The Nightwatch

by Sergei Lukyanenko

  Maxim flung the weapon to the ground as if it were burning his fingers. This was a real magician, well beyond the likes of me.

  "Svetlana, you passed the test," the boss said, looking at her. "What can I say? Grade three for self-control and restraint. No doubt about it."

  I supported myself on Egor and tried to get up. I wanted to shake the boss's hand. He'd played the game his own way again. By using everybody who was there to be used. And he'd outplayed Zabulon—what a pity the Dark Magician wasn't there to see it! How I'd have liked to see his face, the face of the demon who'd turned my first day of spring into a nightmare.

  "But…" Maxim started to say something, then stopped. He was overwhelmed by too many new impressions. I knew just how he was feeling.

  "Anton, I was certain, absolutely certain that you and Svetlana could handle it," the boss said gently. "The most dangerous thing of all for a sorceress with the kind of power she's been given is to lose self-control. To lose sight of the fundamental criteria for the fight against Darkness, to act in haste or to hesitate for too long. And this is one stage of the training that should never be put off."

  Svetlana finally stepped toward me and took me gently by the arm. She looked at Gesar, and just for a moment her face was a mask of fury.

  "Stop it," I said. "Sveta, don't. He's right. Today, for the very first time, I understood where the boundary line runs in our fight. Don't be angry. This is only a scratch," I said, taking my hand away from my wound. "We're not like ordinary people; we're a lot tougher."

  "Thank you, Anton," said the boss. Then he looked at Egor: "And thank you too, kid. I really hate the idea that you'll be on the other side of the barricades, but I was sure you'd stand up for Anton."

  The boy tried to move toward Gesar, but I kept hold of his shoulder. It would be awkward if he blurted out his resentment! He didn't understand that everything Gesar had done was only a countermove.

  "There's one thing I regret, Gesar," I said. "Just one. That Zabulon isn't here. That I didn't see his face when the whole box of tricks fell apart."

  The boss didn't answer right away.

  It must have been hard for him to say it. And I wasn't too pleased to hear it, either.

  "But Zabulon had nothing to do with it, Anton. I'm sorry. He really didn't have anything at all to do with it. It was an exclusive Night Watch operation."

  Story Three

  All For My Own Kino

  Prologue

  The little man had swarthy skin and narrow eyes. He was the ideal prey for any militiaman in the capital city, with a confused, slightly guilty smile and a glance that was naive and shifty at the same time. Despite the killing heat, he was wearing a dark suit, old-fashioned but hardly even worn, and as a finishing touch, an ancient tie from the Soviet period. In one hand he was carrying a shabby, swollen briefcase, the kind agronomists and chairmen of progressive collective farms used to carry around in old Soviet movies, and in the other a string bag holding a long Central Asian melon.

  The little man emerged from his second-class sleeper car with a smile, and he kept on smiling: at the female conductor, at his fellow travelers, at the porter who jostled him, at the young guy selling lemonade and cigarettes from a stall. He raised his eyes and gazed in delight at the roof covering Kazan Station. He wandered along the platform, occasionally stopping and adjusting his grip on the melon. He might have been thirty years old or he might have been fifty. It was hard for a European eye to tell.

  A minute later a young man got out of a first-class sleeper car in the same Tashkent-Moscow train, probably one of the dirtiest and most run-down trains in the entire world. He looked like the little man's complete opposite. Another Central Asian type, maybe Uzbek, but his clothes were more in the modern Moscow style: shorts and a T-shirt, with a little leather bag and a cell phone hanging on his belt. No baggage and no provincial manners. He didn't gaze around at everything, trying to spot the sacred letter "M" for metro. After a quick nod to the conductor of his car and a gentle shake of his head in reply to the offers from taxi drivers, two more steps saw him slipping through the bustling crowd of new arrivals, with an expression of mild distaste and alienation on his face. But a moment later he was an integral part of the crowd, indistinguishable from any of the healthy cells in the organism, attracting no interest from the phagocyte militiamen or the other cells beside him.

