The Heavenly Host

Damien was giving Antefalken a dirty look. Antefalken gave the councilor a wink that Vaselle could not see.

They came into a large kitchen, where a number of D’Orcs were busy preparing extremely large portions of meats, carving and trimming them for roasting. A few other D’Orcs were preparing bundles of wood to go into the ovens.

“This is one of three kitchens where we are slow roasting meat for dinner tomorrow night. We plan to slow roast everything to a nice rare, or medium rare. The wood is to add flavor. Naturally, being in the Abyss, we don’t need wood for fire!” Vespa told them.

“We have three other kitchens preparing meat, two preparing bread, and another one preparing vegetables,” Vespa said.

“Don’t forget Tizzy’s kitchen!” Fer-Rog spoke up; he and Rupert were with the group as well. Rupert had been really happy to see Damien again.

“Tizzy?” Damien asked, puzzled. “What is he doing in a kitchen?”

“Baking cookies!” Rupert said.

“That will be nice for dessert!” Vaselle beamed, feeling a little better being in a large room where there were lots of people to see if Schwarzenfürze tried to eat him.

“I would probably advise going easy on the cookies,” Antefalken said.

“Are they rich?” Vaselle asked.

“Not exactly, but having smelled his pipe, I am betting he is using a special form of butter,” the bard said.

“An extra-sweet and rich form, I bet!” Vaselle rubbed his hands together.

“Yeah, something like that,” Antefalken nodded.

Vaselle let out a loud yelp as he felt something wet rubbing against his arm.

Vaselle, Antefalken and Damien looked over to see Schwarzenfürze pull her tongue back into her mouth from licking Vaselle’s hand and arm. The D’Warg looked at Vaselle and then opened her mouth wide and ran her tongue almost lovingly over her lips and teeth before snapping them shut. She gave the wizard a creepy look, then turned and walked away.

Antefalken looked at Damien. “See? You doubted me?”

Tal Gor smiled. “See! Schwarzenfürze is not as unsocial as everyone thinks!”

Ragala-nargoloth chuckled, as did Beya Fei Geist. Farsooth GoreTusk just grinned at the D’Warg’s game. The orcs were all very familiar with wargs’ sense of humor, and a D’Warg’s was no different.

∼

Rupert pulled at his collar as he stood on the platform behind his father. He had gotten out of the habit of wearing any clothes here in the Abyss; in fact, had never worn clothes in his true form. So it felt really strange. He was wearing a sleeveless gold embroidered black tunic that was open at the back, except at the collar, and then a button below his wings. He then had similar knee-length black pants on.

He, along with Zelda, Fer-Rog, the commanders and most senior D’Orcs, were all on the platform for the initial ceremony. There was a D’Orc orchestra, or a D’Orchestra, he guessed. Okay, it was like twelve D’Orcs, but that was more musicians than he had ever seen in one place before.

Each commander had given a speech about what a great opportunity this was, and how they had never expected to see this day. It was all quite inspirational and rather emotional, but after the first two or three? Rupert rolled his eyes at the latest one. Zelda would also give a speech, as would Tom.

After that, Rupert was to swear fealty, which seemed like an odd thing to do to one’s father. But that did sort of sound like the story books, he guessed. Then Zelda and Fer-Rog would swear, followed by all the commanders. After that, Vaselle and the shamans were going to repeat their oaths. Talarius had agreed to swear to abide by the Rules of Hostage or something like that, and the rest of the entourage were encouraged to declare loyalty or friendship, but not required to swear fealty.

Tizzy, though, had a group of demons that he had hauled in for his baking that were going to swear. Apparently, they were all planning on taking up residence here. Rupert grinned at the thought of Tizzy’s drinking buddies living here. That should be fun if they were all like Boggy. He wondered if Tizzy would swear? The octopod had been telling his demon friends that he was Tom’s Lord High Muckety Muck, so Rupert would think someone with that prestigious of a title would have to swear allegiance. He was not really sure what a Lord High Muckety Muck did, but presumably Tizzy knew.

In any event, after that there would be the first short break as the staff that needed to be rotated for duty, or whose detachment wasn’t going to be swearing in for a while, would be excused. At that point, Rupert, Fer-Rog, Talarius and the guests would be free to go. He figured most would go up to the mortal suite, where snacks would be set out for them. True, none of them would need to eat in the Abyss, but most were in the habit, so Tom felt it only polite to have food and wine.