Luther and Katharina

by Jody Hedlund

  Doctor Luther managed a lopsided grin. “Do as the lord and master Kate commands. She’s my personal physician.”

  When she had everything she needed, she hesitated. “I’ll need to cut the hair around the wound before I can stitch.”

  “I don’t think that’ll be the worst of it.”

  There was no way to avoid causing him more pain. Even if she’d ordered a tonic from the apothecary shop, it would have little effect on a man of his size. “I’ll do my best to be gentle.”

  “I know you will, Katharina.” Gone was the antagonism that had just stood between them, and in its place was the honesty and kindness she’d grown to appreciate about him. “I saw your tenderness with little Anna Melanchthon. And there’s no one else I’d rather have doctor me than you.” He gripped the leg of the table. “Besides, this won’t be the first time I’ve needed sewing.”

  “I’m beginning to realize that you need more doctoring than most.”

  Master Cranach squeezed Doctor Luther’s shoulder with ink-blackened fingers. “Maybe Martinus is just looking for excuses to get your attention.”

  Doctor Luther snorted. “I can think of much pleasanter ways to do that.”

  “I doubt it. Not when you’ve got a pretty young nun running her hands over you and fairly lying on top of you.”

  Katharina pulled away from Doctor Luther. Heat stole through her.

  Master Cranach laughed.

  “I’m only doing my job,” she said.

  “Continue on.” Luther grinned. “I won’t complain.”

  She reached for the scissors, her insides betraying her with more of that pleasant rippling.

  With Margaret by her side and Master Cranach holding a candle to provide extra light, she snipped the hair away from the wound, then cleansed it with wine and warm water. As she punctured his skin with the needle, she tried to ignore the pain on his face and the veins bulging in the tautness of his skin. She tried to take no notice of the clenching of his jaw or the agony in his eyes. But with each piercing of his flesh, her body coiled tighter until she could hardly breathe.

  “I’m done,” she said as she knotted the thread. Then with a long exhale, she finally sat back on her heels and wiped his blood from her hands.

  He was motionless, eyes closed, a layer of perspiration above his lips and across his forehead.

  Perhaps he’d blessedly lost consciousness. She leaned forward and wiped the blood and sweat from his brow, willing her fingers to stop trembling. “I need the yarrow now,” she said.

  Margaret handed her the mortar with the dried yarrow flowers mixed with hot water into a paste. Katharina scooped a small amount onto a cloth, folded it in half, and pressed it against the wound. The healing properties of the yarrow would hopefully keep the gash from swelling and festering.

  Doctor Luther’s eyes flickered open. His glassy gaze found her face.

  “How do you feel?” she asked.

  “Terrible.”

  “I’m afraid it will pain you for a while.”

  He thumped a hand against his chest. “It pains me the most right here.”

  Katharina frowned. Had she missed another wound?

  “It should have been me, Katharina,” he whispered. “I should have been the first to die.” His pain-filled eyes reflected a deeper agony.

  She knew about herbs and medicines and treating sickness. What could she say, what could she do to ease this kind of hurt?

  “They were so young.” The lines of his face were drawn tight. “They were too young to die.”

  Katharina reached for his hand and squeezed it.

  He clutched her hand as if he would sink into the abyss if he let go. “It’s my fault they’ll burn. It’s all because of my teaching.”

  The contact of his long, sure fingers against hers made it hard for her to think. And yet she knew she must say something. “Watch your pride, Doctor Luther. For whose sake are they giving their lives? Yours or Christ’s?”

  He didn’t say anything for a long moment, and she began to wonder if her words had angered him, if perhaps she’d overstepped her bounds in speaking so forthrightly about spiritual matters that she knew so little about compared with him.

  “I’ll take you back to the monastery,” she said, “and you’ll have Brother Gabriel’s Obstwasser. Master Cranach will spare a manservant to assist us.”