  Meanwhile, the little man with the melon and the briefcase was pushing his way through the crowd, muttering countless apologies in rather poor Russian, looking this way and that with his head drawn down. He walked past one underpass, shook his head, and set off toward a different one, then stopped in front of a billboard where the crush was less fierce. Clutching his things clumsily to his chest, he took out a crumpled piece of paper and studied it closely. From the look on his face he knew perfectly well he was being followed.

  The three people standing over by the wall were quite happy with that: a strikingly beautiful redhead in a slinky, clinging silk dress, a young guy in punk-style clothes with a bored expression in eyes that looked surprisingly old, and a rather older, sleek-looking man with effete mannerisms.

  "It doesn't look like him," the young guy with the old man's eyes said doubtfully. "Not like him at all. I didn't see him for very long, and it was a long time ago, but…"

  "Perhaps you'd like to ask Djoru, just to make sure?" the girl asked dismissively. "I can see it's him."

  "You accept responsibility?" There was no surprise or desire to argue in the young man's voice. He was just checking.

  "Yes," said the girl, keeping her eyes fixed on the little old man. "Let's go. We'll take him in the underpass."

  They set out unhurriedly, walking in step. Then they separated with the girl sauntering straight ahead, while the men went off to each side.

  The little man folded up his piece of paper and set off uncertainly for the underpass.

  The sudden absence of people would have amazed a Muscovite or a frequent visitor to the capital. After all, this was the shortest and easiest route from the metro to the platform of the mainline station. But the little man took no notice. He paid no attention to the people who were stopped behind his back as if they'd run into an invisible barrier and walked off to the other underpasses. And there was no way he could have seen that the same thing was happening at the other end of the underpass, inside the railroad station.

  The sleek man came toward him, smiling. The attractive young woman and the casually dressed young guy with an earring in his ear and torn jeans closed in on him from behind.

  The little man continued walking.

  "Hang on, old timer," the sleek man said in a friendly voice that matched his appearance—high-pitched, affected. "Don't be in such a hurry."

  The Central Asian smiled and nodded, but he didn't stop.

  The sleek man made a pass with one hand, as if he were drawing a line between himself and the little man. The air shimmered and a cold breath of wind swept through the underpass. Up on the platform children started crying and dogs started howling.

  The little man stopped, looking straight ahead with a thoughtful expression. He pursed his lips, blew, and smiled cunningly at the man standing in front of him. There was a high-pitched jangling sound, like invisible glass breaking. The sleek man's face contorted in pain and he took a step backward.

  "Bravo, devona," said the young woman, halting behind the Central Asian. "But now you definitely shouldn't be in any rush."

  "Oh, I need to hurry, oh yes I do," the little man jabbered rapidly. "Would you like some melon, beautiful lady?"

  The young woman smiled as she studied the Central Asian. She made a suggestion:

  "Why don't you come with us, respected guest? We'll sit and eat your melon, drink some tea. We've been waiting for you so long; it's not polite to go running off immediately."

  The little old man's face expressed intense thought. Then he nodded:

  "Let's go, let's go."

  His first step knocked the man
with affected manners off his feet. It was as if there were an invisible shield moving along in front of the little man, an immaterial wall of raging wind: The sleek man was swept along the ground with his long hair trailing behind him, his eyes screwed up in terror, a silent scream breaking from his throat.

  The young guy who looked like a punk rocker waved his hand through the air, sending flashes of scarlet light flying at the little man. They were blindingly bright when they left his hand but started fading halfway to their target, and they reached the Asiatic's back as a barely visible glimmer.

  "Ow, ow, ow," the little old man said, but he didn't stop. He twitched his shoulder blades, as if some annoying fly had landed on his back.

  "Alisa!" the young guy called, continuing his useless attack, working his fingers to compact the air, drawing the scarlet fire out of it and flinging it at the little old man. "Alisa!"

  The girl leaned her head to one side as she watched the Central Asian walking away. She said something in a quiet whisper and ran her hand across her dress. Out of nowhere a slim, transparent prism appeared in her hand.

