excerpts from
MAINZ (working title)
In the year 1682, in a small passage behind the drawing room of the Electoral Palace in Mainz, a baby was born to the Prince-Elector and his pale-faced mistress Anna Sofia Eschenberger, who threw up blood, fainted, and died several minutes later. The boy was named Helmut; he was the third bastard of the family named as such. This was only coincidence, and not some historied tradition observed by the current Electoral family. The boy Helmut was brought up in an annex of the palace’s newly-completed Rhine Wing, a baroque construction which made the archaic Mediaeval parts of the palace all the more conspicuous. In the Rhine Wing there was gilded panelling on every wall, and ormolu sconces, and flower-bricks from Delft, and in the largest room a ceiling painted with beady-eyed cherubim dancing among the clouds; fineries made possible after the long-awaited end of the Thirty-Years War. From the tall, newly-paned windows, one could see across the courtyard, past the ornamental garden that had only just been planted, and down into the streets of Mainz. Every Saturday a fat, red-faced Austrian merchant named Heinrich Vogelreith brought fresh meat and vegetables to the servant’s entrance, which were hurriedly accepted by the cook Herr Roser and brought to the pantry. The boy was fed well, and taught well; under the guidance of Herr Meyer he learnt the classics, under Herr Wurz he learnt the art of fencing, under Herr Kappel he learnt the lute and the violin, and under Herr Wasilowetz, a Jew, he learnt geography and history. His father the Prince-Elector himself taught him French, when he was not in the Imperial capital on matters of state or debauchery. Though he served in the station of Archbishop, the Prince-Elector was hardly a man of God - one could even say a man of vile promiscuity. Yet nobody knew this besides the Prince-Elector’s closest friends, who themselves were no pinnacles of piety by any stretch.
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News soon spread across the Palatinate that Castle Arenberg had fallen to the French, and that whatever remained of the fortress following the siege had been blown up in spite. The third Duke of Arenberg was not even in the Palatinate - he was not even in the Empire - but off fighting on Ottoman soil. Arenberg was now abandoned. This news found some sympathy from the Prince-Elector, but the Ducal family of Arenberg were hardly great friends of the Von Ingelheims. The second Duke and his wife had come to the palace several summers before, which was a rare occasion, for they nearly never ventured outside of Arenberg and even their Citadel, and when they did the court fools would sing songs about it, and the peasants would whisper things; rumours that the Duke was ill, or dying, or that he had left Arenberg for good, or even that there really was no Duke of Arenberg at all. There was a common suggestion that the Habsburgs had taken it as a private estate, and as the Habsburgs were especially secretive about their own dealings none could prove the legitimacy of the claim. The Duke and his mother had stayed for not even two hours, and the discussion had been excruciatingly boring. The Duke had little else to say besides his prospects in the Imperial army, and his mother spoke at tiresome length about her family village in rural France. Yet, the legacy of Arenberg was hardly synonymous with respectability. The first Duke of Arenberg was charming and outgoing but undoubtedly mad, and had turned the entire town into a monstrously large, labyrinthine fortress, with walls so thick and impenetrable that the Sun King’s army had turned back upon seeing it. The madness of the Duke was also inherited by his brother, who succeeded him when the former died suddenly at a party. This second Duke was an ungainly, uncertain man. He always bore a solemn expression, and his complexion was sickeningly pale, giving him the appearance that he was nearly dead, or had been for some time. He wore a wig so vast that several people were required to affix it to his pate, and he would anxiously fiddle with it throughout the day. After he left the room, the area around his chair would be discreetly swept. This second Duke was stricken with the most severe paranoia - he feared of a gargantuan plot against him that wished for his downfall. After several years, he had sent the entirety of the Duchy’s troops away, and all but three of his household staff. It was now only him, his wife - who surely lamented marrying the Duke daily - his two sons, the cook, the maid, and a coal-boy, who he had little use for, but whom he felt unkind to let go due to his being a hunchback. There was also a tutor who came frequently named Herr Gitterung, but he was so poor at teaching that the Duke sent him back to Cologne. Now, a year after the second Duke’s death, Arenberg had been entirely seized, with no-one to guard it against the oncoming French attack.
