by Eric Flint
Long enough! Long live the new High King!
A few tankards later, the blessed parent might decide his offspring should now be declared the regent of the USE on the grounds that her father's incapacity had made Kristina the rightful empress-but since she was a mere child, could not rule on her own behalf, and who was the most suitable person to become regent other than the prince to whom she was betrothed?
Unless, of course-let's say, three tankards later-the king of Denmark decided that his son Ulrik was after all a mere stripling-but twenty-four years of age; pfah! barely weaned-and so Christian himself should assume the burden of regency.
The worst of such schemes is that they would actually work…for a while. No matter who won the civil war in the USE that Oxenstierna and Wilhelm Wettin seemed determined to precipitate, both the USE and Sweden would be greatly weakened. In the case of Sweden, quite possibly weakened enough that Denmark could regain its former dominance of Scandinavia.
Scandinavians! Ulrik supposed it was inevitable that people were parochial, and found it hard to see the world except through their own lenses and prisms. Still, even allowing for that natural bias, did Scandinavian princes have to set the standard for myopic stupidity? Couldn't they at least strive for the status of mere dullards?
There were today a total of perhaps five million people in all of the Scandinavian lands. There was nothing close to what the Americans would consider a real census, to be sure, but for these purposes the figure was accurate enough. Say, two million each in Denmark and Sweden, and a half million each in Norway and Finland.
There were already at least fifteen million Germans.
And the disparity would simply get worse, as time passed. Ulrik had taken the opportunity on one of his visits to Grantville to look up the figures for himself in one of their "almanacs." According to the latest almanac in their possession, that of the year 1999-the Ring of Fire had happened in May of 2000, by their reckoning-the population of Germany had been slightly over eighty million people. It was the most populous nation in Europe outside of gigantic Russia.
That same year, Denmark had a little more than five million people; Sweden was the largest of the Scandinavian countries with almost nine million; Norway, four and a half million; and Finland was about the same as Denmark. In other words, in less than four centuries a three-to-one population disparity would becomes four-to-one.
And that was the least of it. The German lands were rich; the Scandinavian, poor, outside of a few important resources such as iron. And petroleum, at a much later date when technology had advanced far enough to drill for oil in the sea beds.
But the one critical resource that was lacking in Scandinavia-was lacking today; would be lacking centuries from now; would always be lacking short of a great climatic transformation-was arable soil. The Scandinavian lands had and would always have a much smaller population than the Germanies. That was a reality dictated by nature, not by any human factor that might be subject to change.
The historical end result was inevitable. It had been inevitable in the world the Americans came from; it was just as inevitable in this one. The Germanies were the center of gravity of Europe. Not Denmark, not Sweden-not even France. Only the Russias would emerge as a true counter-weight, once they were united. But Russia was too far to the east to really dominate European political affairs. It was almost as much an Asian country as a European one.
So what sort of madman would imagine that a Scandinavian ruler could maintain his control of the Germans for more than a few years?
A rhetorical question, of course. Two answers sprang immediately forward: His own father and Gustav II Adolf. If Ulrik could round up a Lapp chieftain somewhere in northern Finland, they'd make the same claim.
Well, maybe not. They had the advantage of being illiterate.
Ulrik, however, was not subject to the same insanity. And he had, by his estimate, at least a decade in which to persuade his future wife to forego it as well.
He thought he could succeed in that project. True, Kristina had an imperious temperament. But she was not engrossed with power, as such. She just liked the end results she could obtain from it. Even at the age of nine, her basic character was already evident-and Ulrik had confirmed his assessment by consulting the American history books to see how she'd turned out in that alternate universe. By now, very quietly, he'd had every single item of information Grantville possessed about Kristina stored in his private records, and had studied them to the point of having them memorized.
There was quite a bit, as it turned out. The up-timers had even once made a movie about her with someone named Greta Garbo cast as Kristina. There was no copy of it in Grantville, but that was probably just as well. When he inquired, he was told by one of the librarians that the Garbo woman had been a famous actress in her day. The librarian had some photographs of her in one of their books and had shown them to Ulrik.
The Garbo woman was quite beautiful. That had been enough, right there, to tell Ulrik that the movie had fictionalized Kristina's life to the point of absurdity. The only thing that would save the Swedish princess from being downright ugly when she grew up was that her vibrant personality would outshine her features.
Still, there had been a number of mentions of her in the various history texts. Far more than almost any other royal of the time period outside of Britain, even male ones.
Vibrant personality, indeed. Glimmers of it had lasted through four centuries and even made their way to another continent. But what people remembered was not her rule, but her discomfort with that rule. The simple truth was that Kristina had no natural aptitude or inclination to be a monarch. That was evident even now. In that other universe, her discomfort had eventually led her to abdicate the throne of Sweden, convert to Catholicism, and move to Rome.
Ulrik thought they could avoid the worst of that, in this universe. Kristina had already told him that her great ambition was to emulate someone named Elkheart and be the first woman to fly an airplane all the way around the world. He would encourage her in that direction-smoothing away the absurd edges, of course. Circumnavigating the earth herself was out of the question, but Kristina had an active intellect as well as an adventurous spirit. There was no reason she couldn't become this world's equivalent of Henry the Navigator, was there? Exceed him, in fact.
