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Xerames was the name of a small, isolated town in the north of Sivarn. As the tale goes, one dark winter night, in the middle of a fierce snowstorm, three travellers arrived at the city gates. Almost delusional from exposure, the villagers took them in, put them up in the town inn, fed them and warmed them. In a few days the travellers recovered, to the town's misfortune. The three were hunted outlaws, cruel magi who had used their spells to sieze power and wealth. When their acts were discovered they fled ahead of the contingent of soldiers sent to bring them to justice. They had evaded capture by fleeing into the fierce snowstorms that had wracked the country, finding their way to Xerames. When their strength recoverd they repaid the town's kindness with malice, unleashing their magic without restraint on the defenseless townsfolk. When the soldiers arrived a week later they found a ruined husk of a town, corpses left to freeze in the snow. The sorcerers had laid waste to everything that they could not take with them.
The commander of the troops, a man named Grevan Hastrin, sickened by the sheer callous destruction of the mages actions, would later form the Order of Xerames, named in honour of the slaughtered people of that town, with the goal of countering the wild, destructive excesses of magic. They trained in ways to counter magic, seeking always to root out whatever acts they considered "abuse" of this talent. If they can, they will attempt to "gentle" a wild mage, a process which involves using an artifact know as a Varanian Seal on the magi; the artifact forcibly and permanently sears shut the doors of the arcane within the mind, binding a mages magic and forcing their perceptions to witness only physical reality. The process is a reviled one amoungst the magical community, even non-mages find it distasteful as it often causes damage to the mind of the victim. The Order is believed to possess only 3 of these Seals, keeping them under careful guard in their strongholds.
Since the Order's inception it has expanded throughout the Westlands, supported by contributions from governments looking for aid in dealing with troublesome mages and nobles with a grudge against those who use magic. The Order has a reputation for zealousness and has clashed with a number of groups, even governments. Athar tolerates the Order as long as they show restraint and respect Atharan law. The Order is outlawed in Koeth, members found within its borders are hunted down by the Grey Brotherhood who see them more as intruding in the Brotherhood's authority than as a serious threat. In Mirtar the Order has recently begun to gain a strong foothold. During the war Lethan made use of a number of mercenary Sidhari sorcerors, their unrestrained combat magics wrought much destruction and misery; the weary Mirtarans have as a consequence greeted the Order's preaching and military aid favourably, especially in the eastern parts of Mirtar where rogue sorcerors still prowl. The Illin Pyrar and the Order share a barely controlled hostility for one another, the Illin seeing too much of the old Talurian Magehunters in the Order's philosopies, the Order believing that the Illin actively seeks to thwart it's attempts to bring rogue mages to justice. Somewhat ironically, the Order is currently extremely unpopular in it's nation of origin, Sivarn. The newest King of Sivarn is himself a mage and seeks to dislodge the strong grip the Order has in his homeland. He has confiscated their lands and assets, outlawed their activities and forbidden their meetings. In response the Order has moved it's main chapter house into Athar but views the situation as intolerable, the King as a practicioner of the darkest arts, a viper who must be cleansed from their home in order to save it from his corruption. The Sivarn' King has made it clear to the Atharan Court that he doesn't view their tolerance of the Order's activity within its border favourably, but the war and its aftermath has given the Atharan's more significant problems to worry about.
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