Ohsan’a

Ohsan'a is mother to all who will have her. When life's troubles seem ready to crush you under their weight, she is the wind in your ear encouraging each next step. When a copperless parent huddles with their babes in an alley, she stokes the fire in their heart to warm their children. Where a surgeon would otherwise hesitate, she stirs the countless hours of their study to guide their scalpel to the precise point needed. Ohsan'a helps those who help themselves, but more importantly those who help others. Her domain is the hearth, the hostel, and the heart. She is often the first deity to take an interest in the mortal children for their own sake, long before they grow into capable adults that would be useful to the other deities. In turn she is often the first divine the very young learn of, exploring the small alcoved shrines to her that often watch over the homes of mortals who worship the pantheon.   Patronage: Ohsan'a is the patron goddess of medicine, hearths, and charity. When the average person thinks of a devout of hers, then tend to think of professional healers such as doctors or midwives. If they are lucky they've met a traveling cleric of Ohsan'a whose magic has mended wounds and allayed illness. Her devouts number many more than the skilled however, and many are simply generous souls looking to ease another's pain in whatever small way they can. Her devouts often work or volunteer at the many public works (often locations that double as her temples) associated with their goddess, with the truly devoted often taking vows of life long service to a specific location. These public works that look to the care and health of their communities most famously include centers of learning to both teach the medical sciences as well as further medical research, both mundane and magical. While they logically are responsible for many clinics and pharmacies, less well known are the (admittedly fewer in number) sanitariums and orphanages they build where able; more oft the mentally infirm and destitute children congregate around temples to Ohsan’a where they know they can receive at least occasional support. The lucky few will be invited to join the temple and serve Ohsan’a in return for lodging, and there is no shortage of clerics, paladins, and high devouts that owe their fervored devotion to their goddess to the life saving kindness of a temple devout. Ohsan’a’s devouts also create hostels, taverns, and shelters to give respite to weary travelers and those with nowhere else to turn. In particularly poor or sparsely populated areas, a monastery may serve as a combination hostel, clinic, religious temple, isolated asylum, and orphanage all in one. While they may not be primary devouts, many parents, teachers, or those who take on apprentices find their prayers to Ohsan'a increase exponentially as they run short on patience and long on anxiety.   Worship: While most devouts to the pantheon will focus on their primary deity if they wish to build a shrine in their abodes, in truth all have built an altar to Ohsan'a. Every hearth-fire from the humblest hut to the grandest castle kitchen is considered her shrine. Even campfires can be considered temporary shrines to her as long as they provide someone warmth, cooking, or ritual. Most devouts of hers, even many general pantheon worshippers, will strengthen their hearth as an altar by either adding a small statuette of the goddess to an adjacent alcove, or even to the center of the hearth itself. Alternatively a relief of Ohsan'a might be carved into the stonework around the hearth. No matter where she is placed, Ohsan'a is always depicted gazing out over the home as if guarding the residents.   Ohsan'a adorns more than just stonework; her devouts are known to have knife handles cast in the shape of her likeness. Cooking and eating knives are of course popular choices, but many forms of knives are chosen. Many medical scalpels either have their handles shaped to resemble a token version of her, or have her image carefully etched in the base of the blade. Those of her devouts who take her third tenet more figuratively are also known to craft the hilts of their daggers in her figure as well, occasionally leaving them in the corpse to mark them as a cancer removed from society.   Those devouts who sought their home shrines to her as a comforting place as children still look to her as a reassuring presence, and wear scapulars embossed with silk scenes of Ohsan'a keeping a hearth fire or guarding over a loved one.