Stephen King – The Dark Tower

hung, suspended and limp, above Patrick’s head.

Mordred came at Roland without a pause, but his charge was a slow, shambling thing; one

of his legs had been shot away only minutes after his birth, and now another hung limp and

broken, its pincers jerking spasmodically as they dragged on the grass. Roland’s eye had

never been clearer, the chill that surrounded him at moments like this never deeper. He saw

the white node and the blue bombardier’s eyes that werehis eyes. He saw the face of his

only son peering over the back of the abomination and then it was gone in a spray of blood

as his first bullet tore it off. The spider reared up, legs clashing at the black and star-shot sky. Roland’s next two bullets went into its revealed belly and exited through the back,

pulling dark sprays of liquid with it. The spider slewed to one side, perhaps trying to run

away, but its remaining legs would not support it. Mordred Deschain fell into the fire,

casting up a flume of red and orange sparks. It writhed in the embers, the bristles on its

belly beginning to burn, and Roland, grinning bitterly, shot it again. The dying spider

rolled out of the now scattered fire on its back, its remaining legs twitching together in a

knot and then spreading apart. One fell back into the fire and began to burn. The smell was

atrocious.

Roland started forward, meaning to stamp out the little fires the scattered embers had

started in the grass, and then a howl of outraged fury rose in his head.

My son! My only son! You’ve murdered him!

“He was mine, too,” Roland said, looking at the smoldering monstrosity. He could own the

truth. Yes, he could do that much.

Come then! Come, son-killer, and look at your Tower, but know this—you’ll die of old

age at the edge of the Can’-Ka before you ever so much as touch its door! I will never let

you pass! Todash space itself will pass away before I letyoupass! Murderer! Murderer of

your mother, murderer of your friends—aye, every one, for Susannah lies dead with her

throat cut on the other side of the door you sent her through—and now murderer of your

own son!

“Who sent him to me?” Roland asked the voice in his head.

“Who sent yonder child—for that’s what he is, inside that black skin—to his death, ye red

boggart?”

To this there was no answer, so Roland re-holstered his gun and put out the patches of fire

before they could spread. He thought of what the voice had said about Susannah, decided

he didn’t believe it. She might be dead, aye,might be, but he thought Mordred’s Red Father

knew for sure no more than Roland himself did.

The gunslinger let that thought go and went to the tree, where the last of his ka-tet hung,

impaled…but still alive. The gold-ringed eyes looked at Roland with what might almost

have been weary amusement.

“Oy,” Roland said, stretching out his hand, knowing it might be bitten and not caring in the

least. He supposed that part of him—and not a small one, either—wanted to be bitten. “Oy,

we all say thank you.I say thank you, Oy.”

The bumbler did not bite, and spoke but one word.“Olan, ” said he. Then he sighed, licked

the gunslinger’s hand a single time, hung his head down, and died.

Eleven

As dawn strengthened into the clear light of morning, Patrick came hesitantly to where the

gunslinger sat in the dry streambed, amid the roses, with Oy’s body spread across his lap

like a stole. The young man made a soft, interrogative hooting sound.

“Not now, Patrick,” Roland said absently, stroking Oy’s fur. It was dense but smooth to

the touch. He found it hard to believe that the creature beneath it had gone, in spite of the stiffening muscles and the tangled places where the blood had now clotted. He combed

these smooth with his fingers as best he could. “Not now. We have all the livelong day to

get there, and we’ll do fine.”

No, there was no need to hurry; no reason why he should not leisurely mourn the last of his

dead. There had been no doubt in the old King’s voice when he had promised that Roland

should die of old age before he so much as touched the door in the Tower’s base. They

would go, of course, and Roland would study the terrain, but he knew even now that his

idea of coming to the Tower on the old monster’s blind side and then working his way

around was not an idea at all, but a fool’s hope. There had been no doubt in the old villain’s voice; no doubt hiding behind it, either.

And for the time being, none of that mattered. Here was another one he had killed, and if

there was consolation to be had, it was this: Oy would be the last. Now he was alone again

except for Patrick, and Roland had an idea Patrick was immune to the terrible germ the

gunslinger carried, for he had never been ka-tet to begin with.

I only kill my family,Roland thought, stroking the dead billy-bumbler.

What hurt most was remembering how unpleasantly he had spoken to Oy the day

before.If’ee wanted to go with her, thee should have gone when thee had thy chance!

Had he stayed because he knew that Roland would need him? That when push came down

to shove (it was Eddie’s phrase, of course), Patrick would fail?

Why will’ee cast thy sad houken’s eyes on me now?

Because he had known it was to be his last day, and his dying would be hard?

“I think you knew both things,” Roland said, and closed his eyes so he could feel the fur

beneath his hands better. “I’m so sorry I spoke to’ee so—would give the fingers on my

good left hand if I could take the words back. So I would, every one, say true.”

But here as in the Keystone World, time only ran one way. Done was done. There would

be no taking back.

Roland would have said there was no anger left, that every bit of it had been burned away,

but when he felt the tingling all over his skin and understood what it meant, he felt fresh

fury rise in his heart. And he felt the coldness settle into his tired but still talented hands.

Patrick wasdrawing him! Sitting beneath the cottonwood just as if a brave little creature

worth ten of him—no, a hundred!—hadn’t died in that very tree, and for both of them.

It’s his way,Susannah spoke up calmly and gently from deep in his mind.It’s all he has,

everything else has been taken from him—his home world as well as his mother and his

tongue and whatever brains he might once have had. He’s mourning, too, Roland. He’s

frightened, too. This is the only way he has of soothing himself.

Undoubtedly all true. But the truth of it actually fed his rage instead of damping it down.

He put his remaining gun aside (it lay gleaming between two of the singing roses) because

having it close to hand wouldn’t do, no, not in his current mood. Then he rose to his feet,

meaning to give Patrick the scolding of his life, if for no other reason than it would make

Roland feel a little bit better himself. He could already hear the first words:Do you enjoy

drawing those who saved your mostly worthless life, stupid boy? Does it cheer your heart?

He was opening his mouth to begin when Patrick put his pencil down and seized his new

toy, instead. The eraser was half-gone now, and there were no others; as well as Roland’s

gun, Susannah had taken the little pink nubbins with her, probably for no other reason than

that she’d been carrying the jar in her pocket and her mind had been studying other, more

important, matters. Patrick poised the eraser over his drawing, then looked up—perhaps to

make sure he really wanted to erase at all—and saw the gunslinger standing in the

streambed and frowning at him. Patrick knew immediately that Roland was angry,

although he probably had no idea under heaven as towhy, and his face cramped with fear

and unhappiness. Roland saw him now as Dandelo must have seen him time and time again,

and his anger collapsed at the thought. He would not have Patrick fear him—for

Susannah’s sake if not his own, he would not have Patrick fear him.

And discovered that itwas for his own sake, after all.

Why not kill him, then?asked the sly, pulsing voice in his head.Kill him and put him out of

his misery, if thee feels so tender toward him? He and the bumbler can enter the clearing

together. They can make a place there for you, gunslinger.

Roland shook his head and tried to smile. “Nay, Patrick, son of Sonia,” he said (for that