I’m not exactly sure.  I think the most cautious option would be as often as Lastwall can spare the healing, there is a Paladin on his way to you now for the use of Paladin’s Sacrifice in an emergency, Jon can check how many lay on hands uses they have, and then calculate from that?  I think once every 4 or 5 hours at minimum, so if that Paladin doesn’t have at least 5 or 6 lay on hands a day, Jon should ask Lastwall for more healing.  And Lastwall should have a bit of extra healing on hand in case it’s really bad.

I’ll ask once the Inquisitor gets back.

Oh, right, they have someone volunteered to die in her place if that comes up. And this apparently works for dying from sudden massive blood loss due to a cursed wound? Well, far be it from Tanya to criticize anyone willing to die in her stead.

Understood. Thank you. And she goes to sit in her antimagic celll guestroom.

She has so much to review and analyze and try to come to terms to! ...and she can't review any of it because she can't read her orb recordings in the antimagic room, or for that matter record what she's told while she's in it. Well, she is practiced at keeping notes the normal way. Although she'll have a hard time organizing them without, without a loyal and excellently trained subordinate -

You know what happened? The magic headband that makes her more alert and functional turned off when she entered the antimagic room, that's what happened. Ugh. Was she supposed to return all these magic items to Terendelev, especially since they're useless while she's in this room? Eh, it's Terendelev's job to keep track of that, there's no problem as long as she doesn't try to charge Tanya for it.

How long does she have until someone arrives who can read or talk to her?

The Paladin reaches them about ten minutes later.

“Reporting for a potentially needed Paladin’s Sacrifice?  I have the 2nd open slot, and an open 1st circle slot, if you have any requests?”

He has a somewhat vacant look to him a keen observer might recognize as something like a milder case of shell shock or war weariness.

He mentally asks Terendelev for a pause from their planning.

He casts a message.  Layering more security when it’s not costly is almost always a good idea!

“It would be best if you could be alert through the night, at least this first night whether a Keep Watch or Lesser Restoration would be best I’ll leave to your judgement.  And Ser… could you restrain your aura of courage?  It isn’t for me and the subject you will be protecting is currently under an antimagic field, but she has a very strong preference against anything mind affecting.”

“Oh sorry, of course.  And my understanding is I’m specifically here to guard against mind control?  That can somehow get through an antimagic field?  My preference, if it is reasonable for you to fulfill it, is to die before being used by such an enemy.”

“Correct, it is absolutely imperative that this woman, Tanya Von Degurechaff not be dominated.  I will instruct her to be ready to step outside the antimagic field quickly on mine or your instructions.”

He debated withholding Tanya’s name, but humans build rapport better with names, and they are potentially asking this man to die.

“Also, how many lay on hands do you have?  She has a mysterious cursed wound, resistant to typical approaches, that reopens outside antimagic fields, and we want to check its progress.”

“4 left today, 7 with the dawn.  And do you want the sacrifice in the event the cursed wound is worse than expected?  I don’t think it can transfer an already established curse, I’ll just get some of the immediate injury.”

“I concur with your expectation.  I think using that spell is only worth it in the event she looks like she is about to die.  For context… despite many other things about her, Tanya is only about as durable as civilian commoner.  And I think to start with we will want one lay on hands every 5 hours, keeping one in reserve in case you need more healing.  I’ll explain to Tanya.”

He speaks in Germanian.

“He has four lay on hands left and will get them renewed to 7 with the dawn.  So I think the best option for checking the wound progress is for you to step out once every 5 hours.  That will leave one in reserve even after the dawn comes.  Also none of his abilities will work within the antimagic field.  Under the hypothesis that Areelu has semi-divine power, her dominates can beat both my own aura and the antimagic field so you will want to step out quickly in a situation where we think Areelu may be approaching.  I can speak in your own language and will instruct him on a few convenient phrases in your language to quickly instruct you.  Do you have any preferences on brief emergency instruction warnings I can tell him to be ready with?”

That man definitely looks like a war-weary veteran! Being on-call as a literal blood sacrifice can't be doing him any favors; Tanya hopes he at least gains something from resting physically while he's posted here. 

The willingness of people to devote their lives in service of the system helps civilization flourish. Pure self-interest even under the best-crafted state produces inferior outcomes compared to a population with a healthy dose of altruism. Tanya only wishes it were possible to carve out some principled exception to the extremes of altruism that enable groups to wage war on each other. Although, if humans achieved such heights, the self-styled 'gods' would certainly intervene to keep them at each other's throats...

"What are our options if you tell me to step out? What might I need to do or communicate quickly?" Teleports are blocked in this area, so Jon thinking Areelu is approaching implies a more conventional assault.

He considers the problem carefully.

