by David Weber
Thank God. I could use your intelligence for a change, Axel. Your prejudices are no good to me at all.
"Please continue," said the chancellor. For a wonder, the tone was as polite as the words themselves.
"The point I'm trying to make is simply that Gretchen, because of her position at the front, often ignores what you might call the political logistics of the campaign." Joachim's face seemed suddenly that of a much older man. "I am not oblivious, King and Chancellor, to the cost of a revolution as well as its benefits. I've studied the same history books the Americans brought with them—as I'm sure you have. And while those books played a great role in leading me to the conclusions which I have reached, they have also—more than they did with Gretchen, perhaps—cautioned me about the possible dangers. So, personally, I would prefer a slower campaign."
The owlish gaze was back—and, this time, very much that of a raptor. "Sieges can be won in many ways, after all. A furious battle at the breach, followed by a sack, is only one of them—and not, all things considered, usually the ideal resolution."
Gustav II Adolf, king of Sweden, emperor of the Confederated Principalities of Europe, returned the raptor gaze with one of his own. Given that he was almost universally acknowledged as the greatest soldier of his time, it was an impressive stare. The great beak of a nose helped, of course.
Still, the young owl did not flinch from the eyes of the eagle in his prime. For some odd reason, Gustav found that reassuring.
"True," he said abruptly. "I've fought and won many sieges, you know—more, perhaps, than any man of my time. The best way to resolve a siege is for the defenders to surrender. And, in my experience, that's always helped greatly if they are allowed to surrender with honor and dignity, and march out of the town still carrying their colors and arms. Best of all, if they then take service in your own ranks."
Finally, Thierbach seemed to be what he was—a very young man, confronting an older and much more powerful one. His expression was . . . not abashed, no, not even nervous—but perhaps a bit uncertain.
"So I believe also," he said softly. "I have no love for bloodshed, Your Majesty. Neither does Gretchen, for that matter, whatever others might think."
A very young man, now. His eyes were worried. "How is she, by the way? Have you heard anything?" He made a little gesture toward the crowd of people in the room. "We're all worried about her. Things in France seem . . . not good."
Gustav barked a laugh. "Isn't that why you sent her there in the first place? 'Not good,' indeed! The perfect place for a trouble-maker."
Joachim managed a smile, but the worry was still evident.
The king waved his hand heavily. "I have not heard anything, no. But—"
Afterward, Axel would chide and scold him. For hours, and days, dribbling on into weeks and months. But Gustavus Adolphus had always been a decisive man. Convinced, since he was sixteen, a teenage prince leading his father's troops in the capture of a Danish fortress, that hesitation lost far more battles—and wars—than mistakes ever did.
"Done," he said firmly. "Whatever I can do to help your firebrand lady, if it proves necessary, I will do. You have my word on it. For my part—if it proves necessary—I will expect your full support against my own enemies. Things in France, as you say, do not look good."
"Richelieu," hissed Joachim. Gustav was gratified to hear the hiss echoed throughout the room.
The young radical straightened. "Richelieu, the Habsburgs—all that carrion—against them, Your Highness, the Committees of Correspondence stand firmly at your side."
Again, the murmur rippling through the crowd indicated that young Thierbach spoke for all of them. Gustav nodded his head.
"Good. And now, before I leave, is there anything further you wish to discuss?"
Joachim studied him with those solemn, owlish eyes. Then, a bit abruptly: " 'Discuss' is not perhaps the right term, Your Majesty. 'Illustrate a point,' might be better."
He swiveled in his chair and pointed to one of the young men standing toward the front of the crowd. A stripling, perhaps seventeen years old, short and skinny. "That's Friedrich Gulda. He comes from Mecklenburg. He's an orphan now. Has been for five years, since Wallenstein passed through the area. He managed to hide in the fields while his family was destroyed. He was there for hours, listening to it all. Wallenstein's soldiers took their time about it."
He allowed Gustav Adolf and Oxenstierna to flesh out in their own minds the details concerning what 'took their time about it' meant. Being very experienced soldiers, neither of them had any difficulty doing so. Joachim's finger moved on.
