'If you know my profession, then why waste all of that time and effort over dinner?' she said icily.

He turned and looked at her, uncomprehending. 'I was told that you work for General Dubyelt at the Third Section,' he said. Then the implication of what he had learned of her and what they both had said dawned on him. He blushed a deeper shade of crimson than Tamara suspected showed in her own face, and his mouth began to open and close like a fish's. Tamara scarcely managed to suppress her amus.e.m.e.nt.

Konstantin beamed and then burst into a laugh. He went over to the table, where he poured two gla.s.ses of brandy and proffered one to her. She joined him and took it.

'I'm sorry,' she said.

'Think nothing of it.' He smiled. 'Though I'm glad you appreciate the dinner.' He caught her eye as he spoke, and she laughed again. Now though, his reasons for bringing her here were even more puzzling.

'Would it be wise for you to consort with someone who spies for your own brother?'

'"For"? I would have thought that "on" would be a more apposite preposition.'

'I've never even met His Majesty.'

'I didn't mean you personally. You, I'm sure, are a loyal subject of the tsar.' They looked at each other for a moment, and then Konstantin threw himself back in his chair. 'I'm sorry, Tamara Valentinovna, I meant that genuinely about you but say it of half your colleagues and the irony would not be misplaced.'

Tamara said nothing. She understood the distinction Konstantin was making, but she had never heard it from the point of view of one so close to the seat of power.

'Things are changing.' He leaned forward as he spoke and clasped his hands together on the table. 'My brother belongs to a new generation. That's not happened in half a century. We're going to make a difference.'

'Didn't Aleksandr I say that?'

'He did! He did! He wanted to free the serfs too.'

'Really?'

'He wanted it. But he never achieved it. The war saw an end to that.'

'We're at war now,' Tamara pointed out.

Konstantin shook his head. 'Not for long. That was our father's war. There'll be peace by the New Year. And then we can begin. Sasha His Majesty has appointed me head of a secret committee to put an end to serfdom.'

'Secret?'

'Absolutely.'

'And you're telling me?'

'And you'll tell your masters within the Third Section I know. And they'll think that they've got their eye on us.'

'Because they will have.'

'To the extent that you tell them what you know. And you'll tell us how they react.'

'I might lie.'

'You won't.'

He seemed very sure of her more so than she was of herself. As far as she could judge, that was where they left it. Konstantin had mentioned a few of their other plans for reform and then the conversation had turned back to music. Konstantin had promised that next time they met he would play the cello for her, at which she had smiled politely. And then he had said that she should leave. He appeared to have forgotten the other aspect of her profession, and she chose not to remind him, but the way he had said they would meet again told her he had not abandoned the idea.

Minutes later she was out on the embankment, beside the Neva. There was no carriage waiting for her not even a pumpkin. She began the short walk back to her hotel.

At least this rail journey was short enough that Yudin could enjoy the comforts of a first-cla.s.s carriage. It was the first ever railway route in the country fourteen years older than the second, the more prestigious line from Petersburg to Moscow. This line covered a mere thirty versts from Petersburg to Pavlovsk, and Yudin would alight before that, at Tsarskoye Selo.

He glanced around the carriage at his fellow pa.s.sengers. There was only a scattering of them. This was the last train of the day, and so these would be residents returning home from the capital, not visitors on a day trip to glimpse the majesty of the imperial palaces. It was a very royal location the name literally meaning 'the Tsar's Village'. Yudin could sense the looks of disdain that he received from a number of those around the carriage. He was, he thought, pretty well turned out, but breeding would always show. He doubted if any of them could guess at his particular breeding.

The train drew into the station and Yudin climbed down on to the platform. He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and glanced at the map he had scribbled there, based on what he had found in the archive in Moscow. The resident he would be visiting was not perhaps quite as high born as most of those who lived in the area, but he had achieved high rank by dint of study and hard work much like Yudin himself. And all his neighbours would be well aware of the fact that the old man in their midst had once, many years before, been personal physician to His Majesty Tsar Aleksandr I.

