Fantasy Fic: One God for All People
Posted: 2003-05-29 11:21pm
One God for all People
Looking West
The Successor looked over his chambers. His was the grandest permanent dwelling in the land of men, which was to say that it was not very grand at all. It was masonry, and the rough stone walls were hidden by tapestries, but it was bare. The empty expanse of desert and grassland left to the weakest of the speaking peoples produced little more than that which came from herds of animals. There might have been gold beneath the sand and dirt, but the men did not have the expertise or tools to find it.
This was one thing that the Successor wished to change.
“What is a man, Busar?” he asked his general.
Busar pursed his lips and considered it, “A man is the weakest of creatures. Like the other speaking races, he lacks the natural defenses of horns, fangs, and claws. But he also lacks the skill and strength that God had rewarded his cousins with.”
Idra, the Successor to the prophet and the leader of God’s house on Earth, nodded, “This is why we live in lands of poverty, yes?”
“Yes. The old writings say that we once lived in rich lands to the west, but that stronger speaking peoples came to push us aside,” Busar replied, “such was God’s will.”
“For only in the wasteland could we learn to fully submit ourselves to Him and to listen to the words of His prophet on Earth,” said Idra, “and this is His gift to us.”
Busar shrugged, feeling the rough touch of his woolen robes against his shoulders. This was all fundamental to the religion that he followed; he had learned this as a child in his grandmother’s yurt. The Successor was getting at something, but he was a political and religious creature. He did not have the directness of a soldier like Busar. The general wished his superior would get to the point.
“Now, it is time for us to send this gift out of the steppe. As the prophet spoke in his last days, ‘After the men who live in felt tents have showed the riders of camels and the dwellers in the river cities the light of God, it will be time for them to turn their horses west and spread the holiness to the other speaking peoples.’ Have we not now conquered these people and turn their minds of the service of God?”
Busar had personally conquered the river people. Their characteristics came easily to mind, because they were a settled nation of men. This made them both easier and more difficult to conquer; easy because they did not have to be hunted like steppe or desert nomads, hard because they had fortifications that defied Busar’s horsemen, and more numerous iron weapons. They had been a rewarding victory, for they entered easily into God’s house, like most worshippers of many Gods and idolaters, and they brought all their expertise with them. As artisans, they were no match for the shortmen of the west, but they were better than the scattered blacksmiths of the steppe.
This made it all the more infuriating that the Successor continued to meander uselessly around the subject which he was addressing. This style of conversation was causing Busar’s mind to wander just as much as Idra’s speech.
“Have we not, Busar?” Idra asked again. Apparently it was not a rhetorical question.
Busar sighed and nodded, “We have done this.”
“Then it is settled. You will turn your army to the west, and lay low those that would oppose the House of God, and convert those who survive your onslaught. Let the west embrace the One God.”
At the point of a sword, the general thought, the point of my sword.
----
Busar exited the palace of the Successor to the emptiness of the grassland. The river Vulge slid past the complex of buildings, completed only a few months ago. It was a wide, slow-flowing swamp of a river, but that would change. On his way to his horse, the general paused to look at the shortmen engineers, drawing up plans to drain the outlying marshes, narrow the course of the Vulge, and to build the new ‘City of God on Earth’, as the Successor had grandiosely dubbed his plans.
Busar stared as the little men tugged on their beards and waddled about on short legs. At little more than thirteen hands from feet to crown, yet weighing as much as an average sixteen-hand man, they were grotesque barrel-shaped creatures. But God balanced his gifts with his curses, the general reflected. The shortmen were smarter and more skilled than regular men. This was why they had been brought from far away to design the Successor’s new city and improve the land.
This was true of all the speaking peoples. Troll-kin were strong and powerful, but led lives as primitive as a bear’s. An elf might live his two-hundred years without bearing an heir. And Busar had just spent a tedious few minutes talking about men. Each race had its power and its lament. The world was like the poles of a yurt, which fitted together to form a useful whole.
It would be Busar’s purpose to go to the west and gather these poles; God would fit them together.
