Iomedae does not herself feel like it makes any sense to try to solve 'Iomedae is stubborn and insubordinate' with 'get Iomedae a more diplomatic commanding officer' but the real sticking point here is Alfirin. She's absolutely not going to blame Alfirin for anything, though. …she's also not going to assure Valentina that everything's fine on Alfirin's behalf. This does leave her without much of anything to say. 

"I think most of our conflict was due to having different understandings of how much authority he had over me, especially how he - ambiguously imprisoned me - after Iomedae was possessed and left. If that's made clearer and he's not holding a grudge I expect we can civilly tolerate each other…for a few weeks or a month at least. I'm less sure, if we're going to be there for the rest of the year."

"We'll probably know within the month whether or not Cheliax is going to keep trying wishes and can revisit the question then if relevant."

"Then I think we can keep working from the Dome for a month and then revisit. I, uh, regret any problems I caused by leaving the dome against orders, I don't remember it and could hardly have done otherwise but I - didn't know they ambiguously imprisoned you -" She squeezes Alfirin's hand again.

"It caused only mild inconvenience, especially considering what was at stake. I also didn't know you'd been ambiguously imprisoned, I will make sure Jeres' orders are clearer about how he should not do that."

"He let me out after I yelled at him and reminded him he had orders to let me leave if I wanted to, but it would've been better if he didn't do it in the first place. He also made me waste a scroll and bother Lord-Watcher Zima because he wouldn't tell me where Iomedae was even after she'd been found."

She reminds herself that Alfirin is a civilian and shouldn't be expected or required to be patient and do her duty in an emergency. It's kind of frustrating. "I understand. I'll make sure his orders are clear. I assume no major progress on radio detection, given the disruptions? There are a lot more undetectable wizards around, these days, and if it bypasses existing wards it could help a lot."

"No, nothing." She's been a little busy.

"In that case I think that's all I have for you." She drops the usual 'Goddess go with you', under the circumstances.

Lastwall calls Marit. Of the shining crusade's commanders, he's the one who lived the longest and saw the most of the relevant period.

"Subject to your best judgment of what information is worth the cost of sharing, we would like you to help us correct the historical record of the shining crusade, particularly as it relates to the individual 'Alfirin', and also to, again subject to your judgment of what information is worth the cost of sharing, consult with our leaders on why Asmodeus is willing to spend as much as he is on preserving Cheliax. In exchange," - and this is always the most awkward part of calling angels for help - "We offer to contribute four thousand absalom pounds to research efforts aimed at producing better enchanted weapons for combatting the undead and the forces of Hell and the Abyss. Most of which would probably have been contributed to that research anyways. Alternately, we can provide that payment to you directly if that is preferred."

Marit is a spyglass archon, now, winged and limbed but not particularly humanoid in form, and hard to look directly at, more like an inconsistency in what one’s eyes are reporting than an actual being. His voice, though, is an ordinary human one. “I assent,” he says, “and would see the payment directed wherever you believe it serves me.” 

"Currently we know that she served in the shining crusade, was capable of casting plane shift at the time of the battle of Vaishali Pass, and had a personal demiplane, though we don't know whether she made it herself. And that the accounts of the Crusade underwent revisions at some point in the past and that may be why she is not mentioned in them. I've been told that we are best served by acting as though she is alive today, though we don't have explicit confirmation that she is. And that's all. What can you tell us about her, during the crusade?"

Marit hasn't been assigned to Golarion particularly, and has talked with many petitioners once of Lastwall but apparently not asked the right questions. "- I would advise against extensive revisions of the histories and the revisions in question would have been very, very extensive." He'd scold more but these probably aren't the people who even did the relevant revisions. "Alfirin was the Shining Crusade's archmage from 3824 through the end of the war. Sarkorin; enchantment specialist; Lawful, not good, not confidently known to us to be Evil. We asked Aroden on several occasions if we could assume her trustworthy in our shared endeavor and always received assurance that we could. I first met her in 3800 shortly before I joined Iomedae's command; she was a fifth circle wizard on contract with the Crusade, at that time, and Iomedae's personal friend.

…she and Iomedae were lovers, briefly, in …probably 3802, before Iomedae decided that the kind of - process - she wanted to be didn't have complicated personal attachments. Alfirin left the crusade at that point, for five years, and returned at seventh circle. They both believe they acted foolishly; I didn't observe either of them to do anything wrong.

Alfirin did not to my knowledge have very many other close friends, then or later; she had a fox familiar, Curiosity; she worked capably with the other crusade wizards and once she was a powerful spellcaster was tutored by Arazni. Iomedae trusted her, though mentioned to me on a few occasions that she was less confident she could trust the person Alfirin might someday become. - she wanted to be immortal, and we weren't sure she wouldn't in desperation eventually turn to lichdom. I never knew her to act cruelly, or to betray trust where it was extended to her, and I spent a lot of time and energy looking for signs she was doing wrong and successfully concealing it and never found any, but she did not particularly attempt to earn my trust in a deeper sense than - that I was confident she wanted to beat Tar-Baphon, and confident she would never betray Iomedae. - the mortal. I do not think she possesses any similar loyalty to the god.

