Battania

From time immemorial there has been a High King of Battania, crowned with great ceremony on the sacred hill of Dunthanach. Ask any Battanian chieftain, however, whose ”kingdom” he lives in, and he will look around at his hall and his fields and his pastures, his flocks and his retainers, and answer ”Mine, of course.” Only lately, following the example of the Empire, have the High Kings made any effort to exert their authority. ”Such unruly cattle as my people require a strong herdsman's hand to steer them from the ravine and protect them from the wolf,” said one recent high king, just before he was betrayed by a jealous cousin and taken in chains to the nearest imperial outpost.