I want to teach you something, but not about the blocks. You've been reading my mind? Jisa's distress that she might have caused a war came out of nowhere, unless actually it came out of an extremely obvious place.

"....Ummm." 

I'm not mad. I'm from a place where people don't get mad about things like that. But you're, what, ten, and if you're going to be a hero and save prisoners and read peoples' minds, you're going to see a lot of stuff, and you need to understand the world so you can handle it, all right? 

Jisa looks thoughtful about this, and then eventually nods. 

Valdemar is very Good. That means that people will try to be nice to you, and try to protect you, and their punishments won't be meant to really hurt you, but it also means that they'll be trying to teach you how your ability can serve them and how your goals should be their goals and how you should build the rules inside yourself and follow them because you believe in them, even when they're not worth believing in. 

The place I'm from is very different. It would teach you how you can serve yourself, and how you can get what you want, and how you should check whether the rules are helping you with your goals or get in the way of them and then how to get away with as much as you safely can. That's why reading my mind isn't against the rules where I am from; it doesn't serve me, but it serves you, and where I'm from, that's enough reason to do it. 

I don't believe in raising children Good. It seems kind of like raising them in a very small cage. But you would absolutely get yourself killed in five minutes flat in Cheliax, because while you've noticed that you don't want to build all the rules inside yourself, you haven't learned which ones are safe to break.

Jisa follows along, nodding and making various faces. 

:...I guess that makes sense: she agrees finally. :Cheliax seems really horrible and I think Melody would say that you seem really traumatized and like you're scared everyone will hurt you: 

I think I have accurate expectations about whether people will hurt me. Melody did. I wasn't scared of you and I was right not to be. And I'd rather live in Cheliax than Valdemar, because in Cheliax you're allowed to get what you want.

Jisa scowls. :I don't get why Melody did that to you, anyway! She's told me a million times that doing Mindhealing to peopel when they don't want it is bad and wrong and I should never ever do it!: 

She and Vanyel and the rest of the Heralds don't like Cheliax and don't think people should live there. Which is fine, people don't have to like Cheliax and don't have to live there. But because they're Good, they think that believing people shouldn't live in Cheliax entitles them to imprison me until I agree with them and build their rules inside myself and tell them they did the right thing. Whereas if I think someone is making a mistake, I will let them. I think all the Heralds are making a mistake in which god they follow but I'm not Good so I don't think my opinion of their choices should matter.

Jisa looks dubiously at her. :I don't think Uncle Van would imprison you just for that. Maybe my papa is worried that if they let you go back then you'll tell your god all about Haven? And then that would be bad if your god decides actually he wants to fight us: 

They were also worried about that but I wouldn't have been mad at them for worrying about that. It's fine to hurt people because it benefits you, it's just not okay to hurt them because you decided it benefits them.

Jisa chews on this for a long time. 

:- Well, my mama's a Healer and she says it's all right to change a patient's bandages even if it hurts them, if you need to?: 

We have magic healing where I'm from, I don't think we have anything like that. I guess I'd say that if the patient would rather die than get treatment that's their stupid choice.

:Huh. ...I had a fight with Melody once. About whether if someone thinks their life is really bad and wants to kill themselves then you should stop them? I said what if they're just right that their life is really bad and Melody said people are almost never right about that in the long run: 

I bet she also thinks people are almost never right about wanting to go to Hell, so you should stop them from that too. 

:I don't know. What happens in Hell?: 

You turn into a devil. It hurts, but devils are really cool, and then you get to live forever being really cool.

:Huh. Did you tell Melody why devils are cool? I want to know what's cool about devils!: 

They're really smart, and they're so good with words, and so good at convincing people of things, and they can teleport so they can just pop all around Hell working on whatever they're working on, and they're perfectly Lawful and perfectly Evil and they have a different kind of magic than ours that's slower to learn but more powerful and intuitive and doesn't need a spellbook.

:Huh: Jisa picks at her thumbnail. :I feel like my Uncle Van is already cool in most of those ways but it seems like you don't like him? Why don't you like him: 

Cause Melody used mind control to force me to think through how I'd betray the Star-Eyed, which in Cheliax is a really awful thing to do to someone - like, you can take anyone and use mind control to force them to think through how they'd betray Asmodeus, and then get them for heresy - and what she forced me to come up with was that I could summon a devil and sell them my soul so I still get to go to Hell instead of the Star-Eyed getting me, and then Vanyel said that for strategic reasons he won't let me, which is fine, and also that even if there weren't strategic reasons he won't let me because I am a slave and belong to Good and Good is against me being hurt even if I want to so  I will be prevented from doing things I want to do that Good objects to, and that if I really wanted he'd sell me to a Good god.

:Oh. ...Uncle Van doesn't like people hurting. It makes him really really sad: 

Jisa stares at the floor, fiddling with the end of her braid. 

:- What's heresy?: 

Well, that's the problem with being Good, lots of things make you sad that are none of your business. Heresy's things you're not allowed to believe. 

:- What does that even mean? You can't help what you believe, it just - happens: 

I mean, some people also can't help going into violent rages and murdering their wife, but it's still illegal if you can't help it.