Sixth Watch (10 page)

“You need a Prophet,” Nadya said.

“Yes, my darling daughter, and we have one.”

Nadya nodded.

“You need combat support even more,” said Svetlana. “Sorry, but . . . you won't be able to cope on your own.”

“I have some ideas about that too,” I said. “Don't worry.”

“Contact?”

“Absolutely none,” I said. “Everything can be traced. I'll drop in to see you in twenty-four hours. You make some coffee, okay?”

Svetlana nodded. Then she hugged me impulsively. Nadya snorted and turned away, examining the hard disk drive, as if she could view the contents just by looking at it.

Although I wouldn't swear to it that she couldn't.

The portal that Nadya opened at my request led me back out into the conference room.

Nothing there had changed—only the chair that was shattered after it caught a kick from my foot in the heat of the moment had been cleared away.

Apart from that, Zabulon was sitting there, slavering his cigar with his lips, and Gesar was painstakingly filling his pipe with the contents of Merlin's tobacco pouch—whatever it was.

“Back again,” Gesar said without even looking at me. “Well, I can't blame you. Sooner or later every one of us realizes that a secret hideaway is a useful thing.”

“You didn't bet on whether I'd come back?” I asked.

“No,” said Zabulon. “I was certain you'd come back. I just hadn't expected you to have the wits to hide your family.”

By his standards this was a serious compliment.

“I'm ready to keep listening,” I said, sitting down.

“There's nothing more to listen to,” Gesar replied.

“How's that? What happened to our guys? What happened to the vampiress?”

“All the analysts are already at work,” said Gesar. “But so far we know no more than you do. You can hook up with them, or you can work independently. I can let you have a few men.”

“I'm ready to help as well,” said Zabulon. “You can hook up with my analysts too.”

He didn't seem to be joking.

“Gesar, I request permission to conduct an independent investigation, the right to bring in any members of the Night Watch, use the archive and the special vault, and have the scientists deal with my requests as a first priority.”

“You are granted that right,” said Gesar. He held his hand out toward Zabulon and opened it.

“What?” Zabulon asked in bewilderment. “You want to swear by the Light and the Darkness?”

“Give me the matches.”

“Ah . . .” Zabulon took a box of matches out of his jacket. “Take them, you aesthete.”

Without saying a word, Gesar struck a match, held it for a moment to allow the head to burn off, then began fastidiously lighting his pipe.

“You definitely don't want to know what it is you're smoking?” Zabulon asked.

“No, it's enough for me that Merlin smoked it.”

Zabulon shrugged.

“Dark One, I have a request to put to you.”

“Put it.”

“I need a car,” I said. “I'm going to go to the school now, to examine the evidence at the scene and have a word with our people who are working there.”

Zabulon took out his keys and tossed them across the table to me.

“Take it. And no need to return it, I'm fed up with it already.”

“Thank you,” I said with a nod. “The second thing—I need your analysts and archivists to respond to my requests.”

Zabulon thought for a moment.

“All right. But they'll only respond to requests that concern what's going on now.”

“That's reasonable,” I agreed. “The third thing . . .”

Zabulon laughed.

“You've matured, Anton. Fifteen years ago you wouldn't have accepted anything from me. But now it's ‘I want health, money, and sexual potency—that's in the first place . . .'”

“No, there are only three points,” I reassured him. I squinted at Gesar—the smoke coming from his pipe had an unpleasant, acrid odor. But Gesar was smoking it with a stony, imperturbable face. “A car. Information . . . At least some information; I realize you'll keep part of it back. And the third thing is—I need to talk to the very oldest vampire of all.”

Zabulon frowned.

“That's curious. Perhaps the Master of the Vampires of Moscow would suit you? Or the head of the European organization?”

“Master Yekaterina is too young,” I said. “She's not even two hundred yet, is she? Master Pyotr is a bit older, but he hasn't been actively involved in things for a long time and they say he never gets
out of his coffin. I don't necessarily need the highest-ranking one, just one who's as old as possible.”

