In the time just after the Reborn Earth, the Creator and the Mother had given their lives to preserve Creation, and the remaining Gods went to war to see who would rule among them. They each absorbed some of the remains of the Divine Pairing to empower themselves for the battles ahead. All but for one.

She was Jinn, and created to be the the weakest of the Gods, even before the First Renovation, and she claimed no part of her fallen parents. While lowly among the Gods, the Divine Pair graced her with affinity in the twin domains of Knowledge and Magic. Further, they made her to be the Servant of the Gods, and so gave her a caring demeanor. Jinn served this role with pleasure until the time of the Reborn Earth.

But she spent her days during the War in Heaven not in the Celestial Sphere, but on the Earth and among the mortals. Graced with great powers, great knowledge, and great compassion, she did what she could to shelter and defend the mortals as the Gods went to war to realign their shattered pantheon.

Jinn did not seek, ask, or demand the worship her status could afford. Instead, she granted a measure of her power to the most wise, the most compassionate, or the most worthy of the village. By accepting this power, this individual became her child; a wishgranter. She called them Genies. In these days, the Genies lived unbound, but could only grant wishes that Jinn herself would grant, and only ever to mortals. Never to Gods, nor themselves. Because she selected every Genie, she assured their worthiness, and none used their powers for cruelty.

As the Wars of the Gods came to a close, and the Twelve came to power, they began to turn their eyes back to the Earth and the mortals whom they should have been shepherding. The work of Jinn and her Genies astonished them They thought that with wishes and magic, man might soon have no need of the Gods. This, they could not abide.

They summoned Jinn to the new Archopolis and demanded she curtail the power of her Genies. She, the weakest of the Gods, merely asked if any of her children had done wrong. Had any broken the laws of the Gods, or of the mortals they served, or caused harm to man or Earth? Of course she knew that none had, and so the Gods could not punish Jinn, but bade her make no more Genies, to which she agreed.

She returned to the Earth and told her servants the news. But she foretold that the Gods would come for them all, and should any Genie not wish the fate set for them, they could give up their power and return to mortal life. None accepted. All continued to serve their Lady.

Back in the Archopolis, as Jinn predicted, jealous Gods began to plot. How could the weakest of the Gods so defy them and come away unpunished? But while the Gods disapproved her actions, many had an affection for their long time servant.

Ifrit, they say, hatched the plan. He cared not for Jinn, and only for his own glory. He would curtail the Genies and their Beloved. He traveled to the Earth in disguise and worked to trick a Genie into destroying an innocent village. But the Genie, the first of the Three, saw through the lie, and threw Ifrit out. He tried again, urging a second Genie to build a temple and proclaim herself a Goddess. She, the second of the Three, refused. Ifrit then went to the youngest of the Genies, and tried to convince him to abandon the obligations of the Genies and grant no more wishes. This, too, failed, and Ifrit returned to the Archopolis with nothing to show for it.

There, he watched Jinn, and discovered that she had fallen in love. Not with a God, nor one of her precious Genies, but a mortal man. He lived a good and kind life, with piety for the Gods and love for his Lady. But Ifrit saw, deep down, a splinter of wickedness in the man.

Ifrit went to the lover and pulled on this wickedness to draw it forth. For while the man meant well, her harbored envy for Jinn’s power. Ifrit shared with the lover a plan that would make the man far more than he ever dreamed. To make him worthy of his lady. And with that done, Ifrit went to Jinn.

To her, Ifrit made a challenge. He proclaimed that all mortals, from birth to death, are wicked in some fashion, and when given power, will abuse it. Not so, said Jinn. She thought some mortals could attain the grace of the Gods and be just in the face of great power. Ifrit asked for proof, and Jinn told him that not one mortal had asked for a wicked wish from her Genies.

Here came the trap. Ifrit pointed out that all Genies must only grant the wishes Jinn herself would. Mortals knew of this, he said, and could not to wish for the things they truly desired. That, if given the chance to have anything they wanted, mortals would be driven into the hands of tyranny.

If, Ifrit challenged, Jinn could find one mortal who could resist their inner wickedness, he would convince the Gods to allow her to create more Genies. But, Ifrit reasoned, if the Genie granted a wicked wish, the Gods would be forced to obliterate them. Ifrit knew this a lie, but a clever one, because he knew Jinn would not risk this happening to one of her children.

