The Power of One
Part 2 - "Transire Benefaciendo"

Chapter 2 - Traversée


Cestié is quiet and thoughtful for most of the flight north, away from the fringe of the swamp and toward Nuvolone Pass. He has a lot to think about - when you set our from Bella Collina, he was leaving a lot less behind than he is now. But ultimately he is undeterred; and as you camp in a field on the outskirts of the town or Ravola, Signore Cestié is happy to continue his history lessons.

"These northern principalities - Miragliano, and Trantio particularly - have a more varied history than old Verezzo. In the ancient times, one of the early Emperors of Sigmar's realm ruled much of the north. That must have been more than two thousand years ago - but between that and old habits and the Empire more recently becoming more prominent in the world, there are many Miraglianans who use the Imperial Calender, instead of the Verenan one. Some call Karnas and Ishea 'Taal and Rhya', as they do in the northern realms. But this town, Ravola, is famous because this is where Tilea turned back the Bretonnian interests a thousand years ago. As the tale goes, the Bretonnian barons from the north were starting ti impinge through the pass and press their interests into Miragliano, assuming authority and demanding taxation from the northern towns. For many years there were skirmishes and conflicts - not to say outright war, not like Tileans have with each other. The Bretonnians never marked an army through the mountains - they just rode around expecting capitulation. In fact, that's much of the insult!"

"At a great banquet held by the Prince of Miragliano, hoping to find terms of peace, an oafish Bretonnian, the Baron du Bors, loudly claimed that Bretonnians were better knights and that the prince ought to save the hassle and hand the city over to them! Well, as you can imagine, the mercenary knights thought very little of this. Bretonnians have always had pretentions about the lack of virtue in mercenary work, and a brave warrior, Etto the Fierce, issued a challenge - a joust! And how could the horsemen of the north refuse such a wager? The Tournament of Ravola took place soon after, right over there..."

He points across the field, past the wall of the town, to a conspicuously grand silhouette of a hippodrome against the starlit sky.

"...and the outcome has been etched in Tilean legend ever since. Etto was the master of a mercenary knight company, the Venators. They were not as well born as the Baron's men, but they were all veterans of many campaigns; while the Bretonnians were young men surging about in a foreign land looking for adventure and exploits. Experience proved the master of chivalry, and the Baron and his knights were roundly beaten in the tournement - subsequently withdrawing in shame, and never again have the Bretonnians pressed their interest beyond the mountains. Of course, the plagues and orcs and such afflicting them in the north might well have played into the dampening of those interests - but as far as Miragliano is concerned, the Venators gave them such a slap they never came back for more."

It's coming into winter, but it's an unusually warm night which evens out into a very pleasant evening, for your last under a Tilean sky for a long time. Graciously, you are not troubled through the night; and the next morning you are flying again toward the Iranna range. From the air, you can see the peaks rising up like crenulations for the Tilean realms; spreading west to border the Blighted marshes, and beyond that swinging south to become the Abasko range on the other side of the sea, where the city state of Tobaro shares its peninsula with the rapacious and lusty Estalians beyond. West, the mountains extend and ramp up into the high peaks and deep vallies known as the Vaults, the old battered dwarven realm; and then turning south to become the Apuccini mountains where Myrmidia is said to have explored and discovered the old elven medical texts that form the basis of modern human medicine, and near to where you blinked into sunlight for the first time in ten years.

You might not have known where this pass was, except for the crescent shaped encampment of mercenary regiments bracing its exit. Through Cestié's spyglass, you can see the soldiers there - perhaps a thousand or so, at a guess - are in a state of attentive idleness. It must have been some time since the orcs have pushed down and made a concerted effort to break through, but old scars in the landscape and dead patches of grass where pyres have long gone suggest it wasn't that long ago.

"We'll put down here, first!" the Signore calls back to you, as he starts tilting the flying machine into a descent; "It wouldn't do to confuse that many crossbowmen - I'd like them to recognize us on the way back!"

As you descend, it's Bella who notices you are not alone in the sky.

"Taalia, look! Look, up there!"

As you are descending to land inoffensively behind the mercenaries' line, another flyer is rising up on the other side and taking to the skies above the pass. It's a great chestnut coloured horse with grand eagle's wings sprouting from its forequarters, whose great beating effort carries steed and rider with practised ease. The knight astride the pegasus is wearing exactly the panoply you would expect of such a sight - chainmail head to toe with sabatons and gauntlets and helm, and both steed and rider draped in black and gold cloth that seems to be heraldic in nature.

"Oh, Taalia - have you ever seen such a thing? What is it?" Bella exclaims, straining against the bindings of her passenger pod in goggle-eyed wonder. Signore Cestié, who is presently concentrating on a landing, defers the question to you rather than looking around.

"Is it a problem?" the old gent asks, as he switches over the gears from the operation of the wings to the wheels.