Dogged (The Obsidian Path), page 1
By Michael R. Fletcher
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business, events, and incidents are the products of the author’s demented imagination. Any resemblance to actual wardogs, living or dead, Rob J. Hayes or otherwise, or actual events is probably coincidental.
DOGGED Copyright © 2025 by Michael R. Fletcher
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, eaten, smoked, howled, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, semaphore, smoke signal, mime, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher (who is unstable at the best of times and let’s be real, these ain’t them), except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews (hopefully not too critical) and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Editor: Tim McKay
Cover Art and Typography: Tomasz Ryger
Other Books by FLETCH
THE OBSIDIAN PATH
Black Stone Heart
She Dreams in Blood
An End to Sorrow
The Lord of the Empty Mirror
MANIFEST DELUSIONS
Beyond Redemption
The Mirror’s Truth
A War to End All (w/ Clayton W. Snyder)
CITY OF SACRIFICE
Smoke and Stone
Ash and Bones
Sin and Sorrow
CHILDREN OF CORRUPTION
The Storm Beneath the World
The River of Days (Coming Soon)
STANDALONE NOVELS
Swarm and Steel (Manifest Delusions Standalone)
Norylska Groans (w/ Clayton W. Snyder)
Ghosts of Tomorrow
In the Shadow of Their Dying (w/Anna Smith Spark)
The Millennial Manifesto
Dogged
A Collection of Obsessions
THE DRIFTLAND DRAGONS
Descent to Azakmar
CHAPTER ONE
The last ranks of wardogs stood waiting in the PalTaq sun. Dull leather, chafed and scuffed from war, creaked in the dust. Bright spears stabbed into the endless blue sky. As each row stepped into the demonic portal, sinking into the slick black of roiling oil as they passed into another reality, the next line shuffled closer.
I rolled my shoulders, trying to get the weight of the hardened leather vest to sit right. Each of its eight pockets had a very specific purpose—some critical piece of gear—it was supposed to hold. Like the other wardogs, I’d stashed most of that stuff back in the kennel and filled the pockets with hard jerky, the chewy sinew strips the emperor’s butchers made for us. I kept the knives and sturdy tweezers for digging out whatever was destined to get stuck in my fur. Standing upright, the way people did, I shuffled about on my hind legs, adjusting the leather skirt the Kennel Master insisted we all wear. It was useless as armour, unless someone tried to stab me in the upper thigh, but people got uncomfortable if we went around naked, as we preferred. It never made much sense to me. Why wear clothes when you have fur? It wasn’t like we got cold or needed protection from the elements. And those damned pockets were so small it was impossible to get anything out quickly.
Wardogs kill. Wardogs die.
We didn’t read maps, use compasses, repair torn clothes with a needle we couldn’t grip, or carry messages. We served but one purpose: destroy the Demon Emperor’s enemies.
Is dying part of our purpose?
I wasn’t sure. While death was guaranteed, it wasn’t exactly considered a goal. Except that wasn’t quite true. No wardog wanted to suffer the shame of achieving old age because it meant they hadn’t given the emperor everything and giving him everything was…well, everything. I thought about asking my mate, Vigilant Aggression, who stood in the line before me, but decided the question could wait. He was good at the kind of puzzles and difficult questions that made my head hurt.
Nose lifted, I breathed deep the air, glorying in the comforting scents of home. I always loved PalTaq and its many complex odours. To the north I smelled the emperor’s palace. More people lived there than on many larger islands and I inhaled the details of their lives. Beyond the palace lay obsidian mountains, where the emperor’s dragon aviaries wormed through the black rock. The horror lizards, big enough even we wardogs left them alone, stank of dust and fire. Volcanoes churned in endless rage on the northern and southernmost reaches of the island, spewing smoke into the sky. With the exception of Kantlament, the Demon Emperor’s sword, all the best demon blades were forged in those flames. From the east, the ocean breeze brought me salt and fish, and my stomach gurgled even though I’d eaten not long ago. The sharp sulphur stench of demonology, undercut by the strange air leaking through to our side of the gate, brought me back to the present as another line of wardogs stepped through the demonic portal and disappeared. An ethereal creature from some distant reality, the demon looked like a sheet of shimmering black framed in intricately carved obsidian. Long enough to allow a squad of twenty wardogs to pass through shoulder to shoulder, that black silk bent and flowed around those who entered.
Sigaria Wen, Kennel Master for all PalTaq and most beloved of people—second, of course, to the Demon Emperor—waved forward the next line and again we shuffled closer. Sharp-eyed and scary smart, she studied every wardog, searching for signs of sickness or weakness. For she loved us as much as we loved her. Only the healthiest were allowed to wage war. Those in need of healing or rest were forced to remain behind until she decided they were fit.
Being left behind was the worst.
“Blood Tooth,” Sigaria barked, nodding toward the hulking wardog to my left. “I’m a little concerned.”
We all winced at the use of that dreaded word.
“Are you favouring your left foot?” she asked.
Blood Tooth looked away, his tail sagging as he desperately searched for the words that would convince her not to leave him behind. “I can fight.”
“I know you can fight,” Sigaria said, voice gentle. “But should you?”
