The Godmakers

  Words, more words. Where was his faith?

  I exist, he thought. That is enough.

  “I am a miracle,” he said.

  “Ohhh, very good,” Mahmud said. “Psi focus, eh? Energy from chaos shaped into duration. But is a miracle good or evil?”

  Orne took a shuddering breath. “I’ve always heard that miracles are good, but they really don’t have to be good or evil. Good and evil relate to motives. Miracles just are.”

  “Men have motives,” Mahmud said.

  “Men can be good or evil by any definitions they want,” Orne said. “Where’s the miracle in that?”

  Mahmud stared down his nose at Orne. “Are you good or evil?”

  Orne returned the stare. Winning through this test in his ordeal had taken on a profound meaning for him. He accepted now that this Mahmud was real. What was the prophet trying to make him say?

  “How can I be good or evil to myself?” Orne asked.

  “Is that your answer?”

  Orne felt danger in the question, said: “You’re trying to get me to say that men create gods to enforce their definitions of good and evil!”

  “Oh? Is that the source of godliness? Come now, my friend. I know your mind; you have the answer in it.”

  Am I good or evil? Orne asked himself. He forced his attention onto the question, but it was like wading upstream in a swift river. His thoughts twisted and turned, showed a tendency to scatter. He said: “I’m ... if I’m one with all the universe, then I am God. I am creation. I am the miracle. How can that be good or evil?”

  “What is it about creation?” Mahmud demanded. “Answer me that! Stop evading!”

  Orne swallowed, recalled the nightmare sequence of this test. Creation? And he wondered if the great psi machine amplified the energy humans called religion.

  He thought: Bakrish said I could bring the dead to life here. Religion’s supposed to have a monopoly on that. But how do I separate psi from religion from creation? The original Mahmud’s been dead for centuries. If I have recreated him, how do his questions relate to me? And there was always the possibility this whole thing was some form of hallucination despite the peculiar sense of reality of it.

  “You know the answer,” Mahmud insisted.

  Pressed to his limits, Orne said: “By definition, a creation may act independently of its creator. You are independent of me even though you partake of me. I have cast you loose, given you your freedom. How can I judge you, then? You cannot be good or evil except in your own eyes. Nor can I!” Exultantly, he demanded: “Am I good or evil, Mahmud?”

  “Thou sayest it for thyself and, thereby, are reborn an innocent,” Mahmud said. “Thou hast learned thy lesson and I bless thee for it.”

  The robed figure bent, lifted the dead child. There was an odd tenderness in Mahmud’s motions. He turned away, marched back into the writhing green wall. Silence blanketed the room.

  The dancing purple lines became almost static, moved in viscous torpor.

  Orne felt his body bathed in perspiration. His head ached. His arm throbbed where Maddie had slashed it. His breath came in gasping sobs, as though he had been running.

  A bronze clangor echoed behind him. The green wall returned to its featureless gray. Footsteps slapped the floor. Hands worked at the bowl on Orne’s head, lifted it gently. The straps that had confined him fell away.

  Bakrish came around to stand in front of Orne.

  “You said it was an ordeal,” Orne panted.

  “And I warned you about hate,” Bakrish said. “But you are alive and in possession of your soul.”

  “How do you know if I still have my soul?”

  “One knows by the absence,” Bakrish murmured. He glanced at Orne’s wounded arm. “We must get that bandaged. It’s night now and time for the next step.”

  “Night?”

  Orne peered up at the slitted windows in the dome. They gave him a view of darkness punctured by stars. He looked around the giant room, realized the shadowless exciter-light of glow-globes had replaced the daylight. He said: “Time goes quickly here.”

  “For some it does,” Bakrish sighed. “Not for others.” He motioned for Orne to get up. “Come along.”

  “Let me rest a moment. I’m worn out.”

  “We’ll give you an energy pill when we bandage your arm. Hurry along now!”

  “What’s the rush? What am I supposed to do now?”