"That girl is Hannelore. She's sixteen years old. She's from Brandenburg. A similar story, except her older brother survived also and their people were killed by Danish troops. They think, at least. Might have been some of Mansfeld's men. Who knows? To commoners, especially peasants, mercenary armies are hard to tell apart."
Gustav Adolf's jaws tightened. Hard to tell apart for their own supposed "commanders," too. Not the least of the reasons I agreed with Stearns' proposal. Or Simpson's, as I think it really emerged.
The finger moved on, centering on a hard-faced man in his mid-twenties. The expression on the man's face was . . . implacable.
"That's her older brother, in fact. Gunther Achterhof." Joachim's lips twisted. "When Gunther first arrived here he had some ears and noses wrapped up in a cloth. Horrid withered things. It took me a week to convince him to throw them away. Fortunately, he'd already thrown away the private parts."
He gave king and chancellor a glance which was every bit as hard as Achterhof's face. "He and his cousin and some neighbors, you see, caught two of the soldiers afterward. Stragglers. Probably not the soldiers who murdered his family, but Gunther doesn't care much. Not at all, in fact. A mercenary soldier is a mercenary soldier. And . . ."
If anything, Joachim's face was now even harder than Achterhof's. "As far as he's concerned, the prince who hired the soldier is simply another prince. Gunther Achterhof is no longer interested very much—if at all—in making fine distinctions. Neither is his cousin Ludwig, who is the tall man standing over there in the corner."
The inexorable finger moved on. "That red-headed man is Franz Heidbreder. He comes from Mecklenburg also. Most of his family survived, fortunately. In fact"—the finger slid sidewise—"that's his brother Friedrich and over there are his cousins Moritz and Agnes. Their farms were destroyed three years ago when your own Swedish army arrived in Germany. All the sheep were requisitioned, along with just about everything else. True, they were paid for the sheep. But you have debased your currency so many times that Swedish coin isn't accepted by most merchants."
Gustav's heavy jaws tightened still further, but he did not argue the point. He had debased his currency, trying to cover the huge expenses of his expedition to Germany.
Softly, but in a tone as unyielding as granite, Joachim continued. "Franz's mother died that first winter, from disease brought on by hunger. His youngest brother died in the spring. After the whole family left Mecklenburg to try to find shelter elsewhere, one of his cousins and an aunt died on the road. Again, disease; again, because they were weakened by hunger and had no shelter. When Franz found his aunt's body, she had a handful of grass stuffed in her mouth. At the end, apparently, she tried to eat it."
By now, Oxenstierna's face was pinched. Gustav's was simply impassive. The chancellor began to say something but the king laid a firm hand on his arm.
Meanwhile, Joachim's finger had moved on. The young Saxon nobleman's face seemed to soften a bit. "That girl there is Mathilde Wiegert. She was the one who introduced me to Gretchen Richter, as it happens. She's from the Palatinate, also driven into exile when the war struck. I met Mathilde herself when I was a student at Jena. She and her cousin Inga had become prostitutes by then, in order to support themselves and the younger girls with them."
The pretty young woman named Mathilde gave Gustav Adolf a little smile. Hers was the only smiling face in the ro
om. But the king understood that the smile was not really directed at him. It was directed at the young man who was giving the king a none-too-subtle "illustration."
Joachim swiveled back in his chair, to face Gustav and Oxenstierna squarely. "As it happens, also, Mathilde is the immediate cause of my estrangement from my family. My noble father had no objection at all to my having mounted a commoner prostitute—in fact, he encouraged me to do so as part of my education—but he was outraged when I told him I plan to marry her once the laws have been changed here in Magdeburg to match the laws of the United States."
Once the laws have been changed. Not if. There, too, was a point being made.
"Such is the piety of aristocracy, King and Chancellor. Such is what—nothing more—all of your fine distinctions between Lutheran and Calvinist and Catholic come to in the end. Which nobleman gets to plunder and abuse which commoner at his convenience."
"Enough!" barked Oxenstierna.
A little growl rumbled through the cavernous room. Joachim fixed Oxenstierna with a stony gaze. "Yes, indeed, Chancellor. Precisely my point. Enough."
Oxenstierna started to rise, angrily. But Gustav's hand, this time, was more than "firm." The king of Sweden was an immensely powerful man. He simply seized Oxenstierna by the shoulder and drove him back down into his chair.
