Apostles of Doom

“Okay,” Tom replied. “Let’s head over there.” They changed course and headed to the temple. Tamarin, once more full-sized to avoid getting bounced off Tom’s shoulder while he walked, started small talk with Zelda. As they chatted, Tom found himself mentally tracing through the Rod of Tommus, looking for any sign of Orcus.

When he had found the Rod, it had been inert. He had not detected any significant mana beyond that of the spells locking it in place. Given the pressure they had been under, he could have missed some residual mana, but surely he would have noticed any animus? He needed to discuss this with someone, like Tamarin or Antefalken, who understood animus and memory and all this crazy spiritual stuff.

His assumption, based on what he’d learned in the weeks since he’d been summoned, was that mana was simply energy; that life and spirit were animus. Using his demon senses, or perhaps his animage sort of senses, it was very easy to tell the difference between the two. Animus was clearly alive; spirits and such, which he had so far only really encountered in his dream, were collections of animus held together with mana bodies. Dream walkers, he gathered, were doing astral projection. That would jibe with his own summoning. One would presume, then, that what Tom thought of as a “soul” was this bodiless animus. Therefore, any memories of an individual — in fact, the consciousness — would be contained within the animus. Thus, it seemed to Tom that if the Rod was trying to infect him with Orcus’s memories, it would have to have animus in it. He had been certain that there had not been any in the Rod.

Could it have come from somewhere in Mount Doom? Following the links between Doom and the Rod, perhaps? If so, why had it taken so long? What had changed? That made Tom blink. Tartarus had changed. He had not previously had a connection to Tartarus. Could Tartarus, a supernatural prison for those even the gods feared, also contain some remnant of Orcus that was now trying to possess him?

Tom sighed. This was one case where having read too much science fiction, fantasy and horror was working against him. All sorts of alien or supernatural possession scenarios were now running through his head nonstop. His stomach, or whatever this body had for a stomach, was twisting itself in knots.

“Lord Tommus!” Beya Fei Geist’s translucent dream manifestation greeted him. “Zelda, Tamarin!” The shaman nodded to the others.

“Beya Fei Geist! Good to see you. I hope the boys aren’t causing you problems?” Tom asked, suddenly concerned that his shaman was having trouble controlling a couple of demonic preteens.

Beya chuckled. “Not at all — quite the contrary!” She shook her head. “No, we had an astral meeting last night with all your shamans, including Trig Bioblast!”

“Excellent!” Tom grinned at her.

“We made a few plans that I wanted to discuss with you,” Beya said. Tom nodded for her to continue. “We would like to start reaching out to other clans and groups; recruit more shamans and reestablish tribal allegiances to Doom.”

“Very good. How can I help?” Tom asked.

“Well, other than in Trig’s world, which is quite odd, I must say, travel between tribes is time-consuming; and then there is the matter of proving the things of which we speak.”

Tom nodded in agreement and gestured for her to continue.

“So, our thought was that perhaps we could borrow some D’Wargs for our expeditions, and also some D’Orcs to come along with us. It would pretty quickly demonstrate the veracity of our claims,” Beya said.

“It could also freak a lot of people out,” Tamarin said.

“I agree with both of you,” Tom said, thinking about the ruckus they had raised in Astlan.

“If we do this, can we try to keep knowledge of what we are doing limited to the orcs? In particular, I don’t want to alert any elves or humans who might decide to raise alarms.”

Beya nodded. “I do not think that should be a problem, although we will have difficulty not alerting other jötunnkind.” She frowned. “Often there are other jötunnkind in orc communities.”

Tom shrugged. “I am less concerned with jötunnkind than elves and humans.”

“Excellent. Thank you, m’lord,” Beya said, bowing slightly.

Tom grinned. “Zelda, can you see to it that Beya is put in contact with someone who can arrange whatever the two of you decide is needed?”

“Indeed, m’lord,” Zelda said. “We still have the hunting lists; we can use those to choose escorts.”

“Excellent,” Tom said. “Also, in addition to the regiment commanders of the selected D’Orcs, coordinate with Vargg Agnoth and Targh Bowelsplitter. They are working up rotation lists for our Nysegard contingent.”

Zelda’s eyes widened in surprise, having not yet heard of this development. “Certainly.”

“Nysegard contingent?” Beya asked.

“We have reopened the Doomalogue in Nysegard!” Tom grinned at her. “We now have a permanent gateway to Nysegard and have reestablished contact with the D’Orcs that were still there.”

“You had D’Orcs stationed in Nysegard?” Beya asked in surprise.