Guild Wars_ Ghosts of Ascalon - Matt Forbeck [98]
“ ‘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