Trumpets cut through the ballroom like a blade.
Oskar was still at the center of the dancefloor with Princess Patricia, the final turn of their dance barely complete, their hands only just beginning to part, when the sound came again—sharp, formal, and entirely separate from the music.
These were not the orchestra's trumpets. They were herald's trumpets, a signal of sorts.
And every head turned toward the great double doors.
For a heartbeat, the whole ballroom seemed to pause. The chandeliers glittered overhead. Silk stilled. Jewels stopped flashing. Even the murmurs of courtly conversation died as if someone had drawn a curtain over the room.
Then the announcer's voice rang out, louder than etiquette allowed and far less steady than ceremony required.
"By the grace of God and by the authority of His Imperial Majesty," he began, though his tone carried the strained urgency of a man who had been handed a script moments before and no longer trusted the order of events, "I announce the arrival of Her Imperial Highness, from the Grand Empire of Russia—"
He did not finish properly.
Behind him, the great doors began to move.
Not in the smooth, measured fashion expected of imperial ceremony, but with sudden confusion. One door shifted first, pushed from the outside with impatient force. A guard, startled, reached to stop it, then froze as he realized who stood beyond it. Another guard hurried to help. Then both doors were pulled wide before the announcer had managed to complete his declaration.
"—Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna Romanova!"
The name rolled across the ballroom too late, for it's owner had already entered. And with her coming a ripple passed through the gathered court.
People parted instinctively, not because they understood what was happening, but because the name Romanov still possessed an old and terrible magic. It carried distance, blood, empire, winter palaces, saints, soldiers, secrets, and the vast shadow of Russia itself. Even in Berlin, even among Germans, even among foreign envoys who disliked Russia as much as they feared it, that name could still open a path.
And through that path came a child.
She was small amid the forest of finely dressed men and women. A little white figure moving too quickly for protocol to catch. Her dark brown hair had been arranged neatly for court, though a few strands had already loosened from her haste. Pale silk caught the chandelier light as she crossed the threshold, and her gray-blue eyes were wide—not with the practiced calm of older princesses, but with open wonder.
She looked like someone who had seen a legend from across the room and decided that rules, escorts, announcements, and imperial dignity could wait.
Behind her, order tried desperately to recover itself. A stern Russian escort followed at once, his face fixed in the grave expression of a man watching disaster unfold in slow motion. Ladies-in-waiting hurried after her. A governess had gone visibly pale. Uniformed attendants tried to reassemble the ceremony she had shattered by sheer impatience.
But Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna did not slow.
She was eleven years old, the second daughter of Tsar Nicholas II and Tsarina Alexandra. In Russia, she was already known within the imperial family as one of the more composed of the Tsar's daughters: graceful, orderly, serious beyond her years when she wished to be, yet still very much a child beneath all that training. Among her sisters, she would one day be remembered as the tall, elegant one—the little governor, the one who liked things arranged properly, the one who could be gentle and commanding in the same breath.
But tonight, she was not acting like a carefully arranged daughter of the Romanov dynasty.
Tonight, she was a girl who had broken ahead of her own entrance because patience had failed her.
And she was walking straight toward Oskar.
Seeing it the hall fell into utter silence. The kind that came when hundreds of people sensed that something unplanned had entered the room. Something alive. Something dangerous not because it was violent, but because no one had approved it in advance.
At the far end of the ballroom, Kaiser Wilhelm II stared in open confusion. Beside him, the Empress seemed equally stunned, her composed expression faltering as the little Romanov crossed the floor without waiting for permission. Ministers glanced at one another. Foreign envoys stiffened. Officers looked uncertain whether to admire the child's courage or worry about the breach in protocol.
Patricia, still standing beside Oskar, turned her head slowly.
Then Tatiana reached the center of the ballroom and stopped directly before him.
Oskar had not yet fully released Patricia's hand. For a brief moment, he simply looked down at the child. And then something cold moved through him.
