No Other God

Nebukhadran stopped a few paces from them.

Close enough to see. Not close enough to be thought reckless.

His gaze moved from Hanan to Mishael to Azaryah and back again as if repetition might make the evidence easier to fit into royal speech. Around them the plain held its breath. Even the image seemed secondary now, which would have horrified the men who built it if any of them had been free enough to admit what they felt.

Then the king said, with a force made more convincing by the fact that it had not been planned:

"Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent His messenger and delivered His servants, who trusted in Him."

The sentence struck the gathered officials harder than the miracle had.

Miracles could sometimes be postponed mentally until paperwork caught up. Royal declarations entered the record at once.

Nebukhadran was not finished.

"They set aside the king's command and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and render reverence before any god except their own God."

Hanan heard the words and nearly laughed from sheer exhaustion. The king had just summarized their crime as if composing the proper form of praise had cost him blood.

"Therefore I make a decree," Nebukhadran said, turning enough that heralds could take the language and relay it outward. "Any people, nation, or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego shall be torn limb from limb and their houses laid in ruins, for there is no other god who is able to rescue in this way."

The decree rippled through the plain by repetition.

No other god able to rescue in this way.

Incomplete theology. True witness. Terrible government.

Babylon, Hanan thought dimly, remained itself even in revelation.

The herald teams carried the proclamation outward while scribes bent over tablets and guards attempted to look as though all of this had been a perfectly normal use of state resources. The image still stood in blazing gold above them. The furnace still burned. But the story governing the plain had split away from both.

Ashpenaz came near enough to speak without being heard beyond the immediate circle.

"I am beginning," he said, voice very quiet, "to suspect your God resents categorization."

Azaryah answered before either of the others could.

"That makes two of you."

Under other circumstances Ashpenaz might have smiled. Today he only looked at Azaryah with something like worn respect.

Arioch stood a little behind him, face stripped down to an older grief. He met Hanan's eyes once and gave the smallest nod. Not triumph. Recognition.

Farther back, Nathrek had already recovered his stillness. That, more than open fury would have done, reminded Hanan the day was not safe simply because it had become undeniable. The Chief Magician stood where the public could see him: composed, obedient, professionally available to the king's new narrative. Only if one knew what to look for could one see that the stillness cost him dearly.

Bel-iddin, beside him, looked less contained. As if he had just watched a bridge he distrusted anyway collapse beneath men he disliked and still found himself shaken by the proof.

Nebukhadran lifted one hand for attention again.

"These men," he said, indicating the three Judeans before the assembled authorities, "shall be advanced in the province of Babylon."

The practical form of the reward took shape quickly. Existing appointments enlarged. Direct access confirmed. No official to obstruct their orders on penalty of royal displeasure.

Honor again. Babylon's preferred method of fastening usefulness to witness.

Hanan barely heard most of it. The plain was beginning to tilt under the accumulated strain of fear, relief, heat, miracle, and survival. He remained upright by effort and by the quiet steadiness of Mishael on one side and Azaryah on the other.

Before the crowd fully broke, Ashpenaz spoke to a royal scribe and pointed west. Within moments a mounted courier was being readied with sealed tablets.

Mishael saw it too.

"Danel," he said.

Hanan followed the messenger's preparation and felt, for the first time since the horn sounded, something like uncomplicated gladness.

"Yes," he said.

"He is going to hate missing this," Azaryah muttered.

"Yes," Hanan said, and this time he almost smiled.

"But he is also going to be right about what it means."