his family name.”
“Yes, you came to us. You volunteered to be our pioneer, but we do not seek revenge because you think our cousin was a saint. This is not to do with your sciences.”
“But it is,” I said. “Like it or no, the new order is coming.”
“Well, we shall have to stop it. My friends and I act to protect our rights as noblemen. You would know nothing of that. The king cannot take a lord’s home and property from him at whim, even if that lord lets every church and abbey fall to the ground. Let Rome maintain her churches. Brahe’s business was his own, and the king ought not have interfered. Do your duty to Tycho, play with your philosophies, but leave the larger questions to men bred to answer them.”
Every man I knew was born to disappoint me. I looked away from Fritz, away from Elsinore, to the glassy gray tapestry of the Bay.
“Have you any plan for the king?” he said.
“I will deliver this horoscope and hope, as has happened in years past, for a meeting in secret with the king, that he might learn what fearful news I have not publically given him. When he is bent over his table reading the chart, I will put a blade into his heart from behind. I already have the dagger and now only require the unwary back of Christian.”
Bernardo had guaranteed me this opportunity. I told myself that the Swiss would not kill me the minute the deed was done. I hoped I was right to believe this. There was no choice but to trust in Bernardo’s baffling code of honor.
“Excellent well,” Torstensson said. “It is a much simpler plot than frozen snakes and poison. I predict you will have success.”
“God willing.” Down along the shore, a gray heron took to wing and flapped slowly inland, to the snowy trees north of Elsinore, and disappeared from view.
“Let us go down to the courtyard,” Fritz said, putting an arm around my shoulders. “I would not miss this Finnish bear. His name is Francisco.”
Francisco was an impressive old bear, nine feet tall, a thousand pounds of meat and bone on him, his broad body covered in ruddy brown hair patched with white around his face and neck.
“He is big as a bull,” Torstensson said.
We found a place in the courtyard near the bear and his trainer, a bent Finn of some antiquity who wore layers of cowhide and carried a thick whip in his right hand. In his left hand he held one end of a long iron chain. The other end was fixed to the heavy iron collar encircling Francisco’s massive neck. The bear was muzzled like a dog, but that did not seem to render him harmless; his claws were as long as my fingers and they looked sharp enough. Francisco the bear was nearly twice the height of his trainer and I wondered that so slight a man could control him. I agreed with Torstensson that the women were sure to be frightened.
The courtyard filled with guests, puffing out clouds of breath and stamping their feet. A lot of mulled wine had already been drunk by those who had arrived early, and the yard smelled like a tavern by the time the king, queen, their retainers, and guards came crowding in. All made way for the royal party and bowed low, even the bear.
The king roared with laughter at this, and with Kirsten on his arm Christian took a place directly before Francisco. King and bear looked into each other’s eyes. Francisco reared up suddenly to his full height, his paws batting the air before him. Beneath his leather muzzle he growled, a wet, metallic bubbling that shook the flagstones. Those closest to the great animal took a step back.
The king released Kirsten and mimicked the bear, holding up his meaty fists and punching the air. He bared his teeth and growled.
“A pugilist, are you? You are a great ugly animal, sir!”
Like a dog throwing off water, Francisco shook his head rapidly from side to side. He took a heavy step toward the king, raised his paws, and bellowed again. One of the queen’s ladies-in-waiting fainted dead away, falling into the arms of a Danish captain. Francisco’s trainer pulled against the chain and barked out a command in Finnish. The bear dropped to all four paws. His head was very close to the king’s.
“You think yourself better than Christian son of Rorik, do you, bear?”