  His grip on her hand loosened and the rough pad of his thumb skimmed the pulse at her wrist. At first she thought the caress was an accident, but when he grazed her wrist again, this time deliberately slower, the soft touch sent a shiver up her arm.

  Remembrances whispered against her skin, and she could almost feel him holding her with his mouth pressed against her ear.

  A sudden grin teased the corner of his mouth as if he’d read her thoughts, as if he’d gotten the reaction he’d wanted.

  She snatched her hand out of his, but his reflexes were quick in spite of his injury, and he recaptured hers in a grip she couldn’t escape.

  “How did you come to be such a smart woman, my dear Kate?” His grin, now out in the open, contained a hint of censure. “You’re very smart indeed. Except about one thing…”

  She needed only to look into his eyes to understand his meaning. He was scorning Jerome again. She yanked again, and this time he released her. “I think Master Cranach can spare two of his men to convey you.” She stood and wiped at the splotches of his blood on her skirt. It would be difficult to wash away.

  What she really needed was to wash away all traces of Doctor Luther’s presence, including those lingering thoughts that wouldn’t befit a woman on the verge of marriage to another man.

  “You don’t need me anymore.” She took a step away and refused to look at him where he lay on the floor, long and solid and strong. She avoided looking at Margaret and Master Cranach, afraid of what she would see on their faces after they’d witnessed her interaction with Doctor Luther.

  She started toward the door. “I should be going anyway…”

  To Jerome.

  The words hung unspoken in the air, but from Doctor Luther’s silence, she knew he understood.

  Her destiny was already settled, and she wouldn’t question it. Neither would he. Not anymore.

  He’d fallen into the trap.

  The sound of his horse’s hoofs drummed in rhythm with the pounding in his head and the wild racing of his heart. Luther tossed a glance over his shoulder. The riders were not gaining ground, but neither was he losing them. He dug his heels against the flank of his mount and tried to spur the beast to move faster. But after running hard for the past hour, the horse had reached its limit.

  “Not far now!” Jonas shouted, his tall frame hunched low over his steed, his dark hair flying in the wind, his cap long ago discarded.

  The pointed turrets of Mansfeld Castle rose over the thick spruce and beech forest that blanketed the peak of the hill to their right. The castle was built into the rocky hillside and set on the highest point above the town. Its massive walls and towers overshadowed the small mining town of Mansfeld.

  The imposing fortress was their signal that they would soon reach safety. If they made it through the gate, they would be alive for another day. The assassins wouldn’t dare follow them inside the protective limits of the town.

  Luther’s body slammed against the horse with each stride, jarring his head, making him nauseous. Father in heaven, You are our protector and defender. We need Your help.

  Ahead, above the trees, the dark smoke of the copper smelters beckoned him.

  He tossed another glance over his shoulder. The cloaks of the riders flapped behind them. Only the span of several horse lengths separated him from the hands of murderers. Maybe it was his day to finally die for the cause. Maybe he ought to stop trying so hard to evade death and just hand himself over.

  “Over there!” Jonas nodded toward the meadow ahead outside the city wall.

  Luther raised his head. Two naked men hung by their necks from a lo
ng plank. The wind slowly pivoted them. Crows circled above them, then swooped near and pecked at their decaying flesh. Their caws filled the air with twisted jubilation.

  Revulsion crawled through Luther’s stomach. As they raced past the grisly scene, he focused on his steed’s mane instead. Hangings were commonplace, but the sight of such desecration always caused the same sick feeling and raised the same question: What had they done to deserve death?

  He could only pray they hadn’t died on account of the reforms, like the monks in Antwerp. The persecutions were sweeping from the Low Countries into Germany. New stories reached him every day of fanatical Roman priests who seized followers of the reforms and threw them into dungeons. The zealots restored Romish rites, prohibited reading the Bible, and forbade sharing the gospel. The persecution was spreading throughout the German provinces, not just in Duke George’s Saxony.

