The Astrologer

{ Chapter Seven }

IF ATLAS VOLUNTEERS


WITH IMMENSE RELIEF I BADE THE PRINCE AND THE other guests a good evening, explaining that I had nine horoscopes to cast before dawn and must begin the work immediately. Neither Ulfeldt nor the bishop acknowledged me as I left the hall. I fled, almost running down the corridors to my chamber, where I bolted the door behind me. It was to be a long night, with many interruptions.

Ulfeldt had known that the king would give me this astrological task; during the banquet one of his clerks slipped a sheet of paper under my door with Baron Jaaperson’s date, time, and place of birth listed on it. I knew nothing of the baron except that he owned an estate west of Copenhagen and, according to the note from Ulfeldt, was a year older than me.

I set my lamp on the table by the window and from my traveling trunk produced bottles of ink in three colors, pens, a brass rule, my compass, paper for the charts, and those books I used to calculate the houses, the positions of the heavenly bodies, the Arabic parts, and the aspects. If I could draw up each horoscope in less than an hour, the king would have his charts by morning. My main concerns were to make the charts beautiful and to stay awake long enough to complete them.

The horoscopes would of course be fantasies, having little to do with the men’s nativities or the positions of the planets. What the king expected were heavenly blessings upon him and his son, balanced by the condemnation of his enemy. Yet even completely false horoscopes covering three consecutive days for three men would consume a good deal of time. I was already drowsy from the wine and my head ached from the attacks upon my book that I had endured during the meal. The king forbade me to publish my book, but he would not be king long, and so I pushed the insults and ignorant remarks from my mind, inked the nib of my compass, and drew the great circles which formed the frameworks for the nine maps of heaven I would prepare. Someday, I thought, I would pay a printer to make up sheets with blank templates on them to save me time. There is much to be said for crafting every element of a horoscope by hand, but there is an equally compelling argument for eliminating those repetitive tasks that require no learning. An entire chapter of Nunc Scio Mysterium is devoted to an idea I had of mechanical inscribing tools, arrayed in long banks which would mimic the movements of a scribe’s hand, and thus many copies of autograph manuscripts, notes, letters, or new laws could be produced without the necessity of typeset and presses. Any secretary or draughtsman with a legible hand would become a printing house at will. Later in the book I extend this idea to include other craftsmen using hand tools, such as bootmakers or wood carvers.

I had no such machine in my chamber at Kronberg, so I drew the concentric circles and intersecting primary angles with my own hands, and that alone took an hour. This mindless work relaxes some men, but it tried my patience and I stood away from the table and paced about my tiny room, wondering how to proceed. The king’s horoscope must predict his good fortune in a manner different from the good fortune predicted by the prince’s horoscope. The ill fortune of Jaaperson must grow out of yet a third set of circumstance, else it would be clear to any that I had fabricated all of the astrological charts. I sat down and scribbled some notes for the prince’s chart, looked through my tables, and tried a few calculations regarding Christian’s planets that I did not like at all. No real progress did I make, and another hour slipped away. The room felt close and distracting; the coal stove was too hot and my eyes closed against my will. Soon I was face down over my notes and charts, dead to the world.

I dreamed of a warm, late summer night. There was a clear sky, moonless but bespeckled with stars. I crossed a field of wheat stubble toward a small farmhouse. A full hayrack stood before the house and a skinny milk cow was tied up within the barn, visible through the open doors. The house was of unpainted wood, its roof of willow branch and thatch. I knew it to be empty, but I did not know where the farmer and his family had gone.

The torch in my hand cast ruddy light that etched deep shadows into the scene around me. I walked to the hayrack and touched the torch to the dry wooden frame. It blazed up like a festival bonfire and I knew that the farmers saw me, that they watched from the darkness as the hayrack erupted into flame. Men shouted across the field of stubble, their voices growing rapidly nearer. I threw my torch into the burning hayrack and ran to the left, down a slope toward a river.

A large round stone came hurtling out of the surrounding black and struck me hard in the skull. I tumbled to the ground and lay dead or dying with my cheek against the warm, soft bosom of the earth and my eyes open. A few inches from my face a handful of my brains glistened wet and bloody in the dirt. The sound of the stone flying against my head was hollow and wooden and I continued to hear that sharp knocking, over and over again.

After a minute—perhaps many minutes—I sat up in my room, disoriented and alarmed. The knocking continued and I realized that someone was at the door.

“A moment,” I said. “Who’s there?”

“A servant of her Majesty the queen. You are summoned.”

I rubbed my eyes.

“What is the hour?”

“It is gone two o’clock,” the voice said. “The queen instructs you not to delay, and to dress warmly, sir.”

“This is all most unlikely.” I opened my door and found a page standing in the hall. He looked no happier than me to be awake at that hour.

“You will need a heavy cloak,” he said. “The queen awaits you at the top of the east tower. It will be cold, sir.”

“You are sincere?”

“It is very late for a page to make jokes with one of the king’s intimates, sir. I pray thee come with haste, that we both may return to our beds soon.”

