Freeholders.
Heretics.
The two words meant very different things, but for the past hundred years or more, they'd become inexorably intertwined.
The First Crusade had forged the Kingdom of Gaal in Holy Fire and quenched it in the blood of the slain, human and Eldritch alike. Before that, settlers from across the sea had made their own decisions about coexisting with the native Eldritch nations or fighting them for supremacy. Under the banner of Gaal, however, collaboration with 'demons' was seen as high heresy.
Still, at the end of the First Crusade, many people who rejected the kingdom's rule had moved west, establishing new villages and towns beyond the king's grasp. Those people called their villages 'Freeholds,' embracing the wilderness of the frontier to make their own way.
