The Sacred Book of the Werewolf

by Victor Pelevin

  I was staggered.

  ‘Are you serious? Aren’t three bullets enough for you? You want more?’

  ‘You get these misunderstandings in our profession.’

  ‘What misunderstandings?’ I groaned. ‘It’s the system! You thought the system needed bright individuals, did you? It needs everyone grunting along together!’

  ‘If necessary, I’ll grunt with the rest. You just think, what are we going to do when the money runs out?’

  ‘Oh, that’s not a problem. Don’t worry about that. When I go to the shop I can do some streetwalking.’

  He knitted his eyebrows in a frown.

  ‘Don’t you dare talk like that!’

  ‘And don’t you dare say “don’t you dare” to me, all right?’

  ‘My girl’s going to sell herself . . . I can’t get my head round that.’

  ‘“My girl, my girl . . .” Exactly when did you privatize me?’

  ‘Are you going to earn money from prostitution? And feed us with it? Like something out of Dostoevsky.’

  ‘Oh fuck your Dostoevsky,’ I exploded. ‘And I have.’

  He looked at me with interest.

  ‘Well, how was it?’

  ‘Nothing special.’

  We both laughed. I don’t know what he was laughing at, but I had a good reason. I won’t include it in these pages, out of respect for Russian literature, but let me just say that the red spider in The Possessed once crawled across the hem of my sarafan ... Ah, all the titans of the spirit to whom I have given my amusing little gift! My only regret is that I never raised to Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov’s lips the goblet that he described so magnificently. But in Soviet times leaving the country was a problem. Let this be yet another villainous outrage on the conscience of the baleful communist regime.

  Fortunately the nascent quarrel had ended in laughter. I had almost made a mistake - you should never directly contradict a man, especially if he is tormented by doubts about his own worth. I ought to have found out what was on his mind first.

  ‘Do you want to go back to pumping oil?’ I asked.

  ‘No, not there. Mikhalich does the howling there now.’

  I guessed that during his absence he had been in contact with the outside world - he might have seen someone or spoken with them on the phone. But I didn’t show the slightest curiosity about that.

  ‘Mikhalich? But when he howled, the skull didn’t cry.’

  ‘They’ve come up with a new technology. Take five ccs of ketamine, add two ccs of pervitine, inject and then apply an electric current.’

  ‘To the skull?’

  ‘To Mikhalich.’

  ‘The perverts.’

  ‘Too true,’ he said. ‘It’ll be curtains in a year like that.’

  ‘For Mikhalich?’

  ‘Nah, it makes no difference to Mikhalich. Curtains for the skull. It’s already covered in cracks from all those tears . . . Caliphs for an hour . . . As long as the oil’s flowing, the money’s rolling in, they’re doing fine. But nobody wants to think about what’s going to happen tomorrow.’

  ‘Listen, what kind of skull is that?’ I said, finally asking a question that had been tormenting me for ages.

  ‘That’s something I can’t tell you,’ he said, suddenly turning sombre. ‘It’s a state secret. And in general, don’t talk about my job.’

  I wasn’t surprised that he still thought of the old firm as his work. There are some jobs you can’t resign from of your own free will. But I hadn’t expected him to want to go back to the people who had put three silver bullets in him. Although I did-n’t know what had really happened then - he never shared it with me.

  ‘Where will you go, if not to the oilfield?’ I asked.

  ‘They’ll find something for a super-werewolf to do.’

  ‘What?’ I said with a frown. ‘What super-werewolf?’

  ‘Me,’ he replied, surprised.

  ‘Since when did you become a super-werewolf?’

  ‘Since when? As if you haven’t seen.’

  ‘You think you’re a super-werewolf?’

  ‘What do you mean - think? I know.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘From this,’ he said. ‘Watch.’

  Another fly zooming along just below the ceiling dropped to the floor. It was strange to watch - the flies didn’t drop vertically, they followed parabolic curve, continuing their forward motion, and they looked like microscopic kamikaze planes, nose-diving at the enemy from on high.