“I want to.” Blood Tooth stared at the Kennel Master’s feet, brow twisted with desperate hope, tail lashing in ill-concealed agitation. The smell of jerky wafted from the stuffed pockets of his vest. “So…yes?”
Sigaria tilted her head in that way she did when she knew that we knew better, and my heart broke for Blood Tooth. “Return to the kennels,” she said. “There will be another war.”
“But I want to fight in this one.”
When she said nothing, Blood Tooth’s tail stopped moving and he stepped from formation.
“If you are careful,” Sigaria promised, “if you rest and heal, you will be ready before this war is over.”
Blood Tooth blew out a breath and nodded, massive head bobbing. He lost one ear last year when some sorcerer from Aszyyr tried to claim the mines of Azal Syl for her own. The other ear perked up in misplaced hope. I wanted to laugh at the big idiot. If Blood Tooth knew how to relax and heal, he wouldn’t have been injured now. We’d known for weeks it was likely we’d soon be off to war with the big nasty bug things.
Blood Tooth set off alone, heading back toward the kennels. I felt bad for him but also happy it wasn’t me.
“Wardogs are born to die,” Vigilant Aggression said to me over his shoulder as we stood in loose formation, awaiting our turn to pass through the portal. A clever warrior, veteran of more wars than I could count, my mate’s tale swept back and forth with anticipation. I wanted to run my claws through the fur of his ears, nibble at the scruff of his neck, but such distractions would have to wait.
Some long-conquered reality inhabited by overgrown insects had risen up in rebellion, and the Demon Emperor wanted us to remind them why it was better to behave. The portal’s flickering sheet of ebony silk leaked coils of black smoke and hummed a note I felt in my chest. Ahead, One-Eye passed through the tear between worlds to join the ranks of wardogs already waiting on the far side.
“But first we kill,” I responded, looking back when the wardog behind me shoved the soldier at his side, growling in annoyance.
As we’d stood at the rear of the pack, most of the wardogs had already stepped into the other world. Only two rows of wardogs remained behind us. According to Sigaria, tens of thousands of us were being sent to war, but wardogs weren’t good with numbers. I long ago learned to translate people speech into something more useful. If they spoke of hundreds, that was a lot of wardogs. Thousands was really a lot. Tens of thousands meant the Demon Emperor was annoyed and someone was going to learn a terrible lesson. Which was weird, because few survived the kind of lessons wardogs were good at teaching.
The thought bugged me.
“Why teach them a lesson,” I asked Vigilant Aggression, “if they’re too dead to learn from it?”
As always, he had a way of understanding me even when I didn’t entirely understand myself. “It’s the survivors who learn the lesson. After, they will know not to test the Demon Emperor’s patience.”
That makes sense, I thought. I guess.
“But why didn’t the…” I couldn’t remember the name of the people we were going to teach.
“Ashkaro,” Vigilant Aggression supplied.
“Why didn’t the ashkaro learn the lesson the first time, when the Demon Emperor conquered them?”
My mate shrugged massive shoulders. “It’s like how Blood Tooth never learned how to take it easy before a war.”
A Darker Shade of Grey, the wardog in front of Vigilant Aggression, stepped through the portal and disappeared. Sigaria waved the next line forward, nodding to me in greeting when she spotted me behind my mate. She watched the way Vigilant Aggression and his line walked and moved, searching for flaws. She found none. My mate was perfect, which was why I chose him.
I saw tension in Vigilant’s shoulders, in the agitated twitch of his tail, and wanted to brush against him, remind him we were one and that someday we’d make the best pups the emperor would ever lay eyes on. My speed and Vigilant Aggression’s strength. My unwillingness to retreat, and his frightening intelligence that came close to rivalling that of people.
“Dogged, something isn’t right,” Vigilant Aggression whispered. “I don’t think—”
“Next!” Sigaria bellowed.
Vigilant Aggression’s line stepped forward, approaching the flickering portal to another world.
He doesn’t think what?
Distracted by the excitement of being next in line to enter the strange reality we were about to war with, I pushed the thought aside. I’d ask him in a moment, once we were on the far side and assigned to our barracks. Nose again lifting, I tested the air creeping through the portal. It was strange, oddly damp with something that smelled like deep jungle and rain.
As Vigilant Aggression and his line stepped forward, the portal stuttered, black silk surface shuddering. With a crack that sent me staggering back a step, sensitive ears ringing, the ebony sheet disappeared.
The hot smell of fresh blood and sundered organs hit me. Gore turned the ground where the portal had been into a red swamp. Loops of exposed intestines writhed and pulsated and fell still. Bright bone and twitching claws. One of the wardogs who’d been passing through the portal whined in agony and rolled onto its back. Muzzle gone, her face ended abruptly beyond her rearmost molars. A stump of tongue hung past the gaping ruin, choked sobs coming in bloody coughs. It took a moment before I recognized Lightning Black, who slept a few rooms down from me. Lightning’s arms ended at the elbows. She shuddered and stilled.
