Rayno will kill Clyntahn!

One Major Phandys - whose real affiliations have be the subject of much speculation for... six books now?

C. O. Thompson wrote:< snip >

Maybe Rayno kills Clyntahn and someone else knocks Rayno off... who was the captain that has been the body guard for Vicar Rhobair?

It is obvious that he's Rhobair ally! [Very Big Kidding Grin]

Louis R wrote:One Major Phandys - whose real affiliations have be the subject of much speculation for... six books now?

C. O. Thompson wrote:< snip >

Maybe Rayno kills Clyntahn and someone else knocks Rayno off... who was the captain that has been the body guard for Vicar Rhobair?

I can't help but think it will be something more spectacular coming for Clyntahn. I don't see that an assassination would provide the necessary ingredients to the story arc. Killing Clyntahn and then suing for peace would not destroy the church to the degree that Merlin requires. The church must not only be destroyed but discredited to the whole population so that technology can advance.

If it weren't for whatever's under the temple (and I believe that if there is anything at all it will be much more passive than some Terminator type destroyer set to wreak destruction on all non-believers or whatever), I'm thinking that Merlin could "become" Langhorne and descend to the temple grounds denouncing the church for perverting "his" wishes. But I suppose there is enough doubt about what's under the temple to prevent that from happening.

TBird50 wrote:I can't help but think it will be something more spectacular coming for Clyntahn. I don't see that an assassination would provide the necessary ingredients to the story arc. Killing Clyntahn and then suing for peace would not destroy the church to the degree that Merlin requires. The church must not only be destroyed but discredited to the whole population so that technology can advance.

If it weren't for whatever's under the temple (and I believe that if there is anything at all it will be much more passive than some Terminator type destroyer set to wreak destruction on all non-believers or whatever), I'm thinking that Merlin could "become" Langhorne and descend to the temple grounds denouncing the church for perverting "his" wishes. But I suppose there is enough doubt about what's under the temple to prevent that from happening.

TBird,

I think that Merlin finds the entire supreme Langhorn concept so abhorrent that the last thing s/he would try would be to usurp his position... Merlin/Nimue has been doing everything possible, as quickly as can be managed, to generate a climate of free will and freedom of choice.
However, I think you are spot on that the "thing under the temple" is a major next step... I hope that David neutralizes it by the end of this next book.

My personal 'best' death scene for our dear friend Grand Inquisitor Clyntahn:

Clyntahn is being dragged to his execution, struggling and screaming imprecations at those who hold him. The audience includes representatives of most of the major Safehold realms and select senior members of the Church.

Suddenly Clyntahn stop struggling and screaming, gasping for breath. A healer is summoned, but it's too late. Clyntahn is dead.

Cause of death: A heart attack. Perfectly natural and not unexpected, given his life style. Not that Charis's detractors will ever believe it.

But back on point: I can see Rayno eliminating Clyntahn, especially if he sees it as "Getting him before he gets me." His ability to hold things together or survive kiling Clyntahn is another story. I have doubts there. And there's no way the surviving members of the Group of Four would allow a known Clyntahn toady like Rayno become Grand Inquisitor. He'd be quietly executed for Clyntahn's murder.

My personal belief as to what would be appropriate for Clyntahn would be that during one of his rages, he should have a stroke which renders him unable to speak.

Rayno is more dangerous than "just a toady of Clyntahn".

Seriously, I can think of two reasons that the remainder of the Group of Four would accept Rayno as either Grand Inquisitor or Acting Grand Inquisitor.

First, Clyntahn's mind-set was dangerous to the main Church's survival and Rayno might assist the others in finding a way to prevent the complete destruction of the Main Church, including a possible "two Church solution" at least for a time.

Second, Rayno as Grand Inquisitor or Acting Grand Inquisitor maybe a much better solution than other likely replacements for Clyntahn. IE The other high level Inquisitors in line for the Grand Inquisitor position might be a "bad" as Clyntahn or worse.

Of course, I've been wrong before and likely be wrong again.

River Monster wrote:My personal 'best' death scene for our dear friend Grand Inquisitor Clyntahn:

Clyntahn is being dragged to his execution, struggling and screaming imprecations at those who hold him. The audience includes representatives of most of the major Safehold realms and select senior members of the Church.

Suddenly Clyntahn stop struggling and screaming, gasping for breath. A healer is summoned, but it's too late. Clyntahn is dead.

Cause of death: A heart attack. Perfectly natural and not unexpected, given his life style. Not that Charis's detractors will ever believe it.

But back on point: I can see Rayno eliminating Clyntahn, especially if he sees it as "Getting him before he gets me." His ability to hold things together or survive kiling Clyntahn is another story. I have doubts there. And there's no way the surviving members of the Group of Four would allow a known Clyntahn toady like Rayno become Grand Inquisitor. He'd be quietly executed for Clyntahn's murder.

