The Master's Apprentice, page 49
part #1 of Faust Series
His destiny was written in the stars. Impossible to change.
Still, he’d wanted to avoid those two scholars taking their musings too far. And so he’d intervened. It had been so easy to lure young Karl Wagner in. Everyone had their weak point, their little secret, and it hadn’t taken long to find out his.
The man ran his finger along the glass rim of his goblet, creating a humming, almost whining sound. His plan had been for the boy to get caught and tortured, and maybe even executed. It had annoyed him for a while now that Faustus had a companion. The doctor was weakest by himself, and most easily steered. Once his assistant had been arrested, Faust couldn’t have stayed in Cologne any longer, and his conversations with Agrippa would have come to an end.
The man took another sip of the delicious red drink. Well, now they were running away together. He’d save Karl for later. The most important thing was that he didn’t lose Faust again like he’d done before. It had taken him a long time to find him once more. Now that the portentous moment had nearly arrived, he couldn’t lose sight of him. He had watched Faust from a distance for years, had helped him occasionally, and had even removed obstacles from his path. But for a few weeks now he had followed him closely, like a sleuth.
The end and the beginning.
Only a few more months.
The man took one last sip, then he carried his goblet over to the cage with the birds, who greeted him with cawing and flapping.
“Here you go, my little ones,” said Tonio del Moravia, pouring the rest of the red drink from the glass into the bottom of the cage. “Drink! Drink with me to the day that must come soon. We have waited long enough.”
The birds greedily drank up the fresh blood. Standing in the twilight of the candles in the room, the master looked like he hadn’t aged one day.
23
CREAKING AND GROANING, the wagon sped along the road by the river. It was still raining when the first glimmer of dawn appeared above the vineyards in the east.
Johann had been whipping the horse like a madman for almost three hours. He wanted to get as many miles between them and Cologne as possible before the guards raised the alarm. Most likely, a delegation of soldiers was already on its way to catch them. Johann didn’t want to begin to imagine what was in store for them if they got arrested. Two sodomites and heretics dabbling in black magic! It was just what the Cologne Inquisition had been waiting for, and Karl had walked straight into their trap.
After Karl had told Johann about his escape, they had rushed to Agrippa’s house. Their wagon was parked there, and Agrippa was the only one who could help them now. With his connections and a pile of money, they had managed to get out of the city. A brief hug goodbye had been the only farewell the two scholars had time for. They had hastily reassured one another that they’d meet again one day and continue their conversations.
But they’d already had the most important conversation.
Johann knew there was only one place where he might lift the secret surrounding his birth. Agrippa had sparked the idea a few days ago, but only last night had its meaning become clear to him. They had spoken about lenses, about eye glasses, and about the laterna magica, and then Agrippa had said something else.
But what if we could also better see what’s in the heavens? If we could see farther, we might understand what makes your birth so special.
Johann knew of an apparatus that might enable him to do just that. But it was hidden at a very dangerous place—a place he hadn’t sought out in more than fifteen years. He didn’t know if Tonio still visited the place.
Back in the wagon, Satan whined. The old dog wasn’t well. She struggled to walk at all now and seemed to be in grave pain, especially after eating. She slept a lot and twitched in her sleep. Johann had given her some theriac to soothe her, but he feared the worst.
I’m going to lose her. Just like I’ve lost everyone else I ever loved . . .
At least he’d been able to save Karl Wagner. Johann nodded grimly. It had been his fault—he hadn’t looked after the boy. The meetings with Agrippa had been more important to him. Just like something had always been more important to him than those he loved. Karl was sitting beside him in silence, only occasionally casting a suffering glance at him that looked much like Satan’s.
“Stop looking at me like that,” snarled Johann. “What’s done is done. I warned you, but I also should have looked after you more.”
“I’m so sorry,” pleaded Karl. “You and Agrippa—”
“Agrippa and I were reaching the end of our discussions anyhow,” said Johann. “I found what I came for. It’s time this journey came to an end.”
