The Mark of the Demon — John Jakes

"We go to the dark. We ride to the awful dark. A stranger leads us, a savage man. His presence brings the evil down!"

The soothsayer's grim words chilled the hearts of the travellers. Even the iron nerves of Brak the Barbarian twanged with foreboding. For in the trader's caravan as it crossed the wasteland of Logol he was the savage, the stranger. Though his strength and swordsmanship might protect the caravan from attacks by brigands or wild beasts, even from the ruby-eyed warriors of Duran, he was as helpless as any against the menace of supernatural powers.

And as first one, then another of the travellers fell prey to the horror that stalked them, Brak knew that he must find a weapon more powerful than his sword if he too was not to be discovered drained of blood and bones, a dry husk bearing the three black marks, the triangular Mark of the Demons.