  ‘Stop showing off,’ I said. ‘What does one thing have to do with the other?’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Well, let’s accept you can kill these flies. Let’s accept that you’re Pizdets and Garm. But why have you suddenly decided that on top of all that you’re the super-werewolf as well?’

  ‘Then who is the super-werewolf, if not me?’

  ‘I told you already,’ I said. ‘The super-werewolf is a metaphor. To call some individual creature the super-werewolf means to descend to a very primitive level.’

  ‘Okay, then I’ll be him on that primitive level,’ he said in a conciliatory tone. ‘You got a problem with that, Ginger?’

  ‘No, we can’t leave things like that. Let’s analyse this question properly.’

  He sighed.

  ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘Imagine I buy myself a uniform on Arbat Street and start walking round town in it, making out that I’m a general in the FSB. You tell me I’m not a general, and I say, ah, go on, let me be a general for a bit, what’s your problem?’

  ‘That’s an entirely different matter. The rank of general is awarded by a specific structure.’

  ‘Right. That’s what I’m talking about. Now think how you found out about the super-werewolf. You didn’t hear it from Mikhalich, did you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then there’s probably some system of values that the word came from. Super-werewolf is the same kind of rank as general. Only it’s awarded by tradition. And you have about as much to do with that tradition as I do with your firm. Do you understand that, grey one?’

  ‘And I suppose you, Ginger, do have something to do with this tradition, right?’

  ‘Not only do I have something to do with it,’ I said. ‘I’m the carrier of the tradition. The line holder, to use the correct term.’

  ‘What line’s that?’

  ‘The line of transmission.’

  ‘You mean you’re the absolute authority here as well?’ he asked. ‘Straining yourself a bit, aren’t you? Think you’ll be able to hold up the roof?’

  He seemed to be genuinely irritated - he even used an expression from the criminal jargon used by bandits and the FSB.

  ‘Don’t confuse a mystical tradition with the Shangri-La casino,’ I said. ‘The line holders are called that because they hold on to the line, not because they hold it up.’

  My answer seemed to puzzle him.

  ‘But what is that - a line of transmission?’ he asked. ‘What’s transmitted along it?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Like I said. Nothing. I’ve explained that to you so often, this kettle will understand it soon.’

  ‘Then what is it they’re holding on to, these line holders?’

  ‘In the line of transmission there is nothing you can hold on to.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘There’s nothing there to understand, either. Seeing that clearly is exactly what holding the line means.’

  ‘All right,’ he said, ‘then tell me this, in words of one syllable. Does anyone in the world have the formal right to call himself the super-werewolf according to this tradition? Even at the most primitive level?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  ‘And who’s that?’

  I lowered my eyes modestly.

  ‘Who?’ he repeated.

  ‘I know this will be a blow to your vanity,’ I said. ‘But we did agree only to tell each other the truth . . .’<
br />
  ‘You again?’

  I nodded. He swore under his breath.

  ‘And who does this line of transmission run from?’

  ‘I’ll tell you about it sometime later.’

  ‘No, let’s have it right now. So you won’t have time to invent anything.’

  Well, okay, I thought, the truth cannot be concealed. He’ll find out sometime anyway.

  ‘All right. Then listen and don’t interrupt. One evening, about one thousand two hundred years ago, in the country that is now called China, I was riding from one town to another in my palanquin. It is of absolutely no importance now which towns they were and why I was travelling. What is important is that on that evening we halted outside the gates of a monastery on the Yellow Mountain . . .’

  Sometimes in ancient China there used to be misty evenings when the world seemed to reveal the face it wore in its infancy, at the very beginning. Everything all around - the houses, the walls, the trees, the groves of bamboo, the poles with lamps burning on them - changed in the most miraculous fashion, and it began to seem as if you yourself had cut all this out of coloured paper and carefully arranged it all around, and then started to pretend that it really was a big wide world through which you could roam . . . On just such an evening twelve centuries ago, I was sitting in my palanquin in front of the gates of a monastery on the Yellow Mountain. The world around me was beautiful, and I was gazing through the window in melancholy delight, and there were tears in my eyes.