“Vigilant?” I searched the horror, praying I wouldn’t find my mate, that he’d passed through the portal before it snapped closed. Recognizing Vigilant Aggression’s back, I loosed a howl of mourning. In a heartbeat, the entire pack howled, voices raised in loss.
My mate had made it further through than the others but had not survived. His entire front half was gone, and I tried not to imagine what had arrived on the far side of the portal. Falling to my knees, I howled my heartbreak, a long keening note, pure and round.
Wardogs are born to die.
But not like this.
We fought and we fell. We gave our lives so the Demon Emperor might bring peace to the infinite realities.
I couldn’t understand what happened.
We’d passed through that very portal more times than a wardog could count.
My howl of pain turned into a roar of rage. It must have been an ambush. It had to be! Foul betrayers had dared attack the emperor’s home and we would rend them!
I looked for enemies, found none.
Sigaria Wen, beloved Kennel Master, stared in horror. She didn’t move, tears streaming from her eyes. Her pain hurt more than my own. Wardogs die. We die to protect. That anything should hurt my Kennel Master was the worst torment. Her pain was my failure.
Where Vigilant Aggression would have known what I wanted to say, I lacked the words.
Bad. That’s all I had. This was bad. My mate’s death was bad. Unknown forces striking us here on PalTaq was bad. Sigaria’s pain was really bad. If the Demon Emperor was in danger, that was the worst bad that could ever be. We wardogs would kill and kill until nothing threatened him, until nothing remained that might hurt our Kennel Master.
I stepped forward, standing over Sigaria. Though hugely important, she was tiny. I could lift her single-handed and throw her a score of strides. All people were like that, small and easily broken. The remaining wardogs joined me and we stood in a protective ring around our Kennel Master, searching for attackers.
Sigaria regained her feet, leaned against me. “I’m so sorry,” she sobbed into my fur.
I needed to kill whatever caused this pain. Could demonic portals be slain? I wanted to find out. Except it was gone. Nothing remained of it to hurt.
“Are we attacked?” I growled in confusion.
Sigaria released me, wiping her tears on a sleeve. “I don’t know.”
Not knowing what to do, I waited for her to tell me.
“We must report this,” she said. “To the emperor.”
Yes! He would know what to do.
“Dogged Determination,” Sigaria said, using my full name.
That usually meant that either I was in trouble, or I’d done something she thought was funny. The latter I could never understand; wardogs were incapable of humour.
“We have to report this to the emperor,” she repeated.
We? I decided she meant that I was to go with her, make sure no one stopped her from reporting.
“Come,” she said.
I walked at her side, testing the air for threats, scanning the training grounds between us and the palace.
Realizing no one else was coming, I signalled two more wardogs to join us, one out front, the other to follow behind. Maybe this was an attack that had taken place in that other world, but maybe we had enemies here. I would not chance my Kennel Master.
“I will do the talking,” Sigaria said in that way people had of speaking the obvious.
I nodded. Though I’d seen my emperor in the halls, passed within a score of strides of him on several occasions, I’d never been the focus of his attention.
I would not speak.
I would not let my Kennel Master down.
I would not betray her trust.
Later, I’d kill whoever was responsible for my mate’s death and Sigaria’s pain.
Wardogs die. But first we kill.
CHAPTER TWO
Sigaria set a fast pace, for a person. Easily striding along at her side, I smelled her tight-wound agitation. Reading people expressions had never been one of my strengths, but my nose worked as well as any wardog’s. She kept darting quick looks in my direction and I wondered if I’d done something wrong. The more I thought about it, the more concerned I became. Why had she chosen me to accompany her? Proximity aside, I was nothing. A lot of other wardogs saw the portal collapse and many of them were more perceptive than I. I’d been too focussed on Vigilant Aggression, wondering what he’d been about to say, when the gateway closed. I played the moment over again in my memory, watching reality shudder, the black silk sheet between worlds flickering before it disappeared, taking the front half of my mate with it. I prayed to the emperor it killed him instantly and that not enough reached the far side to suffer.
No matter how many times I thought about that moment, I couldn’t see what I’d done wrong.
“Are you…” Sigaria looked away and then back to me. “Are you alright?”
She’d never asked that before. Rather than lie, I said, “I don’t know.” Which wasn’t entirely true either, but was more honest than, ‘Yes, I’m fine.’
“You’re not in trouble,” she said. “You were there. I only brought you in case the emperor wanted another witness.”
“What was there to see?” I asked, confused. “The portal was there. The portal was gone.”
“Your perceptions are different than mine,” Sigaria said. “Did you see anything through the portal?”
“People eyes are better,” I answered. I thought back. “There were scents. Damp jungle or rainforest—but not like here. Different…” I couldn’t remember the words people liked to use. “Different animals and plants.”
“Did you smell anything that might suggest there was an attack on the far side of the portal?”
“No.”
“Shit,” she said. “It would have been nice to have something to report.”
I couldn’t think of anything to say to that. It shamed me that I’d been too distracted thinking about what my mate said to pay attention. It was a slip, and unforgivable. Wardogs were the guardians of the empire. We protected our people and killed anything that might threaten them. Instead, I’d been thinking about how someday Vigilant Aggression and I would have pups.
“I failed you,” I told my Kennel Master.