She reached ninth circle about eight months after Arazni died. We'd been making do, barely, with ninth circle scrolls we were running low on. We were gambling that somebody would make it before it was all over, and she did. She had, at that point, significant negotiating leverage she never employed at all; she drew a nominal salary and put what must have been very close to her full slate of spells at the Crusade's disposal. She was never formally in Iomedae's command, but I never knew her to refuse a request unless she thought it was a bad idea, and in that case they'd debate it until someone was persuaded. She was very smart, good tactical judgment, could imitate a few of Tar-Baphon and Arazni's tricks that no one else ever could, one of the people I'd most prefer to work with if conducting a war and sure she was on my side of it.

She left as soon as the site at Gallowspire had been secured and the war was over. I never heard from her again, and I don't believe Iomedae did.

I am willing to elaborate, and don't know where elaboration would be more valuable to you."

"We have both a historical interest, in wanting to correct the record where it is mistaken, and a present interest in that we believe her to be active in the world. For the former, whatever accounting you can give of what particularly she contributed to the crusade, especially after 4824 when her omission seems most glaring. For the latter, elaboration on her capabilities, especially those tricks that only Arazni or Tar-Baphon could manage, and anything Heaven knows about what she did after the Crusade, if that is known to you and permitted for you to tell us. In particular we are of course interested in whether, knowing her to be active today, you predict that she achieved lichdom or some other means of immortality."

Sure, he can give them a description of battles after 3824 in which Alfirin was decisive. It's most of them. Archmages are very useful. He goes through that only briefly; it's a less important use of scarce resources, though he now suspects that it would've been worth correcting in detail when the error first occurred. Then capabilities.  "I have seen her cast six ninth-circle spells in a day. She knew the trick to Dominate or Feeblemind people who try to scry you through the Detect Scrying glimpse back at them, that previously we thought was one of those things only Tar-Baphon could do, and I've seen her use a Limited Wish to imitate Arazni's Haste which no one except Iomedae was ever able to pick up. I did not see her imitate Arazni's Time Stop or Arazni's Tsunami, and she told me she was unable to do Arazni's Wall of Stone or Arazni's Invisibility, even with a Limited Wish. She had multiple clones. She had a private demiplane with self-sustaining gardens, Arazni taught her that. 

…I think she would have pretty strongly dispreferred being a lich, if she could come up with anything else. I know the conventional wisdom is that most archmages in that situation end up being a lich, having failed to come up with anything else. 

Heaven doesn't to my knowledge know what she did after the Crusade. She pretty clearly didn't want to be kept track of, and - she was an ally, intrusive efforts didn't seem warranted. I definitely wrote Lastwall an analysis in case she should later emerge as an enemy. My current best guess, given that she's alive now, is that she is the reason she's not in the history books, and destroyed your records on purpose."

"Our current understanding, based on our own observations and also a commune, is that she is an ally in some of our purposes and not all of them. We are considering whether to attempt to contact her and clarify and formalize the terms of our alliance. We are also considering how much to invest in preparing for a future conflict with her. Do you have advice on either of these matters?"

"- depends a lot on whether she's the same person I knew. If she is, it'd be worth talking. Carefully, she was averse to the way Lawful Good people tend to see the world, but - she was in fact someone who wouldn't make you worse off for checking if there was common ground, and there often was. 

If she's a lich - I'd expect that to be one of the virtues that gets crushed when you do that to yourself.

I could contact her, while I'm here. It seems plausible she'd murder me but that would be informative if so.

I'd be fairly surprised if she went to war with you in your mortal lifetimes, even once your mutual enemies are destroyed. It'd be - well, it'd be ill-advised, and if she's stayed under the radar this long she's evidently still a patient person given to secrecy. It would surprise me if preparing for overt conflict was a good use of resources."

"If you think you contacting her is likely to go better than us doing it, that would be appreciated, though if she is likely to murder the person who reaches out to her it might be wise for someone recoverable to do that. What about covert conflicts? You hypothesize that she tampered quite extensively with our records once, would she engage in other acts of sabotage?"

"That seems much more likely and much more worth preparing for."

"Should we prepare for her to act covertly against us even while we are collaborating against our overt common enemies?"

"The Alfirin I knew never seemed to do that, but it seems likely that she's gotten worse and that's again an obvious direction to get worse in. And it's possible I just didn't catch her at it."

When they're re-ensconced in the Dome and Iomedae has apologized to Lieutenant Jeres for the worry she caused, not that it was a volitional action on her part and not that she can promise it won't happen again, she makes a point of hugging Alfirin very tightly. Probably learning that your alternate timeline self might be an evil wizard is even more upsetting than learning that she's a good god and learning that she's a good god was honestly kind of upsetting.

She appreciates the hug a lot. It is in fact really upsetting to learn that when she doesn't get mysteriously transported to America she becomes a probably-evil probably-undead. "It's not even just that she's evil and undead, it's that - I don't know why she's evil and undead, right, I don't know if it's, like - she got turned into a vampire and now she's evil, or she decided to be a monster - and I don't know that it's not - something that might still happen to me, if the wrong things happened in my life -"

Hughughughughug. "If you get turned into a vampire I will fix it. If you get raised by Geb as a lich like Arazni I can, in fact, apparently get strong enough to fix that too, though I'll try not to rope in any unsuspecting teenagers. If she just - decided to do awful things - then in some ways that's more upsetting but it's also like - the goddess Iomedae just didn't know that democracy worked, so she didn't do it - you know more, and can just decide not to do awful things -"

"I can but… I don't know why she would have decided to do awful things in the first place. So when I think 'Oh, I'll just not choose to be evil' it's - I don't know if it's because something went differently for me already, that I learned… how to be a good person, or something… or if it's just a failure of imagination about what might happen to me, about who I might be."