  “It is apparent that you understand the two faces of a miracle,” Bakrish said. “I observe that you have a personal mystique, an ethic in the service of life, but there is much more to your ordeal and the time is short.”

  “What’s next?” Orne asked.

  “You must walk through the shadow of dogma and ceremony. It is written that motive is the father of ethics and caution is the brother of fear …” Bakrish paused. “... and fear is the daughter of pain.”

  ***

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Silence is the guardian of wisdom, but loud jesting and levity lead a man into his own ignorance. Where there is ignorance there is no understanding of God.

  —Sayings of the ABBODS

  “He shows a nice restraint,” the Abbod said. “I observe that in him: a nice restraint. He doesn’t play with his powers.”

  The Abbod sat on a low stool in front of his fireplace, Macrithy standing behind him with the latest report on Orne. In spite of the hopeful words, there was sadness in the Abbod’s voice.

  Macrithy heard the tone, said: “I, too, observe that he did not call his woman to his side or otherwise experiment with the Great Machine. Tell me, Reverend Abbod, why is it you do not sound happy about this observation?”

  “Orne will reflect upon this himself, given time. He will see that he does not need the machine to do what he wills. What then, dear friend?”

  “You have no doubts that he is the god you called up?”

  “No doubts at all. And when he discovers his enormous powers …”

  “He will come seeking you, Reverend Abbod.”

  “There will be no stopping him, of course. I don’t even want it tried. There exists only one challenge I pray he will face.”

  “We stopped the Speaking Stone,” Macrithy ventured.

  “Did we? Or did it turn away in amusement, seeing another purpose in existence?”

  Macrithy put his hands to his face. “Reverend Abbod, when will we stop these terrible explorations into regions where we have no right to go?”

  “No right?”

  “When will we stop?” Macrithy lowered his hands, revealing tearstains on his round cheeks.

  “We will never stop short of our total extinction,” the Abbod said.

  “Why? Why?”

  “Because we began this way, dear friend. This has begun, it had a beginning. That is the other meaning of discovery. It means to open up into view that which has always been, that which is without beginning and without end. We delude ourselves, you see? We cut a segment out of forever and say, ‘See! Here is where it started and here is where it ends!’”

  “But that is only our limited viewpoint speaking.”

  ***

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Order implies law. By this, we indicate the form which helps our understanding of order, enabling us to predict and otherwise deal with order. To go on to say, however, that law requires intent, this is another issue. It does not at all follow from the existence of law. In fact, awareness of eternity opens quite a contrary view. Intent requires beginning: first, the intent and then the law. The essence of eternity is no beginning, no end. Without beginning, no intent, no eternal motive. Without end, no ultimate goal, no judgment. From these observations, we postulate that sin and guilt, products of intent, are not fixed derivatives of eternity. At the very least, such concepts as sin-guilt-judgment require beginnings, thus occur as segments of eternity. Such concepts are ways of dealing with finite law and, only incidentally, with eternal matters. It is thus we understand how limited and limiting ar
e our projections onto Godhead.

  —ABBOD HALMYRACH,

  Challenge of Eternity

  The night air carried a chill nip, making Orne thankful for the thickness of his toga. Bakrish had led him to a large park area enclosed within the religious warren. Birds cooed from trees in the deeper shadows. The place smelled of new-mown grass.

  There were no artificial lights in the immediate area, but Bakrish followed a rough path as though he could see it and Orne followed the dim outline of the priest’s robe. Ahead of them, a hill stood outlined against stars. Up the hill marched a snaketrack of moving lights.

  Orne’s injured arm still ached, but an energy tablet had walled off his weariness.

  Bakrish spoke over his shoulder: “The lights are carried by students and each is accompanied by a priest. Each student has a two-meter pole with a lighted box atop it. The box has four translucent sides, each of a different color, as you can see—red, blue, yellow and green.”

  Orne watched the lights flickering like phosphorescent insects on the dark hill. “What’s the reason for all this?”

  “They demonstrate piety.”

  “Why the four colors?”

  “Ahhh, red for the blood you dedicate, blue for truth, yellow for the richness of religious experience, and green for the growth of life.”

