Lord Eijion has asked King Haecadem about the history and customs of the Varicans and the Werar. As Lord Eijion, the King's guest, has told King Haecadem many curious things about the history and customs of the Manische, King Haecadem felt obliged by the rule of reciprocality to reply. Being a noble king, he sought to make sure that his gift was befitting his superior station, and therefore he comissioned to his scribes the work on this Brief History of the Werar, first written in Varican and then translated to Manische with the help of Thune translators.
It is known that History begins with Haeka, who comes and goes and yet is always with us, whose rotations are like the cycle of seasons and of men's lives and of sovereigns' rules, and whose light creates order from chaos and reveals the truth among lies. Haeka was also the Life-Giver, for it is known that he is the father of Ptolos, Thea and Sara. Ptolos was the mother of the Sargothi, Thea was the mother of the Haecomus and Sara was the mother of the Thune. The Sargothi lived too high, wanted too much and were too proud; the Thune, meanwhile, were too cowardly and lowly; the Sargothi sought to live in palaces in the sky with no restrictions whatsoever - the Thune, meanwhile, confined themselves in anthill cities and burdened themselves with many bad laws. As for the Haecomus, they were inclined towards the golden middle, seeking to live in freedom, but on the ground, and with but a few good laws. Therefore the Sargothi are now as good as gone except on inauspicious nights, whereas the Thune are dying out now from their inhuman wars and poor governance - while the Haecomus are we and we have been gaining in power since the ascension of Hroth I, taking the lands from those dying peoples and fighting the demons that roamed them until now.
Now it is known why the Three Sisters now reside in the world of the dead: for this the all-desiring pleonexy of the debauched Sargothi is to blame. Unsatisfied with the gifts the Three Sisters bestowed upon all their children, the spoiled Sargothi sought to take more and more, and so whenever they saw that Haeka was asleep they drew the power from the unprotected Sisters with the many fiendish things they made for the sake of stealing, and the Thune, being timid by nature, dared not do anything against them, while the Haecomus could not, for they were not numerous and also were like small children, unschooled in ways of war. So instead they cried out and woke up Haeka, but by the time he woke up it was too late - the Sisters were dead and their other children were enslaved by the Sargothi who grew seemingly powerful and employed their horrible demon-hounds the Fulanti to fight for them. Then in his rage the Unsurpassable Warrior went up into the sky and unravelled their power, destroyed their might and scoured them from corner to corner, chased the Sargothi away into the shadowy crags of the world where his gaze could not reach and banished Jagrokan their injust king into the outer darkness, never to return again. And as for the Fulanti, they too were guilty in the eyes of the Most Superior Judge, but he also saw that they were not as guilty as their masters. Therefore, he said: "You have hunted; now you shall be hunted. You shall be expelled into jungles and never be allowed to settle down; you will flee and hide from the remaining children of my daughters, and they will slay you on sight." And the Fulanti screamed in fear and slinked away. And as for the Thune, he said this: "You have been gifted with many wondrous things, with tools and with knowledge by my daughters, and have once been their most beloved creation; but in this moment of my sadness you did not stand up for her, and doomed her by inaction. So in the memory of their love of you I shall allow you to keep all that you have created and all that you rule, for now. But you will never surpass that which you have achieved to this day and your realm, now extensive, will be diminished with time, until you all become the servants of the Haecomus." And the Thune cried, but accepted their fate. Then he turned to the Haecomus and said: "When my daughters were attacked you cried - and did nothing else. When the Sargothi attacked you for crying, you ran - and did nothing else. You have recognised injustice and called it such openly, but did nothing about it. How, then, should I judge you?" The Haecomus replied: "We cried and ran because we could do nothing else; how could we, who are so weak, strive against those who have acquired so much power?" "You have failed," - said then Haeka - "But you could redeem yourselves, and you shall if you wish to survive. For I shall not give you any punishment or reward now, but only this oath for you to adhere to: that you will learn to fight against chaos, and lies, and the darkness, and the beings I have banished there and those among you who strayed from their righteous path, and that to this end you will learn to become warriors and to fight in my name to avenge my daughters." And the Haecomus swore so. And Haeka went to mourn his daughters, and built bright barrows for them in the sky, and since then the peoples of the world under the sky lived under the watchful gaze of Haeka, who chases away the darkness to observe all the noble and ignoble deeds of his grandchildren.