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In September 1689, while Bonn was being besieged by the Dutch for the second time in sixteen years, now alongside the Brandenburgian Hohenzollerns rather than the Empire itself, the boy named Helmut played at home under the ormolu sconces and the empty spaces where the recently-sold Delft flower-bricks had sat. The boy’s father, the Prince-Elector, had rushed away that morning in the palatial carriage to discuss the current war at the Imperial Council and to ensure the Emperor was aware that there was still one Elector he could trust. By now, seven years later, the Electoral Palace was in a much sorrier state. War taxes in the Palatinate had become so extortionate that the Prince-Elector had instructed his groundsman to sell any excesses which the Palace still possessed, and overnight the family's second and third dinner service had shifted hands with the improvident Prince Johannes of Nassau-Siegen, and by the following week the panelling in the winter dining room was shipped away to a well-to-do widow in Frankfurt. This was not to say, in any sense, that the current Electoral family of Mainz were poor - they still preserved many of the fineries which they had acquired over the centuries. The family Von Ingelheim owned a sizeable estate in their namesake town - a large stately house, a fortified church, and the substantial ruins of the old Imperial palace from which Charlemagne’s sons had once ruled, and which the Imperial family no longer had any use for in its current dilapidation. In the summer the Prince-Elector would often take his bastard son on walks through the overgrown ruins - “This,” he said in French, “is where the great King Charlemagne sat. He built these halls himself. His descendants ruled here. Ah, but that was many years ago, and no Emperor has walked here for many, many years”. There was a calmness about the place which Helmut savoured. You could hear the birds, the flies humming and the beetles clicking, the leaves of the ivy rustling in the mid-day wind. Back at the Electoral Palace there was often peace, but never silence. Always was there a meeting being held, or a servant passing through, or the Prince-Elector himself pacing back and forth across the gallery, for what reason nobody was certain of. And in the nights, the fire would crackle in the fireplace. But here, beneath the ruined walls and caved hallways that were once the Imperial palace, there was pure, unadulterated tranquility.
“Father,” said the boy one day in July 1690.
“Yes, Helmut, tell me”, responded the Prince-Elector. His voice was kind and yet bore the slightest air of disapproval.
“Will I rule after you?”, asked the boy.
The Prince-Elector sighed. He unfurled his mustache and it coiled back into place. “If you are chosen by the Pope, as I was”, said the Prince-Elector.
“Did you meet the Pope?”, asked the boy.
“No, never”, said the Prince Elector, somewhat defeatedly. “I received a document which established me as such, as Prince-Elector, by courier of the Thurn and Taxis. The Pope didn’t even sign the thing.”
For one who was by title Archbishop of Mainz, the Prince-Elector made it quite plain his discontent with the Pope and the Papal States. He had even refused to go to Rome in the fear he’d be called upon by the ambassadors to the Holy See, or even the Pope himself. He was worried they’d discover his indulgences - that he’d be deprived from his position. By now, he had already been Prince-Elector and Archbishop of Mainz for a decade, and he was well-received. He was not intent on falling from grace yet.
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The figure got larger and larger as it progressed along the long shell path to the Electoral Palace. It was a man, around five and a half feet, with a dark blue coat. His hair was his own, and tied back. As he got closer one could see he was squinting, though the sun was hardly out. He waved at the window, from where both the Prince-Elector and the boy were standing. The Prince-Elector waved back, half-heartedly. The doorman let him in, and he entered across the entry hall and into the reception hall. It was both opulent and crumbling - it seemed as though the ceiling plaster would give way at any moment. There were two chairs in the entire room, located at opposite ends. The few pieces of furniture dotted around the room were covered in dust, and a tattered tapestry hung on one wall. It looked as though it was dripping. The Prince-Elector waited for fifteen minutes to ensure the man did not think he was unoccupied; as he usually was. On the fifteenth minute he headed through the double doors of the long gallery, through the entry hall, and, alongside the boy, entered the reception hall. The man was seated on the chair in the right corner, reading a pamphlet from the small assortment on the sideboard. He looked lost in the room.
