Tiger Cub's house

Tiger Cub's house is a secluded two-story brick dacha set beside a small lake, surrounded by a tall fence and concealed behind a magical mirage that makes the approach appear as a solid wall of trees. The property is thickly planted with giant pines and firs, and the house itself was built without damaging them, giving the grounds a wild, untamed character. A concrete apron in front of the house can accommodate several cars, and a small, non-functioning fountain sits beside a flowerbed. The interior includes a large living room, a study with stained oak bookshelves and a computer, a bar, a library, a kitchen, and multiple guest bedrooms. The house is protected by a pack of trained Staffordshire bull terriers, which are conditioned to knock down and restrain strangers, including Others, a security measure Tiger Cub maintains because she is only there two days a week and cannot commute constantly. The dogs, however, are not immune to powerful magic: Semyon freezes them in mid-air with a temporal spell when they attack Yulia upon her arrival.

The Vacation and Its Tensions

The house becomes the setting for a Watch vacation granted by Boris Ignatievich during an unprecedented June heat wave in Moscow. About twenty Light Ones gather there, including Anton, Svetlana, Semyon, Ilya, Ignat, Tiger Cub, Yulia, and Olga. The atmosphere is initially one of forced merriment, with magicians engaging in duels of climate magic, card games with magical cheating, and drinking. However, the vacation quickly becomes a crucible for personal and philosophical conflict. Svetlana, feeling the weight of her accelerated training and the knowledge that she is being prepared for something momentous, questions the nature of the Watch's work and whether it brings any real joy to ordinary people. Anton, who has learned that Svetlana is being groomed for a mission that will separate them forever, becomes increasingly alienated and confrontational. He gets drunk with Semyon on the second-floor balcony, and later, in the early morning, discovers Svetlana in bed with Ignat and Lena, a sight that crystallizes his sense of loss and the invisible wall that is growing between them.

The Study and the Revelation

In the study, Anton confronts Olga, demanding to know the ultimate goal of Svetlana's training. Olga reveals that the Watch's true purpose is not merely to police Dark Ones but to change the human world itself, to create an ideal society through a genuine revolution. She admits that a previous attempt—the Russian Revolution and the project of communism—failed because of a compromise she accepted with the Darkness, for which she was punished by being imprisoned in an owl's body for eighty years. She explains that Svetlana is the key to a new, meticulously planned operation that has been twelve years in the making, one that will use a Great Sorceress to alter the destiny of a single individual and, through him, the course of humanity. Anton realizes that he is being used as a tool in this plan, a piece to be sacrificed for the greater good, and that his love for Svetlana is being exploited to push her toward her fate.

The Balcony and the Tiger

After the confrontation, Anton retreats to the balcony, where Semyon joins him for a philosophical drinking session. Semyon tells Anton that he must find his own truth and fight for it, not simply follow Gesar's or anyone else's. He warns that the Dark freedom is freedom from one's own conscience, and that the moment one feels no pain in their chest, it is already too late. Later, wandering the grounds in the early morning, Anton discovers Tiger Cub in the forest, transformed into a tigress, violently slashing at tree trunks with her claws. The sight is a stark reminder that all of them, even the most powerful combat magicians, struggle not only against the Darkness but against the Light itself, which can sometimes blind them. The house, meant to be a place of rest, instead becomes the stage where Anton fully grasps the scope of the conspiracy and resolves to act, setting him on the path that will lead him to the climactic confrontation on the roof of the "house on stilts."