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behind their armor, using their might to
     bully and threaten those weaker than themselves. For the pride and honor of our Order of
     the Red Robes, join with me!”
    Caramon was beginning to get the uncomfortable feeling that the keep wasn't as deserted as
     he'd first thought. Reluctantly, wishing his brother were at his side, he entered the
     keep. The big warrior wasn't afraid of anything in this world that was made of flesh and
     blood. These eerie voices had a cold, hollow sound that unnerved him. It was as if they
     were shouting to him from the bottom of a grave.
    He and the kender stood in a long passage leading from the outer wall to the inner hall.
     The corridor was adorned with various defensive mechanisms for dealing with an invading
     enemy. He could see starlight through arrow slits lining the cracked stone walls. Bereft
     of his brother's lighted staff and the knight's torch, Caramon was forced to grope his way
     through the darkness, following the flickering flame shining ahead of him, and he nearly
     bashed his head on an iron portcullis that had been partially lowered from the ceiling.
    “Which side do you want to be on?” Earwig asked eagerly, tugging at Caramon's hand to drag
     him forward. “I think I'd like to be a knight, but then I've wanted to be a mage, too. I
     don't suppose your brother would let me borrow his staff - ”
    “Hush!” ordered Caramon harshly, his voice cracking in his dry throat.
    The corridor was coming to an end, opened into a
    great, wide hall. Sir Gawain was standing right in front of him, holding the torch high
     and shouting out words in a language the big warrior didn't understand but guessed to be
     Solamnic.
    The clamoring of the voices was louder. Caramon felt them tugging him in both directions.
     But another voice, a voice within him, was stronger. This voice was his brother's, a voice
     he loved and trusted, and he remembered what it had said.
    YOU MUST PREVENT GAWAIN FROM OFFERING HIS SWORD TO THE KNIGHT!
    “Stay here,” he told Earwig firmly, placing his hand on the kender's shoulder. “You
     promise?”
    “I promise,” said Earwig, impressed by Caramon's pale and solemn face.
    “Good.” Turning, Caramon continued down the corridor and came up in back of the knight.
    “What's happening?” Earwig writhed with frustration. “I can't see a thing from here. But I
     promised. I know! He didn't mean me to say HERE, in this one spot. He just meant me to
     stay here - in the keep!” Happily, the kender crept forward, Caramon's dagger (which he
     had appropriated) in his hand.
    “Oh, my!” breathed Earwig. “Caramon, can you see what I see?”
    Caramon could. On one side of the hall, their bodies encased in shining armor, their hands
     grasping swords, stood a troop of knights. On the other side stood an army of wizards,
     their robes fluttering around them as if stirred by a hot wind. The knights and the
     wizards had turned their faces toward the strangers who had entered, and Caramon saw in
     horror that each one of them was a rotting corpse.
    A knight materialized in front of his troops. This knight, too, was dead. The marks of his
     numerous wounds could be seen plainly on his body. Fear swept over Caramon, and he shrank
     back against the wall, but the knight paid no attention either to him or the transfixed
     kender standing by his side. The fixed and staring eyes of the corpse looked straight at
     Gawain.
    “Fellow knight, I call upon you, by the Oath and the Measure, to come to my aid against my
     enemy.”
    The dead knight gestured and there appeared, standing
    some distance from him, a wizard clad in red robes that were torn and stained black with
     blood. The wizard, too, was dead and had, it seemed from his wounds, died most horribly.
    Earwig started forward. “I'll fight on your side if you'll teach me how to cast spells!”
    Caramon, catching hold of the kender by the scruff of his neck, lifted him off his feet