Day Watch

But just who was I? Wasn't I aiming too high? Was Moscow so short of powerful magicians? Even if they didn't work in the Watches? I couldn't keep being led on up the steps forever, could I?-there are no infinite stairways. Some way would be found to keep me in check-the Moscow magicians had plenty of experience, many of them had an entire century of it. And I didn't really know what I could do and what I couldn't. I was still an unknown quantity. And how did I know my Power wouldn't evaporate just as miraculously as it had appeared?

So you take your time, Vitalik, don't try to force things along. Better think about what bad things this fading night could bring you. But better not drag things out, lengthen that stride…

I walked quickly, as far as Sholkovskoe Shosse, darted into an underpass, and then started hitching a lift on the opposite side of the road.

What I like about Moscow is that even in the dead of night or early in the morning, all you have to do is raise your hand and an automobile will immediately pull in at the curb. In Nikolaev you can stand there for half an hour and no one will even think of stopping. But here everything is decided by money. Everyone needs it.

The Exhibition of Economic Achievements, fifty rubles. The standard rate.

I got into the sporty Volkswagen and set off toward problems that I could almost feel already.

When I reached the hotel, I immediately sensed that my room's defenses had been compromised. The defenses had worked just as they were intended to do, and that was my main problem. Without looking at anyone, I went up to the sixth floor, walked to my suite, put the key in the lock, and froze for a moment, looking at the door.

Okay, whatever was about to happen, I had to go through it.

He was lying in the middle of the lounge with his arms flung out to the sides. There was an expression of childish surprise and resentment on his face, as if he'd opened a wrapper and instead of the candy he'd been hoping for he'd found an angry hornet that had instantly sunk its stinger into his carelessly exposed finger.

He had stumbled into my Shahab's Ring. Not complex magic, but very powerful. And, naturally, he hadn't known the word that was needed. He was the unfortunate young detective, Andriukha Tiu

If he'd been more experienced, he would never have stuck his nose into the area enclosed by the Ring. I hadn't even set it around the whole room-only the safe with the bag in it.

This was the very last thing I needed-the Light Ones regarded the deaths of ordinary people as poaching, but the killing of an Other was a different matter altogether. It already smacked of a tribunal.

But I had simply closed off my own territory, closed it off in a way that Others understood! This is mine! Keep out! No entry!

Only he hadn't kept out. And he'd met his end in the Twilight… The infantile booby! Had he been trying to impress his bosses?

I had to own up. Otherwise they'd ask in a way I couldn't refuse to answer.

I reached for the phone-not my cell, but the ordinary phone that was standing on the table. The number obligingly surfaced from my memory.

"Night Watch? Vitaly Rogoza, Other, Dark. If I'm not mistaken, I have your employee, Andrei Tiu

Strangely enough, the Light Ones weren't the first to arrive. The moment the first Others reached my floor-there were two of them-I felt as if I were suddenly flooded with energy from someone. The pair were Dark magicians and they were both brimful of a Dark Power that reminded me in some ways of the Twilight, except that it was even denser and darker. A long tongue of Twilight ran straight down through the floors of the hotel, gradually growing thi

There was a knock at the door, emphatically correct.

"Yes, yes," I replied, without getting up out of my armchair. "It's open, come in!"

They came in. My acquaintance from the apartment on Pervomaiskaya Street, Shagron. And another one, also a magician, as far as I could tell. A bit overweight, like Shagron, with dark hair. And powerful. More powerful than his partner. But even so, despite my expectations, it was Shagron who started talking. It seemed that the accepted thing among members of the Watches was for the most important member of a team to keep quiet-Anton had preferred to listen too.

"Good morning, colleague."

"What's good about it? You must be joking, colleague."

I deliberately pronounced the word "colleague" in the same tone as Shagron. But he wasn't so easily provoked, and that was where he had the advantage over me. In experience. All I had to rely on were cheap wisecracks like that, plus moments of sudden illumination and the mystical stairway that obligingly offered me one step after another, and then arranged a kick up the backside at the appropriate moment.

"I'm not joking, colleague, simply greeting you. It's a pity you didn't wait for us back there… you know where I mean. I'd been counting on having a word with you."

"I didn't want to get in your way," I confessed, and it was more than half-true. A normal response from an Other-Dark or Light.

"I was counting on help. Help from a brother-in-arms. But you chose to disappear."

That "I" was strictly a Dark way of speaking. In Shagron's place, any Light One would definitely have said "We," and been perfectly sincere. And he'd have meant exactly what Shagron had meant, no less sincerely, of course.

"Okay. Let me introduce you. This is Edgar, our colleague from Estonia, recently a member of the Moscow Watch. What have you got here?"

"What I've got here is yet another body," I confessed. "A Light Other. A Watch member. But then you already know all about it, don't you, colleague Edgar?"

"There's not much time? The Light Ones will be here any minute? Is that what you wanted to say?" Edgar asked, casting aside diplomacy and addressing me in a familiar fashion. I realized there was no point in arguing with this dark-haired Estonian.

"Last Saturday evening, when I'd just arrived, this Light One was in charge of the operation dealing with a poaching vampire…"

"A vampiress," Edgar corrected me with a frown. "And then?"

"By sheer chance I just happened to be there beside the victim. They found me beside the corpse and recognized me as a Dark One. Clearly out of inexperience-I can't see any other reason-Tiu

The last phrase simply burst out on its own-I hadn't been pla

"This snot-nosed kid was in charge of the operation?" Shagron asked incredulously. "When there were Light Ones with far more experience-the tigress, the magicians…"

"Tiu

The question was almost rhetorical. Apparently I'd cast a simple spell, but put too much Power into it. Maybe…

I sensed the approach of the Light Ones at the same time as Edgar, just as they were nearing the hotel. A few seconds later Shagron picked them up too.

"What did you tell them?" Edgar asked, obviously in a hurry. "But keep it short."