Qabal

Qabal Stronghold

The Qabal were a brotherhood of professional sorcerers, scholars who usually worked at the Sultan and Caliph courts.

Stronghold

The Qabal Stronghold was located in Medinaat al-Salaam. Its doors were opened to all who wish to learn. Even the Ashalan sometimes visited the Stronghold to share their esoteric knowledge. Some Qabal prefered to study independent, refining their art in solitude.

Qabal Magic

The hierarchy of the Qabal was that of an academic institution. At the lower level were the students, who ranged in age from children as young as ten to adults as old as 30. These members of the Qabal had lives filled with work and little else, as the discipline needed to learn the Qabal's style of magic was formidable indeed. Qabal instruction styles were rigid and very unforgiving of failure, and almost a third of the Qabal's students left in their first year, unable to stand the seemingly nonsensical lessons in how to draw a perfect circle freehand or how to sign their name 70 times without variation. As their instruction continued, students were astonished to learn that they had been learning spells the entire time – they were simply not told how to assemble and perform the components properly.

Hierarchy

The first level were the Qabal Magi, the second were the Qabal Summoner, the most known Qabal practitioner, and the Qabal students. There were non magical agents, called the Qabal Agents.

History

Foundation and Schism

The first meeting of the Qabal took place nearly 400 years after the Day of Wrath. The Qabal were formally created by Qadir, the successor of Harik, the first student of Hakhim. The term embodied a brotherhood of all the Sahir who had learned the Hakhim's Seal, so that their power would be centralized and reinforced through cooperation. In fifty years the organization suffered an schism and two Qabal Factions appeared, the Qabal Traditionalists and the Qabal Progressivists, one in favor of consolidating their power and the other in favor of expanding the brotherhood's reach.

Immortal Caliph

The Caliph Hanan Talibah took over and began her dynasty of power and tyranny supported by her hated Khadi. The Qabal followed the will of the people who did not want to be commanded by an immortal, but the rebellion was crushed. Hanan lust of power sought to destroy the knowledge in the Burning Sands and destroyed the beloved libraries and scrolls. The renegade men of learned quality as well as a great amount of sahirs joined the Qabal. Its new goal was to destroy the Caliphs hold over the people of the Sultanate.

Outlawed

The Qabal were scattered and began to work from the shadows, spreading their network of agents, waiting for the time they could depose the tyrant. They undermined the influence of the Caliph, lowered the confidence of the people of the Jewel, which proved to be sucessfull. Even men without magical powers began to seek the Qabal to join them and its task.

The Qabal were secretly funded by the Houses of Dahab, who sought to have the two groups destroy each other by playing them off against each other. The Qabal's goals were to have the shelves of the libraries restocked with the scrolls, and books of knowledge taken from them. ^{[citation needed]}

Leader

In the 12th century his champion was a renegade Senpet priest, Hekau.

Prophecy

An ancient prophecy, the Awakening, required to gather four avatars of the Goddess to be released. It was believed that it would mark the dawnfall of the Caliph, and the Qabal worked to fulfill it. Hekau found one of the Avatars, Amru, and avoided the Caliph took her, but it was at the cost of his freedom. With their leader Hekau in chains awaiting the final punishment for his betrayal of the Senpet, the Qabal continued his quest to find the four Avatars of the prophecy.

Shattering of the Jewel

Even before the Erba'a Alliance descended upon the city to begin the Shattering of the Jewel, the Qabal moved to the streets to attack the Khadi.

The Awakening

The Qabal's goals were achieved in 1132 during the events of the Awakening. The Caliph laid dead, but Kaleel the Moon and Shilah the Sun disappeared from the sky in the Twenty-Seven Days of Darkness, and the Jinn Lord, Kaleel and his legion roamed free in the sands beginning a new war.

Celestial Alliance

Many Free Sahir and members of the Qabal died during the process that released their true nature, the jinn of the Qanon, hidden in a human body since the Day of the Wrath. The Qabal joined the Celestial Alliance to confront Kaleel. One of them, Tabari, found the Sayel Blade, and the Alliance used it to defeat the Jinn Lord.

Conflict

The only conflict was a generational one. Many of the younger generation of sahirs in the Qabal never knew what it was like to practice magic with the threat of the Khadi's axes hovering over their wrists, and in the eyes of their elders they seemed to take many of their freedoms for granted. The older generation, on the other hand, was seen by the younger graduates of the Stronghold as needlessly paranoid and hidebound. While this conflict was a long time from coming to real blows, tension was rising faster than the older generation was retiring, and the conflict was almost certain to come to a head unless something happened to unite the Qabal once more.

Known Champions

Qadir	? - ?
Hekau	? - 1132
Amru al-Zaqra	1132 - Present

References

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