But even that’s not the most important thing.

People may be glad that their child is an Other.

They may genuinely love the child and not allow even a single drop of envy into their hearts.

This usually means that we’re dealing with a good, loving family.

But then the most difficult part starts.

“Daughter, your grandmother’s seriously ill . . . but you could help her, couldn’t you?”

She could. A seventh-level intervention. A trifling matter, of course . . . but it disrupts the balance between the Watches.

“Son, life’s getting really hard nowadays . . . Could you drop into my office? There’s a man there, and it depends on him whether they give me a raise or not . . . could you have a word with him?”

He could. It’s only a sixth- or seventh-level intervention. And it undermines the morals of a young Other.

“What the hell are the bastards doing now! This law will destroy our entire education system!”

There isn’t even any need to say anything. The good, honest Other child gazes at the glistening features of the functionary on the TV screen. And involuntarily wishes him ill.

An inferno vortex swells up above the wise bureaucratic head. And not the kind that they accumulate every day from ordinary human curses—they can answer for those themselves, with their drug-addict children, booby-trapped automobiles, spy cameras in the bathhouse—but a genuine, really serious vortex. One that will stir up such a stink that the Inquisition will intervene to make peace between the Watches and determine who’s to blame and what one side owes the other.

Therefore the best, in fact the only way is to explain to someone, no matter how big or little they might be: “You are not human. You are an Other. It’s not better or worse . . . it’s different. The misfortunes and problems of ordinary people are nothing to do with you any longer, and you have nothing to do with them. You’ll have plenty of misfortunes and problems of your own.”

Sometimes it takes a while, but eventually everyone understands.

And as for the parents . . . they learn that their talented child is now going to study in a special school in addition to the ordinary one. A special school for physics and chemistry, or for art. Or else attend a macramé club five times a week. It doesn’t matter in the slightest what they think, because they will accept any lie and never try to discover the truth. There was a time when I thought that even this was cruel. Then I realized that it wasn’t cruelty, but firmness. Benign firmness.