One thing the Dark Ones certainly had was a lust for life. Anton had never had any doubt about that. He only had to look at the way Edgar was dealing with that tasty-looking leg of pork that no dietician would ever have approved, larding it generously with mustard¡ªthe kind the Russians liked, of course, sweetish, but still with a sharp bite¡ªand horseradish too, and swilling it down with plenty of beer.
Anton had always found that astonishing. He had always been on perfectly friendly terms with his vampire neighbors, and even they sometimes looked more full of the joy of life than the Light magicians. The Higher Magicians, that was¡ªthose whose powers were at Anton's level still hadn't finished "playing at people."
The unpleasant thing about it was that their love of life usually didn't extend beyond themselves.
Anton lifted his heavy mug of Budweiser and muttered, "Prosit."
It was a good thing the Czechs didn't have the custom of clinking glasses. Anton wouldn't have liked to clink glasses with a Dark One.
"Prosit," Edgar replied. He drained half of his mug in two swallows, savoring the beer, and wiped the foam off his upper lip. "That's good."
"It is," Anton agreed, although he was still feeling tense. No, of course there was nothing reprehensible about them drinking beer together like this. The rules of the Night Watch didn't prohibit contact with Dark Ones; on the contrary¡ªif a member of the Watch was confident that he was safe, it was welcomed. You never knew what you might find out. You might even be able to influence a Dark One. Not turn him to the Light, of course... but at least stop him from pulling his next lousy trick. Anton surprised himself by saying, "It's nice to find at least one thing we can agree on."
"Yes," said Edgar, trying to speak amicably and politely, so that the Light One wouldn't blow his top over some imaginary insult or get suspicious for no reason. "Czech beer in Moscow and Czech beer in Prague are two different things."
Gorodetsky nodded. "Yes. Especially when you compare it with bottled beer. Czech beer in bottles is the corpse of real beer in a glass coffin."
Edgar smiled in agreement with the comparison and remarked, "Somehow the rest of Eastern Europe seems to have lost the talent for brewing beer."
"Even Estonia?" Anton asked.
Edgar shrugged. These Light Ones could never let slip a chance for a jibe... "Our beer's good. But it's not exceptional. Pretty much like in Russia."
Anton frowned, as if he'd just remembered the taste of the beer back home. But he said something quite different: "I was in Hungary this summer. I drank Hungarian beer, Dreher... almost the only kind they have."
"And?"
"I'd have been better off drinking sour Baltika."
Edgar laughed. Even when he strained his memory a bit, he couldn't remember a single type of Hungarian beer. But then, if Anton thought so poorly of it, it was better not to remember. Anton was a good judge of beer, an excellent judge, in fact. The Light Ones were fond of the pleasures of the flesh¡ªyou had to give them that.
"And these... valiant warriors... drinking their slops from back home," said Anton, nodding toward the Americans. "Peacemakers... Goering's aces..."
Both Edgar and Anton had finished their peceno veprevo koleno long ago. They'd both drunk enough beer to set their eyes aglow and their voices were growing louder and more relaxed.
"Why Goering?" Edgar asked in surprise. "They're not krauts, they're Americans."
Anton explained patiently, as if he were talking to a child. "Aces of the US Air Force doesn't sound right. Do you know any short, snappy term for the US Air Force?"
"No, I don't."
"All right, then. They can be Clinton's aces. At least the Germans knew they were fighting airmen like themselves, but this crowd has dropped bombs on villages where the only defense is a Second World War antiaircraft gun... And they get medals for it, too. But you just try asking them if there's anything in their lives they regard as sacred. They still think they were the ones who liberated Prague."
"Sacred?" Edgar echoed with a laugh. "Why would they need anything sacred? They're soldiers."
"You know, Other, it seems to me that even soldiers should still be human beings first and foremost. And human beings need something sacred to cherish in their souls."
"First you need to have a soul. The sacred bit comes later. Oh! Now we can ask one of them."
