Stephen King's the Dark Tower: The Complete Concordance Revised and Updated (47 page)

The Wizard’s Rainbow represents a corruption of the pure energy of the WHITE. If the White represents wholeness, and the best human beings can strive for in ideal and action, then the debased colors of the rainbow represent the baser emotions, or the fallen drives of a fallen world. For example, the Pink One resonates with sexual energy, but it is desire, possessiveness, and cruelty without the higher emotions that true love can instill in us. Not surprisingly, the gate of the sinister GREEN PALACE is made to resemble Maerlyn’s Rainbow. The gate’s two wings consist of six colored bars each; one for every bend. The central bar (which is broad instead of flat and round), is dead black.

Since the thirteen colored balls reflect the baser aspects of human nature, then it seems likely that they correspond not to the twelve Guardians and the Tower, but to the twelve aspects of the DEMON ELEMENTALS and the CRIMSON KING, the were-spider who wishes to bring the Tower crashing down.

When Roland was a boy, it was believed that only three or four of these magic balls were still in existence. In
The Dark Tower,
we realize there must have been more, since Roland has had temporary control of two of them (MAERLYN’S GRAPEFRUIT and Black Thirteen), and the Crimson King—until about halfway through
Wolves of the Calla
—owned six. (Never a good loser, the Red King smashed his once they foretold Roland’s victories in both CALLA BRYN STURGIS and the DEVAR-TOI.)

GENERAL REFERENCES FOR ALL THE BALLS:
IV:437–39
(Steven Deschain describes),
IV:442, IV:443, IV:452–53, IV:485–93
(Jonas takes from)
IV:634–35
(gate of Green Palace),
V:79, V:80, V:89
(glass balls),
V:90, V:105, V:116, V:142, V:176, VI:8
(bends o’ the rainbow),
VII:550, VII:606–7
(Crimson King had six of them),
VII:674, VII:770, W:169–70

BLACK THIRTEEN:
According to Roland Deschain, Black Thirteen is the most terrible object left over from the days of ELD. In fact, Roland suspects that its wickedness even predates the time of his illustrious ancestor. If Roland is correct and the ancient magician MAERLYN is actually none other than our
tet
’s nemesis,
WALTER O’DIM, then this magic ball probably dates from the time of the GREAT OLD ONES, who tried, in their hubris, to unite magic and technology.

Although we don’t see Black Thirteen until
Wolves of the Calla,
we hear of it through Roland’s father STEVEN DESCHAIN as early as
Wizard and Glass.
According to the elder Deschain, it is unlucky to even speak of Thirteen, as it may hear its name called and roll the speaker away to unknown worlds.

Black Thirteen enters our tale directly via an unlikely person—namely FATHER CALLAHAN, formerly of ’SALEM’S LOT, MAINE. Before coming to rest beneath the floorboards of Callahan’s church in CALLA BRYN STURGIS, Thirteen was in Walter’s possession. In fact, it seems likely that the ball was in Walter’s hands throughout much of
The Gunslinger,
since when that nasty multifaced magician forces Thirteen upon an unwilling Callahan in the WAY STATION between worlds, we catch a glimpse of Roland and JAKE distantly struggling up an incline toward the CYCLOPEAN MOUNTAINS.

Before we see the malevolence of Thirteen at work, we are told that it looks like the slick eye of a monster that grew outside of God’s shadow. As Callahan removes it from its hidey-hole beneath his church floor and unwraps it from its altar boy’s surplice, Roland feels the ball’s low hum vibrating in his bones, a sound and sensation he compares to a swarm of angry bees. Once Callahan removes the surplice, Roland sees Thirteen’s ghostwood box, upon which is carved a ROSE, a stone, a door, and the word
unfound.
With the exception of the Rose, the engraved images come from Thomas Wolfe’s novel
Look Homeward, Angel.
(In Wolfe’s book, the “rose” is actually a leaf, but within the context of the Dark Tower series, a rose is a more appropriate image.) The word
unfound
refers to the UNFOUND DOOR, which Black Thirteen inevitably opens.

It seems likely that Thirteen’s box (like the altar boy’s surplice that Callahan wraps it in) is meant to minimize the ball’s evil vibrations. After Roland touches the magical ghostwood, his fingers smell of camphor, fire, and the flowers of the north country—the ones that bloom in the snow.

