Leareth is able to eat with only a little bit of help, and asks some more fairly coherent questions about the rest of the operation, whether Aroden got all of the weapons and whether he also faced interference and whether the collaboration between Asmodeus and Iomedae plus Abadar went all right. 

Khemet and Aroden only talked briefly about this but his understanding is that he faced interference, but it was easily enough addressed, and all of the superweapons were successfully moved. 

That's good. It sounds like basically everything was successful, and the biggest complication was whatever is wrong with Leareth himself. 

"- I think She was trying to frighten me into calling a Final Strike," he admits. "I only remember fragments of it, but - it was a hallucination, I think, I was being attacked, it seemed hopeless, and then Abadar was trying to call out to me and tell me that She was lying..." 

"That ability of yours is very powerful and I kind of wish none of you had it. It seems like a disadvantage as often as an advantage and it's so messy. When we have native Gifted people I might have a law they have to have a compulsion put in against using it - not that that would've inconvenienced a god -

- I'm mad at Abadar, though I don't know if that's reasonable, it was dangerous and not in a way he can easily fix..."

"It is less exploitable in Velgarth, I think, because it is actually very difficult to place an involuntary compulsion on a mage with training. Or anyone with Mind-Gifts trained to shield. And nearly impossible to do so without alerting them and causing them to put up a fight, so forcing someone to Final Strike is - it almost never happens. But - your mind-affecting magic is stronger, when the archdevil in Cheliax tried to take control me, I could not have held it off by my own will." Sigh. "And, of course, people can and do Final Strike willingly but for very stupid reasons. Our world might be better if no one could do it." 

"At least not impulsively." He squeezes his hand. "We should really work out a variant of Mind Blank that doesn't interfere with Mindspeech so that you can have it up all the time too."

"Aroden mentioned he had an idea for it, he is very good at intuiting his way to inventing variants of spells because of the godmemories, but he is also constantly very busy. I may ask him to make it a higher priority, though; I would also like it very much if I could Mindspeak with you." 

Leareth looks up at Khemet. "...Have you been repeatedly casting Delay Pain? I assume at some point I am going to have to be in pain, you cannot just keep putting it off forever." 

"I have, yeah. I figured it was better to wait until you were oriented."

"I suppose I will probably cope with it more easily when I have any idea what is happening to me." He gives Khemet an unhappy look. "It is very frightening for me, being confused about my surroundings. But it was better, having you there." 

“You were pretty out of it. Melody and Nayoki didn’t seem totally sure...”

"Not totally sure of what? That I would recover from it?" Leareth rubs his eyes. "I - do feel better now, I think - I am not sure I would notice if something were wrong with my head, because that is the part that notices things... Do I seem more like usual?" 

“Much more like normal. I can get them in to look again if you’d like?”

"I would like to know if something is going to be wrong with my mind forever!" 

So he has someone go get Melody and Nayoki. The food arrives while they’re being fetched.

Melody has to be Teleported back over from Cheliax, but she has official permission from the King this time, who seems inclined to be forgiving of Aroden's rudeness yesterday given what they know now about Leareth's injuries. She joins Nayoki, who stayed overnight in the Dome but is just waking up now, and they head in together. 

Leareth is sitting up, eating. "Thank you for coming." 

"Oh, good, you look much better today. You know where you are?" 

"In the Dome in Osirion. The pharaoh has been presumably neglecting all his other duties and his wives in order to tell me every two hours that I am there." 

Leareth did not quite mean to say exactly that phrase out loud, oops. 

Melody bites back a snicker. "Good. I'll let you finish eating and then we'll see if I can sort out the bits that got jumbled around in your head. It's looking like that would eventually sort out by itself, but Nayoki and I can help you feel like yourself faster, I think." Glance at Khemet. "He's still going to need a couple of days and he shouldn't exert himself too much, including by thinking. Which unfortunately seems hard to discourage him from doing." 

"Should we stop delaying pain at this point?"

"Probably. Sorry, Leareth, just - I'm concerned that if we're masking some of the symptoms, you're going to feel better when you aren't actually better yet and then wear yourself out and need longer to recover." 

"That makes sense." He's not enthusiastic about it but it won't get any more appealing if he waits longer. 

"I think I'd better do my work first, though - how much longer is he covered with Delay Pain right now?" 

"It'll last another ten hours if I don't dispel it, I was planning to dispel it when we're ready."

"Shouldn't take me ten hours. I'll let you know. Leareth, all right - can you think about when you walked through the Gate into Haven with Vanyel?"