One of the American airmen, a guy with rosy cheeks in a uniform glittering with braid and various kinds of trimmings, was trying to squeeze past their table. A fresh strawberries and cream complexion, the pride of Texas or Oklahoma. He was probably on his way back from the restroom.
"Excuse me, officer! Do you mind if I ask you a question?" Edgar said to him in good English. "Is there anything in your life that you regard as sacred? Anything at all?"
The American stopped as if he'd stumbled over something.
His instinct told him that a soldier of the very finest nation in the world had to rise to the challenge and give a worthy reply. He thought, his face reflecting the painful workings of his mind until suddenly it lit up. Inspiration. A smile of pride spread across his face.
"Anything sacred? Of course there is! The Chicago Bulls..."
"It's like a game of chess, you get it?" Edgar explained. "The bosses are just moving their helpless pieces¡ªthat's you and me¡ª around the board."
The waiter's face grew longer and longer the more beer Anton and Edgar drank. The number of those big glass mugs he'd brought to this table would have been enough to get the entire American air squadron drunk, and the Chicago Bulls as well. But the two Russians just carried on sitting there, even though it was obvious they were finding it harder and harder to control their tongues.
"Take you and me, for instance," Edgar went on. "You're going to be the defender in this trial. I'm going to be the prosecutor. But we still don't carry any real weight. We're just figures on the board. If it suits them, they'll throw us into the thick of it. If it suits them, they'll set us aside for better times. If they want to, they'll exchange us. After all, what is this trial, really? It's a song and dance over a trivial exchange of pieces. Your Igor's been swapped for our Alisa. And that's all. They just set them on each other, like two spiders in a jar, and took them off the board. In the name of higher goals that are beyond us."
"No, you're wrong," Anton said sternly, wagging his finger at Edgar. "Gesar had no idea that Igor would run into Alisa. It was one of Zabulon's intrigues."
"And how can you be so sure of that?" Edgar asked derisively. "Are you so strong you can read Gesar's soul like an open book? As far as I know, the head of the Light Ones isn't too fond of letting his subordinates in on his fundamental plans either. It's the high politics of the higher powers!" he said very loudly and insistently.
Anton really wanted to object. But unfortunately he didn't have any convincing arguments.
"Or take that latest clash in Moscow University. Zabulon used you¡ªI'm sorry, you probably don't like to hear me say that, but now that we've started... Anyway, Zabulon used you. Zabulon! Your sworn enemy."
"He didn't use me." Anton hesitated, but then went on anyway. "He tried to use me. And I tried to use the situation to our advantage. You understand¡ªafter all, this is war."
"Okay, so you tried to use the situation too," Edgar agreed dismissively. "Let's assume that... But Gesar did nothing¡ª nothing!¡ªto protect you. Why should he try to keep his pawns safe? It's wasteful and pointless."
"You treat your pawns even worse," Anton remarked morosely. "You don't even regard the lower Others¡ªthe vampires and shape-shifters¡ªas equals. They're just canon fodder."
"But they are canon fodder, Anton. They're less valuable than us magicians. And anyway, it's pointless for you and me to talk about things and try to understand. We're puppets. Nothing but puppets. And we don't have a chance to become puppet masters, because for that you need the abilities of a Gesar or a Zabulon, and that kind of ability doesn't come along very often. And anyway, the places at the chessboards are already taken. None of the players will give his place away to a mere piece¡ª not even to a queen or a king."
Anton drained his large mug sullenly and put it back down on the glass stand with the restaurant's logo.
He was no longer the same young magician who had gone out into the field for the first time to track down a poaching vampire. He had changed, even in the short time that had passed. Since that first mission he'd had plenty of opportunities to observe just how much Darkness there was in the Light. He was actually rather impressed by the gloomy position adopted by the Dark magician Edgar¡ªthey were only grains caught between the mill wheels as the big players settled accounts with each other, so the best thing to do was drink your beer and keep quiet. And once again Anton thought that sometimes the Dark Ones, with their apparent simplicity, were more human than the Light Ones, with their struggle for exalted ideals.
"But even so, you're wrong, Edgar," he said eventually. "There's one fundamental difference about us. We live for others. We serve, we don't rule."
