The Astrologer

{ Chapter Nine }

IN THE ECHO OF HIS THUNDER


THE KING’S GENERALS ASSEMBLED ON HORSEBACK IN the courtyard the next morning. The sky was cloudless and hard, the blue of agate, and Christmas was but a week away. I stood next to the prince with his groom and horse, shivering under my cloak. Prince Christian looked fine in his armor, very like a hero of old. I thought it almost a pity that at any moment the king would be discovered dead in his chamber, and the prince’s valiant sally against Jaaperson would not happen.

“You look indeed the warrior this day, my lord.”

“Thank you, Soren. Where is my father? His squire left to seek him a quarter hour ago.”

“It is curious, my lord. The army has never waited for the king; he has always been the first man ready to do battle. I hope no misfortune has befallen him.”

“Tush, my friend. Such talk brings ill luck. Ah, here comes my father even now.”

And it was true. The king marched into the courtyard with armor polished bright, his cape a crimson waterfall down his back. His eyes were clear and he looked at the face of his son a moment, bared his teeth like a dog, and then waved for the yeoman to bring him his stallion. The prince, the generals, and the captains all heaved themselves onto their horses. A wave of martial noise clattered over the courtyard, the sounds of steel plate rubbing over mail, of creaking saddle and harness and the sighing of three score heavy horses. I stood to Christian’s left, his boot near my elbow, one of his gold-plated spurs catching the morning light. We were beneath the leafless maple tree at the west end of the courtyard. The cloak slipped from my shoulders and fell to the flagstones and I took half a step toward the king. It was impossible that he lived.

The king looked around the courtyard, at his men on horseback and then at those of us on foot. He frowned.

“Where is Tristram?”

No one knew. A page ran into the castle. I felt the cold suddenly and pulled my furs off the ground and wrapped myself in them. The air was still, like on Easter mornings in the minute just before the church bells ring.

The page returned, red-faced and breathless. He gave his report to the king’s yeoman, who in turn spoke to the king. The king liked not what he heard, and struck the yeoman a hard blow, knocking him to the ground.

“Bernardo!”

Bernardo guided his horse up next to the king. The Swiss general and his men wore yellow and black armor, a swarm of deadly wasps in the belly of Denmark. The king spoke with Bernardo for a moment. Bernardo grimaced, or maybe it was a grin, then shook his head and called to one of his captains.

“Marcellus!”

Marcellus joined the king and the general. They spoke quietly, gesturing to the castle. Marcellus nodded, saluted the king, and climbed down off his horse. A groom took the reins and led Marcellus’s mount back to the stables as Marcellus walked the other way, into the castle. None of this activity made clear what was happening.

King Christian looked around once more at his officers and then shook his reins, riding out of the yard through the great iron gate on the south wall. The prince moved to ride at his father’s side, followed by the generals, captains, and other knights. In five minutes the courtyard had emptied but for a few guards and me. It would be some days before I saw any of the departing men again.

I went into the castle, to the great hall where a fire blazed. I stood near the hearth and warmed myself. It had been a confusing morning.

The king should have been dead. I had poisoned Tristram’s bottle of wine. A cup of it should have put Tristram into a sickbed for a fortnight, perhaps. The rest of the bottle, if the king drank it down, should have produced a royal corpse. Yet the king looked in fine fettle and showed no sign of having been touched by my potion. And where was Tristram?

I asked a page, asked two of them, and they did not know. They said that the Swiss captain, Marcellus, was in charge of Kronberg now. When I was thawed and warm I went to my chamber and tried to cast Tristram’s chart, but I could not remember the date of his birth, much less the hour. Instead I cast my own horoscope and Mercury turned up in unhappy conjunctions of death, death, and death. I was not safe.

My appetite was gone and I ate nothing all day. I packed my traveling trunk and carried the things that Fritz had brought me down to a corner of the cellars, putting a handful of vials into a hole behind a loose brick. As I walked through the castle I was sure I heard voices around each corner, whispering my name. Evening came on and I felt as though I was choking, short of breath. There was not enough air for me in Kronberg. To remain in the castle seemed foolhardy and I resolved to travel immediately to Hven. I would feel safer within the walls of Tycho’s empty castle than I did at the king’s fortress. What the crown commands, I must do, so none would raise an eyebrow at my departure. A boat could be hired in the morning at the harbor.

Over the last week I had not had a full night’s sleep and I was exhausted, almost a sleepwalker. The sun lowered into the west, taking with it the colors out of the sky, and as night fell over Denmark a darkness fell over my weary mind and I slept, fully dressed at the table by my window.

There was a hallway. The tiled floors and mustard yellow walls were familiar and I knew that I was in Uraniborg and I knew it was a dream. I heard Tycho’s voice behind me, echoing along the hallway, but Tycho was dead and Uraniborg was abandoned.

“Andersmann!”

