The ancestal home of the ghouls is relatively close to the wall, and they were one of the first races to be conquered by the young Empire. At the time, they lived in small tribal communities, supplementing farming with their own very special kind of hunter-gathering. Now as then, ghouls subsist largely on carrion. Unifying against the Imperial Legions, the Ghouls were able to hold off the invasion for many months; during this time, the Imperial commanders were impressed by the humanity and intelligence displayed by the Ghouls compared to most of the other races they had encountered in the Treacherous Lands. Reports were returned to the Emperor, and he agreed to make peace with the Ghouls. The terms of the peace made Adhania a fief of the Empire; however the Ghouls' culture would be aided and developed with the aid of the Imperial authorities, and they would build a nation that would become an ally and partner of the Empire.
Both sides kept to the bargain. Under the shelter of the Imperial Legions, ghoul civilization thrived, the Emperor sending scholars and craftsmen to teach, and the ghouls eagerly learning. In a few generations Adhania did indeed become a valued part of the Empire. The years rolled by, and the Empire crumbled; as the free kingdoms pressed the Emperor ever harder, he informed the ghouls that they must provide for their own defence, and withdrew his legions, with what little regret he was still capable of feeling. In the Treacherous Lands, only Mirror Horizon remained protected longer than Adhania. By this time, the ghouls had taken to living in townships with elected mayors, each a conscientious minature of Horizon. As the legions prepared to leave the mayors met up and decided that their civilization must be maintained. They partially succeeded. Loss of trade and the continual attacks by the various horrors of the Treacherous Lands mean that Adhania has decayed to a dark age culture; the townships have shrunk and are all fortified. Due to the persecuted and embattled position of the Ghouls in the Treacherous Lands, worship of the Soldier is common and socially aceptable.
While the Empire had endured in Adhania, the Ghouls had drawn the Emperor's attention for a second time, and for quite different reasons. The consumption of freshly dead corpses is common in Ghoul culture; when a Ghoul consumes part of the body of another Ghoul, she experiences a few of that Ghoul's memories or dreams, gaining a brief moment of empathy with the departed. The eating of the deceased is therefore an essential part of Ghoul funeral rites, as friends and family remember him in the most vivid and personal way possible (another reason for the Ghoul/Kraeling emnity is that the Kraeling habit of stripping the dead of battle to the bone prevents this ritual of rememberance). Such remembering does not occur when a Ghoul devours animal carrion; however, when a Kraeling or human is devoured, a very limited rememberance is possible. Usually only the sense of strong emotions in the period immediately before death survives, and something about the manner of death. It was also discovered that Ghouls were able, in this way, to detect strong links between the deceased and any Gods. On hearing of this talent, the Emperor invited the Ghouls to send a few of their people to live in Horizon and its mirror city. In return, the new Ghoul communities must take responsibility for the hunting of murderers and cultists in the city, and also for the disposal of corpses. The 'Ghoul talent' made them an obvious choice for the investigation of murders; meanwhile their diets suggested a convenient way of removing corpses that might pollute the city with their putrefaction, or worse, provide a vessel for some spirit from beyond the wall. Previously these matters had been dealt with by cremation, but having Ghouls devour the corpses also offered a way of monitoring causes of death in the two cities. The Emperor reasoned that by confronting the worst criminals in his domain with creatures from beyond the Wall, he would add a novel element of terror to the punishments for those crimes; also there seemed a kind of pleasing justice in allowing those who had traffiked with the Gods to be hunted down by creatures born of the Powers.
A number of Ghouls accepted the Emperor's offer, and left Adhania to set up communities in the two cities. After the destruction of the mirror Horizon, the Ghouls that had lived there mostly returned to Adhania.
[A sketch of some game mechanics. To 'perform the rememberance', a ghoul must eat a sizable portion of the body within one game turn (two months) of death. If the body is a Ghoul, the devouring Ghoul obtains a rush of dreams and memories, although they all appear in a dream - like manner. In fact, the very vividness and quantity of these visions makes them less practically useful; but a Ghoul still gets more information about another Ghoul than about a human. If the body is a human (or any non-Ghoul), the Ghoul experiences one emotion associated with the final hours of the person, and one fact about the death. These facts may or may not be of any practical use. A Ghoul can taste the difference between a human and another race (Kraeling or Fae, for example) but the difference is not so great that a Ghoul who has no experience of outside races would remark upon it. Significantly, almost all Horizon Ghouls have never knowingly tasted anything that isn't human or Ghoul. The Ghoul is additionally able to detect any significant links the deceased individual had with any Gods; such links could include being a dedicated worshipper, being a sacrifice to the god, having been affected with strong magic originating from a god shortly before death, and so on. The Ghoul may tell which God the link is to, but not the nature of the link.]
GHOULS IN HORIZON: unsurprisingly, the Emperor's human subjects in the True Lands were at first terrified by the 'Treacherous Lands monsters' that had arrived in Horizon. To quell their fears, the Emperor put a couple of limitations on the Ghoul community; they must reside in one particular part of the city, and must not travel out of Horizon into the wider True Lands. So far, the Mayors of Horizon have maintained this limitation on the Ghouls' habitation, and the Last Treaty has renewed the ban on Ghouls travelling outside of Horizon. These measures quieted the citizens but could not wholly remove their anxieties; there remains a fear of Ghouls in the city that results in them being stigmatized socially and makes finding employment ouside of their own community difficult. This fear is not helped by the involvement of the Ghoul community with corpse disposal and the hunting of murderers.
