Igor cast a sideways glance at his young wards. He frowned and said, "You're a real swine, watchman… It's easier for me to fight a magician than a witch. All her magic comes from the earth. It cuts straight to the core…"

"Never mind, we'll be together," I said. "The five of us."

The cubs-I forced myself to think about them only as cubs- glanced at each other. Galya jabbed Petya in the side with her fist and whispered something.

"What do you need them for?" Igor asked, raising his voice. "Watchman! They're only children!"

"Werewolf cubs," I corrected him. "Who almost ate children. Do you want to atone for your guilt? Get off with a caution? Then stop yapping."

"Uncle Igor, we're not afraid," the boy called Petya said unexpectedly.

The boy called Anton backed him up. "We'll go with you!"

They looked at me calmly, without any resentment. They clearly hadn't expected anything else.

"They can't do anything more…" said Igor. "Watchman…"

"That's okay-if they distract the witch, that will be a help. Now transform!"

Svetlana turned away, but she didn't say anything.

The werewolves began getting undressed without saying anything. The little girl was the only one who looked around shyly and went behind a currant bush. The others weren't embarrassed.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a village woman walking along the road, carrying a bucket filled with potatoes. She'd probably dug them up out of the collective farm field. When she saw what was happening inside the fence, she stopped, but I couldn't give a damn for her right then. I wasn't in great shape as it was. I had no power to waste on chance witnesses. I needed to learn to run. To run very quickly, so that I could keep up with the wolves.

"Let me help," said Svetlana. She moved her open hand through the air and I felt a pleasant ache fill my body and strength start flooding into my legs. I instantly felt hot, as if I'd stepped into an overheated sauna. 'Pace' is a simple spell, but it has to be used with great caution. Catch the cardiac muscle as well as the legs, and you'll give yourself a heart attack.

Beside me Igor began groaning and arched over with his hands and feet on the ground and his spine reaching toward the sky, as if it had snapped in half. So that was where all the old folktales about having to jump over a rotten tree stump came from… His skin turned dark, broke out in a bright red rash, then sprouted clumps of damp, rapidly growing fur.

"Quick!" I barked. The air coming out of my mouth was hot and damp. I even thought I could see my breath steaming, as if there was a frost. It was unbearably difficult to stand still- my body craved movement.

It was good to see the werewolves felt the same.

The large wolf grinned. For some reason his teeth were the last thing about him to change. The human teeth in a wolf's mouth looked comical, and at the same time horrific. I suddenly had the strange thought that werewolves had to do without fillings and crowns.

But then, I realized, their bodies are a lot stronger than human ones. Werewolves don't suffer from tooth decay.

"Let's-s-s go…" the wolf barked with a lisp. "It's hot."

The cubs ran up to the wolf, yelping-they were wet too, as if they'd been sweating. One of them still had human eyes, but I couldn't tell if it was one of the boys or the girl.

"Let's run," I said.

And I tore off, without looking back at Svetlana, without thinking about whether anyone would see us or not. I could sort that out later. Or Svetlana would erase our tracks.

But the streets were empty, even the woman with the bucket had gone away. Maybe Svetlana had driven everybody back home? It would be good if she had. It's a strange sight-a man running faster than nature allows, and four wolves running along with him.

My legs seemed to carry me of their own accord. The ten-league boots in children's fairytales and Baron Munchhausen's fleet-footed friend-these are the reflections in human myth of this little piece of magic. Only in the fairytales it doesn't tell you how much the pounding of the road against your feet hurts…

After about a minute we turned toward the river and it was easier running over the soft earth. I stayed beside the wolf, like some considerate fairytale Prince Ivan who didn't want to exhaust his gray friend. The cubs fell behind a bit-it was harder for them. Werewolves are very strong, but their speed doesn't come from magic.

"What ideas… have you… come up with?" the wolf barked. "What are… you going… to do?"

If only I knew the answer to that.

A battle between Others is the manipulation of the Power dissolved in the Twilight. I was a second-level magician- which is pretty high. Arina was way beyond all the frameworks of classification. But Arina was a witch, and that was an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. She couldn't have taken all her charms and talismans and amulets with her… only a few little things. But on the other hand, she could draw Power directly from nature. Her powers decreased in the city, but here they increased. For really serious magic she needed to use some particular amulet, and that took time… but the charge of accumulated power in the amulet could be monstrously strong.

I couldn't tell. There were too many variables. I wouldn't even have tried to predict the outcome of a fight between Arina and Gesar. The Great Magician would probably win, but it wouldn't be easy.

And what could I use against the witch?

Speed?

She'd withdraw into the Twilight, where she felt a lot more confident. And with every successive level, I'd get slower and slower for her.

Surprise?

To some degree. After all, I was hoping Arina wasn't expecting my arrival.

Simple brute force? Smash her over the head with a rock?

But to do that, first I had to get close to her.

Everything pointed to the fact that I had to sneak up on her and get as close as possible. And the moment the witch was distracted, attack. With a crude, primitive punch.

"Listen!" I shouted to the wolf. "When we get close, I'll withdraw into the Twilight. I'll go on ahead and creep up on the witch. You advance in the open. When she starts talking to you and gets distracted, I'll attack. Help me then."

"All r-r-right," the wolf growled, not saying a word about what he thought of the plan.

Chapter 7

Was this spot still marked on the maps of the Second World War? Maybe it was a battlefield well known to historians and celebrated in all the books, a place where two armies had once clashed in a bloody, murderous conflict-and the juggernaut of the blitzkrieg had shuddered to a halt and been rolled back?

Or maybe it was one of our obscure, unknown fields of infamy, where the crack German units had trampled into the mud the untrained and poorly armed volunteers thrown against them? A place only remembered in the archives of the Ministry of Defense?

I didn't know my history very well, but it was probably the latter. This place was too deserted, too bleak and dead. An abandoned patch of dirt that not even the collective farms had coveted.

In our country they don't like to erect monuments on battlefields where we were defeated.

Maybe that's because our victories weren't all that slick either?

I stood on the bank of the little river and looked at the expanse of dead ground. It wasn't all that big: a strip of land between the forest and the river, about a half mile long, 6 miles wide. And not so very many people had been killed here. More likely hundreds than thousands.

But then, how could you really say that wasn't many?

The field was absolutely deserted. I couldn't see anybody with my normal vision, and a glance through the Twilight hadn't revealed anything either.