The crowd murmured, and discontent could be seen on a few faces. Griffin knew he'd been playing the game for long enough when he heard that. It wasn't like he was doing this to show off. He was doing this to make a point. That murmur told him that his point been made, and it was time to end this.
He turned directly facing the man and waited till he rolled to his feet from the latest throw. Once he was on his feet Griffin charged, almost in a blur to the crowd. Even Griffin wasn't sure where the speed was coming from, although there was a glowing from his wrists. He skilfully deflected blows from both hands with his arms and head-butted the nose of his opponent. Blood started clearly dripping from that nose, and Magdalena called the challenge over.
His opponent had been forced back a couple of steps by the blow and was shaking his head to clear his vision. When he saw Magdalena walking into the circle and felt the blood dripping from his nose, he dropped to his knees and bowed his head in submission. Griffin acknowledged his submission and turned to the crowd.
"Is there anyone else who wishes to challenge my leadership? Speak now!" he roared.
There was dead silence from the crowd. His opponent had been one of the most skilled amongst them, his apparent domination of the fight proving that no-one could beat him in personal combat.
"Either you follow my rules, or you leave. I am trying to help you, but I cannot do this without your trust. I know you have little reason to trust me, but I have found my heritage and abandoned the Order." He drew on the element of earth, causing the ground to shake slightly under everyone's feet. "I have things to learn from you, like how to use my abilities more effectively, but I guaran-fucking-tee that none of you has the same level of knowledge in military operations I do. If I thought there was someone that did, I would let them lead. I am over two hundred years old. The only person I know who is older than me is standing over there." He pointed directly at Nin. "And she has chosen to follow my leadership. Are you with me or are you leaving?!" His voice rose to an echoing roar. There was a moment of shocked silence, and then his opponent stood to his feet.
"I am with you," the defeated man said, then his voice rose to a roar. He turned to face the crowd, "Are you with us?!" There was a brief silence and then, over the next minute, the crowd's voices rose to a roar confirming their acceptance of Griffin's leadership. The raw emotion from the crowd buoyed Griffin’s mood noticeably. He had at least gained respect from those joining him on this assault.
To Nin, the whole scene was a vision of antiquity, like watching a memory of her childhood playing out before her on a stage. It was also one of the most effective ways to gain the loyalty, at least temporarily, of a group of Soldiers. Griffin had shown at once overwhelming power and mercy.
Now all Griffin had to do was seal their loyalty with a successful assault on the Order’s fortress.
Three Kilometers from Tarpa Order Fortress, March 27, 2014.
After the challenge, thirty to forty of those who were gathered withdrew from the assault force to maintain a base camp to receive casualties once the battle was over. Griffin found this perfectly reasonable and upon asking, most of them answered they did not feel that their skills sufficient to aid in the endeavor. He spent those two days completing plans not only for the assault in these mountains but also the attack in Brazil. The Sisterhood forces in the U.S., once Nin had confirmed her presence to the local Hathori, were gathering for an assault on the small Order base in the Bitterroot mountains.
Griffin was assured, by the leaders of both the U.S. and South American groups gathering, that they would weed out anyone who might be tempted towards an atrocity against the Order. Killing those who would not acknowledge they might be wrong was one thing. Killing those who surrendered and wanted nothing more to do with any combat was entirely another.
He spent the rest of those days training heavily with the frontline groups, making sure those who were equipping themselves with bows or crossbows were proficient with their weapons. Nin was supervising extra training to those who felt their greatest benefit to the assault would be their ability to draw on the planes. Joy and Grey were checking the skill levels of those who had self-designated themselves, pistoleers and snipers, respectively. Out of the remaining force of three hundred another twenty were weeded out as not of proficient skill level for the assault.
They were lucky to have a handful of ex-military personnel skilled in demolitions. It had been decided that blowing the gate rather than using the planes to open it was preferable. Without these former military personnel, that would not be possible. Three of the cells had a small supply of explosives, ranging from basic gunpowder, up to professional demolitions explosives. They would leave the gunpowder behind. A group of fifty of the 'front liners,' including the three demolition’s experts, would be covered by Nin’s cloaking. Griffin would lead the spearhead portion of the assault. Brianna would be in the group as she refused to be far from him.
The sixty best marksmen out of those who had self-designated as snipers, as chosen by Grey, would split from the main column once they were within ten kilometers of the fortress. Their job was to find sniper points that would give them a broad selection of targets on the walls and within the fortress. Many of these men were professional or amateur hunters, and traveling in groups of three, they could move faster than the whole column.
Griffin pushed the column hard for the first hour of travel, giving orders that those that fell out of sight range of the tail of the column were to return to the base camp. His focus on the success of this assault seemed to consume him. The only emotion Nin could sense of him was one of extreme, focused, determination. It was unlike anything she ever encountered or imagined before. In its own way, it was at least as terrifying as anything she remembered. He needed to make sure these fighters would be fit enough to make a quick exit from the assault either in failure or success. They lost forty out of the three hundred and fifty who had chosen to participate, including eight of the snipers. When the shooters split from the rest of the column, there were only two groups of two due to those who’d fallen out.
