Into a Dark Realm. Raymond E. Feist

His eyes locked onto Bek’s in wonder.

      Everyone, including Bek, froze as the man wove between the swordsmen. He passed the man closest to Ralan Bek, and came straight towards the young warrior. Bek sensed some strange power in this man, and his lucky feeling told him something unusual was about to happen. He hesitated, then began to swing at the man in the robe.

      The man held up his hand, not in defence, but in supplication. ‘Wait,’ he said as Bek hesitated again. He reached out slowly, almost gently, and put his hand on Bek’s chest, and said again, ‘Wait.’

      Then slowly the robed man went to his knees and in a voice that was little more than a whisper, he said, ‘What does our master bid us?’

      The man with the amulet looked on in mute astonishment, then he too went to his knees, followed moments later by every other man in the room. Another half a dozen men ran into the hall from other parts of the keep, answering the alarm. Seeing their brethren on their knees, their eyes lowered, they followed suit.

      Bek’s sword lowered a little. ‘What?’

      ‘What does our master bid us?’ asked the robed man again.

      Bek tried to puzzle out what to say next, from what he had overheard Nakor, Pug and the others say at Sorcerer’s Isle. At last he said: ‘Varen’s gone. He’s fled to another world.’

      ‘Not Varen,’ said the robed man. ‘He was highest among our master’s servants.’ The man slowly reached out and touched Bek on the chest. ‘I can feel our master, there, inside you. He lives within you; he speaks through you.’ He raised his eyes to Bek’s again, and asked once more, ‘What does our master bid us?’

      Bek had been ready for combat, and this was beyond his ability to comprehend. Slowly, he looked around the room, rising frustration in his voice as he said, ‘I don’t know …’ Then suddenly, he raised his sword and brought it down, shouting, ‘I don’t know!’

      Minutes later Magnus rushed into the room with a company of Erik’s soldiers at his back, and more Kingdom soldiers entered through the same door as Bek. All of them stopped at the scene before them. Twenty-six corpses littered the floor, but there was no sign of a struggle. Twenty-six headless bodies lay in a wash of blood. Heads still rolled on the crimson stones and blood-soaked cloaks.

      The fire crackled. Bek stood beside it, covered in blood. His arms were crimson to the elbows and gore was smeared across his face. He stood like a fiend possessed by madness. Magnus could see it in his eyes. He was trembling so much he looked like a man about to go into convulsions.

      Finally, Ralan Bek threw back his head and gave out a howl which rang off the stones high above. It was a primal burst of rage and frustration, and when even the echoes had passed away, he looked around the room, then directly at Magnus. Like a petulant child he pointed to the corpses, and said, ‘This wasn’t fun!’

      He wiped his sword on the tunic of a nearby corpse, and sheathed it. Then he picked up a bucket of water which had been set near the fireplace to heat and lifted it, letting it wash down over his head, without even bothering to remove his hat, and then picked up a relatively clean cloak to use as a towel. Cleaning himself off as best he could, Bek said in a more controlled tone, ‘It’s not fun if they don’t fight back, Magnus.’ He looked around the room and then said, ‘I’m hungry. Anyone got anything to eat?’