But he’s not able to close the box— all his strength seems to have deserted him— and it will not close itself. Deep down in the black eye, a red speck forms, glows…grows. Callahan’s horror swells, filling his throat, threatening to stop his heart with its chill.It’s the King, he thinks. It’s the Eye of the Crimson King as he looks down from his place in the Dark Tower. And he is seeing me.

“NO!” Callahan shrieks as he lies on the floor of a cave in the northern arroyo country of Calla Bryn Sturgis, a place he will eventually come to love. “NO! NO! DON’T LOOK AT ME! OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DON’T LOOK AT ME!”

But the Eyedoes look, and Callahan cannot bear its insane regard. That is when he passes out. It will be three days before he opens his own eyes again, and when he does he’ll be with the Manni.

Nineteen

Callahan looked at them wearily. Midnight had come and gone, we all say thankya, and now it was twenty-two days until the Wolves would come for their bounty of children. He drank off the final two inches of cider in his glass, grimaced as if it had been corn whiskey, then set the empty tumbler down. “And all the rest, as they say, you know. It was Henchick and Jemmin who found me. Henchick closed the box, and when he did, the door closed. And now what was the Cave of the Voices is Doorway Cave.”

“And you, Pere?” Susannah asked. “What did they do with you?”

“Took me to Henchick’s cabin—his kra . That’s where I was when I opened my eyes. During my unconsciousness, his wives and daughters fed me water and chicken broth, squeezing drops from a rag, one by one.”

“Just out of curiosity, how many wives does he have?” Eddie asked.