Re: Blood and Iron

Chapter 587: To End All Wars

The Tyrolean wind had teeth in the morning. It scraped across the stones of the high balcony like a whisper sharpened into a threat, curling around the windowpanes and tugging at the heavy drapes in Bruno’s office.

Bruno stood with one hand cradling a tumbler of chilled schnapps, the other tucked behind his back

Below, the forest had turned. Summer had passed, and soon autumn would turn to the coldest of winters.

Somewhere behind him, a fire crackled in the hearth. His desk was buried under reports from Spain, Manila, and Berlin.

The phone rang once, twice, and a third time. He needed not know who was on the other line, for this phone was reserved for one man, and one man alone.

And it had not made the slightest whisper in years.

“Put him through,” Bruno said, voice soft.

There was a click. Then, there was the tired, static-laced voice of President Herbert Hoover.

“Herr von Zehntner…”

A pause. A breath. A man unaccustomed to groveling trying to remember how to do it.

“I understand this call may be… unconventional.”

Bruno didn’t respond immediately. He let the silence stretch; long enough that Hoover began to fidget with something on the other end, breathing audible now, quick and shallow.

At last, Bruno stepped away from the window and sat, reclining slowly into his chair like a man settling into a throne he had never once needed to seize.

“Unconventional?” he murmured. “Mr. President, what would be truly unconventional is an American election not run by theater.”

Bruno could practically hear the scowl form on the other man’s face in the silence that persisted following his condemnation.

“You don’t believe in the vote?”

Bruno’s mouth quirked upward. Not quite a smile. More like the faint twitch of something ancient.

“If you wish to understand my thoughts regarding the democratic process then perhaps you should spare a moment to visit the former President Hughes. He and I after all had many conversations about the topic. But gaining my thoughts on the inefficiencies of your government was not why you called, was it?”

Hoover was silent for a moment. Then:

“I’m not a fool… Though I can’t prove it, I’m quite certain that you own the newspapers. The radios. The wire services. That you’ve poured more capital into our infrastructure than some states have budgets. That… that you built the backbone of half our war economy and tied it all to shell companies no one can trace. Is it true?”

Bruno sipped his schnapps. It burned the way good truths did.

“It’s possible… However it’s equally possible that you’re imagining things entirely….”

“You could change the outcome,” Hoover said. “We both know it. The polls are turning against me. I won’t survive November. Roosevelt will sweep the states and drown this nation in Bolshevism before he finishes swearing the oath.”

Bruno said nothing. His eyes flicked to a report beside him; German Intelligence had long since intercepted FDR’s latest campaign strategy, and a footnote detailed which counties were already covertly bought and which merely needed a nudge.

“You could stop this,” Hoover pressed. “One broadcast. One editorial push. Quiet sabotage of his machines. You don’t even have to rig it; just tilt it. Tip the scales. And you know what I’d owe you for that.”

A pause.

“I know you’ve done worse for less.”

That earned the faintest laugh from Bruno; low, humorless, and dry as the autumn wind.

“Tell me something, Mr. President.”

“Yes?”

“Would you sell your soul to the devil to maintain your power?”

Bruno leaned forward now, voice quiet, almost intimate through the static.

“Who am I kidding… of course you would. You all would. Every man I’ve ever met who’s tasted true power would burn heaven itself for another term.”

Silence persisted longer than it should have. As if the weight of Bruno’s words were weighing silently upon Hoover’s soul.

“So?” Hoover said, hoarse now. “Will you help me?”

Bruno’s voice dropped to a whisper.

“But what worth is your pitiful, blackened soul to me, Herbert?”

The line went quiet.

Not cut. Not ended. Just… quiet.

On the American side, the President sat in the Oval Office with his head in his hands, the lights of D.C. flickering like a dying star.

On the Tyrolean side, Bruno refilled his glass, ignoring the distant sound of laughter from downstairs; Anna and Erika’s voices echoing through gilded hallways that were built to outlast Empires.

He stared once more out the window, watching as the last of the leaves surrendered to the wind.

Another empire was falling.

And he hadn’t even needed to lift a finger.

—

Bruno exited his office later than usual that night.

Whatever agreement had been brokered between Hoover and himself was something only the two parties knew.

