"No!" Tata picked up her pillow and hit him with it. "If you get re-duked, you'll go back home. If you get married . . . I don't want to see you re-duked at all. But for you, it might be the best thing. For you and Friedrich and Margarethe and your sisters." She put the pillow back under her head. "She's pregnant, you know."
"Brahe's sister isn't pregnant. At least, not by me. Is that why they want to marry her off? Did some randy Swedish royal get under her skirts? Maybe they can marry her off to Gustav's bastard son. He's only about eighteen months younger than I am."
"Margarethe, you nitwit. Margarethe is pregnant. You're going to be an uncle."
"Okay, Brahe's sister isn't pregnant. You're not pregnant, either?"
Tata shook her head. "I'm too careful. It's okay for Margarethe. She and Friedrich are married. We aren't and we never will be."
"I wouldn't give you up if I married the Lady Kerstin."
"Yes, you would, if you get re-duked. You might not want to, but you would. I'd leave. I was never cut out to be any nobleman's official mistress. Not even yours. My mouth would get me in trouble all the time, and that would make trouble for you. I'm not cut out for court life.
"Mouth." Eberhard pulled her down. "Your mouth isn't trouble. Your mouth is pretty and pink and cute." He outlined it with one finger. "The rest of you is cute, too. Let's see, your ear is cute, your . . .
The next morning, the window was covered with frost crystals. Eberhard pulled the duvet under his chin, crunched up his pillow into a ball, and lay there for a while, just looking at them glitter in the sunshine.
I'm not going to do it, he thought. The gain is all contingent and not worth the gamble.
He stared at the bright, white window pane while Tata snored softly. There had to be some way to refuse the idea.
No, not refuse it. Just drag things out until it gets dropped, the way so many other things get dropped. Dilly-dally until Brahe forgets about it, the way Gustavus Adolphus forgot about us. It's Brahe's wife who's pushing it, anyway. String things out until she goes back to Sweden and the campaigning season opens.
He pushed his good arm under Tata's shoulder and tickled her ribs until she woke up.
Section Four: Here are the stages in the journey . . .
Barracktown bei Fulda, January 1635
"Package delivery," David Kronberg said cheerfully. He tossed a package onto the sutlery sales counter. "It came in just before closing time."
"What's that on the label?" Riffa asked.
"It says, 'Do not open until Three Kings.' "
"Three Kings?" She scrunched up her forehead. "What's that?"
"Presents day, presents day, presents day." Gertrud chanted as she pounced on it with enthusiasm. "Oh. It's not for me. It's for Jeffie and Joel. Maybe it's a lump of coal and some switches."
"Wrong shape."
"Who's it from?"
"A bookstore in Frankfurt."
"A bookstore wouldn't be sending them a present. Someone must have ordered it."
"Eberhard and Friedrich, I bet." Gertrud tossed it on the counter. "They'll be here later."
"Jeffie and Joel or Eberhard and Friedrich?"
"The first two. The others aren't back from Mainz, yet. If the river doesn't freeze hard and the roads aren't too bad, they should be here Thursday."
"What if the Main does freeze hard and the roads are awful?"
Gertrud grimaced. "Then Jeffie and I may have to postpone our wedding if we want them to be there. And we do."
"Postpone? How long?"
"A few days. Until they get here." Gertrud shrugged. "It's no big deal—not as if we were planning on dozens of guests. Jeffie's mom and brother are already here. Justin finished his EMT course for the Military Medical Department and hasn't been assigned yet. Callmemarsha says she hasn't had a vacation since the Ring of Fire and Stevenson's Groceries owes her one. They can both stay for at least two more weeks, so we can be flexible. It's not as if we're cutting it close. The baby isn't due 'til July."
Denver Caldwell, one of the other up-timers at Fulda Barracks, looked up. "That's just 'Marsha,' Gertrud. I know she runs it all together into 'Callmemarsha-becauseI'mnotoldenoughtobeanyone'smother-in-law.' Trust me, though. Her name is Marsha."
"We really appreciate the Montaigne translation, Eberhard," Joel said. "But I've got to tell you the truth. The only way I can make sense of Florio's 1603 English is to read it out loud. Take where he's talking about the sumptuary laws, for example.
"The manner wherewith our Lawes assay to moderate the foolish and vaine expences of table-cheare and apparell seemeth contrarie to its end. The best course were to beget in men a contempt of gold and silkwearinge as of vaine and non-profitable things, whereas we encrease their credit and price: a most indirect course to withdraw men from them. As, for example, to let none but Princes eat dainties, or weare velvets and clothes of Tissew, and interdict the people to doe it, what is it but to give reputation unto those things, and to encrease their longing to use them?