Indeed, far more so than most, for the six dragons guarding the demon-jester went knowingly and willingly to their own deaths as they followed the stocky little alien up the steps to his box.
Neither Matilda nor Father Timothy had cared at all for that portion of the plan. Grayhame had been unhappy with it, but had grasped its necessity, while Maynton had objected only mildly, as if because he knew it was expected. Although Sir George had come to respect and like Sir Richard as much as he had ever respected or liked any other man, and to rely upon him completely, he had long since realized that the other knight had a limited imagination. And despite all else that had happened, only Sir George had ever actually "spoken" with the dragons. The others were willing to take his word for what had happened because he had never lied to them, never abused their trust in him, in all the years of their captivity, but they had not themselves "heard" the dragons speak. And because Maynton had never heard them, they remained less than human to him. He continued to regard them, in many ways, as Sir George continued to regard the Hathori: as roughly human-shaped animals which, however clever or well trained, remained animals.
But they were not animals, and Sir George knew he would never be able to see them as such again, for it had been they who insisted that their fellows with the demon-jester must die.
Their logic was as simple as it was brutal. If the demon-jester could be enticed out of his air car and taken alive, he could be compelled to order the remainder of his crew to surrender. Like so much else of the vaunted Federation, the guild's hierarchical command structure was iron bound. If their superior officer ordered them to surrender, the other guildsmen would obey... and the "Commander," for all his readiness to expend his English slaves or slaughter the inhabitants of "primitive" planets, possessed nothing remotely resembling the human or dragon quality of courage. With a blade pressed to his throat, he would yield.
But to get close enough to apply that blade had required, first, a way to get him out from behind his air car's force fields, and, second, that someone get within arm's reach. The fashion in which Sir George had structured the "demonstration" for the local chieftains had accomplished the former, but no one could accomplish the latter until the demon-jester's guards, Hathori and dragon alike, were neutralized. The Hathori would defend him no matter what; the dragons would have no choice but to do the same if they were commanded to, and no one could doubt that such a command would be given if they failed to spring forward on their own immediately.
Neither Sir George nor his officers were particularly concerned about the Hathori. Not in the open field, at least, where they were confident of their ability to destroy the bulge-eyed wart-faces with longbow fire or swarm them under quickly. Once aboard ship, in the narrow confines of its corridors and chambers, that would change, unless the humans could win their way into its interior before the Hathori could be armed and armored by the guildsmen. The closer quarters might still favor the smaller, more agile humans, but the structure of the ship would also force them to engage the Hathori head on, without the opportunity to outflank them or bring their own superior numbers to bear. Close combat under those conditions would allow the plate-armored, ax-armed wart-faces to use their advantages in size and strength to their greatest effect. The English advantage in numbers was sufficient for Sir George to feel confident that the Hathori would ultimately be defeated, but he knew only too well how bloody a price his men might be forced to pay.
The dragons and their "energy weapons" were another matter entirely, and they had been relentless in their conversations with Sir George. It was entirely possible that the demon-jester's personal guards would be able to cut a way at least as far as the air car with their personal weapons, especially if the Hathori kept the English busy, and once he was behind his force fields and once again invulnerable, the demon-jester would be ruthless in destroying any and all possible threats. Which meant, the dragons insisted, that no chances could be taken. Capturing the demon-jester alive was the one move they could be certain would succeed; at the very best, any other gambit would almost certainly cost the English far heavier casualties by requiring them to fight their way into the ship. For those reasons, the demon-jester's personal guards must die, and they'd hammered away at that point until Sir George was forced to promise to accept their plan. Which didn't mean he liked it.
Now he watched the demon-jester reach his position on the canopied platform. The "Commander" crossed to the throne-like chair constructed especially for him, and Sir George could almost taste the thick-bodied little creature's satisfaction as he gazed down at all about him. The elevation of his position, establishing his authority over the chieftains he had summoned here, had been a major part of the baron's argument for the arrangement of the stands, and Sir George smiled a much harder, hungrier smile as he watched the demon-jester bask in his superiority to the despised primitives clustered about his feet in all their abject inferiority, completely oblivious to his own exposure.
The demon-jester gazed down at Sir George for another moment, then nodded regally for the demonstration to begin, and Sir George, in turn, nodded to Rolf Grayhame.
The archery captain barked an order, and two dozen plate-armored archers, helmets and metal work brilliantly polished for the occasion, surcoats washed and bright with color over their armor, marched briskly to the firing line. Sir George had longed to call for a larger number of them, but he'd concluded that he dared not. Twenty-four was more than sufficient to provide the demonstration the "Commander" desired. To ask for more bows to be issued might have aroused suspicion, or at least caution, and the demon-jester might have decided to remain safely in his air car after all.
The archers stopped in formation and quickly and smoothly bent and strung their bows, and the demon-jester, like the gathered chieftains, turned to gaze at the targets just over a hundred yards down range. Most of those targets were shaped like humans, but some among them were also shaped like natives of this world, and all were "protected" only by the large wicker shields the natives used in battle. The sort of shields longbow arrows would pierce as effortlessly as awls.
Grayhame barked another order, and twenty-four archers nocked arrows and raised their bows.
"Draw!" Grayhame shouted, and twenty-four bowstaves bent as one.
"Loose!" the archer captain bellowed... and twenty-four longbowmen turned on their heels in perfect unison, and twenty-four bow strings snapped as one. Two dozen arrows flew through the bright sunlight of an alien world, glittering like long, lethal hornets, and crashed into their targets with devastating force.
Eighteen of those arrows carried deadly, needle-pointed pile heads. At such short range they could pierce even Hathori plate armor, and they smashed into the wart-faces on the raised dais like hammers. Five bounced harmlessly aside, defeated by the angle and the Hathori's armor; thirteen did not, and all but two of the bulge-eyed aliens went down. Not all of those felled were dead, but all were out of action, at least for the moment.