Small Gods: Discworld Novel, A

by Terry Pratchett

  The kneeling figure did not look up. Two guards stood over it, with drawn swords.

  “The Turtle people…the people are plotting something,” it said, the voice shrill with terror.

  “Of course they are. Of course they are,” said Vorbis. “And what is this plot?”

  “There is some kind of…when you are confirmed as Cenobiarch…some kind of device, some machine that goes by itself…it will smash down the doors of the Temple…”

  The voice faded away.

  “And where is this device now?” said Vorbis.

  “I don’t know. They’ve bought iron from me. That’s all I know.”

  “An iron device.”

  “Yes.” The man took a deep breath—half-breath, half-gulp. “People say…the guards said…you have my father in prison and you might…I plead…”

  Vorbis looked down at the man.

  “But you fear,” he said, “that I might have you thrown into the cells as well. You think I am that sort of person. You fear that I may think, this man has associated with heretics and blasphemers in familiar circumstances…”

  The man continued to stare fixedly at the ground. Vorbis’s fingers curled gently around his chin and raised his head until they were eye to eye.

  “What you have done is a good thing,” he said. He looked at one of the guards. “Is this man’s father still alive?”

  “Yes, lord.”

  “Still capable of walking?”

  The inquisitor shrugged. “Ye-es, lord.”

  “Then release him this instant, put him in the charge of his dutiful son here, and send them both back home.”

  The armies of hope and fear fought in the informant’s eyes.

  “Thank you, lord,” he said.

  “Go in peace.”

  Vorbis watched one of the guards escort the man from the garden. Then he waved a hand vaguely at one of the head inquisitors.

  “Do we know where he lives?”

  “Yes, lord.”

  “Good.”

  The inquisitor hesitated.

  “And this…device, lord?”

  “Om has spoken to me. A machine that goes by itself? Such a thing is against all reason. Where are its muscles? Where is its mind?”

  “Yes, lord.”

  The inquisitor, whose name was Deacon Cusp, had got where he was today, which was a place he wasn’t sure right now that he wanted to be, because he liked hurting people. It was a simple desire, and one that was satisfied in abundance within the Quisition. And he was one of those who were terrified in a very particular way by Vorbis. Hurting people because you enjoyed it…that was understandable. Vorbis just hurt people because he’d decided that they should be hurt, without passion, even with a kind of hard love.

  In Cusp’s experience, people didn’t make things up, ultimately, not in front of an exquisitor. Of course there were no such things as devices that moved by themselves, but he made a mental note to increase the guard—

  “However,” said Vorbis, “there will be a disturbance during the ceremony tomorrow.”

  “Lord?”

  “I have…special knowledge,” said Vorbis.

  “Of course, lord.”

  “You know the breaking strain of sinews and muscles, Deacon Cusp.”

  Cusp had formed an opinion that Vorbis was somewhere on the other side of madness. Ordinary madness he could deal with. In his experience there were quite a lot of mad people in the world, and many of them became even more insane in the tunnels of the Quisition. But Vorbis had passed right through that red barrier and had built some kind of logical structure on the other side. Rational thoughts made out of insane components…

  “Yes, lord,” he said.

  “I know the breaking strain of people.”

  It was night, and cold for the time of year.

  Lu-Tze crept through the gloom of the barn, sweeping industriously. Sometimes he took a rag from the recesses of his robe and polished things.

  He polished the outside of the Moving Turtle, which loomed low and menacing in the shadows.

  And he swept his way toward the forge, where he watched for a while.

  It takes extreme concentration to pour good steel. No wonder gods have always clustered around isolated smithies. There are so many things that can go wrong. A slight mis-mix of ingredients, a moment’s lapse—

  Urn, who was almost asleep on his feet, grunted as he was nudged awake and something was put in his hands.

  It was a cup of tea. He looked into the little round face of Lu-Tze.

  “Oh,” he said. “Thank you. Thank you very much.”

  Nod, smile.

