The Zehntner estate rose with stoic grace from the snow-dusted fields outside Berlin—proud, not ancient, and built not on lineage, but on earned honor. It was the ho of a family whose nobility had been won on the battlefield, not passed down from coronets and court favor.
In the great hall hung a portrait of Jakob von Zehntner, the founder—a broad-shouldered Prussian officer with iron-gray eyes and a saber at his side. Enobled for his actions at Waterloo, where his infantry regint broke the Imperial Guard's final charge, Jakob had never worn his title like jewelry. To him, duty was its own inheritance. His descendants had never forgotten that.
Bruno sipped his Eierpunsch, warm and spiced, eyes lingering on the photorealistic image of his grandfather, Jakob von Zehntner. There was pride in his posture—and sothing unspoken behind his silence.
Unseen, his second son Josef had co to find him. It was New Year's Eve at the Zehntner estate... Josef was supposed to be mingling with his cousins, his aunts, his uncles, and even distant family mbers who shared the sa surna.
Josef didn't have the sa difficulties with their family as his older siblings had. He was born in a ti after Bruno had forgiven his brothers and earned their loyalty and respect. He and his younger siblings did not have to listen to the whispers spoken about the last son of the main line who had married a bastard girl and fathered "unclean" children.
Erwin, Elsa, and Eva may rember these things, but Josef was either not yet born, or was too young for them to have taken root in his mind. Because of this, Bruno was a bit perplexed that he was here, watching his father silently enjoy art, rather than out enjoying the festivities with the family like he should be.
"Josef, what are you doing here at this hour? Should you not be enjoying the sweets that mother has cooked for you?"
Bruno never called her 'your grandmother.' She was his mother—dignified, nurturing, and the only warmth he'd ever known in a family that had once rejected him. She had given him a ho, in an era known for aristocratic families being aloof to their offspring.
His father? While stern, was ultimately a soldier like his father before him, and raised sons with discipline, respect, but also love, not in the modern soft manner of a postmodern man, but in the rigid, protective way a man willing to die for the health, wellbeing, and future of his sons would in an era of reason, and strong family ties.
Josef, however, was quick to respond to his father, with a phrase he was not expecting at this ti.
"Father, Uncle Heinrich told to find you and send you a ssage. He says that he wishes to speak with you about so urgent matters regarding work…"
Bruno instantly realized this was a military matter and was quick to chug the rest of his alcoholic beverage before patting his second son on the head, letting the boy know he had done well before sending him off.
"Thanks, Josef… Now go enjoy yourself, and the next ti your Uncle Heinrich tells you to deliver a ssage to tell him that I said he should find himself if it is really a matter of urgency…"
Josef ran off, doing as his father instructed, as Bruno took one look at the painting of his grandfather, shaking his head, while letting out a brief sigh from his lips. Whatever he was lanting only he truly knew.
---
Bruno soon found Heinrich, alone, and in the family library, reading books filled with the knowledge Bruno had consud in his youth when he had little other ans to entertain himself.
Everything from the foundations of civilization to 19th-century engineering and science was contained within... Bruno imdiately noticed the book that Heinrich was reading from, and smirked, as he let the man know his presence with a smug tone of his voice.
"I see you have decided to read up on your Florentine renaissance philosophy? Truly a marvelous man, Machiavelli… Perhaps the first politician to codify a concept of rulership based upon ruthless pragmatism and realism, rather than lofty notions of chivalry and divine appointnt….
Looking back now, I think I spent more ti during my childhood here in this very library than anywhere else in this grand estate. In fact, Heidi and I used to play chess together as children precisely where you are sitting now…
I never told her this, but she had quite the mind for the ga, even if she was dispirited by my constant victories…. She would probably slap now if I revealed that fact, so it's best kept between us…."
Heinrich scoffed and shook his head as he closed a copy of The Prince, written in the original Italian... he could barely understand its words, and was rely observing the ancient copy for its historical value, he looked at Bruno as if he was so kind of monster while holding the book in his hand.
"This… This is what you were reading as a child? This is in Italian, you understand that, right?"
Bruno didn't miss a beat. He quoted Machiavelli word for word...
"Of course. 'If you must wound a man, do so in a way that he cannot seek revenge.' Machiavelli was not poetic. He was efficient."
Heinrich couldn't help but shake his head, as he placed the book back where it belonged and shook his head in disbelief… My god, man… That goes well above and beyond a normal aristocratic education…. Is there anything you didn't read?"
Bruno thought about it for a second, as he recited one more obscure philosophical text from his past life that seed to have far grander ramifications on the tiline than one might expect it to.
"I did not get a chance to read Might is Right written by Ragnar Redbeard, a particularly incendiary critique of liberal politics and their delusional worldview, but thought provoking nonetheless. Sadly, it was published while we were at the academy together, and lord knows nobody was going to allow such Anglo-Saxon supremacist drivel into our libraries.
Now, I'm sure you didn't invite here to discuss philosophy. What matter is so urgent you must disrupt my new year's festivities with our family?"
Heinrich sighed before handing Bruno a letter, one that had co from soone below him, making its way up the chain of command.
"Intelligence in xico suggests now that the Blacks skulls have occupied the northern portion of the country, and begun stringing up revolutionaries left and right, they seek to turn on the Werwolf Group, they are requesting silent extraction from the region…
Even though the official leader of the organization is ...that mad dog Röhm, everyone knows you're the one truly pulling the strings. So intelligence wants to know your call?
Bruno could only scoff and shake his head as he heard this, almost slightly, and unusually irritated, as he let his thoughts be known.
"Heinrich, wars waged across the Atlantic are not an urgent enough matter to ruin the celebration of the new year with my family... The wolves already have contingencies in place for matters like this. If they didn't, then we wouldn't be able to deny our involvent with them, now would we?
Tell intelligence to locate and interrogate Röhm if they're that concerned. I'm not in xico. I'm not in command. And I'm certainly not missing the new year with my sons over a turf squabble dressed up as insurgency.
Now co. Let's go back and honor the sacrifices that made this peace possible. It's a new year, Heinrich—and the prosperity we enjoy now did not co without a price."
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