by Susann Cokal
While I’m scurrying across the outer yard, I hear about the Lower Chambers.
Again, Fate is spinning. And so is my head.
The prisons will open this evening, runs the talk as men unload carts and women haul baskets of laundry away. And then the Chambers will be emptied, for tomorrow Nicolas and little Christina-Beatte plan to celebrate their union with multiple executions, cleansing the palace of sin and crime.
“All the prisoners?” I ask of the skirts and jackets switching around me. “Even without trial?”
Not a single answer comes. Perhaps there is no answer; perhaps nobody knows, or the way in which I’ve asked has removed me from the circle of inaudible whispers. But most likely the answer is yes: for the Queen Apparent’s pleasure, every prisoner, including my father, will be killed without the formality of even the simplest trial. Every soul in the Lower Chambers is now considered guilty.
I ask, standing still, “How? Will . . . will it be hanging?” I see Father’s tongue protruding, blue, his eyes bulging in a purple face. “Or beheading?” His thinning pate rolling on a blood-damp floor. I can’t bear to think of other possibilities: stoning, drawing and quartering, slaughter by a thousand arrows — terrible, agonizing earthly deaths for a man who lived aspiring to the stars.
No answer. The busyness of the palace goes on, as cold breezes twine our bodies and ice forms a creaky skin on the bay. I hear only some murmur about it taking more than one dose to make an old biddy die. So I go on too, numbly, past the guards and the carts and the bubbling witch’s bed that still fills the inner yard with the smell of sulfur. I have a position to keep. And a little, desperate time to pray.
Gudrun sets me first to hemming alongside other needlewomen. Pale blue silk, an embroidered underskirt for the little Queen’s betrothal costume, which is being made over from the defunct Princess Sophia’s day-after-wedding dress. The hem is to be scalloped and tacked with nun-made lace; it will take the six of us all day.
“But if you finish in good time,” says Gudrun, with an eye on my chapped fingers, “you all may visit the Lower Chambers when they are opened. The regents want everyone to see.”
The others in the cozy paneled room breathe in as one. As if they’re thrilled to think of peering at the wretched souls driven desperate by conscience, confinement — injustice . . .
“Count Nicolas says the Chambers will make a useful lesson,” Gudrun finishes, “for any who are tempted to stray from duty. But of course, this duty, ours, comes first, being more important than most. The young Queen’s got to dress well for her ceremony. So none of you will leave this room until we finish . . .”
As one, we thread our needles. Or try to.
I wish for the lenses my father assembled for me long ago, now utterly lost in my months of keeping the Queen’s house. The dress for that awful waxen thing was easy enough to make, a matter of cutting fabric with scissors the Dowager gave to me, then tying threads by feel. Now, however, without spectacles, I get the thread into the needle by sheer chance, and then I can barely see where to plant the sharp end. I quickly fall behind the other women; what’s more, my hands have grown stiff and clumsy, unused to such fine work, and cracked calluses pull up threads until the crevices bleed. This may not have mattered when I clothed the gruesome doll, but it will be noticed now.
My fellow seamstresses keep looking over, frowning at my lack of speed and fineness, no doubt asking themselves how I re-elevated so suddenly. As I still wonder too. So for a while I dig blindly into the soft blue blur, trying to hide my mistakes and pricking my fingers over and over. I don’t care about blood, I don’t care about anything in this room, not even the Virgin and Saint Anna watching sternly over me from the wooden wall. I think of my father. And Jacob. And Queen Isabel and Midi Sorte, the horrible things I saw last night . . . and my false sense of relief as I stumbled back to the dorter under my father’s star.
No more than an hour passes before Gudrun yanks me away. She doesn’t have to tell me why. I even start for the door. Nonetheless, she takes me to a corner and says, shortly, “You can’t compare with the others.”
I curtsy. “Apologies, mistress —” I might be glad to go back to buckets and brushes.
Gudrun interrupts. “So. Instead of doing fine work, you will finish up a nightdress that Nidia began for the old Queen. Her Eminence’s grown too large for everything she has now — in fact, she ruined her last good garment yesterday. So in this case the quality of the stitching matters less than the speed. You can make yourself useful after all.”
