However, I find your arguments about the non-religious motives Katte might have had about how this is going to affect Fritz's future and his relations with his father very convincing. You have saved my fanfic! (I can ignore Katte's last-minute return to devout Protestantism, as it was triggered by events that don't happen in my AU, yay.)
I'm glad. :) BTW, I don't know whether it is at all useful for your story, but one element from Hans Heinrich's letters that says something about Katte we didn't know before, imo, is that the request re: his younger brother is just made about one, Albrecht, the youngest one. Why no requests/recs to where the middle brother should study? Might Albrecht also have been Katte's favourite brother in addition to becoming Hans Heinrich's next fave? (*sinister music plays, reasons for duel accumulate*) (Does the mutually assured destruction duel still happen in your timeline?)
That's what I've been assuming this whole time. He had a number of reasons for resenting Katte, which I've never held against him, no matter that I don't blame Katte myself. (Much like how Wilhelmine and Fritz must have resented each other deep down but been unable to work that out in therapy.) It was a horrendous situation for everyone involved.
So it was. How about Katte? We know how important it was to him that Fritz knew he didn't blame him as he went to his death, and also already the night before, when messengers ran conveying just that message. But it would surely only be human if he's experienced moments - like, say, when he was shown the instruments of torture and couldn't be sure they would not be used on him, or when he initially hears his death sentence - when he thinks, damm, Fritz, why did you have to drag me into this? before recollecting himself.
Re: Protestant Katte?
I'm glad. :) BTW, I don't know whether it is at all useful for your story, but one element from Hans Heinrich's letters that says something about Katte we didn't know before, imo, is that the request re: his younger brother is just made about one, Albrecht, the youngest one. Why no requests/recs to where the middle brother should study? Might Albrecht also have been Katte's favourite brother in addition to becoming Hans Heinrich's next fave? (*sinister music plays, reasons for duel accumulate*) (Does the mutually assured destruction duel still happen in your timeline?)
That's what I've been assuming this whole time. He had a number of reasons for resenting Katte, which I've never held against him, no matter that I don't blame Katte myself. (Much like how Wilhelmine and Fritz must have resented each other deep down but been unable to work that out in therapy.) It was a horrendous situation for everyone involved.
So it was. How about Katte? We know how important it was to him that Fritz knew he didn't blame him as he went to his death, and also already the night before, when messengers ran conveying just that message. But it would surely only be human if he's experienced moments - like, say, when he was shown the instruments of torture and couldn't be sure they would not be used on him, or when he initially hears his death sentence - when he thinks, damm, Fritz, why did you have to drag me into this? before recollecting himself.