The Dark Tower Companion: A Guide to Stephen King’s Epic Fantasy (70 page)

D
ARK
T
OWER
, T
HE
(T
HROUGHOUT
)

Also known as the Great Portal, the Thirteenth Gate, and Can Calyx, the Hall of Resumption. The central linchpin that holds all of existence, all of time and all size together. It
is
existence, according to Roland. The world's great mystery and last awful riddle. It exists in all worlds, but it may not be accessible from them all.

It is the great secret the gunslingers of Gilead keep, holding them together as
ka-tet
as the world declines. Roland first learns that it is more than a myth from a vision in the pink glass from the Wizard's Rainbow. The Tower is weakening like a body afflicted with cancer. If it falls, everything will be swept away. There will be chaos beyond imagining. While it weakens, the rose holds everything together. Roland's hope is not to prevent the fall of the Tower—that is inevitable because of the natural decline of magic—but to slow down its decline, which is being accelerated by the Crimson King and his Breakers. Roland's true desire is to gain the Tower and climb to the top to confront whoever lives there. He wants to undo the bad things that have happened because of its decline—and because of the things and people he's sacrificed in pursuit of the Tower. Sheemie tells Roland he may find renewal or death—or perhaps both.

It appears to be a pillar of sooty gray-black stone, located in End-World in a field of roses. Two Great Roads intersect at its base. A path through the roses leads to nineteen steps at the entrance. The Tower tapers gracefully as it rises. Narrow, slitted windows march about it in a rising spiral. Standing at its base, Roland estimates that the Tower is no more than six hundred feet high. At the top is an oriel window made of glass the colors of the Wizard's Rainbow, with the black pane representing Black Thirteen at the center. The intersecting clouds that follow the Paths of the Beam flow from the tips of two steel posts that jut from the top of the Tower.

Balconies with waist-high scrolled wrought-iron railings encircle the Tower
every two or three stories. The doors on these balconies are all closed and locked. The entrance is made of steel-banded ghostwood. In
siguls
, it says
UNFOUND
until Roland presents his guns. Then the word changes to
FOUND
. Roland realizes the Tower isn't made of stone at all—it is a living thing, Gan himself.

It emits a strong pulse composed of thousands of voices. The roses feed the Beams with their songs and the Beams feed them. The voices are singing the names of all the worlds. They stop when Roland steps inside.

The stone staircase is wide enough for just one person. There is a landing every nineteen steps, each representing a stage in Roland's life. The walls contain carvings of people he knew. In each room he finds a token from his life. Few of them are pleasant. After the room containing a charred stake and a carving of Susan Delgado, he stops looking.

The Tower is far taller on the inside than it appeared from the outside. Roland climbs hundreds of floors, maybe thousands, until he reaches the ghostwood door marked
ROLAND
, the only one that is closed, though it opens to his hand.

D
ASHERVILLE
(3)

The fourth stop on Blaine the Mono's route from Lud.

D
EBARIA
(4, 4.5, M)

A busy railroad town on the edge of the alkali flats west of Gilead. From here, cattle are shipped south, east and north. Steven Deschain sends Roland and Jamie DeCurry here to investigate reports of skin-walkers. The high street is wide and paved, but it is crumbling. Sheriff Peavy thinks the town will die when the mines play out in a few years and what remains of the rail line turns to dust. Neighboring towns include Sallywood (south) and Little Debaria in the foothills. Home to Serenity, the retreat where Gabrielle Deschain stayed while Roland was in Mejis after her infidelity was revealed.

D
EEP
C
RACKS
(3, 4.5)

Places such as the abyss near Castle Discordia or the wasteland beyond Lud where monsters dwell. Ardelia Smack believes that Marten Broadcloak is one such monster.

D
ELAIN
(L, 1, 7, M)

John Norman's hometown. One of the East'rd Baronies of In-World. It was sometimes known as Dragon's Lair, or Liar's Heaven. All tall tales were said to
originate there. Walter o'Dim was once Walter Padick of Delain. Roland encounters Dennis and Thomas from Delain chasing Flagg during his journeys.

