skullcap on his head started smoking and Edgar flung it to the ground, with a muffled curse. That was when he realised that we could see him.
'Hi, Edgar,' I said.
He hadn't changed a bit since the last time we'd seen each other in the train, when we were doing battle with Kostya Saushkin. Except that now he wasn't dressed in his eternal suit and tie, but in a much freer and more comfortable style: grey linen trousers, a thin white cotton sweater and good leather shoes with thick soles... He looked like a svelte, fashionable European ?and in the Central Asian wilderness, that made him seem like an amiable coloniser taking a brief respite from the white man's burden, or an English spy from the time of Kipling and the Great Game that Russia and Britain played in this part of the world.
'Hi, Anton,' said Edgar, getting down off the hood. 'Just look at that... now I've interrupted your conversation.'
Strangely enough, he seemed embarrassed. But then, who wouldn't be embarrassed after calling down tectonic spells on our heads? Who wouldn't be afraid to look us in the eye?'
'What have you done, Edgar?' I asked.
'It was just the way things worked out,' he said, with a sigh. 'Anton, I won't even try to make excuses! I feel really awkward!'
'And did you feel awkward in Edinburgh too?' I asked 'When you cut the watchmen's throats? When you hired the thugs?'
'Very awkward,' Edgar said, nodding. 'Especially since we didn't manage to break through to the seventh level in any case.'
Afandi-Rustam began laughing and slapping his sides. How much of it was Rustam and how much Afandi, I couldn't tell.
'He felt awkward!' Rustam exclaimed. 'They always feel awkward, but it never means anything.'
Obviously embarrassed by this reaction from Rustam, Edgar waited until the magician had laughed his fill. I took the chance to look the Inquisitor (perhaps I should have said 'former Inquisitor') up and down through the Twilight.
Yes, he was hung all over with amulets, like decorations on a New Year's tree. But there was something else as well as the amulets. Charms. Combinations of the very simplest natural compon ents, which didn't require great effort to saturate them with magic, which acquired their magical properties from light, almost imperceptible touches of Power. In the same way that saltpetre, charcoal and sulphur, almost harmless in themselves, together become gunpowder, which explodes at the slightest spark.
It was no accident that Edgar was dressed completely in cotton, linen and leather. Natural materials have an affinity for magic. You can't charm a nylon jacket.
And these charms that transformed his light clothing into magical his cheeks swelled up in red botches from slaps delivered by an invisible hand.
'Never try to put pressure on me again,' Rustam warned him when the slapping session was over. 'Do you understand, Inquisitor?'
Before Edgar could decide what to say, if anything, I threw up my hand, feeling absolutely delighted that I hadn't used my set of bracelets against Rustam, and fired off all four tongue-loosening spells against Edgar. The amulets on the Inquisitor's body blazed up brightly, but they couldn't absorb the full force of the blow.
'Who was the vampire with you in Edinburgh?' I shouted.
Edgar's face contorted as he struggled painfully to hold back the word that was rising to his tongue. He failed.
'Saushkin!' he shouted.
Rustam laughed again and said:
'Bye-bye!'
Afandi was suddenly himself again. It was as if a rubber doll had been slightly deflated ?he lost height, his shoulders narrowed, wrinkles appeared on his face, his eyes dimmed, the hairs of his beard fell out and scattered.
Edgar and I looked at each other with hatred in our eyes.
And then, without wasting any time on gathering Power or intoning spells, Edgar struck at us. A fiery rain poured down from the sky, seething and bubbling on the Shields that Alisher and I had erected. But there was no fire around Afandi, who was still confused and hadn't yet recovered his wits ?evidently one of the protective rings had been activated.
The minute that followed was full of attacks and counter attacks. Alisher wisely left me to conduct the battle, took a step backwards and fed Power to our Shields, only occasionally allowing himself a brief lunge of attacking magic.
Geser must have involved the finest diviners in the Watch in the preparation of our equipment. After the fire came ice. A blizzard started howling through the air: tiny snowflakes with edges as sharp as razors tested the strength of our Shields and melted