Dawn at Eskildsgård broke cold and gray, the light seeping slowly over the frosted fields. Henrik Madsen, sleeping soundly in the comfortable master bed of his private cottage, expected the young Baron to be abed until mid-morning, lost in grief and the unfamiliar weight of his new lordship.
He had fatally miscalculated.
Christian had been awake for hours. When the first servant entered the study to build the morning fire, he found the Baron already at the great oak desk, a single candle burning, papers arranged before him in neat, precise stacks. At the seventh hour, he summoned Lars.
"I will be holding a meeting in the study at the eighth hour," Christian stated, his voice devoid of sleep. He handed his valet a slip of paper. "I want these men here. Not a moment late."
The list contained four names: Henrik Madsen, the Estate Manager. Erik, the head groom and master of the stables. Soren, the chief tenant farmer. And Klaus, the foreman of the estate's small port.
An hour later, the four men were assembled in the study. Madsen, who had been pulled from a hearty breakfast, wore an expression of mild annoyance. Erik, Soren, and Klaus stood awkwardly near the door, shuffling their feet and looking deeply uncomfortable, like farm animals brought indoors. They had never been in the Count's study before.
Christian had arranged the room for effect. He sat behind the massive desk, his father's chair lending him an authority that his eighteen years did not. The gray morning light from the large window behind him cast his face in shadow, while illuminating the confused and wary faces of the men before him.
"Good morning, gentlemen. Thank you for coming," Christian began, his tone cool and formal. He gestured for them to remain standing. This was not a conversation. It was a pronouncement. "I have spent the night reviewing the estate's records to better understand the duties that have fallen to me."
He fixed his gaze on the estate manager. "Manager Madsen, I find myself puzzled by the accounts regarding our timber sales. The income seems… modest."
Madsen puffed out his chest, stepping into the role of seasoned expert. "Ah, my lord, the timber market is a fickle thing. Prussian blockades, uncertain shipping, low demand from the English this season… one must be clever to turn any profit at all. It requires a firm, experienced hand."
"I see," Christian said softly. He slid one of the ledgers across the desk. "This is your hand, is it not? This shows the sale of oak to our usual buyers in Copenhagen for a respectable, if uninspiring, price."
He then reached into a separate stack and slid the port manifests next to it.
"Then can you explain this hand, Manager? These are the port records. They show frequent shipments by a company I do not recognize—'Nordic Firewood Trading'—whose cargo is listed as low-grade lumber. Curiously, these shipments correspond perfectly with the felling of our prime northern oak, and they cease entirely when your… 'buyers'… are not in port. Two sets of books, Mr. Madsen. One for my father, and one for yourself."
The change in the room was instantaneous. The air crackled with tension. Erik and Soren stared, their mouths slightly agape. Klaus, the port foreman, turned a deathly pale, realizing he had been the unwitting facilitator of the crime.
Madsen's florid face lost its color. He stammered, "This is… this is a misunderstanding. A clerical error. You are a boy, you do not understand the complexities…"
"I understand theft when I see it," Christian cut through the bluster, his voice like the crack of a whip. The feigned weakness of the previous day was gone, replaced by an authority so absolute it was shocking. "I will not have a thief managing my lands. You are dismissed. Your service to House Eskildsen is at an end."
"You cannot!" Madsen roared, his fear turning to fury. "I have served your father for twenty years! He trusted me! You are a foolish, grieving boy playing at lord!"
Christian rose slowly from his chair, his calm a terrifying counterpoint to Madsen's rage. "My father is at Dybbøl, shedding blood for Denmark while you are here, bleeding his estate dry. He is not here to render judgment. So I will." He turned his icy gaze to the two largest men in the room. "Erik. Klaus. Escort Mr. Madsen to his cottage. He will gather his personal effects and be off Eskildsgård land by midday. He is to speak to no one."
For a heartbeat, no one moved. It was a contest of wills. Madsen, the established power, versus the unknown boy. Then Erik, the head groom, looked from the damning papers on the desk to the cold certainty in their young lord's eyes, and made his choice. He took a step towards the disgraced manager. Klaus quickly followed.
Madsen saw his support evaporate and deflated, sputtering threats and curses as he was firmly escorted from the room.
The manager's furious voice was replaced by a sudden, heavy quiet. The fire in the hearth crackled, indifferent to the drama that had just unfolded. Christian sat back down and looked at the one man remaining: Soren, the chief tenant, a man whose hands were calloused from a lifetime of working the soil.
"Soren," Christian said, his tone shifting from iron to practical steel. "The north pasture, the one that always floods near the creek. I want you to take two men and conduct a thorough survey. I need to know the depth to the bedrock at ten-meter intervals. I am designing a new drainage system. You will report your findings directly to me before supper. Is that understood?"
Soren, who had been expecting a lecture or a warning, was stunned into action by the practicality of the order, by the implication of a lord who understood drainage ditches. He stared for a second, then found his voice. "Yes, my lord. At once, my lord." He bowed, a gesture of genuine respect this time, and hurried out.
Christian was alone. He looked down at the ledgers—the simple tools of his first, clean amputation. The rot was cut away. The estate, this small patch of Danish soil, was now truly his.
One head severed from the rotten branch, he thought. It was a simple, necessary act of pest control.
Now, to see if this barren soil could be taught to grow an empire.