Small Gods (Discworld 13)

There were a lot of towns, so they had to cut him up quite small.

Ragged clouds ripped across the skies. The sails creaked in the rising wind, and Om could hear the shouts of the sailors as they tried to outrun the storm.

It was going to be a big storm, even by the mariners' standards. White water crowned the waves.

Brutha snored in his nest.

Om listened to the sailors. They were not men who dealt in sophistries. Someone had killed a porpoise, and everyone knew what that meant. It meant that there was going to be a storm. It meant that the ship was going to be sunk. It was simple cause and effect. It was worse than women aboard. It was worse than albatrosses.

Om wondered if tortoises could swim. Turtles could, he was pretty sure. But those buggers had the shell for it.

It would be too much to ask (even if a god had anyone to ask) that a body designed for trundling around a dry wilderness had any hydrodynamic properties other than those necessary to sink to the bottom.

Oh, well. Nothing else for it. He was still a god. He had rights.

He slid down a coil of rope and crawled carefully to the edge of the swaying deck, wedging his shell against a stanchion so that he could see down into the roiling water.

Then he spoke in a voice audible to nothing that was mortal.

Nothing happened for a while. Then one wave rose higher than the rest, and changed shape as it rose. Water poured upward, filling an invisible mold; it was humanoid, but obviously only because it wanted to be. It could as easily have been a waterspout, or an undertow. The sea is always powerful. So many people believe in it. But it seldom answers prayers.

The water shape rose level with the deck and kept pace with Om.

It developed a face, and opened a mouth.

“Well?” it said.

"Greetings, oh Queen of- Om began.

The watery eyes focused.

“But you are just a small god. And you dare to summon me?”

The wind howled in the rigging.

“I have believers,” said Om. “So I have the right.”

There was the briefest of pauses. Then the Sea Queen said, “One believer?”

“One or many does not matter here,” said Om. “I have rights.”

“And what rights do you demand, little tortoise?” said the Queen of the Sea.

“Save the ship,” said Om.

The Queen was silent.

“You have to grant the request,” said Om. “It's the rules.”

“But I can name my price,” said the Sea Queen.

“That's the rules, too.”

“And it will be high.”

“It will be paid.”

The column of water began to collapse back into the waves.