It was a small house small for the town some way from the centre. Yudin had to pa.s.s both the Yekaterininsky and Aleksandrovsky palaces before he found it. He slithered over the wall a far easier climb than had been required to get into the Peter and Paul Fortress and dropped into the garden on the other side. He could see light at only three windows; two on the ground floor and one on the first, at a window that was accompanied by a balcony. That would be his best bet. He scuttled across the lawn, unseen in the darkness, and in moments had ascended one of the stone pillars, finding himself on a small terrace on which sat a wrought-iron table and two chairs. Behind them, a French window stood open. Yudin slipped through.

The decor inside was a strange combination. In part it reminded Yudin of what he had heard about the room of the woman Raisa had killed in Degtyarny Lane all those mirrors. Today Yudin did not mind the fact that anyone attempting to observe him in one of the dozens of looking gla.s.ses that bedecked the walls would be able to see nothing. Today anything that might help to instil fear in the man he had come to talk to would be of a.s.sistance. The preponderance of mirrors suggested that such fear already existed, and had done for many years.

What lay between the mirrors, filling every other available patch of wall, indicated that same fear a plethora of icons and crucifixes. These would feel less at home on the walls of a Moscow brothel, and yet Yudin knew full well that many of the women had at least one religious symbol in their rooms, unaware of the ironic contrast it made with their profession, or perhaps able to reconcile it in some way that was beyond Yudin's imagination.

Despite widespread superst.i.tion, religious imagery had no influence on a voordalak, beyond the fear that might be lurking within him on the basis of his own irrational imaginings. Yudin had no such apprehensions, and yet the dozens of pairs of the Saviour's eyes staring at him from the walls did make him feel uneasy. As with the mirrors, they indicated that he was expected.

'You must be Cain.'

Yudin turned. The old man was sitting in an armchair, beside his bed. The one lamp that lit the room stood on a table beside him. Next to it was a book it looked like a Bible.

'You must be Tarasov,' said Yudin.

Dr Tarasov nodded. The two of them had never met, not even in 1825 as they stood on separate sides in the battle for the tsar's soul. 'It seems Danilov was right about you.'

'In what way?' asked Yudin.

'He said you had become like your master.' Tarasov glanced around at the mirrors, in which Yudin knew he would see no reflection of the figure that stood so obviously in the middle of his room.

'I have no master.'

'Then why have you come here?'

'You know why,' said Yudin. 'To meet a man who would dare counterfeit the death of his own emperor.'

Tarasov paused. His eye twinkled. 'So you finally worked it out then, did you? Danilov said you would. And that you'd come here.'

'Why did he think I'd come here?' Yudin asked.

'Because I'm the only one left.'

Yudin postponed the most obvious question. Instead he stuck to the purpose of his visit. 'Where is he?'

'Danilov? In Siberia by all accounts.'

'Romanov.'

'Aleksandr Pavlovich? I've no idea.' Tarasov smiled as he spoke. 'What was it that persuaded you at last, I wonder?' It was a rhetorical question one he had clearly thought through long in advance. 'His Majesty's death, I suppose Nikolai Pavlovich, I mean. You and your master decided that now was the time to make a move against his son, only to discover that you could not.'

'I have no master.' Apart from that one detail, it seemed that Tarasov or somebody had worked it all out.

'He's well prepared, you know Aleksandr Nikolayevich he knows you will come.'

'Perhaps he will welcome it.'

Tarasov's smile broadened, with what appeared to be genuine pleasure. He seemed confident that the new tsar would not easily be persuaded of his destiny.

'Where is Aleksandr Pavlovich?' Yudin asked.

'I've no idea.'

'What name does he go by?'

'They never told me.'

'They?'

'Volkonsky and Aleksandr himself; they were the only ones who knew.'

Yudin took off his jacket and hung it over the back of a chair. He took a step towards Tarasov, hoping that the man would see the danger he was in. 'You will tell me,' he said.

'I'm sure I'll tell you everything I know,' Tarasov agreed. 'But I can't enlighten you over matters of which I have no knowledge.'

