Grayhame needed to enlist only a dozen or so of his men in order to carry out his primary task; but Maynton's and Howice's task was to prepare all of their men, archers and men-at-arms alike, for the brutal hand-to-hand combat certain to rage within the hull of the ship. And they had to do it in a way which would avoid warning the demon-jester. Which meant Sir Richard also had to do it without actually warning any more than a tiny handful of his own subordinates. Indeed, the only men he'd actually briefed in detail were the members of what everyone, following Matilda's initial example, had come to refer to as Sir George's "Round Table": the dozen knights who served as his and Sir Richard's military aides and unit commanders. They, and only they—aside from Grayhame and his carefully chosen archers—knew what Sir George intended.
In many ways, that was the aspect of the plan which most disturbed the baron. He felt more than a little guilty for involving not simply his men but their wives and children in a mutiny which could end only in victory or death without even warning them, yet he had no choice. He could trust the ability of Sir Richard, Sir Anthony, Sir Bryan, and the other knights he himself had created to conceal their excitement lest they give away what was coming. He could not do the same for his entire company. Every individual admitted to the conspiracy more than doubled the possibility of a careless or ill-considered remark which might inadvertently give away the entire plot, and that was a risk he would not run, for this was a conspiracy which could not be allowed to fail.
Once he and the dragons had established communications, the aliens "spoke" with him every night while he seemed to sleep dreamlessly beside his wife, and each of those conversations served only to reinforce the baron's own earlier conclusions about the demon-jester. Whatever happened to Earth, and however much the demon-jester might praise Sir George and his men, the time was virtually certain to arise when the English would become a potential embarrassment for the demon-jester's guild... and when that happened, they would all die.
And so Sir George and his officers made their plans and prayed for success.
"Good afternoon, Commander," Sir George said courteously as the demon-jester's air car floated to a stop at the meticulously laid out lists and the vehicle's domed top retracted.
"Good afternoon," the demon-jester piped back. He pushed up out of his comfortable, form-fitting seat to stand upright in the air car, and Sir George held his breath. The demon-jester had approved the plan the baron had presented for the required demonstration to this world's natives, but there was always the possibility that he might change his mind at the last moment. Now the demon-jester glanced around for another long moment, studying the tall rows of seats the English had erected for the local chieftains. The "seats" were actually little more than long, bare poles, but they served the three-legged aliens well enough, and the chieftains sat with barbarian impassivity. It was, of course, impossible to read their mood from their expressions, but their total motionlessness suggested a great deal to Sir George.
The demon-jester gazed at them without comment, but Sir George could almost taste his "Commander's" satisfaction. The alien had eagerly embraced the baron's suggestion that they might also organize a joust and melee to follow the archery competition and demonstrate the advantages which the Englishmen's armor bestowed upon them in close combat, as well. The fact that organizing the melee meant that Maynton and Sir George, the leaders of the competing sides, would each have a small but fully armed and armored force under his immediate command clearly hadn't occurred to the demon-jester. Of course, the implications hadn't occurred to most of the Englishmen, either... except for a handpicked few among them who had finally been briefed this very morning and knew precisely what their commanders intended.
"You have done well," the demon-jester said now, and Sir George smiled broadly as the alien stepped out of the air car at last.
"Thank you, Commander. It's often better—and almost always less expensive—to overawe a foe into surrender, if possible, than to defeat him in the field."
"So I also believe," the demon-jester agreed, and started up the wooden stairs to the special box the English had built for him. It was rare, though not completely unheard of, for him to leave his air car in the field. But this time there was a difference. Before, Sir George had never known that the invisible barriers of his "force fields" protected him from all physical contact only aboard the ship or within the confines of the air car. Now, thanks to the dragon-men, he did know, and his smile grew still broader as the demon-jester ascended to his place.
His personal escort of six dragon-men followed with no more sign of expression or excitement than they had ever shown, and Sir George's smile faded as he gazed upon them. They remained as alien, as unearthly, in every sense of the word, as ever to his eye, but he no longer knew them by eye alone. Truth to tell, the subtler internal differences between them and humans were almost more alien than their outer appearances, yet those differences now struck him as intriguing, even exciting, rather than grotesque or repellant. The joint sense of existence which always led them to use "we" or "us" rather than "I" or "me" in communication. The calm with which they accepted their own inability to reproduce or their inevitable separation from the ongoing growth and change of their own race. The manner in which they accepted contact and other-induced change or constraint at the very deepest level of their beings... All of those things were truly and utterly alien to Sir George. But they weren't threatening. They weren't... evil. Whatever the dragons' outer shape and form, Sir George had decided, however different their perceptions and methods of communication, and despite the fact they could never father or bear children, they were as much "men" in every important sense of the word as any Englishman he had ever met.
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.