Tycho had a massive voice; words boomed out from deep in his chest like cannon shots. In wintertime, when Tycho was angry or excited the glass would rattle in the windowpanes. Even his compliments were rough, like sand and sawdust mixed with honey, and that metal false nose he wore lent to his speech something of a hollowness, like a man with a head cold every day of his life. But no matter his mood, he was always loud. A few times Tycho had stepped beyond the limits of his patience with me and he leaned close and bellowed. It was like being struck with a plank across the face.

“Andersmann!”

Sand, sawdust, and honey behind me, and I stopped, turned about, and faced him. Tycho was just as I had last seen him: tall, broad through the shoulders and thick through the waist, a middle-aged dandy with brocade over every inch of his breeches, doublet, and sleeves. His great blond beard and mustaches were lovingly combed out and fell down to his chest. He was topped with the ridiculous maroon turban he affected in his last years, looking like a Moghul wizard or, as he called it, one of the Wise Men of the East. Behind Tycho slunk Jeppo, the dwarf he had adopted as something of a pet. Jeppo was dressed in a red and green robe with a white madcap on his head, the bells dangling by his crooked ears.

“Andersmann!”

“Aye, my lord Tycho.” My voice was small and thin, lost in the echo of his thunder.

“Hast thou completed the computations on the orbit of Venus?” He produced from out of the air a vast collection of pages, astronomical observations and rolls of charts and figures written in my hand. “How do you expect me to publish the Ruldophine tables when you are not even here to work? You run off to Copenhagen with that idiot prince, or gallivant over to Jutland on a boat to watch a war. Is this what service you render to me?”

“My lord, I beg your pardon. But you are dead and I must eat and—”

“Ah, you always were disappointing.”

“Nay, I loved you and your work.”

“You loved watching us work, you mean.”

“I worked, my lord. Four years with you on Hven, all night every night, the whole year ’round.”

“Your observations were never very good. Never so reliable as the others’.”

“Nay, I was as good as any.”

“Were you? Which one were you?”

“Soren Andersmann, my lord. I was your favorite. I was your favorite, Tycho. Do you not remember?”

“Ah, you were all my favorites.”

“Nay, just I, my lord. None but I.”

“Have you finished the calculations?”

I am slow at mathematics and I do not well comprehend complex formulae. Better leave me to draw up charts of the stars. I looked at my feet.

“Have you finished the calculations?”

“Nay.”

“What?” Tycho threw his armload of papers and charts at me. “Not done? Not done? Damn you, boy. Damn you. So lazy, so happy to eat at my table, but too lazy to work on my tables.”

His words cut into me and my blouse ripped open. I felt blood welling up through wounds on my arms and chest.

“Not finished, Andersmann? Can I not trust you, even now?”

“He will know not who his master is,” the dwarf said. “I have seen it!”

Tycho arched an eye at this. He had ever lent too much credence to Jeppo’s babbling, waving all to silence when the little beast had anything to say, even from under the table where he always skulked during supper.

I raised a hand in protest, coughing up gouts of black blood. My knees gave way and I toppled to the floor. Tycho stood above me, his mustaches shaking with rage.

“Still not done? Such a simple task I give you, boy: remember me and avenge my foul murder.”

“Most foul,” I whispered.

“Remember me. And finish your task.”

“I will remember,” I said. “If I must forget all else. Thou wert my—”

But he was gone. The observatory was dark and abandoned. A cold wind rolled over me and scattered Tycho’s papers and charts down the length of the hallway.

I awakened on the floor of my chamber, lying between the foot of my bed and the table. The night was still. I could hear nothing in the castle and knew not what time it was. It could have been ten or it could have been three, and there was no way to know how long I had slept. I stirred up the coals in the stove, lay down upon the bed, and pulled a blanket over my face.

The morning came, and with it a pair of Swiss guards banging at my chamber door. Captain Marcellus called for me at once. The Switzers gave me only a few minutes to pull myself together and I was half dreaming still when they brought me, yawning and squinting, to an office in the Trumpeter’s tower.

Marcellus waved me toward a chair and I sat. He stood by the window, the sky bright blue behind him. He raked his fingers through a short blond beard.

“You are the astrologer.”

“Good morning, Captain Marcellus. Is there nothing to eat? Is there no wine? No water? No bread, even?”

Sleep had restored to me some of my confidence. I am not a brave man, but I have a royal commission and Marcellus’s rank was barely above mine. My unease of the previous day remained, but I would not panic under a foreign mercenary’s gaze. I had some idea what he wanted to ask, but I was better educated and more intelligent than him. Marcellus would learn nothing.

“You have a large appetite,” he said. “Especially for one who ought be in mourning.”

“In mourning?”

“You have not heard.”

“The king is dead?”

Marcellus laughed, joined by the Switzers who had brought me to him.

“Nay, Old Christian lives, as far as we know. I speak of Sir Tollbooth.”

