Pokémon: Delphox
Battle Bond Name: Cassandra-Delphox
Base Stats: 75/69/100 (+28)/160 (+46)/100/140 (+36)
Typing: Fire/Psychic
Move Buffed: Mystical Fire
BP: 95 | Accuracy: 100% | Primary Effect: Deals double damage in Hail | Secondary Effect: Raises the user's Special Defence by 1 combat stage | Priority: 0
Activation: Delphox uses Mystical Fire in Hail
Battle Bond Origin: Cassandra de Bourbonnais, as with her "best friend" and court favourite La Chevaline de Fer (about whose life more later), was the queen of Kalos for twenty-four years several centuries ago. A practitioner of many powerful psychic arts, it was her use of the connections between people and Pokémon, especially what we now know as Psychic-types, that cemented her reputation as the Raven Queen of Old Kalos; her sentinels were the haunted trees and standing stones, her spies the birds of the air, and her sword was the grand array of Delphox that formed the unofficial symbol of her rule throughout the region. Led by her own Delphox, Jeanne, this royal guard of Pokémon was a powerful instrument upon the battlefield, especially when supported by other Pokémon unique to Kalos, such as Greninja and Mme. de Fer's contingent of Chesnaught.
While this brought great success in the expansion of Old Kalos through its wars with more northerly regions, the noble houses of the region felt sidelined and denied their privilege by the dynamic but insular (and largely female) court of the young queen. Especially galling to them was the fact that she refused to marry, ostensibly on the grounds that when her kingdom had been safe for thirty years, she would seek the arms of a gentleman; in practice, there is much to suggest that the arms of gentlemen held the same appeal to her as a tie-dyed Hawaiian shirt worn with beige cargo shorts, knee socks and sandals does to M. Lysandre and his associates. After two dozen years of checks and balances being placed on their power, the noble houses rebelled in earnest, with the Raven Queen and her Chevaline being tried for treason in a kangaroo court and executed almost immediately thereafter by hanging, drawing, and quartering, as became the traditional punishment for traitors during the Interregnal Period. What followed was years of bloody civil war as the ever-shifting allegiances of the noble families shattered the rule of the monarchy and led solely to personal fiefdoms run by the old houses, only stopping when a cadet branch of the Bourbonnais was dredged up and plonked on the throne with strict instructions to do exactly what they were told by the people who put them there. Thus began the years of the elective monarchy, known in Kalos as the "Liberté d'Or", which marked the beginning of the transition to republican rule and the end of the monarchy of Kalos as anything more than a figurehead, something kept around largely to draw the tourists in from the newly-discovered Alolan islands.
During the Interregnum, references to Queen Cassandra and La Chevaline were thoroughly expunged from the royal records and the main lines of House Bourbonnais were subjected to brutal reprisals by a succession of noble pretenders to the point where the family all but died out under Cyril the Fat. However, the north remembered; liberated from the rule of their ancient oppressors, the new Kalosians of the border regions preserved as much as they could about the Raven Queen. It is in northern Kalos that the portraits and tapestries from the old palaces were stored; it is within the snows and mountain caverns around old Dendemille that the Delphox symbol's flame was kept from dying. It is there also that the move towards LGBTQ+ rights in Kalos really started, as queer analyses of the history of the Raven Queen gained traction among scholars and inspired generations of young women to train a Delphox as a sly acknowledgement of their orientation. Now, of course, we live in enlightened times were people can freely love as they choose; but it is that love, and that fierce pride in the North, that runs through the descendants of the royal Delphox today. They become the ferocious combatants that they were in the days of the Raven Queen, and can master the snows of the mountain regions to fuel their ancient, mystical flames.
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Pokémon: Chesnaught
Battle Bond Name: Jeanne-Chesnaught
Base Stats: 118 (+30)/107/155 (+30)/74/125 (+50)/64
Typing: Grass/Fighting --> Steel/Fighting
Move Buffed: Spiky Shield
BP: -- | Accuracy: -- | Primary Effect: Prevents moves in the manner of Protect, Detect, &c. | Secondary Effects: If the attacking Pokémon uses a Ghost-type, Dark-type, or Contact move, they lose 1/8th of their maximum HP. This Pokémon draws Ghost- and Dark-type moves to itself for the next 3 turns.
