The Grand Estate was silent.
The guests were gone, the carriages departed, the torches extinguished.
Only the faint hiss of snow against the windows broke the stillness.
Bruno sat alone in the foyer. The great oak doors closed behind him; the fire burned low in the grate.
He leaned back on the sofa, his cane resting against the arm, his gaze fixed on nothing.
His shoulders sagged, the weight of the past days pressing down like a stone.
He did not move when Heidi entered.
He heard her steps, light but certain, and knew it was her long before she ca into view.
She carried a single mug of beer, the foam still rising.
She stopped before him, holding it out.
He shook his head. "Not tonight."
Her lips curved, not in a smile, but in that faint, knowing expression she wore when truth cut deeper than denial.
"When a dog doesn’t eat," she murmured, "that’s when you know sothing’s really wrong."
Bruno exhaled through his nose, half a sigh, half a laugh, and took the mug from her hand.
He raised it to his lips, drank once, and set it back down on the table.
Heidi didn’t move. She stood there watching him.
Her eyes never left him.
He picked it up again, slower this ti, and took another sip.
The bitter taste filled his mouth, familiar, grounding. He swallowed, his hand lingering around the handle longer than he ant to.
Finally, she lowered herself onto the sofa beside him.
Without a word, she slipped an arm around him, pulling him close.
He resisted for a heartbeat, then allowed it, his body leaning into hers, the rigid line of his shoulders softening under her embrace.
For a long while they sat like that, the fire crackling softly; the snow falling beyond the windows.
"You hide from them," she said quietly.
"The brothers. The cousins. The kings. You sit in your office, or you stand in the cathedral, or you walk among emperors in silence. But you don’t get to hide from ."
Bruno gave the faintest shake of his head. "It’s easier to be silent."
"Not with ," she whispered, pressing closer. "Never with ."
He glanced at her then and found her eyes already on him. In them he saw no judgnt, no expectation, only the woman who had stood beside him since the first days, who had seen every mask, every scar, every silence, and still reached for him.
His hand closed over hers, rough and cold, but steady.
She leaned her head against his shoulder, her voice soft but certain.
"You’ve carried the world long enough. Tonight, you let carry you."
For the first ti since the bells began to toll, Bruno closed his eyes.
And in the quiet of the foyer, in his wife’s embrace, the Lion of the Alps allowed himself, if only for a mont, to rest.
The silence stretched, but slowly the heaviness lifted.
Bruno drained the rest of the beer, the last bitter sip sharp against his tongue.
He set the empty mug down and pushed himself upright, stretching his shoulders with a faint groan.
Heidi arched a brow, watching him. "So. Finished sulking?"
Bruno gave a dry chuckle, the sound like gravel.
"If my father could see acting like this, he would have stripped the dals off my chest and told that he would only give them back when I decided to act like a man worthy of them."
Heidi’s lips curved into a smile, small, but genuine.
She stood, smoothing her dress, and slipped her arm through his.
"Then it’s a good thing he isn’t here to see it. I rather like you just as you are."
Bruno shook his head, a faint smirk tugging at his mouth as they turned toward the stairs.
For the first ti in days, the weight on his chest felt a little lighter.
And together, they left the empty hall behind.
---
The snow still lay heavy across the valley when dawn broke.
Pale light crept through the windows of the Grand Estate, glinting off frost-bitten glass, catching in the icicles that hung like spears from the eaves.
Bruno rose before the servants stirred.
He dressed with the sa efficiency he had carried into campaign tents for decades, boots pulled tight, collar fastened, hair combed back.
No hesitation. No pause. His cane clicked steadily as he moved through the halls.
Gone was the silence of the past days.
He gave quiet orders to the staff, reviewed reports brought overnight, and checked the telegrams from Berlin.
He asked after the household, after the guards, after the arrangents that still lingered from the funeral.
Every motion was deliberate, calm, firm.
In the study, Erwin waited, already at his father’s desk.
The younger man had grown accustod to shouldering the work while Bruno had withdrawn.
But today, when Bruno entered, Erwin rose at once.
He studied his father carefully.
The old weight was still there in Bruno’s eyes, but it had hardened, sharpened, not crushing him, but shaping him.
"What changed?" Erwin asked quietly. "Yesterday you were... sowhere else. Today you stand as though nothing has touched you."
Bruno paused, resting his hand upon the desk, his gaze steady on his son.
"The world is on the brink of war," he said simply. "And I have a job to do...."
Bruno stared into his mug of coffee, reflecting on a similar sentint he had once heard in his past life.
"And at the end of the day... Duty does not wait for a man to feel the urge to fulfill it."
The words hung in the air, heavy and certain.
Erwin said nothing at first. He only nodded, slowly and gravely, recognizing them not as rhetoric but as truth carved from the man’s very marrow.
Bruno turned to the window, watching the snow fall over Tyrol. With his jaw set, his shoulders squared.
Grief would remain, as it always had, but grief would not rule him.
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