'You either trust all of the Night Watch or you don't trust anybody,' I told him firmly. 'We're not supermen in red and blue cloaks who work alone. We're just employees. The police of the Twilight world. What I say goes for the Night Watch.'

'But who are they?' The kid was beginning to accept it. 'Magicians?'

'Yes, but highly specialised ones.'

Tiger Cub appeared below me on the bend of the staircase.

'Hi there, guys!' she exclaimed cheerfully, bounding up an entire flight in a single leap.

It was a superhuman leap. Egor flinched and took a step back, staring watchfully at Tiger Cub. I shook my head: she was clearly poised on the very edge of transformation. She was enjoying it, and just at that moment she had good reason to be feeling frisky.

'How are things over there?' I asked.

Tiger Cub sighed loudly and then smiled.

'Oh ... a laugh a minute. Everybody's in a panic. You get going, Antoshka, they're waiting for you ... So it's you I'm looking after, right?'

The boy looked her over without saying anything. To be honest, the boss had made a great choice when he decided to get Tiger Cub to protect Egor. Everyone, from young children to old people, liked her and trusted her. They do say even some of the Dark Ones have sometimes been charmed by her. But then, that was their mistake . . .

'No one's looking after me,' the boy answered at last. 'My name's Egor.'

'And I'm Tiger Cub,' said the girl, already inside the apartment. She gave the boy a friendly hug round the shoulders. 'Show me round the battlefield! Let's start preparing our defences!'

I started down the stairs, shaking my head as I went. In five minutes Tiger Cub would be showing Egor how she got her name.

'Hello,' Bear rumbled as he walked up towards me.

'Hi.' We shook hands quickly. Of all the Watch agents, Bear was the one I had the most mixed feelings about.

Bear was a little bit taller than average, strongly built with a face that gave nothing away. He didn't like to talk a lot. Nobody knew where he spent his time when he wasn't working, or where he lived, except maybe Tiger Cub. There were rumours that he wasn't even a magician, but a shape-shifter. They said that first he used to work for the Day Watch and then, during some mission, he suddenly switched over to our side. But that was all a load of nonsense. Light Ones don't become Dark Ones, and Dark Ones don't turn into Light Ones. But there was something about Bear that made you stop and wonder.

'Your car's waiting,' the field agent told me without bothering to stop. 'The driver's a real pro. You'll be there before you know it.'

Bear had a slight stammer, so he kept his sentences short. He was in no hurry, Tiger Cub was already on guard. But I had no time to hang around.

'Are things tough over there?' I asked, walking faster. The answer came from above me now:

'Worse than that.'

I bounded down several steps at a time and belted out of the entrance. The car was there all right – I slowed down for a moment to admire it. A classy maroon BMW, the latest model, with a flashing light carelessly stuck on the roof. Both doors on the side facing the building were open. The driver was leaning out of the car, hastily smoking a cigarette, and I could just make out the bulge of a holster beneath his jacket. Standing by the back door was an absolutely monumental middle-aged man. Under his open coat he was wearing a very expensive suit, with a Duma deputy's badge glinting on his lapel. The man was speaking on his mobile:

'Who is he anyway? I'll get there when I can! What? What damned girls? Have you gone crazy? Can't you do a single thing on your own?'

Seeing me, the deputy narrowed his eyes, cut short his conversation without saying goodbye and got into the car. The driver took a deep drag, tossed his cigarette away and took hold of the wheel. The engine howled softly and I barely had time to get into the front seat before the car moved away. Icy branches scraped across the outside of the door.

'You gone blind, or something?' the deputy barked at his driver, though I was the one to blame for what had happened. But as soon as the owner of the car turned to face me his tone changed: 'You need to get to Perovo?'

It was the first time I'd ever taken a ride with a representative of authority. And this guy was either a top man in the militia or a gangland boss. I realised in theory that there was no difference as far as a Night Watch agent's powers were concerned, but I'd never tried to experiment before.

'Yes, back to where the guys came from. And make it quick . . .'

'Hear that, Volodya?' the deputy said to the driver. 'Step on it!'

Volodya stepped on it so hard I started feeling a bit queasy and I even glanced into the Twilight to see if we were going to get there in one piece.

It seemed like we were. Only not just because of our driver's skill or because, like any Night Watch agent, I have an artificially elevated success coefficient. It looked like someone had gone through the probability field, weeding out all the accidents, tailbacks and overzealous traffic cops.

The only person in our department who could have done that was the boss himself. But what for?

'I'm feeling a bit frightened too,' whispered the invisible bird on my shoulder. 'When I was with Count—'

She stopped short, as if she'd realised she was speaking a bit too freely.

The car drove through a red light at an intersection, following an incredible twisting route, dodging between the saloons and station wagons. Someone at a bus stop waved a hand in our direction.