"You will listen to my people, Chancellor," he hissed. "I will not lose my dynasty because of the folly of nobility." He gave Oxenstierna his own version of a stony gaze; which, if it had none of the fervor of Joachim's, made up for the lack by sheer self-confidence. "Vasa. Do not forget."
He turned back to Joachim, sensing the crowd settling down a bit. For a moment, the king and the revolutionary studied each other. Then Gustav Adolf nodded, and came to another decision. It would not be the first time, after all, that the king of Sweden had found it necessary to burn a bridge while on campaign. Some of those bridges had been behind him.
"I have decided to bring my family from Sweden here to Magdeburg. My daughter, at least. Kristina, as you may know, is quite young. Seven years old."
He glanced around the room. From their appearance, most of the crowd consisted of teenagers and people in their twenties. But, sprinkled here and there, he could see a few older ones—and a handful of children.
"Palaces are stodgy places. Very boring, for a spirited young girl. I think she would enjoy an occasional outing here."
He brought his eyes back to Thierbach. The young man seemed paralyzed for a moment. Then, astonished; then . . .
His thin shoulders squared. "She would have to learn how to bake," he said firmly, in a voice which had barely a trace of a quiver. "It's the rule."
Axel looked like he might be on the verge of apoplexy. Gustav burst into laughter.
"Splendid!" he said, slapping the table with a meaty hand. "Her mother—my wife—will have a fit, of course. So would my own mother. But my grandmother, on the other hand—the wife of the great Gustav Vasa—is reputed to have been quite an accomplished baker. I see no reason not to restore that skill to the family."
Oxenstierna began expostulating his protests the moment they left the building. But Gustav waved him down impatiently.
"Later, Axel, later. You know as well as I do that my wife is unfit to bring up my daughter. She's a sweet woman, but . . . weak. How much trouble has she caused us already, by her susceptibility to flattering courtiers?"
He stopped, boots planted firmly in the muddy street, and glared down at his chancellor. "And you also know—you've read the histories, the same as I have—what happened to Kristina. In the end, for all her obvious brains and talents and spirit, she converted to Catholicism and abdicated the throne. I won't have it!"
"You were dead in that—" Axel's hand groped in midair. "Other history. You're alive in this one."
The king shrugged. "True. She still needs to be brought up among women. Part of the time, at least." He jerked his head toward the Freedom Arches. "Say whatever else you will about Gretchen Richter and her cohorts, they are not weak."
Axel's face was almost red. Gustav decided to relent. He placed a hand on his chancellor's shoulder and began guiding him back toward the palace. "Oh, do relax. I don't plan to have Kristina spend much time with that radical lot, I assure you. No, no. I'll find some suitable noblewoman to serve as her—what do the Americans call it? 'Role model,' as I recall."
Oxenstierna seemed mollified. Gustav, looking ahead to a day filled with contentious meetings, decided to leave it at that. No reason to mention the precise noblewoman he had in mind, after all.
Alas, despite his often unthinking prejudices, Oxenstierna's own brains were excellent. Within ten paces, the chancellor was scowling fiercely again.
"Don't tell me. Gustav! You can't be thinking—"
"And why not?" demanded the king. "I think my newest—and youngest—baroness would make a splendid companion for Kristina."
He held up a finger. "Given the nature of the times, Kristina should learn how to shoot." Held up another. "And, in reverse, Julie Mackay rides a horse like a sack. Kristina's already an excellent rider, so she can teach the baroness that skill—which, I'm sure you'll agree, is essential for a proper and respectable Swedish noblewoman."
"Julie Mackay is in England," grumbled Oxenstierna. "Maybe even Scotland, by now."
"So? She'll be back."
"Things in England also do not 'look good.' "
"So?" repeated Gustav. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, pointing back to the Freedom Arches. "If I wind up having to rescue one contentious young woman, why not two?"
They plodded on in silence for a bit. Then, Axel sighed. "Or three, or four. I never thought the day would come I'd say this, but I wish Rebecca Stearns were back in our midst. I . . . miss her advice. She is very shrewd, and easy to work with."
