Sgt. Golem: Royal Mech Hussar - Books 2 & 3

While my helpers and I were securing the Russian's mobile fortress, the rest of our unit received reports of a Russian patrol coming up the road from the east. Our skirmishers engaged them, and we evacuated out of the town completely just ahead of a larger group. By the time I got finished and rejoined the group, all Hungarian and Polish troops were west of the bottleneck.

Meanwhile, our troops had been digging in. We improved the makeshift fortifications in the woods we had used earlier to ambush the Russians as they emerged from the gorge. By nightfall, our positions were as secure as we could make them with hand entrenchment tools.

The night itself was quiet. The darkness made it impossible to carry out an effective attack. In the twilight before dawn, a group of Russians came through the gorge in a rush. We met their attack with a wave of rifle and machine gun fire, and it was over almost before it started.

Frank had gone out the night before with the most grievously wounded loaded into the car, evacuating them to the command post up the pass. He returned two hours after dawn with dire news.

The command post had been wiped out before they got there. Evidence pointed to it being Wraith soldiers who had done it. He had arrived there around midnight and found fresh bodies and still-warm guns, but no sign of the enemy. The bodies had been stabbed or had their throats slit, not shot.

Angelica, Frank and Wysocki drew apart from the rest of us for a quick conversation. Their faces were grave, and their discussion was vigorous, punctuated by lots of headshakes, hand-waves, and quick angry gesticulations from Frank. Eventually they broke up the meeting and started issuing orders.

We were to abandon this position and fall back. With no hope of quick reinforcements from the Hungarian regiment, we couldn't risk being cut off by a flanking move over the hills around us. We just didn't have the manpower to hold here.

Wysocki left skirmishers by the gorge with orders to make a fighting retreat if things got too hot for them. Angelica sent scouting parties up the ridges on both sides of the valley with signal guns. They too had orders to retreat as soon as they made contact, but they would warn of any flanking moves.

I went west with another party. We set up fortifications at the next decent choke point. At a steep bend in the valley, we found another good place to defend. It wasn’t as effective as the canyon had been, but we could improve it. We set to work felling trees and piling dirt. I paid plenty of attention to the lines of retreat.

The plan would be the same. As the other force retreated, they would leapfrog past us. After we made contact with the enemy, we would do the same, working our way westward while slowing the Russians down as much as we were able with our limited manpower.

It would all depend on how hard they hit us. And of course, whether we got any reinforcements from the Hungarian army.

While we were doing all this, the chargers were moving into overwatch, up along the sides of the valley. Hopefully, it would be enough.

I kept a steady stream of runners going between the front line and my own strong point to make sure we stayed informed. Twice, the gorge group was engaged, but they repelled the Russians easily.

The day before the party in Budapest, I had managed a short stop to a gunsmith in town. There, I had found they stocked shotgun shells loaded with iron pellets. I’d bought several boxes of these which I now broke out.

We assigned the sentries on duty in pairs, one with a standard issue rifle and the other with a shotgun. Each of these I gave a handful of my precious iron-shot rounds, with orders to only use them on Wraith soldiers, and a firm admonition to not shoot at shadows. They would hand off their steel-armed weapon to the watchers taking the next shift.

The night was uneventful.

At dawn, the forward group retreated to our strong point, calling out as they came to warn us. I met them and got the briefing. They’d been attacked by a stronger force of Russians, taking two casualties – neither fatal – and fallen back per their orders. Now they retreated past us, and we were the front line.

The Russians sent a probing attack against our chokepoint an hour or so after dawn. They came down the road, not along the ridges, and we pushed them back easily. Sooner or later they’d get troops on the ridges above us and then we’d be forced to retreat. I was hoping that would take a day, perhaps even two.

I ran a couple drills with the men to make sure they were ready to retreat on a moment's notice, and we waited. This was the quintessential role of a soldier. Extreme boredom punctuated by moments of absolute terror.

They attacked us twice more that day, but their hearts really weren't into it, just probing attacks to make sure we were still there and awake. At dusk, the scouts I sent up on the ridge to the south signaled no sign of Russians yet.

For the last day and a half, the Hussars had been out of sight. We occasionally heard rumbles in the distance or even the clear sound of an autocannon or howitzer fire. I guessed they were staying up high and taking shots down the valley at larger concentrations of Russians.

Sergeant Wysocki, who had been commanding the other group of leapfrogging soldiers, pointed out that this stronghold was better than most of the ones behind us. “It’s almost perfect, except that field of boulders up above us. It’s too rough to cover with sentries, and it's too good a route for people to sneak up on us."

I rubbed my chin, "That gives me an idea..."

A storm was coming. The wind whipped the pine branches into a frenzy as Captain Mikhail Pirogov moved through the forest towards the Polish base.