I’m stunned. “Health to your soul,” I say by reflex; and, “Health to yours,” Gudrun replies, nodding like a fine lady as she sends me to my new task.
The world, the wheel, it spins and spins. I’m glad to sit again, even in a corner with a lapful of white lawn.
Morning, noon, and after have no meaning here, with candles burning and fingers flying. The others make nimble work of the blue silk; they go on to other parts of Christina-Beatte’s costume, each working as silent as the nuns who blinded themselves knotting the silver lace they use for trimming. No one asks me for one of the old stories I used to tell, and I don’t offer any.
When the palace bells ring five, we are finally allowed to stand and flex our fingers. Shake our shoulders, blink our eyes, take deep breaths, and unwind the serpents of our spines. I had almost forgotten these myriad little pains of seamstressing.
And here is one result of taking such pains: the Queen Apparent’s dress is the loveliest thing I have ever seen. Spring-sky shades mingle with pearls and silver netting to give an impression of dawn upon the bay . . . It’s almost impossible to think this is pieced from scraps and dyed (as a poet would say) with the spirit of her dead sister.
My sister needlewomen gaze upon the dress with clear pride, though I imagine that some of them, at least, feel tinges of regret as they contemplate a sickly child being linked to the demon-lover who will never let her go. Or perhaps they take Nicolas at old King Christian’s assessment and think the sun rises and sets upon him.
As to my labors, the Dowager’s nightdress is almost finished too, even though I’ve been the only one working its ells of thin lawn and added a stain with every stitch. It is ugly but sufficient, a covering for the secrets of which I know too many. Instead of lace, I’ve trimmed it with applications of embroidery: a lily, a swan, and a moon that the departed Nidia must have worked to someone’s orders, for we never devise such designs on our own. (No carnation; that was once my special design.) The last part of the embroidery needs tacking down, but Gudrun says I may leave it to join the others when they take their tour through the Lower Chambers.
“It is not a choice,” she says crisply, watching me fold the unfinished nightdress slowly. “Everyone has to go, by order of the young Queen. Even we essential staff.”
I suppose everyone will also attend the executions, which must be considered even more instructive to essentials.
We stop first at the latrines and then at the kitchens for our allotment of bread and beer, for we have not eaten all day. I can’t swallow; I think I feel the others staring at me, though I can’t say precisely why. Those who were here with me before know me as Ava Bingen; but it’s a common-enough name, so they might not think of my father. Or maybe they wonder what I’ll do next. At the very least, I know they’re asking why I’ve been allowed to stay in the sewing room with my ruined hands.
“I don’t know,” I say baldly, and they skitter away like roaches.
So, like roaches, we head for the prisons and the last rags of humanity there. In the military yard, we find a crowd not unlike the one that filled the cathedral at Sophia’s death. A line of souls reverent not for the Perished Lily but for the spectacle of sin, as sick as they are excited. And up in the wide window of the soldiers’ hall stands Count Nicolas, the Queen Apparent’s intended, gazing down with torchlight playing over his black velvet and white teeth, while a drummer keeps rhythm and a herald reads the names of the prisoners we
will see:
“Henrik Asgar . . . François Ebbelkraft . . . Ehrengard Nattogdag . . .”
Where is Christina-Beatte? Perhaps she is considered too young to participate now.
“Lars Valise . . . Anna Callioux . . .”
Through it all, Nicolas says nothing. His face looks narrower than ever, his clothing darker, his teeth more bright. He has completed his transformation into some sharp and cutting creature. The strong light behind him rims his black hair with luminescence, making his face hard to read — except for those teeth bared in a smile.
“Aurore Lavransdatter . . . Ludvig Rummel . . .”
I shuffle forward, waiting to hear my father’s name, though as excitement mounts, the herald’s voice is being lost in the sound of the crowd.
“. . . Klaus Bingen . . .”
There it is. By reflex, I cross myself and begin to pray.
