The Talisman

by Stephen King

Sloat, in the physical guise of Orris.

Morgan Sloat and Morgan of Orris.

A Wolf who eats of his herd must be put to death. To thoughts of the men in the green car who had stopped to ask him directions, and offered him a Tootsie Roll, and who had then tried to pull him into their

car. The eyes. The eyes had changed. They’re damned. He made himself ...

He asked Wolf about his father—Philip Sawtelle in this world—but

And the small silver thing in his hand had turned to a small rod tipped with crawling blue fire.

It’s a lightning-rod.

Only here he was not Jack. Here he was Jason. But the Queen’s son died an infant, died, he—

The man whose life

you save is your responsibility for the rest of your life.

Sunlight Gardener Scripture Home for Wayward Boys. Mr. Gardener’s work with young fellows in trouble has been nothing short of miraculous.

Gardener was Osmond’s Twinner.

Someone, possibly Sunlight Gardener himself, more probably Sonny Singer or Hector Bast,

“I’ve met you before.” Confess, Sunlight Gardener’s eyes demanded. And Jack felt an urge to do just that. Oh yes, we know each other, yes. You whipped my back bloody.

They have been sent out into the Territories, but there they shall not be fed; there even the trees may eat them up, like beasts which walk in the night.”

You know what I mean, jellybean?

tall blond senior, Etheridge, stalking back to his own building after dealing with the freshmen’s crimes.

“Don’t you want just a little magic, Richard?” “You know, sometimes I think you just want chaos,” Richard said, flushing a bit. “I think you’re making fun of me. If you want magic, you completely wreck everything

believe in. In fact you wreck reality.” “Maybe there isn’t just one reality.”

“Just stop driving me crazy with that kind of stuff,” Richard said. “That’s just Seabrook Island talk. It’s hard enough being one of the six or

seven sane people in America without having my best friend flip out totally.”

Reuel Gardener. The son of that preacher who ran that home you claim you escaped from.”

“You’re punking out on me!

“There were main rail routes leaving Springfield for everywhere. This school exists because Andrew Thayer saw the possibilities. He made a fortune in rail shippage. Mostly to the west coast.

see the potential in shipping west as well as east.”

Jack knew, utterly knew, that Springfield was still a pressure point of some kind, perhaps still a shipping point. That was, perhaps, why Morgan’s magic worked so well here.

This school exists because Andrew Thayer saw the possibilities . . . do you see the possibilities, Jack-O?

And Sunlight Gardener’s Twinner, Osmond, would be more than capable of squeezing out all

the information that Anders knew.

Was it Anders, or Jason, or Richard . . . the boy who would also have been Rushton if my son had lived?

Rushton had drowned while swimming in a pond not far from the Great House.

Anders, the depot-keeper,

My son died; his still lives. Sawtelle’s son died. Sawyer’s still lives. But these things can be remedied. Will be remedied. No Talisman for you, my sweet little friends. You are bound for a radioactive version of Oatley, and you each owe the balance-scales a death. God pounds His nails.

That there are balls of fire that go rolling across the hills and empty places, leaving long black trails behind them—the trails are black in the daytime, anyway, but I’ve heard they glow at night. And if a man gets too close to one of those fireballs,

he gets turrible sick. He loses his hair, and sores’re apt to raise all over his body, and then he begins to vomit; and mayhap he gets better, but more often he only vomits and vomits until his stomach ruptures and his throat bursts and then . . .”

Radiation poisoning, Jack thought. He doesn’t know it, but he’s described the symptoms of radiation poisoning almost to a T.

take shape in Jack’s mind. There were the Territories, which corresponded to the

American east; the Outposts, which corresponded to the American midwest and great plains (Ellis-Breaks? Illinois? Nebraska?); and the Blasted Lands, which corresponded to the American west.

It was Osmond. It was Sunlight Gardener.

The son of

Sawyer and the son of Sloat: the son of Prince Philip Sawtelle and the son of Morgan of Orris.

The devil-things were Uzi machine-guns, plastic explosive, grenades.

In Technicolor.

He drove his hand into his pocket. The coin was like a chunk of ore in his hand—he made a fist around it, and

felt power ram through him in big volts.

Boy, that sounded really stupid. Like telling somebody they had cancer but don’t

worry because pretty soon we’re going to put Star Wars on the VCR and it’ll cheer you right up.

The smell of salt in the air was stronger. “I remember that. And the sign—CAMP READINESS, that’s what it said. There was an obstacle course, and ropes to climb,

and other ropes that you hung on to and then swung over big puddles of water.

Kingsland Motel,