Sure, I could talk about werewolves this week, but in case you hadn’t already guessed, this chapter has a lot to do with them anyway.
So I’ll talk about another sort of canine instead: the hellhound.
Siavash has one, as seen in the prologue - she couldn’t come to this plane mostly because he had no guarantee there’d be space for her. Her name was Dog, but since Siavash ‘vanished’, his mother has taken his dog into her care, and renamed her Princess Hotcakes von Monstertruck III. Princess Hotcakes von Monstertruck III seems pretty happy with the new arrangement.
She does, of course, miss her true owner - and that is a technical term, in a way, because a hellhound isn’t just a pet but a longterm magical companion bound to one being. They’re summoned with a part of your essence: a little blood usually does the trick. The other essential ingredient is grief. You can know all the right incantations and draw out your circles perfectly and bleed buckets but if you are not grieving, nothing will come of it.
If you are, you get a hellhound. They come in as many varieties as normal dogs, but with magical aspects - Siavash’s Dog has an internal furnace much like his, and drools lava. Others have three heads, or can talk, or can vanish. And so on, and so forth.
They generally originate from the demonic plane, but that doesn’t mean they’re not lovable, loving creatures. They’re born only to the grieving, after all. Sort of…magical emotional support dogs, if you like.
