Then she comes to the village of Soria, which Orsina soon learns has come under control of the chaos goddess Aelia, with the chaos gods being entities the Order fights. Aelia soon becomes trapped in a mortal body during a run-in with Orsina and cannot leave Inthya, the setting's world.
Orsina finds Aelia once again, but does not know who she is in her new body. Aelia pretends she is a woman fleeing abusive family members, seeking to find a magical artifact which can free her from captivity in her body while Orsina as a paladin protects her.
As they grow closer, Aelia soon struggles with her desire to be honest and reveal the truth, though she fears Orsina turning against her for this. However, it might not be her choice at all, for her actions have been noticed by Aelia's godly siblings...
The second book in the Tales of Inthya series by Effie Calvin. Not to be confused with the fanfic of the same name, which it isn't connected with.
Tropes:
- Above the Influence: Aelia refuses when Orsina's offering her sex, although she'd clearly like to, as she hasn't been truthful about her identity yet.
- Action Girl: The protagonist Orsina is a female knight. She's the titular character, which marks her as a paladin from the Order of the Sun. She's trained to fight with a sword, and has minor magical powers too.
- Another Dimension: The gods dwell in different planes of existence that reflect their nature somehow. Cyre, God of Animals, lives in an idyllic wilderness where all animals' souls go for instance.
- Braids of Action: Orsina is a female knight and a paladin. She has her hair in a single braid.
- But Not Too Bi: Orsina is bisexual, but only shows attraction to other women in the book.
- Cassandra Truth:
- Orsina laughs and thinks Aelia is joking after she says her age is really fourteen billion.
- Vissente later tries to tell Orsina who Aelia really is. She doesn't understand and thinks he's lying at first, then comes to a wrong conclusion later about what he meant.
- Charm Person: Aelia can make people ignore her or think she's a friendly, familiar person to let pass by through implanting the ideas in their minds with magic.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Orsina was friends with Perlita when they were girls, before growing attracted to each other and having a romance as the two grew up.
- Cultured Badass: Orsina relates that she and fellow paladins in the Order of the Sun are all this. Along with being trained to fight, they also learn history, music and such to be more than just mere warriors.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Orsina has to carefully look only at Aelia's face after she's been bathing in the river while wearing just her underwear, with obvious implied results due to this.
- Divine Date: Orsina, a mortal woman, develops a mutual attraction with Aelia, a Goddess who is in a human body (although she's unaware of Aelia's true nature at first). This is not explicitly forbidden to the gods, but most frown on it given just how much more power they have over mortals, so a mortal wouldn't feel able to refuse their advances. Aelia, having scant power, doesn't feel this is a problem.
- Emotion Bomb: Xera, Goddess of Melancholy, has these. When she's around, anyone who's feeling grief or sorrow has it amplified greatly, to the point this can manifest itself as a wraith that is separate from their body. She can also inflict an emotional attack on someone by touching them, amplifying any past sadness they felt with a phrase connected to it. It's so devastating a person who's affected by this can be left temporarily stricken.
- Exact Words:
- Orsina is sworn not to lie, while she considers truthful but misleading statements to be still okay sometimes. In fact, it's revealed paladins overall have a reputation for using these.
- Aelia initially fools Orsina using this technique as well before just outright lying.
- Faking the Dead: Aelia puts a fake body into Orsina's path which she then beheads, thinking its really Aelia's. She is still around in another body after this.
- Fantasy Pantheon:
- Eyvindr is God of the Harvest, considered Third of the Ten gods in Vesolda.
- Cyre is God of Animals.
- Orsina, as a paladin from the Order of the Sun, serves Iolar, God of Law and Civilization.
- Merla is the Goddess of music and the ocean.
- Dayluue is the Goddess of fertility in Vasolda, being prayed to for conception. She also has "companions" who serve as prostitutes in her name.
- Zeneen is the Goddess of the desert, sun and fire in Masim, depicted with very curly hair and massive feathered wings.
- Ridon is the God of Art.
- The chaos gods are considered dangerous and even evil, standing outside of the others.
- Rikilda is the Goddess of Alchemy. She's extremely powerful and people associate her with dark practices.
- Cytha is the Goddess of revenge.
- Aelia is the Goddess of caprice. Eventually she becomes the Goddess of inspiration.
- Iius is the God of Gluttony. He is in the form of a huge fish, and has followers bring him human beings to eat.
- Xera is the Goddess of Melancholy. Her presence can increase a nearby person's grief to the point it manifests as a wraith wholly separate from their body.
- Edan is the God of wrath.
- First Kiss: Aelia kisses Orsina the first time after saving her life following the battle against Iius.
