Tom Holt (34 page)

He had apparently moved in space as well as in time, for he was inside a building of some sort now; a dark building, not particularly cheerful. Despite his innate optimism, Jason couldn't quite bring himself to believe that it was a restaurant. Which was not to suggest that it wasn't a place designed at least in part for eating in; it was just that a human being standing there would be justified in wondering on which end of the fork he was ultimately going to wind up.

'The temple of Jupiter in Londinium,' he they whispered. 'Not everybody's cup of tea.'

'Talking of...'

It was only then that Jason became aware that the place was full of people; thousands of them, but they were so extraordinarily still and quiet that they simply hadn't registered in his mind. They were all dressed alike, in rather threadbare homespun jackets and knee-length kilts. The women had their heads covered. All of them had that air of nervous resignation that you usually only find in doctors' waiting rooms and tax offices. Jason wondered what they were all doing there.

'Having a good time,' he they whispered.

Jason frowned. 'Are you sure?' he asked.

'I we use the term loosely,' he they replied. 'Actually there's no such thing as a good time here; the nearest equivalent is a pious time, and I we suppose you could say they're having that. This is popular entertainment, Betamax style.'

'What is it, exactly?'

'It's a game show,' he they replied. 'Listen.'

Jason was on the point of applying for further and better particulars when two huge curtains parted at the far end of the hall and a procession entered. At the bead of it were two enormous men with black masks and very large axes, followed by a third man carrying what looked startlingly like- a chopping-block; then came three very sour-faced young women in extremely decorous costumes -- in Jason's world they would have been dentists' receptionists -- carrying silver vessels of indeterminate use. Finally there was a tall, white-haired man with a beard like a silver doormat, dressed in the most outlandishly ornate robes Jason had ever seen; the sort of thing Louis XIV would have gone in for if only he'd had the money.

The procession halted in the middle of a sort of raised dais, and the masked men grounded their axes with a crash. The overdressed man stepped forward, stood for a moment and then spoke.

'A pious evening to you all, worshippers and females; my name is Godfearing George Maniakis, and I'm your host for tonight, when we're all going to play God's My Witness. Now before we begin, let me tell you all about a very spiritually uplifting thing which happened to me on the way to the temple tonight...'

Jason looked round nervously. The building was almost as ornate as Godfearing George's costume; it had butresses, archetraves, roodscreens, pilasters and what Jason failed entirely to recognise as a narthex, but no doors. Pity.

"'Thy Will be done?" I said, well you could have knocked me down with a simpulum, so I turned to him and I said ...' Godfearing George was getting steadily more solemn as his routine continued, and some of the congregation were starting to quiver slightly. Any minute now, Jason felt, some idiot was going to shout 'Hallelujah!' He did his best to ignore the rest of the story, which had something to do with everlasting punishment and the transmigration of the soul. Finally it ground to a halt, and there was a deep, respectful silence.

'And now,' said Godfearing George, 'it only remains for me to welcome tonight's first contestants, who are going to join me in playing God's My Witness. Mr. and Mrs. Constans; many are called but tonight,
you've
been chosen!'

There was a shriek from the second row of the congregation. Not that sort of shriek. A real shriek For a moment nothing seemed to be happening; then the two axemen sprang forwards and returned shortly afterwards with an elderly couple, who were struggling with them in a spirited but entirely pointless way. At last the remaining dribble of fight evaporated and they stood facing Godfearing George with all the light-hearted exuberance of rabbits caught in the headlamps of a rapidly approaching lorry.

'And your name is?'

'Mmmmmmm.'

'Could you just speak up, Mt. Constans? The gods can hear you, of course, but we can't.'

'Flavius Constans,' the man whimpered.

'And you're a retired executioner?' Mr. Constans nodded feebly. 'That must have been a horrible job, Flavius. Didn't you ever wonder whether the people you executed might actually have been innocent?'

Mr. Constans snivelled. Clearly the thought had occurred to him, once or twice. Godfearing George turned to Mrs. Constans, who was somewhat belatedly trying never to have been born, and gave her a smile that would have stripped paint.

