She faced him suddenly, her body stiffening.

‘If I have given cause for offence—’

Before Karsa drew another breath she was upon him. Five concussive blows to his body and he found himself lying on his back, the hard stone floor stinging as if he was lying on a nest of fire-ants. There was no air in his lungs. Agony thundered through him. He could not move.

He heard Delum’s warcry – cut off with a strangled grunt – then the sound of another body striking the ground.

Bairoth cried out from one side, ‘Forkassal! Hold! Leave him—’

Karsa blinked up through tear-filled eyes as her face hovered above his. It moved closer, the eyes gleaming now like black pools, the lips full and almost purple in the starlight.

In a rasping voice she whispered to him in the language of the Teblor, ‘They will not leave you, will they? These once enemies of mine. It seems shattering their bones was not enough.’ Something in her eyes softened slightly. ‘Your kind deserve better.’ The face slowly withdrew. ‘I believe I must needs wait. Wait and see what comes of you, before I decide whether I shall deliver unto you, Warrior, my eternal peace.’

Bairoth’s voice from a dozen paces away: ‘Forkassal!’

She straightened and turned with extraordinary fluidity. ‘You have fallen far, to so twist the name of my kind, not to mention your own. I am Forkrul Assail, young warrior – not a demon. I am named Calm, a Bringer of Peace, and I warn you, the desire to deliver it is very strong in me at the moment, so remove your hand from that weapon.’

‘But we have freed you!’ Bairoth cried. ‘Yet you have struck Karsa and Delum down!’

She laughed. ‘And Icarium and those damned T’lan Imass will not be pleased that you undid their work. Then again, it is likely Icarium has no memory of having done so, and the T’lan Imass are far away. Well, I shall not give them a second chance. But I do know gratitude, Warrior, and so I give you this. The one named Karsa has been chosen. If I was to tell you even the little that I sense of his ultimate purpose, you would seek to kill him. But I tell you there would be no value in that, for the ones using him will simply select another. No. Watch this friend of yours. Guard him. There will come a time when he stands poised to change the world. And when that time comes, I shall be there. For I bring peace. When that moment arrives, cease guarding him. Step back, as you have done now.’

Karsa dragged a sobbing breath into his racked lungs. At a wave of nausea he twisted onto his side and vomited onto the gritty stone floor. Between his gasping and coughing, he heard the Forkrul Assail – the woman named Calm – stride away.

A moment later Bairoth knelt beside Karsa. ‘Delum is badly hurt, Warleader,’ he said. ‘There is liquid leaking from a crack in his head. Karsa Orlong, I regret freeing this ... this creature. Delum had doubts. Yet he—’