Having sacrificed the boy to his purpose, caught the Man in Black, held his long palaver with him unto his death, and reaching he Great Western Sea; Roland awakes to find himself compromised; both in weapon (an analogue for his lethality and purpose) and physically, by the beasts which come in the night with the tide. Having been castrated in this form, Roland begins his task of drawing the three; in which he nearly dies. But die he does not, Roland's determination and his purpose in this dying world are too great, or are they? How many times van the Gunslinger beat death in the bringing together his foretold companions through the doorways from our world to his?