That remained to be seen. For now Yudin would discover just how much Tarasov would tell of what he did know. 'Who was in on it?' he asked.

'Just the four of us plus His Majesty.'

'Four of you? You, Danilov, Volkonsky and ... Diebich?'

'Wylie.'

'Another doctor. What fools people are to trust the members of your profession.'

'Aleksandr didn't trust us that's why he only told Volkonsky.'

'And not Aleksei?'

Tarasov didn't answer. Yudin smiled, revealing his teeth, and took a step closer. The doctor was fast and prepared. Before Yudin had even moved, he had grabbed the Bible from the table beside him and was holding it out in front of him. Yudin could see his knuckles whiten as he tightly gripped the book. Behind it his eyes flared with hatred for the creature from which he thought the holy words protected him. Yudin reached out and plucked it from him, then threw it aside. Already Tarasov had moved to his next line of defence. Now, clasped between his two hands, he held a silver crucifix, thrusting it forward into Yudin's face. It was large enough that Tarasov's clenched fist only came up to Christ's knees; every expression of agony that the silversmith had so lovingly worked into the Lord's face was plain for Yudin to observe.

'I've been preparing for this day for some time,' said Tarasov.

Yudin threw his hands up as though to protect himself, and cowered, if only slightly. He peered over his arm at Tarasov, hoping to see some glimpse of victory in the doctor's eyes. When it came, Yudin moved quickly. He reached out and s.n.a.t.c.hed away the crucifix. It had no more effect on him than did the icons or the Bible. He put the silver figure to his lips and kissed it tenderly on the loincloth, then, taking one end of the object in each hand, he bent the soft metal so that Christ's eyes could witness close up the nails that penetrated his own feet. He cast it aside, as he had the Bible.

Tarasov's third line of defence was more original, but only marginally. Garlic half a dozen bulbs, their stalks woven into a ring. Yudin stood and watched, unmoved, as the doctor pulled off a large clove and then crushed it between his bony fingers. The smell a.s.sailed Yudin's nostrils and he breathed deeply, enjoying the aroma. Then he reached forward and plucked the crushed garlic from Tarasov's fingertips and popped it into his mouth. He chewed it to a pulp and again savoured the a.s.sault of its flavour. When he could taste it no more, he leaned forward so that their faces were close. He breathed out deliberately, his mouth wide, but Tarasov did not flinch at the smell. Yudin spat out the white paste and watched it slither down the old man's cheeks and on to his chin. He leaned in even closer.

'You believe in myths,' he whispered.

'I've been preparing for this day for some time,' repeated Tarasov. His eyes were not on Yudin, but looking beyond him. Yudin stood upright. In the mirrors on the wall behind Tarasov he could see the whole room and everything in it, with the exception of himself.

They were no longer alone.

Yudin turned. There were four of them. They were not uniformed, but they had a military bearing and they were armed. Three of them carried in their left hands solid stakes of wood; hawthorn, Yudin guessed, in keeping with Tarasov's predilection for folklore. But in this case the adherence to it was overkill any wood would do and those stakes could swiftly be driven home by the mallets that each man bore in his right hand. The fourth man was armed only with an axe. His fingers caressed its blade as if verifying in it the same keenness that he himself had for the task at hand. A blow from it correctly aimed at Yudin's neck would be as effective as a stake through his heart.

He had no idea how Tarasov had summoned the men, but it was easy to suppose that wherever it was he had hidden his garlic and his crucifix also had some bell pull which had served to rally these killers. No doubt the scenario had been rehea.r.s.ed many times. Two of the men stood by the door; two covered the windows out on to the balcony by which Yudin had entered. There was no other exit that he could see.

'Danilov said you would come,' explained Tarasov from behind him. 'And he suggested I should protect myself. You'd be surprised how easily men can be persuaded to believe in the existence of your kind as long as they're paid enough.'

Yudin turned. Tarasov was standing now, although it was clearly a strain for a man of his age. He too had a wooden stake in his hand, but shaped more like a sword so that he could drive it home without the help of the hammer.

