Dancing With Bears - Michael Swanwick [97]
Svarožičmade a questioning gesture. To which Koschei responded: “Yes, you are right, dear one. This means that to our all-powerful Father love and vengeance are one and the same thing. Our sins are so contemptible as to be beneath His notice, and our virtues so slight as to be nonexistent. How then can we hope to coerce that Mighty Gentleman into doing our bidding? Only by praying for Him to ignore our petitions and to do as He would have done had we not so prayed. Join me now, beloved friends, and I will teach you the only righteous and proper prayer there is.”
Koschei closed his eyes briefly, gathering his thoughts. Then, raising his hands to the heavens, he said, “Lord, make us weak! Diminish us steadily as we grow older, enfeeble and unman us, weaken our senses, and then cause us to sicken and die! Make us vicious and unnatural and despicable in your sight! One by one, deprive us of all the pleasures of life, destroy all those we love, make the world hateful to us, and undo all certainties in our lives save only our trust in Your loving kindness.”
Bowing low over his clasped hands, Svarožič prayed so intently that beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. Chernobog had slipped from his chair to kneel, head bowed, upon the carpet.
“Lord God, we further pray to You tonight that Your kind regard will soon fall upon this sinful city to reduce its buildings to cinders and ashes, to level the churches which teach only heresy, to cast down the nobles who rule in defiance of Your wishes, to fill the streets with corpses, and to send the few wretched survivors out into the wilderness to suffer and starve and contemplate Your goodness and die. Amen.”
Chernobog regained his seat. “The wrath of God is sweet,” he observed, “and the scourge of His persecution is a delight to the mortified flesh. I—”
There was a loud banging on the door.
Svarožič rose from his armchair and smilingly bowed in two tremendous bear-men in the white-and-gold uniforms of the Royal Guard. They carried between them a narrow wooden crate, which they set down in the middle of the room. The salute they gave the stranniks was correct, but no more. “From Chortenko,” one said curtly. “He said you’ll know what to do with them.”
“So we will,” Koschei said. “What is your name?”
“Sergeant Umka, sir.”
“Tell me, Sergeant Umka, have you given much thought to your immortal soul?”
The sergeant held himself straight and stiff. “Our business deals with bodies rather than souls, sir. At the end of the day we reckon up the numbers of the living and the dead. If their dead outnumber ours, that’s generally considered a good thing. What happens to them afterward is the responsibility of somebody higher up in the line of command than I am.”
“You are a creature of the gene vat,” Chortenko said thoughtfully, “and all life created by Man is inherently blasphemous. Therefore, you and your peers are an abomination unto the Lord. Which means that either you do not have souls, or else you do but were irrevocably damned to Hell the instant your genome was first expressed. Am I right, holy Koschei?”
“Who could argue with such lucid and self-evident insights? In either case, Sergeant Umka, your focus on the transient phenomenal world is commendable. Let those who have hopes of Heaven cultivate their relationship with God and those who do not see to their duties.”
“Sir. Thank you, sir. May we leave now?”
At a dismissive wave of Svarožič’s hand, the bear-men departed.
Koschei expelled an enormous sigh. “Our hour is come round at last. It is time for us to leave these comfortable surroundings and this sweet conversation behind forever, and to be about the holy, necessary, and painful work of Almighty God. Most likely, we shall never meet again. But let me reassure you, my dear brothers, that this is an evening I will cherish in my heart and memory for the remainder of my necessarily short life.”
“And I also,” said Chernobog.
Svarožič spread wide his arms.
They all three came together in a hug of perfect loving fellowship.
Then, separating, they broke open the crate. In it