'And how about you -- Domitilla, isn't it?' Mrs. Constans made a very small, very shrill noise, like a fieldmouse in a blender. 'How did you feel about all this, Domitilla, sharing your bed with a man who made his living by killing people? Didn't you sometimes wonder, Domitilla? Anyway, worshippers and females, how about a good, fervent prayer for the souls of our two contestants, who are going to play God's My Witness here tonight.'

There was a confused mumbling, like many angry bees. Mr. and Mrs. Constans tried to cling to each other, but the axemen parted them with the shafts of their axes. Godfearing George took a bundle of cards from a cedar-wood chest which one of the stern young women had presented to him. Someone somewhere dimmed some lights. There was absolute silence.

'Now,' Godfearing George intoned. 'I'm sure I don't have to remind you of the rules. This first round is all about religious knowledge. For each question you get wrong, you get the opportunity to spend five thousand years in the Bottomless Pit Of Sulphur -- that's after you're dead, of course, although I'm sure you don't need me to tell you that life is but a dream. For each correct answer, you get five denarii, which you'll be entitled to offer to the god of your choice when we play Sacrifice of the Century -- always supposing you live that long, of course. Right then, Flavius, you have the choice of answering questions on Myths, Orthodoxy or Heresy.'

'Myths, please,' said Mr. Constans.

'You've chosen Myths,' said Godfearing George, 'and you have five seconds in which to answer the following question.'

The lights dimmed ever so slightly. You could have built tower blocks on the silence.

'Tell me, then, Flavius,' said Godfearing George, and Jason could feel the palms of his hands becoming distinctly moist, 'in the legend of the Seven Against Thebes, what were the names of King Adrastus's daughters?'

Mr. Constans seemed to freeze. A great drum somewhere offstage marked the passing of the seconds: one, two, three...

'Deipyla,' Mr. Constans croaked.

'And?'

'Aegeia.'

'Correct!' The congregation sagged with relief, and someone actually did shout 'Hallalujah'. 'Heaven be praised, Mr. Constans,' said Godfearing George, 'Deipyla and Aegeia is right. Now, Mr. Constans, your second question is...'

To his utter astonishment, Jason knew the answer to this one (who removed the bones of Orestes from Tegea?), which was plainly more than could be said for Mr. Constans. On the fifth drumbeat he gasped out 'Mercury,' and the silence in the hall solidified still further. A wild guess. Jason shuddered to think what you got for a wild guess. It almost certainly wasn't a souvenir cheque-book and pen.

'I'm sorry,' said Godfearing George, 'but your sins have found' you out, Mr. Constans. The answer is, of course, Lichas. I expect it was on the tip of your tongue, wasn't it? Well, you'll have five thousand years in Tartarus to reflect on that, won't you? Now then, Mrs. Constans, do you want to answer questions on Myths, Orthodoxy or Heresy?'

Mrs. Constans squeaked pitifully.

'Heresy it is, then. Now, in the accursed rituals of the Paphlagonians...'

Mrs. Constans didn't do terribly well.

'Oh dear,' said Godfearing George, 'that's two incorrect answers, Mrs. Constans, and as I'm sure you're aware that means immediate decapitation. Never mind, let's have a really heartfelt prayer for the soul of Mrs. Constans, worshippers and females. She's been a truly wretched contestant...'

And that was more or less all that Jason could take for one day. There were some people, he knew, who didn't believe in the gods; not these gods, not any gods. That had always amazed him; it was like not believing in cholera. The two certain things about human life are, first, that there are gods; second, that pretty well all the gods would benefit enormously from a good hard kick in the head. With a yell that should have caused serious damage to the structure of the building, he unsheathed the Sword of Thingummytite and hurled himself at the dais ...

Only to find that it wasn't there. And neither was he.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

'Well, then.'