Recognition, as he knew this girl from history. Not as she stood now, alive beneath chandeliers, bright-eyed and impatient, dressed in pale silk, carrying the impossible dignity of a child born to the greatest throne in Europe.
He knew her as a ghost.
A photograph in a book. A name beneath a black-and-white image. A young face trapped forever by history, by revolution, by bullets, by a cellar wall in Yekaterinburg.
She was the daughter of the last Tsar. A child who, in another world, would not grow old.
The knowledge struck him harder than he expected.
He saw her small hands. Her lifted face. Her youthful certainty. Her innocence wrapped in imperial silk. And behind all of it, unwanted and merciless, came the memory of what history had done to her family: captivity, fear, false hope, and then the cellar. The shots. The smoke. The bayonets. The dynasty extinguished in blood because living Romanovs remained dangerous to men who wished to own Russia's future.
His chest tightened and for a moment, the ballroom faded. As he then silently swore to himself just then that such a fate would not come again, not while he was here in this world.
Tatiana, unaware of the shadow passing behind his eyes, gathered herself with surprising dignity.
Then she curtsied, perfectly.
The movement was small, precise, and trained into her bones. A Romanov curtsy, offered before a Hohenzollern prince in the heart of Berlin, while half of Europe watched in stunned silence.
Then she looked up, and up, and up.
For Oskar towered over her so completely that she barely reached his midsection. He stood before her like a black-uniformed mountain, broad-shouldered, medal-bright, and impossibly large, while she seemed almost doll-like by comparison, but she did not hesitate.
She spoke to him in Russian, her young voice clear enough to ring through the stillness.
"Ваше Высочество," she said, "я прибыла, чтобы поздравить вас от имени моей семьи."
A few people blinked. Most understood nothing.
The room began to lean toward the translators like a crowd leaning toward a stage.
Oskar, however, heard more than a child speaking Russian. The language reached into him like a hand closing around an old scar, pulling open memories he had buried and tried not to touch. For an instant, the ballroom vanished beneath the weight of those familiar syllables.
He heard Russian military slang carried through cold night air. He remembered men laughing in the dark, cigarettes glowing between gloved fingers, fuel fumes clinging to uniforms, and the thin, distant buzz of drones somewhere above the horizon. Faces returned with the voices—men who had shared jokes with him, shared smoke with him, and died later in places no one in this glittering ballroom could imagine.
Then came the flash, and after it, the silence.
Oskar blinked hard and forced the memories back where they belonged.
The ballroom returned around him: chandeliers, silk, polished floors, watching faces, and the little Romanov princess standing before him with her hands gathered neatly in front of her. Tatiana, suddenly remembering herself, seemed to realize that most of the room had not understood a word she had said. Panic flickered across her face for only a moment before determination replaced it. She straightened, drew a quick breath, and switched into French with the fierce seriousness of a child desperate to prove she had not made a mistake.
"Je veux dire—je vous présente—"
A translator hurried forward at once, already opening his mouth to rescue the moment, but Oskar raised his scarred right hand.
Stop.
He did not need to speak. The gesture alone was enough. The translator froze mid-step, his mouth still half-open, and the court went still with him, caught between confusion and obedience. Even Kaiser Wilhelm leaned forward slightly at the imperial table, his brow tightening. He did not understand Russian, nor did he understand why his son had stopped the translator. Most of all, he did not understand why Oskar looked so calm.
Oskar hesitated, not because he was uncertain, but because the distance between this moment and his old life suddenly felt enormous. Five years had passed since he had spoken Russian aloud. Five years since the language had been useful to him for anything except memory. Five years since he had needed those words, those sounds, that hidden part of himself.
Then he spoke.
"Добро пожаловать, Великая Княжна," Oskar said quietly.
Welcome, Grand Duchess.
The effect was immediate. There were no theatrical gasps, no cries of astonishment, no collapse of decorum. Only shock—deep, clean, unmistakable shock. Princess Patricia's fingers tightened faintly where they still brushed against his, then slowly released. The translator stared at him as if the floor had shifted beneath his feet. Diplomats blinked, their careful expressions cracking for the first time that evening, while officers and foreign envoys exchanged glances and leaned forward by fractions, suddenly far more interested than they had been a moment before.