  The little old man started walking faster, swerving left and right and holding his head down in a funny way. The sleek man went tumbling along in front of him, no longer even attempting to cry out. His face was ragged and bleeding; his arms and legs were shattered and useless, as if he hadn't simply slid three meters across a smooth floor but been dragged three kilometers across the rocky steppe by a wild hurricane or behind a galloping horse.

  The girl looked at the little man through the prism.

  First the Central Asian started walking more slowly. Then he groaned and unclasped his hands—the melon smashed open with a crunch against the marble floor, the briefcase fell with a soft, heavy thud.

  "Oh," gasped the man that the girl had called a devona. "Oh, oh!"

  The little man slumped to the floor, shuddering as he fell. His cheeks collapsed inward, his cheekbones protruded sharply, his hands were suddenly bony, the skin covered with a network of veins. His black hair didn't turn gray, but it was suddenly thinner and dusted with gray. The air around him began to shimmer, and invisible currents of heat streamed toward Alisa.

  "What I did not give shall henceforth be mine," the girl hissed. "All that is yours is mine."

  Her face flushed with color as rapidly as the little man's body dried out. Her lips smacked together as she whispered strange, breathy words. The punk frowned and lowered his hand—the final scarlet ray slammed into the floor, turning the stone dark.

  "Very easy," he said, "very easy."

  "The boss was very displeased," said the girl, hiding the prism away in the folds of her dress. She smiled. Her face radiated the same kind of energy women sometimes show after a vigorous sexual encounter.

  "Easy, but our Kolya was unlucky."

  The punk nodded, glancing at the long-haired man's motionless body. There was no particular sympathy in his eyes, but no hostility either.

  "That's for sure," he said, walking over confidently to the desiccated corpse. He ran his hand through the air above it and the corpse crumbled into dust. With his next pass the young guy reduced the melon to a sticky mess.

  "The briefcase," said the girl. "Check the briefcase."

  A wave of his hand—and the worn imitation leather cracked apart and the briefcase fell open, like an oyster shell under the knife of an experienced pearl-diver. But to judge from the young guy's expression, the pearl he'd been expecting wasn't there. Two clean changes of underwear, a pair of cheap cotton tracksuit pants, a white shirt, rubber sandals in a plastic bag, a polystyrene cup with dried Korean noodles, a spectacle case.

  The young guy made a few more passes and the polystyrene cup split open, the clothing came apart at the seams, and the case opened to reveal the spectacles. He swore.

  "He hasn't got anything, Alisa! Nothing at all!"

  An expression of surprise slowly spread across the witch's face.

  "Stasik, this is the devona, the courier. He couldn't have trusted what he was carrying to anyone else!"

  "He must have," the young guy said, stirring the Central Asian's ashes with his foot. "I warned you, didn't I, Alisa? You can expect anything from the Light Ones. You took responsibility. I may be a weak magician, but I have more experience than you—fifty years more."

  Alisa nodded. There was no confusion in her eyes now. Her hand slid over her dress again, seeking for the prism.

  "Yes," she said softly. "You're right, Stasik. But in fifty years' time our experience will be equal."

  The punk laughed, then squatted down beside the long-haired man's body and started going through the pockets quickly.

  "You think so?"

  "I'm certain. You shouldn't have insisted on having your own way. I was the one who wanted to check the other passengers as well."

  The young guy swung around to protest, but it was too late—the hot currents of life energy were already streaming out of his body.

  Chapter 1

  The Oldsmobile was ancient, which I liked. But the open windows were no help against the insane heat rising from the road after the sun had been scorching it all day long. It needed an air-conditioner.

  Ilya was probably thinking the same thing. He was driving with one hand on the steering wheel, glancing around all the time and chatting with everyone. I knew a magician of his level could spot probabilities ten minutes in advance and there wasn't going to be any crash, but I was still feeling a bit uneasy.

