I know the old ways. There’s nothing evil there, only strange, and not even strange when you know it. - Tanith Lee

A day out from the bay of Saardos, Drokler honored the brass Rorn god in the prow with a pound of incense.
The blank god mask stared back at them through the pall of sweet blue smoke....It gazed in myopic stillness out over the long shock of the waves, ignoring their words, their presence, their costly offering.

The dark storyteller did not look about. He said: “You have presumed the gods value man so much that they will hurry to his rescue. I think you misjudge the gods.”
“And you,” declared the philosopher sternly, “suggest that they are merely as stones.”
“There, I admit, I have maligned them. For if you strike a stone, it may disgorge a stream of water, or a precious jewel. Or you may build a house from it, or scratch words on its surface with a knife. Stones can be serviceable to men.”

Anackire asks nothing because she needs nothing, being everything," Raldnor said tightly, using a quotation of the temple.
The Ommos laughed gently and shook his head.
"Such undemanding gods.