Gond?'
Kelemvor shook his head.
'Then we have something to talk about as our healer tends to your wounds.' Phylanna turned and beckoned for him to follow. 'I sense you have suffered greatly these past few days.' She did not wait for his reply.
Phylanna brought him to a small stairway, which led down to a cramped chamber. There they waited until the high priest, now finished with his tirade against the town's wavering faith, entered the room. Phylanna closed and locked the door as the priest entered.
'You must never tell anyone about what you are going to witness,' Phylanna said as she helped Kelemvor lay back upon the room's single cot.
'I am Rull of Gond,' the priest said, his voice harsh and cracking from his prolonged sermon. 'Are you a worshiper of the Wonderbringer?'
Before Kelemvor could answer, Phylanna held her hand to the fighter's lips and said, 'It does not matter if he worships Lord Gond in this time of trouble. He needs our help, and we must give it.'
Rull frowned, but then nodded in agreement. The priest closed his eyes and took a large, red crystal from a chain around his neck. He waved it over the fighter.
'It is a miracle you find yourself walking and of clear mind. A lesser man might have died from the infections you carry,' Rull said as he examined Kelemvor. The fighter looked at the crystal and noticed a strange, burning glow in its interior.
'Kelemvor is proud,' Phylanna said. 'He bears his injuries without complaint.'
'Not entirely true,' Kelemvor grunted as the high priest went to work.
Phylanna seemed concerned as Rull performed the ritual to heal the fighter, but the priest's skills as a healer became obvious as his deft fingers worked in the air and the black welts that surrounded the fighter's wounds were slowly flushed with blood. The priest was sweating, his voice raised in supplication to Gond. Phylanna cut anxious glances to the door, fearing others might blunder in and interrupt the priest's efforts.
The splinters left by the arrow points rose to the surface of Kelemvor's skin, and Phylanna assisted Rull in removing them with her bare hands. Kelemvor cursed himself as he winced at the pain.
Then it was over. Rull's body relaxed, almost as if he had been completely drained of energy, and Kelemvor slumped forward on the cot. The fighter's wounds were no longer tender, and he knew that his fever had lessened.
'Rull's belief is strong, and so he has been rewarded by the gods,' Phylanna said. 'Your belief must be strong, too, to survive that kind of wounding.'
Kelemvor nodded. He saw that the light within the crystal had become a slight flicker.
'Foolish and stubborn, perhaps, but still very strong,' Phylanna said.
Kelemvor laughed. 'You're lucky I'm flat on my back, woman.'
Phylanna smiled and looked away. 'Perhaps.'
Though both Phylanna and Rull asked Kelemvor about his business in Tilverton and his religious beliefs, he told them very little about himself. But when the fighter spoke of payment for the priest's efforts, Rull said nothing and departed.
'I meant no offense,' Kelemvor said. 'In most places it is customary — '
'Material concerns are the least of our worries,' the priestess said. 'Now about your lodgings…'
Kelemvor glanced around the tiny, windowless cell. 'I have an aversion to closed-in spaces.'
Phylanna smiled. 'The Flagon Held High may have an open room.'
Kelemvor swallowed. 'I have… an aversion… to that particular inn.'
Phylanna folded her arms across her chest. 'Then you'll have to stay with me.'
There was a loud crash and angry voices erupted from the stairway leading to the cell. Kelemvor sat up quickly and reached for his sword. Phylanna put her hand on his shoulder and shook her head.
'There is no need for that in the Wonderbringer's temple. Now, lay back and rest until I return.'
'Wait!' Kelemvor called.
Phylanna turned.
'When Rull is finished, please ask him to return,' the fighter said. 'I would like to apologize.'
'I will bring him at the end of his next sermon,' she said.
'Alone,' Kelemvor said. 'I need to speak to him alone.'
Phylanna seemed puzzled. 'As you wish,' she said and hurried from the small room.
Kelemvor rested in the cell for an hour, growing more uncomfortable in the small room as his condition got better. The crowd of commoners in the Temple of Gond were noisy, and the fighter entertained himself by listening to their cries, which mixed in with Hull's sermon.
'Tilverton will perish!' someone screamed.
'We should all go to Arabel or Eveningstar,' another voice cried.
'Yes! Gond doesn't care about us, and Azoun will protect Cormyr before he protects us!'
Rull's voice rose over the shouting, and he launched into another tirade against the people who had fallen away from their worship of the Wonderbringer. 'Tilverton will certainly be cursed if we give up hope! Lord Gond has left me with healing spell, hasn't he?' the priest cried, and Rull continued to yell over the crowd for a few minutes. Then the sermon was over, and Kelemvor heard footsteps upon the stairs again. He reached for his sword.
The fighter put his weapon down as Rull entered the room, obviously exhausted from his shouting matches with the people in the temple. 'You wished to see me,' the priest said as he slumped to the floor.
Without sitting up on the cot, Kelemvor turned toward the priest and sighed. 'I am grateful for what you've done for me.'
Rull smiled. 'Phylanna was right. It really doesn't matter that you do not worship Gond. It is my responsibility as his cleric to use the spells he gives me to cure anyone who needs my help.'
'And the good people of Tilverton really seem to need your help badly,' Kelemvor added.
'Yes,' Rull said. 'They are losing faith in Lord Gond. I am the only one who can bring them back to his flock.'
'If you fail?'
'Then the town will perish,' the priest said. 'But that won't happen. Eventually they will listen to me.'
'Of course,' Kelemvor said, 'if the people of Tilverton knew that Gond had forsaken you, too, and your healing magic was taken only from the stone you carry, they would listen to you even less than they do now. They would all turn away from Lord Gond for good.'
The high priest stood up. 'The healing magic is mine. It is a gift from the Wonderbringer to show the good people of Tilverton that he still cares. I will — '
'You will do what I ask of you, Rull,' Kelemvor growled. 'Or I will expose you to the people of Tilverton. Even if I'm wrong, they'll believe me.'
Rull hung his head. 'What do you want of me?'
Kelemvor sat up on the cot. 'I need you to help someone who is injured far worse than I was. I made a promise to keep him safe, and I have to uphold it.'
'I don't suppose he worships the Wonderbringer by chance,' Rull said. 'But then, that really doesn't matter, does it?'
Kelemvor gave Rull a description of Cyric and sent him to the Flagon Held High. The priest was just leaving the temple when Phylanna returned to the cell. 'I'm here to take you to your accommodations for the evening, brave warrior,' she said, grasping Kelemvor's hand and leading him from the room.
Adon wandered the streets, trying to find someone to talk to. The heavy storms had abated, and the thought that perhaps he was unsafe on the streets at night, that he might fall victim to robbers or cutthroats, did not occur to him. Even after the cleric learned that there had been a number of bloody murders in the last week, he continued to roam Tilverton. He had important matters to attend to.
Beginning with the young man who had lain outside the inn, oblivious to the heavy rain and hail that had fallen, the reactions to the cleric's inquiries about the town's problems were uniformly apathetic. The eyes of the Tilvertonians had been closed to all but their own inner suffering.
The worship of the gods was meant to uplift the soul, Adon thought as he walked through the streets. And worship was a higher calling than any other the cleric could think of. Still, that same calling had been turned into a