Please, God; please, Virgin — please, any spirit who might help . . . I could almost make a pact with the Devil if he would do what I need.
For all my fervent wishes, I feel nothing. No answering glow, no sense even that my thoughts are anything more than a wet bubble of hope broken against a needle.
My mother also used to say this: If God wanted us all to live, he wouldn’t have created work or childbed.
Or, I’d add now in my own voice, wishes and questions. If only Father had managed to leave the skies alone.
When it’s my turn to enter the Lower Chambers, I do it with the normal trepidation, skidding on stones that seem placed deliberately so as to trip people up. I see the same guards as before, the one who was kind to me and the ones who were not, standing watch over the first set of gates with their halberds at the ready. I wonder if they’ll have work tomorrow or if empty prisons will mean empty barracks for a while. How quickly will the prisons fill after Nicolas and Christina-Beatte empty them?
This has been Father’s home for almost a month now. The narrow passages are warmer than the air aboveground, either because the breeze is less or because so many visitors are pressed together. Nonetheless, there’s a special fishy feeling under the earth; the whitewashed walls feel like wet scales, and here and there a drop of water rolls its slow way to the floor.
All of this excites the grand ladies and gentlemen. They stagger giddily about on their pattens, holding their silks and furs above the stones, bumping into one another and venting soft squeals of naughtiness. To them, prison is a novelty and a pageant — as long as they aren’t the ones locked away. They are mixed in with us now, as the space is too small to separate properly. So when we all get to the cells, it’s impossible to see prisoners because noble hats are blocking every view, especially the tiny grates that mean a prisoner is being punished harshly by a very small oubliette.
“You were looking for someone in particular, mistress? I seem to recall.”
It’s the young guard. He’s at my elbow, has changed places with someone to come to me. I’m surprised.
“You remember?” I ask.
“Like I said, we don’t get many girls asking to come in. Not until today. You know,” he explains awkwardly, “good girls.”
I wonder if he is flirting with me or just curious or maybe kind. Anyway, speaking to him gives me a sudden surge of unburst hope — I’m a good girl; I haven’t lost everything of myself. I give the young man an overpowering smile of gratitude (overpowering to me; I doubt he can see it in the half dark) and dive deeper into the crowd without further answer.
I don’t dare say Father’s name aloud, here where there are those who might toss me in next to him. But Klaus Bingen is not so hard to find. Of course he’s drawn a large set of viewers as the man who summoned the stars’ poisons to murder King Christian. The space before his cell is packed like a barrel of salt herring, and even though guards are shouting, “Move along, please, with all respect, move along, the Count and Queen Apparent wish it,” I have to wiggle and pinch and pry my way between them to look.
I peer over a lady’s shoulder. Father is all dignity (or as much as can be mustered in this situation), well lit with torches and chained to a little stool such as peasants use for milking; his back straight and his face and hair as clean as he can make them, gazing forward at the floor while people around him swear inventively.
My father. Who made delicate contraptions for mastering the heavens and who kissed my mother every morning upon waking up.
I notice for the first time how little he and I resemble each other. Both thin and pale, but there the likeness ends. His eyelids are longer, his frame larger, the shape of his face heavier toward bottom than top.
I might not dare to say Klaus Bingen’s name, but plenty are voicing it around me, in the silent way of aprons and the noisy one of nobles. They demand to know what he did to the King, why he did it, if the effects can be reproduced again or reversed. They ask if he is a Protestant or a witch. They ask if his wife is an enchantress as well, and if the baby she’s just borne him (Just borne! ’Swounds, can it be true?) is the child of trolls or of mermaids.
Quite naturally, he doesn’t answer any of it; to speak could only bring his execution closer. He continues to stare, as if into some new vision of stars and planets that will save him from this earthly mess. Perhaps he’s realizing, as I am, the importance of that idle whisper — if it’s even true — that he has another child, an infant, who will grow up without defenses.
“Lille far,” I whisper. Little father. For he seems very small to me in this moment.
At those two words, which he cannot possibly hear, he does look up. Without hesitation, he finds me in the gawping throng, and his blue eyes meet mine. Now his are cloudy; he’s lost his light.
