Oh there was black blood soup and cold poached fish and fish stew in broth and roe on ice. There was simmered veal and pigs’ trotters, and lambleg with golden potatoes baked in a hollow log. Finally, there were to be sausage pancakes heaped with pink valleyberry and also colostrum pudding made from the first immuno-laden milk given by a cow after calving.
Jon Kelpo was short and skinny, with a thin intent face. His hair was nut-brown. His hazel eyes were wonderfully expressive. Over a white silk shirt tucked in his breeches he wore a striped scarlet waistcoat. The waistcoat was scuffed and less splendid than Tycho’s finery; just as well.
Servants scurried. The fat Dowager fussed. Townsfolk crammed themselves with food in case she accused them of being picky. Equally, they must not seem to be gluttonous. Talk was scientific and over the heads of many guests, but they pretended deep interest—as did Arvid, the elder of Tycho’s two junior brothers. The other brother was Armas. Both brothers were spruced for the occasion. The mana-priest from town contributed his best. Astrid, in a sky-blue gown, was genuinely interested.
Tycho was presenting himself as a patron of science.
“My name prompts me,” he explained grandly to his audience. “There was once a famous astronomer on Earth named Tycho.”
Jon Kelpo nodded. “I know, sir. We mentioned this in Yulistalax. He was a noble, like yourself. I’ve read—”
“You’re obliged to read, whereas I’m obliged not to. Carry on. What did you read about him?”
“He was a genius, with wonderful eyesight and accuracy.”
Tycho smiled. Not having had Kelpo’s advantage—or disadvantage—of literacy, maybe he expected further flattery in the same vein.
“What else do you know about this noble genius?” he prompted.
Kelpo clammed up.
Tycho banged his pot of dark beer on the table. “Tell me. I bespeak you to.” He did not exert too much power.
The young astronomer’s vocal chords seemed in conflict. Tycho frowned, but then forced a smile.
“Be utterly frank,” he reassured Kelpo. “You are my fool-of-reason—my rational shaman.”
For a moment Astrid had difficulty understanding this. Then it came to her that, in Tycho’s mind, an important motive for inviting the astronomer to Castle Cammon must be that Jon Kelpo was a man of science, not of mana-magic. Kelpo’s presence might serve to counterpoise Tycho’s fear of losing control to his impulses.
If Tycho had invited a shaman into his keep, instead, that would have been like attaching a lightning rod to one’s head.
In a strangled tone Kelpo said, “The original Tycho fought with everyone. He was very quarrelsome with his equals. He was harsh with his underlings—”
“And I know how the original astronomer died,” Tycho interrupted. “My father told me, as a warning. It happened at the court of the genius’s royal patron. By etiquette nobody could leave the table until the king retired. The king liked to sit up late boozing. One night the astronomer indulged in far too much wine. His bladder became bloated. He couldn’t leave.”
Guests were exchanging nervous glances. Sweat was breaking out.
“Is this a suitable topic to be talking about during dinner?” demanded the Dowager, her feathers ruffled.
Tycho moderated himself. Very mildly he continued, “Finally, the astronomer’s bladder burst. Poisoning set in. A few days later he died in agony. Enough, enough, I agree, Mother!”
Kelpo rallied. “The astronomer Tycho also had a pupil, named Kepler. Almost my own name, sir.”
“So here you are, my rational shaman, as circumstances require.”
In fact, Kelpo’s name signified brave. Well, in coming here he was either intrepid or rash.
As the banquet progressed, it became clear that Tycho’s motives in sponsoring astronomy were mixed and numerous. He also wished Jon Kelpo to create a new map of the Kalevan sky—to design new constellations to supersede the harp and the cuckoo, the archer and the imp perched on a mushroom.
If the Isi snakes link up the local stars in different patterns to those that human beings had come to perceive, why not a whole sky in honor of the Cammon family?
Of course, a constellation must be dedicated to Queen Lucky. But mainly there’d be: a hervy’s horns, in honor of Tycho’s dad. A cooking pot, for his mother. Speaker’s lips, for himself and for all other proclaimers—the new constellations ought to appeal to everyone in the country. More plausible, more serviceable, more relevant! Oh, there must still be a cuckoo, but in this case a crippled cuckoo with a flower in its beak, which made Astrid flinch.
Megalomania…
Astrid’s relationship with Jon Kelpo grew only gradually—paralleling her own weaning from that verrin’s nipple, Tycho. It was as if some transfer of focus occurred.
At first, Kelpo begrudged the claim that Astrid sometimes made on the telescope. Did this young woman—whose status at Castle Cammon was questionable—imagine that she was a fellow scientist? However, as regards the task of redrawing the constellations, a telescope wasn’t much use at all. The naked eye was best. To be sure, a telescope could reveal distant constellations too dim and tiny to notice ordinarily. What use was there in mapping those? Should he tell Tycho, “My lord, I’ve just found your very face hidden behind the Saucepan! Alas, no one can see it unaided.”
Consequently Kelpo tolerated some stargazing by Astrid, maybe for silent company on the tower top.
When winter came and night spilled into the day, after each new snowfall a servant would dig and sweep the rooftop clear. The river below was ice-bound under a thick white blanket. Wooden stakes marking the road toward town were half-swallowed. Yet the roof remained merely ice-glazed and crisp, instead of engulfed. There was always the brazier to warm one’s mitts at, plus resort to the castle saunas when chill reached the bones; she to the women’s, Jon Kelpo to the men’s.
He was a strangely private person, with an inner intensity which found its outlet in the sky. Attempts to broach his personal history would bring a polite rebuff.
Until…
Winter had come and gone. Buds were bursting open. Snow was melting, splish-splash. On some nights the snow would crust again and the drippings would become icicles. In a restless fever, sweethearts would be carving their names in the bark of trees.
Up on the tower, the night was fairly mild. Showers of actual hquid rain had fallen during the afternoon. Stratus clouds were now breaking up into strato-cumulus as comparatively warm currents rose. Stars gleamed through rifts. Those rifts were on the move, frustrating observation.
“What do you keep in that little pouch you wear round your neck?” Kelpo asked Astrid, as though at long last he had fully noticed her. “There’s no smell of any pomander ball. I suppose no pomander or mustoreum can ward Lord Cammon off.”
This might have seemed an indelicate and insensitive remark. In fact, he was heeding her as an individual.
“I keep my puzzle in it, Jon.”
She must show him.
She did so, by lantern light in the hut.
Ordinarily, Kelpo might have scorned such fiddling with wooden puzzles. He might still have done so, if Astrid had not felt an impulse to confide her secret—that this particular puzzle had two quite different solutions, one of which was a wooden star-shape. Kelpo seemed riveted. He asked to handle the pieces himself.
Twist and pivot the pieces as he might, he couldn’t arrive at either result. She demonstrated. Still he couldn’t copy what her hands were doing. To do so seemed suddenly important to him.
The next night was full of stars. Jon Kelpo couldn’t concentrate on them.