But all the children here had grown up long ago. I walked around a Peugeot parked by the fence, opened the gate, went past the flowerbeds in which withering flowers were struggling to survive, and shuddered as I read the old Soviet bureaucratic-style sign on the door.

BUSINESS HOURS:

At first I thought I must have gone crazy. Then I thought I must be looking through the Twilight. But no, the inscription was absolutely real, written in yellow letters on a black background and covered with a cracked sheet of glass. One corner of the glass had fallen off, and the final letter of the word “Watch” was tattered and faded.

The same text was written alongside in Uzbek, and I learned that “Night Watch” translated as “Tungi Nazorat.”

I pushed the door-it wasn’t locked, of course-and walked straight into a large room. As is customary in the East, there was no entrance hall. And that was right-why would they need a hallway here? The weather was never cold in Samarkand.

The furnishings were very simple, reminiscent in part of a small militia station, and in part of an old office from Soviet times. There was a coatrack and several cupboards full of papers by the door. Three young Uzbek men and a plump middle-aged Russian woman were drinking tea at an office desk. There was a large electric samovar, decorated in the traditional Khokhloma folk style, boiling on the desk. Well, how about that-a samovar! The last time I’d seen one in Russia was at the Izmailovo flea market, with all the matryoshka dolls, caps with earflaps, and other goods for the foreign tourists. There were several other desks with no one sitting at them. An ancient computer with a massive monitor was clattering away on the farthest desk-its cooling fan ought to have been replaced ages ago…

“Assalom aleikum,” I said, feeling like a total idiot who’s trying to look intelligent. Why on earth hadn’t Gesar taught me Uzbek?

“Aleikum assalom,” the woman replied. She was swarthy-skinned, with black hair-quite clearly Slav in origin, but with that remarkable change in appearance that happens without any magic at all to a European who spends a long time in the East or is born and lives there. She was even dressed like an Uzbek woman, in a long, brightly colored dress. She looked at me curiously-I sensed the skillful, but weak, touch of a probing spell. I didn’t shield myself, and she gathered her information with no difficulty. Her expression immediately changed. She got up from the desk and said, “Boys, we have a distinguished visitor.”

“I’m here entirely unofficially!” I said, raising my hands in the air.

But the fuss had already begun. They greeted me and introduced themselves-Murat, sixth-level; Timur, fifth-level; Nodir, fourth-level. I thought they looked their real age, about twenty to thirty. According to Gesar, there were five Others in the Samarkand Watch…and according to Alisher, the members of the Watch in Tashkent were younger. How much younger could they be? Did they take on children from school?

“Valentina Ilinichna, Other. Fourth-level.”

“Anton Gorodetsky, Other, Higher,” I said in turn.

“I run the office,” the woman went on. She was the last to shake my hand and in general she behaved like the most junior member of the Watch. But I estimated her age as at least a hundred and fifty, and her Power was greater than the men’s.

Another peculiarity of the East?

But a second later any doubt about who was in charge here was dispelled.

“Right, boys, get the table set out quick,” Valentina commanded. “Murat, you take the car, run around the route quickly, and call into the market.”

And so saying, she handed Murat the key to a huge old safe, from which the young guy took out a tattered wad of bank-notes, trying his best to do it inconspicuously.

“Please, there’s no need!” I implored them. “I’m only here for a brief, entirely unofficial visit. Just to introduce myself and ask a couple of questions… And I have to call in to the Day Watch too.”

“What for?” the woman asked.

“There were no Others at the border check at the airport. There was just a notice in the Twilight, saying Light Ones should register with the Day Watch on arrival, and Dark Ones should register with the Night Watch.”

I wondered what she would have to say about such a flagrant piece of incompetence. But Valentina Ilinichna merely nodded and said, “We don’t have enough members to maintain a post in the airport. In Tashkent they do everything properly… Nodir, go and tell the ghouls that Higher Light One Gorodetsky is here on a visit from Moscow.”

“I’m here unofficially, but not exactly on personal…,” I began, but no one was listening to me any longer. Nodir opened an inconspicuous door in the wall and walked through into the next room, which I was surprised to see was equally large and half empty.

“Who are the ghouls?” I asked, struck by an unbelievable suspicion.

“Oh, that’s the Day Watch office. They haven’t really got any ghouls, that’s just what we call them…to be neighborly…” Valentina Ilinichna laughed.

I followed Nodir into the next room without saying anything. Two Dark Others-one young and one middle-aged, fourth-and fifth-level-smiled at me amicably.

“Assalom aleikum…,” I muttered and walked through the large room (everything was just the same, even the samovar was standing in the same place) and opened the door to the street running parallel to the one from which I had entered the building.

Outside the door there was an identical garden and on the wall there was a sign:

BUSINESS HOURS:

I quietly closed the door and walked back into the room. Nodir had evidently sensed my reaction and cleared out.

One of the Dark Ones said good-naturedly, “When you finish your business, come back to see us, respected guest. We don’t often get visitors from Moscow.”

“Yes, do come, do come!” the other one said emphatically.

“Sometime later…thank you for the invitation,” I muttered. I went back into the Night Watch office and closed the door behind me.

It didn’t even have a lock on it!

The Light Ones appeared slightly embarrassed.

“The Night Watch,” I hissed through my teeth, scandalized. “The forces of Light-”

“We’ve cut back on space a bit. Utilities are expensive, and there’s the rent…,” said Valentina Ilinichna, spreading her hands and shrugging. “We’ve been renting these premises for two offices like this for ten years now.”

I made a simple pass with my hand and the wall separating the Light Ones’ office from the Dark Ones’ office lit up with a blue glow for an instant. The Dark Ones of Samarkand were not likely to have a magician capable of removing a spell cast by a Higher One.

“There’s no need for that, Anton,” Valentina Ilinichna said reproachfully. “They won’t listen. That’s not the way we do things here.”

“You are supposed to keep a watch on the Powers of Darkness,” I exclaimed. “To monitor them!”

“We do monitor them,” Timur replied judiciously. “If they’re right next door, it makes them easier to monitor. But we’d need five times as many members to go dashing around all over town.”

“And the signs? What about the signs? ‘Night Watch’? ‘Day Watch’? People read them!”

“Let them read them,” said Nodir. “There are all sorts of offices in the city. If you try to hide and don’t put up a sign, you’re immediately suspect. The militia will come around, or bandits working the protection racket. But this way everybody can see this is a state organization, there’s nothing to be got out of it, let it get on with its work…”