Stephen King – The Waste Lands

“And did something happen?”

“No. But it was scary. We stood there and looked at it for a little while, and Henry teased me—saving he was going to make me go in and pick up a souvenir, stuff like that—but I

knew he didn’t really mean it. He was as scared of the place as I was.”

“And that’s it?” Susannah asked. “You just dream of going to this place? The Mansion?”

“There’s a little more than that. Someone comes . . . and then just land of hangs out. I

notice him in the dream, but just a little . . . like out of the corner of my eye, you know?

Only I know we’re supposed to pretend we don’t know each other.”

“Was this someone really there that day?” Roland asked. He was watching Eddie intently,

“Or is he only a player in this dream?”

“That was a long time ago. I couldn’t have been more than thirteen. How could I remember

a thing like that for sure?”

Roland said nothing.

“Okay,” Eddie said at last. “Yeah. I think he was there that day. A kid who was either carrying a gym-bag or wearing a backpack, I can’t remember which. And sunglasses that

were too big for his face. The ones with the mirror lenses.”

“Who was this person?” Roland asked.

Eddie was silent for a long time. He was holding the last of his burritos a la Roland in one

hand, but he had lost his appetite. “I think it’s the kid you met at the way station,” he said at last. “I think your old friend Jake was hanging around, watching me and Henry on the

afternoon we went over to Dutch Hill. I think he followed us. Because he hears the voices,

just like you, Roland. And because he’s sharing my dreams, and I’m sharing his. I think that

what I remember is what’s happening now, in Jake’s when. The kid is trying to come back

here. And if the key isn’t done when he makes his move—or if it’s done wrong—he’s

probably going to die.”

Roland said, “Maybe he has a key of his own. Is that possible?”

“Yeah, I think it is,” Eddie said, “but it isn’t enough.” He sighed and stuck the last burrito in his pocket for later. “And I don’t think he knows that.”

8

THEY MOVED ALONG, ROLAND and Eddie trading off on Susannah’s wheelchair.

They picked the left-hand wheelrut. The chair bumped and pitched, and every now and

then Eddie and Roland had to lift it over the cobbles which stuck out of the dirt here and

there like old teeth. They were still making faster, easier time than they had in a week,

how- ever. The ground was rising, and when Eddie looked over his shoulder he could see

the forest sloping away in what looked like a series of gentle steps. Far to the northwest, he

could see a ribbon of water spilling over a fractured rock face. It was, he realized with

wonder, the place they had dubbed “the shooting gallery.” Now it was almost lost behind them in the haze of this dreaming summer afternoon.

“Whoa down, boy!” Susannah called sharply. Eddie faced forward again just in time to

keep from pushing the wheelchair into Roland. The gunslinger had stopped and was

peering into the tangled bushes at the left of the road.

“You keep that up, I’m gonna revoke your driver’s license,” Susannah said waspily.

Eddie ignored her. He was following Roland’s gaze. “What is it?”

“One way to find out.” He turned, hoisted Susannah from her chair, ~and planted her on his hip. “Let’s all take a look.”

“Put me down, big boy—I can make my way. Easier’n you boys, if you really want to

know.”

As Roland gently lowered her to the grassy wheelrut, Eddie peered into the woods. The

late light threw overlapping crosses of shadow, but he thought he saw what had caught

Roland’s eye. It was a tall gray stone, almost completely hidden in a shag of vines and

creepers.

Susannah slipped into the woods at the side of the road with eely sinuousness. Roland and

Eddie followed.

“It’s a marker, isn’t it?” Susannah was propped on her hands study- ing die rectangular chunk of rock. It had once been straight, but now it leaned drunkenly to the right, like an

old gravestone.

“Yes. Give me my knife, Eddie.”

Eddie handed it over, then hunkered next to Susannah as the gun- slinger cut away the

vines. As they fell, he could see eroded letters carved into the stone, and he knew what they

said before Roland had uncovered even half of the inscription:

TRAVELLER, BEYOND LIES MID-WORLD.

9

“WHAT DOES IT MEAN?” Susannah asked at last. Her voice was soft and awestruck;

her eyes ceaselessly measured the gray stone plinth.

“It means that we’re nearing the end of this first stage.” Roland’s face was solemn and thoughtful as he handed his knife back to Eddie. “I think that we’ll keep to this old

coach-road now—or rather, it will keep to us. It has taken up the path of the Beam. The

woods will end soon. I expect a great change.”

“What is Mid-World?” Eddie asked.

“One of the large kingdoms which dominated the earth in the times before these. A

kingdom of hope and knowledge and light—the sort of things we were trying to hold onto

in my land before the darkness over- took us, as well. Some day if there’s time, I’ll tell you

all the old stories . . . the ones I know, at least. They form a large tapestry, one which is

beautiful but very sad.

“According to the old tales, a great city once stood at the edge of Mid-World—perhaps as

great as your city of New York. It will be in ruins now, if it still exists at all. But there may be people … or monsters … or both. We’ll have to be on our guard.”

He reached out his two-fingered right hand and touched the inscrip- tion. “Mid-World,” he

said in a low, meditative voice. “Who would have thought . . .” He trailed off.

“Well, there’s no help for it, is there?” Eddie asked.

The gunslinger shook his head. “No help.”

“Ka,” Susannah said suddenly, and they both looked at her.

10

THERE WERE TWO HOURS of daylight left, and so they moved on. The road continued

southeast, along the path of the Beam, and two other overgrown roads—smaller

ones—joined the one they were following. Along one side of the second were the mossy,

tumbled remains of what must have once been an immense rock wall. Nearby, a dozen fat

billy-bumblers sat upon the ruins, watching the pilgrims with their odd gold-ringed eyes.

To Eddie they looked like a jury with hanging on its mind.

The road continued to grow wider and more clearly defined. Twice they passed the shells

of long-deserted buildings. The second one, Roland said, might have been a windmill.

Susannah said it looked haunted. “I wouldn’t be surprised,” the gunslinger replied. His matter-of-fact tone chilled both of them.

When darkness forced a halt, the trees were thinning and the breeze which had chased

around tin-in all day became a light, warm wind. Ahead, the land continued to rise.

“We’ll come to the top of the ridge in a day or two,” Roland said. “Then we’ll see.”

“See what?” Susannah asked, but Roland only shrugged.

That night Eddie began to carve again, but with no real feeling of inspiration. The

confidence and happiness he’d felt as the key first began to take shape had left him. His

fingers felt clumsy and stupid. For the first time in months he thought longingly of how

good it would be to have some heroin. Not a lot; he felt sure that a nickel bag and a

rolled-up dollar bill would send him flying through this little carving project in no time flat.

“What are you smiling about, Eddie?” Roland asked. He was sitting on the other side of the campfire; the low, wind-driven flames danced capriciously between them.

“Was I smiling?”

“Yes.”

“I was just thinking about how stupid some people can be—you put them in a room with six doors, they’ll still walk into the walls. And then have the nerve to bitch about it.”

“If you’re afraid of what might be on the other side of the doors, maybe bouncing off the

walls seems safer,” Susannah said.

Eddie nodded. “Maybe so.”

He worked slowly, trying to see the shapes in the wood—that little s-shape in particular.

He discovered it had become very dim.

Please, God, help me not to fuck this up, he thought, but he was terribly afraid that he had

already begun to do just that. At last he gave up, returned the key (which he had barely

changed at all) to the gun-slinger, and curled up beneath one of the hides. Five minutes

later, the dream about the boy and the old Markey Avenue playground had begun to