'Like a sip?' the Duma deputy enquired amiably, holding out a small bottle of Remy Martin and a plastic cup. It seemed so bizarre, I poured myself thirty grams without even thinking about it. Even at that speed the car was a smooth ride, and the cognac didn't spill.

I handed back the bottle, nodded, took the walkman earphones out of my pocket, put them on and clicked play. Out came this ancient song, 'Sundays' – my favourite.

It was a small town, no bigger than a child's toy,

There'd been no plagues or invasions there since long ago.

The cannon rusted in silence on its fortress tower,

And the travellers' roads passed it by.

And so year after year, no holidays or work days –

The whole town slept,

Dreaming dreams of lands with empty cities

And dead cliffs . . .

We emerged on to the main highway. The car just kept on picking up speed, I'd never travelled that fast in Moscow before. Or anywhere else, come to that ... If the probability field hadn't been cleared, I'd have made them slow down, but it was pretty terrifying anyway.

The music sounded among the cold cliffs,

While the town slept. . .

Calling to where?

Calling to whom?

That no one knew . . .

I couldn't help remembering that Romanov was an Other. Only he wasn't initiated, he'd been spotted too late . . . They'd offered him the chance, but he'd refused.

That's one option.

I wondered how often he heard this music in the night.

All who left their windows open in the hot night

Are gone now

Gone away to seek a land where life is full of life,

Following the song . . .

'Like some more?' The deputy was Mr Conviviality in person. I wondered what suggestions Bear and Tiger Cub had implanted in his mind. That I was his best friend? That he was eternally in my debt? That I was the president's illegitimate but favourite son?

But that's all rubbish. There are hundreds of different ways of making people trust you and like you and want to help you. The Light has its own methods, but unfortunately the Dark has plenty as well. It's all rubbish.

The question was: what did the boss need me for so badly?

CHAPTER 6

ILYA WAS waiting for me beside the road, standing there with his hands stuck in his pockets, staring up in disgust at the sky through a flurry of fine snowflakes.

'You took your time,' was all he said after I'd shaken the deputy's hand and got out of the car. 'The boss is getting impatient.'

'What's going on here?'

Ilya grinned, but it wasn't his usual cheerful smile.

'You'll see . . . let's go.'

We set off along a trampled path, overtaking women with shopping bags rambling home from the supermarket. How strange it is that we have supermarkets now, just like the real things. But people still walk the same old tired way, as if they'd spent an hour standing in line for little blue corpses described as chickens.

'Is it far?' I asked.

'If it was, we'd have taken a car.'

'How did our sexual giant make out? Couldn't he handle it?'

'Ignat tried his best,' was all Ilya said. I felt a brief pang of vengeful satisfaction, as if it were in my interests for handsome Ignat to screw up. If a mission required it, he was usually in someone else's bed within two hours of being given his assignment.

'The boss has declared a state of readiness for evacuation,' Ilya suddenly said.

'What?'

'At a moment's notice. If the vortex isn't stabilised, the Others quit Moscow.'

He was walking ahead of me, I couldn't look into his eyes. But what reason would Ilya have to lie?'

'And is the vortex still . . .' I began. Then I stopped. I could see in.

Above the dismal nine-storey block facing us, a black tornado was revolving slowly against the background of the dark, snowy sky.

You couldn't call it a twister or a vortex any longer. It was a tornado. It rose up out of the next building along, hidden by the one we could see. And judging from the side-angle of the dark cone, it went almost down to the ground.

'Damn . . .' I whispered.

'Watch what you say,' Ilya snapped. 'It could easily come true.'

'It's thirty metres high. . .'

'Thirty-two. And still growing.'

I cast a hasty glance at my shoulder and saw Olga sitting there. She'd emerged from the Twilight.

Have you ever seen a bird frightened? Frightened like a human?

The owl looked ruffled. Can feathers really stand on end? There was an orange-yellow flame blazing in her amber eyes.

The shoulder of my poor jacket was torn into tiny shreds, and the claws carried on scraping, as if they wanted to scrape right through to my body.

'Olga!'

'Now you see . . . The boss says the vortex at Hiroshima wasn't that high.'

The owl flapped its wings and soared smoothly into the air, without a sound. A woman shrieked behind me – I swung round and saw a stupefied face, glazed eyes following the bird's flight in amazement.

'It's a crow,' Ilya said quietly, half turning his head to glance at the woman. His reactions were far quicker than mine. A moment later the accidental witness was overtaking us, muttering about the narrow path and people who liked to block the way.

'Is it growing fast?' I asked, with a nod at the tornado.

'In bursts. But it's stabilising now. The boss called Ignat off just in time. Come on . . .'