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Brutha pulled one off the nearest plant. And lo, he thought, there was another leaf.
You died if you had no believers, and that was what a small god generally worried about.
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 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.
But there hadn’t been the flame. There had been fear, and dread, and yearning, and hope. All those emotions had their flavor. But there hadn’t been the flame.
Or if Brutha died…
…it can’t be just him who believes in me.
If Brutha dies… The tortoise shuddered in its shell. If Brutha died, then it could already hear in its mind’s ear the soughing of the wind in the deep, hot places of the desert. Where the small gods went.
Where do gods come from? Where do they go?
And yet there seemed to be a lot of lesser gods around the place. Koomi’s theory was that gods come into being and grow and flourish because they are believed in. Belief itself is the food of the gods.
Any god could grow in stature as its believers increased.
And dwindle as they decreased.
The sea is always powerful. So many people believe in it. But it seldom answers prayers.
belief is where you find it. Specialization. That’s safe, see. Low risk, guaranteed returns. There’s even a God of Lettuce somewhere.
If enough people believe, you can be god of anything…
“Tell me again. Why exactly are we looking for a philosopher?” said Brutha. “I want to get my power back,” said Om. “But everyone believes in you!” “If they believed in me they could talk to me. I could talk to them. I don’t know what’s gone wrong. No one is worshiping any other gods in Omnia, are they?”
“What is it you fear?” he said. “Here in your desert, with your…gods? Is it not that, deep in your souls, you know that your gods are as shifting as your sand?” “Oh, yes,” said the Tyrant. “We know that. That’s always been a point in their favor. We know about sand. And your God is a rock—and we know about rock.”
“And what do you want to know about gods?” Brutha appeared to be listening. Eventually he said: “How they start. How they grow. And what happens to them afterwards.”
“Now…listen. Do you know how gods get power?” “By people believing in them,” said Brutha. “Millions of people believe in you.” Om hesitated. All right, all right. We are here and it is now. Sooner or later he’ll find out for himself… “They don’t believe,” said Om.
Belief shifts. People start out believing in the god and end up believing in the structure.”
‘Around the Godde there forms a Shelle of prayers and Ceremonies and Buildings and Priestes and Authority, until at Last the Godde Dies. Ande this maye notte be noticed.’”
…a god who was a tortoise. A god that only Brutha believed in? Who did Vorbis talk to when he prayed?
“A city of a million souls,” said the voice of Om, “many of them occupying bodies. And a thousand religions. There’s even a temple to the small gods! Sounds like a place where people don’t have trouble believing things. Not a bad place for a fresh start, I think. With my brains and your…with my brains, we should soon be in business again.”
God. God needed people. Belief was the food of the gods. But they also needed a shape. Gods became what people believed they ought to be.
You gave a god its shape, like a jelly fills a mold.
“Sounds like a miracle to me,” croaked Brutha. “Just because you can explain it doesn’t mean it’s not still a miracle.”
See, every god’s a Great God to someone. I
“Why do people need gods?” Brutha persisted. “Oh, you’ve got to have gods,” said Om, in a hearty, no-nonsense voice. “But it’s gods that need people,” said Brutha. “To do the believing. You said.” Om hesitated. “Well, okay,” he said. “But people have got to believe in something. Yes? I mean, why else does it thunder?”
“Anyway, that’s just an explanation,” said Om. “It’s not a reason.”
“I thought you said there were hundreds of thunder gods,” said Brutha. “Yeah. And he’s all of ’em. Rationalization. A couple of tribes join up, they’ve both got thunder gods, right? And the gods kind of run together—you know how amoebas split?” “No.” “Well, it’s like that, only the other way.”
“Oh, I know you exist,” said Brutha. He felt Om relax a little. “There’s something about tortoises. Tortoises I can believe in. They seem to have a lot of existence in one place. It’s gods in general I’m having difficulty with.”
There were thousands of them. He was stronger, yes, he had a believer, but they filled the sky like locusts.
This wasn’t just a small god. This was a small god who hadn’t always been small…
But how much worse to have been a god, and to now be no more than a smoky bundle of memories, blown back and forth across the sand made from the crumbled stones of your temples…
“The wind god has a sense of humor,” said Om. “Although it’s pretty basic.”
Even the small gods kept away from abandoned temples, for the same reason that people kept away from graveyards.
“You don’t know. That’s what stops everyone going mad, the uncertainty of it, the feeling that it might work out all right after all. But it’s different for gods. We do know. You
“You can’t believe in Great A’Tuin,” he said. “Great A’Tuin exists. There’s no point in believing in things that exist.”
“Gods. And the ones we had back there were the puny ones, mind you.” “What do you mean?” Om sighed. “It’s reasonable, isn’t it? Think about it. The stronger ones hang around the edge, where there’s prey…I mean, people. The weak ones get pushed out to the sandy places, where people hardly ever go—” “The strong gods,” said Brutha, thoughtfully. “Gods that know about being strong.” “That’s right.” “Not gods that know what it feels like to be weak…” “What? They wouldn’t last five minutes. It’s a god-eat-god world.” “Perhaps that explains something about the nature of gods. Strength is hereditary.
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You never forgot your first believer. They gave you shape.
There’s a streak of madness in everyone who spends quality time with gods,
“Everything works both ways.”
You can die for your country or your people or your family, but for a god you should live fully and busily, every day of a long life.”
He wished he knew what to say to them. That’s why he needed people like Brutha. That’s why all gods needed people like Brutha.
