‘Passing through. On my way to Edinburgh. I fly out in three hours.’

  ‘Holiday or business?’

  ‘An assignment,’ I said without any further explanation.

  Light Ones, of course, are liberal and democratic. But they respect Higher Others.

  ‘Did you enter the Twilight there?’ the Dark One asked, with a nod towards the human customs officers.

  ‘Yes. Will it be caught on the cameras?’

  The Dark One shook his head.

  ‘No, we monitor everything here. But in town I recommend you should be more careful. There are plenty of cameras. Lots of them. Every now and then people notice us disappearing and reappearing – we have to cover our tracks.’

  ‘I’m not even leaving the airport.’

  ‘There are cameras in Edinburgh too,’ the Light One put in. ‘Not so many, but even so … Do you have the contact details for the Edinburgh Watch?’

  He didn’t bother to mention that he meant the Night Watch. That was quite obvious.

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘I have a good friend who runs a little family hotel in Edinburgh,’ said the Dark One, joining in the conversation again. ‘For more than two hundred years already. Beside the castle, on the Royal Mile. If it doesn’t bother you that he’s a vampire …’

  What was all this, nothing but vampires on every side?

  ‘… then here’s his card. It’s a very good hotel. Friendly to Others.’

  ‘I have no prejudices against vampires,’ I assured him, taking the rectangle of cardboard. ‘Some my friends have been vampires.’

  And I sent one of my vampire friends to his death …

  ‘There’s a good restaurant in Sector B,’ the Light One put in.

  They were so genuinely eager to help me that I wasn’t sure how to get past this solid wall of friendship and goodwill. Fortunately, another plane landed, and several more Others showed up behind me. Keeping a smile on my face all the time – something to which the Russian facial musculature is rather poorly adapted – I went to collect my suitcase.

  I didn’t go to the restaurant since I wasn’t feeling at all hungry. I wandered round the airport a bit, drank a double espresso, dozed for while in a chair in the lounge and walked through into my plane, yawning a bit as I went. As was only to be expected, Egor was on the same flight. But now we ostentatiously ignored each other. Or rather, he ostentatiously ignored me, and I didn’t try to impose my company on him.

  An hour later we landed at Edinburgh airport.

  It was already almost noon when I got into a taxi – one of those remarkably comfortable English taxis that you start to miss just as soon as you leave Great Britain. I greeted the driver and, on a sudden impulse, handed him the card from the ‘friendly hotel’. I had a booking in an ordinary human hotel, but the chance of talking to one of Scotland’s oldest vampires (two hundred years is no joke, even for them) in informal surroundings was simply too tempting.

  The hotel really was in the historical town centre, on a hill close to the royal castle. I lowered the window and gazed around with the curiosity of someone who has just arrived for the first time in an interesting new country.

  Edinburgh was impressive. Of course, you could say that any truly old city is impressive if it wasn’t flattened sixty years ago by the fiery steamroller of a world war, which reduced ancient cathedrals, castles and houses – large and small – to rubble. But there was something special here. Perhaps it was the royal castle itself, so well sited on a hill and surmounting the city like a crown of stone. Perhaps it was the large number of people on the streets – tourists idly loitering or wandering about with cameras hanging round their necks, looking at the shop windows or the monuments. After all, the king’s reputation is always defined by his retinue. Or perhaps it was the lacework pattern of the streets scattered round the castle, with their old houses and cobbled roadways.

  Even if he’s wearing the most beautiful crown, a king also needs worthy robes. The naked king in Andersen’s fairy tale was not saved by the glittering diamonds on his head.

  The taxi stopped at a four-storey stone house with a narrow frontage that was squeezed between two shops crowded with customers. The shop windows were hung with colourful kilts and scarves, and there were the inevitable bottles of whisky. What else would you take away from here? From Russia it’s vodka and matryoshka dolls, from Greece it’s ouzo and embroidered tablecloths, from Scotland it’s whisky and scarves.

  I climbed out of the taxi, took my suitcase from the driver and paid him. Then I looked at the building. The sign above the entrance to the hotel said ‘Highlander Blood’.

  Right. An impertinent vampire.

