Сергей Лукьяненко - Day Watch

"But even so, Igor, you're the key."

"But what can we do about it? Nobody ever tells keys which doors they're going to open. Anton, I'm a perfectly ordinary Other. Only Zabulon knows what makes me so important. And Gesar probably knows too. He'll come upstairs and join us in a moment, then we can ask him."

Anton looked through the Twilight and said enviously: "Seriously? Is he already close? I can't sense him…"

"I can't sense him either: I just saw them through the window, walking into the hotel."

There was a gentle tap at the door. Just a token gesture of politeness, no more than that, and a moment later the visitors entered through the Twilight. Gesar, his silent shadow Alisher, and Svetlana. Svetlana was led through the Twilight by the magicians, and she only saw Anton when all three of them emerged from the Twilight into the human world. She smiled and gave a slightly guilty shrug, as if to say: "Just look what I'm like now." Once again Anton was overcome by a miserable feeling of guilt and tenderness, mixed with shame and anger at himself. Even though he'd had no other option but to let the Mirror take away all of Svetlana's Power… And the most important thing was that as a result, Svetlana was still alive… But he couldn't rid himself of the cursed feeling that the game had been lost.

Could Igor really have similar feelings when he remembered Alisa? Similar, but far more bitter? In that case Anton could only be surprised and delighted that he was still alive.

"Good afternoon, lads…" Gesar said in a soft voice.

He was wearing a modest, inexpensive suit and plain tie, looking like a run-of-the-mill businessman who bought his clothes from Marks and Spencer and always sent his employees modest presents for Christmas. In this case, of course, Gesar regarded himself as the very best present…

"Hello, Boris Ignatievich," said Anton. He couldn't bring himself to call this afternoon good. "Hello, Alisher."

He and Sveta simply exchanged glances again and he took her by the hand and led her across to a chair, as if she were an invalid… It was awful.

"Good afternoon, boss," Igor said calmly. "I'm glad to see you. Hello, Sveta. Hi, Alisher."

Gesar's bodyguard (that is, of course, if it was really possible to regard a third-level magician as a bodyguard for a Great Magician)-or, perhaps more accurately, his orderly, the son of a devona and a human woman-Alisher nodded to the magicians without speaking and moved into the corner of the room, where he froze with his arms crossed on his chest and partially withdrew into the Twilight. Anton sensed that Alisher's ability to observe in the Twilight had been heightened artificially, clearly by the boss. And he also noticed that the young magician was trying not to look at Igor. That was another crazy tangle-Alisher's father had been killed by Alisa Donnikova. And even though he hadn't been a human being or an Other… it was hard to formulate the precise status of a devona , a faithful helper of the Great Magicians. The devona himself did not perform any great feats of heroism, that was not his job. He merely served the heroes, removed minor obstacles from their path. And he strengthened family ties, facilitating the birth of great heroes…

Anton caught his breath.

As a rule, werewolves' children inherited the ability to transform, while magicians' children only became Others very rarely. But how did it work with devonas?

Who was Alisher: simply a magician or a devona like his father, who had been Gesar's assistant in Central Asia for many centuries? And what did the boss need the young Uzbeki magician for? Was it only for sentimental reasons that Gesar had taken him into the Moscow Watch and made him his retainer?

"Anton!"

He looked at Svetlana and only then realized that he was squeezing her hand too hard. "Sorry…"

Gesar was standing in front of Igor, looking into his eyes. He looked for a long time without saying anything. Then he sighed and walked away to a chair, hunched over and looking limp. He sat down and lowered his face into his hands.

"Boris Ignatievich," said Igor, "forgive me."

"No!" Gesar barked, with his hands still over his face, "I won't forgive you! So what if you fell in love with a witch? I won't condemn you for that-that's destiny. But you've given up on yourself-don't expect any forgiveness for that!"

Igor was clearly uncomfortable. As Anton looked at him, he suddenly realized he'd accomplished his mission after all. Not by simple, head-on tactics-it would have been stupid to expect to trick an experienced magician and restore his will to live with a simple drinking session and conversations about his friends. It would have been even more stupid to hope to convince him that the woman he loved was simply a repulsive, greedy bitch.

But their long nocturnal conversation, their attempts to understand what was happening and make sense of the latest stage in the war between the Watches had had an effect. Igor had been distracted from his misery and suffering. He had felt he was part of a team again.

Could that have been what Gesar was counting on? In that case, all of his behavior, including the present scene, had been carefully calculated!

But after all, the boss was right, Igor's mind was simply clouded.

"Gesar, there are things that even you have no right to ask!" Igor suddenly said. He said it abruptly, with a reawakened fury. With life in his voice.

"Yes, of course, Captain Igor Teplov." Gesar's voice was as cold as ice. "I have no right. But who had the right to ask you to swim down the Dnieper under fire in November '42? And who had the right…"

"That's different."

"Why is it?" Gesar stood up, walked over to Igor and stopped still in front of him again, a head shorter than Igor, small and wiry, not looking at all heroic. "Do I have to explain to you, Teplov, what a war requires? It's not bodies that a war devours, but souls! And you knew that in the glorious city of Berlin, when you used your knife on that poor snot-nosed kid from the Hitler Jugend to make him give his friends away-you knew that."

Igor started as if he'd been slapped across the face.

"Conscience… love… honor…" Gesar said thoughtfully. "No one has the right to make anyone go against their conscience. No one has the right to make anyone betray love. No one has the right to persuade anyone to betray their honor. No one.

You're right. But we do it! Of our own accord. When one pan of the scales holds our love, conscience, and honor, and the other holds a million loving, decent, honorable people. We're no angels, that's not for us. And I understand your pain, believe me! But you take a look at Alisher! And try to understand his pain! Ask Anton what he thinks about the one you love. Ask Svetlana."

"I can't condemn Igor," Svetlana said quietly. "I'm sorry, boss. Forgive me, Alisher. Maybe I'm just a fool… unworthy to work in the Watch. But I can understand all of you."

She said this in a very low voice, without any emphasis, but Gesar stopped talking and moved away from Igor. He spread his hands and asked, "Do you think I don't understand?"

The silence in the room was thick and heavy.

"Gesar, when it was my duty, I carried out my orders," Igor suddenly said. "Honestly, right down the line. Regardless of… what I thought or felt. But my duty's done now. I've reached the end of the line."

"No. That's where you're wrong, Igor." Gesar started walking round the room and took a cigar out of his pocket. He looked at it and frowned, put it back and took out a pack of democratic Pall Malls. He crumpled that and gestured in annoyance. "The Watch needs you. We all need you. I need you."

"Svetlana needs me…" Igor remarked casually.

"Svetlana, Alisher, Ilya, Semyon, Bear-all of us!" Gesar said very quickly. "Of course!"