Iomedae makes a face.

And very grouchily the next day flags down Sir Cansellarion after their morning strategy meeting. "Who should I go to with questions about how being a paladin of Iomedae works?"

"...You haven't sworn to an order yet, have you? You should probably do that soon - I can sit down and talk with you about what the oaths for my order are, though you ought to check with representatives of the other major orders too and get their perspective - Whichever one you pick, oaths are initially for a period of a year, and you'd renew them for the longer-term after that. Do you want to have that conversation with me now? I have things to do today but none that have to get done this morning."

" - then I probably do want to talk now, if that's an option. I'm …sorry I didn't ask earlier - was anyone ever going to say anything or were you just going to wait until I thought to ask."

"You're young and very busy with very important work - and with paladins who get empowered younger, before they've chosen or sworn to an order, we usually want to get them into an order quickly because the structure helps them keep to their principles and not stumble - and I guess nobody was thinking of that as a likely problem, with you."

"- I had a pretty hard time the first month after I was made a foster child in America. But here - no, not really. Though yesterday I noticed that I wanted to kiss Alfirin and realized at that I should probably learn all of the rules."

"...Oh." Somehow the possibility had never occurred to him. "Ah. My order does not require an oath of celibacy, though some do take one voluntarily. I think that's not the kind of - um - interest - that my paladins tend to take oaths about, though."

"The Church of Jesus held that it's evil for women to lie together but we weren't sure if this was only because their god stopped answering Communes a couple centuries ago and they've been making things up ever since."

"I do not know us to have specifically put that question to the Goddess but I think it's not evil and we would know if it were."

Iomedae nods, satisfied. "What are the oaths of your order?"

He can sit down with her and go through them. He thinks she'll probably pick his order, after seeing the other options, but he's absolutely not going to say so until she's made up her mind.

" - this is patently ridiculous but I feel odd about swearing to a paladin order, even though I wanted to very badly for such a long time."

Hug. "Is there something wrong with the orders, or is it a more general feeling?"

"No, they're very reasonable. Reassuring about Iomedae as a god, really. They won't take my lifetime oath, for one thing, just a year for a trial, and they're - careful - I would swear to obey lawful orders from my leadership. …that's how America does it too but I don't think it's how America did it in the 1800s. It's just that I guess I've gotten so used to steering only by prayer and my own judgment that now part of me is hesitant even about swearing to obey lawful orders from someone who is trying to fight Cheliax and will be better at it with my help. Like I said. Kind of ridiculous."

"I don't have a leg to stand on calling your reluctance ridiculous when I very much am not signing up for any paladin orders myself - but I do see what you mean. Is it that you think sometimes you'll get lawful orders that are mistakes, or that you'd rather not follow for other reasons, or just the principle of signing away your ability to make the call for yourself -"

"I think it's that - when I planned to join a paladin order, I had contemplated the life path of giving my obedience to a husband, or the life path of giving my obedience to Aroden and to whoever He placed in my way, and it would've just been - silly, pointless, unproductive - to contemplate a life path where I simply did whatever I wanted. It wouldn't have worked. I would have failed to achieve any of my very ambitious life goals. And then in America - I wanted to serve Aroden, but I was very plainly going to have to figure out for myself what that even meant, and sometimes it was terrifying but I think on the whole I was glad of it, and also everyone would've been horrified at the idea of my giving a lifelong oath of service at age fifteen, and I guess that rubbed off to the point where it genuinely started to feel irresponsible. And so now instead of feeling like - the obvious way to get the leverage that I want, as the person that I am - 

I guess I expect sometimes I'll get lawful orders that are mistakes, but even if I never did it's a little frightening to sign away the ability to decide for myself. Or - not just frightening but in a bad reference class - which I think is probably mistaken, but that's how it feels - like an irresponsible decision -"

Alfirin squeezes her tighter. "I don't think it's necessarily irresponsible of you - especially with the one year oaths - but you know you don't have to, right? You wanted to be a paladin before America, and the god Iomedae made you a paladin now, but - that doesn't mean you have to be one. You can say no, if that's what you want."

"I know. I think - I think I want to be one. The deal with the Abadarans about the radio show - it's a very elaborate very expensive workaround for 'when I speak, people know I'm telling the truth', which is very very important to me, and the world has an - institution for it, for being trustworthy and trusted. We're going to invade Cheliax and I want to make the people of Cheliax understand what paladins are so that they know what to expect and - why - and I could do all that without actually being one but I'd be - reinventing the wheel, right. Specifically I'd apparently mostly be reinventing the wheel that historical Iomedae invented. This seems like a really dumb use of my time!"

"I suppose one upside of being a future-shifted copy of the person who went on to invent the metaphorical wheel is that it's already been invented for you, by you. I think it makes sense for you to swear the oaths, then - they're compatible with doing all the work you're doing, right - and then see if you still feel odd about them after following them for a year."

"They are compatible with doing all the work I'm doing unless Cansellarion decides to order me to the Worldwound or something instead. Which I'm not really very worried about. And - yeah, the way to be in a position to make a more informed decision in a year is to try it and see if it feels like - abandoning my responsibility for making my own decisions - or just having more ways to make that responsibility transparent to people."

"Okay." Squeeze "Is there a ceremony? Should I try to be there?"

"...I'm not sure. I'll ask. If there is a ceremony I'd appreciate you being there. …oh I guess while I'm at it I should explain what finally prompted me to ask. I noticed yesterday that I wanted to kiss you, and I wasn't sure if paladins were allowed to do that or not. I obviously do not mind if you don't feel that way, I know most people don't, it's entirely fine, I think if you dislike it that'll probably make it go away at once."

"...Well, are paladins allowed to do that?"

"Yes. I think I made Cansellarion mildly uncomfortable, asking, because I do not think his Goddess got up to anything she would have to leave out of her holy books, but it is allowed. And they are pretty sure they'd have noticed if it was evil and it's not that either, not that I think we were in very much doubt."

Well in that case Alfirin will kiss her. "I noticed wanting to last year but - most people are straight -"

Iomedae has a half formed objection about how that doesn't seem like the relevant reference class at all, probably most women who decide to wear men's clothes and be knights are not straight, but now she is distracted and delightful and can't assemble the words in her head. "Oh. All right." She does not really know how kissing is supposed to work but probably it's not harder to figure out than firearm manufacture.