Re: Blood and Iron

The study was quiet... too quiet.

Even the ticking of the clock on the far wall seemed to hesitate, as if uncertain whether it should break the silence that gripped the Royal Palace of Madrid.

King Alfonso sat at his desk, alone save for the flickering of a single gas lamp overhead.

The window behind him framed the city in fading amber light, rooftops casting long shadows across the courtyards.

Distant gunfire echoed faintly from the eastern hills; sporadic, irregular. The war had not yet touched the capital, but it loomed forever in the distance.

The desk before him was bare, save for a single sheet of parchment, bordered with the royal seal in crimson and gold.

"Order of General Mobilization."

The words stared back at him like an accusation.

A thin film of sweat clung to his brow, not from heat, but from the weight pressing down upon him.

He reached for the quill, paused, and instead looked to the fireplace; cold and dark now.

Where once he would have sought counsel from his ministers, or comfort from his wife, there was only the void.

"Is this what it means to be a king in an age of monsters?" he whispered to no one.

Outside, somewhere in the distance, the bells of a chapel rang out the sixth hour.

He thought of the vineyard. Of Bruno. Of the words that still rang in his ears like a death sentence wrapped in velvet:

"Choose wisely, or I will choose for you."

He did not hate the man.

No, that would be easier.

He feared him.

Not for what he had done... but for what he had not yet done, and already seemed prepared to do.

He had spoken plainly, with a strange German detachment.

A kind of moral exhaustion that came not from cruelty, but from experience.

Alfonso had never heard a man speak so calmly about annihilation.

And yet... he had not lied.

With a long, trembling breath, Alfonso dipped the quill into ink and signed.

His name curled across the page with the finality of a guillotine blade.

When it was done, he rested the quill gently beside the paper, folded his hands together, and sat in silence.

Not as a king.

Not even as a man.

But as a soul who knew what must come next would stain the soil of Spain for generations.

He bowed his head and whispered a prayer.

Not for victory.

But for forgiveness.

---

The makeshift command center in Valencia was a converted university hall.

Its ancient columns scorched by fire, the marble floor now stained with maps, boots, and the scent of oil.

General Francisco Galán stood over a table cluttered with half-torn logistics reports, his expression grim beneath the yellowed light of a buzzing generator lamp.

"Four thousand M1 rifles from the Americans. Three hundred Thompson submachine guns. Ammunition crates are still being offloaded in Almería," said a Republican major reading from a list that shook in his hands.

"And from the British?" a lieutenant asked without looking up.

"A dozen volunteer pilots. Some surplus tanks. Brens. Radios. Medical units."A Major hesitated. "They say more is coming."

Galán finally looked up, eyes dark and sunken.

"They always say more is coming."

Across the room, the younger officers buzzed with cautious optimism. A Scottish volunteer, barely twenty, sat cleaning his rifle and chatting with a group of Republican infantrymen.

"It's just the start, lads. Once they see what Germany's doing here, the whole bloody world will come to your side."

"We've held out this long," muttered one Spaniard, adjusting a new American helmet that didn't quite fit. "Maybe this changes everything."

"Maybe it's the turning point."

But the major wasn't so sure.

He stepped to the shattered window, looking out toward the docks.

Cranes moved like steel skeletons against the dying sun, hoisting crates marked with US stamps and FOR SPAIN – PROPERTY OF HIS MAJESTY'S GOVERNMENT from rusted ships that arrived under British flags.

It should have been reassuring.

Instead, it felt like a funeral procession.

"A few thousand rifles won't stop what's coming," he said quietly.

The lieutenant joined him at the window, arms folded.

"Some believe this will force Germany to back down. That the Reich won't risk escalation with Britain and America both involved."

The major gave a bitter chuckle. "They don't know the Germans."

He thought of the ridge. Of what was left of it.

Of the photos taken by recon aircraft in the smoldering aftermath.

Soldiers flash-cooked in their dugouts, bones turned to charcoal.

Civilians torn apart in their sleep. The earth itself scorched into glass.

"They fight not of the era, but from the future," he said. "And we're still bleeding for the past."

And yet... he knew they had no choice but to fight.