Oskar had not merely answered the Romanov child.
He had answered her in Russian.
Tatiana's gray-blue eyes widened, and for a heartbeat all her imperial training deserted her.
"You… you speak Russian?" she whispered in her own language, awe overtaking discipline.
Oskar inclined his head slightly, a faint trace of amusement softening his expression.
"I do," he replied in Russian. "Or at least, I hope I still do. It has been some time."
For a moment, the palace forgot how to breathe.
And then Oskar felt the danger of the moment—felt it like imbalance in an engine. A Romanov child had rushed protocol. Enthusiasm could become scandal if not handled cleanly.
So he did what he always did in crisis: "He made it look like he had planned it."
He turned slightly and released Princess Patricia with a respectful bow.
"My thanks for the dance, Your Highness," he said, warm and flawless.
She recovered instantly—she was trained for rooms like this—but her eyes remained sharp with surprise.
"The pleasure was mine," she replied smoothly, stepping back, the court exhaling with her.
Oskar turned back to Tatiana. He spoke softly, in Russian.
"Formalities can wait," he said. "You arrived on the dancefloor. That means you want to honor me properly."
Tatiana froze. Then smiled—wide, unguarded, radiant.
"Yes," she said at once. "Very much so."
Oskar glanced toward the dais, from where Wilhelm II was watching.
For a long moment, the Kaiser studied the scene: his towering son, the Romanov child, the entire hall held between them.
Then Wilhelm smiled and nodded in approval. The Empress inclined her head in approval as well. Princess Luise although, did not approve at all.
Oskar felt it anyway—the unease crawling up his spine as he took Tatiana's hands, which were so small that they disappeared inside his.
Then they began to dance as the music began again, and yet the contrast was almost absurd: a mountain dancing with a sparrow. Tatiana's steps were quick as she tried to match his stride, her posture perfect—trained, drilled—yet her eyes never left him, bright with fascination.
"You're… shorter than I expected," she said seriously, still in Russian.
Oskar let out a genuine laugh.
"Two hundred and two centimeters," he answered. "Approximately. Isn't that enough? Or what have they been telling you in Russia?"
Tatiana narrowed her eyes as if interrogating a criminal, as she asked, "And how much do you weigh?"
Oskar though did not hesitate to answer as he said, "Nearly two hundred kilograms."
Her mouth fell open.
"That's impossible! Yet I suppose the rumours were true then?" she hissed. "You weigh more than the brown bear that visits us at the palace sometimes."
Oskar's shoulders shook with quiet laughter.
"I see," he said. "So that's the rumor. What else do you wish to know, Grand Duchess?"
Tatiana did not hesitate.
"They call you the Iron Prince," she said, intensely. "Is it true then that your bones are made of iron? How else could you possibly weigh so much?"
Oskar's mouth twitched.
He leaned closer, conspiratorial.
"Well," he said, "a normal man cannot crush, nor bend iron with a single step."
Tatiana blinked.
"So," Oskar continued, "if you step on my foot… and fail to crush me… then perhaps I am iron."
He said it sarcastically.
Tatiana, however, was a Romanov child. She took it as a scientific experiment. So she stepped on his toes—harder than necessary—and then immediately looked down in disappointment.
It did not hurt him.
But now she was standing on his shoe as they turned, pouting fiercely as if offended by physics itself.
Then she brightened suddenly, as if she had proven something important.
"You are iron," she declared.
Oskar laughed again, unable to help himself.
And then the questions poured out—rapid Russian, tumbling over one another like a flood that had been held back too long.
"Is it true you wrote the book that saved my brother's life?" "Is it true you made helmets so he doesn't die when he falls?" "Is it true you are stronger than ten men?" "And—" she hesitated for half a breath, suddenly remembering why she was here at all, "—I came to congratulate you… for your birthday… and your children."
