Okay," Forrester said. "Sure." He handed the bartender a ten-dollar
bill and got a kind of wry pleasure out of seeing the picture of
Dionysus on its face. "Let's have another, but more brandy and less soda
this time."

The drink was brought and he sipped at it, looking like any ordinary
citizen taking on a small load, but tuned to every fluctuation in the
energy levels around him, waiting.

Only a God, he knew, could hurt another God, and even then it took
plenty of power to do it. Actually to kill a God required the combined
efforts of more than one, under normal circumstances--though one,
properly equipped and with some luck, could manage it. As far as his own
situation was concerned, Forrester was prepared for a deadly assault
from Mars. Maybe Mars didn't intend to kill him, but being maimed for
centuries, like Vulcan, was nothing to look forward to, and it was just
as well to be on the safe side. Just in case the God of War had managed
to get one or two other Gods on his side, Forrester had talked to Diana
and Venus, and had their agreement to step in on his side if things got
rough, or if Mars tried to pull anything underhanded.

And any minute now....

Suddenly Forrester felt a disturbance in the energy flow around him.
Somewhere behind him, invisible to the mortals who occupied the bar, a
Veil of Heaven was beginning to form.

With a fraction of a second, Forrester was forming his own. But this
time he took a little longer than he had before.

It wasn't the first time he'd had to run. For over a month now, he had
been jumping from place to place, all over the world. He had gone to
Hong Kong first. When Mars had traced him there and made a grab for him,
Forrester had made a quick jump, via Veil, to Durban, South Africa. It
had taken Mars all of forty-eight hours to find Forrester hiding in the
native quarter, wearing the _persona_ of a Negro laborer. But again
Forrester had disappeared, this time reappearing in Lima, Peru.

And so it had gone for five full weeks, with Forrester keeping barely
one jump ahead of the God of War.

And, in that month, he had achieved two important things.

First, he had begun to make Mars a little overconfident. By now Mars was
fully convinced that Forrester was nothing but a coward, and he was
absolutely certain that he could beat the newcomer easily, if he could
only come to grips with him.

Second, Forrester had discovered that Mars' basic reflexes were a trifle
slower t