The God Engines

by John Scalzi

  “Head for the Holy,” Tephe said. “It was damaged in an engagement off Endsa when I was first officer. It is structurally weaker to port.”

  “You were first officer a long time ago,” Forn said. “The ship has been to dock since you served on it.”

  “Now would be a very good time to have faith, Neal,” Tephe said.

  “Yes, sir,” Forn said, and gave the order.

  “Tell the crew that the ships opposing us have been taken by faithless,” Tephe said. “We will not be attacking Our Lord’s ships. We will be taking them back for Him, or destroying them if necessary.”

  “Yes, sir,” Forn said, and spread the word through the ranks. Tephe wondered briefly if the crews of the five ships bearing down on them had been told the same thing about the Righteous.

  The Holy’s port side was indeed still weaker. The Righteous launched a volley the moment it was within range and took the Holy and its crew unaware, ripping open the other ship’s side. The Righteous rolled slowly to evade the Holy’s haphazardly launched counterattack and slipped out of that ship’s range as quickly as it had slipped into it.

  “We should finish her off,” Forn said.

  “We do not have missiles to spare,” Tephe said, scanning the battle image. “She is down and disabled and behind us, and our god is not inexhaustible. Look,” he said, pointing at the path of the Righteous. “We have put distance between us and both the Faithful and the Sacred, and the Sainted and Redeemer are farther behind still. If we maintain speed they cannot catch us.”

  “Until their gods recover their strength enough to send them directly into our path,” Forn said.

  “Enough time for us to bring our priest to his senses,” Tephe said.

  “Or to kill him,” Forn said, and then caught the look his captain gave him. “If it will save this ship, captain, I would do it, and I would face Our Lord Himself for it. Our entire crew is worth one priest,” he said.

  “And your soul?” Tephe asked.

  “Let me worry about my soul, captain,” Forn said. “You worry about staying out of range of those ships.”

  Tephe smiled and turned back to the image in time to see four new ships appear and array themselves along the path of the Righteous.

  Forn saw the expression change on his captain’s face and followed his gaze to the image. “Oh, damn,” he said.

  They knew, Tephe thought. They knew I would go for the Holy. They put her in my path as a lure to box me in. Now we have no escape. I have killed my crew.

  No, a voice in his head said, and it sounded to him like the god of the Righteous. You didn’t kill them. Your precious lord did.

  In that moment, Captain Ean Tephe lost his faith. Just for a moment.

  All over the Righteous, lights flickered. Tephe’s bridge crew began to inform him of systems failing all over the ship.

  There was a vibration in the soles of Tephe’s boots, deep and thrumming, coming from somewhere in the bowels of the Righteous. Once, twice, three times. Then it stopped.

  Tend to your faith, each of you, Tephe remembered priest Andso saying, not too long before. If every officer on this ship were as you, the Defiled would have long ago slipped its bonds.

  “No,” Tephe said, to himself, as his crew shouted reports of more system failures at him.

  And then suddenly stopped shouting, as if something even more remarkable had just happened.

  Tephe turned and saw Shalle standing in front of him.

  “You are out of the rookery,” Tephe said, stupidly.

  “I’m not the only thing out where it shouldn’t be, Captain,” Shalle said. “And of the two, it’s the other one you need to be concerned about.”

  It was easy to follow the path of the god. Tephe just followed the blood and the bodies, and the distant vibrations of the god’s footfalls.

  You need to get the god back to its chamber, Shalle had said to him, as the two of them entered his quarters, Shalle having directed them there at speed. It’s the only place where it can be held long enough for me to do what I have to do.

  What do you mean, Tephe said.

  You don’t need to know what I mean, Ean, Shalle said, hands finding the captain’s personal safe and opening it with the combination Tephe did not remember sharing with anyone. You just have to do what I say.

  You, Tephe said. You are the bishops’ spy on the Righteous.

  No, Shalle said, and pulled out a small chest. I am Our Lord’s rook. I answer to neither captains nor bishops, though I serve both when Our Lord doesn’t have anything else He wants me to do. Right now He wants me to do this.