Crossover to Other Works:
King Roland rules Delain in
The Eyes of the Dragon
.

D
ELIGHTFUL
V
IEW
(4.5)

The only hotel in Debaria. Sheriff Peavy doesn't recommend it.

D
ERVA
(7)

The unknown destination for people from the Fedic Dogan after Susannah killed the people involved with Mordred's birth.

D
ESATOYA
M
OUNTAINS
(L, M)

A mountain range Roland passes through before he reaches the Mohaine Desert. Eluria is a village in these mountains.

Crossover to Other Works:
Desperation, Nevada, is also located in these mountains.

D
ESOY
(4, M)

One of the places (along with Garlan) where Farson started out as a harrier and a stage-robber.

D
EVAR
-T
ETE
W
HYE
(5, 6)

The Little Whye—the eastern branch of the Whye River that runs south past Calla Bryn Sturgis to the South Seas and separates the Borderlands from Thunderclap.

D
EVAR
-T
OI

See Algul Siento.

D
EVIL'S
A
RSE
(6, 7)

A name for the monster-filled chasm outside Fedic, next to Castle Discordia. Some people thought the Red Death arose from here.

D
ISCORDIA
(D
IS
) (4, 6, 7)

Though the word has several meanings, including the soup of creation, it is also applied to the noxious wilderness that lies beyond the Castle on the Abyss, which is also called Castle Discordia. According to rumors, the orange ball
from the Wizard's Rainbow is supposedly located in Dis. Roland believes it corresponds to the White Mountains in the real world.

D
OGAN
(4.5, 5, 6, 7, M)

A generic term for any of North Central Positronics' many labs and outposts. The Dogan near Calla Bryn Sturgis (Jake's Dogan) is a medium-security monitoring station that reports to Algul Siento. The North Forest Kinnock Dogan is a low-security outpost at the gateway to Out-World. It has a transmission tower attached to it, but the Dogan is offline due to the presence of magic. The Fedic Dogan (the Dogan of Dogans) was a maximum-security Experimental Station where the essential essence was taken from the brains of the children kidnapped from the Callas. Mia was made mortal in this Dogan, and Mordred Deschain was born here. Susannah creates a mental Dogan based on Jake's Dogan to control her pregnancy and Jake creates one so Oy can operate his body when they are trying to get past the mind-trap under the Dixie Pig. In the Marvel comics, Sheemie gets his powers from a Dogan he discovered while following Roland back to Gilead.

D
OORWAY
C
AVE
(5, 6, 7)

A cave in the hills three hours north of Calla Bryn Sturgis and an hour north of Manni Redpath. Known as the Cave of Voices until Father Callahan arrives with the Unfound Door and Black Thirteen. Called Kra Kammen by the Manni—the House of Ghosts. The entrance is a ragged dark hole nine feet high and five feet wide. A noxious breeze comes out of the entrance carrying the voices of the dead. The Unfound Door stands in the shadows and, eight or nine feet beyond it, the cave floor slopes down at a steep angle until it disappears into a chasm. Henchick believes that the beamquake or the loss of Black Thirteen drove the voices in the cave insane. The freed Breakers hope to use this doorway to return to their world.

D
OWNLAND
B
ARONIES
(3)

Some of the Greater Kingdoms of the Western Earth. They were overrun by riot and civil war after Roland became a gunslinger. He passed through them on his way from Gilead to the Western Sea.

D
RAGON'S
G
RAVE
(3)

A bottomless crack in the ground that gives off a great burst of steam every thirty or forty days.

E
AST
D
OWNE
(6)

One of the places Roland visits during his traveling years, where he encountered the walking waters.

E
AST
R
OAD
(5, 6, 7)

The road leading east of Calla Bryn Sturgis until it turns north and follows Devar-Tete Whye. This is where Jamie Jaffords and his friends killed one of the Wolves and where Roland and his followers faced down the Wolves.

