He held on, hunkering with an unlit match in each hand, now peering out through a tangle of interlaced branches. The smell of mesquite was strong in his nostrils. Not far behind it was the reek of burning oil. The drone of the thinny filled his head, making him feel dizzy, a stranger to himself. He thought of how it had been inside the pink storm, flying through the air... how he had been snatched away from his vision of Susan. Thank God for Sheemie, he thought distantly. He’ll make sure she finishes the day someplace safe. But the craven whine of the thinny seemed somehow to mock him, to ask him if there had been more to see.

Now Latigo and his men were crossing the last three hundred yards to the canyon’s mouth at a full-out gallop, the ones behind closing up fast. It would be hard for the ones riding point to stop suddenly without the risk of being ridden down.

It was time. Roland stuck one of the lucifers between his front teeth and raked it forward. It lit, spilling one hot and sour spark onto the wet bed of his tongue. Before the lucifer’s head could burn away, Roland touched it to the powder in the trench. It lit at once, running left beneath the north end of the brush in a bright yellow thread.

He lunged across the opening—which might be wide enough for two horses running flank to flank—with the second lucifer already poised behind his teeth. He struck it as soon as he was somewhat blocked from the wind, dropped it into the powder, heard the splutter-hiss, then turned and ran.

20

Mother and father, was Roland’s first shocked thought—memory so deep and unexpected it was like a slap. At Lake Saroni.

When had they gone there, to beautiful Lake Saroni in the northern part of Gilead Barony? That Roland couldn’t remember. He knew only that he had been very small, and that there had been a beautiful stretch of sandy beach for him to play on, perfect for an aspiring young castle-builder such as he. That was what he had been doing on one day of their

(vacation? was it a vacation? did my parents once upon a time actually take a vacation?)

trip, and he had looked up, something—maybe only the cries of the birds circling over the lake—had made him look up, and there were his mother and father, Steven and Gabrielle Deschain, at the water’s edge, standing with their backs to him and their arms around each other’s waists, looking out at blue water beneath a blue summer sky. How his heart had filled with love for them! How infinite was love, twining in and out of hope and memory like a braid with three strong strands, so much the Bright Tower of every human’s life and soul.