The first section of the march was through the roughest terrain, on what was effectively a game trail, rarely used by people, as they moved towards the main route to the fortress. The mountainous terrain made the march brutal, even on the fittest, at the pace Griffin was pushing. If Brianna hadn’t been doing her training with Griffin in the Blue Mountains, she was sure she would have dropped out. Marching through mountainous terrain was a different skill to a route march on the flats.
As they approached the fortress, Griffin slowed the column down considerably, allowing for all who had kept up in the first hour to catch their breath. He kept the slower pace until they were within two kilometers of the main entrance. They had left the rough trackway towards the fortress five kilometers before that. Once they were off even that rough road, the more uneven travel also slowed them considerably. They reached Griffin's designated launch point four hours before dusk. Griffin had no plans to attack the fortress before eleven p.m.
He gave orders to everyone in the column to grab cold food and sleep if they could. The main force would wait at the edge of cover while his group of fifty broke through the gates to the fortress. He sincerely hoped they had no firm warning of the attack. If they did, he knew this fortress had a traditional castle gate complete with murder holes. Nin was not concerned by this and was convinced she could hold off any attack from the murder holes until the demolition was complete. Griffin was not so confident.
By nine-thirty, the two Magi telepaths with him had confirmed that the snipers were in position or would be shortly. At ten-thirty Griffin organized his forces. They were fortunate to have a handful of Magi telepaths, three of whom were amongst the snipers. He had assigned one to the spearheaded group, and the final one was with the main force. The snipers’ duties were to take out any watchmen once a demolition charge went off.
In the gathered force, individuals could be seen displaying nerves, excit
ement and, mostly from those who had been in their nation’s armed forces, grim determination. Through it all, Griffin maintained a calm, almost detached, demeanor. He would have preferred to be able to display the grim determination he really felt. The only person that seemed even more detached than him was Nin, and that was probably because she was focusing on her preparations for using her talents.
Despite his best wishes, Griffin could not risk the failure of this assault on the mere possibility that one or two of those watchmen may have surrendered. He already had reports from those that had remained in Australia that they had been forced to kill several of their St. Michael’s captives during an escape attempt.
As the mountain fortress came into view, there was a whispering murmur that ran through the troops. He had to admit it was an impressive sight and could have held its own against round shot for some time with its angled walls and round tower bastions. Initially it could have held a thousand men, but it was more of an advanced training outpost and rest and recuperation station for lay-people who had been injured. It was too remote to launch quick missions from these days. Those the Order hunted hid amongst people in the towns and cities more often than in the wilds unlike in the past when the Order had first occupied the fortification.
By eleven p.m., his forces were well on the way to moving up to the edge of the cleared fire zone. Using hand signals, he organized his spearhead force. Nin nodded that she had raised her power. Griffin signaled, and the force moved forward. Once they had reached the inset gateway, the majority of the force flattened themselves against the external walls of the fortress. Two of the three military demolitions experts ran the charge forward to the locked gate. Once they retreated, the telepath with the spearhead force gave the ready signal to his compatriots. When they answered, he signaled, and the demolitions experts blew the charge.
The front gate burst apart into chunks and splinters with a ball of explosive-created flame. There were no screams. As his force moved through the tunnel, there was no movement from the murder holes. Despite the larger group, they had managed to achieve a measure of surprise.
The spearhead force quickly rushed into the courtyard. There was the thud of bodies hitting the ground from the walls shortly following the explosion, as the snipers took out the targets. The spearhead force split into two as it entered the courtyard. One headed straight for the chapel, the other for the dormitories. The movement of the main force heading across the kill zone, now having no-one to target it, could be heard, softly.
Griffin was in the lead of the force attacking the dormitories. His battle eagerness had taken over again. It wasn’t like a berserker rage, but rather an icy cold focus. Everything simplified for him into taking down as many of the armed men likely to burst into the courtyard shortly.
There might be another five or ten people in the chapel and in or around the armory below it. The twenty that had been sent in that direction could easily neutralize them unless there were several Paladins present. Even then they could contain whoever was in that area. The dormitories were a bigger threat. They could hold up to three hundred people, equal to his entire force including snipers.
By the time he approached the door, a quick reaction force probably made up of the ready reserve, burst from it. They would have been armed, but resting, ready to respond to any assault on this fortress. The Order had some outdated concepts, such as having guards walking the walls. Decent snipers made walking a post damned suicidal.
Griffin had tried for years to change this policy, unsuccessfully. He was now glad he’d failed.
Surging ahead, he drew the short sword Joy had given him weeks ago. Its original owner deserved for it to taste more blood of those allied to the ones who killed her and her unborn child. He took the first man he faced with a precise cut across the throat, the second with a savage disembowelment from a blow of his axe. Continuing his mayhem, he crunched through the thin, unsteady line that had formed. He took another man's leg off at the knee with his axe and slashed a fourth across the face the sword. Having no opponents facing him, he curled his charge to the left, hitting that section of the line from behind. He was looking for the fastest way to defeat these foes. That was part of what was brought on by his battle eagerness.
