Hermdar

The Hermdar are the tyrant-slayers of the lodges, a fyrd that takes rare and particular joy in contracts ending with a despot dead and his slaves unchained. They are Fyreslayers still (gold is sworn, oaths kept, the ledger honoured), but the Hermdar have contrived a theology in which the mercenary trade and a genuine hatred of oppression point, more often than not, the same way.

Their Zharrgrim preach that Grimnir's rage burns hottest against the tyrant and the slaver; that a war-god who broke his own chains despises nothing so much as a chain worn by another. So the lodge will sometimes fight for a pittance, provided the target deserves the axe, while a wealthy tyrant seeking the same warriors is turned away however heavy his purse. The ur-gold must still be gathered, but a debt to Grimnir may be paid in more than one currency.

When they take the field the Hermdar fight with the added fury of the righteous, and their war-cries name the freed as often as the god. Broken manacles hang as trophies from their standards, and liberated thralls have trailed a departing fyrd for miles. Cynics among other lodges call it sentiment dressed as strategy; the Hermdar answer that a god of shattered chains would know his own children anywhere.