Small Gods

but…
    “Just don’t ask me about the second or third time,” he said quietly to himself.

    Vorbis sat in the stone chair in his garden, papers strewn around him.
    “Well?”
    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.