The last words came awkwardly, stiff with unfamiliar gratitude.
"My mother and father are… very grateful," she added, stubbornly, as if forcing herself to say it properly. "Because your inventions have helped Alexei. He gets hurt less. He is… less afraid."
Oskar's chest tightened as he heard the poor boys name, yet he kept his face calm as he answered her patiently.
But beneath the polite conversation, something colder stirred in him.
He looked down at her—at the bright eyes, the trust, the innocent certainty of a girl who had no idea what history had prepared for her family.
Once again, the weight of Oskar's future knowledge pressed hard against his ribs.
Nicholas II had never truly wanted to be Tsar. From everything Oskar knew, the man had tried, in his limited and flawed way, to do what he believed was right. He had been weak, stubborn, and often disastrously unsuited to the throne, but he had not deserved what waited for him.
And his family deserved it even less, not the children, not even Alexandra.
For all her delusions, for all the harm her faith in Rasputin would one day bring upon Russia, Oskar could not see her as a monster. She had been a frightened mother clinging to the one man she believed could save her sickly little boy. Her judgment had been disastrous, yes—but it had been born from love, panic, and desperation, not malice.
To Oskar, they were not villains.
They were tragic figures. A family placed in the worst possible position, in the worst possible empire, at the worst possible moment in history.
So he spoke softly to the young Grand Duchess as the music carried them onward, his voice calm while his thoughts moved through blood, revolution, cellars, gunshots, and ghosts yet unborn.
Around them, the entire hall watched in stunned silence, trying to decide what, exactly, they had just witnessed.
Was it a diplomatic incident?
An embarrassment for the Russian Empire?
A miracle, now that Germany's Acting Crown Prince had revealed he could speak Russian?
Or perhaps—though no one dared say it aloud—the first small crack in the ice between two empires that history had meant to drive toward war.
But as always, not everyone was pleased by what they were seeing.
Up on the dais, the elevated table of the imperial family—high enough to look down on the ballroom like gods judging mortals—Oskar's brothers watched the dance with tight faces and tighter hands. Not all of them, but most.
Prince Eitel Friedrich sat stiff as a sword in its scabbard, smile frozen, fingers clenched so hard his nails bit into skin.
Why is he the one receiving blessings? he seethed. If anyone should be standing in that light, it should be me.
Prince Albert and Prince August Wilhelm wore the same expression in different masks: polite on the outside, sour behind the eyes. Even after Crown Prince Wilhelm's collapse, even after Babelsberg, even after the court had begun quietly shifting its weight toward Oskar… they could not swallow it.
By law of succession they had once had steps. Now they had none.
And now watching their younger brother, the one once known by some as the Unwanted Prince of Prussia, rise past them like a knife through silk felt… unacceptable.
Humiliation made them blind. Ambition made them stupid.
Wilhelm II had warned them—once, clearly, with the cold authority of a father who did not want to repeat himself.
But jealousy did not listen.
Once the flame of hunger ignited, it did not go out politely. It only waited for oxygen.
And worst of all, their eldest brother's paranoia had infected them. In their minds, Oskar's genius could not be natural. No man simply became that—wealth, strength, inventions, public love—without a reason beyond the mortal human world.
So their thoughts narrowed to two answers, either Oskar was blessed by Heaven… or Hell.
Down below, none of it touched Oskar. He was too busy being the evening's gravity. The undisputed star of his own banquet.
Eyes clung to him from every corner of the hall—some hungry, some calculating, some simply fascinated. Young noblewomen watched him like a prize animal. Older women watched him like a problem that needed solving.
Princess Patricia, still near the edge of the dancefloor, looked almost offended by the sight of Tatiana at his side—as if the Russian child had stolen something that belonged to the "proper" level of Europe.
But Tatiana did not know she was shielding him.
She simply existed near him, bright and fearless, and the rest of the women—sensibly—hesitated to pounce while a Romanov grand duchess stood within arm's reach.
