Fifty thousand crystal-clear void-spikes plunged through the freezing stratosphere at Mach three.
Each spike was forty feet long, forged from hyper-dense crystal-hardened null-matter that absorbed light like black velvet.
Falling from forty thousand feet, their striking force alone was enough to pulverize fifty square miles of urban public works.
To any standard castle, this was an un-survivable sky-high bombardment.
To Giles Croft, it was a sudden, massive influx of high-speed unburned fuel entering the town intake pipe hub.
On the running deck of Weather Spire Six, high in the mountain crests, Clan Leader Jarek stood beside the air-powered control rack.
Beside him, thirty mountain keepers braced themselves against the shaking steel grating.
The huge balance weights of the thirty-foot brass flapper valves hung poised above their high-pressure dashpots.