In both
Wolves of the Calla
and
Song of Susannah,
our
tet
carries Black Thirteen in a TODASH version of Jake’s pink bowling bag. Although Jake’s original bag bore the motto, “Nothing but Strikes at Mid-Town Lanes,” the
todash
version reads, “Nothing but Strikes at Mid-World Lanes.” Despite Thirteen’s evil nature, our
tet
uses it to travel between Calla Bryn Sturgis and Calla NEW YORK. At the end of
Wolves of the Calla,
SUSANNAH DEAN (now under the control of her invading demon, MIA) uses Black Thirteen to escape through the Unfound Door to 1999, where Mia plans to give birth to her CHAP. With some help from STEPHEN KING, Jake and Callahan retrieve the magic ball from Susannah-Mio’s room in the PLAZA–PARK HYATT before it can fall into the hands of the WARRIORS OF THE SCARLET EYE. The two of them store it in a locker located below the TWIN TOWERS. We can presume that the ball has since been destroyed.

Like the singing Rose, Thirteen’s hum speaks of power, but it is the dangerous power of the void, a colossal malevolent emptiness which, if aroused, could send its unwary victims to all NINETEEN points of nowhere. Throughout the Dark Tower series, our
tet
believes that this nasty ball is the eye of the CRIMSON KING himself. Although the Red King may use Thirteen to spy upon our
tet
’s movements, by the final book of the Dark Tower series we realize
that it is not his actual eye. Los’s eyes are as red as the roses of CAN’-KA NO REY, and when we see him, shouting madly from the DARK TOWER’s balcony, he has both his ruby orbs. In fact, once PATRICK DANVILLE erases the Red King from MID-WORLD, all that he leaves are the Lord of Discordia’s floating eyes. IV:437–39
(Steven Deschain describes),
V:31
(indirect),
V:48–70
(Eddie and Jake travel via
todash
; 53–56 reality of Black Thirteen),
V:114–16, V:117, V:142
(worst of the bunch),
V:172–97
(traveling in it via
todash
; 176 origins, 180, 196),
V:235
(indirect),
V:238
(indirect),
V:252, V:271
(thing in church),
V:311, V:313–18
(described),
V:338, V:383
(indirect),
V:393, V:400, V:409
(box),
V:413
(box),
V:414, V:415, V:461–65, V:468–70, V:502–5, V:506–49
(Eddie’s New York trip; 507–8 keep Black Thirteen in
todash
bag),
V:591–600
(Callahan to our world),
V:618–27
(Callahan to Stoneham, Maine),
V:688, V:697, V:704
(indirect),
V:705, VI:4, VI:7, VI:8
(and
glammer,
the sum of all the bends o’ the rainbow),
VI:21
(dark glass),
VI:28, VI:49
(in bag),
VI:68
(in box),
VI:74–97
(in bag),
VI:178, VI:234, VI:300, VI:326–38, VI:342, VII:147, VII:302, VII:550, VII:689

THE BLUE:
Fifty years before Roland’s first
ka-tet
sets off for MEJIS, this Bend o’ the Rainbow was in the possession of a desert tribe of SLOW MUTANTS called the TOTAL HOGS.

THE GREEN:
This one is thought to be hidden in the city of LUD.

THE ORANGE:
This ball was last seen in the ruined city of DIS.

MAERLYN’S GRAPEFRUIT (THE PINK ONE):
Maerlyn’s Grapefruit played a large part in Roland’s MEJIS adventures, recounted in the novel
Wizard and Glass.
Until Roland and his friends stole the Pink One for the AFFILIATION, it was in the hands of FARSON’s followers. (Through much of the novel it is held by the wicked witch RHEA OF THE CÖOS.) Like all of Maerlyn’s magic glasses, the Grapefruit is hungry and feeds on the minds of those who use it. Roland was lucky to survive his travels within its pink glare. Like the other Bends o’ the Rainbow, the pink ball is alive. On the lid of its box (now lost) was the High Speech motto
I SEE WHO OPENS ME.
The Grapefruit’s energy is sexual, and its color is often described as labial pink. It is one of the balls that exposes people’s secrets. IV:116–21, IV:122, IV:134, IV:141, IV:164, IV:290–91, IV:299, IV:319–20, IV:325–26, IV:335, IV:353–54, IV:356, IV:374–75, IV:378, IV:413, IV:424–25, IV:437–39
(Steven Deschain describes),
IV:442, IV:443, IV:452–53, IV:485–93
(Jonas takes from Rhea),
IV:528
(voice of the ball),
IV:532–33, IV:536, IV:542–44, IV:545–46, IV:558–60
(Roland takes ball from Jonas),
IV:570–75
(Roland’s vision; he’s trapped within the glass),
IV:579–81
(Roland decides to leave Susan),
IV:601–2, IV:604–11, IV:618–21, IV:634–35
(gate of Green Palace),
IV:648–58
(650 the Grapefruit; 652 Roland’s matricide),
V:36, V:37, V:38, V:49, V:53
(Wizard’s Glass),
V:79, V:116, V:176

MAGGIE

See
HAX

MAGICAL WAND/MAGICAL BASIN/MAGICAL PAIL

For generations, the BARONY COVENANTER had been coming to the village of TREE to collect taxes. Mounted on top of his tall black stallion, his gaunt
black silhouette was a familiar, if unwelcome, sight. Just as familiar, if more puzzling, was the silver basin roped to the Covenant Man’s
gunna.
No one seemed to know the purpose of this priceless basin which the Covenant Man claimed was a relic from GARLAN-that-was, but TIM ROSS was destined to find out.