Now life for the Haecomus was difficult in those first centuries, for indeed they had to confront Fulanti beasts, and Sargothi spirits, and traitors, and nature that has gone wild and hostile after the death of the Three Sisters and the reign of the Sargothi. Still, generation after generation they learned to be warriors, and among the foremost warrior tribes in the Homelands were the Wer of the hero Haephric. This Haephric commanded that all the men of his tribe be warriors, and that all the women be mothers of warriors and defenders of the households while the men were away at war - for in Haephric's time there was much war, as Thune, Fulanti and other Haecomus alike threatened the tribes, and many fled to other lands, but the Wer remained, for they were righteously stubborn and fought their enemies wherever they could. Many were the feats of Haephric and his sons, but though they defeated all the foreigners that attacked them then most of them were slain in another, injust war against a fellow tribe of the Homelands. This injust war came about in this way: the king of a small tribe was staying at the household of Haephric with his three sons and his daughter, as well as some retainers. Now it so happened that one of those retainers, Scorli by name, was in love with his king's daughter, but it was arranged between Haephric and the king that the daughter should go to Haephric's youngest and most favourite son, Riberth. Scorli in his bitterness decided to betray his king and made a deal with Sargothi spirits that hid under a nearby mound, putting their poison into the fine foreign mead that was brought by Haephric's guests to be shared with the hero of the Wer. But to Scorli's dismay, Haephric accepted the gift eagerly, for he was fond of mead and held caution out of battle in contempt, and drank fully and drank first, and was followed by his first three sons; and all four promptly dropped dead, their lips blue with poison. Riberth was the fourth son; when he saw his father and brothers die from poison, his mind was overtaken by blind rage at what he thought was betrayal, so he cut the king down where he stood, although he was a guest, and also killed his bride-to-be; the other guests, as confused and enraged as he, managed to fight their way out of the Wer settlement in the confusion, and even though they later discovered what had happened and killed Scorli, too much blood has been spilled by then to make peace. Moreover, as the word of Riberth (who now led the Wer) killing his father's guests spread, all the other tribes of the Homelands, even those once allied with the Wer, recoiled in horror, and made a pact to hunt the Wer down like mad demons. Against all the other Haecomus tribes the Wer strove mightily and bravely, but all in vain, for their cause was injust; and so Riberth was slain and most of his people were slain also, with only a few men escaping into the depths of the jungles and moving to what was then the eastern edge of the Homelands; those men later took brides from a defenseless tribe of easterners that was being attacked by the Fulanti, and the descendants of this coupling would become the Werar.
As for that tribe with which this unfortunate incident occured, it would come to be named for its most famous king, who became more than a king. For even this injust war had the good consequence of putting this lineage in good favour with Haeka and the Haecomus tribes for its worthy conduct, and time after time the tribe gained more cattle and honour from those around it, and its kings would be called to resolve the disputes of their neighborus. Generations passed, and the king of that tribe was a young man named Hroth. At that time the Fulanti again grew impudent due to their numbers, and took to roaming all over the Homelands and attacking even the larger tribes. The Haecomus would fight back, but they were as pebbles amidst a wave; even when they could defend themselves they could not stop the Fulanti from destroying the crops, slaughtering the cattle, eating all who strayed far frm the camps and taking the hunting grounds for their own. Even when some of the tribes tried to chase the Fulanti away, it came to no avail - as any victory could only be temporary. Hroth grew dismayed at this, and so he went to a distant shrine at the confluence of the Two Greatest Rivers and fasted there for three days, stopping in his prayer to Haeka only to fight off the oncoming Fulanti. Upon seeing this dedication, Haeka shined upon him brightly and anointed him with his light as Emperor - he-who-carries-out-the-will-of-Haeka-under-the-sky, and revealed to him what must be done. Hroth went back to his people, who were amazed to see how much more bright he has become and named themselves the Hrothnani from this time on; and the Hrothnani then did thusly: they moved in all their numbers towards the confluence shrine and built a city the likes of which have never been seen before and which shall never be surpassed, as it is the city where Haeka shines most brightly - that was the city of Varica. And when men form the neighbouring tribes came to marvel at this strange and new thing, they were invited to come join the Hrothnani there, and many did, for the city's walls were blessed and the Fulanti could not enter it, so the warriors of Hroth could now sally forth against the demons knowing that their families were safe. From this city Hroth began the great war on Fulanti, and on all other evil and injustice, and as word of his victories spread many great and famous warriors came to join his ranks; but even before the rest of them was a warrior of the Werar named Haepherth.
