...Ma'ar would very much like to better understand Iomedae. He's been trying and bouncing off thinking of specific questions to ask. 

(He's also scared. This mostly doesn't seem like one of the more important aspects of the situation.) 

"- Noted," he says, when she addresses him. "I - think I have very many questions but they are mostly - abstract." Hard to talk about. "And not necessarily urgent." 

"They're urgent insofar as I would like you to feel comfortable sitting down for peace talks in which I am participating."

"...I would have said that I am more motivated than you to show up for peace talks, because– because Predain is my country, and Urtho was my teacher, and - I am still not entirely sure why you...care...what happens here, when I am sure none of it can possibly harm you or your god's interests. Whether I am comfortable seems - beside the point - it seems more relevant whether you are comfortable." 

"Every person starving or dying or killing or suffering, anywhere, is a place where my interests are threatened."

"....If you actually mean that, then I - I want to be your ally - but I suppose this runs into the same difficulty where it is easy to say you want something and if you were clever and had good intelligence on my past work then you would know exactly what to say to cause me to feel that way." 

" - I would not, actually, have predicted that that was specifically the right thing to say to you. It's not - even a thought original to me, back home, though I am generally regarded as unusually serious about it."

“I already had very many questions about your homeland and now I have more of them.”

(Probably. He isn’t sure what the questions are, exactly, he needs more mental space to unpack all of that and it continues to be hard to think, in this situation. He’s less filled with the constant desperate urge to Gate out but he’s still scared.)

"Many things here remind me of it. Politics isn't the same everywhere but it has distinct similarities everywhere. Your mages aren't precisely like any spellcaster I've seen but the underlying magic they're using might well be similar. You don't have - paladins, the specific kind of god-intervention that enables the work I do in my world - and I claim you're worse off for it, but of course one might argue that I would think so."

“- The last part might be the important difference? I - am not sure I have ever heard of god-interventions here that were actually - helpful on net.” 

"Huh. Not all of Golarion's gods are helpful, and I need to murder some of them, but there are some who run - banks, soup kitchens, orphanages, hospitals, and there should be some actually useful ones coordinating the defeat of Evil, but the one who used to be doing that is incapacitated. ...I am planning to replace Her."

Ma'ar wants– well, several thousand things, at this point, but most urgently pen and paper so he can try to keep better track of this conversation, which seems like plausibly the most important conversation he's ever had (though he is of course instinctively suspicious, but - halfheartedly, at this point...) 

Also he's going to have to switch back to Mindspeech soon, probably, when the spell runs out, and also that's a reminder that time is still passing and he has a hundred other responsibilities and very little idea what's going on in Predain with his commanders - probably he would have heard from Iomedae directly if anything were on fire - 

"I - was not aware gods were the kind of entity that could meaningfully run banks," he says, faintly. "Or that - mortals could replace gods - I am not even sure what that would mean." Though the concept of wanting to do it is perhaps one of the most impressively audacious things he's ever heard. 

"Some of our gods are formerly mortal. It changes you, and many of the details of how it works are secret, but I'm reasonably sure I'll be able to get the end result I want, presuming I return to Golarion at some point or am able to redevelop the method here." And the spell drops out on her; the wings vanish. Her sword stops glowing.

.....Which would be the ideal moment to try to Gate out, if he were going to do that. 

Ma'ar still doesn't anticipate very high odds of success at Gating out. Probably even without the spell, Iomedae can still move very fast, and even the non-glowing sword can kill him given his complete lack of any magical shielding. Also he surrendered to her, which is in some sense an implicit agreement not to try to escape. 

Maybe more to the point, he doesn't want to Gate out. Everything he's spent decades working toward is back in Predain, but - it's not, quite, true, that everything he cares about is there. 

Every person starving or dying or killing or suffering, anywhere, is a place where my interests are threatened, Iomedae said. 

He still doesn't really believe it but mostly because it seems too good to be true. 

He closes his eyes again. 

:Do I have your permission to contact my people again and obtain an update on what is happening: 

It hasn't escaped her that he could now try fleeing. She wouldn't kill him if he did, but she's - definitely taking it as a promising sign, if he doesn't. :Go ahead.:

He'll do that. Since he's using the communication-spell, this mostly involves lying still with his eyes closed. 

A few minutes later, his eyes fly open. He doesn't sit up, or otherwise move, but it's taking a lot of restraint. 

:- General Shaiknam is not where we expected. Apparently he is much further into Tantara at one of the Gate-stations. I am not sure what he is planning but I am confused and that is worrying: 

That does sound like a more urgent problem.

She - doesn't know what she makes of this man, but if he's lying, about wanting peace and good things for all people, it's more adeptness at lying than either his enemies or his friends have ever attributed to him.

:All right. I'm releasing you. Gate back to Predain, don't cross the lines again. Which Gate-station is Shaiknam at.:

...That is not how he was expecting her to respond but it - doesn't seem like a bad sign, at least? 

:Jerfast: He can send her a mental image of a map, and an approximate direction and bearing, though after a moment he remembers that she probably doesn't use Gates and he doesn't actually know what her plan is for getting there. 

He wants to - offer to help - but that is probably not, actually, going to be reassuring to her right now. So he'll sit up, very carefully with no sudden movements, and start raising a Gate-threshold – unscaffolded, but otherwise a normal, doorway-shaped one, maximally unsurprising. 

(The other terminus is in a deserted forest. It's in Predain, but he really shouldn't trust Iomedae far enough, yet, to lead her directly to a place that matters.) 

If she doesn't object he's going to, also very carefully, stand up and walk through. 

She's going to head back in the other direction to pass this along to General Judeth. She doesn't look back.

The mage-barrier around the camp is down; it eventually seemed redundant, when no mages were Gating in to attack, and the Predaini soldiers, weapons abandoned, are huddled up in a tight circle around their injured and dying fellows. They're trying their best to provide field first aid but they don't have any Healers with them and General Judeth has not felt quite secure or generous enough to send any of theirs over. 

She has two more Lay on Hands or one more channel and no way to get them back. She's not going to use them on this.

It does hurt. Always will, hopefully. 

She flags down the first Tantaran Mindspeaker with Ma'ar's news. 

They don't know what to make of that or whether it's supposed to be bad but they'll direct her toward General Judeth while immediately relaying the news ahead to her! 

Judeth is also not really sure what to make of it. Within the new Gate-network security restrictions imposed since the war, the Jerfast Gate is one hop from Urtho's Tower - whereas most of the Gates anywhere near the front aren't - but it's otherwise not important. She can send word to block Shaiknam's access to the Gate-network, if Iomedae is worried, but she's genuinely not sure what to be worried about? 

...a scrying-check thirty seconds later confirms that Shaiknam seems to be there with a relatively small party. Apparently no one at this minor local Gate-station was warned about his betrayal; his presence there seems to have gone unremarked. Judeth can also have a message passed to change that, but - he's by far the highest-ranking military commander at the site, and his mage-retinue outpowers the on-site guards by an order of magnitude. 

Does Iomedae want to be Gated there herself to figure out what's going on. 

Yes, she does. She is in fact worried about Urtho's Tower; is there a way to make those gates not one hop away while she''s figuring this out?