“Tristram is dead?”

“You know Tristram did not see the king off yesterday. I know that you asked after him.”

“There was no news of him yesterday.”

“Then here is news. Tristram was found dead in his chambers, an empty wine bottle at his feet.”

That old fool, that prideful old fool. I should have known him better than to believe he would drink only a single cup. I knew he would become ill from the wine, but I had surely not meant to bring about his end. Tristram was dead, and my poison had killed him. He had not been a bad man, and I hoped he had felt no pain. For a long moment I could say nothing. I strove to hide my emotion as Marcellus waited for my answer, a slight smile upon his lips.

“Alas, poor Tristram,” I said finally. “His physician had warned him against drink. Everyone knows that.”

“Everyone knows that,” Marcellus repeated. “But I think it were better had Tristram been warned against poison. Do you not agree?”

“Poison? What means this?”

Marcellus stepped over to me and struck me hard across the face. I do not encounter pain often and I shrank from Marcellus, pushing the chair over and scrambling on hands and knees away from him. The other Swiss each took hold of an arm and lifted me to my feet. Marcellus reached out and gripped me by a handful of hair. He gave my head a powerful shake. I thought my scalp would come away from my skull, and I let out a pitiful little moan.

“Be quiet, astrologer. If you do not bawl like a woman, we will treat you like a man. But you must answer me honestly.”

“Answer for what?”

Marcellus released me and turned to set right the chair I had pushed over. The Switzers put me down in it and stood on either side.

“You think I am an idiot,” Marcellus said.

“Nay”

“You think you can outfox the truth and speak more cleverly than I have craft to understand.”

“Nay”

“You think that I will not cut you open and pull your entrails from your living gut and feed them to the crows while you watch the feast.”

“What madness is this?”

“You are bleeding, astrologer.”

I put a hand to my face and it came away with a trail of blood on the palm. My left eyebrow was cut open. My head still rang from the blow Marcellus had given me.

“I belong to the king,” I said. “You cannot torture me. You do not have the right.”

“I can deliver you such pain as you have never dreamed of,” he said. “Tristram is dead. I am master of Kronberg while the king and Bernardo are away. You are a murderer. My rights are to pull your fingers from their joints, cut off your ears, skewer you on red hot irons, knock out each tooth in your jaws, suck the eyeballs from your skull, and choke you with your own bollocks. Do you think I cannot do these things?”

Marcellus smiled and I believed that not only could he do these things, but that he had done them before, to other men, many times.

“I am no murderer.”

Marcellus made a fist and put it against my ribs, below my heart. His men seized my arms and held me down in the chair.

“Oh, astrologer,” Marcellus said. He pushed against my ribs with his fist. “You are not being honest with me. Tristram was seen bringing the bottle of wine to you. He was later seen taking it to his own rooms.”

“What of it?”

Marcellus pushed harder against my ribs and I felt the bones shifting, pressing on my lungs. His face was very close to mine, his breath sour and hot. I thought I might vomit.

“Why do you care about Tristram?”

“Aha.” Marcellus removed his fist from my ribs and stood away from me. My chest ached as I inhaled and I imagined the bruise I would have below my heart.

“I do not think you meant to kill Tristram,” Marcellus said.

“I did not kill him at all. The wine—”

Marcellus drew back his fist and I turned my face away. He did not hit me.

“The wine was poisoned. Tristram’s physician is a doddering fool, but we Swiss have a surgeon who knows the smell and actions of uncountable poisons. He was not deceived. Tristram’s wine was tainted. By you. Deny it not.”

I saw how things were. Either Marcellus or the king would have my head over this act. I had failed my mission and so I must take the whole blame to protect Torstensson and his allies.

“Tristram was an accident.”

“Now you are being honest, astrologer. And what of Straslund? An accident?”

“Straslund?”

“You were seen with him as he fell into the moat. We Swiss have sharper eyes than you Danes credit. There was a snake in a snowstorm. A most curious thing it was, too.”

“An accident.”

“Your associates are plagued by accidents. Tell me, why were you in the king’s sleeping chamber the morning Straslund had his accident with the snake?”

I shook my head. Was there nothing they had not seen? Was Torstensson also being questioned, watching as his family was tortured by agents of the king? Were all the others who were involved being beaten by interrogators this morning?

“How long have you spied upon me?”

“We see everything,” Marcellus said. “We have seen you with poisonous snake and poisoned wine. We have seen how your poisons struck well outside the mark. Accidents, as you say. But who is the mark? We have seen you spy upon the king’s coming and going. We have seen that your target is no other than King Christian of Denmark.”

I said nothing. Marcellus shook his head and sighed.

“You are a most clumsy assassin. Must every man in the nation fall prey to your accidents while the king dies slowly of old age? You are not the man to do this deed, astrologer. That much is clear. You will need our help.”