Iskander's eyes widen to saucers, scarcely believing what he's seeing. Her, of all people?

Belatedly he raised his hands in a gesture of adoration. His mouth works like a fish, opening and closing multiple times - he can't find any words that feel right to say in this moment. At least this should get the attention they wanted.

Shiva's joy in Khonsu's acceptance is mingled with equal amounts of shocked relief. Her earnest prayer had been answered. She bared the entirety of her pain, perseverance, and her wish to help others and was chosen. Khonsu would remain at her side and within her soul, empowering her as she faces down whatever the world now wishes to confront her with. Slowly, she stands and turns, bowing deeply to the acolytes with a soft smile.

The elation rapidly begins to cool into serenity as she takes in slow, deep breaths. The warmth of the divinity in her veins feels as though it had always been present, reinforcing her resolve and further soothing the harm caused by her demon's presence. The clarity she now feels is unlike anything she has experienced before, and she thinks on the aspect of renewal that is part of her new god's domain. 

Returning to the group, she stifles a chuckle at Iskander's flabbergasted expression. "You seem very surprised, humble guide. I think it's time that I tell you of my life and what brought me here. Maybe over a drink in a friendly, comfortable place. Do you know any nice places for us to stay?"

Almost absent-mindedly, she turns to Caio with a smile brimming with more happiness than the shadar-kai has seen in some time. "I believe it's your turn, mon vieux." 

"You have given yourself fully to a Netjer who you have only just begun to learn of. You do understand that? How are you so calm about this?"
He looks around expecting to see his feelings echoed on the faces of his companions.

Caio watches with awe as Shiva surrenders herself body and soul to this new god. For all the tiefling’s impetuousness and lack of forethought, surely her ability to throw herself wholeheartedly into any situation is an admirable trait. The woman is unafraid to withhold nothing. Caio gulps. Is this truly what he wants?

His memory reaches back over a century to days spent in isolated meditation deep within hallowed crypts. Days spent whispering hymns to rune scrawled skulls, days spent submerged in pools of consecrated blood, cold as death. Those days hadn’t felt empty then, but at the time that was all he had known. His mother and father were clergy, hells, everyone around him had been clergy. He was fuinequendi, the Matron’s chosen. There had been no other path to walk but in her shadow.

And then she’d found him, that damned enchantress. She pulled his corpse from the frigid ground he’d been buried beneath his entire life. That was true devotion he’d felt then. She could have asked him to betray everything he’d ever lived for… instead it was she who had betrayed him.

When he’d sworn his oaths as an inquisitor, those too had been hollow, in a way. He wasn’t lying when he swore to seek out the Matron’s enemies and bring them to justice, but his motives truly had nothing to do with his queen and everything to do with his broken heart. Truly it was the only way that he could have gone on this quest without deserting. But would it have even mattered? The Matron didn’t even have an inquisitorial order, the idea had come to him from horror stories of witch hunters shared with him by the 99 Hundred. To Caio, the enigmatic goddess hardly seemed concerned with what her chosen people did. The fuinequendi’s existence was as stagnant as the frozen corpses they tended.

“I’ve known a goddess for one hundred and twelve years.” he says to Iskander, though his gaze is fixed ahead of him. “I’ve served her, yes, but never have I given myself fully. Time is irrelevant to devotion. All that matters is alignment.” He walks forward, placing a hand on Shiva’s shoulder with a nod of respect as he passes her. He approaches the silver clad acolyte near the basin and kneels, head bowed.

“I would swear myself as an inquisitor in Khonsu’s service. I would be as the moon’s rays piercing through the thickest night, seeking out corruption wherever it may hide. I would silence those treacherous voices who work even now to poison this great city. Though I am but a traveler myself, here in this place, I have seen that the black roots of tyranny are tangled across all of Arden. I would rip them out and see them burned in the silver light of His justice.”

Quote from Jellyfersh >>

"You have given yourself fully to a Netjer who you have only just begun to learn of. You do understand that? How are you so calm about this?"
He looks around expecting to see his feelings echoed on the faces of his companions.

In a gentle undertone, Alaris replies, "Oh, my friend. We have for so long been facing such destinies and forces and powers... been twisted this way and that by their agendas, that we have developed a keen sense for justice. You might even say a hunger for it. I urge you not to mistake commitment for calm or decisiveness for ignorance. We have counted the cost, and here we stand together."