Now Haepherth was the son of the king of the Werar tribe, which then lived in comparative peace after earlier victories; he grew bored with this peace, however, and so left to seek further adventure, concealing his descent to join Hroth's retinue, where he quickly earned much honour through valour in battle with the Fulanti, whom he abhorred. Now, not all the Hrothnani nobles were happy with the new things Hroth introduced in Haeka's name, and some of them thought in their darkness that in letting warriors of all tribes join his retinue he was planning to overthrow them. When they found out that one of his foremost champions was a descendant of the infamy-sullied Wer, they decided to declare this to the people on the next morning and force Hroth to disband his retinue. But one betrayal breeds another, and a desperate man among their number, one Briulu, who was a powerful and wealthy man, decided that his accomplices were thinking to trick him into challenging the Emperor so that they could decry him, kill him and divide his goods among themselves. So he sent his own household retainers and honourless Thune mercenaries to kill the Emperor during the night. It so happened that Hroth went to pray to Thea for guidance on a matter of court, and was accompanied only by Haepherth, who was to make sure that the Emperor was not interrupted during his prayer. So the assassins came at Hroth at the shrine, but Haepherth hid within the temple as in a jungle, tracked the assailers as he had tracked dangerous prey and killed them all before they could land a blow. And when Hroth was finished with his prayer, he told Haepherth, who was panting after the difficult fight: "I was told that tommorow morning the lords of Varica will come to me and tell me that you are a descendant of the Wer, whom my lineage has always abhorred for their crimes, and that they would tell me to disband the retinue; I bear you no ill will, for I have been enlightened by Haeka and know that we all have a common goal, but lest I spite tradition I shall have to do as they say, and then I will be Emperor no more, for if I do not look beyond the Hrothnani and do not command men of the many Haecomus tribes, then how am I different from a king? And then perhaps the Hrothnani will continue to live well, but this city will crumble, and the rest of the Homelands will never be conquered for the Haecomus." Hearing this, Haepherth dropped to his knees and said: "It is true that I am of the Werar, but I wish for your cause to succeed, for it is a just and noble one and blessed by Haeka. Therefore, for the sake of our victory, I ask you, o Emperor, to behead me here and there for my descent, so that the lords will have nothing to attack you with." At this Hroth smiled and said: "If this is what you say, then you are of more use to Haeka's cause alive than dead", and went back to his palace.
Early in the morning the lords of Varica came to hold council with the Emperor and stated their grievance. To this Hroth replied: "Last night a terrible injustice has occured, for Hrothnani men, my own kin, attacked me in the darkness alongside Thune foreigners, and tried to kill me while I prayed to the Mother. Who is responsible for this?" None replied; but through the window of the palace a beam of sunlight fell upon Briulu, whose treachery exceeded that of the others. "This man," - proclaimed Hroth in outrage - "has sought to kill me while I prayed - and he would have succeeded, if not for the one whom you now accuse! So what if he descends from the once-treacherous Wer, if pure-blooded Hrothnani betray and fight against me now, while a Werar man remains loyal and fights for me and for the cause for which I have built the city we are now in? This cause I speak of is the cause of justice, for which only noble men may fight; and this Werar man is as surely noble as Briulu the noble is surely ignoble, and shall be killed, and have his possessions divided up among his fellows, for he shall serve this cause better dead than alive." To this the nobles could say nothing, for they did covet Briulu's wealth; so they agreed and all happened as Hroth said, and Haepherth became his chief champion.