"That's what all the human leaders have said," Edgar replied, obligingly falling into the trap. "The Party is the servant of the people, remember?"
"But there's one thing that distinguishes us from human leaders," said Anton, looking Edgar in the eye. "Dematerialization. You understand? A Light One cannot choose the path of evil. If he realizes that he has increased the amount of evil in the world, he withdraws into the Twilight. Disappears. And it's happened plenty of times, whenever a Light One has made a mistake or given way even slightly to the influence of the Darkness."
Edgar giggled quietly. "Anton... you've answered your own point. "If he realizes...' What if he doesn't realize? Do you remember the case of that maniac healer? Twelve years ago, I think it was..."
Anton remembered. He hadn't been initiated at the time, but he'd discussed and analyzed the unprecedented case with every member of the Watch, with every Light One.
A Light healer with a powerful gift of foresight. He lived outside Moscow and wasn't an active member of the Night Watch, but he was listed in the reserve. He worked as a doctor, and used Light magic in his practice. His patients adored him¡ªafter all, he could literally work miracles... But he also killed young women who were his patients. Not by using magic¡ªhe simply killed them. Sometimes he killed them using acupuncture¡ªhe had a perfect knowledge of the body's energy points...
The Night Watch discovered what he was doing almost by accident. One of the analysts started wondering about the sharp rise in deaths among young women in a small town just outside Moscow. One especially alarming factor was that most of the victims were pregnant. They also noticed a remarkably high number of miscarriages, abortions, and stillbirths. They suspected the Dark Ones, they suspected vampires and werewolves, Satanists, witches... They checked absolutely everyone.
Then Gesar himself got involved in the case, and the murderer was caught. The murderer who was a Light magician...
The charming and imposing healer simply saw the future too clearly. Sometimes, when he received a patient, he could see the future of her unborn child, who was almost certain to grow into a murderer, a maniac, or a criminal. Sometimes he saw that his patient would commit some monstrous crime or accidentally cause the deaths of large numbers of people, so he decided to fight back any way he could.
At his trial the healer had explained ardently that Light magical intervention wouldn't have been any use¡ªin that case the Dark Ones would have been granted the right to an equal intervention in response, and the quantity of evil in the world wouldn't have been reduced. But all he had done was "pull up the weeds." And he had been prevented from sinking into the Twilight by the firm conviction that the amount of good he had brought into the world was far greater than the evil he had done.
Gesar had had to dematerialize him in person.
"He was a psychopath," Anton explained. "Just a psychopath. With the typical deranged way of thinking... You get cases like that, unfortunately."
"Like that sword-bearer of Joan of Arc's, the Marquis Gilles de Rais," Edgar prompted eagerly. "He was a Light One too, wasn't he? And then he started killing women and children in order to extract the elixir of youth from their bodies, conquer death, and make the whole of humanity happy."
"Edgar, nobody's insured against insanity. Not even Others. But if you take the most ordinary witch..." Anton began, fuming.
"I accept that," said Edgar, spreading his hands in a reconcil-iatory shrug. "But we're not talking about extreme cases here! Just about the fact that it's possible, and the defense mechanism you're so proud of, dematerialization¡ªlet's call it simply conscience¡ª can fail. And now think¡ªwhat if Gesar decides that if you die it will do immense good for the cause of the Light in the future? If the scales are balanced between Anton Gorodetsky on one side and millions of human lives on the other?"
"He wouldn't have to trick me," Anton said firmly. "There'd be no need. If such a situation arises, I'm prepared to sacrifice myself. Every one of us is."
"And what if he can't tell you anything about it?" Edgar laughed, delighted. "So the enemy won't find out, so you'll behave more naturally, so you won't suffer unnecessarily... after all, it's Gesar's responsibility to preserve your peace of mind as well."
He raised the next mug of beer with a satisfied expression and sucked in the foam noisily.
"You're a Dark One," said Anton. "All you see in everything is evil, treachery, trickery."
