The Pacteria Sanctorum began in the catacombs beneath the ruined Basilica of Nine Lanterns, where nine hedge-wizards, two disowned clerics, and a masked diviner survived a siege by a war cult that had bound itself to a minor battlefield god. During the siege, the cult's patron answered every demand with escalating appetite, devouring its own worshipers in the final hour. The survivors found something strange in the aftermath: a half-burned litany that described pacts not as chains, but as contracts that could be negotiated, narrowed, and redirected. Their first experiment was small and daring. They approached a forgotten roadside saint, offered incense, local memories, and the promise of being remembered honestly, and received a single blessing that cured plague in three villages without demanding blood. That success became the seed of the circle. They named themselves the Pacteria Sanctorum, the Sacred Compact, because they believed mortals could make patrons serve mutual interest instead of surrender. The first watershed moment came twelve years later during the Covenant Night Schism. One faction attempted to enthrone a fire-lord spirit as a civic protector, while another insisted that any patron who craved temples was already becoming a tyrant. The argument ended in ritual sabotage, three deaths, and the loss of the original Index of Small Gods. The circle survived, but from that night onward they became split between idealists who sought benign patronage and pragmatists who believed every pact was a calculated risk. Since then, every triumph has been shadowed by the fear that they are proving their own doctrine either true or fatally naive.