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The singing broke off on a sharp, dissonant note

Behind me Las swore "What was that?" he asked

"The sound of the ocean," Kostya chuckled He bent down, picked up the briefcase and put the book and the flask in it "An entire ocean of new possibilities"

I swung around, already knohat I would see I half closedthe shadow of my own eyelashes with ht

The aura of an uninitiated Other was quite distinct Welcome to our happy family

"That’s hoorks on people," said Kostya There were beads of sweat clinging to his forehead, but he looked very pleased "So there you go"

"Then what is it you do want?" I asked

"I want to be an Other aht Ones and Dark Ones, Others and people, et it? Everyone in the world"

I laughed "Kostya you just spent two or three ood is your arithmetic?"

"There could have been two hundred people standing here," said Kostya, "and they would all have become Others There could have been ten thousand The spell works on everybody in my field of vision"

"But even so"

"In one and a half hours the next crew of the International Space Station takes off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome," said Kostya "I think the space tourist from Germany will have to letfor a second as I tried to make sense of what he had said

"I’ll sit quietly by theand gaze at the Earth," said Kostya "The way a space tourist is supposed to do I’ll look at the Earth, spread the blood from the flask on the paper and whisper the spells And way down below the people will become Others All the people¡ªdo you understand? From the little infants in their cradles to the old folks in their rocking chairs"

He looked genuinely alive now And absolutely sincere His eyes were blazing¡ªnot with vampire Power, but with undiluted human passion

"You used to dream about that yourself, didn’t you, Anton? That there wouldn’t be any more ordinary people That everyone would be equal"

"I used to dream that all the people would be Others," I said "Not that there wouldn’t be any more people"

Kostya frowned "Drop that! That’s nothing but verbal gymnastics Anton, we have a chance to make the world a better place Fuaran couldn’t have done it¡ªin her time there weren’t any space ships Gesar and Zabulon can’t do it¡ªthey haven’t got the book But we can¡ªwe can! I don’t want any Power, understand that I want equality Freedom!"

"Happiness for everyone, a free handout?" I asked "With no one left shortchanged and resentful?"

He didn’t understand He nodded

"Yes, happiness for everyone! The earth for Others! And no rievances and resentment Anton, I want you to be with me Join me!"

"What a wonderful idea," I exclai into his eyes "Brilliant, Kostya!"

I’d never been good at lying And deceiving a vampire is alree very badly

He smiled And relaxed

And at that instant I raised my hands and struck out at hi like the blow I had struck on the train The Poas seething inside ers¡ªand it kept coood conductor until they switch on the current?

The spell was visible even in the hu the at hiray cocoon What happened in the Twilight was absolutely incredible¡ªthe world was filled with a seething blizzard of gray that ht caistered vampires within a radius of several reat either They’d be swept away and dematerialize by the ricochet from the spells

Kostya went down on one knee He shuddered, trying to break free, but the Gray Prayer was sucking Power out of him faster than he could work his spells

"Unbelievable!" Las exclaiht behind hto the world around ray stonelow above the ground My ears seeht seeh into our world

But I couldn’t stop I could sense that if I eased up on the pressure for even a second, Kostya would break free and strike back Strike so hard, there’d be no pieces left to pick up it would be me, not Kostya, smeared across the concrete apron

He raised his head and looked at me Not in fury, more in resentful bewilderment He parted his hands very, very slowly

Could he really have any reserves of Power left?

A transparent, bluish triangular prisray threads of the spell, spun around and shrank to a tiny point Then disappeared

Taking the vah a portal

The Poas still raging inside me The Power of a thousand Others, transmitted toa use, a point of application Huh

I brought ray threads into a heavy ball

Enough

There was no eneh

A duel ofwith a cluh

Kostya had provedviolently¡ªbut I stopped ain, the plane on the runway picked up speed

Kostya had gone

Had he turned and run?

No, si a direct portal And it looked like the Higher Ones hadn’t expected Kostya to pull an incredible stunt like that either

He’d co about planes and helicopters and relax, sure that there was still some time left A vampire could be intercepted in hters, you could zap him with a missile

But he’d had the direct portal ready in advance An hour and a half before the launch¡ªhe wouldn’t have had tiet

there by plane And they wouldn’t have let a plane anywhere near Baikonur¡ªwhatever they ht be like now, the air defense forces still existed That hy he’d been able to make the jump, even under pressure from the Gray Prayer¡ªthe spell for the portal had been hanging there, ready for use, like the coician

That o over to his side Or at least he’d had serious doubts But it had been important to him, very important, to defeat me, not by pure Power¡ªwhat could Power prove, when he was already a Higher Vaician, even if I was pu victory is when your opponent adht Accepts your banner as his own

I’d been really stupid I’d thought of him as either a friend or an enemy But he was neither All he’d wanted to do was prove that he was right And I just happened to be the target he’d chosen for proving that No longer a friend, not yet an enemy Simply the bearer of a different truth

"Did he teleport?" Las asked

"What?" I swung around and looked at hiot away through it How did you understand that?"

