Small Gods

‘But that doesn’t matter,’ said Brutha earnestly. ‘What happens to us in this life is not really real. There may be a little pain, but that doesn’t matter. Not if it ensures less time in the hells after death.’

‘But what if the exquisitors are wrong?’ said the tortoise.

‘They can’t be wrong,’ said Brutha. ‘They are guided by the hand of … by your hand … your front leg … I mean, your claw,’ he mumbled.

The tortoise blinked its one eye. It remembered the heat of the sun, the helplessness, and a face watching it not with any cruelty but, worse, with interest. Someone watching something die just to see how long it took. He’d remember that face anywhere. And the mind behind it — that steel ball of a mind.

‘But suppose something went wrong,’ it insisted.

‘I’m not any good at theology,’ said Brutha. ‘But the testament of Ossory is very clear on the matter. They must have done something, otherwise you in your wisdom would not direct the Quisition to them.’

‘Would I?’ said Om, still thinking of that face. ‘It’s their fault they get tortured. Did I really say that?’

‘“We are judged in life as we are in death” … Ossory III, chapter VI, verse 56. My grandmother said that when people die they come before you, they have to cross a terrible desert and you weigh their heart in some scales,’ said Brutha. ‘And if it weighs less than a feather, they are spared the hells.’^{18}

‘Goodness me,’ said the tortoise. And it added: ‘Has it occurred to you, lad, that I might not be able to do that and be down here walking around with a shell on?’

‘You could do anything you wanted to,’ said Brutha.

Om looked up at Brutha.

He really believes, he thought. He doesn’t know how to lie.

The strength of Brutha’s belief burned in him like a flame.

And then the truth hit Om like the ground hits tortoises after an attack of eagles.

‘You’ve got to take me to this Ephebe place,’ he said urgently.

‘I’ll do whatever you want,’ said Brutha. ‘Are you going to scourge it with hoof and flame?’

‘Could be, could be,’ said Om. ‘But you’ve got to take me.’ He was trying to keep his innermost thoughts calm, in case Brutha heard. Don’t leave me behind!

‘But you could get there much quicker if I left you,’ said Brutha. ‘They are very wicked in Ephebe. The sooner it is cleansed, the better. You could stop being a tortoise and fly there like a burning wind and scourge the city.’

A burning wind, thought Om. And the tortoise thought of the silent wastes of the deep desert, and the chittering and sighing of the gods who had faded away to mere djinns and voices on the air.

Gods with no more believers.

Not even one. One was just enough.

Gods who had been left behind.

And the thing about Brutha’s flame of belief was this: in all the Citadel, in all the day, it was the only one the God had found.

Fri’it was trying to pray.

He hadn’t done so for a long time.

Oh, of course there had been the eight compulsory prayers every day, but in the pit of the wretched night he knew them for what they were. A habit. A time for thought, perhaps. And method of measuring time.

He wondered if he’d ever prayed, if he’d ever opened heart and mind to something out there, or up there. He must have done, mustn’t he? Perhaps when he was young. He couldn’t even remember that. Blood had washed away the memories.

It was his fault. It had to be his fault. He’d been to Ephebe before, and had rather liked the white marble city on its rock overlooking the blue Circle Sea. And he’d visited Djelibeybi, those madmen in their little river valley who believed in gods with funny heads and put their dead in pyramids. He’d even been to far Ankh-Morpork, across the water, where they’d worship any god at all so long as he or she had money. Yes, Ankh-Morpork — where there were streets and streets of gods, squeezed together like a deck of cards. And none of them wanted to set fire to anyone else, or at least any more than was normally the case in Ankh-Morpork. They just wanted to be left in peace, so that everyone went to heaven or hell in their own way.

And he’d drunk too much tonight, from a secret cache of wine whose discovery would deliver him into the machinery of the inquisitors within ten minutes.

Yes, you could say this for old Vorbis. Once upon a time the Quisition had been bribable, but not any more. The chief exquisitor had gone back to fundamentals. Now there was a democracy of sharp knives. Better than that, in fact. The search for heresy was pursued even more vigorously among the higher levels in the Church. Vorbis had made it clear: the higher up the tree, the blunter the saw.

Give me that old-time religion …^{19}

He squeezed his eyes shut again, and all he could see was the horns of the temple, or fragmented suggestions of the carnage to come, or … the face of Vorbis.

He’d liked that white city.

Even the slaves had been content. There were rules about slaves. There were things you couldn’t do to slaves. Slaves had value.