- Forced Sleep: Aelia uses her magic to make a couple guards fall asleep so she can spirit Ioanna away.
- Geometric Magic: Orsina draws protective runes in a circle around herself and Aetia while they're sleeping to prevent any dangers getting them. Aetia, who's secretly a chaos goddess, was harmed by the circle inadvertently, though Orsina isn't aware what happened.
- God in Human Form: Aelia is the Goddess of caprice, who has human forms which she's in while down on Inthya, the mortal world. She gets stuck in one inadvertently by Orsina, and has to pretend she's a normal human.
- Gods Need Prayer Badly: The more worship, prayer and sacrifices the gods get, the stronger they are. Aelia is a very weak chaos god with almost no worshipers, so she's very envious of her more powerful divine siblings with lots of them.
- Half the Man He Used to Be: Orsina, when attacked by a priestess of Iius, slices her in half defending herself.
- Happily Ever After: Aelia and Orsina finally become a couple by the end of the book, after many issues facing them, with the possibility that they might marry soon.
- Healing Factor: As a Goddess, Aelia can heal from severe injuries in a few days on her own. Inside of a day, her wound is already looking much better than it was.
- Healing Hands: Aelia heals Orsina of brain damage from a wound as she has both hands on the sides of Orsina's head.
- Hereditary Homosexuality: Orsina is a bisexual woman and it turns out she has two fathers. Given the story's set in a world with a bisexual majority, it's probably the norm.
- Human Sacrifice: Followers of Iius, the God of Gluttony, lure people up to his lake for him to eat them.
- Illegal Religion: Worship of Aelia, Goddess of Caprice, has been outlawed for centuries, as her influence causes people to do whatever feels good and thus neglect necessary things. Other cults to chaos gods are also outlawed from what's implied, though it isn't stated explicitly.
- Internal Reveal: The reader knows from the beginning that Aelia is a chaos goddess disguised as Elyne, a mortal woman, and was deceiving Orsina the whole time. She only confesses this to Orsina near the end of the book however.
- Knight Errant: Orsina is this with her duty as a paladin. She rides around in Vesolda on her quest to seek out an unknown great evil, helping anyone in need from other evils that she's encountered, asking nothing in return while usually all alone on the road. The main difference is she starts traveling with Aelia, whom Orsina believes is just another person in need, and Aelia's soon become her Love Interest. Orsina is very grateful for having company even before they fall in love.
- Knight in Shining Armor: Orsina is a female knight and a paladin who has sworn to protect people against evil. She roams around doing this. However, though people generally expect knights to wear plate armor, Orsina doesn't usually as it's far too hot in Vesolda, where she's stationed, only doing so when facing extreme danger.
- Light Is Good: Orsina is a paladin, with her organization being called the Order of the Sun. Further, her sword can be lit up to guide her way after she prays to trigger it. She's the titular Daughter of the Sun as well naturally. The symbol of the Order is a golden sun, which Orsina wears on her tabard. She can also cast a shield made from golden light around herself.
- Literal Split Personality: Orsina deals with a wraith in a town named Aola that turns out to be this. Due to the influence of Xera, Goddess of Melancholy, a man who'd just lost his son and couldn't properly grieve manifested this way. After he and his husband finally deal with their grief, it fades away.
- Living Lie Detector: Truthsayers, rare people with an ability to see if anyone else lies. They are mentioned several times before Crown Princess Ioanna of Xytan is revealed to have the gift.
- Love Confession: Aelia tells Orsina she loves her after a lengthy period where it's increasingly obvious. Orsina doesn't say it back but she also clearly reciprocates.
- Loving a Shadow: Orsina belatedly realizes that her love for her former lover Perlita was never entirely true, since Perlita's not who she thought. She's a far more selfish, uncaring person that Orsina ever believed earlier.
- Magical Weapon:
- Orsina's sword is enchanted to light up when she triggers this with a prayer.
- Aelia is seeking the Unbinding Stone, which despite this name is really a dagger which can free her from being trapped in a human body.
- Magic Knight: Orsina is a paladin with a magical sword and also magic aside from this, using both to fight.
- Mass Hypnosis: Aelia influenced most of the people in Soria, a small village, who started acting capricious (she's the Goddess of caprice) as a result.
- Nice Girl: Orsina is a kind, earnest young woman who as a paladin really wants to help others.
- Non-Heteronormative Society: Vesoldan culture is shown as finding same-sex relationship wholly unremarkable. Orsina, one of the protagonists, is openly bisexual, with her mentally thinking she's like most people in not having a preference. Her past Childhood Friend Romance with another woman was forbidden by her lover's father not due to them being two women, but as Orsina's a commoner. Orsina is the child of two fathers herself, and same-sex parenting is discussed as common through either adoption or one temporarily changing sex. Some minor characters are also neutroi, nonbinary people who use they/them pronouns, which is wholly accepted too.