"I saw soanantly, "A lot like that, in fact!"

"People aren’t the only ones who can design gaone to Baikonur He wants to take the space tourist’s place"

"I heard," said Las "What a lamebrain"

"Do you understand why he’s a lamebrain?" I asked

Las snorted "If all the people becoicians Today they insult you in the trolley, tomorrow they’ll incinerate you on the spot Today they scratch their neighbor’s door with a nail if they don’t like him, or write an anonymous letter to the tax office, but tomorrow they’ll hex hiood in a circus, not on the city streets And especially if the un"

"You think the monkeys are in the majority?" I asked

"We’re all monkeys"

"You’re headed for the Watch," Ion, I’ll ask for advice"

"What Watch?" Las asked cautiously "Thanks a bunch, but I’ician, thank God!"

I closed my eyes and listened Silence

"Gesar!"

Silence

"Gesar! Teacher!"

"We were in conference, Anton"

In mind conversations, there are no inflexions of the voice But even so even so I thought I caught a hint of weariness in Gesar’s words

"He went to Baikonur The Fuaran really works He wants to turn everybody on the planet into Others"

I stopped, because I realized Gesar already knew He’d seen and heard everything that happened¡ªthrough ical method, it wasn’t important how

"You have to stop him, Anton Go after him and stop hi the channel open, Anton Supplying you with Power Do you kno many Others provided Power for the Gray Prayer?"

"I can iine"

"Anton, I can’t handle him And Zabulon can’t handle hi we can do now is feed Power to you We’re drawing Power from all the Others in Moscow If necessary, we’ll start taking it directly froicians as channels You have to stop Kostya with our help The alternative is a nuclear strike at Baikonur"

"I won’t be able to open a direct portal, Gesar"

"Yes you will The portal still hasn’t closed co and reactivate it"

"Gesar, don’t overestimate ician!"

"Anton, use your head You were standing in front of Saushkin when he recited the spell You’re not second-level any longer"

"Then what level am I?"

"There’s only one level above first¡ªHigher Magician Enough talking, get after hi to defeat him?"

"Any way you like"

I openedin front ofhis hand in front of hted "So what is this Watch? And do you ician too now?"

"Almost" I took a step forward

This here Kostya had been standing he fell parted his handsthe portal appeared

In the hu

Just the wind blowing, the cru over the concrete

In the Twilight¡ªnothing

Gray gloo tendrils of the blue ht

Dense, leaden ht from behind heavy clouds a small blue spark where the portal had been

I reached out my hand¡ª in the huht,

in the second level of the Twilight

And I caught the fading blue spark in o out Here’s Power for you¡ªa raging torrent of energy, rupturing the boundary betorlds Streaers in drops of fire¡ªonto the fading eht light of day¡ªthere’s still work for you to do! I can sense the trace left by the one who opened the portal I can see how he did it I’ll be able to follow his path

And I don’t even need any incantations¡ªall those funny fores¡ªjust as the witch Arina didn’t need them when she brewed her potions, just as Gesar and Svetlana don’t need theher Magician!

Not to learn formulas by heart, but to feel the movement of Power!

How incredible and how simple

It wasn’t just a matter of new abilities, of a fireball with increased casualty capability or a more powerful Freeze If he’s pue reserve of his own, any ordinary ician feel it It was a matter of freedom Like the difference between even the most talented swimmer and the laziest dolphin

How difficult itabout her Power, about her freedoth and weakness¡ªit was the difference between a healthy person and an invalid

But ordinary people ed to live, didn’t they? And they lived with the blind and the paralyzed Because, after all, freedo Freedom was the excuse used by scoundrels and fools When they said "freedo about other people’s freedoe

And even Kostya, as neither a fool nor a scoundrel, had been caught on the same hook that had torn the lips of revolutionaries of every breed¡ªfrom Spartacus to Trotsky, from

Citizen Robespierre to Coachev to the Unknown Soldier

Surely I would have been caught on it myself? Ten or even five years earlier?

If sole stroke¡ªand for the better?"

Perhaps I’d been lucky

At least with the people I’d had around me, who had always shaken their heads in doubt at the words "freedom and equality"

The portal opened up in front of littering, faceted membrane

I parted the filaments with my hands and entered