Poul Anderson - The High Crusade

I believe, therefore, that Sir Roger took Catherine his lady aside and told her how matters stood. He had hoped for calm and courage from her, but she flew into the bitterest of rages.

“Ill was the day I wed you!” she cried. Her lovely face turned red and then white, and she stamped a small foot on the steel deck. “Bad enough that your oafishness should disgrace me before king and court, and doom me to yawn my life away in that bear’s den you call a castle. Now you set the lives and the very souls of my children at hazard!”

“But, dearest,” he stammered. “I could not know—”

“No, you were too stupid! ’Twas not enough to go robbing and whoring off into France, you must needs do it in this aerial coffin. Your arrogance told you the demon was so afraid of you he would be your obedient slave. Mary, pity women!”

She whirled, sobbing, and hurried from him.

Sir Roger stared after her till she had vanished down the long corridor. Then, heavyhearted, he betook himself to see his troopers.

He found them in the afterhold, cooking their supper. The air remained sweet in spite of all the fires we lit; Branithar told me the ship embodied a system for renewing the vital spirits of the atmosphere. I found it somewhat unnerving always to have the walls luminous and not know day from night. But the common soldiers sat around, hoisting ale crocks, bragging, dicing, cracking fleas, a wild, godless crew who nonetheless cheered their lord with real affection.

Sir Roger signaled to Red John Hameward, whose huge form lumbered to join him in a small side chamber. “Well, sire,” he remarked, “it seems a longish ways to France after all.”

’Plans have been, urn, changed,” Sir Roger told him carefully. “It seems there may be a rare booty in the homeland of this ship. With that, we could equip an army large enough not only to take, but to hold and settle all our conquests.”

Red John belched and scratched under his doublet. “If we don’t run into more nor we can handle, sire.”

“I think not. But you must prepare your men for this change of plan and soothe whatever fears they have.”

“That’lI not be easy, sire.”

“Why not? I told you the plunder would be good.”

“Well, my lord, if you want the honest truth, ’tis in this wise. You see, though we’ve most of the Ansby women along, and many of ’em are unwed and, urn, friendly disposed … even so, my lord, the fact remains, d’ you see, we’ve twice as many men as women. Now the French girls are fair, and belike the Saracen wenches would do in a pinch — indeed, they’re said to be very pinchable — but, judging from those blueskins we overmastered, well, their females aren’t so handsome.”

“How do you know they don’t hold beautiful princesses in captivity that yearn for an honest English face?”

“That’s so, my lord. It could well be.”

“Then see you have the bowmen ready to fight when we arrive.” Sir Roger clapped the giant on the shoulder and went out to speak similarly with his other captains.

He mentioned this question of women to me somewhat later, and I was horrified. “God be praised, that He made the Wersgorix so unattractive, if they are of another species!” I exclaimed. “Great is His forethought!”

“Ill-favored though they be,” asked the baron, “are you sure they’re not human?”

“Would God I knew, sire,” I answered after thinking about it. “They look like naught on earth. Yet they do go on two legs, have hands, speech, the power of reason.”

“It matters little,” he decided.

“Oh, but it matters greatly, sire!” I told him. “For see you, if they have souls, then it is our plain duty to win them to the Faith. But if they have not, it were blasphemous to give them the sacraments.”

“I 11 let you find out which,” he said indifferently.

I hurried forthwith to Branithar’s cabin, which was guarded by a couple of spearmen. “What would you?” he asked when I sat down.

“Have you a soul?” I inquired.

“A what?”

I explained what spiritus meant. He was still puzzled. “Do you really think a miniature of yourself lives in your head?” he asked.

“Oh, no. The soul is not material. It is what gives life — well, not exactly that, since animals are alive — will, the self—”

“I see. The brain.”

“No, no, no! The soul is, well, that which lives on after the body is dead, and faces judgment for its actions during life.”

“Ah. You believe, then, that the personality survives after death. An interesting problem. If personality is a pattern rather than a material object, as seems reasonable, then it is theoretically possible that this pattern may be transferred to something else, the same system of relationships but in another physical matrix.”

“Stop maundering!” I snapped impatiently. “You are worse than an Albigensian. Tell me in plain words, do you or do you not have a soul?”

“Our scientists have investigated the problems involved in a pattern concept of personality, but, so far as I know, data are still lacking on which to base a conclusion.”

“There you go again.” I sighed. “Can you not give me a simple answer? Just tell me whether or not you have a soul.”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re no help at all,” I scolded him, and left.

My colleagues and I debated the problem at length, but except for the obvious fact that provisional baptism could be given any nonhumans willing to receive it, no solution was reached. It was a matter for Rome, perhaps for an ecumenical council.

While all this went on, Lady Catherine had mastered her tears and swept haughtily on down a passageway, seeking to ease her inner turmoil by motion. In the long room where the captains dined, she found Sir Owain tuning his harp. He leaped to his feet and bowed. “My lady! This is a pleasant … I might say dazzling…surprise.”

She sat down on a bench. “Where are we now?” she asked in sudden surrender to her weariness.

Perceiving that she knew the truth, he replied, “I don’t know. Already the sun itself has shrunk till we have lost view of it among the stars.” A slow smile kindled in his dark face. “Yet there is sun enough in this chamber.”

Catherine felt a blush go up her cheeks. She looked down at her shoes. Her own lips stirred upward, unwilled by herself.

“We are on the loneliest voyage men ever undertook,” said Sir Owain. “If my lady will permit, I’ll seek to while away an hour of it with a song cycle dedicated to her charms.”

She did not refuse more than once. His voice rose until it filled the room.

There is a little to tell of the outward journey. The tedium of it soon bulked larger than the perils. Knights exchanged harsh words, and John Hameward had to crack more than one pair of heads together to keep order among his bowmen. The serfs took it best; when not caring for livestock, or eating, they merely slept.

I noticed that Lady Catherine was often at converse with Sir Owain, and that her husband was no longer overjoyed about it. However, he was always caught up in some plan or preparation, and the younger knight did give her hours of distraction, even of merriment.

Sir Roger and I spent much time with Branithar, who was willing enough to tell us about his race and its empire. I was reluctantly coming to believe his claims. Strange that so ugly a breed should dwell in what I judged to be the Third Heaven, but the fact could not be denied. Belike, I thought, when Scripture mentioned the four corners of the world, it did not mean our planet Terra at all, but referred to a cubical universe. Beyond this must lie the abode of the blessed; while Branithar’s remark about the molten interior of the earth was certainly consonant with prophetic visions of hell.