  It was music that had affected me so deeply. Somewhere close by a flute had been singing for a long time - singing of the very feelings that were in my heart. As if once in our childhood we had lived in a huge house and played magical games. And then we had become so lost in our games that we began to believe in our own inventions - we had gone out to have fun walking among the dolls and lost our way, and now there was no power that could lead us back home if we did not remember that we were simply playing games. But it was almost impossible to remember that, so spellbinding and horrifying had the game turned out to be . . .

  I do not know if music can be ‘about something’ or not - the dispute over that is an ancient one. The first conversation on that theme that I can recall took place in the time of Qin Shi Huang. And many centuries later, when I came to Yasnaya Polyana in the guise of a nihilist girl student, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy mocked the idea all the way through supper, berating Beethoven with especial disdain - why, he asked, was it the moonlight sonata? On the whole, I would not claim that the sounds of the flute contained precisely that meaning. Or even that there was any meaning in them at all. But I realized that I had to talk to the flute-player straight away.

  Of course, from the point of view of common sense, I ought not to have got out of the palanquin at all. When a flute plays beautifully somewhere nearby, it is best simply to listen to its sounds and not seek the company of the flautist. You cannot tell if he will say anything that is interesting or new to you, but you can be sure that he will stop playing. But all are wise in hindsight. Especially we foxes - by virtue of our anatomy.

  There was mist all around: the people were in their houses, and I was not anticipating any particular danger to myself. Jumping out of the palanquin, I set off towards the source of the sound, stopping occasionally and literally squeezing my tail tight against myself at the astounding, incomparable beauty of the evening. There have been no evenings like that since the eighteenth century - they say that the chemical composition of the air has changed. Or perhaps it is something more serious than that.

  The monastery consisted of numerous buildings crowded together beside the main gates, which were huge, red and very costly. These gates were not set in a wall. Learned monks had explained to me that this was an allegorical expression of the sect’s doctrine: the gates symbolized a journey leading back to where it starts, and starting from anywhere. The gates that weren’t gates, the total openness and radiant space on all sides, I could even remember the hieroglyphs saying that. But I assumed there had simply not been enough money for walls. Just let someone donate the money for a wall, I thought, and changes would be introduced into the doctrine.

  The flute was being played in the main building, which housed the Hall of the Transmission of the Teaching. It would never have entered my head to stick my face in there, despite the romantic lilac mist, but the music lent me courage.

  If you fear tigers, do not go into the mountains, I thought - so come what may . . .

  Raising the skirts of my gown so that my tail would be ready for any surprises, I walked on. In ancient China all garments were wide and spacious, and so I was in no danger from a chance encounter with one or two idle passers-by, especially in the mist.

  As a general rule I did not induce any special illusion - I showed the same world that was all around, but without little A Hu-Li in it. Whenever someone saw me, their eyes would usually pop out of their heads at the sight of my ginger pride, but the next second they would be completely baffled at what could have set them trembling so badly - there was nothing anywhere nearby, only the bare, empty field, with the wind swirling the dry leaves in the air above it . . . This sounds simple, but in fact it is difficult, one of the most advanced of a fox’s tricks, and if you encounter more than three people, there are problems. By the way, that is why, from the times of Sun Tzu, in time of war it was customary to place at least four guards at the entrance to a fortress: they feared my sisters, and with good reason.

  In the main building one window was lit. That was where the flute was playing, there could be no mistake about that. It was a corner room on the first floor, and climbing into it presented no difficulty. I had to jump up on to the tiled canopy and follow it past the dark windows. This I did with no difficulty - I am light-footed. The shutters were raised at the window behind which the flute was playing. I squatted down on my haunches and cautiously glanced inside.

