The Legacy (41 page)

His voice broke on the last word, and he looked away from her so she would not see the tears in his eyes.

“So, now you know I am a coward and a dishonorable son. And so, I was responsible for my own father’s death. I felt it was only right for you to know the sort of man you had married before you made your decision to stay. If you choose to disassociate yourself from me now, I will understand.” He went to the window and splayed his hand against the cold glass, waiting for her judgment.

Sabina looked at her husband’s profile, so full of grief and pain, and understood what his refusal to help his father had cost him that day. What it still cost him. He trailed his fingers over the window glass and then turned his face away to rub his cheek against one sleeve, the dejection in his strong shoulders and the stiff line of his body expressing his expectations. He squared his shoulders and turned back.

“But I pray you won’t leave,” he said. “There are many reasons I wish for you to stay. But the most important one, the only one that matters, is that I love you more than my own life, and I’ll spend the rest of it trying to earn my honor back. So you can be proud of me. I want you to be proud of me,” he said, his voice barely audible. A yearning etched itself into the weary strength of his face. He gazed down at the floor. “I don’t care what anyone else thinks if I can earn your respect.”

She stared up at him. “You cannot.”

His eyes snapped to hers, and the hurt in them nearly broke her heart.

“How can you earn that which you already possess?” she finished gently.

Relief flooded his face, and yet still he seemed hesitant to believe what her smile and her words were telling him.

“You aren’t… ashamed of me? Of my cowardice?”

She touched his face. “Wolf, it was not your fault.”

He blinked.

“Your father made a choice,” she went on. “Rather than accept his lot, admit his mistakes, try to make amends, he forced you to bear the burden of his disgrace instead. What he did was the true coward’s act.”

He shook his head. “He was confused. He was in despair—”

She placed a finger against his mouth to quiet him. “I know you loved him, but I say again, he was the coward, not you. To leave his family behind to deal with the consequences of his actions, to cause you to worry for his eternal soul, to force you into a pact with the baron—those are the actions of a deeply flawed man. You cannot hold yourself accountable for the dealings of such a one, love him though you might.” She caressed his strong jaw. “Besides, even if you had given him what he wanted, who is to say the subsequent failure of his scheme would not have driven him to the very same act? Can you?”

He was silent a moment and then shook his head. “Nay. Papa was always a melancholy sort, given to wild extremes of emotion, even more so in these last few years. It was as if he wasn’t in control of his own passions, as if they governed him where reason and logic could not. In his blackest moods, he could never see any hope for the future.”

“It is likely one of those moods came upon him when he decided to take his own life,” she said. “You cannot be held responsible for that. You did the right thing in refusing to further his plans and put your own child’s legacy in jeopardy. How would you have cared for Gisel if you had lost Behaim Press?”

“I couldn’t have,” he admitted.

She placed her hand atop his heart, trying to infuse him with the strength he had once given her. “My dearest love, it was not your fault. Neither of us is responsible for the sins of our fathers. Let the legacy of guilt and shame die with them today.”

Wolf held her gaze for a long time. Then he placed his hand over hers and tried to speak, but no words came forth. Finally, he kissed her wordlessly, the kiss softer than a butterfly coming to rest on a flower.

“Forgive me for not trusting you with the truth sooner,” he finally managed. “Thank you.”

“You are welcome, as well as forgiven,” she said, and slid her arms around his waist, pressing her face into his chest, smelling his special male scent. As she did, the drying cloth slipped down her shoulders and she let it go. Smiling, she tilted her face up to his. “Now will you come to bed, husband?”

He grinned, his hands sliding down to caress her bare hips. “No power on the face of this earth could keep me away … wife.”

Epilogue

W
olf stared across the garden, ignoring the profusion of red and yellow blossoms fluttering like velvet banners in the gentle breeze. The object of his gaze sat motionless on a bench in the center of spring’s splendor, her face turned toward the sun like one of the hundreds of roses decorating the garden path. She closed her eyes as she enjoyed the pleasure of the sunshine on her skin, and for the first time in weeks she looked at peace. Wolf hesitated to disturb Sabina’s quiet moment, but it was time they talked. Past time.

They had buried von Ziegler a little over a month ago. Günter had delivered Müntzer to Thuringia. Once there, Müntzer had been tried by the state, tortured as an example to others, and then beheaded for his crimes.

The papers they had retrieved from the sea chest had proven quite revealing. Faded family documents supported Sabina’s claim to her inheritance. The new Elector declared Sabina to be the sole and rightful heir of her grandfather’s landholdings and all its entitlements.

Most astounding of all, the baron’s trading vessel arrived in port soon after his burial. Apparently, the reports of it being lost at sea had been premature. If he had lived a few more days, the baron would have seen all of his malicious machinations toward that end realized. Instead, his daughter, and by virtue of Sabina’s generosity, Agnes, reaped the benefits. They were now two of the wealthiest women in Saxony. Sabina had even donated a portion of the proceeds to settle the accounts with the city the baron had embezzled, and added a donation to the city’s coffers as well.

Though she had professed her love for Wolf since the night of his confession, and many times thereafter, she had not spoken about the one thing that mattered to him most: the child she carried inside of her. Wolf was convinced she did indeed carry his child. The signs were all there, even to the gently rounded swell of her belly as their babe began to grow. Surely she must know of it by now, but she hadn’t, as of yet, said a word to him.

He had become impatient. He wanted to make plans.

Sabina opened her eyes to see Wolf’s concerned face looking down at her. She smiled slowly, love for him flowing into her, brimming from her like a cup packed down, shaken and filled to overflowing. She had read that once in Dr. Luther’s translation of the Holy Scriptures, and she liked the sound of it. She arose from the bench on which she sat and walked into his embrace.