  “Nearly done,” said Urn, more or less to himself. “Just got to let it cool now. Got to let it cool really slowly. Otherwise it crystallizes, you see.”

  Nod, smile, nod.

  It was good tea.

  “S’not ’n important cast anyway,” said Urn, swaying. “Jus’ the control levers—”

  Lu-Tze caught him carefully and steered him to a seat on a heap of charcoal. Then he went and watched the forge for a while. The bar of steel was glowing in the mold.

  He poured a bucket of cold water over it, watched the great cloud of steam spread and disperse, and then put his broom over his shoulder and ran away hurriedly.

  People to whom Lu-Tze was a vaguely glimpsed figure behind a very slow broom would have been surprised at his turn of speed, especially in a man six thousand years old who ate nothing but brown rice and drank only green tea with a knob of rancid butter in it.

  A little way away from the Citadel’s main gates he stopped running and started sweeping. He swept up to the gates, swept around the gates themselves, nodded and smiled at a soldier who glared at him and then realized that it was only the daft old sweeper, polished one of the handles of the gates, and swept his way by passages and cloisters to Brutha’s vegetable garden.

  He could see a figure crouched among the melons.

  Lu-Tze found a rug and padded back out into the garden, where Brutha was sitting hunched up with his hoe over his knees.

  Lu-Tze had seen many agonized faces in his time, which was a longer time than most whole civilizations managed to see. Brutha’s was the worst. He tugged the rug over the bishop’s shoulders.

  “I can’t hear him,” said Brutha hoarsely. “It may mean that he’s too far away. I keep on thinking that. He might be out there somewhere. Miles away!”

  Lu-Tze smiled and nodded.

  “It’ll happen all over again. He never told anyone to do anything. Or not to do anything. He didn’t care!”

  Lu-Tze nodded and smiled again. His teeth were yellow. They were in fact his two-hundredth set.

  “He should have cared.”

  Lu-Tze disappeared into his corner again and returned with a shallow bowl full of some kind of tea. He nodded and smiled and proffered it until Brutha took it and had a sip. It tasted like hot water with a lavender bag in it.

  “You don’t understand anything I’m talking about, do you?” said Brutha.

  “Not much,” said Lu-Tze.

  “You can talk?”

  Lu-Tze put a wisened finger to his lips.

  “Big secret,” he said.

  Brutha looked at the little man. How much did he know about him? How much did anyone know about him?

  “You talk to God,” said Lu-Tze.

  “How do you know that?”

  “Signs. Man who talk to God have difficult life.”

  “You’re right!” Brutha stared at Lu-Tze over the cup. “Why are you here?” he said. “You’re not Omnian. Or Ephebian.”

  “Grew up near Hub. Long time ago. Now Lu-Tze a stranger everywhere he goes. Best way. Learned religion in temple at home. Now go where job is.”

  “Carting soil and pruning plants?”

  “Sure. Never been bishop or high panjandrum. Dangerous life. Always be man who cleans pews or sweeps up behind altar. No one bother useful man. No one bother small man. No one remember name.”

&nb
sp; “That’s what I was going to do! But it doesn’t work for me.”

  “Then find other way. I learn in temple. Taught by ancient master. When trouble, always remember wise words of ancient and venerable master.”

  “What were they?”

  “Ancient master say: ‘That boy there! What you eating? Hope you brought enough for everybody!’ Ancient master say: ‘You bad boy! Why you no do homework?’ Ancient master say: ‘What boy laughing? No tell what boy laughing, whole dojo stay in after school!’ When remember these wise words, nothing seems so bad.”

  “What shall I do? I can’t hear him!”

  “You do what you must. I learn anything, it you have to walk it all alone.”

  Brutha hugged his knees.

  “But he told me nothing! Where’s all this wisdom? All the other prophets came back with commandments!”

  “Where they get them?”

  “I…suppose they made them up.”

  “You get them from same place.”

  “You call this philosophy?” roared Didactylos, waving his stick.

  Urn cleaned pieces of the sand mold from the lever.

  “Well…natural philosophy,” he said.