The sound of steel on steel, the crunch of bones breaking, and the smell of spilled blood filled the air. Screams of pain and grunts of effort could be heard in the assault. A slaughterhouse stench filled the air, mixing the odors of blood and meat with that of ruptured bowels and urine. Many of his followers were visibly disturbed by the scent of carnage, but they knew the stakes. While a few vomited when they were in no immediate danger, adding to the foul smells, only one or two were unsteady enough to be sent back through the gates and out of the combat area.
Within minutes, all who had been facing him and the force securing the approaches to the dormitories were down. Those minutes, however, had been critical to giving those inside the rooms time to organize. His group was forced to take cover as gunshots blasted from within the dormitories, through windows and doorways. Bowstrings twanged and arrows whooshed. Although most of the gunshots missed, there was the occasional scream as an arrow bit into flesh.
Ironically, even in this modern day, an archer took far more care to see if he had a target than someone with a gun. In war, it can take up to quarter-million bullets on the battlefield to achieve a single casualty. In this type of assault, the odds were lower, but archers were still more effective than an average trained shooter. Besides, arrows and especially crossbow bolts, are more successful at penetrating ballistic protection vests.
While his main force organized itself, taking positions on the walls, Griffin headed to clear the armory and chapel. He kicked in the chapel doors and was surprised by no resistance in that entire section of the fortress.
Some of the sniper teams were now filtering in through the wrecked gateway. Taking positions from which they could target windows and doorways to the dormitories, they were effectively suppressing fire from that building.
Griffin was surprised that the chapel, armory, and its attached sleeping chambers were empty. Unfortunately, that meant that no Paladin had been stationed here, which was incredibly unusual. Usually, there would be anywhere from five to up to twenty. Griffin was almost disappointed that none of them had been here. About a third of them could be killed, and the world would be a better place. Another third he was unsure of. The final third were good people in a fucking awful organization. It wasn’t like Xandrie was the most dogmatic or fanatical of the Paladins in the Order, just the most psycho. He was still upset with Nin for putting her back together.
Having cleared that building, he returned to cover near the dormitories. He swore as he saw Nin standing in the open until he saw an arrow stopped dead several feet from her. Obviously, she had some kind of shield up, similar to what he'd used during the attack on Joy's house. He saw a flicker of something from a hand, and then suddenly an enormous flame grew out of the match had she'd lit. The odor of frangipani slammed into his nose, and he realized what he'd been smelling in the cave. Nin drawing on the planes. Since he didn’t smell it every time he knew she was using her abilities, she must have a way of masking it sometimes.
Once she had a large ball of flame in front of her, she walked closer to the dormitories pushing it in front of her. She yelled to those in the building, "Surrender or burn. I have not the patience to wait you out. You are all thugs, murderers, and fanatics. I'm giving you this one chance." As if to accentuate her threat, jets of flame burst forth towards the building from the ball of fire in front of her. Suddenly all the gunfire from two sides the house was redirected towards her, but it had no effect.
Griffin heard a couple of the doors on the dormitory open, probably along one of the two sides of the building he could not see. The firing on those two sides slackened, but he heard a couple of screams. Maybe some of those who are trying to surrender were being shot by their own side. It seemed that Nin had come to the same c
onclusion, and suddenly the flame in front of her became a solid wall that washed towards the building.
The wall of fire suddenly raced across the entire dormitory building. Every piece of vaguely flammable material it struck went fully ablaze. Smoke poured from the building, flames leaped from the rooftop, and screams of agony could be heard from inside. He could see many of the nearby allies look at her with fear. The effects she was achieving were obviously beyond most of the Godsborn.
The smell of burning flesh mixed with the odor of burning wood, plastics, and cloth. The crackle of flames was louder than any other sound apart from the screams of agony and desperation could be heard from within the building and across the fortress. Snipers shot those on fire as they found clear sightlines, not out of anger or vengeance, but out of pity.
Maybe two dozen people burst from the building as the wall of flame hit it. Her control over it was incredible if a person had exited the building they didn't receive severe burns, nor were they set ablaze. None of the people who had fled the dormitories were carrying weapons of any sort. Griffin turned to the troops around him and said, "Move it, lads! Take those men into custody before they can cause any trouble. It's not like anyone in the building will attack you. They are busy with other problems." Once they moved towards the potential captures, troops beyond his immediate vicinity followed their example.
Griffin wondered when this group had gone from being allies to troops, and shook his head at his thoughts. It had been one of the main goals they’d hope to achieve in doing this from the start. That they had succeeded warmed him.
Nin moved towards other buildings, taking a piece of the fire she had used and setting them ablaze. It was obvious she intended to leave not a single building standing in this fortress. He could understand that. After all, his public goal had been to destroy it. She was just making a head start. He moved to get the prisoners organized and the troops ready to get out. They would need to move with some haste to clear the area, so they were not detained as potentially responsible for these fires.
A-Viking (Betrayed by Faith Book 3) Page 15