Aya-la

Children of the Raven Queen, the Aya-la live in a matriarchal society where the females hold all the authority. Female Aya-la have a higher affinity for their mothers magic. All Aya-la refer to the Raven Queen as "Mother" and revere her as a God. Aya-la keep their bloodline pure by only breeding with each other child bearing is considered the duty of all high class warriors and sorcerers, Love has no link to breeding as concepts such as love and compassion are foreign emotions to the majority of the Aya-la. Male Aya-la are warriors and only a small number of Males have ever had an affinity for shadow magic and even then these Males only end up having but a small ammount of authority.
When an Aya-la is born, they are presented to the Raven Queen in order to retrieve the infants Soul Mark which is then linked to the Raven Queen. The infants power then becomes part of the Raven Queens power. Her power increases with each descendant.

Female Aya-la are favored by the Raven Queen and often have a high affinity for magic because of their bloodline, making them adept at bloodline magic and shadow magic.

Male Aya-la are considered low class warriors due to their lack of affinity to their mother shadow magic these Male Aya-la make up the entirety of the Raven Warriors