The Burning White (Lightbringer #5) - Brent Weeks Page 0,233

He is a good master, and He has sworn not to make our work meaningless. Every smudge and every blot and every unsteady line we draw will remain. The master will soften a line or turn the darkest graffiti to chiaroscuro, but never will He take the palette knife to gouge out an imperfect piece of the work, for if He erased the imperfections made by our hands, where would He stop erasing? Everything we paint we paint imperfectly.”

“Then the whole scheme is shit. He should paint it all Himself, were He not too lazy,” Teia said. She wasn’t doing a good job of listening, though, and she knew it.

Quentin flashed a quick, apologetic grin. “Sure, sure, if we are to call lazy the one who created the Ur, the Primes, and all the Thousand Worlds—not a heretical notion, by the by, despite what certain scholars . . . never mind. If we’re to call lazy He who spread the stars with His cloak and blows the winds between them, who forms every beating heart and mountain and lake upon them, and is creating yet every life and love and every chick within each egg, bursting out into the light . . . if we’re to do that, then I’m not sure the word ‘lazy’ has a stable definition. But certainly, we could conceive of Orholam as being so vast, so omnipotent, so intelligent that He could direct every moment of every man’s and every woman’s and every child’s and every dog’s day. He could do so, and the picture created thus would be flawless, and every head in the cosmos would nod as one that it was flawless, for they could not do otherwise than nod in unison. For in their perfection, they must recognize His perfection. They must bow and bob at His every command. They wouldn’t need commands, for they would be but extensions of His fingers. Such creatures would be capable of everything except freedom, and therefore, everything except love. And for some reason, Orholam values love—not just of Him but our love toward others, toward even ourselves. The master takes joy when the apprentice grows in her mastery, when she sees the line for herself the first time, when her hand can finally paint what her heart conceives, and when she partakes of the beauty for the first time and the five hundredth.”

“Murdered slaves and dead babies part of that beauty?” Teia asked bitterly.

Quentin folded his hands. “Part of the beauty? No. But part of the canvas. A wag asks from the secret bitterness of his heart, ‘So then, is this the best of all possible worlds?’ If Orholam is watching, and Orholam is acting, is this the best He can do? Because the best He can do appears to be shit.”

Teia was still a bit surprised to hear Quentin use such language.

Quentin grinned, glad to have shocked her. “What? He made shit, too.”

She grinned momentarily, but the ache didn’t abate.

Quentin said, “There was a master who loved his slave, so he freed him immediately. Another master loved his slave, so he wrote into his will that the slave should be freed after he himself died. Which of these loved his slave?”

“The one who freed him.”

“I agree!” Quentin said, “But the master who kept his slave would object that what he did was for the slave’s own good: a free life is a dangerous one, the free man might end up destitute! The master would guarantee a good life for him, meaningful work, and protection—until he passed away and could guarantee it no longer.”

“He’s lying,” Teia said. “Though maybe to himself first. It’s none of the master’s business what happens to that slave.”

“But so long as the slave belongs to him, it literally is his business,” Quentin said.

Teia blinked. “Well, sure, financially, but . . . but the master can’t call it love, then. He’s just making sure no one destroys his investment, the way a free man might destroy himself. The first master is assuming the financial loss in giving the slave his freedom. He’s not investing in property; he’s investing in a man. And not for his own enrichment but for the former slave’s.”

“What happens,” Quentin asked, “if that freedman recognizes his master’s love and continues working in his house, though now as a free man?”

“Everybody wins, I guess?” Teia said. “The master knows his former slave cares about him, and the former slave gets a fair wage and dignity and the ability