Free Gutenberg's Apprentice by Alix Christie Page B

cloisters in their swales, the columned porticoes of law courts, chancelleries, where talents such as his might finally be recognized.
    “How long?” he repeated.
    “He has not spoken to you?”
    His head jerked up. “Of what?”
    She looked into the fire. “He’d like to see you stay. And settle down.”
    “Settle. You mean marry. Say it.”
    “Marry, then.” Her lips compressed. “For heaven’s sake, what did you think? That you could lark about your whole life long?”
    Your wander years are done.
    Grede picked her needlework up again and shifted slightly, turned her body half away. “I wonder sometimes what goes on inside your mind.”
    “I’d rather die.”
    She rolled her eyes. “I’m sure that can be arranged.”
    “Which of those horse-faced hags does Father have in mind?” He slapped the Bible shut. “Kumoff’s? With her breath like shit? Sadler’s? Kraemer’s, maybe, for her sacks of fat?” His voice was cold and low and hard. “No—Windecke’s, now there’s a match: mute, or maybe just too stupid to pronounce a word.”
    Grede sat looking up at him, a glinting needle pinched between her lips. Her face was grim. “You do yourself no favors, Peter, with your pride.” Remember where we come from , said her look. “You think that you can see the path ahead, but it’s not ours to chart.”
    Gutenberg kept their small crew concealed as much as he was able. By day they slaved; by night he bought their silence with his wine. That first autumn he ordained that they would spend their evenings at his fire, to keep their mouths out of the alehouse. He had Lorenz roll in a cask and left them to their own devices. Gutenberg himself went off before they’d even finished wiping down the press from printing all those cursed grammars. The master had the luck, said Keffer darkly, to drink among his peers at their own tavern. Peter wondered how he knew this, though the fact itself was not in doubt: the master drank, prodigiously—the proof was in his morning breath.
    Peter set himself to writing every evening in a corner of the master’s study in hopes of penning his own transit out. He’d need some samples while he waited for a word from Heilant. He did not mind the work; it was a graceful way to keep himself from Fust’s house and Grede’s eyes. The only irritation was the way that Hans regarded him when he pulled out his quills. The old smith might have salved his damaged hand, but was no warmer in his manner. Doubtless they thought him cheeky, Peter thought as he unfolded his clean parchments and installed himself at Gutenberg’s own desk. He didn’t care.
    The others huddled together, playing tablemen or carving; Keffer piped from time to time upon a flute. Peter rolled his shoulders and shook out his arms; he bent and emptied out his mind. Across the page he wrote line by line—across and back and then across again, the way a farmer plows a field. It gave him some small consolation to see that he remembered all the hands that he had learned. He pushed the thought of Fust into the furthest corner of his mind. He would not tell a soul until his bag was packed—he’d leave, and never look behind. It grieved him, but he saw no other route.
    When Peter looked up once, he found the old smith watching him, a strange look in his narrowed eyes. Hans pulled a wooden pick out of his mouth and said, “So you don’t play, eh, fancy hands?”
    Peter said he didn’t think he’d be much contest.
    “My point exactly.” Hans put the gummy splinter back and winked at Konrad. “We got to squeeze it out whichever way we can.”
    “Pay them no mind,” said Keffer, looking up from his own scraps of parchment. When he didn’t have his flute, he drew. The delicacy of his sketches and his music was surprising, given the thick power of his hands. He had a little ash-wood flute and a larger one that he had cast in brass to gain the rank of journeyman. It was well wrought, as were the tablemen that Konrad