“I'm impressed,” Zabulon admitted. “But I can tell you in secret that it's a very good thing Pyotr went batty about abstinence and spends most of the time sleeping in his vault. Fewer problems for everyone . . . All right, Anton, I have a good idea of who you need to see and how I can persuade that person to come to you. But you have to get that person to talk frankly yourself, I'm powerless when it comes to that.”

I nodded.

“Be at home this evening,” said Zabulon. “I'll give you a call if there's any kind of hitch. But I expect everything will be fine and you'll get a visit.”

“You're taking a risk,” said Gesar, looking at me.

“With my boss's permission, I'll take that risk,” I said, getting up. “Call, write, send telegrams. And don't forget the food parcels.”

“Good luck, Anton,” I heard the boss's voice say when I reached the door. Gesar continued beside Zabulon—it looked as if their conversation would only begin in earnest after I was gone. Then Gesar started coughing.

“Just what is this shit?” he asked.

“Well, I did give you a hint,” Zabulon replied snidely.

I hadn't asked for the car because I didn't have one of my own or I couldn't requisition any car that took my fancy.

I wanted to see just how far Zabulon was prepared to go. Well, and in case things went awry—which I wasn't particularly expecting—so that I could show any Dark Ones that I was well in with their boss.

Zabulon drove a Volvo family car—at least it was a normal sedan, not some kind of overhyped SUV. A good car, but without any excessive swank to it. And inside it everything was neat and tidy, lived in, just slightly rearranged to suit the owner's taste—and yet at the same time absolutely sterile. Not a single hint at the owner's person
ality. A pack of tissues and some napkins in the glove compartment, a dash cam on the windshield.

Well, what was I expecting?

Skulls with incense burning in them?

A log recording the day's atrocities?

And it was also amusing that all the spells had disappeared from the car. They had been here; I could still sense a faint trace. Protective, camouflaging, servicing . . . But while I was walking down from the office, while I was looking for the car in the parking lot, it had become absolutely ordinary and human.

Well, that was exactly what I should have expected.

I cast a light veil against traffic cops over the car. I didn't even bother to protect myself against security cameras—Zabulon had removed the protection, they could send the fines to him.

And I set off to Nadya's school.

The schoolyard was clean, the remains of the dead Inquisitor had been removed. Sitting at the entrance was a guard who looked very much like the one who had been hurt, only he was a part-time member of the Day Watch, an Other and—if all the details are important—a vampire.

I nodded to him and he got up and bowed politely.

The corridors were empty; there were lessons going on. Only on the third floor did I come across a boy walking along the corridor. The boy's eyes were blank and sleepy.

“What are you doing?” I asked. “Where are you going?”

“I have to do my lessons. I'm going to the toilet,” the boy replied. “I said I needed to go to the toilet. I really need to pee. But I said that about the toilet, because I wanted to smoke in the toilet. But I have to do my lessons!”

The boy was twelve or thirteen; at that age they don't use the word “pee,” especially to grown-up strangers. They might say “piss,” or “take a leak,” if the child is highly cultured.

I glanced at him through the Twilight. Aha, clear enough. Like everyone in the school, he was under a light concentration spell.
Right now, perhaps for the first time in the history of universal education, all the children in a school really were studying.

Only in this youngster the pull of nicotine (it's a very, very powerful drug) was battling against the inner attraction to knowledge.

“You will take a leak and go back to class,” I said. “You really, really want to study. And you don't want to smoke anymore; cigarettes disgust you.”

“I want to study,” the boy said, relaxing, and he walked on.

And I went to the classroom where the Other guards had caught up with Nadya.

Of course, there weren't any lessons taking place there right now. Repairs were in progress. Two men in overalls, a bucket of cement, bricks . . .

“Hello,” I said. “Esan? Adrian?”

The guys turned to face me. Esan was Fifth Level. Adrian was Sixth. Both from the Night Watch reserve.

“Just leave out the wisecracks, Gorodetsky,” said Esan.

