‘I still think there’s going to be trouble. We have no reason to count on any help from the Day Watch of Moscow, or Prague or Helsinki – any of them.’
‘But that Dark One promised to help us,’ Yari objected.
Raivo frowned and waved his hands through the air picturesquely.
‘He promised! Yes, of course he did. And who promised our Brothers that Fáfnir would be resurrected?’
‘It seems to me,’ Yukha said quietly, ‘that it would have been more rational to serve the great cause of Fáfnir’s resurrection than actually try to resurrect him.’
There was a moment of silence.
‘Yukha —’ Yari said reproachfully. ‘You … you can’t just say that.’
‘Why can’t I? The times when magicians used to play without any rules are long gone. Do you want a global cataclysm?’
‘But our—’
‘Our decrepit leaders were out of their minds! And that’s why they were fooled by promises! That’s why they were killed in Berne … And we won’t be getting any help, Raivo’s right about that! Those who have departed can’t be brought back. Pasi believed too – and where’s Pasi now? Dematerialised in the Twilight by Gesar!’
The telephone on the table rang. Though clearly reluctant to stop talking, Yukha picked up the receiver.
‘Yes?’
The next moment he leapt in the air, dropping his glass of Czech beer. He shouted:
‘You? You … where are you calling from? What?’
He listened for a minute, the expression on his face growing ever more joyful and confused. The expression of a man given good news after he has already braced himself for bad and even managed to infect everyone else with his own pessimism. Finally Yukha put the phone down and whispered:
‘Brothers …’
Anton couldn’t decide if they’d been right or wrong to open the second bottle of vodka. On the one hand, it seemed as though they were getting close to the essential truth of what was going on … but on the other, it was getting harder and harder actually to discuss the problem. For instance, Igor had become extremely sceptical, and he just couldn’t understand what Anton was trying to demonstrate to him:
‘Igor, in such a complicated set-up, if even one episode doesn’t fit in right, the whole thing collapses! There had to be a reason. Maybe you represented some kind of obstacle to Zabulon’s plans?’
‘Me?’ Igor gave a bitter laugh. ‘Don’t be silly. I’m an ordinary field operative. Third-grade … second at a stretch … with no special abilities and no prospects. I couldn’t have stood up to the Mirror. I don’t know, Anton.’
‘But you have an idea about something,’ Anton muttered. He poured some vodka, paused for a second and asked: ‘Igor, was there something between you and Svetlana?’
‘No,’ Igor answered sharply. ‘No, and don’t even think about it. There wasn’t anything, there isn’t, and there won’t be. And if you’re thinking I was supposed to be the father of the future messiah …’
He burst out laughing.
‘It was just an idea,’ Anton muttered, feeling like a total idiot.
‘Anton, think about it … that’s your jealousy speaking, not your head, I’m sorry. The ordinary human process of reproduction has nothing to do with all this. If Svetlana’s Book of Destiny has been rewritten, if she has to be the mother of the new messiah – that’s a process that involves subtle matter, the energes of the Light and the Dark, the fundamental substance of the universe! What difference does it make who’ – he faltered for a moment and went on – ‘happens to be the biological father? It only even depends on Svetlana to some extent! No, that’s nonsense. The only person Zabulon has to be afraid of is Svetlana.’
‘Then I don’t see the point in eliminating you.’
‘Neither do I. But there probably is one.’
They drank in silence, without clinking glasses. And then they both began staring at the sheet of paper.
‘Let’s start with the essentials,’ said Anton, noticing that he was slurring his words a little. ‘So, a year and a half ago Gesar and Olga rewrote Svetlana’s Destiny? And now she’s supposed to give birth to a messiah?’
‘Yes, that’s the way it looks.’
‘And Zabulon tried to use the appearance of the Mirror to destroy her, but he failed.’
‘Yes, that’s it.’
‘Okay let’s leave your part in all this aside for the moment. What could Zabulon’s next move be? Now, when Svetlana has no magic powers at all and is defenceless?’
‘She’s not defenceless,’ said Igor, wagging his finger at Anton. ‘Why do you say that? I’m sure she’s been given the finest possible protection. And in any case, to attack her is a violation of the Treaty. The Dark Ones are fond of their own skins, no one wants to face dematerialisation.’
‘What could his response be? Only one.’
‘The appearance of an Antichrist, the only one capable of standing against the messiah.’
‘And humanity is expecting the appearance of the Antichrist with no less eagerness,’ Anton exclaimed. ‘Thanks to mass culture.’
‘Have you got a Bible?’ Igor asked unexpectedly.
‘With me? No, of course not.’
‘Just a moment,’ said Igor. He walked quickly, if not entirely steadily, into the other room and came back with a small, thick book. He gave Anton a rather embarrassed look and said: ‘Of course, I’m an atheist. But the Bible … you understand. Now …’
‘Igor,’ said Anton, putting his hand on the book. ‘It won’t help us. Why don’t we try thinking logically?’
‘All right,’ Igor agreed readily, setting the Holy Writ aside with some relief.
‘Zabulon wants to live too. He doesn’t want an Apocalypse … I hope. He needs a figure equal in power to a messiah of the Light.’
‘Fáfnir,’ Igor said thoughtfully. ‘Fáfnir?’
‘A powerful Dark Magician,’ Anton agreed. ‘But he’s not the Antichrist.’
‘Six six six,’ said Igor, squirming in his chair. ‘Come on, let’s count what the letters in the name Fáfnir add up to!’
‘I don’t remember how the name Fáfnir is written in the original. But if we write it in Russian, then …’ Anton thought for a moment ‘… then it’s eighty-eight! Nothing like six hundred and sixty-six.’
‘But eighty-eight is a strange kind of number too,’ said Igor, looking at Anton with blazing eyes. ‘Just think about it. Not eighty-seven. Not eighty-nine. Exactly eighty-eight. It’s suspicious.’
‘It is,’ Anton agreed. The number really had begun to seem suspicious to him for some reason. ‘And it probably is possible to resurrect Fáfnir, to bring him back from the Twilight. But …’
‘Not just to resurrect him,’ said Igor. ‘This whole business depends on human beings, right? On their expectations, on their readiness to believe. And if Fáfnir’s return to life can be staged in the appropriate way, the insane magician can be made into an insane anti-messiah.’
‘But how?’
‘The four horsemen of the Apocalypse … the emergence of the beast from the sea.’
Igor’s eyes suddenly glazed over.
‘Anton, Fáfnir was supposedly buried at sea. What if … Alisa and that boy Makar, dying in the sea was some kind of sacrifice? What a release of Dark power …’
Anton shook his head and wiped his sweaty forehead:
‘Igor, maybe we’ve had too much to drink? Yes, I agree that Gesar’s intending to use … could use Svetlana as the mother of a new messiah, a reincarnation of Christ to some extent, or just a magician of unprecedented power. It looks very much that way. And to counter that, Zabulon might try to come up with a figure of equal power, but tying all this up with Armageddon, the Bible and religion – that’s taking it all too far!’