Clear enough. He meant the Day Watch.

«We can search for the girl without anybody interfering, and Danila and Farid are already getting close. I'd say, another five or six minutes… But we've still been given an ultimatum.»

I caught Tiger Cub's eye. Oh, that was her ominous smile. That's right, her smile. Tiger Cub's a woman, but there was just no way the name «Tigress» would stick.

Our agents don't much like the word «ultimatum!»

«We don't keep the Black Magician,» the boss said, looking around at everyone with a dissatisfied expression. «Got that? We'll have to find him in order to disarm the vortex. But after that we hand the magician over to the Dark Ones.»

«We hand him over?» Ilya queried.

The boss thought for a second.

«Yes, that's a fair point. We don't eliminate him and we don't prevent him from contacting the Dark Ones. As far as I've been able to tell, they don't know who he is either.»

The operatives' faces were turning sourer by the moment. Any new magician on the territory they monitored was a big headache. Even if he was registered and observed the terms of the Treaty. But a magician this powerful…

«I'd prefer a slightly different scenario,» Tiger Cub said quietly. «Boris Ignatievich, in the course of our work, situations can crop up over which we have no control…«

«I'm sorry, but we can't allow any such situations to arise,» the boss snapped. But his irritation was fleeting, he did not press too hard; he'd always been fond of Tiger Cub. She backed off immediately.

I'd have done the same.

«Well, that's about it…« The boss glanced at me. «I'm glad you got here, Anton. There's something I especially wanted you to hear…«

I automatically tensed up.

«You did a good job yesterday. Yes, it's true, the reason I sent you out to look for the vampires was to test you. And not just to see how good an operative you are, either… you've been in a difficult situation for a very long time, Anton. Killing a vampire is a lot harder for you than for anyone else here.»

«That's just where you're wrong, boss,» I said.

«I'm glad if I'm mistaken. I want to thank you on behalf of the entire Night Watch. You destroyed one vampire and captured the image of the female vampire's trail. Captured it very accurately. You still don't have enough experience for investigative work. But you know how to record information clearly. The same thing goes for this girl. It was a completely non-standard situation, but you made a humane decision… and that's gained us some time. The image of her aura was magnificent. I knew right away where to look for her.»

That really stung. No one was smiling or laughing, no one was smirking at me, but I still felt humiliated all the same. The white owl, whom nobody had seen yet, twitched on my shoulder. I took a deep breath of the Twilight air, that cold, tasteless air that isn't air at all. I asked:

«Boris Ignatievich, then what was the reason for sending me around the circle line if you already knew the right district?»

«I could have been wrong,» the boss replied with a note of surprise in his voice. «That's another thing… you have to understand that when you're working out in the field, you can't afford to rely on any opinion, no matter how high up it comes from. One man in a field is a warrior—if he knows he's alone.»

«But I wasn't alone,» I said. «And this assignment is absolutely crucial for my partner; you know that better than I do. By sending us to check districts you knew were empty… you deprived her of a chance to redeem herself.»

The boss's face is made of stone; you can't read anything in it if he doesn't want you to.

But even so, I felt like I'd hit the target.

«Your assignment isn't over yet, Anton and Olga,» he replied. «There's still the girl-vampire, who has to be neutralized. No one has any right to interfere with us there: She violated the terms of the Treaty. And there's still the boy who showed such exceptional resistance to magic. He has to be found and turned to the side of the Light. Plenty to be getting on with.»

«And this young woman?»

«Already detected. Our specialists will now try to neutralize the vortex. If that doesn't work, which it won't, we'll have to figure out who cast the curse. Ignat, that's your job!»

I turned around. Yes, there was Ignat standing not far away. Tall, well-built, and handsome, with blond hair, the figure of Apollo and the face of a movie star. He moved without making a sound, but even so in ordinary reality he couldn't escape excessive attention from women.

Really excessive attention.

«That's not my way of working,» Ignat said gloomily. «Not an M.O . I'm particularly fond of.»

«You can choose who you sleep with on your own time,» the boss barked. «But when you're working, I make all your decisions for you. Even when you go to the John.»

Ignat shrugged. He glanced at me and growled to himself:

«It's discrimination…«

«You're not in the States,» the boss said, and his voice turned dangerously polite. «Yes, it's discrimination. Making use of the most appropriate available member of staff without taking his personal inclinations into account.»

«Couldn't I take that assignment?» Garik asked in a quiet little voice.

That released the tension immediately. Garik's incredibly bad luck in affairs of the heart was no secret to anyone. Someone laughed.

