"And failing to do it, stand foresworn before three gods?" Rathan teminded him. "Saer Torm, are ye already, in thy green count of seasons, that tired of living?"
"You're not much older!"
"I," the priest of Tymora replied with as much dignity as any old, slow, and wise high priest, "am not the one contemplating breaking a holy bond. My age enters not into this. I have never claimed ro be grayer in years then ye, nor wiser. I merely believe that a bond is a bond-and even a thief to whom lying and bond-breaking is everyday ease should hold that a bond is a bond when the very god of thieves hath been a part of the bond in question. In short, staff-stealer: break this agreement, and ye're tluined."
Totm sighed gustily, looked down at the staff in his arms, then glanced around the forest glade they were sitting in. "I know that," he said in a voice raw with anguish, kicking his heels against the great rock he was sitting on. "What, precisely, was the agreement again?"
"So ye can slithet all over it like a snake seeking a hole to slide through?" Rathan asked in amused tones. "Very well. I'm a priest. I have every last waking moment left in my life to talk over holy matters. Except when actually praying, of course. I trust that doesn't poad ve into seeking to end mv life, here and now."
"Don't tempt me," Torm muttered. "Let me hear the deal."
Rathan smiled and leaned forward on his rock to stab one stubby finger at the thief. "Ye were to steal the staff and put the token of Azuth that I gave ye in its place. Ye would thereby be protected from all harm by the spells and vigilance of the Unseen One, god of spellcasters, while ye did the theft. After, I am to put the staff on this altar of Azuth"-the priest swung around on his rock to point down the glade at the circular, flat-topped stone that lay in the leaf-littered moss and dirt at the far end of the clearing-"and the Unseen One will then magically claim it and leave a reward in its place. We split that offering evenly- evenly, thief-and ye give thy half to Mask, whilst I lay mine upon an altar of Tymora."
Torm nodded a trifle wearily. "I rise in Mask's measuring thanks ro my daring theft of something truly powerful, and you earn a smile from Lady Luck for chancing this crazed scheme and persuading me to have a hand in it."
"Precisely,"Rathan agreed heartily. "Tymora be praised."
"And Mask be tickled pink or some such favorable hue," Torm replied sourly-and thrust one end of the staff out to touch Rathan's chest, bowing his head and closing his eyes. "Take it!"
Carefully, almost reverently, the priest closed both hands around the staff and tugged ever so gently.
Flinging back his head to sigh loudly enough to stir an echo in the nearest trees of Hullack Forest, Torm let go.
"There, now," Rathan said soothingly. "That wasn't-"
"Don't say it!" Torm shouted, springing up from his rock to yell in the priest's face. "Yes, it was stlarning hard. Thank you very much for nor asking nor even suggesting I think along such lines! Grrr!"
He strode around the rocks, drawing his needle blade and slashing the air with it so furiously, it hissed and whistled as it cut nothing at all.
He stopped, sighed again, resheathed his thin sword, and sat down on the rocks again as if nothing had happened.
"Right," he said calmly. "That's done. Yout turn, I believe."
Rathan nodded, his attention-as it had been from the moment the thief's sword had slid back into its sheath-on the staff in his hands. He wasn't stroking it as Torm had been, but he was studying it, hefting it in his hands as if to try to feel the magic it contained.
"Tymora look down!" he gasped. "Such arrogance! He even labeled itI"
"Staff of Doom," Torm intoned grandly. "Made by Manshoon, mightiest of Zhentarim." He chuckled. "Modest, isn't he?"
"Hmm. Mayhap he feared it would get mixed up with the staff of another Zhent at some Brotherhood gathering or other," the priest of Tymora said. "We must grant that possibility."
"We can grant the possibility that the tree he cut this from grew this limb with those words graven in it by the hands of the gods," Torm replied sarcastically, "and he merely found it and was seized by inspitation, but forgive me if I refrain from betting on such a likelihood, hey?"
Rathan raised his head and gave the thief a severe look. "Thy faith is less than strong."
"My faith in myself is strong," Torm countered. "The gods, I'm not so sure about. Especially the fanciful versions of gods some priests try to hand me. Some priests, note. Not you, stout champion of Tymora."
Rathan looked up again. "Stout champion?"
"Ah, you were listening." Torm grinned. "Purely an accidental slip of the tongue, I assure you."
"Thy assurances," the priest told him dryly, "are as strong as thy faith."
He stood up, the staff in his hands, and gave Torm a long, steady look.
"Do it," the thief said quietly after a time. "I won't jump you or try to snatch it."
Rathan nodded, turned slowly, and then solemnly strode the length of the glade, the staff held out before him horizontally. Torm trailed after him, well to one side, watching the staff and the altar in turn, half expecting either or both of them to burst into something loud and bright and different.
Nothing happened, and no one sprang into view behind the altar.
When he reached that massive, plain disk of stone, the priest of Tymora stopped, held out the staff, and announced calmly, "Rathan Thentraver am I, and unworthy, a priest of Tymora. To holy Azuth this we give, Saer Torm and myself."
Leaning forward, he carefully laid the staff down on the altar, stepped back, bowed deeply, and stepped back further.
The staff stayed motionless on the altar. Silence fell. Nothing happened.
After several long breaths had dragged by, Torm sighed. "Well, that was a bit of a-"
The altar glowed, a bright white fist of dancing motes rising from the bare dark stone around the staff and gathering together in a sphere a foot or so above the altat.
As Torm and Rathan stared, the sphere grew to shield size, then as large as the boulders they'd been sitting on at the far end of rhe glade, a blinding white light that made the thief hastily back away. "If that explodes-!"
Rathan stood his ground.
The light streamed down to cover the altar, dripping down its sides like white candle wax, hiding the staff entirely. Then, very suddenly, it went from white to a deep, rich blue… and statted to fade.
The staff was gone, but there was something in its place. A heap-no, two heaps, accompanied by a whiff of pipesmoke.
The blue radiance ebbed even more, and two small heaps of gems could be seen sitting side by side on the altar, each covered with a leather pouch from which prorruded a neat quartet of cylindrical metal vials.
"Healing potions?" Torm breathed as the last of the glow faded away.
"Mayhap," Rathan muttered, his gaze never leaving the altar. One of the two pouches was labeled "Torm" and the othet "Rathan." Both had small, folded scraps of parchment thrusr into them.
Torm and Rathan broke off staring at the altar long enough to stare at each other in astonishment. Then they both shrugged, stepped forward, took up their parchments, and read them.
"Well, holy man?"
"Rathan," the priest read aloud, "go ye to Shadowdale. Once there, use any pretext to become a trusted Knight of Myth Drannor."
Then he made a surprised sound. The parchment melted away to dust in his fingets. He looked quickly at the thief.
"Torm," Torm read out rather hastily, "go ye to Shadowdale. Once there, use any pretext to become a trusted Knight of Myth Drannor." His parchment, too, promptly fell to dust.
They stared at each other. Again.
Rathan finally found his voice, rather feebly. "Trusted? Us?" Torm grinned. "Got anything to drink? I find myself in need of something like that just now. Rather a lot of it, too."