Then he blinks and looks down again, and that is all. Our good-bye, our I-have-failed-you.
So.
I shuffle blindly past the other poor souls imprisoned, thinking only of that one glimpse of my father. The dimming of his hopes and heaven: strangely, I feel closer now to his heart than I ever did when we were whole.
I think, This be the tale, the tale, the tale. Of a time poison-auntie magic failed.
I thought to pull Isabel out of madness, not make her happier in it. But now I watch her squeeze her breast to bring the milk, as she have seen the wet nurse do. She make a kissing noise to her self and she do n’t hear the sorrow-child makes none.
“Is he not beautiful?” she ask. “Just what I’ve wished for.”
I say no thing, wonder how long I can pretend to sleep while I think what must happen next and if poison-auntie had any cure for such deep madness. Except the obvious, which be death, which I have once refuse to give Isabel.
Nicolas will soon give me death as a trade, for failing him. I wonder will it hurt, how will he do it, how much will I mind. It would be better if I died from my own poison, but that is one more failing.
Isabel coo at her baby, she sing it a song about sweetness and youth. I try to breathe to the bottom of my lungs, a trick for thinking better.
All at once Isabel squirm and lose the baby mouth so she can poke me. She have remember some thing.
“Do you think it can pass through milk?” she asks. “The Fire, I mean. The . . . Italian disease.”
I shrug. I do not know and it does not matter.
“Elinor,” she whine, soft so she do not wake the waxy child, “Elinor, help me!”
To answer, I pinch her breast and guide it back to baby’s mouth. “Shhh, shh, sh.” I can think of no thing else, but Isabel is content.
“I’m losing my fat,” she confide while the baby mouth cup her nipple. “I’ve heard that’s why poor women are always skinny, they feed their own children. I’ll be as slim as the Virgin before you know it!”
Some place in this palace, I know, Nicolas gloats all ready too. He will marry his apparent queen and later kill the darlings.
Kiss, kiss, kiss. The sorrow-child seem happy enough in his way too.
The Lump bubble within me.
Outside the Lower Chambers, G
udrun pulls me away from the crowd and the gossip about prisoners and sentences. We go far across the yard, into the shadow of a pillar where the torch has snuffed but where I can still watch visitors emerging from the prisons like spangled ghosts, gleaming in the darkness.
“Time for more work?” I ask, numb and dumb with it — another piece of my heart has broken and fallen away.
“Tomorrow . . .” she says, and hesitates.
Tomorrow? Of course, tomorrow. There is always work tomorrow. I hunch like a shrub and wait for tomorrow.
Gudrun takes a breath, then presses a cold bit of something into my hand and holds it there till it becomes warm. “Tomorrow,” she says, as if still searching for words, “when you finish the Dowager’s nightdress . . .”
I wait.
“We all serve the Crown,” she interrupts herself; words I recognize. Suddenly my heart quickens, and with it the rush of blood between my legs. “Our duty, yes, by God’s wounds, our duty is to the Crown rather than any one head under it. So — to serve. Tomorrow, when you finish, after you have starched and ironed it, the nightshift — yourself, you have to do it yourself, that’s very clear — and fold it up and wait till the rest of us are gone, then you must sprinkle this powder inside, all of it. Then iron the whole thing again, to let the powder bond with the cloth.”
I look down, try to open my fingers, but Gudrun keeps them curled.
“It’s in a glass vial,” she whispers. “Don’t let the vial break. When you cut the seal around the stopper, make sure you don’t breathe in. Don’t let the powder touch your skin, either. And don’t let it settle in the cracks in your hands. Wrap the nightdress in a fresh piece of linen before you deliver it to the inner chamber.”
I understand. “Poison.” With another surge of blood: “You want me to poison the Queen.”
Gudrun doesn’t confirm it; she doesn’t have to. She holds my hand the harder. “Make sure that her in-waiting, that Negresse she calls Elinor, puts her in the nightdress right away. It had best be the Negresse.”