As Hroth won victory after victory, the Fulanti fled farther and farther into the jungles; then one day Hroth decreed that it is no longer enough to chase the enemy into the dark nethers of the world, for the redemption of the Haecomus who had failed to protect the Three Sisters was in chasing the enemy into the dim lands and destroying him in every turn. Therefore the tribes under his command groupped together to do what they could not do alone and without an Emperor's order, and cleared the jungles, and established new towns, settlements and forts from where to strike further still at the Fulanti, and so had tamed nature, brought light into darkness and greatly reduced the menace of the Fulanti, pleasing Haeka greatly. So when a host of Fulanti gathered in great numbers to try and destroy the army headed by Hroth himself and slay the great Lightbringer in the dimmer woodlands of the east, Haeka sent down his ravens to turn into warriors, who turned back the Fulanti tide. From that day on those raven-men were known as Hrafn, and their kin were considered holy birds of Haeka in the eastern lands.
The Werar, too, came to serve Hroth in those years, as Haepherth became their king; it was not in happy circumstances that he took up bronze sword of Haephric, however, as the Fulanti, driven from other lands, overran the Werar stronghold and sent them into wandering again, following Hroth's armies as they campaigned in the east. When finally the last great Fulanti host there was scattered, Hroth called aside Haepherth and said: "You have fought bravely for me in three hundred battles for thirty years, and have known great joy in our victories while being unshaken by the defeats. But now at last this war against the Fulanti has grown old, and so have you. There will be other wars later, but those shall be left to later generations; now it is the time for peace, for the Haecomus to spread in the lands we have conquered from darkness and monsters. Therefore I shall allow you to retire, for even the life of a warrior must one day end, and it will be better this way; but as you retire, you may ask me for a boon, for I have now come to be the most powerful ruler under the sky." And to this Haepherth replied: "I would like to keep fighting to the end of my days if I could, but I know that every man grows old and perhaps it is time for me to retire. But I shall still serve you, my Emperor, though in a differen way; for what is the calling of the old if not to raise and instruct younger warriors? Therefore I shall ask you to grant me a land, where I shall settle with my people and rear them for the next war." And this was granted.
The land Haepherth picked was fertile and also well-defended, but nevertheless other tribes avoided it, for there was a large Sargothi mound there. Haepherth and the Werar were all too happy to settle right at that mound, however, for they were warriors first and foremost, and therefore valued arms and armour more than anything else, which caused them to eagerly seek out Sargothi metals, which, although tainted by evil, could nevertheless be purified in a furnance by a Werar blacksmith true to his family's lore. The native tribes that lived around this region earlier distrusted the Werar, however, and claimed that they were as good as Sargothi for fighting with their weapons and living at their home; upon learning of this, Haepherth gathered his warriors and went between the camps of all the eleven nearby tribes that spread those rumours; at each camp the Werar gathered in plain sight and challenged the defenders, mocking them until they came out to fight and were promptly defeated, after which they were forced to become Werar vassals; and so he did at the home of every tribe, fighting at the front desptie his old age. The warriors of the eleventh tribe were desperate, and wished to avoid a battle; when eventually the nagging of their women forced them to come out and fight, they still could not bring themselves to do it honestly, and so they used poison-tipped spears and arrows. They were defeated like the rest, but not before wounding Haepherth; and so upon returning to the capital of his kingship, which he called Werhold, he promptly died.
From Haepherth the kingship passed to Beherath, and from Beherath to Cuphric, and from Cuphric to Haecadem, and from Haecadem to Haecadem, who rules to this day.
During the kingship of Beherath the Werar mourned the death of Hroth and attended the acclamation of his son. At the time there were some among the tribes who thought that Hroth's empire will not outlive its first ruler, and also some who thought that its demise should be hastened whether or not it was inevitable. The Werar, however, stood firm with Emperor Hroth II and his allies, and helped him defeat those who conspired against the empire. While the conspirators among the Hrothnani themselves were punished direly for their double infraction against their king and Emperor, the rebel tribes of the west were mercifully spared from any fatal punishments at the time, and granted a second chance they later used to doom themselves. The Emperor's reign was secure, however; at this time, cities, including Werhold, grew throughout the empire, but none surpassed Varica, to the superior greatness of which Haeka himself was commited and which he ensured by making it the center of commerce and learning, as the Emperor's scribes devised a holy script with which to fortify and make permanent all that is good and truthful. Many roads were built during this time; all the roads led to Varica, and the beneficient effects of the Emperor's justice spread outwards to the edges of the empire. The Werar, aside from the wars of this time, have also partaken in this beneficient age, as Werhold became one of the empire's greatest cities and as scribes, merchants and craftsmen first gathered at Beherath's court. Nevertheless Beherath was also a warleader, who firmly established his dominance over the vassal tribes and introduced good laws to make sure that the Werar do not grow soft in the time of prosperity. He died peacefully at a ripe old age, having been fighting alongside his father since he was king.
