on hopes and prayers

"Raven, I was wondering"

"Yes Alex?"

"As an inquisitor you have done a fair bit of religious studies, correct?"

"A bit yes, mostly Sakhmet only concerns herself with the mortals who drew short straws, but she and her followers keep apprised on the maters of the gods as well. I think there are a few she'd love to add to her collection of trophies."

"Oh I'm sure of that, but I was wondering who would be the right god for Julian to pray too with his present predicament?"

Raven scratched his chin, "Now that is a lofty question that I don't know the right answer too."

Alex nodded, "Right. These might be the lands of Pyrotheo, but asking him for a favor is pretty pointless even when you already give him absolute devotion, he likes to deal harshly with disobedience, granting favors isn't really his thing."

"Don't most merchants pray to Fortisa?"

"Only when luck is the question, she has two hands afterall, the right and the left, one promises favor and the other disfavor. Julian isn't relying on market fluctuations to make profit he'd racing against time to keep his products fresh. I don't know of any gods of time so I was trying to think about who would be suitable to this situation."

Raven contemplated the problem, "I never thought about that much, the goddesses of fate control the weave of destiny, but they're not exactly time gods either."

Glad to have the diversion to keep his mind off his own troubles Alex was quite glad to keep this conversation alive. "The most logical to me would be Boann or Paihoar. Boann is the goddess of harvests and he's hauling produce so that's sort of her domain, and Paihoar is the god of winter and ice so it stands to reason that he would be able to reinforce any chilling spells cast on the crates."

Raven made an offhand gesture, "Yes, but both of them have distaste for merchants. They don't agree with the practice of resell for profits and prefer you to make wealth with your own sweat."

"Agreed, which is why I said 'most logical' and not just 'logical'."

"Fair point."

"Although I've met many ocean merchants who worship Paihoar for their journeys north and south along the coast."

"I'm not an expert on the coast," Raven commented, "I've never been on the other side of the mountains and I've never been further north than the south side of the steeps."

"Ahh," Alex remarked, "I'm not a cleric so I never thought much on the gods when I didn't need them. But the way it was explained to me was that there aren't any known gods of the ocean so the north-men worship the god of winter and ice because if you melt snow you get water, so he's the closest thing we have to a water god."

"Well, I didn't know that. You really can learn something every day. Do you suppose there's a god of water out there?"

"I'd imagine so," Alex explained, "In the very center of Praenomen is the Citadel of the Gods, it contains one hundred alcoves to various deities, many are sealed behind walls of something that cannot be destroyed or studied, but crumbles from time to time to reveal a statue of a figure. All but two of the known gods are represented among these statues so the ones not recognized are assumed to be gods as well. And if you ever make your way to Vulcan-Nyta there are a collection of 200 mithril statues inside the anvil that are believed to have some association with the citadel. I can personally vouch that all of the marble statues in the alcoves of the gods are present among the metal ones in the anvil, and the dwarves who work the anvil call them the memories of lost gods, but I think that's only a title given because the gods are among the statues, and we don't know who the rest of the statues are. And again all but two known gods are among these statues."

Raven, for all his mania, seemed to be genuinely interested in this knowledge, "How very interesting. What do you mean 'all but two of the known gods' having statues in Praenomen and Vulcan-Nyta?"

"Well, as you've probably heard, the god known as 'the creator' has a tendency to strike people dead who try to make a statue of them, we're not even aware of the sex of said deity because making male and female statues result in the same treatment once you add a plaque that reads 'the creator'."

"Duly noted. And the other?"

"Well, that's the god of chaos. I'm sure that there are no statues of him for...reasons."

Raven laughed, "Quite probably. He isn't very well received even though he's also not easily ignored. Is even Sakhmet among the statues then?"

"Quite so, lower half woman, upper half lioness. Her being among the statues makes the whole rest of them really curious, some of the statues look highly demonic, although despite being marble they are also enchanted to the point of indestructible so removing the unsavory is impossible."

Raven looked into the distance, "Perhaps..." he trailed of before starting again, "Perhaps I would like to see that."

Alex nodded, "I'm sure that Sakhmet would find a use for you on either side of the Giagis mountains. Just be careful of the goblins who live in the abandoned darkness."

"Why?" Raven looked perplexed, "The lesser children of Shershi will do no harm to their brothers of faith."

Alex looked confused, "What did you call them?"

Raven chuckled, "The goblins are the lowest race in service of Shershi, they are his children same as Vampires, although they are much lower they ensure that he always has believers with the way they breed and lack the capacity for existential contemplation like we are enjoying right now."

It was Alex's turn to be amazed, "That explains so much about the little monsters."

"Indeed it might, although I've never seen one myself I have heard many stories of them and the Avatar said they were little brothers so I believe them to be so."

"You've met the Avatar?"

"Oh yes." Raven became somewhat dreamy eyed, "As often as I can. It's such an honor to meet anyone so close to divinity as an Avatar. And even as a person and not an Avatar Ryu-shi is an overwhelming person."

Alex thought to his meeting with the Avatar, "I only met him once, and I wasn't really paying much attention beyond my own suffering. So I don't remember much about it, but he really did seem divine on his own without the status of Avatar in my memories, although I admit I never really thought much about it."

"So back to our original line of thoughts, maybe we should pray to the Avatar for the preservation of Jullian's goods."

"Pray to the avatar and not the god?"

Raven laughed madly, "Even I, as a servant of Chaos and ****, admit that whimsy isn't the best option, the Avatar still has mortal needs, so he'll be much more responsive to Jillian's plight, especially if he gets to enjoy the literal fruits of our journey."

"Alright," Alex conceded, "You definitely make a reasonable point there. Maybe we should tell Jullian about our plans to pray to the Avatar on his behalf." Alex grinned conspiratorially.

Raven met him with an equally evil grin, "No, let's keep him in hopeful suspense, for his own sake, I'm sure he'd faint if he heard about the solution we've devised for his problems."

Both laughed lightly, aware that their current destination was much closer than could be seen, and that their next one would probably get them both hunted by the inquisitors of Pyrotheo if it was spoken of out loud.