Re: Blood and Iron

The cathedral had emptied, but the weight of its silence lingered.

The funeral was over, the hymns sung, the banners folded, yet the memory of it clung like incense in the air.

The hall adjoining the nave had been prepared for the mourners.

Tables stretched the length of the chamber, draped in black and white cloth, laden with wine, bread, and meat for the guests.

Yet the food remained untouched by most, the company subdued.

Bruno stood at the center of it all.

Normally, at such gatherings, a glass would already be in his hand, a quiet refuge, a mask to dull the endless procession of condolences and polite words.

But tonight, he was stone-cold sober. His face was still, his expression carved in iron.

Only his eyes betrayed the weight pressing on him, a weariness that no uniform, no honor, no title could conceal.

At his side, Heidi bore the burden with grace.

She moved from group to group, receiving sympathies, offering polite smiles and gentle words where her husband could not.

She shielded him as she always had, the empress in all but name, carrying the weight of ceremony so that he might endure the weight of grief.

Still, some he could not avoid.

Heinrich von Koch was the first to reach him.

The old friend clasped his hand, holding it longer than formality required.

His hair had gone white, but the strength in his grip was unchanged.

"You've outlived too many, Bruno," Heinrich said, his voice low, his eyes steady. "But not him. I thought the old man would bury us both."

Bruno allowed the faintest curve of a smile to touch his lips. "So did I."

The silence between them said the rest.

Heinrich squeezed his hand once more before stepping back, leaving Bruno with that rare comfort, the kind of wordless understanding only forged in blood and decades.

His brothers came next, one by one, their faces carved by age.

Men who had once laughed at him, scorned him, envied him, now bowing their heads, acknowledging him not only as head of the house but as the son who had carried their father's legacy further than any had thought possible.

Bruno met each in turn, offering nods, clasping hands, murmuring the words that duty demanded.

Then the sovereigns.

Kaiser Wilhelm II approached with his family. Age bent his frame, but his eyes still burned sharp. He gripped Bruno's arm with surprising force.

"The old bull is gone," the Kaiser muttered. "God above, I never thought I'd see it. I thought death was too impatient to take him. And now here you stand, the last son carrying him forward."

Bruno inclined his head. "He carried me in ways I did not see until the end."

The Kaiser's gaze softened. For a moment, the weight of titles fell away, and Wilhelm spoke as a man to another man.

"You honored him well today, Bruno. He would have been proud."

Next came King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, his voice warm despite his small stature.

He praised the strength of Bruno's house, calling it a pillar of Europe, and offered his hand in friendship.

Bruno answered with formality, but there was no coldness in his tone.

Tsar Alexei followed, his wife Elsa beside him, her face pale but composed once more.

Alexei clasped Bruno's shoulders, meeting his eyes with a depth of understanding few others could.

"My father once called yours 'unyielding as the Alps.' It seems fitting that even the mountain must now bow to time."

Bruno gave a slow nod. "Even stone erodes, Alexei. But providence endures."

One by one, the others came.

The kings of Greece, Hungary, Belgium, Portugal, and Spain, each offering their condolences, their admiration, their respect.

Bruno met them all with the same unshaken composure, his voice steady, his gaze unwavering.

Yet for all the crowns, all the princes and ministers, all the distant cousins and allies, it was the simplest gestures that cut deepest:

A nephew who bowed awkwardly, too young to find the words; a niece who clutched Heidi's hand and whispered of memories of the patriarch's laughter; children darting between the guests, reminding all present that life endured even as death claimed the old.

Bruno stood through it all, silent more often than not, his eyes shadowed but clear.

He was a soldier, a prince, a statesman, but tonight he was simply a son who had buried his father.

And in the great hall of mourning, beneath the weight of empire and dynasty, that was enough.

The stream of condolences ebbed, the tide of princes and ministers flowing back toward the tables where wine was finally being poured.

The hall softened with murmurs and the clink of glasses, the ritual of mourning yielding to the ritual of remembrance.

Bruno stood apart, his cane planted on the marble, his gaze distant.

Heidi lingered at his side, but she said nothing, knowing when silence served him better than comfort.

It was then that Kaiser Wilhelm approached again, slower this time, his family keeping a respectful distance.

The old monarch's shoulders sagged beneath his uniform, the years weighing heavier than medals. He drew close enough that only Bruno could hear.

"I am tired, Bruno," the Kaiser murmured. His voice was no longer the commanding timbre of a sovereign, but that of an old man at the end of a long road.

"The winter is long, and I have felt it in my bones these past years. Death has circled me more than once, yet still I linger. But not for much longer, I think."

Bruno inclined his head slightly, saying nothing.

Wilhelm's eyes glimmered, sharp still, but softened by weariness.

"When I am gone, and when you too are gone, though you are younger than I, I will rest easy. Because I have seen our sons, yours and mine. They were raised as we were not, with the burdens we carried thrust upon them early. And I believe when the storm comes again, they will not falter."

The Kaiser's hand rested briefly on Bruno's arm, a gesture not of emperor to prince, but of one father to another.

"That is all a man can hope, in the end, that the world after him will not collapse for want of his breath."

Bruno's eyes lingered on the floor, the candlelight flickering across the stone. He said nothing.

Around him stood emperors and kings, the rulers of Europe, gathered in black under one roof.

The weight of crowns pressed upon them all, yet Bruno felt the weight of something heavier still, time.

He wondered, as he had often in recent years, what the world would be when he was gone.

Would his life's work endure? Had he truly altered the course of fate, or merely delayed it?

Would the path he had carved with iron and blood hold, or would history slip back into the same abyss he had once known, the world he had despised, the ruin that had driven him to remake it all?

His father was gone. Wilhelm soon would be. Even he, the Lion of the Alps, would one day falter.

And then the burden would pass.

He glanced toward Erwin, standing tall beside Alya, speaking with foreign princes in calm, assured tones.

Toward Eva, poised as ever, her husband at her side. Toward Elsa, icy once more, her grief hidden behind a sovereign's mask. His children. His legacy.

Bruno exhaled slowly, the sound nearly lost in the murmur of the hall.

He could not know what world they would inherit, nor whether it would be one worthy of their sacrifices.

But he had given them the chance.

And perhaps in the end that was all a man could do.