During the kingship of Cuphric, the traitor-kings moved once again against the dying Hroth II, making an alliance with some of the south-eastern Thune and even the resurgent Fulanti, and in addition to this treacherous former vassals; and this time it was a bigger war like that in the days of Hroth I. Nevertheless Haeka's favour and the loyalty of noble warriors had carried Varica through this test as well. Cuphric had dedicated himself wholly to war; whenever he was not campaigning against the Emperor's enemies in all directions, he was seeking new ways to make the Werar into even better warriors, and taught them to fight with both bravery and discipline and to conduct themselves with both honour and wisdom, and in this wise scored so many victories as to go even further to the east and the south than the First Emperor's armies ever did, washing his bloodied sword in the southern sea as some say. It was with Cuphric also that the Werar first began to go further and deeper into Sargotbak, for to them there was no darkness great enough to be feared and to keep them from spreading Haeka's light, and also because the Werar had greatly multiplied by this time, and needed more and better weapons.
The third and most difficult test came during the kingship of Haecadem I, for it truly was a dark new time, when many good new things introduced by Hroth had turned to evil: scribes learned deceit, kings became treacherous and merchants became greedy. Above all, evil has taken route at the city of Varica itself, as after the death of first Emperor Hroth III and then his Empress Hrothiya chaos ruled there even more than elsewhere, and dreadful crimes were overlooked by unworthy pretenders to the throne, who could not in the end overcome their unworthiness no matter their tricks; but the fall of one viceful claimant only led to the rise of another. This dreadful confusion spread across the land, and for a time it seemed to some that Haeka had turned away from the Haecomus, as the minds of even the nobler kings and peoples became muddled, and old friends and blood-brothers saw each other on the opposite sides of the battlefield. How much worse, then, was the conduct of the lesser tribes, that had taken to changing loyalties every month! Even Haecadem of the Werar had succumbed to this madness, and was punished by Haeka for what he has done then, as several of his vassals were taken away from him by the end of the Twenty Years of Chaos. Nevertheless, the night never lasts forever; and eventually the people of Varica acclaimed a noble warrior who had once fought with success against the traitor-kings of the west to become the one true Hroth IV. At first the other kings, consumed by blood-lust, could not recognise him as the Emperor, though he was chosen by Haeka as well as by the people; and Haecadem himself did not trust Hroth IV early on. But after the Werar marched upon Varica and Haecadem met with Hroth IV personally, he realised the extent of his crimes done and planned, and repented and surrendered to the Emperor, who, however, was understanding and merciful, and permitted Haecadem to return to his land and help restore order.
Though much damage was done prior to this conciliation, a new morning had come to Varica, and this was proved by the next generation, for even as Haecadem I died his son, Haecadem II, peacefully succeeded to the throne, and a dark conspiracy against him was successfully thwarted by his advisor, Haeroph the Thane. Haeroph also led the Werar warriors to fight alongside the other eastern kings, with whom the Werar became close allies; in the wars against the uppity Fulanti, the rebellious tribes that refused to acknowledge the Emperor and those conspirators in Varica itself who had thought to start the Twenty Years of Chaos anew, this alliance proved victorious, and the peace of Varica was trully and properly restored. As Haecadem II came into his own, the boundaries of the empire were once more solidified, the scribes returned to righteousness, the merchants made both safe and honest and the warriors endowed with many acquisitions and much honour from their victories. And it is as true as that morning comes after the night that after this dawn the empire and those loyal to it will grow even stronger as time goes on, while the forces of darkness will be forced to scatter and flee further as the rays of Varica move further outwards. The scribes of today have set it in stone that the golden age of Varica is both behind us and ahead of us, and it is well known that the Werar and their allies will have much to do with the Emperor's newest triumphs.