Finally off the streets out of the curious eyes of the citizens of Beschadik, Astrid is able to breath a sigh of relief. The cleric wanders the grounds respectfully as the bells ring through the grounds of the temple of Khonsu. There is something about this place feels comforting for the devotee of The Scribe. Perhaps it's the phases of the moon commonly displayed reminding her of the passage of time. 

Seeing their friend in line to receive the blessing of this foreign god, Astrid moves to stand next to Alaris in watching the baptism. 

A vampire. A demonic stallion. The Warden. And now a Saramenian god... She seems to always be searching for something bigger than herself. I suppose I can’t fault her for that.

She holds an arm up to block the light that fills the chamber. As Shiva approaches them, Astrid smiles and slowly nods, not being surprised at her taking on another new devotion. "Shiva, dear, it seems your choice of patrons seems to grow in power with each one you collect. I just hope you don't end up serving too many masters... Because eventually you may be at odds with what each wants from you. "

Shiva merely listens with that same smile on her face as her friends imply just how she came to find herself in the moonlight of Khonsu's blessing.

Looking on with quiet reverence as Caio begins his vow, she can feel the stirrings of air around him that were far too faint for her to have noticed even an hour ago. Had she truly lived this much of her life without proper sense? As though all sight, sound and sensation had to pass through wool to make its way to her? The thought of feeling more deeply makes her long for Mistress, only for Astrid to interrupt her revelry. 

Shiva quirks an eye at her dwarven friend, though her smile remains. "I take lovers, I forge bonds, I swear oaths, and I broker partnerships. I have no masters." She indicates lazily with her pointer finger towards the two statues with broken crowns. "That's part of the whole freedom and justice thing. What Khonsu and I now share is a partnership. I'm starting to see that partnership lies in everything we do, in one way or another. Especially religion. Speaking of partnership..." 

Taking a step closer to Iskander, she does her best to whisper as to avoid interrupting Caio's ceremony. "Can you tell me of the brothels in the city, the lavish ones in particular? I'm expecting a letter."

When Caio kneels, the sanctum falls into a deep stillness. The basin’s surface, which a moment earlier had roiled and poured its light into Shiva, calms into a pallid sheen. Moonlight gathers at the edges and, then, with the same deliberate inevitability, threads itself towards the shadow elf like a thin blade of silvered frost. It floods him with a cold clarity, like the keen purity of midnight air after rain. Where the light touches the inquisitor's skin it drinks into him, drawing shadow into ordered patterns, rather than banishing it. Fine, interlocking sigils, as silver as starlight and as black as the void between, map themselves along Caio's jaw and down the hollow of his throat, humming faintly against his pulse.

Be the beam that finds rot, the blade that severs the guilty, charges an intimate voice that slips along the edge of reason in response. The sensation is settling, sharpening and steadyies old grief and vows into something serviceable.

Acolytes' reactions ripple through the sanctum after witnessing Khonsu's direct reply to such oaths twice in quick succession. Some of the faithful gasp at the unexpected marriage of moonblessing and shadow-blood. One among them inclines her head slowly, eyes damp with a pious wonder, while another mutters a prayer of thanks under her breath. Others stiffen. Shiva’s blessing draws open astonishment and a hush of devotion, but Caio’s consecration invokes respect leavened with a sober approval. 

“Thank you.” he whispers, audible only to the deity which he now serves. Caio rises, and there is a lightness in him noticeable to his friends. Where once he was monolithic gloom, now there is definition and clarity. The soft light of the temple glints off of him as it would a polished shard of obsidian. 

“I, Caio Cypherien, swear to uphold and deliver Khonsu’s justice. My,” he glances at Shivala and pauses. The hint of a smile plays at the corners of his lips before he continues, “My sister and I may be newly blessed by His silver light, but our quest to uproot corruption is far from new. We have traveled here from afar to hunt a serpent, known to us but hiding here in your fair city. Even now her coils wrap around your empire like a noose.  I would ask that my companions and I be granted an audience with Halime.” His voice is strong, stoic as ever but there is a softness and serenity to it now. No longer a frigid wind, now a refreshing breeze.