Je T'aime.

XXIV. Bittersweet

It seemed as if all of Vienna had come out of their houses like earthworms after a rainstorm. Trumpets were sounding, and the call of drums sent a rumbling through the ground that set your stomach to tremble. There were flags and banners hanging all around. The Salm Regiment, of about a thousand enlisted men of foot, was departing for the front on the Prussian-Saxon border.

The soldiers themselves almost didn't look real. They were all in identical uniforms, in identical poses, with identical steps. But there were many kinds of men: battalion, grenadier, fusilier, artilleryman, musician. And of course, the officers, the more superior, ride on horseback along the sides of the lines. And with such grandeur and a controlled unison step, the regiment marched the streets just in front of Hofburg Palace.

Mama always liked to make a display of her large family. My siblings and I surrounded my parents' chairs underneath a purple canopy, surrounded by our most highly honored guards. The aura of a court affair was high in the air, and everyone kept their spines straight and their gazed fixed.

Though there was an uneasy mood about us all. Charles was still absent, up in his room with Doctor van Swieten, who kept his lips under lock and key as if he contained some kind of government secret.

Only the Empress and Emperor were allowed to sit. Everyone else, including Maxmilian, holding tenderly to Madame von Brandeis's hand, had to stand for the duration of the parade. My mother turned to whisper to my father. "What a grand sight, Franz, don't you think?"

"The grandest," my father replied. "The musicians are the cream of the crop, I must say."

As my parents were distracted with the military display, Liesl turned to whisper to me, "What a grand sight," my sister mocked, rolling her eyes. "I'm freezing. I want to go back inside. This is all so stupid."

There was an empty chill to the air, but there was no wind, and to me it was tolerable. "You should have worn another layer."

Liesl sighed, irritated. "Shut up, Mimi."

I ignored my sister's attitude. I had bigger things to worry about. I glanced out to the citizens of the city, wrapped in whatever warm article that they could find. They were an unbridled, realistic bunch, with dirty faces, pockmarks, and rotten teeth. For a moment I was glad they were forced back by the royal guards, far away from me. They were waving touch-pieces in the air, begging my mother to take them. Some people, I was told, believed that if they touched something that the Empress had touched, then their illnesses would be cured. I never understood this; to me my mother was nothing but a woman. A grand woman, a great Empress, but she was no saint and she was no goddess. But I supposed some people needed a little something to believe in.

The fifes played a marching tune as they came towards us, the drums serving as their great accompaniment. As the soldiers would pass by us, they would stop and salute to the Empress before continuing on the march.

The horses' tack clanged as they walked, wintry slush from the street being kicked up from under their hooves. In the air flew many flags, but the regimental had a double-headed black eagle on a yellow field, surrounding a coat of arms. The eagle was a symbol of the Empire. On each wing were the letters MT. Maria Theresa. There were flags from nearly every nation my mother ruled. Empress of Rome and of Austria, Queen of Hungary, Bohemia, Croatia, Dalmatia, Slavonia, Galicia, and Lodomeria, as well as the Duchess of Lorraine and of Burgundy, along with other flags, honors, and titles that I could not even begin to name. It seemed as if my mother ruled the whole Catholic world in one way or another.

A pitch black horse decorated in silver and gold came riding up along the ranks of the men. It was a glorious beast, with fog coming from its nostrils like the grandest of dragons. "Easy, easy," coaxed the rider, and the steed came to a stop, digging at the cobblestones with its foot. I looked up at the rider in all of his finery, even more so than he had before. The metal on his uniform gleamed in the winter sun, and at that moment he looked like the grandest thing on earth. Albert.