Small Gods

‘Argh, ow, that was my knee,’ muttered most of the guards, in a heap about halfway up.

One made it to the top, though. By starlight he could just make out the skinny figure, bounding madly along the street. He raised his crossbow. The old fool wasn’t even dodging …

A perfect target.

There was a twang.

The guard looked puzzled for a moment. The bow toppled from his hands, firing itself as it hit the cobbles and sending its bolt ricocheting off a statue. He looked down at the feathered shaft sticking out of his chest, and then at the figure detaching itself from the shadows.

‘Sergeant Simony?’ he whispered.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Simony. ‘I really am. But the Truth is important.’

The soldier opened his mouth to give his opinion of the truth and then slumped forward.

He opened his eyes.

Simony was walking away. Everything looked lighter. It was still dark. But now he could see in the darkness. Everything was shades of grey. And the cobbles under his hand had somehow become a coarse black sand.

He looked up.

ON YOUR FEET, PRIVATE ICHLOS.

He stood up sheepishly. Now he was more than just a soldier, an anonymous figure to chase and be killed and be no more than a shadowy bit-player in other people’s lives. Now he was Dervi Ichlos, aged thirty-eight, comparatively blameless in the general scheme of things, and dead.

He raised a hand to his lips uncertainly.

‘You’re the judge?’ he said.

NOT ME.

Ichlos looked at the sands stretching away. He knew instinctively what he had to do. He was far less sophisticated than General Fri’it, and took more notice of songs he’d learned in his childhood. Besides, he had an advantage. He’d had even less religion than the general.

JUDGEMENT IS AT THE END OF THE DESERT.

Ichlos tried to smile.

‘My mum told me about this,’ he said. ‘When you’re dead, you have to walk a desert. And you see everything properly, she said. And remember everything right.’

Death studiously did nothing to indicate his feelings either way.

‘Might meet a few friends on the way, eh?’ said the soldier.

POSSIBLY.

Ichlos set out. On the whole, he thought, it could have been worse.

Urn clambered across the shelves like a monkey, pulling books out of their racks and throwing them down to the floor.

‘I can carry about twenty,’ he said. ‘But which twenty?’

‘Always wanted to do that,’ murmured Didactylos happily. ‘Upholding truth in the face of tyranny and so on. Hah! One man, unafraid of the—’

‘What to take? What to take?’ shouted Urn.

‘We don’t need Grido’s Mechanics,’ said Didactylos. ‘Hey, I wish I could have seen the look on his face! Damn good shot, considering. I just hope someone wrote down what I—’

‘Principles of gearing! Theory of water expansion!’ shouted Urn. ‘But we don’t need Ibid’s Civics or Gnomon’s Ectopia, that’s for sure—’

‘What? They belong to all mankind!’ snapped Didactylos.

‘Then if all mankind will come and help us carry them, that’s fine,’ said Urn. ‘But if it’s just the two of us, I prefer to carry something useful.’

‘Useful? Books on mechanisms?’

‘Yes! They can show people how to live better!’

‘And these show people how to be people,’ said Didactylos. ‘Which reminds me. Find me another lantern. I feel quite blind without one—’

The Library door shook to a thunderous knocking. It wasn’t the knocking of people who expected the door to be opened.

‘We could throw some of the others into the—’

The hinges leapt out of the walls. The door thudded down.

Soldiers scrambled over it, swords drawn.

‘Ah, gentlemen,’ said Didactylos. ‘Pray don’t disturb my circles.’^{53}

The corporal in charge looked at him blankly, and then down at the floor.

‘What circles?’ he said.

‘Hey, how about giving me a pair of compasses and coming back in, say, half an hour?’

‘Leave him, corporal,’ said Brutha.

He stepped over the door.

‘I said leave him.’

‘But I got orders to—’

‘Are you deaf? If you are, the Quisition can cure that,’ said Brutha, astonished at the steadiness of his own voice.

‘You don’t belong to the Quisition,’ said the corporal.

‘No. But I know a man who does,’ said Brutha.^{54} ‘You are to search the palace for books. Leave him with me. He’s an old man. What harm can he do?’

The corporal looked hesitantly from Brutha to his prisoners.

‘Very good, corporal. I will take over.’

They all turned.

‘Did you hear me?’ said Sergeant Simony, pushing his way forward.

‘But the deacon told us—’

‘Corporal?’

‘Yes, sergeant?’

‘The deacon is far away. I am right here.’

‘Yes, sergeant.’

‘Go!’

‘Yes, sergeant.’

Simony cocked an ear as the soldiers marched away.

Then he stuck his sword in the door and turned to Didactylos. He made a fist with his left hand and brought his right hand down on it, palm extended.

‘The Turtle Moves,’ he said.

‘That all depends,’ said the philosopher, cautiously.

‘I mean I am … a friend,’ he said.

‘Why should we trust you?’ said Urn.

‘Because you haven’t got any choice,’ said Sergeant Simony briskly.

‘Can you get us out of here?’ said Brutha.