the original one. She would have a lot less information
than one of the original Gods.

_If there were any originals left...._

He tabled that thought hurriedly and went on. Vulcan had told him at
least a part of the truth, and Vulcan looked like a good bet. Forrester
didn't like the idea of bearding the artisan in his workshop; it made
him feel uncomfortable, and after a while he put his finger on the
reason. His little liaison with Venus made him feel guilty. There was,
he knew, no real reason for it. In the first place, he hadn't known the
girl was Venus, and in the second place she may not have been the same
one who had been Vulcan's original wife, thirty and more centuries ago.

But the guilt remained, and he tabled Vulcan for the time being and went
on.

Morpheus, Hera, and most of the others he passed by without a glance;
there was no reason for them to dislike him, but there was no reason for
comradeship, either. Mars popped into his mind, and popped right out
again. That would be putting his head in the lion's mouth with a
vengeance.

No, there was only one left, the obvious choice, the one who had helped
him throughout his training period--Diana. She genuinely seemed to like
him. She was also a good kid. The thought alone was almost enough to
make him smile fondly, and would have if he had not remembered the peril
he was in.

He turned away from the window to look at the color-swirled wall across
the room. He had remained in his room ever since Mars and Venus had
brought him back from New York, and he wasn't at all sure that he could
leave it. In the normal sense of the word, the place had neither exits
nor entrances. The only way of getting in or out of the place was via
the Veils of Heaven--matter transmitters, not something supernatural, he
realized now.

As far as Forrester knew, they still worked. But the Gods could generate
a Veil anywhere, at any time. Forrester, as a demi-God, could only will
one into existence on sufferance; he could only work the
matter-transmitting Veils if the Gods permitted him to do so. If they
didn't, he was trapped.

Well, he told himself, there was one way to find out.

He walked over to the wall and stood a few feet away from it,
concentrating in the way he had been taught. He was still slower at it
than the Gods themselves, and hadn't developed the knack of forming a
Veil as he walked toward the place where he wanted it to be, as they
had.

But he knew he could