The Wizard's Tower

Trandelomacus heard a commotion outside his prison door. He stepped away from his balcony, and the idyllic view of the rolling hills and lazy sheep on a fine summer’s day, and sighed. Outside the door, he heard the dull jangle of heavy keys accented by the pitched squawking of angry politicians.

The iron-bound wooden door lumbered open with a groan. There was Hubert, the one soldier in town and his jailer and constant companion – and behind him was a crowd of aldermen. They were red-faced and growling, all struggling to fit through the doorway at the same time. Enough of them shoved at once and the tide of flesh spilled into Trandelomacus’ humble foyer.

“Gentlemen,” he said, tugging at his long, white beard. “And ladies,” he added, spotting the Miller sisters stepping into the room. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

The aldermen rose from the floor with grunts and growls, and dusted themselves off. Two of the younger ones helped Grandfather Morroway to his feet, who was well known to be the wisest by virtue of being the oldest.

He sneezed when they set him on his feet and adjusted his glasses, and then he looked at the others, and they looked at him, and everyone looked at everyone other than Trandelomacus.

“Shall I put some tea on then?” Trandelomacus asked. “I’m afraid though, I may not have enough cups for everyone. Nor, for that matter, any tea. Or a stove. What with,” he waved his arms around the cramped, bare chambers, “my prison and all. I do believe it’s nearly lunch though, so… Hubert, would you be a dear and bring an extra portion of slop for my guests?”

“Ah, that won’t be necessary,” said Grandfather Morroway. “This isn’t a social call.”

“No, of course not,” said Trandelomacus. “Can’t say I get too many of those, what with,” again he motioned his bare stone walls, pile-of-hay-for-a-bed, and leaky bucket that served as a toilet, “being a prisoner and all.”

“Er,” said Grandfather Morroway, “municipal ordnance 17-B stipulates this is a retirement, not a prison.”

“A forced retirement.”

“All the same.” The words put the conversation in an awkward spot, and Grandfather Morroway cleared his throat. “Er, anyway, regarding that social call situation…”

“Yes?”

“Well, the council has decided it’s cruel to keep you locked up here without anyone for company–”

“–Oh, but I have Hubert and his sunny disposition–”

“–all the same. So, anyway, we’ve decided to grant you, kind of like a, let’s call it, communal visiting pass.”

Trandelomacus arched a bushy eyebrow. “A communal visiting pass?”

“Yeah. Like, you’ll get to visit the community for a bit – escorted of course – catch up, see things on the outside, yadda yadda, and then back in the hole. Home. Back home.”

“Hmm.” Trandelomacus crossed his arms. “Something broke, didn’t it? You need my help.”

“We most certainly do not!” said Grandfather Morroway, at the same time Lurlene Miller said, “The river’s flooding.”

Grandfather Morroway glared at her, then harrumphed. “Let’s go!” And the lot of them descended the prison tower and approached the banks of the Fetterwild River. Or rather, the new banks, as the river had more than quadrupled in width and showed no signs of slowing its growth.

A crowd of other townspeople were already there waiting for them, grumbling about the rising water and the price of turnips. Mud-smeared children made faces at each other, and their shifty-eyed elders gossiped daggers. When they saw the aldermen and Trandelomacus arriving, they all made some sort of hand sign and recoiled from him. Or rather, each of them made a hand sign, but none of the signs were the same, and they all looked bizarre and unpracticed. Perhaps they were meant to ward off the evil eye, but Trandelomacus couldn’t possibly tell, and it had been years since he’d given anyone the evil eye.

When the waters inched forward and swept over Trandelomacus’ thin sandals, he swore. “Bloody hell.” He looked at the rushing river and a hush fell over the crowd. “Morroway!”

“That’s Grandfather to you. Or Alderman.”

“Where’s the dike?” Trandelomacus asked.

“The what?” asked Thormelina the baker, covering her snot encrusted child’s ears.

“The dike! The dike! You know, the big strip of dirt? That I put here? To keep the river from flooding the town?” They stared at him with slack jaws. “The dike, damn it!” They winced when he stomped his foot.

“Oh, the dike,” said Lester Platt, picking his teeth with a knife. “We got rid of it.”