  Shalle opened the chest and gave Tephe the whip inside of it. Single made iron, Shalle said. Even now the god will be scared of it. Use it. Drive it back into the chamber, Ean. There’s not much time. Those ships are going to blow us out of the sky sooner than you think. Get going.

  Where is the god going? Tephe asked.

  I think you know, Shalle said. There’s someone on this ship it likes less than everyone else. Go. Shalle left and headed toward the godchamber.

  Tephe caught up with god where he expected it, with the priest Andso. From a distance, the god appeared to be holding the priest in a long and tender kiss. As the captain approached, the kiss transfigured itself. The god had torn off the priest’s jaw and was leisurely consuming his tongue. Tephe hoped the priest was already dead.

  On either side of the priest his acolytes lay crumpled, pikes tossed aside, missing their heads. The hallway stank of blood.

  The god was fondling something on the priest’s chest. It was the Talent it had sought for so long. Between chews, the god sighed as it stroked the Talent. As it did so, its body shifted and changed. Freed of its constraints, the god was returning to its own form. The god did not seem to notice that Tephe was behind it. Tephe looked back, imagining the path to the godchamber in his head. As silently as he could, he came to within striking distance of the god.

  Be with me now, My Lord, Tephe thought.

  For the first and last time, Tephe spoke the god’s name.

  The god turned and screamed as the whip caught it in the face, tearing through cheek and eyelid and puncturing eyeball with a serrated snap. The god howled and grabbed at the ruin of its face, tearing the Talent off the dead priest as it brought its hand up. It fluttered in the air; Tephe followed it for a moment and then lost it as the god writhed, slipped on the blood on the walkway and fell with a crash.

  Tephe did not wait for the god to get up. He ran at full speed toward the godchamber.

  The god was behind him within seconds, colliding into bulkheads, screams in the god’s own terrible language tearing at the captain like lashes. Twice he felt the scrape of claws against his back and neck. Only his knowledge of his own ship and the damage he had inflicted on the god kept the creature from catching him and killing him short of the godchamber.

  The open portal of the godchamber came into view. Tephe threw himself at it, turning as he did to see what the god had become.

  The god had transformed into something insectoid. Two larger eyes, one ruined, stared unblinking at the captain, malevolent jewels. A row of smaller, faceted eyes sat above where eyebrows would have been. Jaws expanded to contain shearing pinchers, held wide. Arms had split laterally, cutting blades on each new arm where fingers had been.

  Tephe lashed out at it again with the whip but without force. The god caught the whip, wrapped it around an arm and pulled it from the captain’s grip. It tossed it aside and opened its arms wide, fingerblades flashing as it prepared to tear Tephe apart.

  Shalle entered the chamber and uttered a word that drove the god across the chamber and into a far wall. Tephe looked up at his lover, amazed.

  “Close the portal,” Shalle said to him, staring at the god. “Get the whip. Help me.”

  Tephe staggered to the portal to find Neal Forn on the other side.

  “The other ships have stopped advancing,” Forn said.

  “Their gods are waiti
ng,” Tephe said.

  “Waiting for what?” Forn said.

  Tephe pulled the portal shut.

  Chapter Eleven

  “Don’t let it get out,” Shalle said. “Don’t let it near the portal.”

  “No,” Tephe said, and as he did the god rushed Shalle, who spoke a word and drove the god back into the wall once more, howling.

  “Drive it into the iron circle!” Tephe yelled. The god feinted toward the captain. He swung the whip around, fast and accurate. The god moved back and its attention turned toward the rook, blades twitching. Tephe moved forward, ready. The god waited for its moment to strike.

  “The circle is broken,” Shalle said. “Too many of the crew lost their faith. A circle broken cannot be renewed. This god is no longer a slave. It has to be killed.”

  The god wailed and flung itself at Shalle. Tephe yelled and lashed the whip. It caught the god in the abdomen, driving it to the floor. Tephe lashed it again, and once more. He drew his arm back a third time and found it held by Shalle.

  “Enough,” Shalle said.

  “You said it must be killed,” Tephe said.

  “Yes,” Shalle said, and smiled. “But I didn’t say by you. You’ve weakened it enough for me to bind it. That’s enough.”

