Swiss Arms-Chapter 139

Swiss Arms-Chapter 139

Swiss Arms
Chapter 139
-VB-
Henry of Bohemia
"... So I guess you and I are in the same camp," Henry spoke up after a lengthy discussion over dinner. His wife Anna sat next to him and across from them sat the Duke of Upper Bavaria and Count of Palatine, Rudolf von Wittelsbach.
Rudolf, who's lost some weight since he last saw him, nodded. The much larger man had cut down on his thick and bushy beard to something more manageable and also cut his hair short to neck length rather than the shoulder-length mane he used to have.
Dressed in a silky (but not silk) Fluelaberg Blue dyed shirt and pants underneath the stuffier and more "regal" fur and red-dyed coat he wore, Rudolf pulled off the proper prince-elector look.
Except both he and Henry knew that the Duke of Bavaria didn't feel that.
Never the intellectually inclined or administratively gifted man among his family and peers, he was now struggling to manage the realm that had been devastated thrice: first by the loss of so many men-at-arms and knights in the Battle of Engandin, second by the counterfeit crisis that Rudolf himself had a hand in, and third by the loss of prestige and trust he suffered to need someone else to come and get his seat back which also "mysteriously" resulted in the death of his younger brother who had usurped him.
On the surface alone, Rudolf von Wittelsbach suffered.
Deeper down, it was clear to even Henry that his young brother's death was still weighing heavily on him.
Henry wondered if he would be like that were he in Rudolf's place.
"Yes," Rudolf replied as he set his fork down. "By the way, thank you for inviting me to dinner instead of offering to talk some other time."
"We are allies not just of convenience but of hardship," Henry replied with a satisfied hum. "But if you really want to thank someone, you can thank Hans. After all, it was Hans who convinced the rest of the alliance to not leave you behind after we helped you regain your seat."
Right as it was, the Duchy of Upper Bavaria was a liability for everyone in the alliance.
Crippled militarily.
Weak economically.
Avoided politically.
The trifecta of a noble family's domain ready to fail.
"I know that very well," Rudolf grunted placidly. The man merely felt the sting of five years of failures, not counting regaining his seat. He took a deep breath in. "I won't even bother to enter my own name. That just isn't happening, not when I can't even handle my current domains and the other lords of my house are looking to absorb my lands into theirs."
"Hmm. You are talking about the Dukes of Lower Bavaria."
"Who else?" Rudolf asked and Henry hummed in return. "The bastards are trying to absorb my lands so that they can use my resource to bolster their claim for the Hungarian Crown.
Just like the Duchy of Upper Bavaria, two Dukes co-ruled the Duchy of Lower Bavaria.
Stephen I of Lower Bavaria was the man in charge of the aforementioned fief and acted as regents for his older brother's children.
His older brother, Otto III was the King of Hungary and Croatia, though heavily disputed. He managed to grab onto a few nobles bordering the Habsburg lands within the empire, but not enough to turn the tide against the much stronger, younger, and more charismatic Charles Robert of Naples, who had his claim to the Hungarian Crown via his grandmother's claims just like Otto had his claim via his mother. Unfortunately, Hungary was currently a fractured mess that made the empire look good. Sure, there might be more dukes within the empire than Hungary by a factor or two, but at the very least the constituent members of the empire weren't killing each other in a free-for-all war.
Yes, they had spent most of their time here discussing the Hungarian Crisis rather than the election because as they both bordered neighbors interested in the Hungarian Succession Crisis, it mattered more than the future Holy Roman Emperor who might not even ever visit their lands and neither dukes present in this dining hall cared to become the emperor.
So who they voted for in this election had more to do with who might stand against the Wittelsbachs of Lower Bavaria rather than who might directly benefit them.
Because frankly, none of the candidates likely to win the election favored them.
And one of those candidates was most likely going to cause them grief in a totally different way.
"I didn't think that the Archbishop of Mainz would put forth the Count of Luxembourg as his candidate," Henry sighed.
And that was a headache.
Why?