“You said something similar in Cologne,” replied Karl. “What do you mean? What journey?”
“The journey of my life.”
Johann cracked his whip and shouted at the horse while the wind tore at the wagon’s canvas.
They traveled along the Rhine toward Worms, the old imperial city. A stab went through Johann’s heart when he thought about the fact that Valentin had been taken to this city to stand trial for heresy. As if the heavens were punishing him, the weather grew worse by the day. It was the coldest fall since anyone could remember, and winter was already making its presence felt at the end of October. An icy wind swept across the plains and bare fields. After about two weeks they crossed the border to Bavaria, where the Alps formed a white chain on the horizon. Johann grew more withdrawn by the day. Every time he looked at that mountain range, the memories returned—memories of Salome and Venice, but also of his time at the tower with Tonio.
The tower.
More than fifteen years ago, Tonio had introduced him to the secrets of the black guild there, but to this day Johann didn’t know what the master had really been up to during those cold winter nights. Johann had avoided the area since, almost as if he feared Tonio might be waiting for him there and once again draw him into his dark rituals. But despite his unease about the place, Johann hadn’t forgotten what they had buried inside a heavy crate behind the tower upon their departure.
Books and a tube.
A tube that might allow him to see the stars up close. Johann hoped it was still there.
After ten more days they reached the Alps. Meanwhile, winter had fully arrived. The snow wasn’t hip deep like the first time Johann had traveled this road, but they still struggled to find the right track between the low-hanging branches. Occasionally they were forced to jump off the wagon and lead the horse through snowdrifts. In the sky above them, crows circled, and Johann tried not to think of them as Tonio’s crows. In the last few days, he had frequently heard the cawing of a raven that sounded human, almost like laughter.
Sheel . . . draay . . . sheel . . . draay . . .
Finally, after more than three weeks and a long search, they arrived at the tower.
It still stood atop the hill like a broken tooth, an ancient bulwark at the edge of the Alps. The shed beside it was derelict now, but the entrance to the tower was still barred with the heavy beam, and the windows were still nailed shut the way they’d left it.
Johann breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of the solid black walls. Evidently there hadn’t been any unwelcome visitors. Strange, really, because the tower stood in an elevated position and could be spotted from other hills. It was as if it was surrounded by an invisible line that only a few people dared to cross. The black pentagram on the front door probably helped—the drawing looked as clear as on the day of their hasty departure.
Johann jumped off the box seat and rushed to the tower’s rear. He swept the snow aside with his feet and saw to his relief that the white stones were still in place. No one had dug around here. Then he walked back to the front and removed the beam from the entrance. He found the large key under the stone plate and turned it in the lock. The door creaked open, and a musty smell like from an ancient crypt engulfed them. It took a few moments for Johann’s eyes to adjust to the dim light. At first he thought everything was as they had left it. But then he noticed the changes.
Very unsettling changes.
“This is fantastic!” exclaimed Karl from next to Johann. “I expected a filthy hole—but this looks like a knight’s chamber.”
Johann said nothing as he studied the furnishings. There was a newly made pinewood shelf, holding about two dozen books. Next to it stood a velvet-covered four-poster bed, a silver-studded chest, and a table with chess pieces made from ivory. Behind a folding screen by the fire stood another bed, and this one was covered in dozens of soft cushions and furs. Johann ran his fingers through the dust that had settled on the pillows.
He was here. But when?
“The complete works of Aristotle are on this shelf,” said Karl. The young man had walked into the room and was pulling out books. “Ha! And if I’m not mistaken, this is Avicenna’s book on healing. At Leipzig they always told us that it was burned as a work of heresy. Did you furnish this place so nicely and collect all these volumes?”
“A . . . an old friend of mine did,” said Johann vaguely. His heart was beating wildly, and once more he felt he was being watched. Tonio had visited the tower in recent years and turned it into a comfortable home. Table, chest, and bed were covered in a thick layer of dust, so he guessed the last visit was a while ago—over a year, perhaps.