Oskar, meanwhile, was enjoying himself.
Tatiana's questions came like arrows, and for once, they were not poisoned. For once, someone's curiosity was innocent.
The music slowed. The final notes softened.
Oskar guided Tatiana through the last steps and she followed perfectly, chin lifted, posture precise—concentrating so fiercely you would have thought the fate of Russia depended on her footwork.
When the dance ended, she curtsied with a neatness that earned approving murmurs.
"That was wonderful," Tatiana said brightly, still holding his hand. "You move like a… like a mountain that learned to be polite."
Oskar laughed, genuinely.
"I'll take that as praise."
Her gaze slipped past him then—toward the long household table crowded with children, women, and the strange new power around him.
Her eyes widened.
"Oh!" she breathed. "Your children—are those them? They really are like the paintings. They look… special."
"They are," Oskar said, warmth slipping into his voice before he could stop it. "Would you like to meet them?"
Tatiana nodded at once.
"Yes, please!"
And with that she released his hand and practically skipped away, slipping through the parting crowd with single-minded determination, already bowing and greeting on instinct as she went.
Oskar watched her go with something like relief.
Good, he thought. Now I can return to my table, breathe, eat something, and pretend I'm a normal man for five minutes.
He turned, and immediately discovered what happened when Tatiana was no longer at his side.
The crowd didn't part for him, it came for him.
"Your Highness!"
A man with too many medals and too much enthusiasm caught him first, bowing deeply while already speaking. Another diplomat flanked him. Then another. Compliments poured in like artillery fire.
"Remarkable dance—" "Historic evening—" "Germany is fortunate indeed—"
Oskar smiled, nodded, deflected, edging sideways like a man trying to escape a room that was slowly filling with water.
He was nearly free—nearly—when a soft, decisive hand closed around his wrist and stopped him.
"Well then," a mature woman's voice said warmly, almost musically, "since Your Highness appears to have survived the Russian assault, perhaps Romania may claim one dance?"
Oskar turned, or rather, he began to turn—and immediately made the mistake of looking down first.
The first thing he saw was not her face.
It was her neckline.
Deep sapphire silk framed pale, milky-white skin and the full, rounded softness pregnancy had given her figure. Resting between the generous curves of her chest hung a golden cross, the little figure of Christ catching the chandelier light with an expression so sorrowful that, for one terrible second, Oskar felt as if both Heaven and court etiquette were judging him at once.
"Oh, Jesus," he said aloud before he could stop himself.
The woman giggled, not like a girl. Like a woman who had planned the trap and was delighted to see it work.
"You like what you see, Your Highness?" she asked sweetly, her blue eyes bright with mischief. "My necklace, I mean."
Oskar's gaze snapped upward at last.
Only then did he properly see her face: golden-auburn hair swept high in a jeweled Edwardian arrangement, soft curls framing her cheeks, dark lashes around vivid blue eyes, lips curved in a smile that looked innocent only because the room was too polite to call it dangerous.
She was Crown Princess Marie of Romania, she was married, she was in the early stages of pregnancy, and she was also thirty-two, and clearly here to cause problems.
"Yes," Oskar said after a half-second too long. "The necklace is… impressive."
She smiled, "Then you may admire it while we dance."
Before he could form a proper excuse, Marie had already drawn him toward the floor with astonishing confidence. Oskar followed, because for all his strength, wealth, discipline, and alleged genius, he had one weakness known to half the female population of Europe.
Beautiful women.
Especially beautiful women with large breasts and no sense of mercy.
The orchestra rose again.
Meanwhile, off to the side, at the Romanian table, Crown Prince Ferdinand watched the whole thing with the stiff, wounded expression of a man being diplomatically murdered in public. He lifted his glass, emptied it, then immediately ordered more wine. One hand drifted to his mouth, and for a moment he seemed to bite at his nail before remembering he was a crown prince and lowering it again.
