Tsar’s Winter Palace, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 1931. Elsa sat by the window, painting the landscape below. And her children playing in its grass. Life had been extremely peaceful and pleasant since her marriage and move to the Russian Empire.
Alexei was being groomed to become his father’s successor. A failure Nicholas did not intend to replicate from his own upbringing. And the Tsar had even asked Bruno for a list of material that he would recommend.
Bruno having compiled a large curriculum on necessary readings to rule a nation, and run a war campaign, all of which was more philosophical and instructive than actually doctrinal based, had sent the list he used as the material for the education of his own children.
As well as the way he handled discussions with them, teaching them how to think, not what to think. Sure Alexei was now an adult, and had begun learning the basis for rulership many years ago.
But his father was getting older, much like Wilhelm in Germany, and extending his preparations to become a more suitable future monarch was a necessary step towards the continued prosperity of the Russian Empire and its people.
As for Elsa, she didn’t play politics, at least not to the extent her elder sister Eva did in Berlin. She was more like her mother in that regard. The peace that her husband needed when he came home from war, and councils regarding national policy.
In her free time, she continued painting masterpieces that would make the likes of Monet and Van Gaugh cry with envy. Today, however, an unexpected visitor arrived. Or I guess you could say, a host of them.
While her children were out playing in the yard, and she was in the midst of completing her latest project. A familiar voice erupted from behind her.
“Well, well, well, if it isn’t my dear little sister Elsa. Long time no see….”
Elsa looked over and saw Eva standing smugly in the doorway, prompting the woman to immediately put her paints aside and walk over to her older sister, staring her in the eyes with an ice cold façade.
“Princess Eva, I was not expecting your encounter? I thought at this hour you would still be nursing your sickness from last night’s festivities.”
Eva glared at her sister sternly, and then the two broke out laughing as they hugged one another.
“You little brat! You make it sound like I’m an alcoholic!”
Elsa smiled as she embraced her older sister.
“I missed you…”
Eva returned the gesture as they stood together in silence for a while.
“Me too….”
The emotional reunion of the two sisters was interrupted by another voice from behind them. Joining in on the fun that he had just witnessed a moment before.
“What do I see here? A Habsburgian relationship in the Tsar’s home? How scandalous!”
The two sisters broke away from one another in an instant and looked over to who had said that to see their brother standing in the doorway, smirking like a charming devil as he did so.
“Erwin, get your mind out of the gutter you little knave!”
The man walked over to his two sisters and hugged them both. All the while Elsa was stunned, looking at the two of them instantly realizing something.
“Wait… What are you both doing here?”
Eva was about to say something when Erwin interrupted her, swirling the glass of wine in his hands as he did so.
“You weren’t made aware? The Tsar invited us all out to visit. Father and mother included. They are downstairs now, speaking about something dreadful or another. I don’t know how you lot do it. Politics is so dull…”
Eva grabbed her little brother by the ear and yanked on it hard, but not painfully so.
“You little brat! You’re our father’s heir, and you still have no interest in the family business! I know you’re not brain dead enough to have no proper understanding of our family’s place in the world! And yet you treat your position like a joke!”
Erwin, wincing in embarrassment more than pain, in a way he had not suffered since he was bullied by his sisters as a child, was quick to plead for mercy.
“Yield! I yield! My beloved sister Eva please spare me! I am no match for your fury!”
This only seemed to provoke Eva more as she applied the slightest torsion to the man’s lobe.
“Fury! I am a lady! Do you think I look furious to you!”
Elsa only giggled at the two siblings, remembering their past as youths growing up together.
“You two are so immature… If I didn’t know better, I would say it was still the year 1910!”
1910… Four years before the great war, the year the second crop of children their parents had begun to raise were born.
It was the last year the three of them had together without any real responsibility, without the threats of war, and the stress of managing entire sectors of governance, or being raised how to do so.
The twilight of their innocence, that comment alone halted Eva and Erwin in their childish tomfoolery, as they all sat there in silence reminiscing about their youth, and the world that once was, but could never be again.
Finally, a voice erupted from behind them.
“There you are, all three of you! I have been looking all over the place to find my oldest children. What are you all doing up here?”
Bruno stood in the doorway, aged but not old, weathered but not wrinkled. His appearance afflicted more by the brutal weave of fate than by the petty cruelty of Chronos.
