Just about over halfway through, Jake has been drawn through the speaking ring and Roland and ka-tet are about to enter the city of Lud, and have stopped to palaver and share perspectives from their drawings before fully embarking on their quest.

I’m pausing for a minute to unpack the idea of ka-tet, those bound together by fate. I’m finding it a useful concept in human life outside of fantasy novels. The idea of a bond that forms at random as a result of the particular idiosyncrasies of individual personalities. We might also call this “fitting in” or “belonging.” Each individual in a ka-tet like a puzzle piece that forms a different picture when brought together. The idea of individuality no longer applies which, per the character development over the arc of the three novels, isn’t the most pleasant of experiences.