His children although did not understand the situation at all. They simply stared at Oskar in open awe, as if he had stepped out of one of the heroic paintings spread across Europe.
At the imperial table, Oskar's parents were surprised, to say the least.
Wilhelm II had gone very still. For a moment his mouth opened, then closed again, as if several different imperial reactions were fighting for command and none had yet won.
"Well," he murmured at last, trying and failing to sound neutral, "my boy certainly has a talent for attracting attention."
Beside him, Auguste Viktoria's lips pressed into a dangerous line. Her gaze remained fixed on the dancefloor, where Crown Princess Marie of Romania had placed herself far closer to Oskar than dignity required.
"That woman is married," the Empress said in a low, displeased voice. "How can she touch my son like that? How can she press herself against him in front of the whole court? Has she no shame?"
Wilhelm had noticed all of it, but for the sake of peace, diplomacy, and his own sanity, he attempted optimism.
"Now, now," he said awkwardly. "Not to worry. She is pregnant. What harm can she possibly do? I am sure she is merely curious, as the rest of the women here are, about our magnificent boy."
The Empress turned her head and gave him a look sharp enough to slice through bone.
Wilhelm wisely said nothing more.
On the dancefloor, Marie moved with practiced grace, close enough to remain technically proper and near enough to make that technicality suffer. Her hand rested on Oskar's arm with growing curiosity, her fingers tightening once as if testing the muscle beneath the sleeve. When she felt how little the rumors had exaggerated him, her smile deepened.
"My," she said softly, her voice warm and amused. "I must say, Your Highness, the paintings were truly modest when they depicted you."
Oskar fought to keep his expression composed. He tried to hold her gaze like a disciplined prince, a soldier, a man in full command of himself.
He failed miserably.
His eyes dropped to the daring line of her gown, then rose too slowly to her full red lips before he finally managed to return to her eyes.
"Your Royal Highness is kind," he said, a little too quickly.
"I am not being kind," Marie replied. "I am being honest."
During the next turn, her palm slipped briefly against his chest. It was not an accident. She pressed close just enough to feel the solid power beneath the formal uniform, and Oskar actually flinched—not from pain, but from the sheer audacity of it.
Marie noticed at once, of course she did.
She smiled, biting her lower lip in a way that made the gesture look almost innocent to the room and not innocent at all to him. Her blue eyes brightened with delighted satisfaction.
"Truly marvelous," she murmured. "The Iron Prince indeed. Perhaps, during my stay in Germany, you could teach me at the palace gym. I would very much like to learn more from you."
Oskar swallowed.
For one awful moment, no diplomatic answer came to mind.
Then he gave a stiff little laugh and managed, "Yes… we shall see about that."
Marie's smile only grew warmer, as if she had already taken the answer as a promise.
The dance continued under the horrified fascination of the court. Oskar's steps remained flawless, his posture perfect, his smile polite, but his eyes searched for escape like a commander trapped behind enemy lines. Marie, by contrast, looked radiant, amused, and thoroughly pleased with herself, as if she had crossed a border no army had dared defend.
Sadly for her, the music ended.
Oskar bowed at once, seizing the opportunity like a drowning man reaching for shore.
"My thanks for the dance, Your Royal Highness."
"The pleasure," Marie replied, letting her fingers linger for one final heartbeat before releasing him, "was entirely mine."
Oskar turned to flee, he made it exactly one step.
Then Cecilie appeared directly in front of him, smiling with a dangerous sweetness as she caught his hand.
"Oh, Your Highness," she said, already drawing him back toward the floor, "before you vanish…"
And just like that, he was trapped again.
She moved close—tall, elegant, and far more confident than the frightened woman she had been a year ago. The change in her was impossible to miss. The training showed in the steadier line of her back, the firmer control of her hips, the way she carried herself without shrinking from the room or from him. She no longer danced like a woman trying to survive courtly attention. She danced like someone who had decided fear would not own her anymore.
Nor did she shy away from Oskar.