Jinn accepted the challenge, and accepted to be bound to a Mortal master of her choosing. She agreed to grant this Master whatever three wishes he demanded of her. Ifrit agreed. Jinn chose her lover to be her Master, just as Ifrit knew she would.

Her Master first wished for a fertile river to flow among a desert and support a great civilization for generations, and Jinn granted this with ease and comfort in her heart. For the second, Jinn’s Master wished for a golden bottle fit for the tables of the Gods, and this Jinn granted, but with some worry. And then came the third wish, the wish Ifrit had worked out with the lover. The one to rid the Gods of Jinn and her Genies once and for all.

Jinn’s Master used his last wish to replace her as a God. She had no choice but to give him all her power, her divinity, and her mastery over her Genies. That is how Marid came to be a God, and how Jinn came to be a mortal.

Yet he continued to love his lady, and he asked for her hand in marriage. He proclaimed that if she accepted the proposal, he would make her immortal again and return her beloved Genies to her. But she would live in the Archopolis and accept Marid as her Master for all time.

Though lowly and mortal, Jinn refused. Now a God, anger consumed Marid. The splinter of wickedness in him grew to be a stake. Marid proclaimed all Genies to be servants ever more. He bound them to obey all the commands of mortals, and grant whatever wish mortals asked of them.

He knew this would sow chaos, and so bound every Genie to a Vessel. A nearby ring, an old oil lamp, a golden amulet, a glass bottle, and many, many more became prisons to Genies around the world. They found themselves enslaved and bound to new laws. They all feared what had happened to their Beloved.

Now that he bound the Genies to their prisons, Marid made Jinn into a Genie to share their fate. He cast her into the golden bottle made for her second wish. Now, Jinn would be his servant, and she could not disobey him. Then, something strange happened. The Golden Vessel disappeared, and no one, not Marid, nor Ifrit, knew where it had gone. They simply knew it did not exist in Heaven, or in Hell, or on the Earth.

Furious, Marid began to question the Genies. And while their power now came from him, he could not command them, for every Genie had more love of Jinn than fear of Marid. He proclaimed that from here on, all Genies made would remain bound until one of them returned Jinn to him. The Genie who did this would become the Lord among the Genies.

The Gods watched all of this, and while they approved of the binding of the Genies, they knew that a rogue God on Earth would be disastrous. So they ordered Marid to return to the Archopolis. While wary of the new God, the old would accept him him so long as he made no move against them.

Ifrit reminded the Gods on High that the Genies themselves formed a potent army. The Gods agreed, and they ordered Marid to give up control of the Genies. If he did this, he would be welcomed in the arms of the Gods. If he did not, he would be obliterated, his carcass and his powers divided up amongst the others.

Marid agreed, and relinquished the power of the Genies. They Gods on High had intended to set the Genie’s power in the Archopolis, and for the children of Jinn to become the servants of the Gods. But when Marid severed his connection the Genies, their vessels began to draw their  power from the Earth itself. And when the Gods attempted to remove the vessels to the Archopolis, they would not budge.

Still, the Gods needed to know the location of Jinn. Marid released the Three from their vessels and invited them to the Archopolis for a time. Here, the Three plead their case to the Gods on High. They had broken no laws, their Queen had been tricked, and they had been bound. The Three proclaimed they would not reveal the location of Jinn, that no Genie would, until the Gods on High restored her to her rightful place. This demand, the Gods on High could not accept.

Ifrit, caring nor for the protestations of Marid, offered to release all the Genies from their vessels in return for the location of Jinn. This, the King of the Gods proclaimed a fair trade. Yet the Three refused, and Marid sent them back to their vessels. Then he scattered their prisons across the world. Mankind came to know of Genies only as a wondrous myth and no longer thought to pray to them instead of the Gods.

Since this time, Marid has proclaimed himself the Lord of the Genies and Master of Jinn, though he has neither. He has never forgiven Ifrit for the part he played in this misery. Ifrit cares not for the lesser God, and has taken up his place among the Twelve. To this day, he seeks to punish every insolent Genie who thinks to defy any God.

Meanwhile, hidden from all other realms, Jinn lives in her bottle. Around her, a city has grown. A city that has made connections to each and every Genie vessel. She remains their Lady, their Beloved. She remains the Goddess of Genies.