"I'm worried, sir, that our enemy has people inside the Church. And I'm worried that the Church won't be happy about the books, or about the man. He also claimed that in the future, Aroden is dead."

"That can't be."

"It is definitely heretical," says Iomedae.

She has a disturbing way of saying that things are heretical while implying with her expression that she also thinks they're true. "Give me the books."

Of course.

He doesn't look at them. It's probably a curse of madness on the pages. "Where's the man?"

"In the dungeons. As we don't want rumors of this I told Angelu to take him in with the deserters. But I would rather not leave him there. He is a cleric of a Lawful Good god, and Aroden intervened to save him. And - he claims that he is a priest of me, as at the end of the war I ascend by the Starstone."

Definitely a curse of madness. "Who else heard this?"

"The whole company heard him scream that he was a cleric of Iomedae. It could have been some different Iomedae."

"But the book says it's you?"

"Yes."

"You don't seem very surprised."

"...Aroden put the Starstone there so we could follow Him, sir."

Arnisant does not think woman gods is precisely what Aroden had in mind but then he also wouldn't have expected Cayden Cailean or Norgorber to be what Aroden had in mind. "Return to your duties, don't speak of this, don't act on this, tell your man the same."

"I would like to speak to my cleric, sir."

"We'll see how the Commune goes. Dismissed."

While incapable of apprehension about how it's going to go down when they find out he's an ex-Asmodean is a fine time to think about how to play that out.

One possibility, of course, is that they're reading the letters in his bag already. The correspondence with the Commandant would suffice even if he didn't have letters from before that which he also chose to keep.

If he has to tell them he should...

It is so hard to think of things. There are probably lots of things he should do and they aren't there to find among the miscellany. He has to wait for them.

If... he were holding a prisoner in a remotely analogous situation...

Wow, Blai would make a terrible god.

What if Grec were a god instead, how about that.

If he were holding a Lawful Neutral cleric of Grec, who used to be a cleric of... Norgorber?... then... it would be... polite of them... to...

Okay. He should ask if they are satisfied with the security of his imprisonment, it's possible they're undershooting because he is not in the same category of prisoner as the others he was brought in among.

He might still be in a paladin aura at the time it comes up, but if he is not he should be aware that it's going to be unpleasant, in an emotionally normal fashion, and be braced for that. He is not sure how to brace himself for forthcoming unpleasantness in a paladin aura. He is arguably doing it right now and still doesn't know.

It's possible he should frontload a reiteration of Asmodeus conquering Cheliax and having been recently defeated in case that did not get passed on. It might be important context on how he could be distinct from Shining Crusade era Asmodean clerics, who probably had to seek out the office.

Unless that's dishonest spin. It might be. He isn't sure.

Being unsure of things in a paladin aura is weird. It's very - blank - even more than the rest of the time spent in a paladin aura.

He probably wasted five entire seconds on that one observation and now he's wasting another five entire seconds on this one.

They probably leave their auras on for a reason. Maybe it's important to the other prisoners. Maybe auras that toggle off haven't been invented yet.

Angelu's just going to stay here making sure that his important prisoner doesn't get mixed up with the other prisoners and all the bones in his hand broken, that would be horribly embarrassing.

The Church in Oppara will not actually mind if he covers for them by figuring out what share of this man and these claims Aroden cares to have conveyed to them. Will prefer it, certainly, to the whole mess being dumped in their lap in one piece. Aroden is far-seeing; His plans need not make sense to mortals, and this is plainly one of them.

Should the claim be conveyed to your Church in Oppara that this book represents a prophecy of the Shining Crusade?

NOT NOW

Should the claim be conveyed to your Church in Oppara that Arazni would be willing to aid us in the Crusade?

YES. It's not going to go as well in the short run but it's just as needed. More so, really, because the man can't fall into enemy hands.

Is this going to get her killed?

I HOPE NOT

(It's very irregular for gods to give a non-standard answer to Communes, let alone several such, and the priest doing this one looks extremely overawed.)