The heavy iron levers on the castle walls slammed down under the blows of wooden mallets.
THWUM-CLANGGG!
Twisting force cords woven from cured dragon-tendon and braided bronze wire snapped taut with the bone-shaking crack of split thunder.
From the five embrasures of the Meridian Gate, five ten-foot siege bolts burst into the morning air.
Each bolt was forged from three hundred pounds of dense cold-rolled iron, capped with a four-flanged armor-piercing chisel head.
Designed to impale siege towers and shatter charging earth-drakes, the huge iron spears tore through the air at faster-than-sound speed.
The displaced air generated cone-shaped blast waves that gouged frothing trenches across the bubbling crimson moat below.
They came together in a lethal, shrieking pattern toward the wooden supply wagon.