Because not only did the archbishop do that, he, along with the surprise guest the Count of Luxembourg Henry himself, announced to the electors that he had betrothed his nine year old to the twelve year old
Elizabeth of Bohemia
, Anne's own sister.
Because, apparently, there was enough opposition within the Kingdom of Bohemia for them to smuggle out Elizabeth so that she can get hitched to one of two powerful nobles in the realm who can dispute Henry's Crown of Bohemia! And she had help from none other than … Rudolf.
Not the Rudolf sitting across from him and his wife but a
Habsburg
Rudolf, the son of the late emperor and the current Duke of Austria and Styria.
Yes, the alliance between him, Hans, the Habsburgs, and Rudolf von Wittelsbach was already falling apart as the election was happening.
Henry didn't doubt for a moment that the moment the election was over, the Habsburgs might stab him in the back.
It was obvious what was happening. The Count of Luxembourg, the Archbishop of Mainz, and the Habsburgs were scheming. Since they couldn't become the emperor again, they were going to get the consolation prize that was the Crown of Bohemia. And they - Henry and Rudolf - did not know who else was backing Henry of Luxembourg.
"... Who should we approach?" Rudolf asked after a while. "Between the two of us, we have two votes. All we need are two more votes to keep the count from becoming the emperor."
Henry thought about it.
The Archbishop of Trier was not in a good relationship with the Count of Luxembourg mostly because their lands bordered each other. In fact, they were each other's longest border neighbors, which in and of itself caused a lot of problems due to a number of land claims they and their subjects had on each other's lands.
"We should at least confirm with the Archbishop of Trier that he isn't supporting the count," Henry said. "For all we know, Henry might feel that a dozen land claims on Trier might be worth giving up if it means he can get his son on the Bohemian throne."
"Aye," Rudolf grunted. "Then what about Cologne?"
"He's a natural enemy of Trier territorially, though they stick together on theological matters. We might vote for the count."
"Then that leaves the Dukes of Saxony and Margrave of Brandenburg."
"Yes," Henry took a deep breath in and let it out as she said that.
Both the Electorate of Saxony and Brandenburg bordered his new Bohemian lands. Hell, there were territorial disputes between the Crown of Bohemia and the Electorate of Brandenburg around the Margraviate of Lusatia, which was one of the main titles under Brandenburg's control. That might be reason enough for the Margrave to vote for Henry the count so that Henry the king can get screwed over.
But this also naturally made the Electorate of Brandenburg's rival, the Electorate of Saxony, a natural friend for Henry.
"How about this, Rudolf?" he asked his ally. "You go talk to the Archbishop of Trier tomorrow and I'll go talk to the Dukes of Saxony."
"... Aye. That sounds like a plan. Then we meet at dinner time?"
"Sounds good."
After Rudolf left, Henry wrote a letter and got one of the rangers to deliver it to Hans.
And the letter was a very simple one.
Just in case Henry was elected, Hans needed to be ready for war not just against the one of the most powerful noble families within the empire but also against his own subjects who had Habsburg blood ties.
-VB-
A/N:
So.
Tl;dr.
Henry the Count got nominated and announced a betrothal between his son John (future John the Blind) to Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia, who got smuggled out by anti-Henry the King Bohemian nobles with the help of the Habsburgs who also want the Crown of Bohemia.
On the other side, we have Otto III and Stephan I, neither of whom are present in the council, but could be nominated. However, they're going to cause trouble
anyways
because Otto III wants to use the resources (manpower and vassals) of Upper Bavaria to bolster his claim to the Kingdom of Hungary, whose powerful nobles are choosing sides.
Henry the King and Rudolf both don't want the emperorship but they can't allow one of their rivals' candidates or their rivals to become the emperor. Because if that happens, then it's war.
But neither Henry the king nor Rudolf have candidates of their own (no one planned to have the fucking emperor to get murked by his nephew) and they have been struggling until very recently in their own problems. So they are on the backfoot and trying to
prevent
someone from becoming the emperor.

.
!
Chapter 139