Even with the magical cube from the cave, he was amazed they had managed to locate their quarry over hundreds of miles and across a war front.

Pirogov stumbled as a rock shifted under his feet. Even when it wasn't dark, the mountainside was difficult in his wraith cloak. The magic that imbued it allowed him to pass through many things, but not soil or living stone.

He was still unclear on what a living stone was. The monumental slabs that made up the bones of the mountain counted, as did the many boulders laying on the ground covered in moss. All around were places where shards had broken away and tumbled down. Some of those no longer counted as living stone.

It was a strange exclusion, but definitely better than falling into the center of the earth as soon as he put on the cloak.

Mikhail slipped through the woods, working his way closer to the Polish camp. Between the trees, he could see the fire burning. Clouds were moving in, and the night was incredibly dark.

He worked his way by feel across the boulders and passed through trees unimpeded, catching no glimpses of his fellow wraith soldiers. There were a dozen this time, nearly all that remained from the first batch of cloaks crafted. So far, his contingent had proven useful, but not as impressive as he had hoped.

He paused by a large stone the size of a small house as he finally caught sight of another swirling cloak-cloud coming closer.

Drops of rain pattered down on the forest floor around him. Occasionally, he shivered as a raindrop passed through him on its way to the ground.

Lightning crashed and briefly threw the forest slope around him in stark relief, deep shadows and brightly lit stones and floor.

He paused and let his eyes adjust again. Finally, he felt his way ahead once more.

There was a faint noise, like someone dropping a sack of potatoes. Mikhail turned, staring into the darkness. Had he imagined it?

He caught a flicker of movement from the corner of his eye and turned. By the firelight filtering through the trees, he could see a few patches of needle-strewn dirt and boulders. In one cleaning, he spotted something. A darkness. A swirling cloak? Perhaps one of the Wraith soldiers, but he looked like he was lying on the ground.

Mikhail blinked, and it was gone again. He had to stick to the plan.

He felt the cool sensation of his foot passing through something, probably a tree root. He paused, studying his path ahead. The firelight dimly revealed a trail he could take.

A branch cracked under him. He froze. The cool sensation shifted and flowed up his leg. With sudden horror, he realized someone had been crouching beside him. Hands grabbed at him.

He opened his mouth to warn to the others it had been a trap. But then a skeletal hand, impossibly large, wrapped itself around his neck. Its thin bones cut off his air.

A voice whispered in his ear. He could feel the cool tingling inside his head. Whoever had him was leaning forward, their face actually inside his own head. A deep rumbling voice shook his brain. "How many are there? If you speak above a whisper, I will remove your head."

Mikhail started to draw his bone knife. But another skeletal hand grabbed his elbow and clamped down.

It wasn’t a skeleton, he realized. The hands felt skeletal through his cloak, because instead of the pressure of thick fingers, he felt narrow strips cutting into him. The hand around his throat loosened, and he gasped for air. "Quiet now," the voice said in warning.

"How did you do this?" Pirogov gasped.

The voice chuckled deep and low. "Wires in my gloves. Now tell me, how many more are there before I take off your head?"

Major Pirogov had not become a stealth assassin due to his extreme bravery. "Eleven others. Twelve in all."

"Only nine now," the voice said, sounding amused. Now Mikhail recognized it. It was that damnable golem. The strange one.

Somewhere off to their left came a sharp cry, like the squawk of a strange bird. Or, Mikhail realized, the cry of a dying man cut off in mid-scream. The voice chuckled again. "Or maybe eight. Come, let's move closer to the fire where it's warm."

His air cut off again as he was lifted bodily from the ground by the wires cutting into his neck. The monstrous golem carried him to the edge of the firelight, just outside the clearing, then set Mikhail back down. He gasped for breath as the pressure on his neck relieved.

He was roughly stripped of his cloak. Mikhail stood shivering as raindrops started hitting him. Fortunately, the pine branches above were deflecting most of them.

The golem bellowed, "Lights!" All around in the forest, electric torches were lit, at least half a dozen flashing through the trees.

In the distance, he heard more gunfire as the strange golem loomed over him. "And now, Mr. Russian, we will have a little chat about where you came from, where the Red Widow is, and what she's really up to."

Now that the hand was not around his neck Mikhail summoned the last shreds of his courage. "You don't scare me. You wouldn't dare stoop to torturing a prisoner of war."

"A prisoner of war?" The golem stepped back and looked about theatrically. "I don't see any prisoners of war here." He leaned back in with a menacing leer. "I only see a man out of uniform. That makes you a spy or a partisan, and either way, you're subject to summary execution under the laws of war."

Mikhail felt himself go pale as the monstrous man drew a wicked-looking knife. He licked his lips, which were suddenly incredibly dry. "What did you want to talk about?"