But who could tell when the master would return?
Strangely, Tonio hadn’t unearthed the crate out back, not as far as Johann could tell, anyhow.
“You’re not afraid of black magic, I take it?” said Karl, who was holding up a book with a pentagram on its leather binding.
Johann started when he read the embellished title: The Sworn Book of Honorius. It was one of the books he’d read at Signore Barbarese’s back in Venice. How on earth had it gotten to the tower? It must have been a different edition. There was no other explanation.
“Put it back,” said Johann. “Now. It’s not suitable for you. Or for me,” he added quietly.
He waited until Karl had placed the book back on the shelf, then he gestured upstairs. “You sleep on the second floor. There’s another bed. A bit of fresh straw and some cushions should make it homely enough. The third floor is out of bounds for you, just like the rooftop—you hear me?”
Karl nodded.
“Good,” said Johann. “And you’d do well to remember my words. If I ever catch you up there, I’ll skin you like a rabbit. Now help me bring Satan inside and light a fire before we freeze to death.”
As they got the fire going together, Johann remembered how Tonio had once used almost the exact same words with him. That was a long time ago.
But right at that moment it felt as though no time at all had passed.
They spent the following weeks almost exclusively in the bottommost chamber. Apart from brief trips outside, Satan was always sleeping by the fire. They read a lot and played chess, and Karl’s skills improved with each match. Johann still beat him most of the time, but the games were no longer as boring. Sometimes Johann even had to think a little harder. Karl increasingly enjoyed the challenge.
“Ha, you’re stumped. Admit it!” he said one time when Johann was taking particularly long to make his move. “I’m making you sweat.”
“If anything is making me sweat, it’s the damned fire,” growled Johann. “You put far too many logs on. It’s as hot in here as the pyre you twice narrowly avoided.”
Karl’s only response was a sheepish look. But there was also something else in his eyes, something Johann couldn’t read. He would notice those looks more frequently over the coming weeks but never understand them. Johann was too preoccupied.
On the very first day they’d arrived, Johann had dug up the crate behind the tower and opened it nervously. The tube and books had been wrapped in waxed cloths and were undamaged. Many of the carefully hidden works were about astronomy. Johann found countless rows of tiny numbers and symbols in the margins of the books. It looked as though Tonio had made coded entries, almost like secret messages the master had left for him. Johann thought about the coded messages he and Margarethe had written to each other in Knittlingen. Surely there was a solution to this riddle, too, some kind of key to read the rows of numbers. But try as he might, he couldn’t figure it out.
Johann spent many hours trying to solve the mystery, during the day as well as at night. He started with fright every time there was a noise outside—snow falling off the trees, a startled wildcat on the prowl, or the goddamned cawing of the crows. With every sound he thought Tonio had returned.
But the master didn’t come. Maybe he had left this place for good?
During clear nights, Johann climbed atop the platform and watched the stars. After a few failed attempts he had finally managed to set up the tube. It wasn’t so different from the laterna magica: on the inside were lenses that improved one’s eyesight so much that the stars stood clear and bright before him. Everything that usually seemed so far away appeared suddenly within reach. The moon—normally a round yellowish disc with blurred edges—was suddenly covered in craters and lakes of sand, almost like a small version of the Earth. The planets, too, and even the constellations of the eighth sphere were much clearer through the tube.
But Johann still couldn’t tell what lay beyond the eighth sphere; he guessed the lenses weren’t quite strong enough. And so he hadn’t come an inch closer to answering his pressing questions.
He had tried to inspect the lenses closely without taking them out. They appeared to be cut better and more precisely than anything he’d ever seen from glaziers in the empire. They seemed like small miracles to Johann, and not for the first time he asked himself where Tonio had gotten the apparatus. He had never seen anything like it anywhere, not at any courts or at any universities.
As if it stemmed from a foreign world.
