City of Brass (WOD)

The City of Brass is the only accessible umbral citadel of the Djinn.

History
According to Djinn legends, the city is the result of the wishes of an ill-fated trio of mages, who asked a Djinn to build them a city according to their design. The djinn exerted the promise from them that they would reside within the city until their death, which they swore. As the mages had neither specified the location nor the material from which the city should be built, the Djinn created it over a node in the middle of an inhospitable desert, designed out of various strands of copper and brass. When the mages tried to defy the agreement and leave the city, they found out that they were not able to leave their new home. After the last of the mages had died a natural death, the city was translated into the Invisible World, commemorated as a symbol of Djinn victory over humanity.

The City of Brass has the shape of a gigantic city with eight great streets made out of various shades of brass and copper and acted as an economic center between the Djinn pashas of the Invisible World and sorcerers who wanted to gain the Djinn’s aid without needlessly angering them by using the Solomonic Code to force them into servitude. As most djinn are excellent bargainers, liars and are blessed with long memories that reckognize if a mage has been disrespectful to a spirit friend of his, most mages avoided the City of Brass except in times of need. During the Medieval Age, when the Gauntlet was thinner, Shallowings lead into the City from empty places within the Arabian desert, allowing occasional mortals within its realm. Most of these visitors, however, died because of the immense heat within the city or were enslaved by vengeful djinni and sold as servants to mimick the practices of mortal sorcerers. The city is ruled by Caliph al-Dimiryat, who had served Suleiman himself and came to respect the wisdom of the Jewish king. The city has six codified laws that govern the relations between visitors and residents.

In the Modern Nights, the City of Brass lies on the far reaches of the High Umbra, although the mortal activity within the city has diminished, as most djinn retreat completely into the Invisible World and few mages (besides the Taftani, who don’t really count on that matter, given their long history of djinn abuse) remember the right rites to coerce the djinn into service. As such, the city has evolved into a hub for spirits of all kinds, who visit the city to trade favors and exchange rumors. An outpost of Void Engineers has taken up residence within the city, monitoring visiting mages and studying djinn customs, believing them to be an alternate evolution of humanity within the Umbra. Th djinn are not happy about their visitors, but tolerate them as long as they do not disrupt trading.