Walter Storm

Gemaerka Walter Storm

Foundation had successfully hidden and protected their language and customs for nearly 1200 years. Customs and Language given them by their founders Theodonis and kaThea. Theodonis and kaThea were refugees, the last of their kind. They impressed on the people who sheltered them the need to hide their culture. The outside world would destroy it if they found out. They developed the means to avoid notice, appearing to match the culture around them without changing. The result was to become very insular and inbred. Only rarely taking in someone from the outside. All this was simply a backdrop to Willem. For him, the immediate concern was being declared gemaerka, genetically defective, by the church council. It would ban his ever being part of the people he was raised with. The declaration would make him less than human. However, Willem was not less than human, just very different. Theodonis and kaThea had one last gift to the people who had accepted them.