Wolves of the Calla

Slightman around the neck in the crook of one arm, then yanked him forward. The move simultaneously cut off the flow of the man's accusations and drew him close.

'Listen to me,' Roland said, 'and listen well. I care nothing for your life or honor, one's been misspent and the other's long gone, but your son is dead and about his honor I care very much. If you don't shut up this second, you worm of creation, I'll shut you up myself. So what would you? It's nothing to me, either way. I'll tell em you ran mad at the sight of him, stole my gun out of its holster, and put a bullet in your own head to join him. What would you have? Decide.'

Eisenhart was badly blown but still lurching and weaving his way up through the corn, hoarsely calling his wife's name: 'Margaret!Margaret! Answer me, dear! Gi'me a word, I beg ya, do !'

Roland let go of Slightman and looked at him sternly. Slightman turned his awful eyes to Jake. 'Did your dinh kill my boy in order to be revenged on me? Tell me the truth, soh.'

Jake took a final puff on his cigarette and cast it away. The butt lay smoldering in the dirt next to the dead horse. 'Did you even look at him?' he asked Benny's Da'. 'No bullet ever made could do that. Sai Eisenhart's head fell almost on top of him and Benny crawled out of the ditch from the… the horror of it.' It was a word, he realized, that he had never used out loud. Had never needed to use out loud. 'They threw two of their sneetches at him. I got one, but…' He swallowed. There was a click in his throat. 'The other… I would have, you ken… I tried, but…' His face was working. His voice was breaking apart. Yet his eyes were dry. And somehow as terrible as Slightman's. 'I never had a chance at the other'n,' he finished, then lowered his head and began to sob.

Roland looked at Slightman, his eyebrows raised.

'All right,' Slightman said. 'I see how 'twas. Yar. Tell me, were he brave until then? Tell me, I beg.'

'He and Jake brought back one of that pair,' Eddie said, gesturing to the Tavery twins. 'The boy half. He got his foot caught in a hole. Jake and Benny pulled him out, then carried him. Nothing but guts, your boy. Side to side and all the way through the middle.'

Slightman nodded. He took the spectacles off his face and looked at them as if he had never seen them before. He held them so, before his eyes, for a second or two, then dropped them onto the road and crushed them beneath one bootheel. He looked at Roland and Jake almost apologetically. 'I believe I've seen all I need to,' he said, and then went to his son.

Vaughn Eisenhart emerged from the corn. He saw his wife and gave a bellow. Then he tore open his shirt and began pounding his right fist above his flabby left breast, crying her name each time he did it.

'Oh, man,' Eddie said. 'Roland, you ought to stop that.'

'Not I,' said the gunslinger.

Slightman took his son's severed arm and planted a kiss in the palm with a tenderness Eddie found nearly unbearable. He put the arm on the boy's chest, then walked back toward them. Without the glasses, his face looked naked and somehow unformed. 'Jake, would you help me find a blanket?'

Jake got off the waggon wheel to help him find what he needed. In the uncovered trench that had been the hide, Eisenhart was cradling his wife's burnt head to his chest, rocking it. From the corn, approaching, came the children and their minders, singing 'The Rice Song.' At first Eddie thought that what he was hearing from town must be an echo of that singing, and then he realized it was the rest of the Calla. They knew. They had heard the singing, and they knew. They were coming.

Pere Callahan stepped out of the field with Lia Jaffords cradled in his arms. In spite of the noise, the little girl was asleep. Callahan looked at the heaps of dead Wolves, took one hand from beneath the little girl's bottom, and drew a slow, trembling cross in the air.

'God be thanked,' he said.

Roland went to him and took the hand that had made the cross. 'Put one on me,' he said.

Callahan looked at him, uncomprehending.

Roland nodded to Vaughn Eisenhart. 'That one promised I'd leave town with his curse on me if harm came to his wife.'

He could have said more, but there was no need. Callahan understood, and signed the cross on Roland's brow. The fingernail trailed a warmth behind it that Roland felt a long time. And although Eisenhart never kept his promise, the gunslinger was never sorry that he'd asked the Pere for that extra bit of protection.

TWENTY

What followed was a confused jubilee there on the East Road, mingled with grief for the two who had fallen. Yet even the grief had a joyful light shining through it. No one seemed to feel that the losses were in any way equal to the gains. And Eddie supposed that was true. If it wasn't your wife or your son who had fallen, that was.

The singing from town drew closer. Now they could see rising dust. In the road, men and women embraced. Someone tried to take Margaret Eisenhart's head away from her husband, who for the time being refused to let it go.

Eddie drifted over to Jake.

'Never saw Star Wars , did you?' he asked.

'No, told you. I was going to, but—'

'You left too soon. I know. Those things they were swinging—Jake, they were from that movie.'

'You sure?'

'Yes . And the Wolves…Jake, the Wolves themselves…'

Jake was nodding, very slowly. Now they could see the people from town. The newcomers saw the children—all the children, still here and still safe—and raised a cheer. Those in the forefront began to run. 'I know.'

'Do you?' Eddie asked. His eyes were almost pleading. 'Do you really? Because… man, it's so crazy —'

Jake looked at the heaped Wolves. The green hoods. The gray leggings. The black boots. The snarling, decomposing faces. Eddie had already pulled one of those rotting metal faces away and looked at what was beneath it. Nothing but smooth metal, plus lenses that served as eyes, a round mesh grille that doubtless served as a nose, two sprouted microphones at the temples for ears. No, all the personality these things had was in the masks and clothing they wore.

'Crazy or not, I know what they are, Eddie. Or where they come from, at least. Marvel Comics.'

A look of sublime relief filled Eddie's face. He bent and kissed Jake on the cheek. A ghost of a smile touched the boy's mouth. It wasn't much, but it was a start.

'The Spider-Man books,' Eddie said. 'When I was a kid I couldn't get enough of those things.'

'I didn't buy em myself,' Jake said, 'but Timmy Mucci down at Mid-Town Lanes used to have a terrible jones for the Marvel mags. Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America , all of em. These guys…'

'They look like Dr. Doom,' Eddie said.

'Yeah,' Jake said. 'It's not exact, I'm sure the masks were modified to make them look a little more like wolves, but otherwise… same green hoods, same green cloaks. Yeah, Dr. Doom.'

'And the sneetches,' Eddie said. 'Have you ever heard of Harry Potter?'

'I don't think so. Have you?'

'No, and I'll tell you why. Because the sneetches are from the future. Maybe from some Marvel comic book that'll come out in 1990 or 1995. Do you see what I'm saying?'

Jake nodded.

'It's all nineteen, isn't it?'

'Yeah,' Jake said. 'Nineteen, ninety-nine, and nineteen-ninety-nine.'