  “How does marching up a mountain show piety?”

  “Because they do it!” Bakrish picked up the pace, deserted the path to cross a stretch of lawn. Orne stumbled, hurried to catch up. He wondered again why he allowed himself to follow this ordeal.

  Because it might lead him to the Abbod? Because Stetson had ordered him to carry out this assignment? Because of his oath to the I-A? None of these reasons seemed adequate. He felt trapped on a narrow track which he might leave as easily as Bakrish had left the pathway behind them.

  The priest stopped at a narrow open gate through a stone wall and Orne grew aware that a line of silent people was passing through the gateway. Hands reached out from the line to take long poles from a rack beside the gateway. Lights bloomed into existence beyond the wall. He smelled human perspiration, heard the shuffling of feet, the swish of robes. An occasional cough sounded, but there was no conversation.

  Bakrish took a pole from the track, twisted the base. Light glowed from a box at the top of the pole. The box was turned red side toward the procession through the gate. It cast a ruddy glow on the people—student and priest, student and priest, eyes downcast, expressions sober and intense.

  “Here.” Bakrish thrust the pole into Orne’s hands.

  It felt oily smooth to Orne. He wanted to ask what he was supposed to do with it besides carry it ... if anything, but the silence of the procession daunted him. He felt silly holding the thing. What were they really doing here? And why were they waiting now? Bakrish took his arm, whispered: “Here’s the end of the procession. Fall in behind; I will follow you. Carry your light high.”

  Someone in the line said: “Shhhhh!”

  Orne picked out a dim figure at the end of the procession, stepped into line. Immediately, warning prescience sapped his energy. He stumbled, faltered.

  Bakrish whispered: “Keep up! Keep up!”

  Orne recovered his stride, but still felt the klaxon emptiness in his vitals. His light cast a dull-green reflection off the priest ahead.

  A murmurous rhythm began to sound from the procession far ahead, growing louder as it passed down the line, riding over the shuffling and slither of robes, drowning out the chitter of insects in tall grass beside their path. It was a wordless sound: “Ahhh-ah-huh! Ahhh-ah-huh!”

  The way grew steeper, twisting back upon itself, a meandering line up the hill—bobbing lights, dim shapes, chant, root stumbles in the path, pebbles, slippery places, cold air.

  Bakrish whispered at Orne’s ear: “You’re not chanting!”

  The sense of danger, his own feelings of being out of place, combined to fill Orne with rebellion. He whispered back: “I’m not in good voice tonight!”

  Ahhh-ah-huh!

  What utter nonsense. He felt like throwing the light down the hill and striding off into the night.

  The line and chanting stopped so abruptly Orne almost collided with the priest ahead of him. Orne stumbled, regained his balance, straightened his pole to keep from hitting someone. People were bunching up all around him, moving off the trail.

  He followed, breaking a way through a low thicket. There was a shallow amphitheater beyond the thicket, a stone stupa within it about twice the height of a man. Priests began separating from the students, who formed a semicircle flowing down to the stupa. Their lights bounced multicolored reflections off the stones.

  Where was Bakrish? Orne looked around, realized he had been separated from Bakrish. What was he supposed to do here? How could this show piety? A bearded priest came from behind the stupa, stood in front of it. He wore a black robe, a three-cornered red hat. His eyes glistened in the light. The students grew silent.

  Orne, standing in the outer ring, wondered how this could be part of an ordeal. What were they going to do?

  The red-hatted priest spread his arms wide, lowered them. He spoke in a resonant bass voice: “You stand before the shrine of Purity and the Law. These are the two inseparables in all true belief. Purity and Law! Here is the key to the Great Mystery which leads on to paradise.”

  Orne felt the tension of his warning prescience and, now, the impact of an enormously swelling psi force. This psi was different, somehow, from what he had experienced before. It beat like a metronome with the cadence of the bearded priest’s words, blossoming and amplifying as the passion of his speech increased.