  From the floor, the god spat blood and spoke from a mouth no longer suited for words. “Stupid,” it said. “All will die today. This ship will be destroyed whether you kill me or not. Your lord countenanced it.”

  “Perhaps,” Shalle said. “But that was before you got loose. If this ship were destroyed with you within your circle, you would still be His slave and Our Lord could collect you as He would. But now you are unbound. If the Righteous is destroyed you could escape. Our Lord would rather see you dead, god. Of that I am certain. Now,” Shalle uttered another word and the god stiffened and lay immobile. “be still, creature. Your fate is coming.” The rook’s gaze went back to the captain.

  “You knew the Righteous was to be destroyed on this mission,” Tephe said.

  “No,” Shalle said. “I did not. But it doesn’t surprise me now.”

  “You seem unconcerned,” Tephe said, and his voice held something it had never held before when speaking to Shalle: reproach.

  “Our lives are Our Lord’s, Ean,” Shalle said, lightly, and touched his face. “One day or another we meet Him and receive our judgment. If this was to be our day, would that be so bad? We have helped Our Lord strengthen Himself in the face of His enemies. We have kept the secrets of His rule secure so that His peace could continue.”

  “A peace based on deception,” Tephe said.

  “It is not deception to tell the faithful no more than they need to know to keep their faith alive,” Shalle said. “Our Lord has told no lies here.”

  “No lies?” Tephe said, incredulous. “Our lord ate the souls of His newly faithful, Shalle. The bishops said those people were to be converted, not killed!”

  “Then it is the bishops who lied to you, Ean,” Shalle said, and then dug a toe into the supine god. “And so did this one. I know you spoke to it alone. I can guess what it told you. A story about Our Lord as a criminal, as a mad god. Right?”

  Tephe nodded. Shalle smiled and touched him again.

  “The god is devious, Ean. It sensed what Our Lord had done out of urgent necessity. It knew you would struggle with your faith, and knew the faith of the crew would be tested. And it knew it could break the circle of iron by breaking your faith and the faith of the crew. Think, Ean. It knew all these things. And it lies. Did you really expect it would tell you the truth?”

  From the floor, the god uttered a high pitched wheeze. Tephe recognized it for what it was: A laugh, bitter and cold.

  “Your faith has been tested,” Shalle said. “You passed that test. And now you will be rewarded.”

  “My ship and my crew are to be destroyed to keep Our Lord’s secret,” Tephe said. “There is no reward for us. That much truth this god has told.”

  “No,” Shalle said. “Because I know something it doesn’t.” Shalle pressed something into Tephe’s hand. He looked at it.

  “Your Talent,” Tephe said.

  “Yes,” Shalle said. “Look at it and tell me what you see.”

  Tephe looked at the symbol of the Talent. It had seemed familiar before but he had not been able to place it. Now he could, and his heart sank.

  “It is a Talent of Entrance,” he said.

  “Yes,” Shalle said taking back the Talent. “But more than that. It is also a Talent of Obligation. A rook does many things for Our Lord, Tephe. We comfort His crews. We’re His eyes and ears. We carry His secrets. And when necessary, we call to Him and become the door through which He brings Himself. In return we are given a gift. When we call Him, we may ask Him for a thing. A wish. A promise. By His own laws, He must oblige.”

  “You are going to call Him here,” Tephe said.

  “To deal with this god, yes,” Shalle said. “And when I do, I’ll get my wish. And my wish is for you and the Righteous and every faithful on it to live.”

  “All but one,” Tephe said.

  “Yes,” Shalle said. “All but one, Ean.”

  “Stop this, Shalle,” Tephe said. “Let me kill the god.”

  “And then let those ships kill you?” Shalle smiled and kissed Tephe. “You silly man. You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said. Our lives are Our Lord’s. I’ve made peace with the fact that I am going to die today, Ean. One way or another. This way I get to save you. And the ship and the crew you love. You will live because of me. And that’s a comforting thought. You know how I am about these things.”

  “I thought I did,” Tephe said.