Lifting her face to his as she had lifted it to the sun, she whispered, “Good morning, beautiful.”

Wolf flushed. “Hardly,” he muttered, but he kissed her nonetheless.

She pulled back with a mischievous grin.

“Oh, yes you are, do not try to deny it.” She lifted her hand to his face, and allowed her fingers to trace the elegant brows, the once-broken nose, and the sharp angles of his jaw. “You are the most beautiful man in the world. With your looks, and my intelligence, how can our children go wrong?” she teased him, her eyes wide.

Wolf’s eyes lit up. “Speaking of children …” He still embraced her, his arms slung casually around her waist.

“Yes?” She traced the soft skin of his lips with her finger.

“Have you been … thinking about children lately?” he prompted.

“Why, yes. How did you guess?” She almost felt naughty for toying with him so, but she could not help herself.

“Oh, a little bird told me,” he said with a smug smile. “So, will we have glad tidings for Christmas this year?”

“I do not know—do you think the workers can finish in time?”

His face went blank. Cautiously, he said, “Ah, perhaps we should clarify what it is we are speaking of.”

She turned away in order to hide her smile and pretended intense interest in one of the rose bushes. “Well, I wondered if you think they can finish the renovations on the castle in time. I think Christmas would be a wonderful time of year for all of the children to move into their new home.”

“All
of the children?” he said, agog.

She plucked a luscious red rose and buried her nose in it, trying not to laugh outright. “Of course, silly, it would hardly be much of an orphanage with only one child.”

The silence behind her was deafening. Finally, she ventured a peek in his direction. She could see the wheels turning in his head.

“Oh. You have decided to convert the castle into an orphanage,” he said, his voice carefully neutral.

Sabina trailed the velvety edges of the red rose over his hunter green doublet. “Yes, I hope you do not mind. I find the idea of living at the castle holds no appeal for me. Too much has happened for me to ever be happy there as it is now.” She suppressed a delicate shiver as a cloud passed over the sun. “I hope to create new, happier memories by filling the place with children who were once like me.”

Wolf frowned slightly. “It seems like a lot of work. I mean, considering …?” his brows rose meaningfully.

“Oh, nay, not at all. The haven for the nuns will, of course, take time to establish, but I have already found a builder who can renovate the castle. I intend to speak to Dr. Luther tomorrow about some of the former nuns I traveled to Wittenberg with as well. They might wish to help.” She frowned. “Considering how many young peasant children were left without fathers after the revolt, I think founding an orphanage is the least we can do. I intend to put the baron’s ill-gotten gains to good use. With the income from the shipment, we will be able to offer free room and board for at least fifty children.”

“Sabina,” he said gently, bringing her close once again, “you mustn’t think of the money that way. It’s a part of your inheritance.”

“And therefore mine to do with as I wish. Unless,” she arched a brow at him and pulled slightly away, “as my husband you have an objection?”

The look she sent him informed him clearly if he did, he would be sleeping alone for the next several months.

“Nay, none at all,” he responded hastily. She nestled back up against him, the motion intentionally suggestive. His arms tightened around her.

“Good.” She smiled again. “Besides,” she stood on tiptoe and gently nipped his chin, “it will give me something to do until the baby comes.”

Wolf, distracted, mumbled, “That’s nice.” Then,
“What?”

“And after he or she is born,” she continued, unfastening his doublet and working her fingers inside the folds of his shirt until she could touch his skin, “we can teach some of the former nuns how to be nurses and housekeepers, like Barbara and Bea, so they are not limited just to marriage or the bawdy house.”

She pulled his shirt open, and with a sigh settled in to stroking his bare skin, circling the copper-colored heads of his nipples with her thumb. The rose dropped unattended onto the flagstones below. She nibbled up the strong column of his neck, resting her lips on the rapid pulse there.

Wolf grabbed her fingers where they had begun to tease him and pulled back, his intense emerald gaze on hers. Obviously torn between the desire to throw her onto her back behind the rosebushes and the desire to hear, once and for all, whether or not he was going to be a father again, he asked, “What are you saying, Sabina? Tell me outright, for pity’s sake.”

She laughed and clasped her hands around his neck. “We are going to have a child, Wolf. A little baby, just for us.”

Wolf’s face lit up, but then his joyful smile suddenly died. His brows drew together, a look of unease stealing over him.

Sabina could practically hear the thoughts running through his head—
Beth died giving birth to Gisel. What if the same thing happens to her?
It was why she had waited so long to tell him, to be certain all was well.

She grabbed his shirt and pulled him to her. Nose to nose, she said, “Wolfgang Philip Matthew Behaim, look at me.”

He did.

“I am not Beth,” she said fiercely. “I am healthy, hale and hearty. I have survived more than most
men
could in a lifetime. And I am not—I repeat
not
—going to die. This baby will be born, and we will have a beautiful son or daughter to raise together with our lovely Gisel, and many, many more besides, and we will live
happily ever after.
Do you understand?”

He nodded. “Yes. Yes, wife, I understand.”

Relief, and much more, sang through the searing kiss he pressed upon her, and soon the perfume of the roses surrounded them as they shocked the servants once again.

Not for the first time—nor the last.

Author’s Afterward

T
o paraphrase a popular expression, it takes a community to write a book. To write mine, and to gain insight into the Early Reformation period, I perused the writings of several historians: notable among them were Steven Ozment, William J. Petersen, Dietrich Steinwede, Roland H. Bainton, and David N. Durant. Thanks in particular to Dr. Ozment, McLean Professor of History at Harvard University, and Professor John Flood, University of London School of Advanced Study, Institute of Germanic Studies, for their generous responses to my questions. Of course, any errors in fact are mine and mine alone.