Zagarna

Zagarna
Second Archlord of the Darklands
Titles	Archlord Zagarna Darklord Zagarna Lord of Kaag
Status	Dead (killed by Lone Wolf) Spirit trapped in the Plain of Despair
Became Archlord	MS 4219
Died	MS 5050
Domain	Helgedad (as Archlord) Maarkaag
Affiliations	Darklords (as Archlord, subordinate) Vashna (lieutenant of) Haakon (rival)
Previous Archlord	Vashna
Next Archlord	Haakon
Illustrations	The Darklands: p. 88

Darklord Zagarna (died MS 5050) was the second Archlord of the Darklords. Zagarna served as Vashna's lieutenant when Vashna became Archlord, until Vashna's fall in MS 3799. Zagarna became Archlord himself after a prolonged internal struggle amongst the Darklords in MS 4219. Under his rule, the Massacre of the Kai occurred after Vonotar gave him information about the Feast of Fehmarn, when the Kai would gather at the Kai monastery. Zagarna planned to wipe out all of the Kai in one stroke. However, one Kai warrior, Lone Wolf, survived, and vowed to avenge his Kai brethren.

Lone Wolf managed to retrieve the Sommerswerd from Durenor, despite Vonotar's attempts to stop him. As Zagarna commanded a siege of Holmgard, Lone Wolf pointed the Sommerswerd at Zagarna atop the battlements, and obliterated him with the power of the Sun. For his failure, Naar imprisoned Zagarna's spirit in the Plain of Despair to be tortured for eternity.

Appearance

Zagarna was a humanoid with blue reptilian skin. He had two powerful sets of jaws, one where his mouth would be expected and another large set in his abdomen controlled by a secondary brain:

His voice was quiet and bubbling, as if he spoke through a foot of water. Its quietness was all the more terrifying, bearing in mind the hugeness of his form. Standing, he was nearly twenty feet tall. His skin was scaled, and coloured blue and green. The outsides of his arms and legs were studded with sharp claws, as were his hands and feet; a double row of claws ran backwards from his forehead and down his spine. From his horned face projected a massive jaw in which were set knife-sharp teeth longer than a man's hand. His incongruously pink tongue flickered in and out like that of a serpent." (Eclipse of the Kai, pp. 99–100)

Those loyal to him rallied to orange banners depicting a broken skull.

Biography

Rise to power

After his arrival on Magnamund, he became Lord of Kaag, and Archlord Vashna's lieutenant.

Zagarna rose to power in the wake of the defeat of Vashna at the Maakongorge by Ulnar I of Sommerlund. Though all 19 Darklords attempted to succeed Vashna, Zagarna undertook a quest to find the Doomstones of Agarash the Damned and used this power to establish solid rule over the other Darklords. He delegated Kaag to Darklord Slûtar, who ruled it in his name, although the denizens of Kaag did not all necessarily agree, leading to a permanent state of warfare. He then took up the goal of destroying Sommerlund, first invading the country in MS 4219.

Initially successful, Zagarna's invasion met with defeat when the Sommlending discovered that Giak infantry would break and run were their leaders to be killed in battle. Led by the Kai Lords, the Sommlending Army exploited this weakness to great effect and the invasion failed.

Second invasion of Sommerlund

Immortal like all Darklords, Zagarna continued to hold power over his fellows in the wake of the failed invasion and plotted a new assault centuries later in MS 5050. What might have been a similarly failed endeavor, however, was changed dramatically by the chance defection to the Darklands of Vonotar, a dissatisfied wizard of the Brotherhood of the Crystal Star who sought to increase his power by merging his magic with that of the Nadziranim.

Vonatar revealed to Zagarna that there was one day on which all Kai Lords gathered for a feast at their monastery, and that on this day alone it was possible to annihilate them without the armies of Sommerlund at their call. Persuaded, Zagarna moved earlier than he had planned, and in the subsequent massacre timed to coincide with the Feast of Fehmarn killed all but a single initiate survivor who would subsequently take the name Lone Wolf.

Downfall and death

Within months of his invasion, Zagarna had laid waste to half of Sommerlund, killed Crown Prince Pelathar, besieged Toran, and moved his vast army to besiege Holmgard. He had not, however, killed the last of the Kai, and while he entrusted to Vonatar this task, the wizard failed in every attempt to prevent Lone Wolf first from reaching the Durenese capital of Hammerdal and then returning at the head of the Durenese fleet with the Sommerswerd.

On daybreak of the return, on the dawn of his apparent triumph, Darklord Zagarna was obliterated in his tent by a beam of power unleashed by the Sommerswerd, becoming the first Darklord in millennia to die. His death sent his entire army into panic and they fled back to the Darklands, leaving behind hundreds of thousands of their fellows who were either trampled or run down by the combined forces of Sommerlund and Durenor.

For his failure, Naar trapped Zagarna's spirit in the Plain of Despair, to be tortured for all eternity.

In Lone Wolf media

Zagarna is encountered in Fire on the Water, although he is not fought directly, and his appearance is cut short by the Sommerswerd obliterating him.

Nevertheless, two sets of combat statistics were given for Zagarna. In Newsletter #6, they were given as:

Darklord Zagarna
Combat Skill 46, Endurance 60

These are reduced by 25% if Zagarna is beyond the limits of the Darklands.

In the second edition of The Darklands, a different set of attributes are given:

Zagarna, Lord of Kaag, Archlord of the Darklands
Combat Skill 57, Endurance 78

Legends of Lone Wolf

In the Legends of Lone Wolf novelization, Zagarna was originally a dustworm named Garna. Garna encountered Alyss when the latter visited Ragadorn to persuade Cloud Maker to return to the Order of the Kai. That done, Alyss decided to investigate her own origins, travelling through time with Garna to the truce between Ishir and Naar. Here Alyss witnessed Ishir and Naar setting the terms of the truce. Naar argued that for the contest to be fair, the two extra spirits (Alyss & Garna) had to be equally split between them. Ishir claimed Alyss, leaving Naar to turn Garna into Zagarna.

Image

Sources

• Hahn, August [2004] (2011). "Darklands Geography: Maarkaag – The Province of Blades", The Darklands, Dever, Joe, Second Edition, Mongoose Publishing. 
• Hahn, August [2004] (2011). "Darklords, Demons and Gods of Darkness: Zagarna, Lord of Kaag, Archlord of the Darklands", The Darklands, Dever, Joe, Second Edition, Mongoose Publishing. 

External links

• Oasis Vonotar Entry
• Caverns of Kalte Book review
• Ishir definition
• Lone Wolf Newsletter 2000
• Sun Eagle entry
• Shadows on the Sand Book Review
• Kingdoms of Terror Book Review
• Oasis Agarash entry
• Doomstones entry