«Igor and Garik, you carry on with the search for the girl-vampire.» The boss almost seemed to have taken the suggestion seriously. «She needs blood. She was stopped at the final moment; now she's going insane from hunger and frustration. Expect new victims at any moment! Anton, you and Olga look for the boy.»

Clear enough.

The most pointless and least important assignment again.

Somewhere in the city there was an Inferno just waiting to erupt; somewhere in the city there was a wild, hungry female vampire, and I had to go looking for a kid who might, potentially, possess great magical powers.

«Permission to proceed?» I asked.

«Yes, of course,» said the boss, ignoring my quiet hint of revolt. «Proceed.»

I swung around and left the Twilight as a sign of protest. The world flickered as it filled up with colors and sounds. I was left standing there on my own in the middle of the small square. To any outsider watching it would have looked really crazy. And then there were no footprints… I was standing in a snowdrift, surrounded by a shroud of virgin snow.

That's how myths are born. Out of our carelessness, out of our tattered nerves, out of jokes that go wrong and flashy gestures.

«It's okay,» I said and set off in a straight line for the street.

«Thank you…« a quiet voice whispered affectionately in my ear.

«For what, Olga?»

«For not forgetting about me.»

«It really is that important to you to succeed in this mission, isn't it?»

«Yes, it is,» the bird answered after a pause.

«Then we'll try really hard.»

I skipped over the snowdrifts and some stones or other—a glacier must have passed that way, or maybe someone had been playing Zen gardens—and came out onto the avenue.

«Have you got any cognac?» asked Olga.

«Cognac… why? Yes.»

«Good cognac?»

«It's never bad. If it's really cognac, that is.»

Olga sniffed scornfully.

«Then why don't you offer a lady coffee with cognac?»

I pictured to myself an owl drinking cognac out of a saucer and almost laughed out loud.

«Certainly. Shall we take a taxi?»

«It was an old line straight out of Twelve Chairs by Ilf and Petrov.»

«Don't push it, kid!»

Hmm. Just when had she been locked into that bird's body? Or maybe it didn't stop her reading books?

«There's such a thing as the television,» the bird whispered.

Darkness and Light! I'd been certain my thoughts were safely concealed.

«Experience of life is an excellent substitute for vulgar telepathy… a long experience of life,» Olga went on slyly. «Your thoughts are closed to me, Anton. And anyway, you're my partner.»

«I wasn't really…« I gave up. It was stupid to deny the obvious. «And what about the boy? Are we just dropping the assignment? It's not all that serious…«

«It's very serious,» Olga exclaimed indignantly. «Anton, the boss has admitted that he acted wrongly. He's given us a head start, and we've got to make the most of it. The girl-vampire is focused on the boy, don't you see? For her he's like a sandwich she never got to eat; it was just grabbed right out of her mouth. And he's still on her leash. Now she can lure him into her lair from any side of the city. But that gives us an advantage. Why go looking for a tiger in the jungle, when you can tether a little goat out in a clearing?»

«Moscow's just full of little goats like that…«

«This boy is on her leash. She's an inexperienced vampire. Establishing contact with a new victim is harder than attracting an old one. Trust me.»

I shuddered, trying to shake off a foolish suspicion. I raised my hand to stop a car and said somberly:

«I trust you. Absolutely and completely.»

The owl emerged from the Twilight the moment I stepped inside the door. It launched into the air—for just an instant I felt the light prick of its claws—and headed for the refrigerator.

«Maybe I ought to make you a perch?» I asked, locking the door.

For the first time I saw how Olga spoke. Her beak twitched, and she forced the words out with an obvious effort. To be honest, I still don't understand how a bird can talk. Especially in such a human voice.

«Better not, or I'll start laying eggs.»

That was obviously an attempt at a joke.

«Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you,» I told her, to avoid complications. «I was trying to lighten things up too.»

«I understand. It's all right.»

I rummaged in the refrigerator and discovered a few odd bits and pieces. Cheese, salami, pickles… I wondered how forty-year-old cognac would go with a lightly salted cucumber? They'd probably find each other's company a bit awkward. The way Olga and I did.

I took out the cheese and the salami.

«I don't have any lemons, sorry.» I realized just how absurd all these preparations were, but still… «At least it's a decent cognac.»

The owl didn't say anything.

I took the bottle of Kutuzov out of the drawer in the table that I used as a bar.

«Ever tried this?»

«Our reply to Napoleon?» the owl asked with a laugh. «No, I haven't.»

The situation just kept getting more and more absurd. I rinsed out two cognac glasses and put them on the table, glanced doubtfully at the bundle of white feathers, at the short, crooked beak.