Sgt. Golem: Royal Mech Hussar - Stubs Soon!

The line of cars and horse-drawn carriages crept forward, and it was our turn in front of the red carpet. I climbed out and went around to Eva's door, opened her door and handed her down from the car.

She gave me a dazzling smile and took my arm, reaching up a bit to do so. The disparity in our heights was impressive. We turned and started down the red carpet, smiling at the footmen by the door. Their shock at seeing a golem in a tuxedo leading a small red-haired girl into their ball was simply hilarious.

When we got to the door, I proffered our invitation. The confused man looked at it twice and then looked back at me before clearing his throat. Finally, he announced us, "Hussar Eva and Sergeant Sam Golem."

More than a few heads turned in our direction as we stepped into the hangar. The industrial building had been impressively made over into a ballroom; bunting hung from the rafters and draped across the walls. A concert stage was set up along one wall, the band already playing. There was a bank of tables and chairs and a wooden dance floor laid out. Spectacularly dressed couples already scattered the room, with more coming all the time.

Tamara swept past us with a confused-looking young Hungarian officer in tow. Angelica and and Colonel Mazur were already here, standing together not far from the door, both immaculately dressed and wearing those polite smiles people put on for parties. We made our way over to them.

"What now, Colonel?"

"Now, Sergeant, we mingle."

As a backwoods boy from Alabama, trained in heavy machinery, I was severely out of my depth. "Improvise, adapt, and overcome," I muttered to myself.

"What was that?" Eva asked. Again, she looked at me with that dazzling smile, and I had to remind myself she was young enough to be my daughter. Barely.

"Just something our officers used to say back where I came from. It's about being flexible to any situation that may come along." I smiled and nodded.

“You really were a man once. I mean a real man.”

"Oh, definitely, I was just an ordinary man. About yea high,” I waved my hand to indicate 5'10". Not even shoulder height for me now. “I had blond hair and was, I guess, average looking. Maybe a bit fitter that average since I'd been in the Army.”

"You weren't old?" she asked. "I heard you died."

"I wasn't that old. Well, maybe to you I would have been. I was 29."

“That's not so old. What happened?"

"It was an accident. My brother-in-law," I censored a curse word, "backed over me with a piece of earth-moving equipment."

Her eyes got big. "You remember all that?"

“All too well.” I suppressed a shudder. In my mind, I could still hear the sound of my bones crunching.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry."

"No, it's fine. So many people don't even bother. They just treat me like a fake man.” I hadn't meant to bare my soul like this, but she had a very open personality that made it hard to resist her questions.

The band paused and then struck up a sprightly waltz. Pairs of elegantly dressed men and women swung onto the dance floor and took up dancing. Eva looked at me, eyes wide. “Can we?”

“Of course.” I offered her my arm and we joined the dancers.

“I can’t believe you were just a normal man once,” Eva said, shaking her head, as I held her waist as delicately as I could. I had to bend way down to reach her. “I wish I was as interesting as you. I’ve never been dead or a golem or anything.”

I laughed. “You were only raised by the most mysterious and enigmatic figure I've ever heard of. Why, the things you must have seen and heard are far beyond what all of these people know or have experienced. Don't sell yourself short. There's much more to you than meets the eye."

She blushed and ducked her head. "I don't know about all that."

"Certainly," I said. "You might think being raised in the woods wasn't anything exotic, but I was raised in the woods myself. The way we grew up is far outside what most of these people have experienced, with their fancy balls and shiny cars.”

“You grew up in the woods too?"

"Oh yes, in the backwoods of a place called Alabama. Trust me, the way we were raised would be shocking and exotic to most of the people here. Why, I'll bet most of them don't even know how to skin a rabbit or chop wood."

She laughed. "Really?"

"Of course. Why would they have to do those things in a city like this? But you have, haven't you?"

She laughed. "Of course. Of course, when Baba wasn't around, I would steal her axe, the one that she enchanted to chop wood on its own, and just use that. It was so much easier."

I laughed at the sight of her sneaking out a magic axe, Sorcerer's Apprentice style, and making it chop a pile of wood by itself. "See, that’s what I mean. Most of these people would be astonished by the idea of a magic axe chopping wood for you. Don't assume just because they have fancier clothes or exotic airs that they're somehow better or more interesting than you. It simply isn't true."

She smiled and held my arm a little tighter. "Thank you, Sam. Now let's go see if there's something to eat around here," I said, and led the way towards a table of hors d'oeuvres.

After the first dance, I managed to turn Eva over to a young Hungarian officer, and after that, she continued dancing with a succession of dashing young men. Which is just the way it should be with a young girl at her first ball.

I sat at a table in the corner with Alexander and Angelica. We occasionally caught glimpses of Tamara across the ballroom floor, twirling the night away with various young men, although she seemed to favor the ones she'd come in with most particularly.

We didn't see very much of the colonel except across the room. He was making the rounds, working the groups of older men and talking to them intently. Whether he was making new connections or whatever it was a diplomat did, I didn't know.