Ever since the Congress of Copenhagen, Ulrik had been pondering these matters. What sort of USE should they aim for? What would his role be? Kristina's?
Much remained unclear and uncertain, but Ulrik had reached some conclusions already.
First. The USE would soon-it already did, in many ways-surpass all other European lands as a center of population, industry, commerce, education and culture. It would certainly surpass the Scandinavian nations, regardless of political formalities.
Second. It would be a German nation. Not the only one, since Germans were a colonizing folk. But it would be the center of the German people.
Three. This was more in the way of a goal than a conclusion. In the universe the Americans had come from, the Germans had been politically fragmented until very late in their history. The vacuum that had created in European affairs had been disastrous. In the short run, disastrous for Germans. In the long run, disastrous for everyone.
It would not be so in this universe. Ulrik had spoken enough to Mike Stearns to know that the former prime minister was determined to avoid that at all costs. On that if nothing else, Ulrik agreed with him completely. That was one of the reasons he would oppose his father if Christian tried to pull the USE apart in Denmark's narrow immediate interest.
Europe needed a stable, powerful, secure and prosperous Germany at its center. Without that, there would always be chaos. Lurking right under the surface if not always in the open.
Four. The national sentiments of the German people, long dormant, were now rising very rapidly. The Ring of Fire had accelerated the process greatly. Something that had taken decades in the Americans' universe was happening in this one
in a handful of years.
Five. Most importantly for Ulrik and Kristina's own situation, what all of this meant was that the USE's ruling dynasty would only survive if it transformed itself into a German dynasty. "German," at least, insofar as the populace accepted Kristina and Ulrik as legitimate and not foreign. Their Scandinavian roots would then be a moot point. Many European dynasties had origins outside their own countries; people took that much in stride as long as they felt the monarch was theirs and not the instrument of another power.
Six. This was his latest conclusion and still a bit tentative, but he was now almost certain that in order to accomplish any of his goals he-and Kristina; without her it would be impossible-had to accept that the future belonged to democracy and not monarchy. He'd read some of Scaglia's writings and agreed with him at least that far.
The Americans had had a peculiar sport, of which he'd watched videotapes. "Surfing," they called it.
Needless to say, Ulrik had no intention of half-freezing in the Baltic and risking his life on a flimsy little board. But stripped of the physical aspect and transformed into a political metaphor, "surfing" was exactly what he and Kristina would have to do for the rest of their lives. Ride the ever-growing, thundering waves of German nationalism and democracy toward the shore; understanding that they did not and could not control it. No one could, really. But they could learn to surf well. They-their children; grandchildren-could reach the shore safely. And if they did it well enough, help many other people to get their safely as well. Perhaps entire nations.
The Union of Kalmar had reached the dock, been tied up, and a gangway laid. Admiral Simpson started to come across.
"What did you say?" asked Kristina.
Ulrik realized he'd been muttering. "Ah…"
"He said, 'and here comes the big one.' " Baldur was grinning. He'd spent hours discussing these issues with Ulrik. "But he's quite wrong. This is just the outrider wave. The big one will be riding into Magdeburg."
"What is he talking about?" She glared up at Ulrik. "You're keeping things from me again, aren't you? And you promised you wouldn't!"
So. Once again, Baldur Norddahl demonstrated his perfidious, foul, treacherous nature. On the brighter side, once again Kristina dispelled any fears that he might have dimwitted children.
Chapter 17
Luebeck, USE naval base "Please, have a seat." Admiral Simpson gestured toward a comfortable looking divan with four equally-comfortable-looking chairs clustered around a low table. The ensemble was located in one half of what Ulrik took to be the admiral's office. Part of his suite, rather. He could see other rooms connected to it, in one of which he spotted an up-time computer perched on a long desk.
The walls were decorated with paintings, but they were seascapes rather than the usual portraits. Three of them were representations of sailing vessels underway.
The variation from custom in the decor was a subtle reminder of the differences between the American and down-timers. At least, down-timers who could afford to commission art work in the first place. For such down-timers, the art's purpose was in large part to remind anyone who looked-perhaps themselves, first and foremost-of their lineage. To a very large degree, though not always and not entirely, it was that ancestry which explained and justified their present status.
Americans also cherished their ancestry, Ulrik had discovered, but the logic behind that esteem was often peculiar from a down-timer's standpoint. He'd been struck, for instance, by the fact that several Americans with whom he'd discussed the matter claimed-with great obvious pride-to number a "Cherokee" among their ancestors. In one case, a "Choctaw." Curious, Ulrik had looked up the references and discovered the Cherokees and Choctaws were barbarian tribes who'd been conquered by the white settlers of North America. Conquered, and then driven entirely off their land into the wilderness.
All Americans who could do so-which many couldn't, since they were the product of recent immigration-boasted of their polyglot lineage. Father's side is mostly Polish, but with some Irish mixed in there. Mother's side is part-Italian, part-Pennsylvania Dutch-those were actually Germans, not Dutch-and part Scots-Irish.