  Orne focused on the words: “ ... the immortal goodness and purity of all great prophets! The breath of eternity given for our salvation! Conceived in purity, born in purity, their thoughts ever bathed in purity! Untouched by base nature in all of their aspects, they show us the way!”

  With a shock of realization, Orne recognized that this psi force around him now arose not from some machine, but from a mingling of emotions arising out of the massed listeners. He sensed the emotional content, subtle harmonics on the overriding psi field. The bearded priest played his audience like a musician playing his instrument.

  “Have faith in the eternal truth of this divine dogma!” the priest shouted.

  Incense wafted across Orne’s nostrils. A hidden voder began emitting low organ notes, a melody full of rumbling and sonorous passages which came up behind the priest’s voice, but never drowned it.

  Orne saw a graveman circling the massed

  audience to the right, priests there waving censers. Blue smoke wafted over the listeners in ghostly curls. A bell tinkled in abrupt cadence as the priest paused. It rang seven times.

  Like a man hypnotized, Orne absorbed the whole scene, thinking: Massed emotions act like a psi force! What is this power? The priest at the stupa raised both arms, fists clenched, shouted: “Eternal paradise to all true believers! Eternal damnation to all unbelievers!” His voice lowered: “You, who seek the eternal truth, fall to your knees and beg for enlightenment. Pray for the veil to be lifted from your eyes. Pray for the purity, which brings holy understanding. Pray for salvation. Pray for the All-One to cast his benediction upon you.”

  A shuffling whisper of robes came from the students as they sank to their knees around Orne. But Orne remained standing, his whole being caught up in discovery: Massed emotions produce a psi force!

  He felt elevated, cleansed, standing on the brink of a great revelation. He wanted to call out to Bakrish, to shout his discovery.

  Angry muttering flowed through the kneeling students, catching Orne’s attention only in part. Glares of protest were directed at him. The muttering grew louder. Prescient awareness roared within Orne. He came out of his reverie to recognize the danger all around him.

  At the far corner of the kneeling crowd a student lifted an arm, pointed at Orne. “What about him? He’s a student! Why isn’t he kneeling with t
he rest of us?”

  Orne cast searching glances all around. Where was Bakrish? Someone tugged at Orne’s robe, urging him to kneel, but Orne backed off. The trail was right behind him through the thicket.

  Someone in the massed students screamed: “Unbeliever!”

  Orne felt the force of it like a psi net hurled across him, dimming his awareness, blocking reason.

  Others began taking up the word in a mindless chant: “Unbeliever! Unbeliever! Unbeliever! …”

  Orne inched his way backward through the thicket, fear sharp within him. The tension of the crowd was a tangible thing, a fuse that smoked and sizzled its way toward a massive explosion.

  The bearded priest glared up at Orne, the dark face contorted in the kaleidoscopic gleams of the students’ torches. The amphitheater suddenly was a nightmare scene to Orne, a demoniac place, and he realized he still carried his own torch like a waving beacon. Its light revealed the trail beside him leading off into blackness.

  Abruptly, the priest at the stupa raised his voice to an insane scream: “Bring me the head of that blasphemer!”

  Orne hurled his light like a spear as the students jumped to their feet with a roar. He whirled, fled along the trail hearing the thunder and shouts of pursuit.

  As his eyes adjusted to starlight, Orne discerned the trail, a black line on black. He discarded caution, ran all out. A ragged yell lifted into the night from his pursuers.

  The trail curved to the left and a blotch of deeper blackness loomed at the turn. Woods? Branches whipped his face.

  The trail dipped, twisted to the right, then left. He tripped on a root, almost fell.

  His robe caught on a bush and he lost seconds releasing it. The mob was a roaring, waving pack of lights almost upon him. Orne plunged off the trail downhill to his right and parallel to a line of trees. Bushes snagged his robe. He fumbled with the belt, left the robe behind.

  Someone above him shouted: “I hear him! Down there!”

  The pursuers came to a plunging stop, held silence for a heartbeat. Orne’s crashing flight dominated all other sounds.