... now she does understand the orthodoxy but has backed herself into enough of a corner that unless Alfirin is generous with her it will be difficult to extricate herself. The orthodoxy is that it's not a loyalty test. Everyone should vote whatever is in their hearts, and this will not be used against them at all, and so there is no reason for them to even want to know how their superiors would like them to vote. "Right, of course."

"I suppose it must seem…unbelievable… if you lived your whole life in Cheliax."

Is there a good way to say 'well it's not really at all believable' without making it sound like she doesn't believe it? Not really. 

"I think you will have a harder time getting anything useful out of employing it there."

"Do you, uh, believe in paladins?"

That one Carissa absolutely knows, and practiced extensively as soon as the Reclamation decided to employ her. "The Lord Marshal and the Supreme Elect are both paladins," says Carissa. "So is Freedom, and many of the officers of the Glorious Reclamation, and the people who defend us at the Worldwound. Iomedae, as a mortal, was a paladin, and chooses paladins who embody Her virtue and bravery and honor."

"Right, but is it true that they can't lie or is that just a trick to make gullible people trust them?"

"Well, they can't lie very often or they wouldn't be able to maintain the pretense they can't lie at all," says Carissa reasonably, "so they're unusually trustworthy." It is one of those nice middle grounds that makes you sound neither gullible nor liable to distrust paladins when you're obviously not supposed to.

"Okay. I can, uh, work with that, I guess. So when Codwin says very publicly that he'll step down if he doesn't win the next election, he's probably not lying. Because we'd all be able to tell, if he didn't step down, and lots of people are going to be looking for proof that they're lying about the vote totals so it'd be pretty risky to lie about those."

Carissa is an idiot. The Supreme Elect has announced publicly that the loyalty test is not a loyalty test, and so thinking that it is is, itself, disloyal. Of course.

"I - apologize if I seemed to be questioning the honor of the Supreme Elect. Of course I trust his word."

"I, um. Didn't think you were. I just meant that - if he says he'd step down, and he can't lie about something public like that where he'd get caught, and people paying attention in Lastwall and Galt and Taldor all think he'd step down... one wouldn't be particularly stupid to believe that he'd step down. If he lost the election."

"I, uh, would have expected people to believe that he'd - quite reasonably and correctly change his mind under some circumstances? Like...say that the Most High Aspexia Rugatonn won, he would not step down in her favor, nor would he be expected to, nor would it call his honor into question that he didn't, since of course a paladin can't enable an Evil person coming to power. And ...that's an extreme example but probably there are lots of unworthy people like her." Everyone but himself, for example. Or everyone but his chosen successor.

"I think he might, actually. It would be terrible for the country but he swore in his oath of office to step down when his term is over and - I think paladins usually stick by their oaths. Even when that has terrible consequences. If, uh, it was some other terrible person who was actually eligible to run, I don't think his oath obliges him to step down if someone ineligible happens to get more votes than him."

Ah hah, maybe 'eligible' is where all the actual deciding who runs the government is hidden. 

"What makes someone, uh, eligible?"

"Landowning Andoren citizen, over the age of - I don't actually remember all of them, but thirty for humans - not an Asmodean or a diabolist or demoniac or soul-sold, willing to take the oath of office."

And Andoran was formerly part of Cheliax, so anyone can be credibly accused of being an Asmodean. Or just stripped of their holdings. That does seem like sufficient rules that you can, as the ruler, make sure you like the result while also truthfully insisting you'll respect it. "Oh. All right, I understand."

Alfirin seems to have gotten whatever she wanted out of this line of conversation. She steers it back toward magic.

Carissa will gratefully accept the opportunity to escape that line of conversation. Alfirin's apparently still annoyed, though, as she doesn't ask her to stay the night.

The next day, with dread in her heart, she goes to the city building to register to become an Andoren citizen. She hates Andoran. But if she wasn't going to be willing to play the game, she should've run back home.

They ask her questions about her understanding of voting in Andoran. She knows the answers, now. She does spectacularly.