“Who do I have the pleasure of meeting”, said the Prince-Elector, echoing throughout the room. He reached out a hand for a handshake, but was much too far away. He came closer and tried again. The man shook his hand and smiled.
“I am Josef Thoms,” said the man, “I am here to accompany your son to Vienna.”
“Are you Herr Schöndorf?”, asked the Prince-Elector. He scanned the room: it really did need a clean.
“No, I am Herr Thoms. I am a magistrate in Hochheim. I am Schöndorf’s replacement.”
“Ah, yes,” said the Prince-Elector, as if he had already known this information.
“Shall we be hasty?” said the magistrate, “The roads can be treacherous. And we shouldn’t want to be late. Or, at least, not late by much.”
“Highwaymen?”
“Wild beasts, I’ve heard.”
“Are there?”
“I’ve heard.”
“Who says?”, said the Prince-Elector, leaning in.
“For one, Wilhelm Kotsch at the inn in Bingen.”
“Very well then. Keep safe, and to the roads. And don’t let my boy get to danger.”
“I won’t,” swore the magistrate.
“Very well,” said the Prince-Elector.
“We’ll be off then,” said the magistrate. It was evident he was eager to leave.
“Wait!”, shouted the Prince-Elector. He trundled back down the reception hall, through the entry hall, until he disappeared somewhere in the palace. Herr Thoms looked at the boy. The boy looked at Herr Thoms.
“Here!” shouted the Prince-Elector, but he was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, he appeared in the doorway with a portrait in his hand. It was a rather crude Mediaeval painting of the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus. Both of their faces looked slightly deformed.
“Take this”, said the Prince-Elector, pushing the painting on the magistrate.
“Sir, you can’t be serious. This is far too large to bring”, said the magistrate. He attempted to hand it back.
“Nonsense, it’ll be fine”, claimed the Prince-Elector.
“Sir, do you have anything smaller the boy can take with?”, asked the magistrate.
“Herr Schöndorf,” started the Prince-Elector, clasping his hands together. The magistrate hesitated. This was not his name. “I take you for a man of God? Am I correct?”
“Yes.”
“As am I. I think it is necessary that the presence of God be with you at all times. This is what I provide with this portrait. Please, take it. Tie it to the roof of the carriage if you must.” At that the Prince-Elector went to say goodbye to his son, but he was quickly stopped by the magistrate.
“Sir!” he stressed, “It will be destroyed on the roof. Do you have nothing smaller with the Lord’s portrait upon it”.
The Prince-Elector sighed. He looked at the magistrate for a moment, disapprovingly. He reached beneath his coat and grappled for something. Soon he pulled out a small silver medallion engraved meticulously with the face of Jesus Christ, staring forward, surrounded by sunbeams. He handed it to the magistrate. “Here. You have now deprived me of my personal holy pendant.”
“Thank you, your lordship,” said the magistrate, “this will much better serve us on the journey.” He slowly set the painting down on the chair.
“Very well,” said the Prince-Elector. He walked to the boy. “You will stay safe, yes?”
“Yes, father”, said the boy. His father was tall, maybe six-foot-two. He seemed smaller now, in this huge room.
“Remember - stay away from trouble, and trouble will stay away from you. I will see you soon. I wish the best for you”. The Prince-Elector smiled. He looked only kind now, and not at all disapproving. “But oh, I keep you waiting, you must go.”
The magistrate waved. He ushered the boy to him and the two were led out by the doorman. The Prince-Elector stayed in the reception hall for the rest of the day.