Satan enjoyed the warmth and barely ever left the fireplace. Johann always tried to feed her the best cuts of meat, but the dog hardly ate anything. She grew skinnier and skinnier, only lapping up the theriac from time to time. Every time Johann stroked the large animal, she looked at him with loyal eyes. Those eyes nearly broke his heart.
What am I supposed to do when you’re no longer with me? he wondered before calling himself a fool for posing such a question to an animal.
On their journey to the tower, they had bought enough provisions so they wouldn’t have to go into the village. By now it was snowing so heavily that they couldn’t have gone far even if they’d wanted to. The snow piled up outside the door and the windows, so that they had to shovel their way out every time they needed more firewood.
“I feel like we’re imprisoned,” moaned Karl one afternoon when they once again sat together over a game of chess.
“Don’t talk nonsense,” said Johann as he took Karl’s queen. “I told you once before: you could be sitting in Cologne right now, waiting to be burned at the stake.”
“Then why can’t I at least go up to the third floor? Or up on the platform? That thing you use to watch the stars with . . . does it really bring them that much closer?”
“I said no, and that’s my final word on the matter.” Johann checkmated his student with his next move, turned the board around, and sorted the pieces anew. “From the beginning. You’re black this time.”
In fact, Johann didn’t really know why he wouldn’t allow Karl upstairs. There was nothing there. Only a faded brownish pentagram that wouldn’t go away. Just like the bad memories.
A pile of dirty, torn children’s clothes.
Johann had tried to wash away the pentagram many times—in vain. It remained a steady reminder that Tonio might return at any moment.
Satan died during one particularly cold night in December. The evening before, she had rested by the fire and lapped up a bit of theriac, and the following morning, Johann found her cold and stiff like a log—a giant skeleton held together by a bit of shaggy fur.
Johann knelt down beside her and stroked her for a long time. He remembered all the wonderful moments they’d shared. Satan had been his companion since his escape from Heidelberg, and even though she was only a dog, Johann loved her more than he’d loved most people. He curled up beside her and tried to feel the last bit of warmth. But there was nothing.
Over the last few weeks, he’d tried everything he could to help Satan. He had collected spruce sprouts and brewed a medicine from them, and he had palpated Satan’s abdomen. Toward the back he had found a hardened area, and from then on he had known there was no hope. All he could do was try to ease her pain. Despite his grief, Johann was relieved that Satan had died naturally that night. If the dog had suffered for much longer, he would have had to put her down. He didn’t think he would have been capable of cutting her throat.
They buried her behind the tower, in the hole where the crate with the tube and the books had been hidden. Praying seemed inappropriate to Johann, but he remained standing at the grave for a long while, in spite of the bitter cold and the icy wind that cut through his clothes like knives. Karl stayed with him for a while before sighing deeply, giving Johann one last sympathetic look, and returning to the tower’s warmth.
Johann was like an empty shell for the following days. Not even chess brought him joy, and he gave up watching the stars. He had placed all his hopes on finding the secret of his life here at the tower, but he found nothing. He had been wrong. Now that Satan was dead, he had lost all remaining willpower, the force that had kept him going and pushed him on since childhood. All he ever did now was stare into the fire. He felt so tired—so many years of traveling that had been nothing but an attempt to run from himself. What had all his cleverness, all his knowledge brought him? He stayed sitting in front of the fireplace until late at night and watched the embers die.
On the third day, Karl disappeared.
He hadn’t come downstairs in the morning, and when Johann checked in his chamber he found the bed empty. Karl must have sneaked past him in the early hours, when Johann had nodded off, and left him for good. Johann couldn’t blame him. He knew full well that the years had turned him into a choleric, imperious, and sometimes plainly unbearable man. Now that his will to live had left him, he wasn’t even a good teacher any longer. What was the young man supposed to hang around with him for? If he didn’t get caught for sodomy, Karl had a promising future. He was intelligent and inquisitive, though perhaps a tad too soft for this world. When Johann thought of him, he suddenly felt real affection.
