Kenku

(KEHN-koo)

Kenku, the birdfolk of Taelgar, favor high places and steady winds. Clifftop towns perch above sheltered harbors in the Eastern Green Sea, while bands in the far north fly the summer thermals where the Sentinels meet the plains. Kenku are enigmatic and rare outside their homelands; most common folk know them from garbled stories and rumors of the Great War.

Appearance

Kenku are humanoid birds. Northern kenku tend to resemble ravens, hawks, owls, or eagles, with plumage, eyes, and beaks matching their avian kin; islanders are more diverse, with individuals resembling gulls, terns, and songbirds as well. All kenku are feathered, with feathered wings that sprout from their back and support true flight.

Language and Naming

Kenku speak their own tongue and trade broadly in Common across the Green Sea.

Lifecycle

Kenku mature and age at roughly the same rate as humans. Clutch size, nesting seasonality, and elder care traditions are locally variable.

Settlements and Homelands

Many kenku settled in the northern plains after the Great War, east of the Sentinels and north of Vostok. These northern settlements are rarely visited by outsiders, and the exact extent of kenku communities in the north is a subject of much rumor and mystery.

Small communities live in isolation or among other species in a broad area across the northern half of the Green Sea, with particularly notable populations in Tollen and the Sembaran highlands. Rumors also speak of large populations of islander kenku, living in the Eastern Green Sea.

Kenku are exceptionally rare west of the Sentinel Range and south of the Green Sea.

Historical Perspective

Though kenku rarely speak of their history, rumors from the Great War record that kenku were subjugated by Cha’mutte, living in squalor in Pandar and forced to work to support Cha’mutte’s war effort. Kenku warriors were among the fiercest opponents of Cha’mutte in the Great War and many died in the fighting. After the Great War, many kenku retreated from settled lands to make their own way in the north.

Rumors claim that the islander kenku, living in the far eastern Green Sea, were never under Cha’mutte’s thumb, and may preserve a memory of the pre-War history of the species. But if they do, they do not speak of it.