  The flute-player was sitting on the floor with his back to me. He was wearing a robe of blue silk, and on his head he had a small conical straw hat. I could see that his head was shaved, although his style of dress was not like a monk’s. He had broad shoulders and a lean body, light and strong - I sense such things immediately. On the floor in front of him I saw a teacup, a brush and a pile of paper. There were two oil lamps burning on the wall.

  Evidently, I thought, he was engaged in calligraphy, and then decided to rest and took up his flute . . . I wonder what I shall say to him?

  I had no plan at all - only some vague ideas swirling around in my head: first have a heart-to-heart talk, and then hypnotize him, that was the only way to deal with people. Although, if I had thought about it calmly for a moment, I should have realized that it would not work: no one would talk to me openheartedly, knowing that afterwards I would hypnotize them in any case. And if I were to hypnotize them from the very beginning, then what openheartedness could there possibly be?

  But I was not allowed to think the matter through - the light of torches glimmered below me, I heard footsteps and voices. There were about ten men - I could not cast a spell on so many all at once. Pondering for no more than a second, I leapt in through the window.

  I decided I would quickly bewitch the flute-player, then hide and, when the men had gone away, go back to my palanquin, since fortunately it was already almost dark outside. I landed on all fours without making a sound, raised my tail and called out quietly to the man sitting in the room.

  ‘Most honourable sir!’

  He calmly put his flute down and turned round. I immediately tensed my tail and focused all the power of my spirit at its tip - and then something quite new and unexpected happened. Instead of the pliable fizzy jelly which is how my tail perceives the human mind (it is pointless to attempt to explain this to someone who has never experienced it for themselves), I encountered absolutely nothing at all.

  I had met many people who were strong or weak in spirit. Working with them was like drilling through walls made of different materials: everything can be dril
led, only in different ways. But here I discovered nothing to which I could apply the willpower focused in the fine strands crackling with electricity above my head. In my astonishment I literally lost my balance and slumped to the floor like a fool, with my tail squeezed between my legs, which were exposed in front of me in an unseemly manner. At that moment I felt like a fairground juggler whose balls and ribbons have all fallen plop into the liquid mud.

  ‘Hello, A Hu-Li,’ the man said, and inclined his head in polite greeting. ‘I am very glad that you have found a moment to call in and see me. You may call me the Yellow Master.’

  The Yellow Master, I thought, drawing in my legs. Probably from the Yellow Mountain on which the monastery stands. Or perhaps he is aiming to be emperor.

  ‘No,’ he said with a smile, ‘I do not wish to be emperor. But you are right about the Yellow Mountain.’

  ‘What, did I say it aloud?’

  ‘Your thoughts are reflected so clearly on your sweet little face, that it is quite easy to read them,’ he said with a laugh.

  Embarrassed, I covered my face with my sleeve. And then I remembered there was a tear in my sleeve, and began to feel completely ashamed - I covered one arm with the other. My robe at the time was a beautiful one, an imperial concubine’s cast-off, but no longer new, and there were holes in it here and there.

  But my embarrassment was, of course, a pretence. In actual fact I was feverishly searching for an exit, and I deliberately hid my face so that he would not read in it what I was thinking. It was not possible that I could be defeated by one man on his own. I could not feel his mind anywhere. But that did not mean that his mind did not exist at all. Clearly he knew some cunning magical trick . . . Perhaps he was showing himself in a place which was not where he really was? I had heard about such things. But he was not the only one who knew some tricks.

  We foxes have a method that we can use to transmit an illusion in all directions at once, instantly subduing a human being’s will. When we do this, we do not attune ourselves to a specific client, but become, so to speak, a large, heavy stone that falls on to the smooth mirror of the ‘here and now’, sending out in all directions ripples that make people’s heads spin. And then the disoriented human mind grasps at the very first straw offered to it. This technique is called ‘Storm above the Heavenly Palace’.