After the first couple of dances, a trio of slightly older women approached. They wore brooches with regimental coats of arms on them. Angelica’s eyes went wide. She whispered to me “those are former mech riders. Probably still influential in politics. Be careful!”

I stood up as the women drew near our table. Angelica smiled and introduced us all. The women were a Contessa and two Baronnesses. They exchanged a few polite words with Angelica about frontier battles they’d participated in, and then the Contessa turned to me. Her dark eyes sparkled. “Sergeant Golem. You’re the talk of the ball. My former sisters-in-arms and I are dying to find out a bit more about you. As I am the ranking officer here, I must claim the first dance.”

I cleared my throat, wondering how to turn her down, and from all the way across the room met Colonel Mazur’s eye. He gave me a slight head nod. How the hell did he –

“Of course,” I rumbled, and held out my hand. “Contessa?”

The Contessa and I swept onto the dance floor as her comrades seated themselves beside Angelica to wait for me. My dance partner looked me up and down – mostly up – appraisingly. “So. You are a golem who talks like a man. And dances remarkably well,” she added.

“Yeah, I’m kind of surprised by that myself. I don’t think Alexander loaded any waltz programs up and I had two left feet until one of them got blown off in—previous service,” I said.

She frowned. “You have two legs now. Did they change your body for you?”

“You might say that.”

She laughed and drew a little closer. The floor was getting crowded now, so all the couples were dancing more tightly, but she didn’t have to be quite that close. Her body heat pressed through my tuxedo. “I must say, back when I was in the regiment we girls did like how a golem could fill out the uniform but I’ve never known one to dance. Are you, perhaps, a new model?”

“You could say that.”

“I hope we shall see more like you.” She raised one eyebrow.

“I’m afraid I’m one of a kind, ma’am.” The waltz ended and I led her back to our table, where one of the baronesses immediately claimed the next dance. I barely had time to catch my breath before I was back out there. The baroness had black hair now shot through with gray, and a much more piercing stare than had the Contessa. We exchanged pleasantries as we started up the dance.

“I saw Olivia giving you a hard time. You will have to forgive her. Some of us find retirement harder than others. Olivia’s just divorced her third husband, you know, and there are all those rumors about her and the regent—” she looked up at me from under long lashes, smiling, and my head swam.

Look, I’m not the quickest of men, even before I became a golem, and I’m out of practice with women flirting with me, but by the time I was dancing with Baroness #2 and warding off her verbal sorties, I figured it out. Well, not all of it. Why were they so interested in me? I honestly considered the possibility that one or more of them were Russian agents, and then it hit me.

I was 7 feet tall, muscular, pretty good looking if I was going on what the golem who had beaten me looked like. These women were former adrenaline junkies, probably with a nice pension making them independently wealthy…

I left the baroness at the table, with a whispered invitation for later on in my ear. “Where are you going?” Angelica asked as I made for the door in a fog.

“Got to get a little air.”

I pretended not to hear her reply.

Frank Lewis wove through the party balancing two drinks. He found Veronica with a group of especially blue-blooded characters off to one side of the dance floor.

"Oh, thank you, Franklin," she said, taking the fluted glass from his hands.

"You simply must meet István Nádasdy,"

A stuffy man with a full gray beard and a chest full of medals gave a firm handshake. The ancient crone in a ball gown beside him twittered as Frank bent over her hand.

"A pleasure," he said.

"István is one of Daddy's most important advisors on army matters," Veronica gushed.

It had been great while they were dancing. Swinging a girl around the room in a waltz was something Frank was always up for, but now she seemed intent on impressing him with her myriad friends and acquaintances.

She addressed the old man. "Frank came all the way from America to join the Polish army."

The relic adjusted his monocle. "Really? America? What part, son?"

Veronica turned and waved at someone she just saw. "Oh, it's Countess Széchenyi! I simply must introduce you. Don't go anywhere," she said to Frank and slipped into the crowd.

Frank resisted the urge to groan aloud.

"Boy," the old woman, apparently named Istvánne, said, "I better warn you, she can be quite a handful, and you don't want to run afoul of her father."

Frank's ears perked up. He always paid attention when the talk turned to fathers, older brothers, and husbands. It didn't do to be caught off guard.

"Oh yes," the old man joined in. "The regent is very exacting about the sort of man his daughter hangs out with."

"The regent?" Frank asked. "The Regent of Hungary?"

They both nodded.

Frank was caught off guard.

"Oh yes, he simply dotes on her. His wife was barren, you see, and when she came along, he was besotted.” The old woman leaned in conspiratorially. “She's the daughter of his mistress, of course.”

“That hardly matters when someone is a bonded Hussar.”

The woman nodded." Quite right. The Countess deserves her place. Now, the old regent, he had three daughters, and only one of them was able to bond with a mech.” Istvánne launched into a detailed comparison of the old regent and his family with the love life of the new regent.

Frank steeled himself and took another sip of his drink. This night was not going as planned. Not by a long shot.