“For anything short of an archmage, staying in the antimagic field is a reliable option.  Once you step out… the Paladin will immediately heal you, and be ready to cast Paladin’s Sacrifice.  It only works to redirect very recently cast effects, so be watching for unexpected high power casting to request it the moment before the spell hits you.  The literal word to say to request… how about the spell’s name in his native language: Paladin’s Sacrifice… just Sacrifice will be enough.  Our warning, in the event we got any, would be someone noticing the faint distortion of someone under invisibility moving through the fortress.  Normally invisibility can be spotted by someone under the spell see invisibility, but the 8th circle spell mind blank blocks that.  Your flight speed is supreme, it should surpass even an Archmage’s options for flight, so we may also want the option of getting you in the air… once I’m done explaining to you and him I’ll request to be shown the quickest path to get airborne from here, and then explain it to you, or uh, I could get paper and writing material.  Also it is a tertiary priority next to ensuring you do not get dominated, but he has said he would prefer dying than being controlled by an enemy, if you can spare an attack… and to clarify, killing an ally under mind control that consented to such an option in advance is definitely not Evil, and volunteering for suicidal missions is not Evil.”

He pauses.

“Questions?  And I’ll request some writing material for you as well.”

"I can't sense magic while I'm in the antimagic field. It's more likely that you - or he, if he's posted outside - will notice or be told something is wrong before I notice anything. Perhaps I should leave the cursed orb just outside so one of you can notice if it suddenly becomes magically active, since you say the antimagic field doesn't suppress it anyway. If I step outside and I'm not otherwise impaired it will still take me a few seconds to spin up the orb and my flight spell and barrier. ...I will do my best to carry out his request in the event it becomes relevant."

The man's preferences are eminently rational. Tanya is having some unexpected mental turbulence about the idea of abruptly ordering someone who isn't a Germanian soldier and can't even understand her, not to accomplish some goal, but simply to die. She's rationally aware there is a goal, she just isn't used to the local spells, and of course it wouldn't stop her from doing so either way, but the situation feels eminently unfair for everyone involved and she is used to having command in the field and with command comes responsibility. She will mentally drill the possible scenarios and her responses to make sure there's no embarrassing delay at the moment of truth.

"Are there any other plans to rehearse? For flight I would need to know which direction the enemy is approaching from so I can take a route leading away from them." This is a highly secure area, which hopefully means it's secure against Tanya quickly blasting her way out through the ceiling. 

“We could wait for rehearsing moving outside the antimagic field and subsequently moving to fly outside until we do our first check on how your wound is doing in 5 hours?  We can rehearse some common short phrases now, although your tongues and comprehend will return as soon as you step outside the antimagic field.”

Rehearsing the phrases isn’t hard.  For Tanya to tell Ser Abban (Jon finally got around to asking his name) are: Exiting (to warn him she is exiting), Heal, and Sacrifice.  For Ser Abban: stay (to stay put in the antimagic field), attention (moderate/nonemergency need for attention), alert (emergency happening without further instructions yet), exit (to exit the antimagic field), and fly (for flying away, flight route to be determined by Jon and practiced in 5 hours).

After about a half hour later, a finely dressed elderly woman comes up with several books and writing materials.  “I haven’t been fully briefed on the situation and it might be easier if I’m not (although I have the right level of clearance if necessary)?  I just know there is someone I’m supposed to read to who has very little context on common things.  May I hear a sample of their native language?”

“This is Tanya Von Degurechaff.” He says in Germanian. 

She addresses Tanya in that language.  “I am Sorcha Apvander, diplomat-consular of Lastwall.  I should inform you I have not yet been fully briefed on your situation.  I have the appropriate clearances should you wish to inform me, or you can keep it secret should you wish to maximize secrecy and I can simply read books to you?”

She makes a light joke.  “It will save me some debriefing time if you don’t tell me, although I must admit some curiosity.”

 (She likes to imagine totally wild stories to reduce the odds she accidentally guesses something realistic… her current imagining… escapee from secret massive demiplane of an Archmage.  With exotic traits from being raised in a demiplane, except they need suppressing while she adepts to the material and thus the antimagic room.)

Finally, a non-military person to interact with! Tanya puts on her best face. "Thank you for your time. How should I address you?"

"I'd like not to tell you about myself at first, because it would take too much time to do so and the topics it raises might distract us. I may share more details later if it turns out to be important to explaining some questions I have." Need-to-know is good not just for Tanya's but possibly also for Sorcha's own safety - no, actually, there is one obvious thing to share when talking to someone who isn't from the military and presumably can't be ordered to sacrifice their life! "I'm told there's a hopefully remote possibility of me coming under attack here, in which case depending on Jon and Ser Abban's judgement I might need to flee on a moment's notice, and there might be danger to anyone nearby. Also, you should know that I'm in the antimagic zone because it suppresses a cursed wound I have that gets worse over time when I'm outside it, and every once in a while I'll step out briefly out to evaluate its progress." The wound is presumably not dangerous to share and she hopes it will make her look more normal human and less like she's in here because she isn't trusted, although not being in an antimagic prison cell should make that clear regardless.

