“Once you get a D’Orc in the sack, you’ll never go back!” Ragal-nargoloth chortled to herself. From the sounds she had heard last night from around the camp, she was pretty sure she would find lots of agreement in the tribe.
“Good morning!” Antefalken called to Tom as the bard walked into Tom’s quarters. “I like my new bedroom. There are some decent-looking D’Orcettes here; I think the bed should be most useful!”
Tom chuckled. “You could also sleep in it. The competition for mana with the complex tends to make demons sleepy. We are all going to be taking up Rupert’s bad habits soon enough, I fear.”
“Well, if I’m going to need to sleep, I’ll want a companion or two, that’s for sure.” The bard grinned. “Is Rupert in there sleeping now?” He pointed to Rupert’s bedroom.
Tom shook his head. “He and Fer-Rog stayed the night in Astlan with the Crooked Sticks. Later today they are going to help me create a gateway to the Crooked Stick camp, so we can return the orcs who went to Murgatroy for glargh.”
Antefalken nodded. “Very nice shortcut. Might be handy if you could teach Rupert how to make those gateways. It’s going to be a pain if you have to play gatekeeper all the time.”
“True. We really need to find some others who can do this stuff. Maybe some training sessions.”
“That’s a very undemonic way of doing things. At least in the Courts, it is. There, it is everyone for themselves,” Antefalken observed.
“Yes, but like orcs, D’Orcs are very tribal and band together for the common good. I’m pretty sure it’s one reason they have been able to resist Lilith’s periodic purges.” Tom shrugged. “I want to do some rebuilding and help the D’Orcs get back their standing.”
“Admirable,” Antefalken commented.
“Not so much admirable as something to occupy my time,” Tom admitted. “Something to give me a purpose. Sitting bored in a cave, waiting for others to make a move that I would then need to react to is not a lot of fun. This makes me feel more in control of something.” Tom tilted his head. “I know that Tiernon’s folks are going to come looking for me; you said it yourself. I know my helping the D’Orcs is going to make Lilith mad. So, might as well do what I can to deal with these threats in advance.”
“I did,” Antefalken said, smiling, “and I agree.” The bard hopped up on the back of a chair. “The only thing that gives me pause is how others will react to your actions.”
Tom shrugged. “We are out here in the middle of nowhere. It will be some time before people notice that Mount Doom is active.”
“I bet Lilith knows. She has that fortress watching the place. Or she will know before long,” Antefalken reminded him.
“I am sure, and therefore, we need to be ready. But she still doesn’t know much about me, and I would think that might slow her down, although I could be wrong,” Tom said.
“One would hope it would give her pause. She’s very hard to read on such things,” Antefalken answered. “However, that will happen one way or the other. I might be more concerned about D’Orcs showing up in Murgatroy.”
“It’s an orc trading city; you think the D’Orcs will freak out the orcs?” Tom asked.
“Well, it’s not so much an orc trading city, as a city to which orcs and a lot of others come to trade. It is the others that concern me.”
“Meaning the humans in Murgatroy?” Tom asked.
“A little, but really, the alvar are a bigger concern. There are quite a few alvar there, living tenuously with the orcs, but there. Alvar live for thousands of years; they are bound to know what D’Orcs are. Pretty sure it will freak them out.”
“Great! This would probably have been good to consider before I agreed with their plan.” Tom shook his head and chuckled wryly. “You never stop by with happy news or thoughts!”
“Oh, I don’t know. That actually reminds me, I was working on the music for the feast. We have several musical bands that want to play.”
“Excellent!” Tom said.
“And to that point, they wanted me to ask you if you could make sure the sound system is active and that the lightning cables are working.”
“Sound system and lightning cables?” Tom asked, puzzled.
“Yes; they have arcane devices to amplify and even modify the sound. Then they have some instruments they haven’t been able to play in over four thousand years that use these special cables that provide the instruments with lightning.”
“You mean electricity?” Tom asked.
Antefalken thought for a moment. “Exactly!”
“So they have electrical instruments?” Tom asked.
“That is my understanding; they’ve had to make do with more traditional instruments in the interim. Unfortunately those instruments don’t produce the same effect for the type of music most D’Orcs like.”
“What type of music is that?” Tom had a feeling about where this was going.
“Well, given this is Mount Doom and most of their instruments have metal strings, their favorite type of music is called Doom Metal, but they also like all sorts of D’Orc rock. Anything that lets them really go to town on these metal stringed instruments. We get some of it at the Courts. I am not personally a huge fan, but I know a lot of demons who are. Of course, we do not call it D’Orc rock in the Courts, but I expect that it is similar. ”
Tom laughed. “Well, this should be more exciting that I’d expected! Sounds like we’ll be doing some serious head banging!”
“We may all want to, after two thousand orcs all line up to personally swear to you. I’m figuring that’s going to take a day or two,” Antefalken said.
“Yeah, that’s something I need to discuss with Zelda,” Tom said. “I am thinking we do it by commander. That way they all see their immediate comrades swear, but they don’t all have to be in the throne room the entire time if they don’t want to be. I am thinking some would get restless standing for a day or more at a time.”
Antefalken nodded. “I haven’t had any real experience with D’Orcs until now, but assuming they are like orcs, huge amounts of patience and just standing around is not their thing.”
“My thinking exactly,” Tom agreed as he stood. “I need to head down to open the gate to Ithgar. Beya Fei is awaiting us with the Olafa Horde.”
“Ithgar? Isn’t that a ways out there? It’s not in the Astlan localverse, is it?” Antefalken asked.
“It is not. Apparently the rules of magic are a bit different, but nothing too significant to cause problems. Frigda is one of our most experienced commanders and she is from there. We’re going to Romdan a bit later this morning once we clear the staging area, and that is in the localverse.” Tom told him.
“I spent a few years there with a master early in my career. I liked the place just fine.”
“The more interesting one that I want to see is Gormegast,” Tom said. “I am thinking about a visit this afternoon.”
“It’s a high-tech plane, as I recall,” Antefalken noted.
“Exactly.”
“I had a friend who was stuck chained to a mech for about a century there.” Antefalken shook his head. “Is this the Antilles Cluster where Zog Darthelm is from?”
“It is, interestingly. Given the vastness of space, I find that odd. Of course, I find it odd that on the magic planes we always seem to end up on the same planet. Why don’t some gateways open up to other planets in a particular universe?” Tom mused.
“How do we know that they don’t?” Antefalken asked.