  The stick whanged down on the Moving Turtle’s flanks.

  “I never taught you this sort of thing!” shouted the philosopher. “Philosophy is supposed to make life better!”

  “This will make it better for a lot of people,” said Urn, calmly. “It will help overthrow a tyrant.”

  “And then?” said Didactylos.

  “And then what?”

  “And then you’ll take it to bits, will you?” said the old man. “Smash it up? Take the wheels off? Get rid of all those spikes? Burn the plans? Yes? When it’s served its purpose, yes?”

  “Well—” Urn began.

  “Aha!”

  “Aha what? What if we do keep it? It’ll be a…a deterrent to other tyrants!”

  “You think tyrants won’t build ’em too?”

  “Well…I can build bigger ones!” Urn shouted.

  Didactylos sagged. “Yes,” he said. “No doubt you can. So that’s all right, then. My word. And to think I was worrying. And now…I think I’ll go and have a rest somewhere…”

  He looked hunched up, and suddenly old.

  “Master?” said Urn.

  “Don’t ‘master’ me,” said Didactylos, feeling his way along the barn walls to the door. “I can see you know every bloody thing there is to know about human nature now. Hah!”

  The Great God Om slid down the side of an irrigation ditch and landed on his back in the weeds at the bottom. He righted himself by gripping a root with his mouth and hauling himself over.

  The shape of Brutha’s thoughts flickered back and forth in his mind. He couldn’t make out any actual words, but he didn’t need to, any more than you needed to see the ripples to know which way the river flowed.

  Occasionally, when he could see the Citadel as a gleaming dot in the twilight, he’d try shouting his own mind back as loudly as he could:

  “Wait! Wait! You don’t want to do that! We can go to Ankh-Morpork! Land of opportunity! With my brains and your…with you, the world is our mollusk! Why throw it all away…”

  And then he’d slide into another furrow. Once or twice he saw the eagle, forever circling.

  “Why put your hand into a grinder? This place deserves Vorbis! Sheep deserve to be led!”

  It had been like this when his very first believer had been stoned to death. Of course, by then he had dozens of other believers. But it had been a wrench. It had been upsetting. You never forgot your first believer. They gave you shape.

  Tortoises are not well equipped for cross-country navigation. They need longer legs or shallower ditches.

  Om estimated that he was doing less than a fifth of a mile an hour in a direct line, and the Citadel was at least twenty miles away. Occasionally he made good time between the trees in an olive grove, but that was more than pulled back by rocky ground and field walls.

  All the time, as his legs whirred, Brutha’s thoughts buzzed in his head like a distant bee.

  He tried shouting in his mind again.

  “What’ve you got? He’s got an army! You’ve got an army? How many divisions have you got?”

  But thoughts like that needed energy, and there was a limit to the amount of energy available in one tortoise. He found a bunch of fallen grapes and gobbled them until the juice covered his head, but it didn’t make a lot of difference.

  And then there was nightfall. Nights here weren’t as cold as the desert, but they weren’t as warm as the day. He’d slow down at night as his blood cooled. He wouldn’t be able to think as fast. Or walk as fast.

  He was losing heat already. Heat meant speed.

  He pulled himself up on to an anthill—

  “You’re going to die! You’re going to die!”

  —and slid down the other side.

  Preparations for the inauguration of the Cenobiarch Prophet began many hours before the dawn. Firstly, and not according to ancient tradition, there was a very careful search of the temple by Deacon Cusp and some of his colleagues. There was a prowling for tripwires and a poking of odd corners for hidden archers. Although it was against the thread, Deacon Cusp had his head screwed on. He also sent a few squads into the town to round up the usual suspects. The Quisition always found it advisable to leave a few suspects at large. Then you knew where to find them when you needed them.

  After that a dozen lesser priests arrived to shrive the premises and drive out all afreets, djinns, and devils. Deacon Cusp watched them without comment. He’d never had any personal dealings with supernatural entities, but he knew what a well-placed arrow would do to an unexpecting stomach.

