1636： The Saxon Uprising ARC - By Eric Flint Page 0,107

more or murder them—would be cures worse than the disease. His own lapse into gasoline-over-fire-pouring, as it were.

Quite a charming expression. Of course, you had to know what gasoline was—but, by now, that knowledge was quite widespread.

It didn’t take him long to reach the king’s quarters. Berlin’s palace was a palace, yes. But it was what you’d expect in Berlin.

When he came into the room, he saw that Gustav Adolf was asleep. That was a blessing, he thought. For the past two days, his cousin had been prone to fits of anger great enough that he’d had to be restrained. But these fits, unlike the ones he’d had earlier, were more complex. There was confusion there, not just fury. In fact, Erik was pretty sure most of the anger derived from the confusion. As if the king, trying to awaken, was frustrated by his difficulty in doing so.

Before he could say anything, the king’s bodyguard spoke. “He asked for you, Colonel,” said Erling Ljungberg. “Twice, before he fell asleep. And the second time, what he said was: ‘Where is Erik? He must see to Kristina. It’s very important.’ ”

The colonel took a long, almost shuddering breath. Three sentences, each of which was clear and meaningful—and what he suspected was most important, all three sentences held together as a coherent, consistent and logical whole. He wished he could consult the Moor doctor, but there was no chance of that, not now. He had to stay in Berlin, until…

Erik realized, with a little start, that he’d never actually taken that thought to its conclusion. Until what? Always, he’d stopped at the edge of hoping—desperately hoping—for his cousin’s recovery. But now that it seemed he might actually be recovering…

He came to one immediate decision. There was no more time for subtlety.

“My loyalties are entirely to him, Erling Ljungberg.” He pointed at Gustav Adolf. “Yours?”

“Don’t be an ass. You know the answer to that. What you really want to know is if I’m as dumb as the ox I look like.”

Erik couldn’t help laughing. A quick, nervous laugh—but a laugh it definitely was. “I’d hardly use the term ‘ox’! Bull, yes. And now that you bring it up, how smart are you?”

Ljungberg heaved his massive shoulders. The gesture might have been a shrug, or it might have been a bull shifting his stance to attack, or it might be something of both. Ljungberg himself probably didn’t know for sure.

“I’m not so stupid that I can’t figure out the chancellor is taking advantage of my king’s condition to carry through policies my king would never have agreed to himself. Nor am I so stupid that I can’t figure out that the blessed chancellor is in over his head. And he’s supposed to be the clever one!”

As answers went, that was the best Hand could want. “How does the rest of your unit feel about it?”

“Even Scots aren’t that dumb. And they take their orders from me, anyway.”

The colonel nodded. He started chewing on his lower lip again, deciding on his next steps. He’d begin with the Östergötlanders. He no longer commanded that regiment, but he had their respect, and he was on good personal terms with its current commander. After that…

“Ha!” jeered Ljungberg. “Haven’t really thought about it, have you? Well, I have. You’ll start with the Östergötland infantry regiment, of course. After them, go see Colonel Klas Hastfer and his Finnish regiment. He’s married to my wife’s half-sister, by the way. Then, I recommend you talk with Karl Hård af Segerstad.”

He commanded the Västergötland infantry. Erik didn’t know him very well, though.

Ljungberg grinned. His grin was as cold as Hand’s own. “My cousins aren’t as highly placed as yours, Colonel. But I have three of them in that regiment, one of whom is the commander’s adjutant. I know what they’re thinking, and it’s nothing the chancellor would like to hear.”

Hand spend a moment looking at the issue from all angles he could think of. On the one hand, this level of caution seemed a bit mad. No one including Oxenstierna would question Gustav Adolf’s authority if he should recover. On the other hand…

Who knew, really? There was a sort of insanity lurking underneath Oxenstierna’s whole enterprise. The man’s resentment at the steady erosion of the aristocracy’s position in the USE had obviously been much deeper than anyone realized. Hand had always assumed—so had his cousin, he was pretty sure—that Oxenstierna would be satisfied with the still-intact position of the nobility in Sweden. But apparently