The main entrance hall of the Royal Palace of Warsaw had been built to impress men before they understood they were being judged.
The moment one stepped through the great double doors, the space opened wide and bright, not as a mere foyer, but as a chamber of ceremony. Polished marble stretched beneath the feet in pale sheets veined with grey and gold, so carefully cleaned that the light above shimmered across it like water. The walls rose high on every side, cream and white stone trimmed with old gilding, carved pilasters, painted panels, and the faded symbols of a kingdom that had once imagined itself eternal.
Doorways opened to the left and right, leading into side chambers now claimed by German clerks, guards, and palace servants. Directly ahead, another broad doorway led deeper into the palace and it's marvelous splender.
Flanking that central doorway, twin staircases curved upward in graceful marble arcs.
One rose from the left, one from the right, both sweeping toward the second-floor gallery like pale arms lifting the hall toward the painted ceiling. A dark carpet ran up the center of each stair, thick and formal, softening the footfalls of officers and nobles alike.
And above it all hung the chandelier that was not candlelit, that mattered.
The old crystal frame remained, grand and aristocratic, its arms branching outward in tiers of glass and gilt metal, but within it burned clean electric bulbs. Their steady glow filled the hall with a modern brilliance that no flame could match, catching on bayonets, polished boots, gold trim, pale stone, and the jewels at women's throats. It made the palace feel caught between ages: old monarchy in its bones, new empire in its veins.
And at the entrance, Black Legion guards stood at either side of the double doors.
They were clean as could be, and equipt lightly. These were Black Legion palace guards, chosen for appearance as much as skill, and their uniforms reflected it: dark charcoal-black tunics buttoned cleanly to the throat, polished black belts, shoulder straps, gloves, high boots, and dark steel helmets that sat low enough to shadow the eyes.
At collar and breast gleamed the insignia of Oskar's new order: the Imperial eagle worked in silver and black, severe and sharp, without softness or apology.
In their hands rested short M1 carbines with bayonets fixed.
The weapons were modern, compact, and ugly in the practical way Oskar favored, but the bayonets gave them something older, something ceremonial and threatening. Whenever a guard shifted even slightly, the steel caught the chandelier light and flashed.
More guards stood near the side doors and at the base of the twin staircases, not many, but enough.
Enough to remind every guest that beauty in this palace now existed under watch.
At the center of the hall, Princess Patricia waited.
She had dressed in white.
That, too, was not an accident.
The gown fell from her shoulders in soft ivory layers, rich without being gaudy, pure without being innocent. It was a princess's dress in every possible sense: pale, elegant, dignified, almost bridal in its careful suggestion of untouched virtue. Gold ornaments clasped the fabric at her arms and waist. A narrow jeweled band rested in her pale blonde hair, which had been arranged high and graceful, with loose curls falling down the side of her neck.
The white made a statement before she spoke a word.
It said she was noble.
It said she was clean.
It said she had nothing to hide.
It said, with almost shameless audacity, that whatever rumors followed her from Britain to Germany and from Germany to occupied Warsaw, she would stand beneath a chandelier in conquered royal halls and look every inch the perfect princess.
And physically, she nearly succeeded.
Patricia was taller than most woman of this age, and she carried herself as though height were merely another title. Her neck was long, her shoulders pale and smooth, her posture trained by years of courtly life. The gown shaped her waist tightly, then flowed over her hips and down to the marble in graceful folds. It did not expose crudely. It revealed with refinement, allowing glimpses of skin, curve, and form while still pretending that every choice had been made for elegance rather than effect.
She knew exactly how she looked.
That was part of her armor.
Her smile was calm, confident, and practiced. The smile of a woman who had once belonged to one of the oldest royal circles in Europe and had not yet accepted that scandal could fully strip her of it.
Beside her stood Elise.
Elise had chosen pink.
Or rather, Patricia had likely chosen it for her.
