" 'Retreat?' the Sorcerer-King shouted. 'Retreat is not an option!'
"With the Flame Legion flooding through the city's defenses, Ascalon City had already been lost. The human soldiers ignored their king's complaint as their retreat transformed into a rout.
"The insane king raised his sword-a relic from the ancient land of Orr-over his head and bellowed down at his men, 'We will never surrender! Never!'
"Then he plunged his sword downward. As it struck the stones beneath his feet, a gout of white fire shaped like a blade shot from the tower's roof, enveloping Adelbern. The tower collapsed then, its very stones unable to withstand the power of the Foefire. Adelbern rode the battered rocks all the way down, disappearing in a cloud of shattered stones and dust.
"The mystic light from the Foefire burned without abatement. When the last stone of the tower stopped tumbling, the light intensified for an instant, then burst out and engulfed the entire city. The wave of destruction spread out from there, soon engulfing nearly all of Ascalon.
"The charr nearest the tower-the imperator and his victorious guard-were immolated in a heartbeat, their fur igniting like tinder, their flesh blasted by the unearthly flames. Yet, what happened to the humans in the blast was infinitely worse.
"The air in Ascalon City rang with a choir of their screams as the humans died in their tracks. Their bodies were blasted into burning fragments, but their spirits remained standing. Their mortal forms were reduced to broken skeletons but their souls remained, eternally bound to Ascalon. Only the charr close to the city were destroyed in the blast, but every human for leagues around was suddenly transformed into a ghost.
"This is why we call him the Sorcerer-King." Ember nodded at Dougal and Riona. "He worked a spell as great as the Searing itself, and in a single blow denied the Flame Legion their ultimate victory and damned the humans of his own land. Before the night ended, not a single body in Ascalon City still drew a breath. The Foefire that towered over this carnage remains to this day.
"Eventually, Frye managed to free himself and then the other charr in his warband. Unbound, they slunk away from the disaster, determined to bring news of the atrocity to the rest of the charr.
"The Fireshadows returned to the invasion's staging grounds-the site of the Black Citadel today. When they delivered the news of the Flame imperator's defeat at Ascalon City, few who heard the news could believe their ears. Everyone who met Fireburn and his warband, though, trusted every word because they could see how the horrors they had witnessed had transformed them.
"From head to toe, the fur of each of them had turned a snowy white."
There was silence in the empty barn. Even Riona seemed cowed by the strength of Ember's story. At last Dougal said, "What of the Claw?"
"It was on the imperator," said Ember. "He was in the city. There were a few attempts at salvage by the charr after the Foefire, but there were too many ghosts, and the city itself was declared off-limits. We had assumed that it had been destroyed."
"Someone thinks otherwise," said Kranxx. "Why else would the truce faction demand it, and Almorra think we could provide it?"
Gullik added, "It would be wherever this nameless imperator fell, then?"
Dougal scowled for a moment, then said, "It is in the royal treasury."
All eyes turned to him and he continued: "On the back of Dak's map there was a list. Gold, silver, tribute, and gifts from different lands. Suits of ornate armor. An inventory of the royal treasury. And at the bottom of it, the word 'claw.' That's why I think it is there."
"How would anyone know it was there, if it disappeared in the Foefire?" said Riona. Her earlier irritation had evaporated by this point.
"That I do not know," said Dougal. "I suspect it was on another piece of parchment and transferred to the map later, perhaps by a group of salvagers that knew more legends than we did. If someone had uncovered the royal regalia of the treasury over the past two hundred years, whether they were charr or human, we would have heard of it."
"As with the Claw," said Riona.
"As with the Claw," agreed Dougal. "It is a tenuous link, but the most likely one."
"Mysteries upon mysteries," yawned Gullik. "I know I have spent a hard night walking, and more in sight. Let us think more of this later, after a good sleep."
Kranxx volunteered for the first watch. Dougal offered to join him. Riona didn't say anything to him, but she was less frosty and more relaxed as she laid out her bedroll. The shock of the previous night had washed over her, Dougal decided, and she had come to terms with it. That did not surprise him. If Riona was anything, she was resilient.
Putting his back against one of the feed barn's walls, Dougal pulled out the locket with Vala's cameo. It felt warm and reassuring in the darkness. Dougal removed the Golem's Eye as well and saw a warm red spark dancing at its heart. He wondered if he could use it to see the cameo.
"Is that what I think it is?" Kranxx was suddenly at his side. "How did you get your hands on a vintage ambient thaumaturgic construct like that? They don't enchant them like that anymore."
Dougal wanted to hide the gem, to keep it a secret. Yet, hadn't keeping secrets done nothing but hurt him and the others? Slowly he held it up and let it catch the moonlight shining through the slots of the barn wall.
"I… recovered it," Dougal said, "with Killeen's help. From the tomb of an asura named Blimm."
At the mention of Blimm's name, Kranxx choked. Dougal smacked him on the back to help him clear his throat.
"May I… see it?" said the asura, with the voice of a child asking for a third piece of candy.
Dougal's mouth was a thin line, but hesitantly he handed the gem over.
The asura examined the gem closely. "It's been deactivated," he said. "That's standby illumination in the heart. That is old magic, from just after my ancestors emerged on the surface." The asura blinked at it, turned it over in his hands, whistled softly, then handed it back. Dougal noticed that Kranxx seemed to have the same problem returning it that he had had giving it.
"It did that automatically after we left the crypts beneath Divinity's Reach," said Dougal.
Kranxx grinned as Dougal pocketed the gem. "It's an archaic spell matrix, but I think I know just how to recharge it. If you're interested, of course."
Dougal felt uncomfortable. The Golem's Eye was a victory, messy and bought at a high price, but a victory nonetheless. And should everything go south, it would bring a pretty gold piece in Lion's Arch, or even Rata Sum.
And the sudden avarice in Kranxx's eye reminded him of Clagg.
"I think we have other things to worry about," said Dougal, and, to his surprise, the asura did not argue or offer any retort. Instead he just nodded and crossed to the far side of the barn and sat by the other entrance.
Yet, through the rest of their watch, Dougal felt that the asura was watching him, not the outside world. And when, after a few uneventful hours, Ember and Gullik took their watch, Dougal shifted the gem to another pocket, buttoned it, and then slept on that side for the rest of the evening.
It was almost morning when Dougal awoke, refreshed. His hand went to his pocket, but the gem was still there, and he cursed his own distrust. He looked around: Riona, Ember, and Kranxx were all asleep in the soft hay. Gullik was alone and awake by one of the barn doors.
"Couldn't sleep?" Dougal asked.
Gullik shook his head. "Normally I sleep like Bear herself, but sleep was a prey I could not catch this evening."
Dougal sat down next to the norn. Because of their difference in size, he felt like a child sitting with a parent.
"Thinking about Killeen?"
Gullik nodded.
"It's not your fault."
"Of course it is! If I had not charged into battle against that minion, we might have escaped from the Dragonbrand clean!"
"Or it might have run us down and killed us all."