Jann

The jann are an ancestry of mortal elementals native to Urth. Jann can be found in every environment and land on Urth though they tend to cluster around areas of exposed power such as nodes, nexuses, portals, gates, rifts or chromarchs, visual manifestation of ambient power that other people call ley lines. The largest and perhaps most ancient collection of jann can be found on the continent of Pan Orda. Here, the jann once held sway under the warlike Khanals who ruled the lands in ages past. Now they are treated as servants, slaves, and foot soldiers in the constant battles of in the Realms of Power.   Although the jann are not as great in numbers as Kin or elves on the continent of Koth, they can be found in numbers in the countries of Shakar, Quar and Sinut. When jann do gather, they spend their time with jann of a similar elemental alignment. While jann seek kinship with elemental creatures, elementals shun the jann, ignoring, dismissing, or attacking them outright. Some elementals influence jann through their shared connection to the elemental source. Some jann exploit this connection that exists among all elemental beings to gain access or influence as well though the immortal elementals always seem to have the upper hand.   Jann bear markings of the four elements of fire, water, stone, and wind upon their bodies that they call tamga. The elemental marking that has the most power or importance to a jann is always found on the face and is known as the ehknii tamga. These marking have a great significance in jann society, as like markings indicate some type of spiritual relationship, not just in the alignment of the power but in the design of the mark itself. Those in the same family generally share at least one tamga between parents and children. Even physically unrelated jann can share a tamga marking. Whether physically related or not, these relations are known as ilkar. Many jann hold that it represents a part of their spirit and their great name. The more marks ilkar share, the closer their bonds seem to grow as though they shared parts of a life before this one.   • Naar favor the power of FIRE, the FLAIR, and MIGHT Approaches. • Reeh favor the power of WIND, the GUILE, and AGILE Approaches. • Maa favor the power of WATER, the WIT, and TOUGH Approaches. • Hajar favor the power of STONE, the TOUGH, and MIGHT Approaches.   There are stories that other clans exist and manifest different powers and colors but most attribute these claims to other phenomena. All jann have a special affinity for things elemental, magics in particular. In fact, their affinity runs so strong that it prevents them from mastering any other form of magic. They even can transform their bodies into a pure elemental form for brief periods of time.   Most jann develop an affinity for one element that seems to influence them more strongly than the others. It has been reported that this alignment can shift over the course of centuries, but this occurrence, known as a Flux, is unusual. It is also possible for a jann to have their tamga change due to exposure to powerful elemental forces or what some call Echoes. Depending on who you ask, Echoes are fragments of elemental power given a semblance of awareness or fragments of elementally aligned spirits or remnants of elementals themselves.   Jann live around four times the life span of a Kin. Even more so than the other long-lived ancestries, jann have extreme difficulty reproducing. Very few jann ever have more than a single child in their lives. Though in times of conflict, birth rates climb as death tolls rise. Even more rare is a phenomenon known as Walking. Some call those who are born in this manner Walkers, others called them scarborn, as the places where this occurs are also known as Elemental Scars. In this scenario, a fully mature jann simply walks out of an elementally powerful area, seemingly spawned by the element itself. Examples of Elemental Scars are a fire scar found in the Sea of Glass, the water scars of Nissus and Rive in the Abyssmal Sea, a stone scar in the great Sand Sea of Scythia and a wind scar over the Shattered Isles in the Sea of Storms.