Charles Marlow
Marlow's name may be inspired by the Elizabethan playwright Christopher Marlowe. Conrad's father was a translator of William Shakespeare who doubtless would have known of Marlowe's work as well. Some intertextual interpretations of "Heart of Darkness" have suggested that Marlowe's "The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus" may have influenced Conrad. Charles Marlow describes a character as a "papier-mache Mephistopheles", a reference to the Faust legend. Marlow's and Kurtz's journey up the Congo River in "Heart of Darkness" also has similarities to another work by Marlowe, "Dido, Queen of Carthage", in which Aeneas is stranded on the shore of Libya and meets the African queen Dido.
Books of Swords
The Dark King, known also as Vilkata, is one of the chief antagonists of the series. Vilkata is a powerful sorcerer and master of many demons. He will do anything to gain an upper hand over his enemies; as a younger man he gouged out his own eyes as a sacrifice in order to gain the power required to get revenge over those who had wronged him. Since then he uses minor demons kept in thrall to give him a bizarre form of telepathic vision. He traditionally wears black cloaks over stylized armor. He bears a ringlet of gold on his brow that keeps his long silver hair swept back. His eye sockets are empty—Vilkata wears no patches or blindfold to hide them which many find unnerving. He employs scorched earth, torture, and other deplorable tactics liberally to strike fear in any who would oppose them. Though an accomplished and feared warlock in his own right, what elevates Vilkata to a global threat is his frequent possession of the terrible Mindsword.