Poul Anderson - The High Crusade

God granted, though, that we had not much longer to wait. The Bodavant fleet was already gathered in orbit. Now several dozen lean battlecraft from Ashenk arrived, and soon thereafter the boxlike vessels of Pr?°t lumbered in from their poisonous home world. We embarked and roared off to war.

Our first glimpse of Darova, after we had fought past outlying Wersgor ships and into Tharixan’s atmosphere, made me doubt that aught was left to rescue. For hundreds of miles around the land lay black, ripped, and desolated. Rock bubbled molten wherever a shell had newly struck. That subtle death which can only be sensed with instruments had lain waste this entire continent, and would linger for years.

But Darova was built to withstand such forces, and Lady Catherine had provisioned it well. I glimpsed a Wersgor flotilla as it screamed low above her forcefield. Their missiles burst close, causing the near-solid stone of the aboveground structures to flow on the outside — but leaving the interiors unharmed. The seared earth opened; bombards thrust out like viper tongues, spat lightning, and retracted ere fresh explosives could smite. Three Wersgor ships tumbled in ruin. Their wrecks were added to the carnage which was left from an attempt to storm this place on the ground.

Then I saw no more smoke-veiled Darova. For the Wersgorix were upon us in force, and the combat moved up again into space.

Strange was that battle. It was fought at unimaginable distances with fire-beams, cannon shells, unmanned missiles. Ships maneuvered under direction from artificial brains, so fast that only the weight-making fields prevented their crews from being smeared across the bulkheads. Hulls were blown open by near-misses, yet could not sink in airless space: the wounded portions sealed themselves off, and the remainder continued to shoot.

Such was the usual way of space war. Sir Roger made an innovation. It had horrified the Jair admirals when he first proposed it, but he had insisted it was a standard English tactic — which it was, in a way. Actually, of course, he did it for fear that his men would otherwise betray their clumsiness with the hellweapons.

So he disposed them in numerous small, exceedingly fast craft. Our over-all plan of battle was made highly unorthodox, for no other reason than to maneuver the enemy into certain positions. When that chance came, Sir Roger’s boats flitted into the heart of the Wersgor fleet. He lost some few, but the others continued their outrageous orbit, to the very flagship of the foe. It was a monstrous thing, almost a mile long, even big enough to carry force-field generators. But the English used explosives to punch through its hull. Then, in space armor, atop which the knights planted their crests — carrying sword, ax, halberd, and bow, as well as handguns — they boarded.

They were not enough to seize that entire labyrinth of corridors and cabins. Yet they enjoyed themselves, suffered small loss (sailors out here being untrained in hand-to-hand fighting), and threw matters into a confusion which vastly aided our general assault. Eventually the crew abandoned that ship. Sir Roger saw them doing so and withdrew his own troop just before the hull was blown to bits.

Only God and the more warlike saints know if his action proved decisive. The allied fleet was outnumbered and very much out-gunned, so every gain we made was valuable out of proportion. On the other hand, our attack had come as a surprise. And we had boxed the foe between ourselves and Darova, whose largest missiles flew into space itself to destroy Wersgor craft.

I cannot describe the vision of St. George, for it was not my privilege to observe this. However, many a sober, trustworthy man-at-arms swore that he saw the holy knight ride down the Milky Way in a foam of stars and impale enemy ships on his lance like so many dragons. Be this as it may, after many hours which I remember but dimly, the Wersgonix gave up. They withdrew in good order, having lost perhaps a fourth of their fleet, and we did not pursue them far.

Instead, we hovered above blackened Darova. Sir Roger and the chiefs of his allies went down in a boat. In the central underground hail, the English garrison, grimy and exhausted from days of battle, gave a feeble cheer. Lady Catherine took time to bathe and garb herself in her best, for honor’s sake. She swept out like a queen to greet the captains.

But when she saw her husband, standing in dinted space armor against the chilly glow-light, her stride faltered. “My lord—”

He took off his glazed helmet. The air tubes got somewhat in the way of his knightly gesture, as he tucked it under an arm and went to one knee before her. “No,” he cried aloud. “Say not that. Let me rather say, ‘My lady and love.’ ”

She advanced like a sleepwalker. “Is the victory yours?”

“No. Yours.”

“And now—”

He rose, grimacing as the necessities~ clamped back down on him. “Conferences.” he said. “Repair of battle damage. Making of new ships, raising of more armies. Intrigues among allies, heads to knock together, laggards to hearten. And fighting to do, always fighting. Until, God willing, the bluefaces are whipped back to their home planet and submit—” He stopped. Her face had lost its quick lovely color. “But for tonight, my lady,” he said, unskillfully, though he must have rehearsed it many times, “I think we ye earned the right to be alone, that I may praise you.”

She drew a shaken breath. “Did Sir Owain Montbelle live?” she asked. When he did not say no, she crossed herself, and a tiny smile flickered on her lips. Then she bade the alien captains welcome and held out her hand for them to kiss.

I come now to a grievous part of this history, and the most difficult to write. Nor was I present, save at the very end.

This was because Sir Roger hurled himself into his crusade as if he fled from something — which in a way was true — and I was dragged with him like a leaf whirled along in a gale. I was his interpreter, but at every moment when we had naught else to do I became his teacher and would instruct him in Wersgor until my poor weak flesh could endure no more. My last glimpse, ere I toppled into sleep, would be of candlelight guttering on my lord’s haggard face. Then he would often as not summon a doctor of the Jair language, who would teach him until dawn. At this rate, it was not many weeks before he could curse hideously in both tongues.

Meanwhile, he drove his allies nigh as hard as he did himself. The Wersgorix must be given no chance to recover. Planet after planet must be attacked, reduced, and garrisoned, so that the foe always fought off balance, on the defensive. In this task, we had much help from enslaved native populations. As a rule, these need only be given arms and leadership. Then they attacked their masters in such hordes, with such ferocity, that the latter fled to us for protection. Jairs, Ashenkoghli, and Pr?*tans were horrified. They had no experience in such matters; whereas Sir Roger had encountered the Jacquene in France. In their bewilderment, his fellow chieftains came more and more to accept his unquestioned leadership.

The ins and outs of what happened are too complex, too various from world to world, for this paltry record. But in essence, on each inhabited planet, the Wersgorix had destroyed whatever original civilization existed. Now the Wersgor system in turn was toppled. Into this vacuum — unreligion, anarchy, banditry, famine, the ever — present menace of a blueface return, the necessity of training the natives themselves to eke out our thin garrisons — Sir Roger stepped. He had a solution to these problems, one hammered out in Europe during those not dissimilar centuries after Rome fell: the feudal system.