‘How?’
‘Over the balconies. He only had to climb up three floors. The vampire was already waiting for him. And she knew the boy was under guard – the moment she took him, she revealed herself. Now the parents are sound asleep and the vampire’s standing there with her arms round the kid, while Tiger Cub and Bear are going out of their minds.’
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have anything to say.
‘Our stupid mistake,’ Ilya concluded. ‘And a combination of unforeseen circumstances with potentially fatal consequences. Nobody had even initiated the kid … How could anyone know he could enter the Twilight?’
‘I knew.’
Perhaps it was my memories that did it, or perhaps I was just frightened by our terrible speed as the car raced along the highway, but I looked into the Twilight.
People are so lucky that they can’t see this – ever! And so unlucky that they will never be able to see it.
A high, grey sky, where there have never been any stars, a sky as glutinous as milk jelly, glowing with a ghastly, wan light. The outlines of everything have softened and dissolved – the buildings, covered with a carpet of blue moss, and the trees, with branches that sway regardless of which way the wind’s blowing, and the streetlamps, with the birds circling above them, barely moving their short wings. The cars coming towards you move really slow, the people walking along the street are hardly even moving their feet. Everything appears through a grey light filter, everything sounds as if your ears are plugged with cotton wool. A silent, black and white movie, an eerie, elegant director’s cut. The world from which we draw our strength. The world that drinks our life. The Twilight. Whoever you really are when you enter it, that’s who you are when you come out. The grey gloom dissolves the shell that has been growing over you all your life, extracts the core that people call the soul and tests its quality. And that’s when you’ll feel yourself crunching in the jaws of the Twilight, you’ll feel the chilly, piercing wind, as corrosive as snake venom … and you’ll become an Other.
And choose which side to take.
‘Is the boy still in the Twilight?’ I asked.
‘They’re all in the Twilight,’ said Ilya, diving in there after me. ‘Anton, why didn’t you tell them?’
‘It never occurred to me. I didn’t think it was that important. I’m not a field operative, Ilya.’
He shook his head.
We find it impossible, or almost impossible, to reproach each other. Especially when someone’s really messed up. There’s no need, our punishment is always there, all around us. The Twilight gives us more strength than humans can ever have, it gives us a life that is almost immortal in human terms. And it also takes it all away when the time comes.
In one sense we all live on borrowed time. Not just the vampires and werewolves who have to kill in order to prolong their strange existence. The Dark Ones can’t afford to do good. And we can’t afford the opposite.
‘If I don’t pull this off …’ I didn’t finish the sentence. Everything was already clear anyway.
CHAPTER 8
SEEN THROUGH the Twilight it actually looked beautiful. Up on the roof, the flat roof of that absurd ‘box on stilts’, I could see different-coloured patches of light. The only things that have any colour in there are our emotions. And there were plenty of those around.
The brightest of all was the column of crimson flame that pierced the sky – the vampire’s fear and fury.
‘She’s powerful,’ Semyon said simply, glancing up at the roof and kicking the car door shut. He sighed and started taking off his coat.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked.
‘I’ll go up the wall … over the balconies. I advise you to do the same, Ilya. Only you go in the Twilight, it’s easier.’
‘And how are you going?’
‘The ordinary way. There’s less chance she’ll notice. And don’t you two worry … I was climbing mountains for sixty years. I took the fascist flag down from Mount Elbrus.’
Semyon stripped to his shirt and threw his clothes on to the bonnet. Then he cast a swift protective spell to cover the clothes and the car.
‘Are you sure?’ I asked.
Semyon laughed, did a few squats and swung his arms around like an athlete warming up. Then he jogged across to the building, with the fine snow settling on his shoulders.
‘Will he make it?’ I asked Ilya. I knew how to climb the wall of a building in the Twilight. In theory. But an ascent in the ordinary world, and with no equipment …
‘He ought to,’ said Ilya, but he didn’t really sound convinced. ‘When he swam through the underground channel of the River Yauza … I didn’t think he’d make it then, either.’
‘Thirty years practising underwater swimming,’ I said glumly.
‘Forty … I’ll get going then, Anton. How are you going up, in the lift?’
‘Yup.’
‘Okay … don’t keep us waiting.’
He shifted into the Twilight and ran after Semyon. They were probably going to climb different walls, but I didn’t really want to know who was going which way. My route was waiting for me, and it wasn’t likely to prove any easier.
‘Why did you ever have to find me, boss?’ I whispered as I ran up to the building. The snow crunched under my feet, the blood pounded in my ears. I took my pistol out of its holster on the run and took off the safety catch. Eight explosive silver bullets. That ought to be enough. As long as I hit the target. I just had to seize the moment when I had a chance to take the vampire by surprise and not wing the boy.
‘Sooner or later someone would have met you, Anton. If not us, then the Day Watch. And they had just as good a chance of taking you.’
I wasn’t surprised he was keeping tabs on me. Firstly this was a serious business. And secondly after all, he was my first mentor.
‘Boris Ignatievich, if anything happens …’ I buttoned up my jacket and stuck the barrel of the pistol into my belt behind my back. ‘About Svetlana …’
‘They ran an exhaustive check on her mother, Anton. No. She’s not capable of casting a curse. No powers at all.’
‘No, that wasn’t what I meant, Boris Ignatievich … I just had this thought. I didn’t pity her.’
‘And what does that mean?’
‘I don’t know. But I didn’t pity her. I didn’t pay her any compliments. I didn’t make any excuses for her.’
‘I understand.’
‘And now … disappear, please. This is my job.’
‘Okay. I’m sorry for turning you out into the field. Good luck, Anton.’
I couldn’t remember the boss ever apologising to anyone before. But I had no time to be surprised, as the lift had finally arrived.
I pressed the button for the top floor and automatically reached for my earphones dangling on their lead. Oddly there was music coming through them. When had I turned on the walkman?
I love Picnic’s music. I wonder if Shklyarsky’s ever been tested to see if he’s an Other. He ought to be … But then, maybe not. Let him keep singing.