House Filim (Flying Horse)

The original house famously refused to surrender a crescent-moon magic stone to Crissen IV and was hounded by the empire. The modern revival under Charlwood relies on bought titles, mercenary contracts, and bulk armour purchases from House Norton.

The original House Filim won fame in the Half-Moon War about a century ago. It refused to surrender a crescent-moon magic stone (a moonstone) to the imperial house, and the enraged Crissen IV sent troops to seize it. The Filims, together with seven other nobles, resisted in self-defence. Even after their defeat Crissen IV did not brand them traitors: in the eyes of all the nobility it was not treason but an emperor abusing his power to crush a few hapless houses.

For that reason, when the descendant Baron Charlwood raised the flying-horse banner and proclaimed the family's restoration, it drew not condemnation but considerable praise — the Flying Horse banner remained a symbol of those who would not bow to tyranny.

The restored house is embodied solely by Baron Filim Charlwood — a direct descendant of the line and a Gold-rank knight. He looks utterly harmless, yet Lorist at once senses a deep cruelty and ferocity in him.

Under the Flying Horse banner Charlwood recruits some fifty wandering knights. His men die shielding the baron during an assassination attempt, and he himself remains a key figure of the western Northern Lands right up to the partition of the grand-ducal lands between him and Baron Shahin.

The modern revival rests on a baronetcy with a Northern Lands domain bought from the Second Prince, on mercenary contracts, and on bulk purchases of equipment from House Norton — notably a request to buy five thousand sets of iron armour.

Its military backbone is the wandering knights it recruits. After the Second Prince's defeat Lorist splits the southern grand-ducal lands in half between Baron Filim and Baron Shahin, markedly enlarging the Flying Horse holdings in the west.

House Filim appears as yet another new noble house of the Northern Lands, rising at the Kemmes and Norton tournaments. Baron Charlwood manoeuvres between the Second Prince and the northern houses, sends envoys to the Nortons for armour, and survives an assassination attempt that costs several of his bodyguards their lives.

In the Second Prince crisis Charlwood is sent ahead of the main army into the Northern Lands. After the prince's collapse the Flying Horse joins the four-family alliance alongside the Nortons, the Kemmes, and Baron Shahin, entrenching itself as one of the pillars of the region's new order.