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MY MOTHER-IN-LAW CLUCKED AND FUSSED OVER NADIUSHKA AS SHE PUT her to bed "Ah, you little storyteller, what an io for a ith the aunty," hter protested sleepily

"You did, of course you did" reed happily

Svetlana winced painfully Sooner or later all Others are obliged to manipulate their relatives’pleasant about that

Of course, we do have a choice We could reveal the truth¡ª or part of the truth¡ªto our nearest and dearest

But that doesn’t produce very good results either

"Good night, little daughter," said Svetlana

"Off you go, go on," irl out, exhausted her, the poor sweetheart"

We left the room and Svetlana closed the door firmly It was quiet The only sound was the pendulu on the wall

"All that namby-pamby talk," I said "You can’t treat a child like that"

"A girl you can," Svetlana said, dis my opinion "And especially if she’s only three Anton let’s go into the garden"

"The garden, all right, the garden it is," I agreed cheerfully "Let’s go"

We both walked over to the hammock and sat down beside each other I could feel Svetlana trying to pull away, hard as that is to do in a ha," I advised her

"Fro that’s not possible Everything’s too tangled up"

"Then explain why you let the witch go"

"She knows too much, Anton And if there’s a trial if it all comes out"

"But she’s a cri bad to us," Svetlana said in a quiet voice, as if she were trying to convince herself "I don’t think she’s bloodthirsty at all Most witches are genuinely malevolent, but there are so my hands in the air "She kept the olves in line, and she didn’t hurt Nadya A genuine Arina Rodionovna, she really is And what about the disruption of the experiment?"

"She explained that"

"What did she explain? That almost a hundred years of Russian history was flushed down the tubes? That instead of a normal society, a bureaucratic dictatorship was built with all the consequences that flow from that?"

"You heard what she said¡ªthat would have ave a deep sigh and tried to collect hts

"Sveta think what you’re saying Five years ago you were a hu yourself We still are human only we’re more advanced Like a neist in the spiral of evolution If people had found out, it wouldn’t have mattered!"

"We’re not more advanced," Svetlana said with a shake of her head "Anton, when you called ht, so I jua, I don’t think any of our Light Ones have ever been there"

She stopped And I realized this hat Svetlana wanted to talk about So that was truly terrible

"What’s down there, Sveta?" I whispered

"I was there for quite a long tis Just how doesn’t ht now"

"And?"

"Everything it says in the witch’s book is right, Anton We’re not genuine reater abilities than ordinary people We’re exactly like the blue ht Remember that example from the book about body tes? Well then, all people have a ical temperature of 977¡℮ Some who are very lucky, or unlucky, have a fever¡ªtheir tey, all that Poarms the world Our body temperature is below the norm We absorb Power that isn’t ours and we can redistribute it We’re parasites A weak Other like Igor has a teht Mine is fifty"

I had ht about this, just as soon as I finished reading the book

"But so what, Sveta? What of it? People can’t use their Power We can So what’s the point?"

"The point is that people will never come to terms with that Even the best and the kindest always look enviously at those who have been given more At the sportseniuses and the ones with talent But they can’t coine that you’re an ordinary hu Perfectly ordinary And suddenly you discover that some people live for hundreds of years, can predict the future, heal diseases, and put a hex on you Quite seriously, all for real And all at your expense We’re parasites, Anton Exactly like the vaets out, if they invent souish

Others fro us and exterether and create our own state, they’ll drop atom bombs on us"

"Divide and protect" I whispered, citing the Night Watch’s ht Divide and protect, not people froeneral"

I laughed I looked up into the night sky and laughed, re a dark street to a rendezvous with vampires With a passionate heart, clean hands, and a cool, empty head

"We’ve talked so many times about what the difference is between us and the Dark Ones" Svetlana said in a low voice "I’ve found one way of putting it We’re good shepherds We watch over the flock And I suppose that means a lot Only we mustn’t deceive ourselves or anyone else There’ll never be a time when all people become Others We’ll never reveal ourselves to them And we’ll never allow people to build a more or less decent society Capitalism, communism that’s not the point The only world that will ever suit us is one in which people are preoccupied with the size of the trough and the quality of hay Because the h, look around and see us, we’ll be finished"

I looked up into the sky and toyed with Svetlana’s hand, lying there on my knees Just a hand, war down bolts of lightning on the witch who had sabotaged Russia

The liic in her as I did

"And there’s nothing to be done," Svetlana whispered "The Watches won’t let the ordinary people out of the cattle-shed In the States there’ll be huge feeding troughs that make you want to dive in over your head Sorass on the mountain pastures, so people have no ti we can do is choose the prettiest cattle-shed and paint it a nice bright color"

"What if you tell the Others all this?"

"It won’t bother the Dark Ones at all And the Light Ones will come to terms with it I learned a truth I didn’t want to know, Anton¡ªand I’ve come to terms with it Maybe I shouldn’t have told you? But that would have been dishonest As if you were part of the herd too"

"Sveta" I looked at the faint reflection of the night-light in the"Sveta, then what’s Nadiushka’s ical temperature?"

She hesitated before she answered

"Zero"

"The Greatest of all the Great" I said

"Absolutely no ic in her at all" said Svetlana

"So nohat do we do?"

"Carry on living," Svetlana said simply "I’m an Other it’s too late now to pretend to be innocent I take Power froht¡ªeither way, it’s not my Power But I’ to Gesar Right now I’ the Watch"

"I know Go"

I got up and steadied the swaying hammock It was dark, and I couldn’t see Svetlana’s face

"Go, Anton," she repeated "It’s going to be hard for us to look into each other’s eyes We need tiet used to it"

"What’s down there, on the fifth level?" I asked

"It’s best if you don’t know"

"All right I’ll ask Gesar"

"Let him tell you if he wants to"