Uh. That is! in fact! pretty concerning! 

It definitely looks like something incredibly mentally violent was done to her. It does not look like the kind of thing any magic he's aware of can do. 

His diagnosis is that he has absolutely no idea what happened to her but it was very bad, and it's not at all surprising that she's semiconscious and not very responsive, and they should ABSOLUTELY NOT MINDSPEAK HER, wow, there's a lot of structural damage there and it's surprising that things are holding together as well as they are. 

Oh. 

...Is she going to recover. 

What part of "he's never seen this problem before and has no real idea what's going on" did they not hear the first time? Gah. 

- he's actually pretty reluctant to touch anything, but he'll sit quietly and watch her mind for the next ten minutes, and can at that point at least tell them whether he's noticing any ongoing deterioration? 

There is not obviously ongoing deterioration. Some things might be getting a bit better? The water is drying? Some other things do not look likely to improve on their own. A lot of those shredded bits are just shredded.

...He's probably going to have to figure out a way to fix that part, isn't he. Ugh. 

He does kind of want to wait for the metaphorical paint to metaphorically dry out some more and not be so soggy, things look incredibly fragile right now and he's pretty worried that any wrong step will set off a horrible cascade of more things falling apart.

Also he's pretty sure that she's in appalling pain right now, and unable to really process what's happening, and she's probably going to find it confusing and terrifying as well as painful to have someone doing anything to her mind, and you cannot very effectively fight a Mindhealer doing things to your mind but she's probably going to try and possibly cause herself more damage in the process. Can they get her some very strong painkillers or something? It'll make some things harder to see, but he doesn't enjoy torturing people. 

Oh no. They should definitely give her something for pain, then, given that it sounds like she's not going to be very lucid for a while anyway. 

(Ma'ar is finding himself surprisingly distressed by knowing that Iomedae is in pain and not even alert enough that he can reassure her. This is not a thing that should be happening. Iomedae should be okay, and also he is kind of blindingly furious with whoever - or whatever Power - did this to her.) 

It's not clear to the Healers if Iomedae is even conscious enough to safely swallow, but they'll attempt to get some strong painkillers and a sedative into her. They're at least much less worried about the physical side effects of a higher dose, given her bizarre toughness. 

Painkillers do seem to push her into a slightly less tense and miserable unconsciousness.

Can someone at some point please tell him they have word from Urtho's Tower. If they don't get anything soon he's going to try for the magic sword directly; he's been reluctant in case they're in the middle of a fight for their lives where a god or gods might be able to turn a moment of badly timed distraction into a lethal misstep. 

Uh, the Tantaran monitors have been updated and it sounds like someone is headed there. They are, understandably, treading carefully. They seem at least reasonably convinced that whatever is pretty clearly wrong there wasn't Ma'ar or Predain's doing. 

...He's going to bother the magic sword again. 

They have been wandering around for what feels like candlemarks in Urtho's INCREDIBLY CREEPY BASEMENT. Which, according to Need, at least doesn't contain any superweapons anymore, but it probably has lots of OTHER scary things that Urtho made for fun in his free time, and also it's spectacularly confusing to navigate and full of secret passages. Which would be a very cool adventure, honestly, if not for everything else about the situation. 

Shayeen is so worried about Iomedae and honestly also pretty worried about Ma'ar, who is supposedly basically responsible for this war but who seemed nice? In the three seconds she actually saw him, most of which he spent collapsing on the floor. 

<Ma'ar! Whatever took you so long. We're doing all the work over here.> Pause. <...Urtho's alive. Found him collapsed in his workshop, the Healers think it's just overwork and stress, and he wasn't fully over the being poisoned. Most suspicious timing I can imagine, but it might not be enemy action.> 

It's almost certainly enemy action in the sense that a goddess, with Foresight, who wanted to take Iomedae out without interference, might have rather a lot of leeway to pick the time most convenient for Her. 

<He's getting Healing?> 

<Mm-hmm. Healers are banning him from any meetings today.> 

Which is ALSO unfortunate timing, but - probably they can manage to navigate this. Maybe. 

<The shamans?>

<Leading us on a merry chase through Urtho's basement. I think Shayeen should be having more fun with this, honestly, it's just like an adventure out of ballads.> 

....Ma'ar tenses. 

<Who else knows. Do you have help to subdue them - if they Final Strike too close to the wrong artifact...> 

<Urtho's people are guarding the exits. Offered to send in a search party but I declined, they're terrible at sneaking. ...I wouldn't say no to Iomedae's help, if she's any shape for it?> 

He looks down at Iomedae's unconscious body. <No. I - she is not going to be able to help with any operations for - I have no idea how long. I think that I can keep her safe while she recovers> if she recovers <but I– just find the shamans. Please. And - Urtho has guards, right - he should plausibly not be in the Tower at all...> 

<You'll have to negotiate that with his people, sweetie, they're not about to listen to a foreign teenager's magic sword. I think he'd protest leaving, but - you do have a point.> 

The mental sense of a gentle cuff at his hair. <And let a woman concentrate, will you, I did say we're busy.> 

It's not the answer he wanted but it's an answer, and now Ma'ar has a lot of other people to update. He wants confirmation via the Tantaran monitors that Urtho is, in fact, alive and not dying and has Healing attention and is ideally somewhere else out of a Final Strike radius. ...Were either of the shamans actually mages? He can't remember if Iomedae mentioned... 

He's trying to stay focused on the tactical details rather than being pointlessly upset about Iomedae's condition, but it continues to be very upsetting. He's bothering the Mindhealer kind of often for updates. 

The water is mostly dried. It's leaving behind an oil painting that has been brutalized but is recognizable, even in its details. The shredded edges of the painting have - tied themselves off, or something, there's no retrieving the information that was lost but the mind can begin repainting there. 

It's not happening all that fast, though that'd probably only be concerning to someone who saw how fast she recovered from anything else. The slit throat, for comparison, has knitted itself up entirely. 

Once it looks a little less like anything he touches will come apart like wet paper, Shakat will risk reaching in and trying to, as a start, clean away the residue of metaphorical soot and ash and smoke. There’s a lot of damage, but that in particular seems like it might be contributing to her being so out of it, and he would honestly feel much better about his life if he didn’t have to do fiddly, delicate, and probably quite uncomfortable mental work on someone who could trivially kill him if sufficiently startled. 

He’s being as gentle as he can, and Iomedae should be pretty heavily sedated still, but it’s still likely to hurt.

She will make the occasional agonized sound. She still doesn't seem to be tracking anything that's going on.