Mar 04, 2011 02:04
It was not so very long ago that gods were everywhere.
There was not just one great god who lived in the general direction of the stratosphere. There was not a revered pantheon who lived on a mountain, away from humankind. There were gods for everything. Gods of cities, gods of mountains, gods of oceans. Gods of deserts, gods of plains, gods of scrub and gods of woodlands. There was a God of the Sun and a God of the Moon and a God of The Sunset On Mid-Autumn Days When The Sky Looks More Red Than Blue.
The biggest cities, where gods were most likely to get the best prayers and the choicest sacrificial offerings, were downright lousy with gods. In Msenmya, where the Emperor kept his palace, there were gods who lived in fountains, in palaces, in bridges and marketplaces, and even gods in latrines (which could be slightly embarrassing in the case of the God of Penis Envy). There was even Simmlé, the Goddess of Athlete’s Foot, who took up residence in the stinkiest shoe in the city, and how she cursed the man who dared to put his foot in her mouth, which is how we derive the phrase.
But not every place was Msenmya. Some places were Tennu-Tikba.
Tennu-Tikba was a dusty little town whose chief export was pillows full of seed husks to block the drafts that sneak in beneath the cracks in doors. While they had never been able to sustain more than one god among them, they were very devoted to the god they had. This god was Hirue, the god of sweetness, who had taken up residence in the town’s well. And so, Tennu-Tikba was blessed with the sweetest water in the world.
This meant that, as small as it was, Tennu-Tikba was often a stop for travelers, who often bought the beautiful yet functional draft-blocking pillows that the townspeople crafted, and perhaps a cake or a loaf of bread from the baker, who sent her son, Gibal, out with a little tray to offer refreshments by the well each day. Since her goods were baked with Hirue’s water, they were always sweet and delicious.
All was well until the day a strange visitor not passed through town. He was tall and richly-dressed. Travel-weary and throat-parched, he dismounted his steed, and gave Gibal a gold coin to hold the reins. Gibal had never seen a coin, let alone a gold one, and he thought perhaps it was something to eat, until he tried to bite into it. Disappointed to discover it was inedible, he put it in his pocket.
The stranger tasted the water. It was sweet, like honey and apples and grapes, all at once. “What is this miraculous thing?!” he asked.
“It is called a well,” said Gibal. “Do you not have them where you are from?”
“No, no, I know that, boy!” said the stranger. “What makes your water so sweet?”
“Our well is inhabited by Hirue, the god of sweetness,” said Gibal. “Would you like to buy a cake baked with Hirue’s water? Or perhaps a pillow to block the drafts beneath your door?”
“I do not have any drafts,” said the stranger, “but I will try a cake.” He gave Gibal another gold coin in exchange for a small cake.
The stranger bit into the cake and pronounced, “Extraordinary!” although that was not extraordinary in and of itself, because many people made exclamations after tasting Hirue’s water.
What was extraordinary was that the stranger returned, in the dead of night, and leaned over the well and whispered to Hirue. He whispered of his lush palace, which had cinnamon and sugar. He whispered of his own well, which was built of solid gold, with a pump, and a furnace that could warm the water to any temperature desired. For the stranger was the Emperor himself, and his palace was the most modern and opulent of wonders.
In the morning, the townsfolk came to collect their water for the day. The smell that came from the well was not the usual scent of honey and flower petals, but one of moss with a slight hint of algae and clay. They quickly realized that Hirue was gone!
“This is terrible!” said the Town Chancellor. “We can’t be without a god!”
“I agree!” said the Town Treasurer. “And once the travelers find out that we no longer have a remarkable well, who will buy our cakes and draft-blocking-pillows?”
Although this was not too long ago in the grand scheme of Creation, this was certainly before the internet, so becoming a mail-order fulfillment house was out of the question for the people of Tennu-Tikba.
“We must not have prayed enough,” said the Priest. “We ought to all pray for Hirue’s return.”
“There’s only one thing to do,” said the Town Elder, who was a wise, wise woman, not so much because she was so old, but because she smoked a lot of mind-expanding substances that would be illegal now if they weren’t extinct. “We need to get a new god.”