I’d like feedback, to decide whether to continue or not.
Looking West
The Successor looked over his chambers. His was the grandest permanent dwelling in the land of men, which was to say that it was not very grand at all. It was masonry, and the rough stone walls were hidden by tapestries, but it was bare. The empty expanse of desert and grassland left to the weakest of the speaking peoples produced little more than that which came from herds of animals. There might have been gold beneath the sand and dirt, but the men did not have the expertise or tools to find it.
This was one thing that the Successor wished to change.
“What is a man, Busar?” he asked his general.
Busar pursed his lips and considered it, “A man is the weakest of creatures. Like the other speaking races, he lacks the natural defenses of horns, fangs, and claws. But he also lacks the skill and strength that God had rewarded his cousins with.”
Idra, the Successor to the prophet and the leader of God’s house on Earth, nodded, “This is why we live in lands of poverty, yes?”
“Yes. The old writings say that we once lived in rich lands to the west, but that stronger speaking peoples came to push us aside,” Busar replied, “such was God’s will.”
“For only in the wasteland could we learn to fully submit ourselves to Him and to listen to the words of His prophet on Earth,” said Idra, “and this is His gift to us.”
Busar shrugged, feeling the rough touch of his woolen robes against his shoulders. This was all fundamental to the religion that he followed; he had learned this as a child in his grandmother’s yurt. The Successor was getting at something, but he was a political and religious creature. He did not have the directness of a soldier like Busar. The general wished his superior would get to the point.
“Now, it is time for us to send this gift out of the steppe. As the prophet spoke in his last days, ‘After the men who live in felt tents have showed the riders of camels and the dwellers in the river cities the light of God, it will be time for them to turn their horses west and spread the holiness to the other speaking peoples.’ Have we not now conquered these people and turn their minds of the service of God?”
Busar had personally conquered the river people. Their characteristics came easily to mind, because they were a settled nation of men. This made them both easier and more difficult to conquer; easy because they did not have to be hunted like steppe or desert nomads, hard because they had fortifications that defied Busar’s horsemen, and more numerous iron weapons. They had been a rewarding victory, for they entered easily into God’s house, like most worshippers of many Gods and idolaters, and they brought all their expertise with them. As artisans, they were no match for the shortmen of the west, but they were better than the scattered blacksmiths of the steppe.
This made it all the more infuriating that the Successor continued to meander uselessly around the subject which he was addressing. This style of conversation was causing Busar’s mind to wander just as much as Idra’s speech.
“Have we not, Busar?” Idra asked again. Apparently it was not a rhetorical question.
Busar sighed and nodded, “We have done this.”
“Then it is settled. You will turn your army to the west, and lay low those that would oppose the House of God, and convert those who survive your onslaught. Let the west embrace the One God.”
At the point of a sword, the general thought, the point of my sword.
----
Busar exited the palace of the Successor to the emptiness of the grassland. The river Vulge slid past the complex of buildings, completed only a few months ago. It was a wide, slow-flowing swamp of a river, but that would change. On his way to his horse, the general paused to look at the shortmen engineers, drawing up plans to drain the outlying marshes, narrow the course of the Vulge, and to build the new ‘City of God on Earth’, as the Successor had grandiosely dubbed his plans.
Busar stared as the little men tugged on their beards and waddled about on short legs. At little more than thirteen hands from feet to crown, yet weighing as much as an average sixteen-hand man, they were grotesque barrel-shaped creatures. But God balanced his gifts with his curses, the general reflected. The shortmen were smarter and more skilled than regular men. This was why they had been brought from far away to design the Successor’s new city and improve the land.
This was true of all the speaking peoples. Troll-kin were strong and powerful, but led lives as primitive as a bear’s. An elf might live his two-hundred years without bearing an heir. And Busar had just spent a tedious few minutes talking about men. Each race had its power and its lament. The world was like the poles of a yurt, which fitted together to form a useful whole.
It would be Busar’s purpose to go to the west and gather these poles; God would fit them together.
I’d like feedback, to decide whether to continue or not.