The dress was softer and more modest than Patricia's white, made of pale rose fabric with delicate ruffles at the shoulders and a fitted bodice that tried to be humble while failing entirely to make Elise disappear. She was much shorter than Patricia, petite in frame, with a smaller waist, light blonde hair, and a face that always seemed caught between mischief and panic. Her beauty was not grand like Patricia's. It was more immediate, more girlish, more dangerous in the way a maid was not supposed to be dangerous.
She had dressed carefully enough not to outshine her mistress.
But she could not make herself plain.
Her figure made that impossible. For her size she was strikingly full, and the dress, however humble in intention, could not help but show it. Where Patricia looked like a princess defending her dignity, Elise looked like the lovely companion who had followed her too far, knew too much, and now wished the floor might open before Tanya arrived.
Her fingers kept moving.
First at her sleeve.
Then at the ribbon near her waist.
Then at the side of her skirt.
Patricia noticed without looking.
"Stop fidgeting," she murmured.
Elise stopped for three seconds, then her fingers found the ribbon again.
"I am trying," she whispered, "but I cannot help it."
Patricia's eyes remained fixed upon the double doors.
"Elise."
"What if Lady Tanya hates us?"
The words came out small.
Patricia did not answer at once.
Elise's gaze slid back toward the children clustered behind them, toward the pale heads and wide icy blue eyes and little hands gripping skirts, sleeves, and one another.
"What if she hates them too?" Elise continued, voice tightening. "What if she looks at them and sees only scandal? What if she thinks they are proof of something shameful and wants us gone?"
Patricia's mouth remained composed.
But Elise kept going.
"She could send us away, couldn't she?" Her voice dropped further. "Back into exile. Or worse, she might make us disappear…"
That final word was barely spoken. Yet it struck Patricia harder than the rest.
Neither woman needed to explain what it meant.
They both understood the truth of their position. Patricia could dress in white and stand beneath the chandelier like a wronged princess. Elise could wear silk and lace instead of servant's wool and stand beside her as companion rather than maid. The guards could bow. The clerks could obey. The maids could lower their eyes.
But none of that was rank.
Not truly.
Patricia had abandoned Britain. Elise had never possessed rank to abandon. They were not wives. They were not recognized consorts. They were not German princesses. Their place here had been carved out of scandal, persistence, desire, and Oskar's inability to turn away from the women who had tied themselves to him.
They were here because Oskar had allowed them to be here. Because he had to his own surprise, found them useful, especially Patricia as she was highly educated.
But Oskar was not here now.
Tanya was coming.
And Tanya was not some distant wife whose name could be ignored. She was the first wife. The true one. The one the guards respected without being ordered to. The one whose children were legitimate in ways Patricia's and Elise's never would be.
Elise looked back at the children.
"They only just began to know him properly," she whispered. "Arthur speaks of him every night. Alfred asks when he will come back. Rose cried after he left. So did Victoria, though she tried to pretend she did not."
Her voice trembled.
"And the little ones, Clara and Mary both now reache for every tall man in black because they think it might be him."
Patricia's expression flickered.
Only slightly.
Elise's eyes shone now.
"If Tanya sends us away, they lose him again. And we lose…" She stopped, breath catching. "We lose everything."
For Elise, that was the truth beneath the fear, not the money and the status, but belonging.
They had lived too long as women without a country. Patricia no longer fully belonged to Britain, and Germany would never receive her as one of its own without Oskar's shadow over her. Elise had followed her mistress across scandal and sea, only to find that the center of her world had become one man: the man who had taken them, protected them, used them, fed them, touched them, and left them always wanting more.
They loved him.
That was the cruelest part.
They loved him knowing perfectly well that he did not love them as he loved Tanya.
Not as he loved Anna.
Not as he loved the women of his true household.
To Oskar, Patricia and Elise were a problem he had decided to keep.
To them, he was the pillar around which the world had rebuilt itself.
Patricia's hand moved.
She caught Elise's restless fingers and held them firmly.
"Elise," she said softly.
Elise looked at her.
Patricia turned, not fully, only enough for her gaze to pass over the children.