Activation: Chesnaught uses Spiky Shield in Hail
Battle Bond Origin: Jeanne de la Maupine was the daughter of a common family of blacksmiths and farriers, the servants of the local lord who (as was the barbaric custom in those days) often chose to exercise his droit de seigneur on the girls of his estate. It is not without reason that he never selected Jeanne for this privilege; she was tall and muscled and full-chested and (according to Dendemille's many stories) smelled of forge-ash and horses, which was about as far from the conventional ideas of beauty as it was possible to get. Nevertheless, it was this abuse of power by the lord that formed de la Maupine into a ferocious defender of the village's women, young or old, and caused her to learn how to wield the hammer and shield that are even today covert symbols of LGBT-friendly establishments in the old Northern towns.
Eventually, the upset caused by the young woman as she fended off the baron's "collectors" became too much for him, and he rode to seek audience with the then-king Maurice, of the ruling de Bourbonnais line. The king was old and infirm, and still had no male heir (his beloved son Charles had been killed in a hunting accident some years before; his wife had died giving birth to their second child), so the noble felt sure that his plea would be answered and the "she-brute" dealt with harshly. His problem, however, came from the young princess, who (at barely 19) had matured into a surprisingly perceptive young woman. Tall and headstrong where her father was stocky and prone to dithering, she declared it unseemly for a court to pass judgment without the defendant present to defend herself, and rode out to meet the accused.
The story of the trial is well known - folk songs still sing of it, at least in Dendemille's more secluded bars - but the details are sketchy. Certainly it happened; the records of King Maurice IV are quite clear that the princess held court in the far south and oversaw a case involving the noble in question, but beyond that much is lost to history. The ballads speak of the young Jeanne's unhoneyed and simple words, but said with such passion and heartfelt nature that the princess all but swooned at their saying. They also say that when the time came for the nobleman to speak, as he waddled up to give his evidence, the princess's eyes narrowed and glowed, and with every paused for breath she called him liar with the voice of a thunderstorm. The man was stripped of his rank and sent away; Jeanne's family became the new holders of the estate, and Jeanne herself decided to accompany her saviour back to court. They rode together, and spoke of much, and soon the young princess Cassandra had fallen in love with the proud and passionate commoner.
From there, the rest is history; upon the death of King Maurice IV, the new Queen Cassandra set about forming a court of talented and able administrators, the better to handle the running of state enterprises. By night, she was guarded by her lady-knight, her Chevaline of the newly ennobled House de Fer. They bonded over the woods and wild places of the kingdom of Old Kalos, Jeanne forming a closer and closer bond with her queen. Finally, as the midwinter moon hung heavy in the sky, the pair kissed by the fireside for the first time, and soon they began to court in earnest.
Of course, that last part is speculation on the part of romantically-inclined historians, but the fact of the matter is that after the first winter of the Raven Queen's reign, the Chevaline de Fer became her close confidant and boon companion. Additionally, it was around this time that sweeping reforms to the Kalosian military came in, with a centralised standing army that combined humans with well-trained Pokémon. The Queen's guardians were all Delphox, for they reflected her temperament; full of power, full of passion, guided by light and possessed with the spirit of fire. By contrast, Jeanne de Fer formed the closest bond with the region's many Chesnaught, in whom she saw herself; solid, dependable, strong and lasting. Her force formed the front line in their battles to win the North from darkness and anarchy; she clad them in armour that the Queen and her psychically-gifted court enchanted, and they formed a shieldwall that was all but impenetrable. This allowed them to function much as their trainer did; by forming a bulwark and taking hits, they allowed the Royal Delphox to sunder the enemy's formations with flame and psychic power. It was this closeness of spirit and combined arms philosophy that allowed the Kalosian expansion into the north, fending off the bandit-chiefs and evil cults that had long driven the populace into miserable squalour.
All their glory on the battlefield, however, could not save them from rebellion at home. In the capital, the Noble Revolt gained an overwhelming momentum, and the army could not march home from the north in time thanks to the treachery of the conditions. The two women were kidnapped and whisked away in the night by northern mercenaries in the pay of this or that noble family (history is unclear as to which) and taken to the capital for a show trial. Though they spoke eloquently and passionately, the court silenced them with scold's bridles, clapped them in iron shackles, chained them to a Rapidash and paraded them through the streets for a mob to throw stones at them. Then they spent one final night in the cells of Lumiose's old jail, separated by stone walls three feet thick, before they were murdered by treasonous, power-hungry noblemen.
The spirit of Jeanne de Fer, who brought her hammer to bear in defence of the innocent and the voiceless, can still be felt by certain Chesnaught to this day. If they are lucky enough to have a trainer that shares those values, then they too can be touched by the spirits of those Chesnaught who have gone before, and wear the heavy iron that protected their forebears on the long Northern campaigns. They become as impenetrable as the shieldmaiden of Old Kalos, the Lady-Knight and lover of the Raven Queen; Jeanne de Fer, the Chevaline of the North.
