Nazagorn

Nazagorn is the "pet" zombie dragh-kin of Malzadrian. Her body exists in the flesh, while her soul is trapped between the flesh and the grim dream.

In life, Nazagorn guarded the Portal of Sunset. She was the most ancient, beautiful, and powerful dragh-kin to ever live. She was proud of her appearance and was surrounded by a crippling aura of beauty that would make mortal kin weep uncontrollably with joy and awe.

Dragh-kin are not fully understood, but it is believed that all dragh-kin give birth to one child in their lifetime. Thus, Nazagorn likely has a daughter somewhere in Landfall. Her daughter would be at least 1000 years old and might even have a daughter of her own.

## Nazagorn's Deathlock

Near the end of the Myriad, at the moment of her death, Nazagorn was deathlocked by Suul Barat (Malzadrian). Her deathlock is one of Suul Barat's greatest magical achievements and was part of the reason for the schism between himself and Cyrildrim. Cyrildrim strongly disagreed with Suul Barat's use of deathlock magic. Cyrildrim ominously warned that deathlocking Nazagorn was Suul Barat's biggest mistake and would ultimately cause his death.

Deathlock keeps Nazagorn in a lingering, decaying state halfway between life and death. Her skin and organs have decayed and mostly fallen from her body, leaving only a wretched, tattered skeleton. Half of her face is gone, and her eye sockets are empty. She lacks a tongue and is unable to speak, but she is able to communicate telepathically with great effort. She is surrounded by a paralyzing aura of fear, dread, and sadness. Without magical shielding, it is nearly impossible for a person to remain conscious in her presence. Plants rapidly wither and die in her shadow.

Through his deathlock, Malzadrian controls Nazagorn as a puppet. She has no free will and is a helpless spectator to her own horrid existence. She yearns for death and feels a burning hatred for Malzadrian. When Malzadrian is under heavy stress, or when he lets his guard down, or when his lock on Nazagorn is magically shielded, Nazagorn gains brief periods of self control. She typically uses those moments to cry for help by invading people's minds. Such cries are usually targeted toward a specific person, and can cover unlimited distances. This can be traumatic for the listener, as Nazagorn's telepathic "voice" carries overwhelming feelings of loss, sadness, and anger. Nazagorn is also able to briefly communicate with people as they pass into or out of the dream, but she cannot reach the dream itself.

In the story, Malzadrian uses Nazagorn as a weapon. Nazagorn reaches out to Mikoa, begging her for help. It is later revealed that Nazagorn also sought help from Cyrildrim, when he was masquerading as Khazr. Khazr's death, at the end of Book 2, creates a crack in Malzadrian's deathlock, which allows Nazagorn to gain increasingly long moments of self-direction throughout Book 3. At the end of Book 3, Nazagorn gains enough freedom to finally strike out and kill Malzadrian. With Mikoa's help, Nazagorn impales Malzadrian with her claws, channels hundreds of years of pain and anguish into his soul, then slices him to pieces. She then peacefully retreats to her den to enter the Portal of Sunset. She becomes a new constellation of stars in the night sky, called the Dragh-kin Constellation.

## In The Between

Nazagorn's deathlocked soul lingers as a dragh-kin woman in the Between. There, she subsists in uneasy, eternal equilibrium with the Forgotten Gods, who are also trapped there. In the Between, Nazagorn is not a zombie -- she still has her original (normal) appearance, though lacking any aura of magical beauty. Unlike the mindless zombie minion in the flesh, Nazagorn is fully independent in the Between, but without the power to escape.

When Mikoa crosses through the Between, she sometimes meets Nazagorn's soul. Nazagorn tries to help Mikoa defeat the Forgotten Gods, in exchange for Mikoa's help in defeating Malzadrian.