He was tired… far more than usual. Yet it was not the flesh that had been overwhelmed by exhaustion; rather, it was the mind.

The corridors of the estate were dark, save for the amber wall sconces that glowed faintly along the stone halls.

The kind of soft, flickering light that made shadows stretch and whisper.

Bruno loosened his collar, exhaling slowly as he descended the staircase. The weight of the Reichsmarschall’s baton still hung at his side; he hadn’t yet found the energy to remove it.

In the grand salon, a fire had been lit. And in front of it, seated not with poise but with practiced comfort, was Heidi.

She was barefoot, legs curled beneath her, wrapped in a thick wool blanket that had belonged to Bruno’s grandfather.

She looked up as he entered; not surprised, not concerned. Just… waiting.

Without a word, she held out a liter of beer in one hand, and a small porcelain dish in the other. Slices of cured venison, warm bread, and pickled onions the way he liked them.

He stopped a few paces away. Something about the gesture; so casual, so familiar, made the ache in his chest pulse once more.

“You spoil me,” he muttered, taking the bottle with a grateful grunt as he sat beside her on the rug.

“You make it easy,” she replied, brushing a few strands of grey from his temple. “And besides, you look like hell.”

Bruno smirked faintly, then took a long pull from the bottle. It was dark, bitter, and cold… perfection.

He set it down and leaned back against the couch behind them, knees bent, staring into the hearth’s glow.

Heidi watched him a moment longer, then tucked herself closer, her shoulder pressed to his, head resting lightly against him.

For a while, neither spoke.

The fire crackled. Somewhere upstairs, a door creaked open and shut; one of the housemaids retiring for the night. Outside, the wind sighed across the high valley.

Finally, Heidi broke the silence.

“Did he beg?”

Bruno didn’t answer at first. Then:

“Not in so many words.”

“And did you help him?”

“No.”

She didn’t look surprised. Just nodded once, eyes still watching the flames.

“You did the right thing,” she said softly.

“I’m not so certain….” Bruno replied. His words lingered just long enough to unsettle her.

“By refusing to help Hoove, I have ensured that someone far worse will come to power, and when he does the war that will break out soon enough, the second great war… It will be far bloodier, and far more destructive than anything we have ever seen as a species.”

Heidi reached for the dish and took a small piece of bread, tearing it in half and handing him one. He accepted it without comment.

“Bruno,” she said quietly, “I know you feel the weight of all this. I know the evil that you must do to prevent an even greater tragedy from occurring is so heavy it threatens to break your back with each step you take. But, if you are so certain of this outcome, why go through with it?”

He turned his head slightly. Her eyes were there, steady, unwavering. Fearful, but not averting.

“Because it is necessary… America’s dreams of an empire must be brutally snuffed out before they have a chance to truly begin. They seek to expand beyond the Monroe Doctrine that their founders set for them a century before. And instead become the new Rome of this world. But to do so would have them fighting wars of expansion for the next hundred years….”

Bruno stood up, and began to pace, his figure flickering in the shadows produced by the grand fireplace.

“If it is war they want. Then, I will show it to them. I will show the Americans what their industry can produce when turned against their fellow man. I will show them what their distorted science can wreak upon the world. I will show them what happens when millions of men march to the beat of the drum, and into artillery fire. And when I am done, the Americans will be so despairing of war they will never raise the sword again. And the world will be free of their poison forever. It is inevitable…”

Heidi did not respond, not right away.

And after the longest of silences, she rose to stand before her man, hugging him tightly, despite being dwarfed by his stature, whispering the words in his ears that he couldn’t help but find warmth in.

“If it is inevitable, then let us wage such a war that the world will think twice before deciding to challenge the Reich a third time…”

The firelight danced along his face, highlighting the hard edges softened only by her presence.

The cold outside pressed at the windows. But here, in this room, in this one moment, there was warmth.

They sat there together for a long time; the war outside, the collapsing democracies, the hungry eyes of foreign agents all held at bay by the quiet strength of one man and the woman who had never once flinched in his shadow.

And in that silence, for the first time that week, Bruno slept; not in his bed, not with armor or maps around him, but against Heidi’s shoulder, the fire burning low, the empty bottle beside him, and the world, for now, forgotten.

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