Personally I see Clynthan as most likely being killed by the (in my opinion) inevitable coup by Duchairn and Magwair. It's very clear that while both are loyal to the church that neither feel that Clynthan's leadership of proceedings is actually improving the chance of victory for the Church.

Also consider that Magwair just had most of the disloyal subcommanders killed off for him by Nynian and her cronies and we have a reverse of what traditionally happens when a dictator feels the need to prop up his reigeme.

Clynthan's reigeme protection forces are rapidly getting killed off and in a face to face the temple guards still loyal to him will be overwhelmed by AoG or the properly trained Harchong forces.

Also such a coup could take a leaf from Merlins book and either break of suborn the church semaphore chains so Clynthan doesn't know the army is comming. A few key men suborned 1 step down the chain from Zion and the grand fornicator has no idea where the forces really are. They are totally dependant on the semaphore for information flow, there is very little done by messanger.

My own supposition has been that Duchairn's conspiracy will will eventually get Clyntahn with Phandys in the middle of it, possibly with Nynian's help.

But I can also see that having Rayno do it and take Clyntahn's place would be a real improvement for the COGA. Rayno is at least sane.

Don

Silverwall wrote:Personally I see Clynthan as most likely being killed by the (in my opinion) inevitable coup by Duchairn and Magwair. It's very clear that while both are loyal to the church that neither feel that Clynthan's leadership of proceedings is actually improving the chance of victory for the Church.

Also consider that Magwair just had most of the disloyal subcommanders killed off for him by Nynian and her cronies and we have a reverse of what traditionally happens when a dictator feels the need to prop up his reigeme.

Clynthan's reigeme protection forces are rapidly getting killed off and in a face to face the temple guards still loyal to him will be overwhelmed by AoG or the properly trained Harchong forces.

Also such a coup could take a leaf from Merlins book and either break of suborn the church semaphore chains so Clynthan doesn't know the army is comming. A few key men suborned 1 step down the chain from Zion and the grand fornicator has no idea where the forces really are. They are totally dependant on the semaphore for information flow, there is very little done by messanger.

A few observations on your suppositions:

1. Clyntahn did not suffer from having a majority of his loyal sub-commanders killed off by either the Seijins or by Magwair. The Seijins killed a few dozen fanatics who'd particularly distinguished themselves in their brutality towards "heretics" and the unfortunates in the prison camps. There's no textev at all that Magwair has been offing the more fanatical of the CoGA army's leadership, although for the preservation of his own skin I'll agree that it's a good idea. After all, the Army of Glacierheart would still be functional and dangerous if its commander wasn't a Clyntahn toady. So you're certainly correct that Magwair and Duchairn are correct that the jihad would go better without Clyntahn's interference!

Of course Clyntahn won't hesitate to eliminate either of them if he feels it's necessary to preserve his own skin, and in the fantasy world he lives in, he might kill them even if they pose no danger to him at all.

2) As far as we know, the Temple Guard forces in and around Zion are all loyal to the Inquisition (or are members of it) so we shouldn't expect a coup from them.

Keep in mind that there are inquisitors embedded with every army unit, and no CoGA army would be so impious and move on Zion to express their unhappiness with Clyntahn personally, especially an army of fanatically loyal Harchongese. Magwair literally cannot order an army to attack the Temple Guard around Zion because that order would be unlikely to be obeyed. It would probably result in a bloodbath among the troops as some moved against the inquisitors embedded with them, while others rose to their defense.

Of course now that I've ruled out that possibility, RFC will promptly begin a civil war among the CoGA forces, or Phandys will finally do something, which we've been waiting for almost as long as we've waited for the ICN to sail into Gorath Bay in retribution for Dohlar turning the Charisian POWs over to the Inquisition in AMF! Barring a highly unlikely coup, I expect the Temple Guard around Zion will die when the ICN sails into Temple Bay and starts offloading the troops. A King Haarahld VII may not be able to sail up the Zion River to the Temple, (although it might...) but the City class ironclads certainly can!

3) Much of the message traffic on the semaphore network is routinely encoded, so it wouldn't be possible to take over a station en route and alter the contents of the message traffic that passes through it - certainly not the military or church messages, which are all encoded. So it makes little difference whether a tower is suborned or blown up, although if a tower in each of the chains that lead to Zion stopped passing military messages, the resulting confusion would buy some time for whichever "enemy" force was approaching Zion.

So your proposal to suborn a tower does have some merit, if a delay of a few days or hours before the forces around Zion realize that something is wrong with the semaphore network is crucial. Unfortunately you'd have to capture/suborn a tower in almost every chain that ends in Zion, so it's far more feasible to blow up one or more towers in each chain instead.

Nice thinking out of the box there. Keep it up!