The Heavenly Host

They did not want to budge; the space between the blocks was glowing now, as if the bar of metal was inside a force field or something. “I think you guys might want to get out and onto the landing; I think this is going to blow!” Tom yelled.

He shoved mana into the blocks as hard as he had shoveled it into the dagger. KABLOOM! The blocks shattered into dust. Tom was thrown back by the force of the explosion, stunned. The metal bar fell to the floor with a loud thud.

“Shit.” Tom shook his head and got back up and moved to the bar. Now that the ends were free, he could see it was more like a staff, or would be a staff for a human. For Tom, it was more like a bat or club. The narrow end had a silver-rimmed end cap with a very sharp nine-inch long metal spike on the bottom. The wider end came up to a hexagonally shaped top cap about six inches across from side to side, and from that rose a two-inch round cylinder or neck with a large metal ball, or sort of amorphous blob of unshaped metal, about the same diameter as the hexagon cap.

“Okay, it will work as a mace then,” Tom said to himself. He grabbed it. “Ouch!” The damn thing had shocked him! He was pissed. He had just freed it and now it was going to shock him! Yes, he knew it was an inanimate object, but he was in a hurry, and getting angry.

Tom reached down and grabbed it again, ignoring the shock, and willed himself into it. He did not need to use the arrow this time, which would have been bad. The thing did not like the arrow’s magic, he could tell that. This thing was a mana pool, huh? Well, he would see what would happen if he filled it.

He willed himself into the rod even as it shocked him. He was determined to win. He would treat it like an unwilling priest, or an unwilling rune. He flooded it primarily with his own mana, but also god mana. In and in, envisioning himself becoming one with the mace, intertwining his essence with its molecules and atoms. He mixed and merged until he could feel the crystalline pools. There were only the two crystals, as Antefalken had said: unbroken ruby and sapphire strands. He flooded them with mana; the sapphire with god mana, the ruby with his own.

He was the crystals, he was the adamantite bar, and he was the mithral end caps, the mithral ball. He, Thomas — Tommus! He was the rod, the mace, the staff. This was the Rod of Tommus and he was Tommus! They were one; they were the same. Tom suddenly realized that the rod was not fighting him; it was embracing him, joining him. Welcoming him. He did not know how he knew this, but he did. He was the rod, the rod was him!

“Yes! We are Tommus!” Tom shouted at the top of his lungs. The rod flashed, its ruby and sapphire strips glowing brightly and radiating the room in red and blue, melding into purple.

The room suddenly lurched. Was that him? No, the room lurched again. Earthquake!

“What the hell are you doing in there?” Boggy called to him. The others filed back into the room, blinking in the purple light from the rod.

“So... you recharged the mana pools?” Antefalken said.

Tizzy was grinning from ear to ear and doing a little dance for some reason.

“Cool!” Rupert said.

“Wicked!” Reggie slapped his thigh with his lower left hand.

“Did you feel those tremors?” Tom asked.

“Yes. Did you do that?” Boggy asked.

“No, not that I know of. I just took control of the mace,” Tom said.

“I have to say, that is one nice mace,” Talarius said. “I am hoping we don’t regret this.”

“Why?” Tom shrugged. “I fully control it, and it’s like a part of me. I have no idea what I can do with it other than smacking people, but for now that’s about all we need.” The ground rumbled again beneath their feet.

“I think we need to get out of here,” Boggy said as the ground shook some more. “We just need to face the D’Orcs up above and be done with it.”

“I agree,” Talarius said as yet another tremor rocked the room.

“I will go first,” Tom said, leading them out onto the landing and heading up the stairs. The stairs went up and up for a long way.

“It’s amazing we can hear any noise from the top, given it’s so far,” Boggy said.

“Perhaps there is a very large echo chamber at the top,” Antefalken suggested.

“You know, it seems a lot quieter since the tremors,” Estrebrius noted.

“Maybe it scared the crap out of them!” Rupert said excitedly.

“I doubt that,” Tizzy said. “Not yet, at least,” he added softly.

They finally reached a landing at the top of the stairs. At the opposite end of the landing was a marble portcullis engraved with Etonian runes. On the other side of the portcullis was a large room with wall carvings and several Tom-sized benches as well as more human-sized benches. There were also marble tables of various heights between the two. At the opposite end of the room was a large double door that had apparently been opened recently, given the tracks in dust on the floor. However, no one was in the room. Light was streaming from beyond the door.