The object was a head.
It was a monstrous thing, larger than a full-grown bull. It was covered in thick, black, chitinous plates that shone with a dull, oily light.
Two long, serrated mandibles, each as long as a man's arm, were open in a silent scream. A dozen multi-faceted eyes, like a cluster of black diamonds, stared blankly at the ceiling.
A thick, black, and foul-smelling ichor was still dripping from the severed neck, pooling on the old, scarred wood of the table.
The entire inn was frozen. The mercenaries, the merchants, the guards—they were all tough men who had seen their share of death and monsters.
But they had never seen anything like this.
Tyren, the one-eyed mercenary captain, was the first to recognise it. He had seen it once, from a great distance, during the last swarm.
He had seen its terrible shape silhouetted against the sky as it commanded its army of death.
