Summoning 5.95 (Cerulian Sphinx)

“Captain?” Paldor couldn’t tell, from the tone, which soldier was speaking. “Captain, what do we—?”

Shouts and screams erupted from the tube as something—a door, perhaps?—shattered into a million splinters. Steel sang against leather as swords whirled from their sheathes, and the clatter of iron links of chain echoed through the narrow conduit. A dozen voices rose into a chaotic clamor, Sevrien’s own barely audible as he shouted orders that nobody heeded.

Wood cracked, so hard that the floor beneath Paldor’s feet trembled. Human voices disappeared beneath a monstrous roar, loud enough that he heard it clearly from the level below without need of the tube at all. The shouts of soldiers were transformed into shrieks of terror, wails of agony that ended in a series of horrible, wet thumps.

***

Agents of Artifice, Chapter 22