She knew he found her beautiful. She knew his gaze had lingered on her more than once. And tonight, in front of the whole court, she used that knowledge with quiet, trembling courage. She stepped closer than she needed to, pressed herself near enough for him to feel her warmth, and let herself become lost in the moment. Her eyes remained fixed on him, lips parted slightly, her expression so open and yearning that Oskar found it increasingly difficult to remember where his feet were supposed to go.
For one dangerous moment during their dance, it looked as if she wanted him to kiss her right there beneath the chandeliers.
Oskar held himself back by force of will alone.
Then as the dance ended, before he could even exhale, another voice cut in.
"Big brother."
It was Luise. And she did not ask to dance, she came and claimed her spot.
She stepped into his path like a small commander, smiled with angelic wickedness, and took his hands before he could retreat.
Then she leaned up and whispered, quiet enough that only he could hear, "If you refuse, I will tell everyone who took my first kiss."
Oskar's soul left his body for half a second.
"…You're evil," he muttered.
Luise smiled wider, "I'm your sister."
So he danced with Luise. Then, somehow, with Bertha.
After that came Tanya and Anna, both heavily pregnant and both deeply offended by the idea that other women might monopolize him in public. Each insisted on at least one slow dance, not because either of them particularly wished to be paraded before the court in their condition, but because some claims had to be made where the whole Empire could see them.
Then came another woman he did not properly know—perhaps Princess Alice of Battenberg, though by then names were beginning to blur. After her came Marie-Adélaïde of Luxembourg, still very young, round-cheeked, and determined to make a dignified impression while her mother and sisters watched with awe, expectation, and far too much political hope. Oskar treated her with perfect courtesy and absolutely no interest.
After that, the daughters of dukes, princes, counts, and great houses began moving with the coordination of she wolves.
Thus Oskar danced again, and again, and again.
Hours blurred into silk, perfume, music, jewels, bright eyes, gloved hands, whispered compliments, and polished traps disguised as etiquette. At one point he glanced desperately toward his family's table, hoping for rescue, only to find Tatiana happily hugging the children, utterly enchanted, while Anna and Tanya watched him with expressions that blended amusement, pride, and something sharp enough to cut bone.
Farther away, Princess Patricia watched it all with calculating eyes, clearly trying to find an opening to approach him again, but failing to do so.
Oskar Kept getting swapped away by other women, and he gave every woman enough attention to remember and none enough to claim victory.
Around Patricia, other noblewomen watched in the same wounded silence.
They wondered, "Why not me?" "Why does he not linger?" "Why does he keep slipping away?"
Because that was the strangest part. He danced with everyone, and chose no one.
Up at the royal table, the Empress exhaled slowly.
"This is not courtship," she said quietly. "This is avoidance."
Wilhelm chuckled. "Or exhaustion."
She gave him a look sharp enough to shave steel.
"This is his coming-of-age celebration," she murmured, "and he behaves like a man trying to survive a flood."
Wilhelm watched his son navigate yet another dance below, shoulders tense, smile fixed, eyes searching for escape even as his body moved with flawless precision.
"Let him be," the Kaiser said at last. "He will choose when he is ready."
Auguste Viktoria was not convinced.
Down on the dance floor, the music slowed again, strings easing into something gentler—an invitation for all to dance, not a command.
For the first time that evening, Oskar thought he might escape.
He had danced enough. Smiled enough. Offered the court its due. If he moved carefully, he could reach his table, sit, breathe, eat something substantial, and spend a few precious minutes with his family before the next wave crashed.
But then a man in black stepped into his path.
Middle-aged. Impeccably dressed. Smile practiced to the point of artificiality. The kind of man whose warmth had been measured, approved, and deployed by committee.
"Your Highness," the man said smoothly, inclining his head. "Allow me to congratulate you."
Oskar recognized him at once.
Ambassador Vincent—Britain's representative in Berlin. A man who spoke of the British Empire as if it were a law of nature rather than a political arrangement held together by ships and habit.