"You should assume I have a very poor understanding of local conditions, including the nations and other factions, their political and military situation, local gods and religions and their beliefs, and widely and not so widely available magic and mundane technology. Most of what I do know, I was told by Jon over the past day under hurried circumstances." She can't hide this because she'll be asking to have the basics of everything explained to her. In the short term she might get away with pretending to be from the a very remote place on this planet, but an intelligent and curious person will quickly figure out that her language isn't local and her clothes look strange and, above all, the implicit assumptions underlying her questions must be completely bizarre by local standards. Tanya doesn't intend to tell Sorcha she's from another planet, or anything else specific about herself, but she can't expect to pass as any kind of local. (Also, she isn't using a pseudonym and well-connected locals can presumably pay to pull up information by name from the divine surveillance system... But Jon hadn't suggested she change her name, so it probably wouldn't have helped.)

What this all comes down to is that she has to trust Sorcha, like she does everyone else vetted by her allies. Who happen to be literally the first people she met on the planet after being kidnapped and having her memory erased. So it goes.

"I will need to learn about all of these and more, but I'm not sure what to prioritize. I'm inclined to ask for a brief geopolitical overview first, followed by overviews of military technology and the military and spycraft applications of magic, followed by technology and economic and social conditions more broadly, but as I learn things I may ask to change topics. And of course I can't expect to monopolize your time; I hope to use this session to identify topics I should prioritize in later days. If a solution to the curse is found soon and I can leave the antimagic field, I will at least be able to read local books for myself."

(This list omits the gods. Tanya hopes it will be more pleasant and productive to engage religion in a practical manner, by noticing how it manifests in descriptions of the world, rather than by directly discussing theology.)

What else... "I'm used to taking notes using a magic device; I'll be writing things down while I'm in here, but unfortunately I don't have an eidetic memory." This keeps coming up! Tanya is a little jealous of the benign applications of mind-affecting magic. Alas, their magic comes from the 'gods' and might not be safe to use.

She’s not worried at all about any threats, this fortress was warded by Arazni herself!

"If you want to be formal, you can call me consular or consular Apvander.  I won't mind informality if you just want to call me Sorcha.  And for yourself, is Von Degurechaff appropriate?"

"Depending on what exactly you mean by local.  Lastwall, the nation we are in, has it's history and it commitments.  This continent, Avistan, it's current geopolitical balance is heavily influenced by the death of Aroden a century ago and the Worldwound.  If by local you mean the material plane or this planet... I think Aroden stands out notably?  And Iomedae, especially in Lastwall and Avistan.  So for choices of reading material... that would come be between one, a brief history of Lastwall and maybe some text on its commitments, two, a history of the Worldwound and world history focusing on the past century leading to an overview of Avistan, or three maybe Aroden's holy book and a very general history of the past several millennia?  And I can go for scholarly works, or more novice introductions, and lean more towards primary source materials or more derivative materials?  I'll try not to read too much into whatever your choices.  I have a few books with me, but I might need to go fetch some more depending on where you want to start.  And don't worry about my time, I'm mostly retired, but today has seen Lastwall call practically everyone up to standby."

She isn't sure if Tanya is human, she doesn't look like a halfling but Sorcha has heard halflings can sometimes have really youthful faces.  And she might be some totally different race, like an Archmage's experiment!  And that looks like some type of military uniform, so best not to patronize Von Degurechaff either way.

"Then please, call me Tanya." Social niceties! It's good to finally talk to a trained diplomat, even if Tanya can't reveal her alien status yet.

"In the short term, I'm only interested in history inasfar as it helps me understands the present. As for the scope... I don't know how much it makes sense to talk of Lastwall without its neighbors, or Avistan without the other continents, or Golarion without the other planets or planes it's in contact with, but one has to start somewhere. If possible, I would like to start by understanding Lastwall and its neighbors - Mendev, Cheliax, Andoran and the Worldwound in particular came up earlier today - but I appreciate that many things might not make sense outside of a larger context. And I'm afraid I can't predict yet how deep of a treatment I will be able to grasp on each topic, but I hope we can identify that over the next few hours."

It's disappointing that Lastwall can and does call up people from retirement without notice, even diplomats when the immediate crisis is military, assuming the attack on Kenabres is the cause. (Jon and Terendelev made it sound like they had no diplomatic channels with the demons' factions, but maybe they were exaggerating and Lastwall has a more rational approach?) Hopefully Sorcha means they just called up the people who signed up for being on call, not literally everyone who ever served in a senior government role, and they're being well compensated!

