like Franco’s. He recognized their sort from history disks. They were nondescript-looking, low-grade Transhumanists, doubtless with high but very specialized intelligence and little initiative. His intuition seemed to be paying off, for they stood seemingly paralyzed with indecision.
“I’ll also break his neck,” he continued, pressing his advantage, “if you don’t release my companion.”
They released Mondrago, who hurried to join Jason behind Pan.
“Don’t hurt me.”
It took a second for Jason to realize the voice was Pan’s. It had an odd timbre to it, and was unexpectedly high-pitched, and it was difficult to sort out the emotions behind it. But he found himself thinking it was an undeniable—if odd—human voice. And it was pleading.
“I won’t hurt you if you do as you’re told,” Jason said. “Show us to the nearest exit from this building.”
With Jason still holding him in the same potentially neck-snapping grip, Pan moved in a cautious sidewise gait back along the corridor from which he had emerged. The four guards followed closely but cautiously, making no moves that might precipitate the death of the god the cult-worshipers expected. The corridor was a very short one, terminating in a door.
And here Jason faced a dilemma. They couldn’t take Pan with them out into the city, where he would have been conspicuous to say the least.
“Kill it now!” hissed Mondrago, seeming to read his mind. “We don’t need it as a hostage anymore—they won’t be able to pursue us once we’re outside in public. Kill it just before we bolt out the door. And that will be the end of their little scheme for a cult of the ‘Great God Pan’.”
“No,” Jason heard himself saying. “We’re not murderers.”
If telepathy had been a reality, Mondrago’s searing contempt could have been no more obvious. “‘Murderers’? This thing isn’t human. It isn’t even a decent animal. It’s just a filthy, obscene mutant! Have you gone soft in the head?”
“We don’t kill any sentient being without a reason! Remember that. And get ready to move . . . now.” With a sudden movement, Jason thrust Pan back into the narrow corridor. The four guards rushed, but got in each other’s way in the confined space even before stumbling over Pan. Jason and Mondrago hit the door with their shoulders. It burst open, and they were out, into one of the crooked streets of Athens.
While running, Jason summoned up his map-display and saw that the red dots of his and Mondrago’s TRDs were in the area south of the Agora, on the terraced lower slopes of the Areopagus hill—the vicinity of their rented house, where the dots of Chantal’s and Landry’s TRDs still glowed reassuringly.
Good! Jason thought as they sprinted through the winding, uneven alleyways. Even in this maze, it won’t take us long to find it. We’ll get Chantal and Landry out of it before Franco can “deal with them in due course” . . . and find a new address.
There were no such things as apartment blocks in fifth-century b.c. Athens. But there were blocks of houses—as many as six houses. Their quarters were in such a block. All the houses had the inward-looking design of Athenian residences, organized around miniscule courtyards and having upstairs rooms. A narrow street-front door in the mud-brick wall gave access to the courtyard.
It was ajar.
Off to the left, out of the corner of his eye, Jason barely glimpsed a figure hurrying around a corner of the block, seeming to push another figure ahead. He was about to investigate when he heard shouting from within, in Landry’s voice. Without waiting for Mondrago, he plunged through the open door.
The shouting was coming from one of the small rooms opening off the courtyard. Jason rushed in, to see one of the goon-class Transhumanists grasping Landry by on arm and holding a dagger in his other hand.
Without thinking, Jason sprang forward, reaching out to seize the wrist of the dagger arm.
With the strength of desperation, Landry broke the Transhumanist’s grip and rushed frantically forward. He succeeded only in tripping himself and Jason. The Transhumanist grasped him from behind, under the chin, and brought his dagger-edge across the historian’s throat. With a gurgling shriek, Landry fell across Jason. Mondrago, desperately trying to get into the room, stumbled over the fallen body. The Transhumanist, with the quickness of his unnatural kind, shoved him aside and plunged out the door.
Mondrago got to his feet and gave chase. By the time Jason could get out from under the body atop him, it was too late. That