Something along those lines was what you generally heard, where a European nobleman would stress the narrowness of his line. Its purity, to look at it another way.
Not royal families, of course. There simply weren't enough of them to avoid constant marriages across national lines. But that simply reinforced the status of royal blood as a special category of its own.
For the up-timers, the pride they took in their lineage had very little to do with their present status. That was defined almost entirely by their occupation. Indeed, it was considered a mark of honor for a man to have achieved a high position without the benefit of family patronage, although such patronage was certainly common and not derided.
So, John Chandler Simpson's walls had paintings of ships and the sea on them. As well he might, given the ships in question. Ulrik had enjoyed this second crossing of the Baltic in an ironclad even less than the first. The warships were tolerable enough in calm waters, if you could ignore their acrid stench. But any sort of rough seas-and it didn't take much, for a sea to be rough for an ironclad-made them thoroughly unpleasant. On two occasions, Ulrik had begun to worry that they might sink.
The one thing he hadn't been worried about, however, was Chancellor Oxenstierna. Had a Swedish warship crossed their path and tried to prevent the Union of Kalmar from taking its royal passengers to their destination…
But its commander never would have tried in the first place. No more would a mouse try to impede a bull crossing a pasture. The ironclads completely dominated any patch of the seas they passed through.
Simpson's ironclads-and, as the diagrams and designs on some of the walls in the anteroom showed, the same man was now creating a new line of warships. Sailing ships, these, but Ulrik didn't doubt they would overshadow any sailing ships that currently existed in any navy in the world.
Once they were seated, Simpson asked: "Would you care for any refreshments?" He looked at Caroline Platzer. "I have some real coffee, I might mention."
Platzer's hand flew to her throat, her expression one of histrionic relief and pleasure. "Oh, thank Go-gosh. Yes, admiral, please. A bit of cream, if you have it."
"Sugar? I have some actual sugar, too, it's not the usual honey."
"Really? Then, yes, I'd appreciate some sugar also."
The admiral turned to the down-timers. "Your Highnesses? Mister…ah…"
"Baldur Norddahl," said Ulrik. "He is my…ah…"
The admiral smiled thinly. "I'm familiar with Mr. Norddahl, at least by reputation."
Baldur looked a bit alarmed. Perhaps for that reason, he asked for nothing. Ulrik and Kristina both settled on broth.
The admiral rang a small bell that had been sitting on a side table. A moment later, a servant appeared. A naval enlisted man, judging from the uniform, not a house servant.
And there was another variation in custom. Americans used servants-indeed, ones who'd been wealthy like Simpson were quite accustomed to doing so-but they used them differently. Even a man as powerful and prestigious as Simpson did not think twice about asking his guests for their preferences, as if he were a mere waiter in a restaurant. The orders taken, he would then summon a servant to do the actual work-but he would have to summon them. Usually, with a bell of some sort. He couldn't simply crook his finger at one of the servants already in the room. There weren't any.
This was an American custom that Ulrik had already adopted for his own, and had every intention of expanding into imperial practice once he and Kristina were married. He would gladly exchange the trivial chore of having to ring a bell for the great advantage of having some privacy-the one commodity that was in shortest supply for a royal family.
There were two other advantages to the custom, as well, both of them cold-bloodedly practical. The first was that it made it more difficult for enemies to spy on you. They couldn't just suborn o
ne of the servants. The second was that it would add a bit to the patina of egalitarianism that Ulrik intended to slather all over the new dynasty.
In truth, Ulrik was not burdened with any high regard for egalitarianism. But that sentiment was already burgeoning in this new world and he knew it would only continue to swell. Establishing the new dynasty's friendliness toward the sentiment-perhaps no more than a tip of the hat, here and there, but polite formalities were important-was just part of the surfing process.
The naval enlisted man returned shortly with a tray bearing the various refreshments ordered. The admiral himself, like Platzer, had ordered coffee. Simpson waited politely until everyone else had sipped from their cups, and then took a sip from his own.
From the slight grimace, he found the coffee still too hot. He set down the cup and said: "I need to ask-my apologies, but this is an awkward position you've put me in-what your intentions are."
Ulrik had expected the question, and had given careful consideration to the right answer. He thought he'd come up with one that would be suitably vague without being transparently vacuous.
Kristina made it all a moot point, however. "We're going to Magdeburg!" she exclaimed cheerfully.
Simpson stared at her for a moment. Then, at Ulrik. Then, at Platzer. He gave Baldur no more than a glance.
That wasn't an indication of anyone's status in the admiral's eyes, just his judgment of who was immediately critical. Quite good judgment, it turned out.
"Your Highness"-this was said directly to Kristina-"with your permission, I would like to speak privately to Prince Ulrik."
She frowned. "Well…"
"Of course, Admiral," said Platzer. She rose and extended her hand to the princess. "Come on, Kristina." Seeing the girl's stubborn expression, Caroline added gently: "It's a perfectly reasonable request on the admiral's part."