"All I do is not close my eyes to them," Edgar retorted. "And that's why I don't trust Zabulon. I distrust him almost, as much as I do Gesar. I can even trust you more¡ªyou're just another unfortunate chess piece who happens by chance to be painted a different color from me. Does a white pawn hate a black one? No. Especially if the two pawns have their heads down together over a quiet beer or two."
"You know," Anton said in a slightly surprised voice, "I just don't understand how you can carry on living if you see the world like that. I'd just go and hang myself."
"So you don't have any counterarguments to offer?"
Anton took a gulp of beer too. The wonderful thing about this natural Czech beer was that even if you drank lots of it, it still didn't make your head or your body feel heavy... Or was that an illusion?
"Not a single one," Anton admitted. "Right now, this very moment, not a single one. But I'm sure you're wrong. It's just difficult to argue about the colors of a rainbow with a blind man. There's something missing in you... I don't know what exactly.
But it's something very important, and without it you're more helpless than a blind man."
"Why am I?" Edgar protested, slightly offended. "It's you Light Ones who are helpless. Bound hand and foot by your own ethical dogmas. And those who have moved up onto the higher levels of development, like Gesar, control you."
"I'll try to answer that," said Anton. "But not right now. We'll be seeing each other again."
"Avoiding the question?" Edgar asked, laughing.
"No, it's just that we decided not to talk about work. Didn't we?"
Edgar didn't answer. The Light One really had got him there! Why had he bothered getting into such a useless argument? You can't paint a white dog black, as they said in the Day Watch.
"Yes," he agreed, "It's my fault, I admit it. Only..."
"Only it's very hard not to talk about the things that separate us," Anton said with a nod. "I understand. It's not your fault... it's destiny."
He rummaged in his pockets and took out a pack of cigarettes. Edgar couldn't help noticing that they were cheap ones, 21st Century, made in Russia. Well, well. A Dark magician of his level could afford all the pleasures of life. But Anton smoked Russian cigarettes... and maybe it was no accident that he'd ended up in this small, cozy restaurant that was so inexpensive?
"Where is it you're staying?" he asked.
"The Kafka Hotel," Anton answered. "Zizkov, on Cimburkova Street."
That fit, all right¡ªit was a small, second-rate hotel. Edgar nodded as the Light One lit up. It looked awkward somehow, as if he hadn't been smoking long or didn't smoke very often.
"And you're in the Hilton, aren't you?" Anton suddenly said. "Or the Radisson SAS at the very worst?"
"Are you following me?" Edgar asked, suddenly on his guard again.
"No. It's just that all Dark Ones are so fond of famous names and expensive establishments. You're predictable too."
"So what?" Edgar said defiantly. "Are you a supporter of asceticism and the poor life?"
Anton looked around ironically at the restaurant, the pathetic remains of his leg of pork on the knife-scarred wooden board, his latest mug of beer¡ªhow many had there been? It didn't seem like he even needed to answer, but he did: "No, I'm not arguing that. But the number of rooms and staff that a hotel has isn't the most important thing. Nor is the price of the dishes on the menu. I could have stayed at the Hilton too, and gone to drink beer in the most expensive tavern in Prague. But what for? And you¡ªwhy did you come to this place? Not exactly top flight, is it?"
"It's comfortable here," Edgar admitted. "And the food's good."
"See what I mean?"
In a sudden fit of drunken magnanimity, Edgar exclaimed, "That's it! I think I've got it! That's what the difference between us is. You try to limit your natural requirements. Maybe it's some kind of modesty... But we're more extravagant, yes... With power, money, financial and human resources..."
"People are not a resource!" Anton's eyes were suddenly piercing and angry. "Do you understand? They're not a resource!"
That was always the way. As soon as the areas of contact came up... Edgar sighed. The Light Ones were really deluded. How could they be so deluded?
"All right. Let's change the subject." He took another mouthful of beer and couldn't help remarking, "There was an American airman sitting in here... and he was a Light magician... an absolute oaf, by the way; he didn't even notice me. I'll bet you he regards people as a resource. Or maybe as a stupid, dull-witted inferior race that can be nurtured and punished. The same way we regard them."