Zujnathar Lord of the Ghouls

A man is marching across a landscape of granite dunes beside a polluted ocean. Gradually he remembers that he has died and that he is on the way to fulfill a promise he made in life. Strewn along his path are skulls and the gnawed bones of men. Sometimes, carnivorous beasts cross his path, but nothing attacks him. He carries a naked broad sword in his left hand and three light javelins in his right.

He reaches a deserted city somewhat resembling a western ghost town, but more medieval. The only inhabitants are a few blind old women. He purchases some fruit and they beg him to stay and protect them. He travels on, followed by the women's curses.

Upon his right, as he leaves the city, rise desolate hills of shale. The trail winds over the hills which are hard to climb since the shale keeps crumbling beneath his feet.

Colossal worms live in burrows and emerge when they feel the vibrations of someone passing. He stabs at them with a javelin and they retreat back to their lairs. He guesses that whatever prey they are used to ambushing does not fight back. When he falls asleep on the shale, he is attacked by spider baboons, ugly creatures with the fangs of spiders and the heads of baboons.

Great cats drawn to the sound of conflict arrive and attack the spider baboons. There are two black panthers and four snow leopards. They make short work of the baboon creatures. They form themselves as guards about the man as he continues his journey.

He arrives at a palace built of black marble that pulsates with light, as though the marble itself were alive or enchanted. They enter and the great cats accept his petting and thanks for guarding him through the wasteland. Some of the cats polymorph into beautiful women: The black panthers, black women and the snow leopards into white women.

The women show him a suite in the palace and offer to sleep with him. He notices with disgust that occasionally a maggot drops out of their nostrils, or a larger worm pokes its body out of an ear or mouth. He declines female companionship.

Seven Years Before: The battle had raged from dawn till just after noon. Both sides had then withdrawn to erect temporary and flimsy barricades before falling asleep. Neither side had energy to search for the wounded, who lay upon the fields crying for water or for their mothers, until they died.

Around midnight, Ensign Allen Hennessey awoke in a puddle composed of equal parts water, mud, puke and excrement. He searched the camp for water and when he found it, quenched his raging thirst and washed himself off. Then he went in search for his sister Lynda, who had joined his squadron as a trooper only a month ago. She was nowhere in the camp. Allen took a torch and began a slow search of the immense battlefield.

The odds of finding one particular trooper among several thousand dead were somewhere between fat and nonexistent. What Allen found were dozens of ghouls, dire wolves, and four foot long tomb beetles feasting upon the dead. Enraged by grief and despair, he falls upon the ghouls with his cavalry sword, slicing and dicing until the horrid creatures flee from him in terror. A ghoul's most powerful weapon is fear; fear of the unnatural, and fear of the infection caused by their diseased claws and bite. An enraged and grief stricken man has no fear. All he wants to do is kill and then die while killing some more.

“That was unkindly done,” Allen heard someone say. “Scaring my children off their food makes them so cranky for nights on end.” A bipedal dire wolf lounged against a pile of dead. In its hands it carried a chain with an axe head attached to each end.

“Damn,” Allen exclaimed, “this must be Halloween! Shouldn't you be dressed up in a cloak and carrying a scythe?”

“You mistake me for death, A.K.A. the Grim Reaper,” the wolf man replied. “I am his exact opposite, King of the Undead.”

“Love to stop and chat a while your majesty, but I am searching for my sister.”

“Lynda is still alive, although just barely,” the dire wolf remarked. “What would you give to have her alive and well?”

And so a deal was made. A sister was found barely alive beneath a pile of bodies. The Lord of the Ghouls gained a servant, a paladin if you like, to run his errands.

Chapter two:

The palace of Zujnathar turned out to be a boring and predictable place, filled with outwardly attractive girls who turned into repulsive undead when you got interested in them. The palace was like comic relief in a good horror story. But, how much could you really do with a one joke plot, “Boy meets girl, falls in love, girl turns undead and eats boy”? Anyway, Allen was technically one of the undead himself now, so who was he to cast the first stone? The King of the Ghouls was not selected for his style and literary talents.

Alan was finally summoned to join Zujnathar in the throne room. In the immense room were two thrones, one for the King and the other occupied by a coiling maggot about ten feet long. “Now that is amusing, your majesty. That super maggot really sets the ambiance for the entire palace. ‘Theatre of the Vampires' it is not, but it does show some imagination and literary potential…”

Author's Note: This tale has not been completed. Readers are invited to write their own adventures and endings based on the story so far. Submit the adventures to Kitric at this website if you would like them considered for publication. A sample adventure begins following this note.

Sample adventure begins: “My queen and I are not familiar with the term ‘ambiance,'” Zujnathar responds. But your first assignment does involve a castle full of vampires, although I was not aware that Castle Forsaken had a theatre room.”