It's not very...hinting that the god cares at all about murder being bad, it's not Good, but - it has to be the case that Someone Lawful - so, Abadar? - coached the Shadow-Lover on a bunch of those concepts, even if the putting-them-together was ad-libbed and not part of the starting script. He's not sure why this feels so true, just - there's something very, very Law-flavored about the careful disambiguation of where Seldan's proposed sort-of-apology script was or wasn't accurate. Does Blai see it too, or is Seldan pattern-matching wrong? 

It sure is a good thing that Blai had such excellent advice for the Shadow-Lover earlier about which of the Golarion gods would be friendly and helpful! Since it's working out so well for the Valdemargod! (Seldan is thinking that very cheerfully and loudly, and also notthinking about less cheerful things.) 

Honestly, knowing Leareth, an explanation conveying an understanding of Law might be more reassuring that one that claims Good motives. 

There was some distant shadow of Law in that statement, now that Seldan mentions it; Blai did not twig to it at once because it was under a layer of god-dense-ness. It's not "let's sign a treaty" but it's maybe "we're looking forward to a ceasefire"?

Velgarth may have low standards when it comes to Law.

It...makes sense? Insofar as he can make sense of it without quite being able to fit all of the concepts in relation to each other in his mind. It's not surprising that the Shadow-Lover's god doesn't agree with him on everything or intend to defer to him on value judgements, that would be a bizarre thing for a god to do and so a claim of intending to do it would be suspicious and confusing. 

Communication and deliberate cooperation would be - better. He can't really...engage with it, right now, it's too far away from the current being-dead reality, it requires being someone capable of remembering the agreements they made, and he can barely hold onto concepts that are right there in his face. But it's - good news - if it's true. He will just have to trust his allies to be maintaining an assessment of the Shadow-Lover's truthfulness.

(He's aware that he's probably hanging more hope on his allies, who he remembers rather little about, than he might endorse if he had all the information and the ability to think about it properly. But what else is he going to do? That's what he has to work with. If they don't negotiate for his resurrection, and the Shadow-Lover's god holds onto him, it's not like he's going to remember this conversation to feel betrayed that no one came for him)

"I think I understand," he says, slowly. "You are interested in limited cooperation, only on goals we share, and are not conveying an intention for more than that, but You believe that if I am - alive - I will prefer that to the way it was before, and this will benefit You as well as myself." 

Another pause "You - are likely to be right."

...He seems to be looking uncertainly at Blai and Seldan, as though not entirely sure that he’s retrieved his sense of self in enough fidelity to actually know what he would do. 

“I should certainly think so,” Seldan says cheerfully. “You can be a ruthless bastard, but - you’re consistent. We don’t know you to ever have lied about your intentions, and if someone gives you even a crumb to work with, you try cooperation, even when your priors are very strong that it won’t work.”

That does sound like - a set of principles he would consider correct to try to follow? It’s just…hard to be sure what claims he can confidently make about himself and his character, when he remembers so little of his life.

He stands there blankly for another long moment. 

"...Did we know one another?" he says to the Herald, puzzled. "You - are not like most Heralds." 

Ah. Ahaha. 

"...It's complicated," Seldan says. "We met briefly before you died, but I was a Groveborn Companion at that point. Select Artigas' Companion, actually." Fond smile. "Before that - a long time ago, multiple incarnations ago for you - we were...friends. You probably don't remember it, but I was Herald Seldasen, and you were a scholar in Rethwellan. ...I would say I knew you quite well, then, even if I didn't know your - history." 

Oh. 

(Select Artigas has a Companion? That - but he can't be Valdemaran, if he's - wouldn't that be– it probably does't matter. Maybe they explained everything already and he forgot.) 

"I - wish I remembered," he says. 

Awwww. 

"I'm sure it's in your notes," Seldan says. 

And then, since dead-Leareth with negative emotions suppressed actually seems more impaired at...anything goal-directed...he looks at the Shadow-Lover. "Did you get everything you wanted from him? Is there more?" 

The Shadow-Lover turns to Leareth. 

"We do have a question that We wish to ask,” She says.

Leareth…tries to find the will to make an effort and concentrate. It mostly isn’t working.

“I will do my best to answer,” he says.

“One of the paths available is that We give your soul to the god Abadar in the other world, in exchange for resources that We can use here,” the Shadow-Lover says. “But We cannot see where that path ends or whether it is good for Us. What would you do?”

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

(The - emotion, it’s hard to tell what it would even be - doesn’t feel like anything, but it’s there.)

Is he supposed to have the slightest idea who Abadar is???? Maybe that was explained and he forgot????

“The Lawful Neutral god of trade,” Seldan reminds him. “You discussed a claim by the Shadow-Lover that Abadar’s goals have significant overlap with yours. Which would be why He offered to buy your soul in the first place, I imagine. I have the impression that’s especially important for Golarion gods.”

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

“…I think I do not have enough information to answer the question,” he says. “It seems likely it would - mostly be up to Abadar.”