- Off with His Head!: Orsina beheads Aelia's human form to banish her and make her regenerate another, which normally would take a very long time.
- The Order: The Order of the Sun is an organization sworn to protect people, in service of Iolar, God of Law and Civilization. While their most prominent component is the paladins, they have justices and magistrates in their ranks as well.
- The Paladin: Orsina is the titular Daughter of the Sun. As a knight in the Order of the Sun, she's sworn to not tell lies, drink alcohol or gamble while protecting people against evil gods and monsters. Orsina though then clarifies that it's just actually drunkenness that's forbidden, not drinking overall. Also she has light-based, mostly protective magic.
- Patron God:
- Orsina devotes herself to Iolar, God of Law and Civilization, serving as a paladin in his name.
- Some chaos gods want human sacrifices by their worshipers, a practice condemned and banned otherwise.
- Aelia gets a following by giving artists' telepathic inspiration to help them create art. She's strengthened in turn by their prayers to her.
- Power Tattoo: Orsina has protective magical tattoos on her arms which make her feel when there is evil nearby.
- Protective Charm: Orsina's arm tattoos are imbued with protective magic that lets her sense danger, such as chaos magic. She can also conjure a shield of light around herself in defense as well. Later she also draws protective runes in a circle around herself and Aetia which give protection when they're sleeping.
- The Quest: Orsina has been on one for two years, searching for a great evil in Vesolda that she must fight. However, she's had no luck at the start of the story. Then she comes across a chaos goddess, and it seems she's finally found the great evil... but things are more complicated than they first seem. It turns out her quest is not from Orsina's god Iolar. Instead, she was sent away with this excuse by her lover's father, who lied about having a vision Iolar sent which ordered it.
- Really 700 Years Old: Aelia is really fourteen billion. In her human form however she looks about twenty five at most. It's later revealed she's even older than that.
- Religion is Magic: As a paladin who's sworn to the god Iolar, Orsina's magic works by prayers toward him.
- Religion of Evil: Iius, God of Glottony, is served by cultists who feed him other people.
- Shapeshifting Seducer: Aelia tried to seduce Orsina in the form of Orsina's Love Interest Perlita, kissing her, but it didn't work.
- Supernatural Sensitivity:
- Orsina can detect if magic is near, and she found Aelia this way due to Aelia's chaos magic.
- Aelia can detect people who serve fellow chaos gods by how this marks them, and the magic which they get as a result.
- Super-Strength: The priestess of Iius who attacks Orsina is far stronger than she looks, as an old woman. Her blows even break some of Orsina's mail, they're so hard. It's presumably a gift Iius gave her.
- Switching P.O.V.: The book shows things alternately from Aelia and Orsina's views, though Orsina has more POV segments.
- Telepathy: Aelia can read Orsina's mind, seeing memories of hers about her lover Perlita.
- Time Abyss: Aelia has been in existence for fourteen billion years. She's a Goddess, so it's not as surprising as it might be otherwise. It then turns out she's even older.
- Uptight Loves Wild: Orsina is duty-bound and serious, while she's drawn to Aelia, an inquisitive, very impulsive woman. It's her type apparently as she was also in love before with Perlita, a woman who Orsina notes had much the same personality.
- Uptown Girl: Orsina is a commoner, and had been in a romance with Perlita, the baron's daughter in her home city. She reflects that their very different classes made it impossible for them to marry, as Perlita's family would want her making a match with a noble. Orsina's service as a paladin took them apart, with their relationship dissipating early in the book.
- Vestigial Empire: Xytae once ruled the entire continent and many lands beyond. Now it's only a shadow of its former height. While still commanding large territories, most of the continent is now made up of independent countries besides Xytae.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Aelia could change her human form to appear however she'd like until she became trapped in it.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Orsina describes herself as an idealist who's dismayed how older paladins are often much more cynical, fighting with the Temple of Iolar (their organization, the Order of the Sun, is also dedicated to Iolar), wishing they could get along because after all they have a common faith and shared goals. She believes sincerely in her work as a paladin and their ideals. Orsina has to face dangers which challenge her idealism while the story's unfolding. Aelia takes advantage of her naive, trusting nature to deceive Orsina repeatedly and at length.
- Will Not Tell a Lie: This is among the things Orsina has sworn against, being a paladin. People who know she's one thus feel assured of honest answers from her. This does not stop her from using exact words sometimes though, which Orsina feels is acceptable and doesn't break her oath.
