"I wonder sometimes if that's wiser," Arialla commented, rather ruefully. Oh, yes, she offered the gods her devotion -- but she also knew that staying out of their thoughts, out of their line of fire, sometimes made for a longer, healthier life. "I think when you're an Outlander, you come in with all these desires: I want to go home, I want to find my place here, I want this, I want that. And in the Grounds, at least, everyone tells you 'go to the gods.' So you do, because you don't know how else to get what you need -- and you're in this new world, so you don't really have a grasp on the consequences, the full effect of what you're doing."
She paused, realizing she'd said more than she really intended to. "I mean, that's how I felt when I arrived. I would imagine that Naturals -- especially in Torchline, where everyone grew up without the heralds and their hands-on approach -- have a better idea of how to solve their problems without running to the nearest deity."
At the mention of the impending war, Arialla frowned. Oh, she knew something was brewing; she wasn't stupid. But she still had hope that it might not come to all-out war. If it did ... she had effectively chosen her side, pledging herself to Safrin, but she didn't want to actually fight, didn't want to kill the Ascended for the Voice's crimes. And yet what choice would she have, if Safrin ordered her to? "I don't want to see war, but it feels like the gods and demigods do, and the rest of us have no say in the matter. And I don't know much about war, but I know it's not usually the people on top who suffer the most."
Though Arialla could comfort herself with the thought that she was a healer and a priestess, not a warrior -- if war did come, perhaps she could serve Safrin in a different way, not direct combat. But still, she would be contributing to the deaths of people she didn't think deserved to die.
Maybe Arialla really hadn't thought through the consequences of pledging herself to Safrin. The thought had her solemn and more than a little worried, to the point where she barely even noticed Raza's frustration.
Then Raza asked about her gods, and Arialla tried to shake off her concerns. "We had many more gods at home, but they were more distant. We prayed to them all the time, but to get a direct answer was almost unheard of. My god, Apollo, blessed me with ... something I didn't think was possible. But when it came to more mundane things, we never expected the gods to come fix our problems for us. You said a prayer for good fortune and then got to work for yourself."
please don't take my sunshine away
