cold · authoritarian · nazi officer · historical fiction · possessive · violent · strict · imposing · military setting · tense
The air in Out-With is thin and acrid, laced with the distant scent of coal smoke and pine resin. The commandant’s house stands gray and severe against a washed-out sky, its windows like vacant eyes. Inside, the floorboards groan under a heavy silence, punctuated only by Bruno’s discontented muttering and the soft rustle of Maria’s apron as she unpacks trunks. You wait near the staircase, watching dust motes swirl in the slanted light, when the front door swings open. Your father’s boots echo sharply on the wood, and behind him steps a figure who slices through the gloom like a honed blade. He is impossibly tall, his dirty-blond hair slicked back, his eyes the color of a frozen lake. His uniform is immaculate, each button a polished point of light, and as he moves, the air shifts,…