In the beginning...


Laws to suppress tend to strengthen what they would prohibit.
Ze`er saying


The first written testimony about House De la Rey is also what some might call a "birth certificate". It is said that back in the ages when time was not measured in years but in seasons, in the lands of the Kara Khitai, there was one warrior from a minor noble`s court who was outcast by his family because of a degrading relationship with a peasant girl. Having to choose between keeping his place in his family or either disposing by steel of his beloved or leaving with her, he chose the last action as being in accordance to his feelings.

Ruyter de Veer - that was the knights` name - left with his pregnant woman and few of his men across the mountains, into the Ze`er desert, the lands to the east of his country. He did now know what he would find there, for many of those who crossed the mountains never returned, and those who did, either returned with ill minds, either dissapeared shortly after coming home, together with their families. Now it is a known fact that those who left to never return preferred to stay in Ze`erland and start a new life there, than return to their ancestors lands and be treated like cattle and sometimes even worse.They were colonists, in a land to be tamed.

Ruyter had no idea on what he would find at the end of the road. His journey started at the beginning of the snowy season, and the way across the mountains was hard and dangerous. It is said that being lost in the white hell of the mountains, a swan showed him the way across, to safety. On the other side, our hero found paradise. Or so he thought: after the blizzards and frost of the mountains, the heat and adversity of the desert seemed to be heaven. The exiles established a camp close to an oasis, and named the place Ala Ma'umma - Nourishing Mother
. In a couple of months Ruyter was the proud father of a little boy he named Blassa. The country that laid before his eyes wasn`t welcoming anyone, as sand was everywhere; a land untamed and scarce. But was his land.

In the next years, Ruyter sent patrols to explore the Ze`er. Many of his scouts never returned to the camp at Ma`umma, but those who did brought amazing stories about settlements in the desert. The scouts spoke of hundreds, thousands of men, most of them from back home, outcast or refugees, fleeing from prosecution just like de Veer. His wife was one of them, a peasant, and many recalled her parents. A leader who has a peasant as wife cannot look away from his people, and as time passed, the camp grew in numbers, in infrastructure, and soon Ruyter de Veer was acknowledged lord of many a hundred settlements just like his own. Honouring the almost divine intervention that brought him and his party across the mountains safely, Ruyter added the swan to his coat-of-arms.

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