Lexicon/NibarakSeafarers
Nibarak, Seafarers of
The Seafarerers of Nibarak are the oldest Pirate Clan in Creation, dating back to the first years after the Primordial War, when a Solar led his fellows into the West to battle the hordes of the Fair Folk. During this early time of the Realm, it was well understood that the Fae represented the strongest threat to the Realm and all of Creation. For this reason, no effort was spared to guard Creation’s borders against their depredations.
It was quickly realized that the West, with its endless expanses of untraveled and uninhabited water, would be the area most vulnerable to attack. By sending Leviathan and other great naval captains, the Solar Deliberative started the War of Glamorous Waves. The war raged for over a century, pushing back the Wyld almost two thousand miles and revealing new land masses. It also revealed some of what the western Fae had been up to. Thousands of captive humans fled the Wyld as it solidified around their former captors. A smaller number of Changelings, those folk born of the Fae masters and human pleasure slaves, were the only ones able to survive the dangers of the exodus from the Wyld. It was these folk, the Changelings, who became the Seafarers of Nibarak.
They have remained in the West to taunt their faerie kin and ancestors with their presence and prosperity. Some even say that the Nibarak patrol the farthest seas in order to hold back the Wyld and keep their former masters at bay.
If the Nibarak have such good intentions, it may be one of their few redeeming qualities. They are a friendly folk to their allies, among whom they count any and all Exalted and most gods, but to anyone else they are a nightmarish terror beyond understanding. Their appetites for dreams and passions are the main driving force behind their piracy. Their victims are drained of imagination and passion, then sold to the Guild as slaves or kept on by the Nibarak to work the menial labor jobs in their floating cities and ships.
Today, the Nibarak are known for three main things; these features act as cultural distinguishments to keep these proud people from being mistaken for anything but what they are. Their tattoos, song-stories and manners of dress are unique and spoken of across the entire West, even into the Southern and Northern areas adjacent to the great oceans.
Nibarak tattoos are peerless; they make use of the Jindar needles and their magical properties to create exceedingly fine tattoos of a multitude of colors. The great Firdausi was born of the Nibarak, though he left his home early on and became a famous tattooist and independent pirate before he was killed by a jealous and angry Solar. Some Nibarak have tattoos across their entire bodies, but most often they simply tattoo their chests, backs and hands. It has been rumored that the Lunar Exalted learned the art of making magical tattoos from the Nibarak.
The song-stories of the Nibarak are the part of their culture that has traveled the farthest, reaching almost all corners of creation. A Nibarak singer or storyteller is considered to be one of the finest forms of entertainment and education available. Even the Scarlet Empress kept three Nibarak on retainer for their songs and stories of things ancient, new, near and distant. How they gathered these tales is unknown, for they are reclusive, remaining only in the farthest West; but their stories tell of things happening even in areas like Rathess, Farhold and Qasanda. Nibarak stories are almost always lewd and bawdy; they have no taboos about sexuality in their society and exhibit no qualms about including explicit passages in their stories. Part of the Nibarak reputation as the “Cynises of the West” may rise from their stories.
Nibarak do not limit their sexual interests to their stories; they also display it in their manner of dress. Nibarak of both sexes go shirtless in all but the worst storms and their shimmering pantaloons are an almost translucent white. The fabric reflects light in skittering patterns that have something to do with Wyld taints upon the plants the fiber is spun from. When wet, these garments become transparent. Some dancers in the South and East pay huge sums of money for Nibarak cloth to use as veils and such things. At least one Ebony Dragon has been tricked into wearing robes made of Nibarak silk and had to make his apologies to a number of important Immaculates when his Anima flare activated the fabric’s see-through properties.
The last serious note about the Nibarak is their relationship with a rival gang of pirates, the Lintha Family. It is known the Lintha were once servants of the Realm, acting as the majority of the Western Navy’s crewmen and officers. After Leviathan sank his flagship and the Dragon-Blooded took control of the remains, the Lintha mutinied and became pirates. For some reason, the Nibarak hate the Lintha with a passion even exceeding their hatred of the Fair Ones. No Nibarak I have spoken with has been willing to speak of what the Lintha did to earn their ire, but it was surely something dire.
- Telgar, Sidereal Historian. Chosen of Saturn.
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