JARLSBERG CASTLE

LIVONIA, SWEDISH EMPIRE

“¿Como se llamas?”

“Good, now in French.”

“Comment vous appelez-vous?”

“Good. German?”

“Wie heißen Sie?”

“And now English.”

“Whut uus yaar nem?”

The tutor, her tired face wrinkled with age, sighed and placed her fingers on her temples. She knew that her student was trying her best, but what frustrated her even more was that she herself was no great speaker of the language of the Englishmen. Even so, she knew poor pronunciation when she heard it. Her student's words in that foreign tongue made her cringe.

“Crista,” she said to her young student in their native Swedish, “we have discussed this time and time again. English is a language that requires you to enunciate and change the sounds of some letters. For example, the 's' in 'is' is pronounced like a 'z'.” she tried to sound like she knew what she was talking about, but she was unsure of even that.

Crista Stenbock sat in her bedroom chair, curling her long, flowing blonde hair with her finger as she lost her thoughts in the painted stars on her ceiling. Her eyes wandered about her room, with its silk curtains and wolf skin carpet. She glanced over to her large canopied bed; she would rather be napping under its covers than struggling over this language lesson.

Her father, Greve Olaf Stenbock, had hired a language tutor as part of her formal education. She would require many skills to be the intelligent and sophisticated future wife of a member of the Protestant nobility. She was expected to know how to speak the languages of the major foreign courts (especially French, as it was the lingua franca of Europe), be aware of her region’s current political dynamic, and be skilled at the womanly arts such as painting, music, and crocheting.

“Sister Margret,” she said, complaining to her tutor in English, “I practicing engelska språket for weeks, and it seem that I no be get any better unless I find good English teacher.”

Sister Margret – the honorific made the old woman wince slightly. She had indeed, at one point in the past, been a nun, and preferred not to be called by that title anymore, but Crista insisted on using it as a form of respect.

Sister Margret had mastered many of the languages of continental Europe, translating Bibles for the French, Germans, English, and Spanish Catholics. She had left that life behind, however, leaving the convent after hearing about the 'evils of monastic life' from Lutheran preachers.

It also helped that the Church of Sweden decided to become Lutheran and sever ties with Rome. Her conversion and desertion of the monastic life had very good timing, too. That was thirty years ago, right before the wars of religion started. Now it was a dangerous time to be a Catholic, more so a nun in Sweden, just as it was dangerous to be a Protestant in Catholic Spain or Italy.

Ever since the Protestants and the Catholic league went to war over the ridiculous argument over who worshipped God correctly, a person’s declaration of faith could be a death sentence.

Margret’s primary concern now, though, was Crista and her English lesson.

“Child, English sounds much like Dutch, only less... erm...”

“Ergerlijk,” annoying, Crista said, after which she switched back to Swedish. “I know you are trying your best, Sister, and I know you are trying to help me, but I think I might need some guidance from a real Englishwoman. I believe our lessons are over for the day. I bid you thanks, and I wish you well.”

“I do not think your father would--”

Before Sister Margret could continue, Crista was out the door.

As she slowly descended the stone steps that led from her room in the solar to the great hall below, Crista's mind wandered as it often did, wondering what life must be like for the peasant girls that lived and worked in her father's county. Surely they did not have such a routine and boring existence as hers.

Every day it was the same thing – breakfast, usually some bread with lingonberry jam, seasonal fruit or some salmon, followed by language lessons with Sister Margret, lectures on statecraft, dancing lessons, fika or coffee time with her father (which of course would be used to teach Crista about social graces), followed by crocheting, history lessons, and horseback riding, before a supper that usually consisted of warm salad, more fish, maybe some game birds or meatballs, and then bedtime, only to wake up and do the same thing again the next day.

It was enough to drive any seventeen-year-old girl insane. Certainly, living in a castle had the security and grandeur that a country home could not offer, but besides the horseback riding, it was terribly boring. Every window, every doorknob, every nail in the castle had been known to her since she was about nine.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

Although she was free to come and go as she pleased, there was almost never any point to it. Her father was not the king, and his land holdings existed in name only, since by the new laws the land actually belonged to the king of Sweden alone, and he was merely its steward. The nearest large city was Riga, which was many miles away. Jarlsberg Castle was her home, in the easternmost corner of Sweden's new empire – but to her, the finely decorated walls and the same blue and ocher drapes and banners hung on the interior had lost their appeal years ago.

Jarlsberg was a castle by name, but in reality it was a Swedish fästning or fortress, constructed with lower walls and simpler defenses than a traditional castle. While the compound maintained a traditional keep that was surrounded by buildings like the smithy, stables, barracks, servants’ quarters, store room, and chapel, its perimeter defenses were much simpler than older medieval fortifications.

