Of course, it’s slow, laborious work. Two days for even the least intricate aura.
But if the aura was already in the database, you could sidestep the long process, which was what I intended to do. Just to make sure I’d done everything possible – well, how would an unregistered vampire’s aura get into the database?
A table appeared on the screen and I started clicking away with the mouse, constantly checking with the traces in my memory as I entered plus and minus signs.
‘Is there an upper arc?’
Of course not. How could an undead vampire have an upper arc in his aura?
The figure showing the number of registered auras was immediately cut by a factor of five. There were far fewer undead in the archive than live Others. Several lines also disappeared and the table immediately became shorter as it was targeted on vampires.
‘How marked is the first lateral barb?’
I entered two plus signs. I could have entered three – the barb was right on the borderline.
The questions followed each other. I answered about twenty of them before I let myself glance at the right upper corner of the table.
I saw the figure 3 winking at me.
I’d got a result after all. A small figure like that had to refer to a vampire and members of his clan, the ones he had initiated. There are certain differences between their auras, but they are absolutely minimal, it would take hundreds of questions to get a specific identification.
But three candidates suited me just fine.
I clicked on the figure 3.
And I almost fell off my chair. There was Kostya Saushkin’s smiling face looking out at me, with the words LAID TO REST written across it in thick red letters.
I stared dully at the screen for a few seconds, remembering the contents of the aluminium container that Geser had shown me the previous week, after I had got back from Samarkand …
And then I groaned out loud when it finally hit me.
I clicked again, and shuddered again when I saw Polina, Kostya’s mother. But it wasn’t the photograph that shocked me, it was the words written across it in red: LAID TO REST.
I started running through her file from the top: ‘Born a human being, with no abilities as an Other. Initiated by her husband under paragraph 7 of the agreement, “The right to self-determination of an Other’s family …”’ A little further down I picked out the lines: ‘Refused to participate in the lottery, rewarded with a monthly supply of non-preserved donor blood, group 3, rhesus positive’. She was conservative in her feeding habits, did not hunt human beings, always took exactly the same type of fresh blood, unlike some vampires who, once they gave up hunting, started demanding ‘virgin’s blood, only group 1 or 2 – groups 3 and 4 give me indigestion’.
The final lines made everything clear.
‘Voluntarily terminated her existence and laid herself to rest on 12.09.2003, shortly after the death of her son, Higher Vampire Konstantin Gennadievich Saushkin (case No. 9752150). Buried on 14.10.2003, at her own request, with the Christian rites of burial, carried out by the Light Other Father Aristarkh.’
I knew Father Aristarkh – he was one of those very rare cases when an Orthodox priest managed to combine his life as an Other with his faith, and also tried to carry out some kind of missionary work among the Dark Ones. I had been speaking to him only a month earlier. Why hadn’t I known about Polina Saushkina’s suicide – for that was what it was, if you stripped away the shell of words.
I hadn’t wanted to know, so I hadn’t. All very simple.
A third click of the mouse – and a third file.
Naturally.
‘Gennady Ivanovich Saushkin …’
I groaned and clutched my head in my hands.
Fool! Fool! Fool!
It didn’t matter that, according to the file, Saushkin senior was a fourth-level vampire, that he didn’t hunt, was not a member of the Day Watch and had never been known to break the law.
Edgar had never been listed as a Higher Other, either. But just look at the way he had managed to withstand the influence of four amulets and only tell me part of the truth.
And I had understood the partial truth exactly the way that suited me. The way that suited my own complexes, fears and feelings.
The boy Andrei, who had been fished out of the pond after his close encounter with Gennady Saushkin, was wrong to blame himself. He was not to blame for his teacher and fellow trainee being killed.
I was to blame. I had got stuck on the name ‘Saushkin’, as if it was some kind of impassable barrier. And I hadn’t bothered to take even a single step sideways.
I was just about to print out the page when I realised that I couldn’t even wait thirty seconds for the printer to purge its printing heads and make itself ready.
I leapt out of my office and dashed up the stairs.
But then I ran into a dead end – Geser wasn’t in. Of course, I realised that he needed to rest sometimes too, but why did it have to be right now? This was really bad luck …
‘Hi, Anton,’ said Olga, coming out of the door of the office. ‘Why are you looking so … hyped-up?’
‘Where’s Geser?’ I howled.
Olga looked at me thoughtfully for a second. Then she walked up to me, pressed her hand carefully against my lips and said:
‘Boris is sleeping. He hasn’t gone home even once since the day you got back from Uzbekistan. An hour ago I used all the female wiles in the book to get him to go to bed.’
Olga was looking great. Her hair had obviously been worked on by a good stylist, her skin was covered with a wonderful gold tan, she was wearing a hint of make-up – just enough to emphasise the beautiful outline of her eyes and the sexy plumpness of her lips. And she smelled of something very expensive: spicy and floral, hot and seductive.
She really had used all her female wiles.
But then, I’d seen her when she looked quite different. And not only seen her – I’d actually been inside that magnificent body myself. The sensation had been instructive, but I couldn’t say that I really missed it all that much.
‘And if you, Anton, start yelling and phoning Boris and insisting that he has to come to work immediately, I’ll turn you into a bunny rabbit,’ Olga said. ‘I just haven’t decided yet if it should be a real one or a stuffed toy.’
‘An inflatable one from a sex shop,’ I said. ‘Don’t try to frighten me, it’s impossible anyway.’
‘You think so?’ she asked, narrowing her eyes.
‘I do. But if you really want to practise your battle magic that badly – I have someone you can use as a target.’
‘Who?’
‘A Higher Vampire. The one who’s been working with Edgar. The one who took out two Light Ones today at Chistye Prudy.’
‘Who?’ Olga repeated insistently.
‘Saushkin.’
A faint shadow ran across Olga’s face. She took me very gently by the elbow and said:
‘Anton, we all have tragedies in our lives. Sometimes we lose friends, and sometimes we lose enemies, but we still blame ourselves…’
‘Save the psychotherapy for Geser!’ I barked. ‘It’s Gennady Saushkin! Saushkin senior! Kostya’s father!’