Chapter XVIII
Many long Tharixanian days passed: weeks of Earth time. Having taken the first planet he aimed at, Sir Roger went on to the next. Here, while his allies distracted the enemy gunners, he stormed the main castle afoot, using foliage to conceal his approach. This was the place where Red John Hameward actually did rescue a captive princess. True, she had green hair and feathery antennae, nor was there any possibility of issue between her species and our own. But the humanlikeness, and exceeding gratitude, of the Vashtunari — who had just been in process of being conquered — did much to cheer lonely Englishmen. Whether or not the prohibitions of Leviticus are applicable is still being hotly debated.
The Wersgorix counterattacked from space, basing their fleet in a ring of planetoids. Sir Roger had taken an opportunity while en route to turn off the artificial weight aboard ship and let his men practice movement under such conditions. So now, armored against vacuum, our bowmen made that famous raid called the Battle of the Meteors. Cloth-yard shafts pierced many a Wersgor spacesuit without fire-flash or magnetic force-pulse to give away a man’s position. With their base thus depleted of manpower, the enemy withdrew from the entire system. Admiral Beljad had grabbed off three other suns while they were occupied with this one, so their new retreat was a long one.
And on Tharixan, Sir Owain Montbelle made himself pleasant to Lady Catherine. And he and Branithar felt each other out, cautiously, under pretext of language study. At last they thought they had touched mutual understanding.
It remained to convince the baroness.
I believe both moons had risen. Treetops were hoar with that radiance; double shadows reached across grass where dew glittered; by now, the night sounds had become familiar and peaceful. Lady Catherine left her pavilion, as often after her children were fallen asleep and she unable to. Wrapped in a hooded mantle, she walked down a lane intended for the street of the new village, past half-finished wattle huts that were blocks of shadow under the moons, and out onto a meadow through which ran a brook. The water flowed and sparkled with light; it chimed on rocks. She drank a warm strange smell of flowers, and remembered English hawthorn when they crowned the May Queen. She remembered standing on the pebble beach at Dover, newly wed, when her husband had embarked on a summer’s campaign, and waving and waving until the last sail was vanished. Now the stars were a colder shore, and no one would see her kerchief if it fluttered. She bent her head and told herself she would not weep.
Harp strings jingled in the dark. Sir Owain trod forth. He had discarded his crutch, though he still affected a limp. A massy silver chain caught moonlight across his black velvet tunic, and she saw him smile.
“Oho,” he said softly, “the nymphs and dryads are out!
“Nay.” Despite all resolutions, she felt’ gladdened. His banter and flattery had lightened so many sad hours; they brought back her courtly girlhood. She fluttered protesting hands, knew she was being coy, but could not stop. “Nay, good knight, this is unseemly.”
“Beneath such a sky, and in such a presence, nothing is unseemly,” he told her. “For we are assured there is no sin in Paradise.”
“Speak not so!” Her pain came back redoubled. “If we have wandered anywhere, ’tis into hell.”
“Wherever my lady is, there is Paradise.”
“Is this any place to hold a Court of Love?” she gibed bitterly.
“No.” He grew solemn in his turn. “Indeed, a tent — or a log cabin, when they complete it — is no place for her to dwell who commands all hearts. Nor are these marches a fit home for you… or your children. You should sit among roses as Queen of Love and Beauty, with a thousand knights breaking lances in your honor and a thousand minstrels singing your charms.
She tried to protest, “’Twould be enough to see England again—’ but her voice would go no further.
He stood gazing into the brook where twin moonpaths glided and shivered. At last he reached beneath his cloak. She saw steel gleam in his hand. An instant she shrank away. But he raised the crosshilt upward and said, in those rich tones he well knew how to use: “By this token of my Saviour and my honor, I swear you shall have your wish!”
His blade sank. He stared at it. She could scarcely hear him when he added, “If you truly wish it.”
“What do you mean?” She drew her mantle tight, as if the air were cold. Sir Owain’s gaiety was not the hoarse boisterousness of Sir Roger, and his present gravity was more eloquent than her husband’s stammering protestations. Yet briefly she felt afraid of Sir Owain, and would have given all her jewels to see the baron clank from the forest.
“You never say plainly what you mean,” she whispered.
He turned a face of disarming boyish ruefulness on her. “Mayhap I never learned the difficult art of blunt speech. But if now I hesitate, ’tis because I am loath to tell my lady that which is hard.”
She straightened. For a moment, in the unreal light, she looked strangely like Sir Roger; it was his gesture. Then she was only Catherine, who said with forlorn courage, “Tell me anyhow.”
“Branithar can find Terra again,” he said.
She was not one to faint. But the stars wavered. She regained awareness leaning against Sir Owain’s breast. His arms enclosed her waist, and his lips moved along her cheek toward her mouth. She drew a little away, and he did not pursue his kiss. But she felt too weak to leave his embrace.
“I call this hard news,” he said, “for reasons I’ve discussed erenow. Sir Roger will not give up his war.”
“But he could send us home!” she gasped.
Sir Owain looked bleak. “Think you he will? He needs every human soul to maintain his garrisons and keep up an appearance of strength. You recall what he proclaimed ere the fleet left Tharixan. As soon as a planet seems strongly enough held, he will send off people of this village to join those few men he has newly created dukes and knights. As for himself — oh, aye, he talks of ending England’s peril, but has he never spoken of making you a queen?”
She could only sigh, remembering a few words let slip.
’Branithar himself shall explain.” Sir Owain whistled. The Wersgor stepped from a canebrake where he had waited. He could move about freely enough, since he had no hope of escaping the island. His stocky form was well clad in plundered raiment, which glittered as with a thousand tiny pearls. The round, hairless, longeared, snouted face no longer seemed ugly; the yellow eyes were even gay. By now Catherine could follow his language well enough for him to address her.
“My lady will wonder how I could ever find my way back along a zigzag route taken through swarming uncharted stars,” he said. “When the navigator’s notes were lost at Ganturath, I myself despaired. So many suns, even of the type of your own, lie within the radius of our cruise, that random search might rec1uire a thousand years. This is the more true since nebulosities in space hide numbers of stars until one chances fairly close to them. To be sure, if any deck officers of my ship had survived, they could have narrowed down the search somewhat. But my own work was with the engines. I saw stars only in casual glimpses, and they meant nothing to me. When I tricked your people — rue the day! — all I did was push an emergency control which instructed an automaton to pilot us hither.”
A lift of excitement brought back impatience to Catherine. She pulled free of Sir Owain’s arms and snapped, “I’m not altogether a fool. My lord respected me enough to try to explain these things to me, however ill I listened. What news have you discovered?”
“Not discovered,” said Branithar. “Remembered. ’Tis an idea which should have occurred to me erenow, but there was so much happening — Well… “Know, then, my lady, that there are certain beacon stars, brilliant enough to be visible throughout the spiral arm of the Via Galactica. They are used in navigation. Thus, if the suns called (by us) Ulovarna, Yariz, and Gratch, are seen to form a certain configuration with respect to each other, one must be in a certain region of space. Even a crude visual estimate of the angles would fix one’s position within twenty or so light-years. This is not too large a sphere to find a given yellow-dwarf sun like your own.”