'How did Aleksei contact you?' Yudin asked. Time was short, and suddenly the question of how, from the depths of Siberia, his old enemy had managed to warn Tarasov of what would unfold seemed more pressing than the reason he'd originally come here.

'By letter,' replied Tarasov.

Yudin laughed curtly. 'Impossible. It wouldn't have got past the censor.' There was no need to reveal that he himself was that censor.

'He had an envoy. Someone he could trust.'

As Tarasov spoke he nodded towards his four bodyguards. In the mirrors, Yudin saw them begin to close in. With them behind him and only Tarasov in front, there was little question over where to go. And therein lay the flaw in Tarasov's long-nurtured plan he had nothing like the physical strength of any of his four guardians. A single blow from Yudin's clenched fist knocked the weapon to the floor and in a moment Yudin was behind him, his double-bladed knife to the doctor's throat.

'Dr Tarasov and I are going to be walking out of here,' he said, pressing the tips of the knife into the old man's wrinkled skin. None of the men moved.

'You think I wouldn't exchange the few remaining years of my life for yours, Cain?' asked Tarasov. 'You think any of them would dare to disobey the orders that have been drummed into them for so long? Their instructions are not to save me; merely to kill you.'

Yudin looked at the men and decided that Tarasov was telling the truth. He could kill the doctor easily, and then there would be only four of them to deal with. The chances of his defeating them were good, but not so good as to make him leap at the opportunity and they understood enough not to attempt to fight him like a man. They would know what he feared.

But they would also have discounted what he feared as a weapon that he might use against them. Something that could be a danger to both man and vampire could swing the odds in his favour.

He grabbed the lamp from the table and hurled it at one of the men by the window. It was a modern device, fuelled by paraffin rather than oil, and so when it shattered against the man's shoulder he was quickly enveloped in the liquid, which in an instant was aflame. The curtains behind him caught alight too and soon the whole of the window was framed with lashing orange and yellow tongues.

Yudin tightened his grip on Tarasov and began to shuffle towards the door, navigating his way around the bed and not needing to fabricate the terror that the fire held for him. The two men at the door stood their ground, as did the one who remained at the window. Clearly they had been trained well. They watched unmoved as their burning comrade rolled around on the floor, his agonized screams filling the room. The scent of his roasting flesh reached Yudin's nostrils.

At last the other man beside the window could bear it no longer. He had been forced to take a few steps from it, because of the intense heat, but now he abandoned his post altogether and threw himself towards his fallen colleague, attempting to smother the flames by covering him with a rug. Yudin did not wait to see the result of this act of humanity. He released his grip on Tarasov and flung himself across the room towards the window. Tarasov shouted, but it was too late. All that Yudin could see was the fire, but he overcame his every instinct to cower from it and instead plunged through and out into the night. His feet scarcely touched the balcony beyond before he was over it and falling on to the lawn below.

He was up again in an instant. The arm of his shirt was ablaze, but he knew he could not waste time there trying to put it out. He raced over to the bushes at the side of the garden and disappeared within them. With a few pats of his hand, ignoring the pain which he knew would be only temporary, he put out the flames on his arm. He looked at the blackened, blistered flesh beneath, but it didn't concern him. Fire might kill a vampire, but only if it consumed his body totally. Otherwise, as with every injury, he would soon recover. He climbed the wall and glanced briefly over his shoulder. The fire was still blazing, but wasn't so large that it would not soon be put out. Tarasov would almost certainly survive, and that was all to the good. Yudin might soon have need to question him again, though on such an occasion he would be more circ.u.mspect.

But that occasion would not be soon. Yudin dropped from the top of the wall on to the street below and ran.

CHAPTER XIII.

DMITRY STEPPED DOWN from the sleigh, making sure his left leg touched the ground first and then putting down his right, taking most of the weight on his stick. Moscow looked beautiful matching the picture in his memory that could only be true for half the year. The whole city was covered in snow. The people took it in their stride. All wore heavy coats and hats and mittens, and travelled in sleds rather than carriages, but other than that, life in the city continued.