"Your Excellency," Oskar replied, returning the bow with polite precision. "Thank you for attending my coming-of-age ceremony."
Vincent's smile widened, just enough to show confidence rather than courtesy.
"As heir to the throne of a great power," the ambassador said, lowering his voice as if offering wisdom rather than pressure, "your views on the world naturally carry weight. The British Empire hopes that Your Highness will continue to contribute to peace between nations."
He paused—then added, lightly: "Perhaps another dance with Princess Patricia would be a fine symbol of that friendship. We believe such bonds are… worth strengthening. After all, should war ever come, it would be something no one could bear."
Oskar's smile did not reach his eyes.
So this was it, not advice or goodwill, but a test. A polite threat wrapped in silk, either he chose her or else.
Was Britain warning him? Or attempting to anchor him—to influence German policy through proximity and charm? Or both?
Neither pleased him.
"Your Excellency," Oskar said evenly, "you misunderstand me."
Vincent's brows lifted, ever so slightly.
"The German Empire is a peace-loving nation," Oskar continued. "We have no desire to invade others or provoke conflict. If war ever comes, it will be because necessity left no alternative."
He let the words settle, then added, without apology: "And I do not wish to dance again tonight."
The air between them tightened.
Vincent's smile faltered.
"Your Highness," the ambassador said, his voice cooling, "the British Empire does not seek enmity with Germany. But if your empire continues its current course, the consequences may be… severe. Britain has dominated the world for centuries. We are not unfamiliar with challenges."
Oskar felt his patience thin.
"As a sovereign nation," he replied, "does Germany not have the right to develop its own defenses? We build ships to protect our interests—not to threaten others. Or is power now reserved only for those who had it first?"
Vincent's tone sharpened.
"Is the construction of fleets on this scale truly defensive? Or is it provocation under another name?"
Oskar's voice hardened in response.
"We will not be bullied," he said. "Not by implication, not by legacy, and not by those who mistake habit for destiny."
Several nearby guests had begun to notice.
The conversation, though quiet, carried weight.
Vincent's expression closed.
"Very well, Your Highness," he said stiffly. "I hope you do not come to regret this independence."
He turned and left the hall without another word.
Princess Patricia remained.
Oskar exhaled slowly.
For a heartbeat, anger flickered—then cooled. Arrogance never impressed him. Empires that believed themselves eternal irritated him deeply.
Patricia approached, concern written plainly across her face.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't know he would speak to you like that."
Oskar smiled, softer now.
"It's only words," he replied. "Words are harmless—until someone decides to turn them into action."
She touched his arm lightly, then glanced toward the other women watching from the edges of the hall—eyes sharp, calculating, restless.
Above them, at the royal table, Oskar's brothers watched with darkening expressions.
Prince Eitel Friedrich clenched his jaw. If I had the army's support, he thought bitterly, Father would have chosen me. The women would be watching me.
Prince Adalbert and Prince August Wilhelm exchanged brief glances of their own.
If power could be taken… it could be redirected. If the military favored Oskar now, perhaps that loyalty could be reshaped.
Down on the floor, Oskar led Patricia aside, speaking idly about English athletics—weightlifting clubs, training halls, the slow spread of physical culture.
To his surprise, she barely listened.
After a moment she excused herself, murmuring something about checking on the ambassador.
She left the hall.
Oskar watched her go, genuinely surprised.
Was that… rejection?
He hadn't expected it to sting.
Around him, the atmosphere shifted. Some of the women who had watched him earlier now looked away—pride bruised, interest cooled, assumptions rewritten.
Except his household.
Tatiana still clung happily to the children. Anna and Tanya watched from their table with expressions that blended amusement, possession, and warning.
From across the room, Princess Luise observed everything with narrowed eyes.
The music slowed again.
Oskar stood alone for the first time all evening, with a glass of apple juice untouched, thoughts circling.
Politics demanded a wife. Status demanded a match, but the room felt suddenly… empty.
And then—his gaze drifted toward the far corner of the hall.