Gustav chuckled heavily. "Indeed. It's a bit amazing, isn't it, the way it works. Having Gretchen Richter—or Julie Mackay—as a frame for the portrait, Rebecca Stearns suddenly looks like the wisest woman in the world."
Chapter 6
"Remember, Julie," said Melissa sternly, "that you don't have any antibiotics. So—"
"Will you cut it out?" interrupted Julie crossly. She folded another corner of the blanket around her baby's head. "If I have to listen to one more lecture about this, I think I'll scream." She gave her husband a sour glance. "Alex chews on my ear about it ten times a day."
Julie's Scot husband flushed. With his fair complexion and redhead freckles, a "flush" was fairly dramatic. "Damnation, lass," he growled, " 'tis no joking matter. I shouldna allowed you to come on this trip at all, much less bring the child."
For a moment, Julie's lips parted. Melissa almost winced, imagining the retort. And how the hell do you propose to have STOPPED me from coming? You—!
Fortunately, Julie reined in the impulse. Whatever the realities of their personal relationship, Julie had learned to accommodate her husband's need to maintain, at least in public, the façade of being the "man of the house." That—just as his willingness, however reluctant, to allow her and their infant daughter Alexi to accompany him on his sudden emergency trip to Scotland—was one of many compromises the two young people had learned to make in order to keep their marriage a going concern.
It had not always been easy for them, Melissa knew. The clash of cultural attitudes between a 17th-century Scot cavalryman and a 21st-century American woman was . . . awesome, at times. That wasn't helped by the fact that, on one side, Alex Mackay was a Scot nobleman—born under the bar sinister, true, but still with a nobleman's attitudes. And, on the other . . . Melissa had to force herself not to laugh. To describe Julie Mackay as "stubborn and strong-willed" would have been much like describing the ocean as "wet and salty." A given; a fact of nature. As well command the tides to roll back as expect her to be meek and demure.
Then, too, they were both very young. Alex in his early twenties; Julie still months away from her twentieth birthday. With all the advantages of being in late
middle age, and separated by far less in the way of a culture gap, it was not as if Melissa herself and James Nichols hadn't had their share of domestic quarrels.
Feeling a little guilty that she'd occasioned this latest clash, Melissa groped for words to soothe the situation. Dammit, woman, you're supposed to be a peacemaker on this mission. You're not a '60s college radical any longer, cheerfully poking the establishment.
Grope, grope. The truth was that Melissa found agitation and troublemaking a lot more natural than being a diplomat. She couldn't find the words.
Fortunately, Julie had other characteristics than stubbornness. One of them—quite pronounced, in fact—was affection. So Melissa was spared the need to play the role of peacemaker. Julie suddenly smiled, slid an arm around her husband's waist, and drew him close. A wet and enthusiastic kiss on the cheek drained the flush right out of Alex's face. And immediately put another one in its place, of course. But that was a flush of pleasure, not anger.
Nor embarrassment, even though Julie's display of affection was quite public. They were all standing on the quays where the ship from Hamburg was moored. The Pool of London was crowded with stevedores and sailors and people waiting to embark on other ships. But Alex was not disturbed. Not at all, judging from the way his own lips sought Julie's.
One of the things Melissa had learned, in the two years since the Ring of Fire, was that people of the 17th century were far removed from the prim and proper attitudes of that later era usually labeled as "Victorian." That had surprised her, even though she was a history teacher by profession. Without ever having thought much about it, Melissa had assumed that European culture got progressively more "Victorian" the further back you went in time. She certainly would have expected the early 17th century—the heyday of religious zeal; the era of "Puritanism"—to have been one characterized by tight-lipped reserve on all subjects, and sex in particular.
The reality was quite otherwise. The primness of social customs in the 19th century had been a recent development, occasioned by the Wesleyan Methodist response to the horrors of 18th-century English city life, and its spread onto the Continent through the Pietist movement. Melissa had discovered that people of the 17th century were actually quite earthy—even bawdy. If the Scot cavalrymen who stumbled onto Grantville soon after the Ring of Fire had found the clothing of American women rather scandalous, they hadn't thought their "modern" casualness about sex to be peculiar at all. They themselves, like most people of 17th-century Europe, had a relaxed attitude about sex which had far more in common with the mores of late 20th- and early 21st-century America than either did with the Victorian era.