  I walked up to the door, blinking against the bright sunshine. It was getting hot. The legend that vampires can’t tolerate sunlight is just that, a legend. They can tolerate it, they just don’t find it pleasant. And on a hot summer day like this I could almost understand them.

  The door didn’t swing open in front of me – obviously they weren’t fond of automatic devices in this hotel. So I pushed it with my hand and walked in.

  Well, at least there was an air-conditioner here. The coolness that I felt could hardly have been left over from the night, despite these thick stone walls.

  The small entrance hall was rather dark, and perhaps that was why it felt a bit cosy. I saw an elderly, highly respectable-looking gentleman standing behind a counter. A good suit, a tie with a pin, a shirt with silver cufflinks in the form of thistle heads. A plump face with a moustache and red cheeks, a strawberries-and-cream complexion … But his aura left no doubt at all – he was human.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ I said, approaching the counter. ‘Your hotel was recommended to me … I would like to take a single room.’

  ‘A single?’ the gentleman asked, with an extremely pleasant smile.

  ‘A single,’ I repeated.

  ‘We’re very short of rooms, it’s the festival …’ the gentleman said, with a sigh. ‘You didn’t book, then?’

  ‘No.’

  He sighed again and started leafing through some papers – as if this little family hotel had so many rooms that he couldn’t remember if any were free. Without looking up, he asked:

  ‘Who was it that recommended us?’

  ‘The Dark One at Heathrow customs.’

  ‘I think we should be able to help you,’ the man replied, without any sign of surprise. ‘Which room would you prefer, light or dark? If you have – er – a dog with you, there is a very comfortable room that even the very largest dog can leave – and come back to – on its own … without disturbing anyone.’

  ‘I want a light room,’ I said.

  ‘Give him the suite on the fourth floor, Andrew,’ said a voice behind me. ‘He is a distinguished guest. Very distinguished.’

  I took the key that had appeared as if by magic in the receptionist’s hand (no, no magic involved, it was simply his dexterity) and turned round.

  ‘I will show you the way,’ said the light-haired youth standing in front of the cigarette machine beside the door that led into the small hotel r
estaurant. Hotels like this one very often do not have a restaurant and they serve breakfast in the rooms, but the guests here had rather exotic tastes.

  ‘Anton,’ I said, introducing myself as I examined the owner of the hotel. ‘Anton Gorodetsky, Moscow Night Watch.’

  ‘Bruce,’ said the youth. ‘Bruce Ramsey, Edinburgh. Owner of this establishment.’

  He looked just perfect to play Dorian Grey in a film version of Oscar Wilde’s novel. Young, graceful and indecently fresh and handsome, he could easily have worn a badge that said ‘Ready for debauchery!’

  Except only that his eyes were old. Grey and faded, with the uniformly pink whites of eyes that belong to a two-hundred-year-old vampire.

  The youth picked up my suitcase – I didn’t object – and started walking up the narrow wooden stairs, talking as he went:

  ‘Unfortunately we don’t have a lift. It’s an old building and too narrow to fit a shaft in. And besides, I am not used to lifts. It seems to me that a mechanical monster would disfigure this wonderful house. I hate those reconstructed houses, old façades hiding boring standard-plan apartments. And we don’t often have guests who find it hard to climb the stairs … except that werewolves don’t like steep steps, but we try to accommodate them on the first floor – there’s a special room there – or on the second … what wind has blown you into our quiet town, Higher Light One?’

  He was not so ordinary himself. A vampire at the first level of Power – not exactly magical Power, not the same as my own, it was vampire Power. But he could definitely be called a first-level Other.

  ‘The incident in the Dungeons,’ I said.

  ‘Just as I thought.’ The youth walked on in front of me, striding easily up two steps at a time. ‘A most unpleasant incident. I appreciate the humour of the situation, of course … But it is not good. These are not times when you can simply walk up to someone you like the look of and drink him dry. Not at all!’

  ‘Do you miss the good old days?’ I couldn’t resist asking.

  ‘Sometimes,’ said the youth. He laughed. ‘But each age and each time has its own advantages, doesn’t it? People become civilised, they stop hunting witches and believing in vampires. And we become civilised. We can’t regard human beings as cattle who have no rights. People deserve the right to be respected, if only as our own ancestors. You should respect your ancestors, surely?’