After discovering his dead father’s LUCKY COIN in his murderous stepfather’s trunk (the magical skeleton key that Tim used had been a gift from the treacherous Covenanter), young Tim rode his father’s mule into the ENDLESS FOREST to find the Barony tax collector. There, surrounded by ancient IRONWOODS, the Covenanter asked Tim to fill his basin with the nearby stream’s putrid, bug-infested water. Once Tim collected the water (avoiding a dangerous POOKY as he did so), the Covenant Man twice waved a magic wand over the basin to clear away the flesh-eating bugs it contained. (The wand was actually the gearshift of an old Dodge Dart.) Once the water was pure, the evil magician waved his wand a third time, and the water in the basin became a kind of scrying mirror—one which showed both future events and events happening at a great distance. The image that the Covenant Man conjured was a cruel one—it was of Tim’s steppa, BIG KELLS, beating Tim’s mother, NELL, into unconsciousness for opening his precious trunk. Soon after, the Covenanter showed Tim an even more horrific sight—the body of his father, Big Ross, floating in a nearby stream.

Later in the folktale, after Tim informed the men of Tree where they could locate his father’s corpse, Tim found yet another silver water-holder and magic wand. This time the scrying vessel was a battered silver pail, and the wand—which Tim discovered sticking out of the ground as if someone had plunged it into the dirt with amazing force—was of stainless steel and had a white tip that looked like ivory. Remembering the Covenant Man’s words that, in the proper hand, any object could be magic, Tim used this bucket and gearshift to glimpse his destiny. In the magical water he saw a vision of the Covenant Man and a beautiful green female SIGHE beckoning him deep into the heart of the forest where the FAGONARD swamp lay. Beyond the swamp, he saw a version of himself—water-Tim—finding the home of the great magician MAERLYN who gave him a magic blindfold which would cure his mother’s blindness.

Unfortunately, as with every other gift given by the Covenant Man, Tim’s visions proved to be cruelly misleading. Although beautiful, the sighe named ARMANEETA turned out to be both faithless and treacherous, and Maerlyn was stuck in TYGER form, locked in a cage in the clearing of the NORTH FOREST KINNOCK DOGAN. The Covenant Man’s silver pail played one final trick on Tim before the end of the tale. Tim discovered it sitting upside down in front of tyger-Maerlyn’s cage. Beneath it was a mocking note from the wicked Covenanter.

W:137, W:141, W:150–60, W:165, W:167, W:169, W:181–84, W:188, W:194, W:206, W:237, W:242, W:247

MAGRUDER, GEORGE

See
CALLAHAN, FATHER DONALD FRANK
: CALLAHAN’S HOME SHELTER ASSOCIATES: MAGRUDER, ROWAN

MAGRUDER, ROWAN

See
CALLAHAN, FATHER DONALD FRANK
: CALLAHAN’S HOME SHELTER ASSOCIATES

MAGRUDER, ROWENA

See
CALLAHAN, FATHER DONALD FRANK
: CALLAHAN’S HOME SHELTER ASSOCIATES: MAGRUDER, ROWAN: RAWLINGS, ROWENA MAGRUDER

MAINE CHARACTERS

ANGSTROM, JUNIOR:
Junior Angstrom is one of the many western Maine residents who sighted a WALK-IN. Angstrom’s walk-in was a naked man, traveling up the center of ROUTE 5.
For more information on the supernatural walk-ins, those beings that “walk in” to our world from other worlds, see
WALK-INS
. VI:151

BARKER, GARY:
Gary Barker has photographs of the bizarre weather patterns that affect KEZAR LAKE in LOVELL. VII:113

BARKER, JUNIOR:
Junior Barker runs JOHN CULLUM’s caretaking business whenever Cullum is out of town. VII:44

BECKHARDT, DICK/BECKHARDTS:
Dick Beckhardt owns one of the many beautiful houses located along TURTLEBACK LANE in LOVELL. JOHN CULLUM is his caretaker. The Beckhardt cabin is the site of Cullum’s final palaver with Roland Deschain and EDDIE DEAN. The Beckhardts are friends of the TASSENBAUMS. VII:117, VII:118, VII:120, VII:123, VII:126, VII:432, VII:518