Jarlsberg’s walls were twice the height of a man and had earthen mounds built outside them to absorb the impact of cannon. The walls were constructed in a circle around the central structures, but the weakest parts of the wall were the gates that opened up to the western and eastern roads – their large wooden gates had enough room for three horses to walk through comfortably, but they had to be opened through a gatehouse that sat on top of them.

The most popular part of the castle was the courtyard, which was large enough to play badminton in, and indeed it had often been used for this purpose. It was also the garrison muster field. Crista had ordered that its edges be decorated with ornamental bushes and small trees to make it feel more “alive” as she put it.

Today, she thought, she would skip the lessons as she did every so often and head straight for the stables to tend to her horse, Sigfrid, whom she believed to be the second best listener in the castle, bested only by her friend Captain Sven Bjornsson, the garrison commander.

As she entered the great hall with its freshly mopped and scoured floor and richly decorated walls filled with paintings of the Swedish landscape in the summertime, she passed by Ratsherr Joachim Fegelein, a Baltic German councilman who acted as an adviser to her father and a teacher to her. In these times it was considered fashionable to invite foreign statesmen and dignitaries to “westernize” the “wild” lands of Eastern Europe, and Fegelein and people like him were doing a fine job in Sweden.

“Guten morgen, mein kleiner Mausebär.” Good morning my little mouse-bear, he said with a smile. He knew that she had no intention of attending his lecture on European politics, and he was quite happy with that – it gave him more time to do more important matters, not that her education was not important, but running a county was no easy task. Taxes needed to be levied, labor needed to be allocated, and the grievances of peasants needed to be addressed. As soon as Crista went out the door to the great hall, he would proceed to his office to do some much-needed writing.

“Guten morgen, Herr Ratsherr.” she replied with a curtsy in near-perfect German. She always felt that it was odd that the German people liked to use the word “mouse-bear” as a term of affection, but she never bothered to ask why. Brushing the thought aside, she proceeded out the door and into the castle courtyard, where she was greeted by the bright sunshine and the smell of daisies.

Dressed in her fitted pink and purple gown, she was more than a distraction for the soldiers that were assembling for their morning formation. Rows of helmeted heads turned her way as she sauntered towards the stables. She smiled back at the staring soldiers playfully, knowing full well that her presence was a pleasant surprise in the morning, and she was happy to know that she was boosting morale.

As she walked by the captain's quarters, she shouted a “good morning, captain!” through his window. Captain Bjornsson was a fine officer, although long in years, and acted like a second father to her, listening to her complaints and sharing her happiness while her own father was away on important affairs. It was unusual for him to be inside his quarters at this hour, but she thought nothing of it as she continued towards the stables.

Bjornsson awoke in a daze, thinking he had just heard the sound of a woman's voice; Crista's, possibly. Standing upright in his straw-filled mattress, he winced at the sunlight glaring down on him. As he ran his hands through his long blond hair and over his beard, he noticed that –

Sunlight? He was late for duty! Realizing what a fool he had been thinking that he could down eight tankards of mead like he was still a young man and make it to formation on time the next morning, he dashed out of bed and scrambled for his uniform and armor.

The laborious process of changing had begun: first came his blue trousers, tied off at the knees, followed by his silk stockings and boots; next, he hurriedly doffed his nightshirt and put on a cotton doublet, followed by a quilted blue woolen gambeson. He sighed heavily as he put on his blackened steel breastplate and combed helmet. In the time it took him to get dressed, a man could have eaten a good meal and closed his eyes for a nap.

Once he was satisfied, he grabbed his baldric, a belt worn over his shoulder that was used to carry his sword, and went out the door of his quarters, with the lingering feeling that he had forgotten something.

“Avdelning, giv AKT!” shouted the sergeant of the guard; a short, rotund man named Torsten. At this command, the mass formation of pikemen and musketeers slammed their left feet on the ground and stood at rigid attention, with their eyes facing forward, ready to be inspected by their commander.

Bjornsson walked in front of his formation and towards the sergeant, who was staring at his stomach.

“Sir,” said Torsten, “your armor...”

Confused, the captain looked down himself and saw that he had failed to buckle his breastplate. He groaned in embarrassment. Sighing, he turned around and gestured for the sergeant to buckle him up.

“What are the reports from the watch, sergeant?”

“Nothing to report, sir.”

“Very well. Have the men proceed with their usual morning drills and rotate through their designated guard positions.”

As Torsten finished buckling him up, he turned and faced him, tipping his helmet in a gesture of thanks.

“Apologies for the tardiness – what I would not give to be a young man again. That much mead does not do my old head any good.”

“Sir.” Torsten said, not wishing to continue the conversation. He was about to turn to the men and give the first orders of the day when he heard a faint sound in the distance, like the fife and drums of a marching band.

Bjornsson turned to the watchman posted at the southwestern gate and shouted,

“What do you see?”

The watchman fumbled for his spyglass and rapidly scanned the horizon. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see a tiny red and white banner slowly approaching.

“Polish infantry company, sir!”