  However, in the case of these two corpses, it was more likely that Count Albrecht in his hilltop castle had sanctioned the hangings due to the growing unrest with the miners. The miners were simple men—laborers and peasants—who risked their lives in the deep, dark tunnels, chipping away at the rocks and lugging ore to the surface day after day with little to show for it except illness and accidents. The Mansfeld count, like most of the nobility, demanded much but gave little in return. The town leaders had asked for Luther’s mediation between the count and the miners. It was one of the reasons he’d ventured away from Wittenberg.

  Jonas cast a glance to the two riders still chasing them. The lines of his face tightened. “Faster!”

  The assassins’ horses thundered behind them. Somehow his enemies had gotten word of his route, had set the trap, had tried to waylay him. He had the feeling someone in his circle of followers wasn’t quite loyal. But he had no proof of it, and even if he did, he couldn’t bear to accuse anyone.

  The pressure in his head radiated to his aching bones. The gash that he’d sustained in Cranach’s printing shop throbbed, even though it was healing. His breath came in gasps and caused a sharp pain in his side. At forty he was too old to be racing like a university boy.

  He focused ahead. The smoke of the smelters billowed over the clay tiles of the crowded rooftops and seemed to roast the underbellies of the low clouds to a charcoal black.

  “Almost there!” he called.

  The familiar acrid tang of burning coal and melted copper greeted him. The city gate loomed ahead, and the traffic on the road thickened.

  “Make way for Martin Luther!” Jonas shouted. “Make way!”

  Travelers and peasants stood back and stared as they galloped past.

  Luther didn’t slow the gait of his horse until he rode past the city gates. Only then did he draw the reins so that his beast pranced sideway and whinnied.

  The dark-cloaked figures brought their horses to an abrupt halt outside the city wall, only a stone’s throw away. They didn’t dare ride inside a town where he was not only well loved but also under the protection of the count.

  “This time was too close.” Jonas slowed alongside him. Dust mingled with sweat along his brow.

  The assassins watched from outside the walls. Their horses foamed at the mouth and snorted with flared nostrils. Finally one of the riders motioned to the other, then they spurred their beasts and began to canter away.

  Jonas glared after them, his scowl sharp enough to flay a man alive.

  “Doctor Luther!” A milling crowd surrounded Luther, and eager hands reached toward him.

  “This is why you’ve come,” Jonas said, turning to the crowd. “They need encouragement. They need to know that the death of the martyrs wasn’t a defeat but rather a confirmation that the gospel is good and worth dying for.”

  Work-weary, haggard townspeople filled the street. Yet when the laborers looked up at Luther, their eyes filled with hope, and his heart strengthened with renewed determination. By now they’d surely heard about the death of the martyrs in the Low Country. If the news hadn’t discouraged them, why should he let it weigh him down?

  He took hold of the dirt-incrusted hand of a stoop-shouldered man who’d raised it to him. “God bless you, my man.” He reached for another hand, then another and another. Slowly he made his way through the gathering, speaking words of hope to each person he touched, his heart welling up with compassion.

  Jonas was right. He had to put to rest all fears and proclaim to their enemies they were not afraid, not defeated, not shriveling away. He had to stop blaming himself for the deaths of the young monks and the increasing persecution of his followers. He had to remember that death would be the ultimate cost of pursuing the truth of the gospel but that such a sacrifice was worth it if he could help set these people free from their bondage.

  He finally made his way past the swell of townspeople to the inn. Johann Ledener, the vicar of the Church of Saint George, met him, as did a number of other important citizens who had accepted the gospel. They sat together at a long table, and the men updated him on the unrest. They informed him that Count Albrecht had wanted to make an example of any miners who associated themselves with the rebellious Bundschuh peasants. So he’d hung two and put more in prison. His move had only fueled the animosity.

  “The count is holding the prisoners as leverage. He says he’ll hang a prisoner every time there’s an offense.” Vicar Ledener gripped his mug, his knuckles white.