“You what!?” asked Trandelomacus. “Why?”

“Well, it was an eyesore,” said Lester. “A big pile of dirt just lying there? It was making the skyline all ugly. Driving down the price of my hovel.”

“But you don’t live anywhere near the river!”

“Well, no, of course not. Wouldn’t nobody move here with that unsightly dirt staring us in the face.”

Trandelomacus pinched the bridge of his nose. “The dike was there to keep your hovels from being flooded. Do you understand that? Now there’s nothing stopping the river from coming this way and washing the town away.” To emphasize his point he took a couple splashing steps away from the river, as it had risen nearly half an inch since he got there.

“All the same,” said Grandfather Morroway. “Fix it.”

Trandelomacus rolled his eyes. “‘Fix it,’ he says,” he muttered. He placed his hands on his hips and frowned at the river again. It was swollen and getting bigger, but it wasn’t aggressive. Not yet. Even though the bumpkins cut it pretty close in fetching him, they should still have time.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m going to need my wand.”

The crowd gasped.

“Ha!” said Grandfather Morroway. “Not a chance in all the hells. There’s children here – you think we’d let you play with your wand, wizard?”

“But, I need it.”

“Nice try, sorcerous snake, but it ain’t gonna happen. There’ll be no witchery from you.”

Trandelomacus grit his teeth. “How am I supposed to fix the river without my wand?”

Grandfather Morroway stepped closer. “I know,” he whispered conspiratorially, “it looks pretty dire. But the town would never agree to giving you your wand back. My hands are tied. I wish it were different, but it ain’t.”

“Then why am I here? You know as well as anyone else that I can’t magic this problem away without my wand.”

“Yes, yes, I know. Frankly, the whole situation looks pretty bleak, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, it does. The town’s going to get washed away.”

“Yeah, that’s what I figured. So, you’re mostly here so that they have someone to blame that isn’t me.”

Trandelomacus recoiled, as though slapped, and Grandfather Morroway shrugged.

“Fix it!” shouted Lester. “Fix it!” the others joined in, and soon the whole mob was shouting. For whatever reason, their unruly children got to throwing mud, and soon everyone was shouting “Fix it!” all covered in mud.

“All right!” Trandelomacus bellowed. “All right!” The mob quieted down, and he wiped mud from his face. “I’ll fix it.”

“You better,” said Thormelina, pouting. “It’s ‘cause your stupid dike broke we’re in this mess.”

Trandelomacus snorted. “It didn’t break, you broke it–never mind. Never mind. I need a moment to think.” He started pacing up and down the dwindling river side, massaging his temples, and everyone watched him. Finally he raised a finger into the air. “I’ve got it! Sandbags!”

“What’s that then?” said Albert, the town’s foremost-and-only sand collector. “Some kind of witch-slang?”

“Witch what? No, it’s sand, in bags. Sandbags.”

“Oh,” said Albert. “Sand-in-bags. Why didn’t you say so?”

“I–yes. Sand-in-bags. That’s what I meant. I need sand-in-bags. Lots of them. Enough for everyone and then some.”

“What are you going to do with them?” said Thormelina. “It’s not some kind of magickery, is it?”

“Just the magic of community.”

The crowd screamed.

“No no no no no, sorry!” Trandelomacus said. “I didn’t mean that! Poor choice of words.” The crowd caught their breath and calmed down. “It was just a metaphor.”

Again they screamed.

“Oh, please stop! What I really meant is, it’s honest, back-breaking drudgery.”

The crowd murmured their approval.

Trandelomacus rolled his eyes. “So, I’m going to need everyone to be involved in this. Head back to town, grab as many sand-in-bags as you can, and bring them back here. Stow them on carts and wagons, load them onto beasts of burden, hold them in your hands – whatever it takes.”

“What are you going to do with them?” asked Thormelina.

“We’re going to build a wall of sand-in-bags, to keep the river from flowing into the town.” He looked around and saw a dip in the countryside, which would be the natural path of the water. Maybe, just maybe, they could wall it off in time. Maybe it would hold. He pointed to it. “There.”

