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feel dizzy.
What for? Darkness and Light, what for? Neither the young vampire nor this young Other, the kid, were worth that
kind of effort!
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"Egor!" I shouted.
I was beginning to feel frozen. I'd only ever entered the second level of the Twilight twice: once in class, with an
instructor beside me, and the day before, to get through the closed door of the apartment. I didn't carry any
protection for this level, and every moment I was losing more and more strength.
"Egor!" I took a step through the mist. I could hear muffled blows behind me-the snake was pounding someone
against the roof, clutching his body in its jaws... and I knew whose body it was...
Time down there moves even more slowly, and there was just a tiny chance that the kid might not have lost
consciousness yet. Struggling to make anything out in the gloom, I walked toward the spot where he'd dived
down to the second level of the Twilight, and I didn't spot the body under my feet. I stumbled and fell, then got up,
squatting on my haunches, and found myself face to face with Egor.
"You okay?" It was a stupid question to ask, because his eyes were open and he was looking at me.
"Yes."
Our voices had a hollow, rumbling sound. There were two fluttering shadows right beside us: Bear was still tearing
at the vampire. She was really holding in there for all she was worth!
And so was the kid!
"Let's go," I said, reaching out and touching his shoulder. "It's... tough being down here. We could get stuck here
forever."
"So okay."
"Don't you understand, Egor! To be dissolved in the Twilight means suffering, eternal suffering. You can't even
imagine what it's like, Egor! We're leaving!"
"What for?"
"To stay alive."
"What for?"
My fingers wouldn't bend. My pistol felt heavy, cast out of ice. I might last another minute, or two...
I looked into Egor's eyes.
"Everyone decides for himself. I'm leaving. I've got something to live for."
"Why do you want to save me?" he asked curiously. "Does your Night Watch need me?"
"I don't think you'll join our Watch," I said, surprising even myself.
He smiled. A shadow slowly ran through us-Semyon. Had he spotted something? Was someone in trouble?
And there I was, wasting my final strength trying to prevent a little Other from committing esoteric suicide-when
he was doomed anyway.
"I'm leaving," I said. "Goodbye."
My shadow clutched hold of me, freezing to my fingers and growing onto my face. I began tearing myself out of it
in jerks, and the Twilight hissed in displeasure at such behavior.
"Help me," said Egor. I only just caught the sound of his voice; I was almost out already. He'd left it until the very
last moment.
I reached out and grabbed his hand. I was already being torn out, the mist around me was melting. All my help
was purely symbolic; the boy had to do the real work for himself.
And he did.
We tumbled out into the upper layer of the Twilight. The cold wind struck me in the face, but this time it felt good.
The listless movements on every side were transformed into a furious struggle. The blurred tone of gray looked
bright and colorful.
Something had changed during those few seconds we'd spent talking. The vampire was still twitching under
Bear... that wasn't it. The young warlock was lying on the roof, either dead or unconscious; Tiger Cub and the
witch were rolling about nearby... that wasn't it.
The snake!
The white cobra was expanding, inflating to fill a quarter of the roof. As if it had been pumped full of air and it was
rising, or flying up of its own accord into the low sky. Semyon was standing by the twined coils of the fiery body,
half-squatting in one of the ancient combat stances, with small orange spheres streaking from his palms into the
clump of white flame. He wasn't aiming at the cobra, but at someone else underneath it, someone who should
have been dead a long time ago but was still struggling...
There was a sudden explosion!
A vortex of Light and scraps of Darkness. I was tossed onto my back and as I fell I hit Egor and knocked him
down, but just managed to grab hold of his hand. Tiger Cub and the witch, locked together, shot across to the
edge of the roof and froze against the barrier. Bear was torn off the vampire, who was badly mauled but still alive.
Semyon staggered but stayed on his feet, protected by a dimly glowing defensive shield. The only thing blown off
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the roof was the unconscious warlock: On his way he broke through the rusty bars of the barrier and plunged
downward in a helpless bundle.
But Ilya just continued standing where he had been, rooted to the spot. I couldn't see any defenses around him,
but he just gazed curiously at what was going on, clutching his wand.
The remains of the fiery cobra soared upward, spreading out into glowing clouds, melting away, scattering in
showers of sparks and fine rays of light. Beneath this fireworks display Zabulon slowly rose to his feet, extending
his arms in some complex magical pass. He'd lost his clothes in the struggle and now he was completely naked.
His body had changed, assuming the classical features of a demon: dull scales instead of skin, an irregular skull,
covered with some kind of matted fur instead of hair, close-set eyes with vertical slits for pupils, a massive,
dangling male member, and a short forked tail hanging from the base of his spine.
"Begone!" cried Zabulon. "Begone!"
The things that must have been going on at that moment in the human world... Outbursts of deadly depression
and blind, irrational joy, heart attacks, ludicrous behavior, quarrels between best friends, betrayal by faithful
lovers... People couldn't see what was happening, but it touched their souls.
But why?
Why did the Day Watch want all this?
And at that moment I suddenly felt calm, a state of icy, rational composure I'd almost forgotten.
It was all one complex maneuver. If we started from one simple idea, made one initial assumption-that everything
was happening according to Day Watch's plan-and then connected up all the chance events, starting with my
hunt in the metro-no, starting with the moment when the young vampire had been allocated a girl to feed on, a girl
he couldn't help falling in love with.
My thoughts were moving as fast as if I were acting as a brainstorm conductor, connected up to other people's
minds, the way our analysts sometimes worked. No, of course, that wasn't really happening; it was just that the
pieces of the jigsaw had started moving around on the table in front of me, coming together.
Day Watch didn't give a damn about the girl-vampire...
Day Watch wouldn't risk open conflict for the sake of a kid with potentially great powers. Day Watch had only one
reason for doing all this.
A Dark Magician with monstrous reserves of power.
A Dark Magician who could reinforce their position, not only in Moscow, but right across the continent...
But they'd already achieved that goal; we'd promised to hand over the Dark Magician...
The unidentified magician was the only unknown in the equation, the X. We could designate Egor as Y: His
resistance to magic was far too high for any novice Other. But on the other hand, the boy was an already known
quantity, with just one indeterminate factor...
And that had been deliberately introduced into the problem, to make it more complicated.
"Zabulon!" I shouted. Behind my back Egor was scrabbling and sliding on the ice as he tried to stand up.
Semyon was backing away from the magician, still maintaining his defenses. Ilya was observing everything
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