“Aye.” I looked at my unfinished work. There was much to do, but I could not refuse an invitation from Kirsten, even one coming in the small hours of the morning. It was intriguing besides, and the cold air atop the tower would clear my head. I found my heaviest cloak and told the page to lead me to the queen.

“What is this about?” We had come to the stairs up the tower.

“Faith, I know not. I was sleeping until her summons to summon you. That is all I know. And now we are near the summit and I must wait here for you. The queen would speak to you in private.”

“Try to stay awake, and I shall try to be quick.”

I left the page at the landing and walked up the last flight of stairs alone. My footsteps echoed on the tiles and the stairwell was cold. The page was not dressed for warmth and I felt sorry for him. At last I came to a heavy wooden door. I raised my hand to knock, but the door opened and one of the queen’s private guards, a tall Dane whose name I did not know, stood in my way.

“It is the astrologer, my lady,” the guard announced.

“Admit him,” Kirsten said from within.

The guard stood to one side and I entered the watchman’s platform at the top of the tower. It was a plain room with plaster walls, four paces square, with a bare wooden floor. It was empty but for an iron stove in one corner and an oak chair next to it. The queen sat in this chair, wrapped in her fox cape and wolf hat. Coals burned in the stove, but the room had wide windows in three walls, unshuttered and open to the night. My breath clouded the air before me and I shivered as I approached Kirsten. She bade the soldier wait outside with the door closed and then she stood.

“Do not be alarmed,” she said.

“Majesty.” I bowed low. “It is very late, is it not?”

“Come stand beside me at the window,” she said. “There is a fine view of the harbor, the wind and waves making toys of the great ships. Those shapes beyond are your little town of Elsinore. See you there?”

I looked out at darkness. It had stopped snowing, but the moon and sky were hid behind banks of clouds. The wind lifted sheaves of dry snow from the castle roof and blew them all around the tower. Nothing was visible of the harbor or the town and I said as much to Kirsten.

“Perhaps I only fool myself that anything is out there to be seen,” she said. “But I trust that even if you find nothing in the dark, you are a man of some vision, Soren.”

The queen fell silent. Something was required of me, but I knew not what it was and the silence grew more uncomfortable with each moment until I had to speak.

“Majesty, I do not know what you mean.”

Kirsten sighed.

“I doubt it not. I find myself speaking in riddles all the day. So I shall be plain with you. My son holds you in high regard.”

“And I him, my lady.”

“He is crown prince of Denmark; your regard for him is natural. I have learned that you saved his life aboard ship from Jutland.”

“That is an exaggeration, Majesty.” The wind blew a cloud of ice crystals into the room and I shut my eyes against the blast of cold. “There was a wave come over the ship’s rail and your son was splashed, nothing more.”

“The prince tells it differently. This brave act of yours is the principle reason I invited you to sup with our family. I had planned to thank you at table so that my husband would know of it and reward your heroism.”

I said nothing.

“Do not frown so,” Kirsten said. “You feel that your reward has been small-mindedness and punishment, but my husband’s behavior to you is your own doing. You have ever been an opinionated little scholar. I admire that in one who tutors my son, but it was inevitable that your opinions should get you into distress.”

“My book is not so troublesome as Lord Ulfeldt paints it. If the king had but read it—”

“Oh, your book, your book. Enough on your book. As I said at table, Prince Frederik interests himself with the very debates you introduce, and I shall see to it that a copy of your manuscript finds its way to him. You know how Frederik admires learning and new ideas.”

“Aye, lady. He is a friend to philosophy.”

“He was also a friend to your late master.” Kirsten gave me an odd half smile and leaned forward, into the breeze at the window. The blowing snow dusted the front of her wide fur hat with a smear of white. “Frederik did not share my husband’s poor opinion of Tycho and will do whatever he can to keep that great man’s instruments—and his legacy—within Denmark. I think such would please you?”

“My queen, such would earn my deepest gratitude.”

“I would be happy to have your gratitude. Especially if my kindness repays a kindness of your own.”

“My lady, what gift have I to offer a queen? I am but your servant.”

“You are my husband’s servant.”

“Aye, lady. And yours, and Prince Christian’s.”

Kirsten backed away from the window, her face red from the cold.

“Christian is my only child. You may well value him as a friend and the future king of Denmark, but I hold him in greater esteem than that, as my son.”

“I do not doubt it, Majesty.”

“Christian is your friend?”

“I have no friend greater. I would refuse him nothing.”

“And of me, his mother? What would you refuse me, were I to ask you to act out of your love for Christian?”

“I confess that your meaning escapes me.”

Kirsten sighed again and closed her eyes a moment. My failure to understand her hints did seem to frustrate her.

“You are this night casting horoscopes for the upcoming battle against Baron Jaaperson, are you not?”

“Aye, lady.”

“The king hopes for a happy alignment of the heavens.”

“Of course.”

“And he will receive such happy news.”

“Of course.”

“I merely ask that you cast my son’s chart very ill, so that the king will not bring him into the battle. You have such subtlety of craft, I assume.”

“Does my lady think that the king will be dissuaded by scribbles on a few sheets of parchment? He will only ignore my prognostications should they displease him.”