Albert’s eyes narrowed. “And just where do you plan on getting all these sand-in-bags?”

“Well, from you, Albert.”

“Ho-ho!” Albert laughed cruelly. “Fat chance, necromancer.”

“Oh, come on. That’s a slur.”

“You’re not getting any of my sand wet.”

“Well, okay,” said Trandelomacus. “But then the river will flood the town. And then it will flood your home. And your sand will get wet.”

“Oh. Damn it. Fine.”

That matter being settled, Trandelomacus led everyone back to their homes where they began in-bagging the sand and loading up the bags onto whatever conveyances they had. Any available wagon and cart was conscripted, as well as a fair number of wheelbarrows, sleds, and sleighs. Every horse, donkey, and dog was loaded up. The Crandlehart triplets even filled a boat with the bags, which was ultimately unhelpful, but their heart was in the right place.

“You really think this’ll work?” Grandfather Morroway asked.

“Well, if we had a bit more time,” Trandelomacus said, his words trailing off. Everyone was pitching in, but they were all working independently and at different paces.

“We don’t really have time, do we?”

Trandelomacus frowned. There were ways of organizing labour, of synchronizing a group of people and keeping them united in deed and spirit. A song was what they needed. He grabbed a bag of sand and sung the first few notes of Hang Ye The Witch This Eve, and after a moment of stunned silence, the whole mob joined in.

It was then that Trandelomacus realized pretty much all the town songs involved hanging wizards and such, but it no longer mattered. The music took on a life of its own, driving the townsfolk to work diligently and together. They loaded the sand-in-bags up and drove them to the spot he had identified, and began sand-in-bagging, effortlessly moving from one song to the next. As the day turned to night and the fading sun gave way to distant starlight and sputtering torches, the dour faces of the locals transformed, and glowed with a sweaty sheen and hard won grins.

By morning their wall was nearly the height of Albert, and thrice as thick, but on their side it was dry, while on the other side the water came almost to the top. And then, the Crandlehart triplets noticed it stopped rising.

“We did it!” they shouted, and soon the whole town raised the cry with them. And just in time. People were dead on their feet. They sat down wherever they were standing, and basked in the good work they had all done together. The Festers, who ran the local inn, rolled in a giant pot of soup, and everyone voraciously shared a meal they would never forget.

“I don’t believe it,” said Grandfather Morroway. “You actually pulled it off.”

“We pulled it off,” Trandelomacus said, and the town cheered.

Grandfather Morroway grunted. “True, I suppose. It can’t be denied, even. Maybe we were wrong about you.”

“Maybe not all wizards are vile,” said Thormelina.

“Maybe sometimes they have okay ideas, I guess,” said Lester.

Trandelomacus stood tall – or as tall as he could, with an aching back that he would feel for the next week. It had been fun though, he had to admit to himself, and more to the point, it had been necessary. It was nice to be needed again.

Grandfather Morroway conversed with the other aldermen, and then cleared his throat.

“It has been decided,” he bellowed. “For your services to the town in our time of need, the council of aldermen has decided that your sentence shall be overturned.”

The crowd cheered, and Trandelomacus felt a swell of emotion in his breast.

“All the same,” said Grandfather Morroway, “we hereby find you guilty of ensorcelling the town with the dread magic of community, and sentence you to ten consecutive lifetimes’ imprisonment.”

The crowd cheered louder. Trandelomacus… shrugged. Wasn’t the first time that happened.

They dragged him back to his tower, where Hubert handed him a fresh bowl of slop.

“Thanks for your help,” said Grandfather Morroway.

“’Till next catastrophe,” said Trandelomacus, as Grandfather Morroway shut the door.

“Yeah, see you next week,” came the old man’s voice from behind the door.

Trandelomacus walked to his balcony, enjoyed a spoonful of slop, and looked out over the countryside. He saw their sand-in-bag wall, saw the shimmering river in all its massive glory, and saw that most people had gone back to town. But there by the wall was Albert. Busy tugging at a bag. Busy, no doubt, trying to save his beloved sand.

Trandelomacus took another spoonful of slop just as Albert tugged a bag loose. Then the wall collapsed and a torrent of water swept him away, surging towards the town.