  Someone tapped him on the rib-cage. He gasped at the sudden linkage of real life into the chain of thought, and reached instinctively for his dagger.

  “Oh,” he said.

  Lu-Tze nodded and smiled and indicated with his broom that Deacon Cusp was standing on a patch of floor that he, Lu-Tze, wished to sweep.

  “Hello, you ghastly little yellow fool,” said Deacon Cusp.

  Nod, smile.

  “Never say a bloody word, do you?” said Deacon Cusp.

  Smile, smile.

  “Idiot.”

  Smile. Smile. Watch.

  Urn stood back.

  “Now,” he said, “you sure you’ve got it all?”

  “Easy,” said Simony, who was sitting in the Turtle’s saddle.

  “Tell me again,” said Urn.

  “We-stoke-up-the-firebox,” said Simony. “Then-when-the-red-needle-points-to-XXVI, turn-the-brass-tap; when-the-bronze-whistle-blows, pull-the-big-lever. And steer by pulling the ropes.”

  “Right,” said Urn. But he still looked doubtful. “It’s a precision device,” he said.

  “And I am a professional soldier,” said Simony. “I’m not a superstitious peasant.”

  “Fine, fine. Well…if you’re sure…”

  They’d had time to put a few finishing touches to the Moving Turtle. There were serrated edges to the shell and spikes on the wheels. And of course the waste steam pipe…he was a little uncertain about the waste steam pipe…

  “It’s merely a device,” said Simony. “It does not present a problem.”

  “Give us an hour, then. You should just get to the Temple by the time we get the doors open.”

  “Right. Understood. Off you go. Sergeant Fergmen knows the way.”

  Urn looked at the steam pipe and bit his lip. I don’t know what effect it’s going to have on the enemy, he thought, but it scares the hells out of me.

  Brutha woke up, or at least ceased trying to sleep. Lu-Tze had gone. Probably sweeping somewhere.

  He wandered through the deserted corridors of the novice section. It would be hours before the new Cenobiarch was crowned. There were dozens of ceremonies to be undertaken first. Everyone who was anyone would be in the Place and the surrounding piazzas, and so would th
e even greater number of people who were no one very much. The sestinas were empty, the endless prayers left unsung. The Citadel might have been dead, were it not for the huge indefinable background roar of tens of thousands of people being silent. Sunlight filtered down through the light-wells.

  Brutha had never felt more alone. The wilderness had been a feast of fun compared to this. Last night…last night, with Lu-Tze, it had all seemed so clear. Last night he had been in a mood to confront Vorbis there and then. Last night there seemed to be a chance. Anything was possible last night. That was the trouble with last nights. They were always followed by this mornings.

  He wandered out into the kitchen level, and then into the outside world. There were one or two cooks around, preparing the ceremonial meal of meat, bread, and salt, but they paid him no attention at all.

  He sat down outside one of the slaughterhouses. There was, he knew, a back gate somewhere around. Probably no one would stop him, today, if he walked out. Today they would be looking for unwanted people walking in.

  He could just walk away. The wilderness had seemed quite pleasant, apart from the thirst and hunger. St. Ungulant with his madness and his mushrooms seemed to have life exactly right. It didn’t matter if you fooled yourself provided you didn’t let yourself know it, and did it well. Life was so much simpler, in the desert.

  But there were a dozen guards by the gate. They had an unsympathetic look. He went back to his seat, which was tucked away in a corner, and stared gloomily at the ground.

  If Om was alive, surely he could send a sign?

  A grating by Brutha’s sandals lifted itself up a few inches and slid aside. He stared at the hole.

  A hooded head appeared, stared back, and disappeared again. There was a subterranean whispering. The head reappeared, and was followed by a body. It pulled itself on to the cobbles. The hood was pushed back. The man grinned conspiratorially at Brutha, put his finger to his lips and then, without warning, launched himself at him with violent intent.

  Brutha rolled across the cobbles and raised his hands frantically as he saw the gleam of metal. One filthy hand clamped against his mouth. A knifeblade made a dramatic and very final silhouette against the light—