The Fire of Asshurbanipal

Steve Clarney and Yar Ali are down to their last bullets in a desert sand-pit, with Bedouin riders circling and their water nearly gone, all for the sake of a legend.

The American wanderer and his big Afghan comrade have followed rumors from Shiraz to the Persian Gulf: a dead city of black stone lost in the sands, and on its throne a skeleton clutching a flaming jewel, the Fire of Asshurbanipal. The Arabs call it the City of Devils, and every tale about it comes with a warning. Now, half dead of thirst, the two stumble into broken country where the legend might be real, and where something has guarded the gem far longer than any man has lived.