Even if the outcome had already been written in the smoke above Catalonia.

---

The din of the frontline was distant now.

Just a muted thunder beneath the chirping of birds and the occasional hum of an overworked generator.

The olive groves behind the hill swayed gently in the breeze, giving little hint that a brutal civil war was unfolding just a few kilometers to the east.

Erwin Rommel stood beside a map table shaded under a patchwork canvas tarp, his uniform dusty but immaculate, arms crossed as he watched a pair of liaison officers exchange communiqués by motorcycle.

"Hard to believe this is where we end up," said a voice behind him.

Rommel turned slightly.

Erich von Zehntner. Young, sunburned, with that quiet fire in his eyes that reminded Rommel far too much of a younger someone stepped forward and offered a tired smile.

"When this war began, I thought we'd be at the tip of the spear," Erich continued. "Not watching the rear lines and escorting wounded supply convoys."

Rommel didn't respond immediately. He simply looked back at the hills, at the distant smoke from artillery strikes somewhere near the Ebro. Then he turned, his expression thoughtful.

"You were never meant to finish this war," Rommel said. "That was never the point."

Erich frowned. "Then why send us at all? Why send the Legion in force if we're not here to end it?"

Rommel took a step closer and tapped the young man on the chest with two fingers.

"Because your grandfather orchestrated this entire campaign knowing exactly how much you needed to see. Not to win glory. Not to play the hero. But to learn the weight of command, the cost of war and the limits of intervention."

Erich lowered his gaze.

Rommel's voice grew sharper, more instructive.

"Wars like this can't be won by outsiders. Not truly. The Spaniards must finish this themselves, or they will never own the victory. We can break the lines. We can train their crews. We can even drop the bombs. But the flag planted at the end of it all? It must be theirs."

Erich clenched his fists. "But we could finish it in weeks."

Rommel nodded. "And that would ensure it falls apart in months. A nation cannot be rebuilt on borrowed will."

He gestured toward the field hospital where Spanish Royalist troops were unloading stretchers from trucks marked with the Yoke and Arrows.

"Our role now is to secure the roads. Keep the pressure off the flanks. Reinforce where needed. Give them the space to win their war."

Rommel paused, then added more gently:

"You'll get your war soon enough, Leutnant von Zehntner. Trust me."

Erich didn't respond.

He simply turned and looked eastward, toward the smoke in the distance toward the place where history was being written not by Germans, but by Spaniards finally fighting for their own soil.

---

Rain tapped gently against the tall windows of the Tyrolean estate, mist rolling in from the pine-covered slopes beyond.

The mountains loomed like sleeping giants in the distance, wreathed in fog and silence.

Bruno von Zehntner sat at his desk, a thick sheaf of reports spread before him.

Dispatches from Zaragoza, intercepted communiqués from London and Washington, aerial reconnaissance photos from Catalonia; all neatly stacked, annotated in red ink.

The fire crackled softly in the hearth beside him. Outside, the bells from a village chapel rang the ninth hour.

He read in silence.

Another trench network collapsed near Lleida.

Republican reinforcements routed in the Aragon corridor.

A joint Franco-American logistics convoy was destroyed in an ambush before even reaching the front.

Royalist armored columns are now just days from encircling Valencia.

He leaned back in his chair, exhaled slowly, and allowed himself a small smile.

Two months. At most.

That was the estimate.

By summer's peak, the red banner of the Republic would lie in the dust and the royal standard of Spain would rise once more over a land baptized in fire.

And with it… so too would the Reich's vision for the continent.

Bruno reached for his glass of dark wine, swirling it once before taking a slow sip. His eyes drifted toward the open window. The rain had softened now, reduced to a whisper.

He thought of the vineyard in Madrid. Of Alfonso's face when he signed the order. Of Rommel and Erich, waiting just behind the front line.

It was all falling into place.

The democracies had hesitated.

The monarchies had not.

And history did not reward hesitation.

Bruno set the glass down with a quiet clink and picked up a pen. At the bottom of the page, beneath casualty projections and logistics forecasts, he scribbled three words:

"Victory through finality."

Then he underlined them.

Twice.