The cheers died in the farmers' throats, replaced by a thick, anxious silence. Every eye was fixed on the black-sealed letter in the young Baron's hand. The festive air of their triumph evaporated, replaced by the cold dread of the outside world.
Christian's fingers did not tremble as he broke the wax. His movements were deliberate, precise. He unfolded the single sheet of crisp, official parchment from the War Ministry. The words were spare, formal, and brutal.
It is with the deepest regret that we inform you that Count Erik Eskildsen, commanding the 8th Brigade's left flank at Dybbøl, fell in the line of duty on the 2nd of March, 1864. He was killed instantly during a sustained Prussian artillery barrage. He met his end with the courage and honor befitting an officer and a nobleman of Denmark. All debts, public and private, are now the domain of his heir…
The rest was a blur of condolences and logistical details. Christian read the words, but his mind was processing on two distinct levels. One level was a distant, hollow echo—the ghost of the eighteen-year-old boy's grief for a father he had respected and feared. It was a cold, empty space in the architecture of the memories he had inherited.
The other level, the dominant one, was the cold, swift calculus of the 21st-century strategist. He's gone. I am no longer a proxy. I am the principal. All assets, all titles, all authority—are now mine. Absolute control. The thought was chilling in its clarity. This tragedy was also an opportunity. A promotion.
He lowered the letter, his face a mask of dignified composure. He took a long, slow breath, letting the silence stretch until it was almost unbearable. Then he looked up, not at any one person, but at all of them.
"My father, Count Erik Eskildsen, has fallen at Dybbøl," he announced, his voice steady and clear, carrying across the silent field. "He died defending our country."
A woman in the crowd began to sob quietly. An old farmer removed his cap and held it to his chest.
"We will mourn him," Christian continued, his voice taking on a new, harder edge. "But we will not let his sacrifice be in vain. My father fought for Denmark with the tools he was given—with courage, and with cannons that were already obsolete. He fought a war of the past."
He turned and gestured toward the new plow, its iron share still gleaming with fresh earth. "We will honor him by building the future. We will build a Denmark that is strong, prosperous, and self-reliant. A Denmark that does not need to depend on faulty cannons or fickle allies. That work does not stop today. It accelerates. That future begins here. On this soil. With these tools. Now, more than ever, the work continues."
He held their gaze for a moment longer, then gave a sharp, definitive nod. "You are dismissed."
It was a masterful performance. He had taken a moment of shattering personal news and transformed it into a rallying cry for his own mission, binding their grief and patriotism to his own revolutionary agenda. The tenants, awed by his strength, dispersed quietly, speaking in hushed, respectful tones.
Christian walked back to the manor alone, the triumphant inventor of moments ago replaced by the inheritor of a dead man's legacy. The victory of the plow felt small and distant now.
He stood before the fireplace in the study, the official notice in his hand. He was no longer Christian Eskildsen, Baron-heir, acting with his father's implicit authority. He was now Count Eskildsen. The title brought with it not just Eskildsgård, but two other baronies, vast timber holdings in Norway, shares in Copenhagen trading houses, and a web of debts and political alliances.
And it brought him a seat in the Landsting, the upper house of the Danish Parliament.
He was, in an instant, a national political figure. A player in the heart of a government that was actively failing its people. His quiet, controlled experiment at Eskildsgård, his plan to perfect his foundation before stepping onto the larger stage, was now shattered. The crisis would not wait for his harvest to come in.
He looked at his reflection in the dark glass of a windowpane. The face of the eighteen-year-old boy stared back, but the eyes were ancient. The weight of the new title, the new power, settled onto his shoulders.
The work of Baron Eskildsen was to perfect a farm, he thought. The work of Count Eskildsen is to save a nation.
His peaceful interlude was over. He had to go to Copenhagen. The game had just escalated beyond all expectation.