Six of them.
Fair-haired, blue-eyed, soft-cheeked. Dressed carefully for inspection, as if brushed curls, lace collars, polished shoes, and ribboned clothes could protect them from the judgment of adults.
"Look at them," Patricia said.
Elise did.
"Really look."
Arthur stood nearest, solemn as a miniature prince, one small hand gripping the ivory folds of Patricia's gown. His pale blond hair had been combed until it shone beneath the chandelier. His eyes were clear, icy blue, and unmistakably his father's. Beside him, Victoria watched the hall with quiet suspicion, her little fingers curled around her brother's sleeve as if he were her shield.
Behind Elise, Alfred leaned out with more courage than wisdom, trying to see the doors before anyone told him not to. Rose hid behind him, peering around his shoulder with wide, anxious eyes. Farther back, the youngest two, Clara and Mary remained with Zofia and Maria, too small to understand the room but not too small to feel its tension.
"They are beautiful," Patricia said. "Every one of them."
Elise's fingers tightened around hers.
"The boys especially," Patricia continued, her voice gentler now, though the calculation beneath it did not disappear. "Arthur and Alfred look so much like him that one would have to be blind not to see it. The hair. The eyes. That solemn little frown Arthur makes when he is trying to be brave."
Despite herself, Elise glanced toward Arthur. And a faint smile touched her mouth.
"He does look like Oskar when he frowns."
"He does."
"And Alfred has his stubbornness."
"Alfred has everyone's stubbornness," Patricia said.
Elise gave a tiny, nervous laugh.
Patricia's thumb brushed once over Elise's knuckles.
"Tanya may despise us," she said quietly. "She may resent us. She may wish we had remained hidden somewhere far from her sight, tucked away in some comfortable exile where we could not trouble the shape of her household."
Her eyes remained on the children.
"But remember, she is kind and she loves children. Everyone knows that, it's in the newspaper's all the time. And these are his children."
Elise drew a slow breath as hope entered her face, fragile and frightened.
Patricia saw it.
She saw that Elise almost believed her, almost. So she gave her one more certainty.
Her free hand moved, lightly and deliberately, to Elise's stomach.
Elise went still.
Then Patricia touched her own.
"And she cannot cast us aside so easily now," Patricia whispered. "Not while we carry more of his children."
Elise's eyes widened.
Patricia's expression remained serene.
"To harm us would be foolish. To exile us would wound him. Oskar may not love us as he loves her, but he will not approve of his children being thrown away. Not the ones already born, and especially not the innocent little ones yet to come."
Elise stared at her and for a moment, hope strengthened.
Then confusion entered.
Then alarm.
She leaned closer, whispering so quickly the words nearly tripped over one another.
"Wait. Are we… are we doing it again?"
Patricia looked at her.
"Doing what?"
Elise's cheeks colored.
"You know what. Using scandal. Using the children. Using ourselves." Her voice dropped into horrified realization. "Are we blackmailing Oskar's women now, like we blackmailed him before?"
Patricia closed her eyes for one brief second.
When she opened them again, the faintest smile had returned, polished, and entirely too calm.
"Perhaps we are," she said quietly.
Elise's mouth fell open.
For a moment, she looked as though she might faint from the combined weight of moral discomfort, social terror, and the sudden realization that Patricia had not denied it.
Patricia squeezed her hand once.
"You worry too much," she said, her voice soft but firm. "Now smile, Elise. Smile and behave as though all is perfectly well."
Elise stared at her, lost for words.
Yet, just as she had done back in Britain, when Patricia had led her across every sensible line and into Oskar's bed for the first time, she did not question her mistress for long.
She swallowed, then nodded.
Footsteps sounded beyond the double doors. At once, the hall seemed to tighten around them.
Elise forced her hands to stop trembling.
Patricia released her, then smoothed the white folds of her gown with graceful, unhurried fingers.
"Smile," she whispered one last time.
Elise obeyed.
And the great doors began to open.