  “The biggest offense is protesting his request for a larger share in the revenues from the mines,” grumbled the man next to Luther.

  Luther had already drained his drink, and he leaned against the cool wattle wall, grateful the pounding in his head had subsided. The dank, dimly lit inn provided a haven after the long, hard ride.

  “You need to speak with the count and ask him to release the prisoners,” said another one of the townsmen.

  “Why haven’t you done this yet yourselves?”

  His question brought a chorus of angry replies.

  Vicar Ledener’s voice broke through the commotion. “We have already spoken with the count. And as usual he won’t listen.” Again the men’s voices crescendoed.

  “Ach, so here is my son,” came a familiar voice from the doorway, “solving the world’s problems once more.”

  Luther sat forward and his muscles tensed. His father pushed through the crowded room, making his way toward him. His brow was creased with lines of perpetual disappointment—the common look his father wore whenever they met.

  “When word reached me that my son was in town, I hurried home. I thought surely my son would visit his family before conducting business.” His father doffed his beret and crushed the brim in his soot-covered hands.

  “Good day, Father.” Luther stood and gave up his spot for his father, refusing to be drawn into old arguments.

  With a long sigh and shake of his head, his father lowered himself onto the bench. The others offered Hans Luther a round of greetings and passed a drink his way. His father, like other leaseholders, had already suffered enough losses in recent years. Their floundering profits would suffer even more if the count didn’t lessen his demands.

  Luther swallowed a lump of frustration. Perhaps he would bring himself more peace with his father if he attempted to wield a measure of influence over the count. As Luther watched his father take a swig, he wished, as he always did, his brothers hadn’t died of the plague in their youth. His younger brother, Jacob, had survived and had become a smelter master like Father. But Jacob had neither the education nor the drive to give their father the success and prestige he craved. Nor had he given their father what he wanted most—a grandson to pass on the Luther name. If his other brothers had lived, perhaps his father wouldn’t have placed so much hope in him.

  Luther sat back and sipped from his mug silently, letting the conversation flow around him, watching his father’s easy camaraderie with the men. Even if his life had taken a different course than the one his father had hoped for, Luther was relieved that his father had embraced the reforms or at lea
st hadn’t opposed him as he had with other things so many times in the past.

  As though sensing Luther’s attention and the tempest of his swirling emotions, his father’s expression turned grave, and he set his mug on the table and let his thumb draw circles around the slick rim. “I heard you were almost caught today on your way into Mansfeld.”

  The other men at the table grew silent and stared at Luther. He squirmed at the sudden attention but nodded. “It was close. But apparently God isn’t ready to take me home yet.”

  Jonas slapped him on the back. “You may be turning into an old goat, but you showed our dear friend Duke George that goats can tuck their tails and run when they need to.”

  Luther grinned, but the seriousness in his father’s eyes cut short the humor of the moment.

  “Then it was Duke George’s men who were after you?” his father asked.

  “We forgot to ask them,” Jonas started, his voice tinged with his usual sarcasm.

  Luther elbowed his friend but then looked squarely at his father, seeing all the fear and heartache in those brown eyes that were so much like his own. “We’re fine, Father.”

  “Maybe if you settled down and had a normal life now,” his father began, “if you stay in Wittenberg and focus on being a professor and resume teaching your classes at the university…”

  Luther tensed and braced himself for the litany of things he could be doing to please his father. In a deep place he knew his father loved him, worried about him, and wanted what was best for him. But what his father thought was best usually didn’t match Luther’s plans.

  It was Luther’s turn to stare at his mug and run his fingers around the rim, the swirling movement matching the churning in his gut.

  “Perhaps if you got a real home instead of living in that big, empty monastery,” his father continued, “and if you found yourself a wife and had children, then you’d be able to live a normal life.”

  Luther didn’t want to respond and say anything that would hurt his father. He’d already done that enough in his life. So all he did was sigh.