Part 1 (1/2)

Pagan Pa.s.sions.

by Gordon Randall Garrett and Laurence Mark Janifer.

Adult Science Fiction, with the supernatural making complete sense.

The G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses of Ancient Greece and Rome had returned to Earth--with all their awesome powers intact, and Earth was transformed almost overnight. War on any scale was outlawed, along with boom-and-bust economic cycles, and prudery--no change was more startling than the face of New York, where, for instance, the Empire State Building became the Tower of Zeus!

In this totally altered world, William Forrester was an acolyte of Athena, G.o.ddess of Wisdom, and therefore a teacher, in this case of a totally altered history--and Maya Wilson, girl student, evidently had a totally altered way of grading in mind--but what else would a wors.h.i.+pper of Venus, G.o.ddess of Love, have in mind?

This was just the first of the many Trials of Forrester, every bit as mighty and perilous as the Labors of Hercules. In love with Gerda Symes, like him a devotee of Athena, like him a frequenter of the great Temple of Pallas Athena (formerly known as the 42nd Street Library)--dedicated, in short, to the pleasures of the mind--Forrester was under the soft, compelling pressure of soft, compelling devotees of Venus, Bacchus and the like, and in need of all the strength that he and his G.o.ddess, the beautiful and intellectual Athena, could muster to save him from the endless temptations of this new Earth.

And into this sensuous strife strode Temple Myrmidons--religious cops sworn to obey orders without question or hesitation--with a pickup order for William Forrester.

Where he was taken, what happened to him, the truly fantastic discoveries he made about himself and the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses--here are the ingredients that make up this science fiction novel of suspense, intrigue, mystery and danger. For science fiction it is, with the supernatural making complete sense, and fun too, despite the Sword of Damocles hanging by a thread over Forrester's head!

_by Randall Garrett and Larry M. Harris_

CHAPTER ONE

The girl came toward him across the silent room. She was young. She was beautiful. Her red hair curled like a flame round her eager, heart-shaped face. Her arms reached for him. Her hands touched him. Her eyes were alive with the light of pure love. I am yours, the eyes kept saying. Do with me as you will.

Forrester watched the eyes with a kind of fascination.

Now the girl's mouth opened, the lips parted slightly, and her husky voice murmured softly: ”Take me. Take me.”

Forrester blinked and stepped back.

”My G.o.d,” he said. ”This is ridiculous.”

The girl pressed herself against him. The sensation was, Forrester thought with a kind of awe, undeniably pleasant. He tried to remember the girl's name, and couldn't. She wriggled slightly and her arms went up around him. Her hands clasped at the back of his neck and her mouth moved, close to his ear.

”Please,” she whispered. ”I want you....”

Forrester felt his head swimming. He opened his mouth but nothing whatever came out. He shut his mouth and tried to think what to do with his hands. They were hanging foolishly at his sides. The girl came even closer, something Forrester would have thought impossible.

Time stopped. Forrester swam in a pink haze of sensations. Only one small corner of his brain refused to lose itself in the magnificence of the moment. In that corner, Forrester felt feverishly uncomfortable. He tried again to remember the girl's name, and failed again. Of course, there was really no reason why he should have known the name. It was, after all, only the first day of cla.s.s.

”Please,” he said valiantly. ”Miss--”

He stopped.

”I'm Maya Wilson,” the girl said in his ear. ”I'm in your cla.s.s, Mr.

Forrester. Introductory World History.” She bit his ear gently.

Forrester jumped.

None of the textbooks of propriety he had ever seen seemed to cover the situation he found himself in. What did one do when a.s.saulted (pleasantly, to be sure, but a.s.sault was a.s.sault) by a lovely girl who happened to be one of your freshman students? She had called him Mr.

Forrester. That was right and proper, even if it was a little silly. But what should he call her? Miss Wilson?