On their fourth night on The King’s Way,they came to a major intersection where the main road made a crooked turn,bending more south than east and thus off the Path of the Beam. Ahead, lessthan a night’s walk (or ride, if one happened to be aboard Ho Fat’s LuxuryTaxi), was a high hill with an enormous black castle dug into it. In the chancymoonlight it had a vaguely Oriental look to Susannah. The towers bulged at thetops, as if wishing they could be minarets. Fantastic walkways flew betweenthem, crisscrossing above the courtyard in front of the castle proper. Some ofthese walkways had fallen to ruin, but most still held. She could also hear avast, low rumbling sound. Not machinery. She asked Roland about it.

“Water,” he said.

“What water? Do you have any idea?”

He shook his head. “But I’d not drink whatflowed close to that castle, even were I dying of thirst.”

“This place is bad,” she muttered, meaningnot just the castle but the nameless village of leaning

(leering)

houses that had grown up all around it.“And Roland—it’s not empty.”

“Susannah, if thee feels spirits knocking forentrance into thy head—knocking or gnawing—then bid them away.”

“Will that work?”

“I’m not sure it will,” he admitted, “butI’ve heard that such things must be granted entry, and that they’re wily atgaining it by trick and by ruse.”

She had read Dracula as well asheard Pere Callahan’s story of Jerusalem’s Lot, and understood what Rolandmeant all too well.

He took her gently by the shoulders andturned her away from the castle—which might not be naturally black afterall, she had decided, but only tarnished by the years. Daylight would tell. Forthe present their way was lit by a cloud-scummed quarter-moon.

Several other roads led away from the placewhere they had stopped, most as crooked as broken fingers. The one Rolandwanted her to look upon was straight, however, and Susannah realized it was theonly completely straight street she had seen since the deserted villagebegan to grow silently up around their way. It was smoothly paved rather thancobbled and pointed southeast, along the Path of the Beam. Above it flowed themoon-gilded clouds like boats in a procession.

“Does thee glimpse a darkish blur at thehorizon, dear?” he murmured.

“Yes. A dark blur and a whitish band infront of it. What is it? Do you know?”

“I have an idea, but I’m not sure,” Rolandsaid. “Let’s have us a rest here. Dawn’s not far off, and then we’ll both see.And besides, I don’t want to approach yonder castle at night.”

“If the Crimson King’s gone, and if thePath of the Beam lies that way—” She pointed. “Why do we need to go tohis damn old castle at all?”

“To make sure he is gone, for onething,” Roland said. “And we may be able to trap the one behind us. I doubtit—he’s wily—but there’s a chance. He’s also young, and the youngare sometimes careless.”

“You’d kill him?”

Roland’s smile was wintry in the moonlight.Merciless. “Without a moment’s hesitation,” said he.

Eight

In the morning Susannah woke from anuncomfortable doze amid the scattered supplies in the back of the rickshaw andsaw Roland standing in the intersection and looking along the Path of the Beam.She got down, moving with great care because she was stiff and didn’t want tofall. She imagined her bones cold and brittle inside her flesh, ready toshatter like glass.

“What do you see?” he asked her. “Now thatit’s light, what do you see over that way?”

The whitish band was snow, which did notsurprise her given the fact that those were true uplands. What did surpriseher—and gladdened her heart more than she would have believedpossible—were the trees beyond the band of snow. Green fir-trees. Livingthings.

“Oh, Roland, they look lovely!” she said.“Even with their feet in the snow, they look lovely! Don’t they?”

“Yes,” he said. He lifted her high andturned her back the way they had come. Beyond the nasty crowding suburb of deadhouses she could see some of the Badlands they’d come through, all thosecrowding spines of rock broken by the occasional butte or mesa.

“Think of this,” he said. “Back yonder asyou look is Fedic. Beyond Fedic, Thunderclap. Beyond Thunderclap, the Callasand the forest that marks the borderland between Mid-World and End-World. Ludis further back that way, and River Crossing further still; the Western Sea andthe great Mohaine Desert, too. Somewhere back there, lost in the leagues and lostin time as well is what remains of In-World. The Baronies. Gilead. Places whereeven now there are people who remember love and light.”

“Yes,” she said, not understanding.

“That was the way the Crimson King turnedto cast his petulance,” Roland said. “He meant to go the other way, yemust ken, to the Dark Tower, and even in his madness he knew better than tokill the land he must pass through, he and whatever band of followers he tookwith him.” He drew her toward him and kissed her forehead with a tendernessthat made her feel like crying. “We three will visit his castle, and trapMordred there if our fortune is good and his is ill. Then we’ll go on, and backinto living lands. There’ll be wood for fires and game to provide fresh foodand hides to wrap around us. Can you go on a little longer, dear? Can thee?”

“Yes,” she said. “Thank you, Roland.”

She hugged him, and as she did, she lookedtoward the red castle. In the growing light she could see that the stone ofwhich it had been made, although darkened by the years, had once been the colorof spilled blood. This called forth a memory of her palaver with Mia on theCastle Discordia allure, a memory of steadily pulsing crimson light in thedistance. Almost from where they now were, in fact.

Come to me now, if you’d come at all,Susannah, Mia had told her. For the King can fascinate, even at adistance.

It was that pulsing red glow of which shehad been speaking, but—

“It’s gone!” she said to Roland. “The redlight from the castle—Forge of the King, she called it! It’s gone! Wehaven’t seen it once in all this time!”

“No,” he said, and this time his smile waswarmer. “I believe it must have stopped at the same time we ended the Breakers’work. The Forge of the King has gone out, Susannah. Forever, if the gods aregood. That much we have done, although it has cost us much.”

That afternoon they came to Le Casse RoiRusse, which turned out not to be entirely deserted, after all.

Chapter III:

The Castle of theCrimson King

One

They were a mile from the castle and theroar of the unseen river had become very loud when bunting and posters began toappear. The bunting consisted of red, white, and blue swags—the kindSusannah associated with Memorial Day parades and small-town Main Streets onthe Fourth of July. On the façades of these narrow, secretive houses andthe fronts of shops long closed and emptied from basement to attic, suchdecoration looked like rouge on the cheeks of a decaying corpse.

The faces on the posters were all toofamiliar to her. Richard Nixon and Henry Cabot Lodge flashed V’s-for-victoryand car-salesmen grins (NIXON/LODGE, BECAUSE THE WORK’S NOT DONE, these read).John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson stood with their arms around each other andtheir free hands raised. Below their feet was the bold proclamation WE STAND ONTHE EDGE OF A NEW FRONTIER.

“Any idea who won?” Roland asked over hisshoulder. Susannah was currently riding in Ho Fat’s Luxury Taxi, taking in thesights (and wishing for a sweater: even a light cardigan would do her justfine, by God).

“Oh, yes,” she said. There was no doubt inher mind that these posters had been mounted for her benefit. “Kennedy did.”