E
ASTERN
P
LAIN
(5)

The prairies that run between the forest and the River Whye.

E
AST'RD
B
ARONY
(7)

Delain.

E
LURIA
(L, 6, M)

A little western town in the Desatoya Mountains. It has a gate and pink adobe walls that extend twenty feet on either side of the road and then stop. It has a town square, an inn, two saloons, a mercantile, a smithy, a sheriff's office, a gathering hall and a church with accompanying manse.

E
MPATHICA
(7)

A snow-covered region between Le Casse Roi Russe and the Dark Tower. The territory magnifies sensitivity to emotions and feelings. Roland and Susannah set up Hide Camp here to turn the carcasses of the deer they kill into food, clothing and medicine. It takes them more than a month to cross the snowfields on foot and snowshoes.

E
NDLESS
F
OREST
, T
HE
(4.5)

An unexplored wilderness far north of New Canaan also known as the Great Woods. Filled with ironwood trees, strange and dangerous plants and animals, weird marshes and the often-deadly leavings of the Old People. Subject to starkblasts once or twice a year. Bonfires of dragons are said to live there, and some people believe Maerlyn has a magic home where time stands still in the forest.

E
ND
-W
ORLD
(L, 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, M)

A region of Roland's world. According to Blaine, it begins in Topeka. The Dark Tower is located at the very end of End-World. Sylvia Pittston claims that beyond it is burning darkness. Location of Thunderclap, Castle Discordia and Fedic.

E
YEBOLT
C
ANYON
(4, 5, 7, M)

A short box canyon northwest of Mejis (four wheels north of Hanging Rock) that has been taken over by a thinny. It resembles a chimney lying on its side that has broken and has a crooked piece in the middle. The thinny occupies the section beyond the crook. The sides are too steep to climb except for in one spot where a groove runs up the wall with enough jutting spurs to provide handholds. The mouth of the canyon is choked with bushes that are burned each fall to silence the thinny. Roland, Alain and Cuthbert lead Latigo's forces into the canyon, set the brush on fire and let the thinny devour them.

F
AGONARD
(4.5)

The great swamp that interrupts the Endless Forest for many leagues, a place more liquid than solid. The men who cut ironwood won't venture into it. Home to a tribe of mutants who hile Tim Ross as a gunslinger and a dragon. The starkblast laid waste to the swamp, the tribesmen and the dragon alike.

F
ALLS OF
H
OUNDS
, T
HE
(3, 4)

The third stop on Blaine the Mono's route from Lud. The falls, which put Niagara to shame, are part of a huge boiling river that plunges off the mountains. Jutting from the center of the falls below the point where the river goes over the edge are two enormous stone protrusions that were either carved or eroded to look like the heads of snarling dogs. Power from the Beam is stored in these dogs. The Great Old Ones may have carved them. Blaine uses them to recharge during his journey.

F
EDERAL
O
UTPOST
19 (7)

Also known as the Federal. A North Central Positronics outpost located on Tower Road at the edge of the White Lands of Empathica, one hundred and twenty wheels from the Dark Tower. Stuttering Bill's base of operations. Travel beyond the Federal is forbidden. The common room contains more than three dozen TV screens, some of which still operate. The one that used
to show the Dark Tower went to static a few months before Roland got there. The cameras that once showed pictures from satellites are also offline.

F
EDIC
(6, 7)

A ghost town that sits between the inner keep of Castle Discordia and its outer walls, beyond which lies the abyss. The town has been dead for a thousand years. The Red Death killed everyone who once lived there. It consists of a single street that ends at Arc 16 Experimental Station, where the Wolves brought the children of the Callas. Mia brings Susannah here on todash trips so they can palaver. Roland and Susannah spend the night here before continuing on the Path of the Beam toward the Badlands. Among its businesses are the Gin-Puppy Saloon, the Gaiety Bar and Grill, the Fedic Millinery & Ladies' Wear, Fedic Hotel and Fedic Station, where Patricia the Mono once stopped.

F
EDIC
H
OTEL
(7)