In truth, the prince’s horoscope confused me and I did not like anything I had seen in my tables and calculations earlier. I said none of this to Kirsten. She made a fist and beat it against the window sill, once, and then opened her hand. Kirsten wore fine gloves of white kidskin, with small crosses of rubies inset on the backs.

“Then you must give my husband an ill horoscope. He values his own life, and he values your advice.”

“He values that I know what advice he wishes me to give, Majesty. Should I defy his imagination in this he will only cut off my head and find another astrologer. I am yet young, and I hope to grow to a very old age, my lady.”

The wind kicked against the side of the tower and threw snow up into our faces. Kirsten and I pulled our furs more tightly about ourselves. She was silent a moment and turned her face away. When she again looked at me her face was wet, but I could not tell if she wept or was merely damp from the snow melting off her hat. The queen moved close and lowered her voice to a whisper.

“My son risks his life tomorrow or the next day over the precious politics men play at. I much do enjoy having Prince Christian with me in Copenhagen during these holidays, but I like it not at all that my husband drags him off to war, collecting rents for demanding noblemen while he pretends that Jaaperson is some great threat to the crown. The king may play with death all he likes, but I do not desire my son to partake in this game.”

“My lady, is this not the role of a prince, to follow his father into war?”

“Do not mouth these empty words into my ear,” she hissed. “Be kind to your former pupil’s mother. I bring you here as friend to Christian, not as friend to Denmark. I do not want my boy to lie butchered in the snow on the highway to Copenhagen, no matter how princely it would be. I hear that speech enough from my husband.”

“He will not live forever,” I said, the words coming out of my mouth before I had time to consider them. My flippancy alarmed me and I made to step back from the queen, but she took hold of my arm and pulled me to her. Kirsten smelled deliciously of delicate powders, soaps, and perfumes I could not name. For a moment I was dizzy.

“Just so,” she whispered. “He will not live forever. And if he falls in battle, great soldier that he is, such a battle will surely overbear my son, and his death will be certain. Is it not so?”

“My lady, I do not presume to—”

“No matter.” She released me from her grasp. “You must forgive me. I am a worried mother and the passion of my speech holds nothing of sense. I pray you, speak to none of my concern.”

“Majesty, not a word.”

“Remember that you are my son’s friend.” She glided away from me, her slippers silent on the bare floor. She paused at the door and inclined her head. “I leave you now to your task.”

I bowed and then Kirsten was gone. For a few minutes I stood alone atop the tower, staring out at the black night, seeing nothing but stray plumes of blown snow and what may have been a few torches beyond the battlements. The air was cold and dried my eyes and I began to shiver. The page who had brought me to the queen had gone to bed and I was left to find my way alone, but Kronberg is not so large nor as labyrinthine as the royal palace and I found my room directly.

The unfinished horoscopes waited there for me. I hung my cloak on a peg, stretched my neck and shoulders, and then sat down to work. Not long before daybreak, I finished, rolled up the charts, and tied them with a string.

Yawn after yawn overtook me as I walked from my chamber to the king’s office where I left the horoscopes with a page. The page bade me good morning. I bade him good night and hurried back to my chamber. Passing the tall windows in the corridors I looked out upon a dull gray world lying beneath a dull gray sky, the sun a gray shape hulking on the horizon, giving no color to the clouds or the Earth.

I do not remember getting to bed or falling into sleep, nor do I remember what I dreamt before Torstensson let himself into my room and shook me awake.

“A man who aspires to be an assassin ought to remember to lock his door,” Torstensson said.

“I have only just come to bed,” I complained. “I aspire to nothing but more sleep. What time is it?”

“Well past noon. You need not rise on my account. I am in Elsinore but another hour or so, and then I must away.”

“You’ve brought the weapons?”

“If that is what you call them, yes. The trunk is there in the corner. Take care with these toys, my friend.”

“I will. You bring a box full of death, and I am aware how you put your own life in jeopardy to carry them into this castle.”

“I do not complain, Soren. Just as you demanded that yours be the hand to silence the king, I swore to assist you as I can. If Atlas volunteers for his employment, he ought not bemoan the weight of the world on his back.”

“You are a good man, Fritz.”

“This is not about my goodness, but the good of the nation. Last night I dreamed of the king. He marched his army across Denmark, fighting a great battle from one end of the realm to the other, the nation blood-soaked and too small to hold all the fallen. Christian rode at the head of his terrible army, the troops all clad in black armor spattered with Danish blood, the soldiers’ faces black and beaked cruelly like man-sized ravens, their shining black eyes gazing unblinking at the hillocks of corpses and gore left in their wake. The king stood in his saddle, his sword arm sweeping across the sky, blocking out the sun. I awoke terrified, in a bath of sweat. I am not a good man. I am a conspirator in treason.”

“I could ask for no better conspirator. Now get thee gone, that I might sleep.”

Torstensson took my hand.

“Have great care, Soren. Lock your door.”

“I will, by the Cross. You shall soon hear news of the king. Has cousin Erik met his fate?”

“Killed by highwaymen only yesterday.”

“A tragedy.”

“Aye, for him.”

“Well, Fritz. I will write another tragedy here in Elsinore. But first I must sleep.”