He was over forty. A very cultured man, he used to teach in a university in his home country, and even wrote some kind of textbook. Then he left and came to Moscow to earn a bit of money from painting and decorating. He had been identified as an Other here—Semyon discovered him when he decided to redecorate his apartment.

“Okay, I will,” I said.

Adrian, a young, dark-skinned guy, smiled cheerfully.

“What's the problem? Spells won't do the job for you here, this needs repairs. And all you Muscovites are useless. A Tajik and a Moldovanian—that's real power for you!”

“That's good,” I agreed. “Power.”

As far as I knew, these two guys, who had only recently acquired the full abilities of Others, were joint owners of a small construction firm. And why not? It's an excellent, Light kind of trade.

And in addition, it's handy for all the Others to have a builder they know. Not only can they get a dacha built, they can have a few spells put on it at the same time.

“Where are our boys?”

“They've moved up to the fourth floor,” said Adrian.

I set off toward the stairs. Halfway up I was overtaken by the same boy, dashing back from the toilet to continue his pursuit of knowledge. What miraculous academic progress would be made in this school for the next few days!

On the stairs I met Las.

“Gorodetsky!” he exclaimed joyfully. “They told me you'd gone zooming off somewhere with the boss!”

“I'm back already.”

Las turned serious, evidently remembering what had happened in the school less than two hours earlier.

“How's your daughter?”

“Everything's okay.”

“And your wife?”

“Fine. We coped.”

Las nodded.

“I'll be sure to light a candle for our patron saint . . .”

I had no problem with Las's religious enlightenment; in fact I rather liked it. But something here triggered my doubts.

“For whom?” I asked suspiciously.

“For Ilya. Ilya of Murom.”

“Whose patron saint is he?”

“Well . . . Ours . . . the Others.”

“Did the priest tell you that?”

“No, I figured it out for myself. A warrior. He fought against forces of evil. As a child he was paralyzed. But he was cured and initiated by three wayward militants.”

“Wandering mendicants!”

“Right, sorry about that,” said Las, totally unembarrassed. “But all the rest is right.”

“Light your candle,” I said with a nod. “No problem. What's happening here, in the school?”

“Well, we're gradually sorting everything out,” Las said with
modest pride. “I've been put in charge of the operation, by the way. Because this is the school where I—”

“You were a pupil here?”

“No, I used to teach singing. Only I didn't really teach anything, it was just a cover to give my friends a spot for their band to rehearse, so I know this place well. We're handling things. The kids are in their lessons, the teachers are teaching them, the Tajiks are doing their repairs, the healers are saving the wounded . . .”

“Wounded?”

“Oh yeah. That vampire went on a binge. Did he really save you?”

I nodded.

Las shook his head in wonder.

“Weird stuff. You know, he cut loose first. Wounded the guard. Then ran through the classrooms, sucking a bit of blood . . .”

“What?” At this point I was completely at a loss.

“Eight little kids! Just a little drop from each one, mind you. Maybe he was preparing for battle?”

“Maybe,” I said pensively.

“Anyway, I don't understand these vampires.” Las sighed. “Okay, back in the Middle Ages, if you wanted to suck a bit of fresh blood, without any syphilis or plague, and without any pockmarks or scars—then children were the only ones you should feed on. Not nice, of course, but logical. But now, in this day and age, why suck a kid's blood? It's laced with chemicals. All those low-alcohol cocktails! Nicotine! Burgers made with palm oil! A crazy amount of sugar from cola. Synthetic drugs. Dill and parsley smoking mixtures! Inoculations! Sheer poison!”

“And who would you recommend?” I asked. “You know, if I suddenly turn vampire?”

“I've been thinking about that myself,” said Las, nodding with a perfectly serious expression. “Right now the best choice would be some thirty- to forty-five-year-old brainworker. That means he's already over his wild days, he can't afford to get up to too much mis
chief for his health's sake, and at the same time he's not old enough to have accumulated a whole load of toxins.”