Demigryph Knights

Demigryphs are lesser kin of the griffon: horse-sized predators of the deep forests, all hooked beak, raking talons, and territorial fury. They cannot be broken the way horses are broken. A knight earns a demigryph by mastering it, a rite reserved for the inner circles of the great orders, and one that leaves the beast's respect written in scars as often as not.

On the field, Demigryph Knights are the Empire's answer to the monstrous. Where a horse shies from a troll or a tide of vermin, a demigryph accelerates, and the knight on its back brings a lance to whatever the beast leaves standing. Enemy lines do not describe being charged by demigryphs as fighting cavalry. They describe it, the few who can, as being hunted.