The Mayors have also maintained the rest of the agreement between the Ghouls and the city; following the Last War, this was restated in the Mayor's Compact, the sole surviving work of one of Zero's predecessors. The Ghoul community is allowed considerable self-determination, and is provided with money by the city. In return, the Ghouls are expected to organise themselves to perform two services for the city. The first is the collection and treatment of corpses; city law states that all corpses must be handed over to the Ghouls within twenty-four hours of death. The Ghouls are to collect the corpses and perform the rememberance of them. Evidence of murder or cultism associated with the deceased is to be investigated by the Ghouls themselves; evidence of any other criminal activity is supposed to be passed on to the Watchdogs, although it has been noted that this process is less than ideally efficient. The Ghouls then have the right to use the corpses as food, and they cremate any surplus.
The second duty of the Ghoul community is the investigation and hunting of cultists and murderers. Any evidence the Watchdogs find of these kind of crimes is supposed to be passed on to the Ghouls, though again this is more a statement of intent than reality. In this respect the Ghouls are expected to act like a second police force (though one with an eerie kind of evidence and shamanistic aid; see below); investigate the crime, arrest the criminal, bring him before the courts. It should be noted that many legal proffesionals find it difficult to argue aginst the Ghouls' grim - faced recitations of what they have tasted in corpse - flesh, so the Ghouls do have a rather better conviction rate that the Watchdogs. The Ghouls are then expected, where applicable, to act as executioners.
'Murder', for these purposes, must be a killing with no moral mitigation; death at the hands of another in a gangland battle, for example, doesn't count. Other types of unlawful killing are supposed to be handed over to the Watchdogs. Since most humans have no clear idea what goes on in a Ghoul hunt, it has been fearfully claimed that the Ghouls, by deciding who and who not to pursue and what to tell the Watchdogs, manipulate their task not for the good of the city, but to increase their own influence and appease their parent Powers. Others retort that you should worry about the Watchdogs abusing their position before looking at the Ghouls.
The organisation of these activities is centred on the Circle, a commitee of twelve elected by district that then appoints foremen and other such things. The Circle also elects the Headman, who is recognised in the Mayor's Compact as the spokesman for the ghouls. Officially he is not the ghouls' leader or anything like that, though unofficially many Headmen have effectively united the community behind them or dominated the Circle. Under the Mayor's Compact the headman is not a member of the privy council and may not appear before the privy council, having only the right to submit written messages. In practice the ghouls are vital to the running of Horizon and such written messages are rarely ignored by the privy council. Circlemen are elected by a ward; there are twelve wards in the area of the city in which tradition and the Mayor's Compact allow the ghouls to live. Few people really want Ghouls as neighbours, so the area in question has for years been at the heart of the slums.
The Circle organises Ghoul citizens into specialist groups that perform tasks such as corpse collection. Notably, tradition and law dictate that Ghouls engaged in investigating crimes must wear Horizon's coat of arms, prominently displayed; Ghouls doing so have the same rights as the Watchdogs. Ghouls appointed to these jobs are also usually well armed. Typically, the Circle relies on 'professionals' to man the crime - fighting groups, Ghouls who do this sort of thing on a regular basis. There is always a need in these groups for more muscle and pairs of hands, though, so many Ghouls will find themselves in such squads at one time or another. In some cases participation is very much unwilling, as the Circle makes decisions for the good of the community and expects individual members to follow those decisions. Whether 'professional' or not, a Ghoul's presence in these squads is entirely on the Circle's say so. Pretending to be in a squad (which is quite distinct from having been pressed into a squad on the spot in an emergency) will not be punished by the city authorities (who may never find out), but the Ghoul community leadership will make your life very, very difficult. In fact, the need for the Ghoul community as a whole to be answerable to the city has led to the Circle being a quite overbearing form of government, with the Ghoul community acquiesing to its intrusiveness to ensure that their place in the city is preserved. This consent is an important part of how the community works; the Circle is less a totalitarian state government, and more of a manifestation of a very close knit and conformist society.
Part of the agreement between the Ghouls and the city is that if their duties are carried out, their other doings are no concern of the city's (so long as the rules mentioned above are adhered to and no laws are overtly broken). Ghouls that are not occupied in hunting criminals or collecting corpses are hence free to live as ordinary citizens (albeit with the suspiscion and fear of the actual human citizens); indeed the Watchdogs are loathe to interfere with the Ghouls, giving them somewhat liberty than average human citizens. Such liberty is constantly invaded upon by their own community leaders; the Circle and other respectable figures usually have ideas about what a Ghoul should be doing if not engaged upon keeping the community's place in the city (ie corpse collecting or policing). The stock attitude of the Ghoul community's elders is one of pride in their race's elevation, among all the creatures of the Treacherous Lands, to this place in the heart of civilization. Everything possible must be done to preserve this state of affairs. Younger Ghouls often chafe under their community's restrictions and unending moral guidance; such youths are all the more likely to join mobs. The Circle contains several individuals next to whom Colonel Zero himself would seem lacking in personal dignity.
Another manifestation of the Ghoul community's independence is that they are able to practice their shamanistic religion without interference or overt persecution. This was part of the original agreement with the Emperor, with the Ghouls arguing that the Intercession, and hence the faith of the Intercessor, meant little to them. The religion of the Ghouls adds to their sense of 'otherness' for the humans, but is of use the community in various ways. Ghoul shamans suffer no more social problems for their faith then they do already for being Ghouls.
[I suggest that any Ghoul character get the basic set of being able to Remember, disease resistance, and connection to the Ghoul community (a somewhat dubious merit). Being a 'professional' hunter of cults/murderers (ie being trusted by the Circle) could then be an additonal merit, as could things like having influence with the Circle; possibly we could have quirks like 'law - enforcement official' that would give this when taken by a Ghoul character? Being a 'professional' corpse collector might be a freebie, if anyone seriously wants it.]