Doru

The smallest of the divs, dorus are little more than floating heads.  But divs are all about ruination…and to ruin, all you really need are a pair of eyes, a pair of ears, and a mouth whispering the right foul words.  Appropriate, then, that dorus are obsessed with secrets (the promise of which being the reason they are so often pressed into service as familiars) and spread pain through lies, exaggeration, and the power of suggestion.

A doru has teamed up with a gang of tooth fairies to prowl the city streets, pairing the div’s stronger magic with the fairies’ speed and cunning.  The doru uses the fairies to threaten secrets out of his victims—if they refuse to divulge, he lets the fey go to work.  Of course, if the secrets he learns are especially juicy, he lets the fey go to work anyway.  After all, toothless gums have a much harder time telling what they know…

Manfred of Orm was a black-hearted but confident student of magic in his apprentice years.  When he returned for graduate studies, he used the Collegium’s cold iron summoning circle to bind a doru familiar.  So publicly taming the outsider won him repute, but months of his servant’s whispers, insinuations and prodding have left the once easygoing man a suspicious and scheming wretch.  When adventurers come to town to peruse the Collegium’s library, Manfred is convinced they are plotting to replace him and attempts to eliminate the spellcasters one by one.

Jealous of her comelier rivals, a noblewoman uses various ruses to abduct, imprison, and eventually behead them.  The doru Ablavad thinks this is great fun, and he eagerly guards her collection of heads while ruminating over the secrets the desperate and Wisdom-sapped girls shared with him during their confinement.  Meanwhile, Ablavad’s master, an aghash, is prepping the noblewoman for ever-greater acts of despoliation.

—Pathfinder #19 80–81 & Pathfinder Bestiary 3 84

I’ve gently poked at Ed Greenwood before for his love of undead, floating eyeballs, and especially floating skulls…but given my obsession with vargouilles, beheaded, and now dorus, I suppose I’m just as bad. 

By the way, you can find a hair more on the doru in Pathfinder #19: Howl of the Carrion King.

Looking for the dodo? We covered it with other exotic familiars back here.

Thanksgiving at The New Indie Canon means Thanksgiving songs!  (Of which there are two, and one of them is “Alice’s Restaurant Massacre.”)  It was also the 20th anniversary of Pearl Jam’s Vitalogy.  Tune in! 

(By the way, the feed cut off the first song, Manchester Orchestra’s very nice “Girl Harbor.”  Show link good till Friday, 12/5, at midnight.)