“I’ll start with a history of the worldwound and a history of the last century.  And an atlas or two of course.”

She glances at the books already in the room.

“I’ll go fetch some more books.  I don’t think I’ll be more than half an hour!  And I’ll set the books I already brought and the writing material down with you.  Is there anything I can do for you before that or while I’m on my way?” 

Tanya just said that she wasn't interested in history! And that she can't read while she's in the antimagic field! But if the local expert thinks it's best to start with a historical overview despite that - well, she might be right. Tanya had expected Sorcha to explain recent history to the necessary level of comprehension from memory, but Tanya asked to be instructed in everything which is quite an unreasonable request. And she might be misreading the meaning of 'diplomat-consular;' Sorcha's expertise might be more like an ambassador who's an expert in the foreign but firmly domestic politics of some other nation.

"I'm afraid I can't read those books while I'm in the antimagic field," Tanya reminds her. "But I can't think of anything else. Thank you." The building's security measures presumably stop them from calling the library directly to have someone much more junior do the delivery.

You really need to understand how the Worldwound treaty took shape to make sense of any of the present state of things!

“Oh, I’m just saving myself some weight leaving them here!  I could try to get someone to fetch the books, but I’d feel most confident looking them over myself, and if any are already lent out I would want to decide on the next best choice… anyway.”

She walks off, at a decently fast pace for her apparent age.

She's back in 20 minutes!  All the books she wanted were there and sorted in the right place!  Praise Zohls!

"Alright, I've got six additional books, all my first choices were available and I thought of another few useful ones as I was looking!  Ah, and to start with, if we open up one of the books I left with you."

She takes the book and opens it up.

"This is a decent map of the continent and the inner sea.  The worldwound is here, we are here at Lastwall, Cheliax is here, Andoran here, and Galt here."  She points at each area on the map.

"The book I would recommend starting with is Century of Calamity, an overview of the first century of the age of lost omens. (The Age of Lost Omens is what we call the present era, with prophecy no longer working.)  This book isn't too long and is an interesting read, at the expense of being light on details.  I plan to read two thirds of the way through it or so, and that should give us enough context to jump into An Avistani Political Atlas, Shall I begin?"

Prophecy is no longer working? no, no, Tanya resolved she wouldn't get into theology and she'll stick to that for as long as she can.

And she is really unsure the plan to simply read a single book start to finish will work. Also, reading a book takes a whole day! (*) Did she not emphasize her schedule - she probably didn't, and that's her fault really. Reading entire books start to finish starts looking much more reasonable when you're thinking in terms of weeks not days, and that's probably the scale on which education must work. Tanya's expectations were unrealistic; nobody is going to have a summary ideally suited to her level of understanding.

"I expect there will be constant mentions of things that you take for granted and that I will have to interrupt to ask you about. Please point out implicit assumptions the text relies on, and at least to begin with you should check that I correctly understood any important points that might not be obvious to me." Tanya prepares to be a very diligent student, and to take copious notes in her horrible handwriting.

(*) Tanya doesn't mentally categorize a work as a book unless it's at least 100,000 words long.

Century of Calamity is really quite short!

"I can also note places it seems like the translation is coming up a little short or lacking connotations it should have."

"Anyway..."

Her voice becomes solemn as she reads.

"In our current times, is often overlooked just how much Aroden planned to do and to change in his Age of Glory and how heavily every God and Mortal Government was planning around that..."

The book spends a few paragraphs mentioning some of the things Aroden planned to do by directly incarnating on the planet in Cheliax!  An end of all famines!  The advancement of human (and other mortals, but that is kind of an afterthought to the book) civilization!  The ability to directly intervene to solve many horrific problems like Nidal (the author sort of assumes you've at least heard of Nidal and Zon-Kuthon)!  Unfortunately he died either as the cause or as the result of the breaking of prophecy.  The book follows with a few pages laying out the initial set of disasters in the first few decades.  In the ensuing chaos, the struggles between the Gods disrupted weather around the planet, causing mass famines, and many other disasters including a never ending storm that completely wrecked some islands now called the sodden lands and creating an opportunity for Deskari and Areelu Vorlesh to open the worldwound from which demons could pour forth from the Abyss!  The author also notes some near disasters enabled by the death of Aroden and the end of prophecy, including a credible attempt by the Whispering Way to release Tar-Baphon from his long imprisonment and a not very credible but still worrisome attempt by some Rovagug cultists at puling off kind of ritual near Gormuz 

"Any questions so far?  The short of it is a lot of disasters a century or so ago, some of which are still ongoing.  I'm not sure how much is new to you... I've noted at least a few terms seem really lacking in connotations in the translation I could try to fill in?"