Everyone agreed. But the people of Tennu-Tikba were not sure how to attract a new god to their well.
Then, one morning soon after, when everyone was becoming accustomed to slightly mossy-tasting wellwater, Gibal’s mother found the two gold coins in Gibal’s clothing.
She could not comprehend where Gibal had gotten such wealth! But she took the coins to the town leaders, who were delighted. They used the money to place an advertisement with many town criers throughout the Empire, calling for a new god to inhabit their well.
“Any minute now,” the Town Chancellor said eagerly, rubbing his hands together. “Any minute, and the new gods will be coming.”
And come they did. The trouble was that most of them came because they hadn’t attracted followers in the larger cities and towns, and usually there was quite a good reason for this. They very politely turned down the God of Off-Key Singing and the Goddess of Sleepwalking, who kept putting her shoes in the Town Chancellor’s larder. They had a little more trouble with the God of Urinary Tract Infections, who was so disappointed that he cursed the whole town so that everyone was walking funny for a week and drinking a lot of cranberry juice.
Then, one day, a beautiful god came into town. He was tall and muscular and wore brilliant, shining armor. The people of Tennu-Tikba were quite taken with him at once.
“What are you God of?” asked the town leaders.
“I am Ratir, God of Bloodlust!” he bellowed, and brandished a beautiful sword.
The town leaders traded a skeptical look. “And what can you, er, offer the town of Tennu-Tikba?” asked the Town Treasurer. “You understand that we are looking for a replacement well god?”
“Yes!” answered Ratir. “When I inhabit your well, those who drink from it will be spurred to a deadly rampage! It will be glorious.”
“Hmm,” said the town leaders. Everyone was a little afraid to turn him down.
Finally, the Town Elder spoke. “Thank you,” she said. “We’ll be in touch.”
This phrase was so effective that it is used at the end of awkward job interviews even to this day.
Meanwhile, Gibal was having a difficult time out at the well. It had only been a few weeks, so the travelers were still coming, and of course there was a nice bit of side business because of the gods who were coming in and out of the town. But it was much harder to sell bread that tasted vaguely of algae than it was to sell the sweetest bread in the world. Fortunately, the draft-blocking pillows had not been adversely affected by the current situation.
Gibal was having a very slow day, and had taken to dropping pebbles into the well. He pretended they were divers, diving off dangerous cliffs.
“In you go,” he said to the pebbles. “Jump in, in you go.”
Plonk, plonk, plonk, in they went. Then, he found a rather funny pebble. It had a spiral shape to it, and was smooth and shiny, and a bit gooey on one end. He dropped it into the well, too.
“In you go,” he said.
Plonk.
Suddenly, a mist formed around the well, and a small, pale, and rather damp-looking little girl manifested, as if from the mist itself.
“Thank you!” she said.
Gibal jumped back. “Who are you?” he asked.
The damp child gave a little bow. Behind him, Gibal could see dozens of those funny little stones, stuck to the surface of the well. He squinted-- one of them seemed to be moving. Then he realized it was more than just one-- it was all of them, all moving, slowly, to be sure, but steadily, into the well.
“Oh, no!” exclaimed Gibal. “What are you doing? Help!” he cried. “Help, help! Poisoning the well!”
The cry went up around town, and the town leaders came running to see Gibal flailing and crying and the strange damp child looking rather mystified.
“What’s going on here?” asked the Town Chancellor.
“What are those things climbing into our well?!” asked the Town Treasurer.
“They’re animals,” said the Town Elder, giggling as she picked one up. “See? Little animals with shells.”
“Yes,” said the girl. “I am Kibit, the Goddess of Snails. This young man has invited me to live in your well.”
“I did?” asked Gibal.
“Why yes,” said Kibit. “You tossed me in, and said, ‘in you go.’ That is as good an invitation as any. Please? Please, may I stay? I have never been invited before. Usually I am only thrown out, or people pour salt on me.”
The town leaders supposed they couldn’t very well take it back now. So the water in Tennu-Tikba never quite regained its former glory, and always tasted a little bit of snail shells.
On the other hand, the town became renowned the world over for its fine escargot.
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