  Shalle kissed Tephe again, and held his face. “None of us are all of who we are to any one person, Ean. I told you that once. I’m sorry if you thought you knew all of me. But you can know this for truth. I love you.”

  One last kiss, and then the rook stood apart. “Goodbye, Ean,” Shalle said, smiled again, and spoke a single word.

  Tephe turned away as Shalle’s body unfolded in a veil of blood.

  When he looked again, through tears, His Lord was standing there, as tall as He was at Cthicx, looking at him with mild curiosity. Tephe stepped away from the god on the floor, assuming His Lord would be more interested in it. He was not. He gazed at the captain.

  YOU SHOULD BE DEAD NOW—Tephe heard in his mind.

  “No, Lord,” Tephe said. “Your rook Shalle wished for you to spare me, my crew and my ship. You are obliged to grant this wish.”

  NO—Tephe heard, and then felt the air rush from him. His Lord casually gripped him as if he were a small child, and prepared to consume his soul.

  Tephe gazed at His Lord, who was even now crushing the life from him, and did something in what he knew were to be his last few seconds of life that he did not expect. He laughed, squeezed and thready, as his ribs began to snap.

  And found he was not the only one laughing.

  From the floor, the supine god of the Righteous began a choking laugh. Tephe’s Lord, distracted, gazed over at the god on the floor. The god rolled and revealed in its bladed fingers a Talent. The Talent Tephe had taken from the woman in the street and that the god had taken from the priest Andso. A Talent that Tephe has thought was from the god, but now realized was not.

  A Talent which Tephe now recognized as a Talent of Entrance.

  A god can’t be an entran—Tephe thought, and then the god spoke a thundering word and the room went terribly white.

  Tephe felt himself lift from His Lord’s grip and slam into a far wall of the godchamber, crushing ribs that had not yet broken. Blood forced itself from Tephe’s lips as he collapsed to the floor. When he was able to lift his eyes, Tephe saw His Lord, backing Himself against a wall, hissing at the thing lifting itself from the twitching wreckage of what was the Righteous’ god. The thing was indistinct, blindingly bright and unspeakably beautiful.

  The gods have gods, Tephe thought, and looked at His
Lord shying away from the thing in front of Him. And mine is afraid of His.

  His Lord tried to slip away and under and over this new thing, and found Himself blocked each time as a sudden appendage appeared to burn Him, or shock Him, or taunt Him. The new thing kept advancing on Him, slowly and inevitably.

  At last Tephe’s Lord stopped trying to escape. He drew His head back and offered a scream that took Tephe to the edge of madness. Tephe screamed himself.

  As he did, Tephe’s Lord changed form, from the beautiful man He had always been to something primal and powerful, unlovely and rank—into what Tephe knew now was as His Lord had been, before He met those He would make His people.

  The new thing stopped advancing on Tephe’s Lord, and moved back, spreading its appendages as if to offer Tephe’s Lord an embrace, or to dare Him to advance.

  Tephe’s Lord turned into all sharp edges and thrust Himself at it, keening as it did so. The new thing held itself open, inviting Tephe’s Lord in, and then spun and closed with a metallic snap. Tephe’s Lord flew into slices, spraying godblood as He did so.

  Tephe felt something rip and tear inside his mind: the place of his faith, the part where His Lord lived in him, pulled out from him in the moment His Lord had fallen. Around him Tephe heard dull howling and knew it came from the crew of the Righteous, as Their Lord disintegrated, taking their faith and their Talents with Him. Captain Tephe closed his eyes and tried to keep his sanity intact within the bereft vertigo of his soul.

  An endless time later Tephe opened his eyes and saw the new thing hovering above him, considering him. Tephe had no idea what to do and chose to avert his eyes from it.

  In time the new thing drifted from him. It went first to the whip, which lay discarded on the floor. The thing seemed to consider it for a moment, and then reached appendages to it, picking the whip apart. Chunks of iron made small clattering sounds as they fell to the ground. The godskin and bone disappeared.

  That finished, the new thing moved again and went to the ruin of the god of the Righteous. As it had with the whip, the thing reached out appendages to the ruin, moving the pieces and chunks of the body and gathering them together in a pile.