"I unfortunately do not know what Abadar does with souls He buys or what He would have in mind for yours specifically, only the guess that He might emplace you in Axis, the paradisical city Lawful Neutral afterlife in which He dwells."

The problem is that Leareth has absolutely no idea how anything works, or what the Shadow-Lover intends to do differently based on his answer to this incredibly underspecified question. 

...The Shadow-Lover's god...might...care about whether They get anything from the hypothetical Leareth-cooperation if he goes to Axis. That...would make sense. 

(Thinking is still very slow but he's at least not losing threads of it to random terror.) 

There's something he doesn't remember. About...why...it was especially bad for him to die before - before what? Before doing something. Leareth dredges at fragments and - he's stuck here in the possession of a god and keeps reminding himself that his allies can't personally get him out and that's - because they don't have access to a spellcaster who can actually do the resurrection. Which - also has other ramifications - Leareth wasn't the only one dead... 

"- If the question is, whether I would - come back to Velgarth?" he says haltingly. "I think that I would try? In - most scenarios - if there were an emergency that threatened millions of people, I might stay for that? That...seems unlikely in a paradise afterlife? So. I think I would try. Whether I succeed would...depend on whether someone in that situation is actually allowed to leave?" 

Well, Blai did mention there were afterlife police. Would they stop Leareth from Gating to Velgarth– would Leareth even be able to do magic, he thinks he remembers picking up in Blai's memories that clerics don't still have their spells once they've been sorted to their afterlife, even if it's the same one their god is in? 

People generally do not have magic in the afterlife, no.

Seldan isn't exactly sure of the logistical setup of afterlives, but it sounds like Leareth-in-Axis would have something like a body - not literally his old body with its Gifts, but more than what he has right now, he would be able to think properly and take actions normally - and his (vague) understanding is that Leareth would at that point actually remember what he knew when he died, with the attendant effects on his priorities. But wouldn't actually have any way to get out of Axis and back to Velgarth quickly, unless Abadar decided to resurrect him in Golarion for whatever Abadar-reasons - it would take a True Resurrection, presumably? if Leareth's soul is available but his body isn't? so, yeah, unlikely that Abadar would do it without expecting payment from someone.

And...probably...Abadar wouldn't stop them from doing their own resurrection on the grounds that He had paid for that soul and it was His now? That feels un-Abadar-like, not that Leareth right now would necessarily be reassured by that character assessment. Leareth wouldn't be cut off from Velgarth forever, just - not in a good position to solve their current problems. Which the Shadow-Lover seems unworried about, but there are time-sensitive elements, like everyone in Iftel who's alive right now but won't make it until spring, that the Valdemargod gives no indication of caring about, but that Leareth was clearly upset about during the brief interval when he was filled in on the Iftel context. (Seldan is pretty sure that Leareth dropped that at some point. It doesn't seem productive to remind him.) 

...That's a lot of uncertainty and caveats to throw at a very disoriented Leareth. 

"Your Gifts probably wouldn't accompany you to Axis," he says. "It wouldn't be as easy as researching a Gate-routing. But you wouldn't be a prisoner there. And Abadar would value trade between Velgarth and Golarion, in the long run. I can't see that He would - feel He hadn't gotten what He paid for - if that was the project you chose to work on." It would take a long time, but the Shadow-Lover isn't the one who's in a hurry. 

Why does Abadar even want his soul if it won't include his magic He's missing way too much context for it to make sense to reason about that. 

"I would try to come back," he says, with slightly more certainty. "My work is not done in Velgarth." 

The Shadow-Lover seems satisfied by this. 

....Seldan is abruptly getting a Foresight-tug feeling that this conversation is wrapping up. 

He's not sure what the Shadow-Lover is taking away from it, or whether there's anything important that She's too dense to have thought to ask Leareth about. It does feel like they've learned that resurrecting Leareth on their end, if they somehow get a cleric for it, might not be as trivial as hoped, but in fact they don't have a cleric for it or any way to get one yet and so it's hardly the main obstacle. 

He has a tangle of unformed objections to the situation, mostly the part where they're leaving Leareth's soul here with a god who seemed inclined to keep poking Leareth and does not seem to have any understanding of aspects like "the reason this wasn't working like the Shadow-Lover expected before is that it's awful for Leareth." But it's not as though it's going to damage Leareth in any enduring sense, it seems like there might be literally no way for the Shadow-Lover to give Leareth any new trauma, so it's just...unpleasant experiences that have no causal effect on the future. Seldan needs to do a lot of unpacking on whether he cares about that, but he kind of suspects that Leareth doesn't. 

It seems probably bad in the same way that it is bad for someone to spend some time in Hell even though they won't remember the details if they are raised later but they do not really have an angle on this. Well, it's probably cheap to try telling the Shadow-Lover, "Please be kind to him." That won't work probably but still.

The Shadow-Lover does seem to listen to this very seriously, but it’s indeed unclear what if anything was successfully communicated.