Jason considered his options. He had, within the space of a relatively short time, defied the gods, been to Hell, beaten up the Driver of the Spoil and the Grim Reaper, been made to feel about twelve years old by his mother, discovered that he had Free Will, discovered that, on the contrary, his entire life had been planned out for him from the start by the personification of laughter and an eagle, acquired a three-headed dog, mislaid a three-headed dog, been taught most but not all of the funniest joke ever, routed a divine army, spent a long time in his own shirt pocket and tried without success to murder a game show host. More or less the only thing he hadn't done in the last few days, in fact, was have a decent meal.

But there is that within a man that drives him ever onwards, just as the power of the seasons drives the roots of flowers into the hard earth; and so he decided, against his better judgment, to open his eyes and find out what was going to happen to him next. He was, after all, a Hero whether he liked it or not, and when he had been offered the choice between the path of Luxury and the path of Glory he had chosen the path marked Diversion. Although he was no expert, he had an instinctive feeling that that came under the heading of Asking for Trouble. Anyway, he opened his eyes.

'So?'

He looked round, and the first thing he saw was sandwiches. Ham, beef, cheese, sardine and prawn sandwiches; also a pork pie, a plate of sausage rolls, two Cornish pasties and an iced bun.

'This,' said the voice above his head, 'is not a bribe.'

'No,' Jason replied, torn with indecision. 'Of course it isn't.' It had been difficult, but he had made up his mind. To start with, the beef.

'And since it's not a bribe,' the voice continued, as the sandwich jacknifed out of his hand and skittered away like a frightened kitten, 'it would be best if you didn't eat any of it until you've decided on your verdict.'

'I just did,' Jason said. 'I thought the beef first, then a bit of that pie, then...'

'About the future of the human race.'

'Oh, that. Well, I know for a fact that some of them aren't allowed to eat beef, or pork, so they really won't mind if...'

'About whether the gods should be allowed to destroy laughter.'

Jason remembered. It had been nice when there was just the food to think about, but clearly his destiny, the world's destiny and the destiny of the beef sandwiches were all somehow interlinked; how, he had no idea, but that was all right, he had never claimed he was Marcus Aurelius. Ah yes, the world. He considered the matter with the small area of his brain not mentally eating beef sandwiches, and after a short while he delivered the following judgment.

'Well, he said, 'if that place, or world, or whatever you want to call it, that I saw just now was what the world would be like if the gods did away with comedy, then I don't think a lot of it 'and personally I wouldn't like to live there. On the other hand, I wouldn't like to live in Florida, but a lot of people are very taken with Florida, and who am I to say they're wrong? I mean, one man's meat...' Meat. Ham. Beef. Pork. Chicken. Turkey. Veal. Lamb. Sausages. 'One man's meat,' he forced himself -- salami! Dear God, was there anything in the whole of creation as wonderful as a salami and mozarella salad, with fresh white bread on the side and -- he forced himself to continue, 'is another man's poison and all that. I could just fancy a poison meat casserole, as it happens, but never mind. What I'm getting at is... Are you still there?'

'Yes.'

What I'm getting at is ... Will there be any mustard? Eventually, I mean?'

'Quite possibly.'

'What I'm trying to say is that I refuse to make a judgment, one way or another. I know what I want and what I'd do, but I'm blowed if I'm going to lay down the law to anybody else. Please stop me before I finally drift over the edge into complete incoherence, but I don't hold with deciding things for people. My dad does that, and I don't respect him very much for it. I don't think it's right to decide what other people's lives are going to be like.

Personally, when I think of the hash browns, corned beef hash, no, the hash, the cock-up I've made of my own life, I can't really say that I'm in any position to shape other people's. By the way, exactly why is all this up to me, anyway?'

'Because.'

'Ah. I might have guessed. Well, if you want me to decide between you and the gods, then, bearing in mind all the experiences I've had over the last 'few days, what I've seen of you and the various insights I've had into the way the gods go about things, and also bearing in mind the fact that Jupiter has always bossed me about and apparently you've been manipulating me ever since I was born and I always seem to find myself doing what my mother tells me to do, my decision is that I choose whichever side will make it possible for me to eat all this food at the earliest opportunity. Satisfied?'