Vakaar (vɑːkɑɹ)

Called variously the vakaar, vaakar, vaakr, fakaar, fakr, faakaar, the species is universally distrubuted throughout the known world and adjecent realities with the folds of the Rift. However, by no means is this indication of their being common. Absolute numbers are impossible to know, because the vakaar, are true shapeshifters, and lack a true, fixed form. As they age, they can acquire more and more forms, but they retain their sharp intelligence regardless of how they appear. But from those among them who have said, and the few scholars who have any great knowledge of them, they are rare. (Cynical scholars have said that it is in the best interests of the vakaar to lie about their numbers.)
Among the vakaar, beings who use magic to shapeshift are reviled; others shapeshifters—those limited in number of forms, such as werewolves—are considered lesser, flawed beings, and pitied.
The vakaar are born from the union of one of their number and a host species, usually sentient beings selected for its access to wealth, privilege and knowledge. Or by the mating of two vakaar. Purist vakaar prefer to mate with their own, which leads to numerous and highly inbred lineages, but this is believed the only way to insure the species' ultimate survival, lest lesser shapeshifters be created and the higher lineages become extinct.
Vakaar are brood parasites: they are incapable of raising their own young. Even though they are driven to reproduce, they leave their infants in the care of host species. The infants are thought to naturally enchant and imprint upon the first suitable potential parent that finds them. The foster parent is enchanted by the presence of the child and become its fierce advocate. Whilst, not at the expense of their naturally born children, but the adoptee becomes a clear favourite. The infant vakaar is invariably of the same species' form the vakaar took when it bore the child—presumably the vakaar itself had imprinted on that species—and although this could mean the offspring appears as one of the members of the foster parents' kind, because the vakaar are wanderers, this is not always the case. A dwarf child adopted and raised by humans, only later to discover that it was never a dwarf at all, is a story told in large ethnically and species diverse nations like Hœm.
These brood parasite children, when they are finally revealed, are labeled "changelings" and are often reviled and driven from their homes by other members of the family unit leaving their enchanted fosterers mad with guilt, confusion, and betrayal.
It is for these reasons that shapeshifters generally, and the vakaar specifically, are largely hated and mistrusted by other tribes.

Basic Information

Biological Traits

The vakaar can take the form, physiology, and abilities of creatures that they have shifted into. The longer lived vakaar, the less they are tied to the realm of mortals and they more wild and bestial they tend to be. Some of the vakaar assume an animal form and live for decades without shifting, all but forgetting any other life. When a traumatic event and/or violence occurs the past memories return and the vakaar will shift to another form and wander.

Civilization and Culture

Interspecies Relations and Assumptions

Many vakaar hate sentient fixed-formed beings and they revel in their ability to elude, deceive, corrupt, and commit acts of violence upon them. Wild vakaar are disinterested in the lives of sentient beings and actively avoid them.

llōqh t'Naahn [mauve]

Mauve llōqh t'Naahn by BJRP

One of the standard glyphs of the Cult of Naahn, the llōqh is a pinwheel representing movement and change, the umbrae shifts from light to dark and twilight in between. The directionality of this version is turned to the left, although uncommon it is not significant beyond artistic choice. Mauve is a rarer colour choice however.
A mauve llōqh is the mark of the vakaar.

Genetic Descendants

• The Werewolves of PÈRYL

Scientific Name

Faakri tressuz

Lifespan

Because of their mutable forms, aging can be shed easily. The average vakaar, barring violence, can live for centuries.

Geographic Distribution

• PÈRYL

Related Organizations

• Fist of the Black Isles
• The Grand Army of the Ptarshakkian Empire
• The Oligarchs of Ebb-Ta
• The Tzolgarin Dynasty