I walked out into the square and looked around. On my left GUM – the old State Department Store – was teeming with life. On my right were the battlements of the Kremlin wall, with the pyramid of Lenin’s Mausoleum rising up in front of it. Could that be where I was being led?
No, not there. And that was good. No matter what people in Russia felt about their former leader, it was a sin to disturb the peace of the dead. Especially of those who had died irrevocably, for ever – he wasn’t an Other … and it was a good thing he wasn’t.
I walked across the square without hurrying. A line of official government cars snaked out of the Kremlin and tore off into the side streets. The Execution Site greeted me in silence. Citizen Minin and Prince Pozharsky watched as I walked by. The bright-painted domes of St Basil’s Cathedral breathed a sigh.
Power. Power. Power …
There was so much of it here that an Other who had exhausted himself could restore his strength in moments.
But nobody would ever do anything of the kind. Because it was strange, alien power. It belonged to no one. It was unruly and uncontrollable, the power of the past centuries. The power of dethroned tsars and general secretaries of the Communist Party. Touch it and it would blow you to pieces.
I looked around again.
And I spotted him.
The Inquisitor.
It’s impossible to confuse an Inquisitor with anyone else, either a Light One or a Dark One, let alone an ordinary human being.
The Inquisitor was looking straight at me and I couldn’t understand why I’d only just noticed him now.
He was alone, completely alone, outside and above any worldly balance of power, alliances and treaties. He embodied Justice and the Inquisition. He maintained equilibrium. I didn’t need to ask what he was there for.
I walked up to him.
‘You did right not to disobey,’ said the Inquisitor.
Somehow I knew his name was Maxim.
He reached out his hand and said:
‘The Talon.’
There was nothing imperious about his tone, not even a hint of pressure. But I had no doubt that anyone would obey that voice, up to and including the chief of either of the Watches.
I reached gloomily inside my sweater, with obvious regret.
The Talon was seething, processing the surrounding power. The moment I held it in my hand I was swamped by a dense wave of it. The power given to me by the Talon rushed into every cell of my body, it felt as if the whole world was ready to go down on its knees and submit to me. To me. The possessor of Fáfnir’s Talon.
‘The Talon,’ the Inquisitor repeated.
He didn’t add anything more or tell me not to do anything stupid. The Inquisition is above giving meaningless advice.
But I still hesitated. How was it possible to give up a source of such inexhaustible power voluntarily? An artefact like that was every Other’s dream.
I automatically noted the redistribution of energy as a Light portal opened up nearby. Of course, it was Gesar, the chief of the Moscow Night Watch.
The Inquisitor didn’t react to the appearance of the unexpected witness. Not at all. As if no portal had opened up and no one had surfaced out of the Twilight.
‘The Talon,’ the Inquisitor said for the third time. The third and last. He wouldn’t say another word. I knew that.
And I also knew that even if all the Dark Ones of Moscow appeared beside me, it wasn’t worth trying anything. They wouldn’t help me. On the contrary, they’d take the Inquisitor’s side. The intrigues played out around the Talon could only continue until the guardians of the Treaty put in a personal appearance.
I squeezed my eyes shut and drew in as much power as I could hold within myself, almost choking on the pressure; with a trembling hand, I held out the case holding the artefact to the Inquisitor. As I did so, I could just sense the amorphous desire that Gesar was struggling to control – to dart forward and take possession of the Talon. But naturally, the chief of the Night Watch didn’t move a muscle. Experience is primarily the ability to restrain our fleeting impulses.
The Inquisitor glanced at me. I probably ought to have been able to read satisfaction and approval in his glance: well done, Dark One, you didn’t flinch, you did as you were told, clever boy.
But I couldn’t see anything of the kind in the Inquisitor’s eyes.
Not a thing.
Gesar was gazing at us with open curiosity.
Without any hurry the Inquisitor put the case into the inside pocket of his jacket and then disappeared into the Twilight without even saying goodbye. I stopped sensing him instantly. Instantly. The Inquisition has its own paths.
‘Ha,’ said Gesar, looking away to one side. ‘You’re a fool, Dark One.’
Then he looked straight at me, sighed and added:
‘A fool, but clever. And that’s remarkable.’
Then he left too, quietly this time, without using a portal. I could still sense him for some time in the deeper layers of the Twilight.
And I was left on Red Square, out in the piercing wind, alone, without the Talon after I’d already got used to its power, with no warm clothes, still wearing the same sweater, trousers and shoes, and my hair was as tousled as a film actor’s in some dramatic solo scene. Only there weren’t any viewers to appreciate this fine shot, now that Gesar also had gone on his way.
‘You really are a fool, Vitaly Rogoza,’ I whispered. ‘A clever and obedient fool. But then, maybe that’s the only reason you’re still alive?’
But the person inside me suddenly came to life and reassured me: ‘Everything’s happening as it should. You did the right thing by getting rid of Fáfnir’s Talon.’ I was so overwhelmed by such a blissful, unshakeable certainty that I was right, that I even stopped feeling the cold, piercing wind.
Everything was just fine. Everything was right. Children shouldn’t play with atom bombs.
I twitched my shoulders, turned round and strode off in the direction of Tverskaya Street.
I’d only gone a few steps when I came across the entire senior grade of the Day Watch (apart from the magician Kolya and – naturally – the chief), plus about fifteen mid-grade agents, including Anna Tikhonovna’s young witches, three vampire brothers and a rather tubby werewolf. The entire company was staring at me like bystanders idly gaping at a penguin that has escaped from the zoo.
‘Hi,’ I said in a surprisingly cheerful voice. ‘What are you all doing here, eh?’ I’m getting carried away again, I thought miserably. Oh-oh …
‘Tell me, Vitaly,’ Edgar asked in an odd, unnatural voice, ‘why did you do that?’
His attention was distracted for a second as he diverted an over-vigilant militiaman all set to approach a gathering that he thought looked suspicious. Then he gazed back at me:
‘Why?’
‘Do the Dark Ones really want a needless fight? Do they want needless casualties?’ I said, answering a question with a question, like some joker from Odessa.
‘I think he’s lying,’ Anna Tikhonovna said aggressively. ‘Maybe we should probe him.’
Edgar frowned darkly. As if to say: How can we probe him?
So they were already afraid of me in the Day Watch. Would you believe it?
‘Anna Tikhonovna,’ I said, addressing the old witch sincerely ‘Fáfnir’s Talon is an incredibly powerful destabilising force, capable of disrupting the balance of power like nothing else. If it had remained in Moscow, a bloody battle would have been inevitable. As a law-abiding Other, I accepted the Inquisition’s verdict and returned the Talon. That’s all I have to say.’
I was keeping quiet for the time being about the power that had settled in me after my contact with the Talon. Until the right time.