  "I was thinking about putting in an air-conditioner," he told Yulia in a guilty voice. The young girl was suffering worse than anyone else from the heat; she had a blotchy rash on her face and her eyes looked glazed. I was just hoping she wasn't going to be sick. "But it would have ruined the entire car; it wasn't meant to have one! No air-conditioner, no cell phones, no onboard computers."

  "Uh-huh," said Yulia, with a feeble smile. We'd all been working late the day before. No one had gone to bed at all; we'd been stuck in the office until five in the morning and then stayed the rest of the night there. I suppose it's pretty mean to make a thirteen-year-old girl slave away with the grown-ups. But it was what she'd wanted; no one had forced her.

  From her seat in the front, Svetlana shot Yulia an anxious look.

  Then she shot Semyon a look of extreme disapproval. The imperturbable magician almost choked on his Yava cigarette. He breathed in and all the cigarette smoke drifting around inside the car was drawn into his lungs. He flicked the butt out the window. The Yava was already a concession to popular opinion—until just recently Semyon had preferred to smoke Flight and other repulsive tobacco products.

  "Close the windows," said Semyon.

  A moment later it suddenly started getting cold. A subtle, salty smell of the sea filled the air. I could even tell that it was the sea at night, and quite close—the typical smell of the Crimean shoreline. Iodine, seaweed, a subtle hint of wormwood. The Black Sea. Koktebel.

  "Koktebel?" I asked.

  "Yalta," Semyon replied. "September tenth, nineteen seventy-two, about three a.m. After a small storm."

  Ilya clicked his tongue enviously.

  "Pretty good! How come you haven't used up a set of sensations like that in all this time?"

  Yulia gave Semyon a guilty look. Climate conservation wasn't something every magician found easy, and the sensations Semyon had just used would have been a hit at any party.

  "Thank you, Semyon Pavlovich," she said. For some reason Yulia was as shy of Semyon as she was of the boss, and she always called him by his first name and patronymic.

  "Oh, that's nothing," Semyon replied calmly. "My collection includes rain in the taiga in nineteen thirteen, and I've got the nineteen forty typhoon, a spring morning in Jurmaala in fifty-six, and I think I've got a winter evening in Gagry."

  Ilya laughed:

  "Forget the winter evening in Gagry. But rain in the taiga…"

  "I won't swap," Semyon warned him. "I know your collection; you haven't got anythin
g nearly that good."

  "What about two, no, three for one…"

  "I could give you it as a present," Semyon suggested.

  "Go take a hike," said Ilya, jerking on the steering wheel. "What could I give you that would match that?"

  "Then I'll invite you when I unseal it."

  "I suppose I should be grateful for that."

  He started sulking, naturally. I always thought of them as more or less equal in their powers, maybe Ilya was even a bit stronger. But Semyon had a flair for spotting the moment that was worth recording with magic. And he didn't waste his collection without good reason.

  Of course, some people might have thought what he'd just done was a waste: brightening up the last half hour of our journey with such a precious set of sensations.

  "Nectar like that should be breathed in the evening, with kebabs on the barbecue," said Ilya. He could be incredibly thick-skinned sometimes. Yulia went tense.

  "I remember one time in Yemen," Semyon said unexpectedly. "Our helicopter… anyway, never mind that… we set out on foot. Our communications equipment had been destroyed, and using magic would have been calling way too much attention to ourselves. We set out on foot, across the Hadramawt desert. We had hardly any distance left to go to get to our regional agent, maybe a hundred kilometers. But we were all exhausted. And we had no water. And then Alyoshka—he's a nice young guy who works in the Maritime Region now—said: 'I can't take any more, Semyon Pavlovich; I've got a wife and two children at home, I want to get back alive.' He lay down on the sand and unsealed his special stash. He had rain in it. A cloudburst, twenty minutes of it. We drank all we needed, and filled our canteens, and recovered our strength. I felt like punching him in the face for not telling us sooner, but I took pity on him."

  After a long speech like that, nobody in the car said anything for a minute, Semyon had presented the facts of his stormy biography so eloquently.