And as he gazed upon his children, each of which still shared the graceful aging of their parents, he couldn’t help but smile.
“Well, come along then, your mother is waiting for you all below.”
Bruno then left the room, giving his kids a moment to finish up whatever moment he had interrupted.
And Elsa, the youngest of the three, was the one to step forward, lifting the hems of her dress as she gracefully descended the staircase.
“Duty calls….”
Eva and Erwin were left to stare at one another in silence. Though they exchanged no words, the glances shared between them shared the same sentiment.
“When does it not?”
—
Josef stood next to his bride Sophie von Hohenburg, the oldest child and sole daughter of the late Archduke Franc Ferdinand.
Like his older brother, Josef had married young. It was a dynastic necessity, considering Sophie was nine years his senior.
Because of this, despite being a mere 21 years old, he was a veteran when it came to being a father, and had a small crop of his own children.
He gazed upon the ballroom where the House of Romanov and the House of Zehntner had gathered, or at least their main branches. Even Bruno I, Josef’s grandfather, stood proudly in the hall. Wearing an old Prussian Colonel’s uniform from the war 1871 and the medals he earned on its front lines.
Bruno’s father was ancient by now… He was in his early nineties. And despite his advanced age that was well beyond the norm of the era.
He was still walking, albeit with a cane. Death seemed to have lost his patience waiting for the old veteran, and thus Bruno was still not the leading member of his house.
Even so, a decree had been made in years past, granting Bruno, the youngest, the line of succession considering his princely status. And hence, Bruno was considered the head of the house in all but name.
It was because of this that only Bruno’s line was present. As for Nicholas, he seemed to be pleased by the sight of their two families, prosperous, healthy, and plentiful being gathered together for a summer visit.
And when he noticed this, he walked over to Bruno’s side and spoke in a hushed tone that only the two of them could properly hear.
“It seems the future will be in good hands. I see knights, princes, and titans of steel and lead alike gathered here. Surrounded by princesses and maidens of virtue. They will be alright without us by their side won’t they?”
Burno looked over at Nicholas. The man’s gaze was somber. He pieced together what the man was thinking.
“How bad is it?”
Nicholas’s expression turned grim as he sighed heavily and faced Bruno.
“The doctors say I have about a year left to live…. Even the most advanced treatments for cancer that our scientists have developed have no chance of saving my life. That is why I gathered you all here today. Of course you would detect it immediately….”
Bruno frowned. He had always kept an arm’s length from figures of historical significance in this life, believing them worthy of such respect and courtesy.
But Nicholas and Wilhelm had always tried to approach like a genuine friend.
He had seldom reciprocated, not until recently, as he began to understand their deaths were soon approaching. And it would appear Nicholas’s had come sooner than Bruno had thought.
“Nicholas… I’m sorry…. I know it’s too late to say this now, but I should have accepted your offers of friendship much sooner. You have always treated me with dignity, respect, and genuine kindness. And I behaved too formally, as I thought was my duty. I promise you, your son will have my love and my protection. The way I have provided the same for you throughout all these years….”
Nicholas smiled bitterly. It was not the response he was expecting, and it for sure had come too late in life to the point where it was almost cosmically comical. But in that bitterness was genuine happiness as he placed his hand on Bruno’s shoulder in a gentle gesture of acceptance.
“It’s okay, my friend. I go to God now…”
He paused, glancing toward Bruno Sr., who stood proudly beside the Tsarevich Alexei — regaling the young heir with tales of distant battlefields and an era of gallantry long past.
“And should death ever finally deem it fit to wrestle with your father,” Nicholas said with a faint, wry smile, “I’ll share a drink with him in paradise. I’ll tell him all about the man you became. The man we all leaned on in the end.”
Bruno was struck silent.
Nicholas gently stepped away, his words lingering like the scent of incense after a liturgy. He glanced back once, his voice carrying with a warmth that defied the weight of fate:
“Come now, Bruno. Don’t look so glum. I’ve lived a good life these past twenty-some years — thanks to your friendship. Be happy for me. Death comes for us all, and I intend to meet him without regret.”
And then… silence.
Bruno remained standing long after the Tsar had stepped away to make his final announcement. He neither heard the words nor registered the ripple of shock and sorrow that followed.
He simply stared into his glass of wine…
As if its depths were endless.
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