The Wizard’s Tower

The consequences of a Cat's curiosity

“No, no. You wait here,” said the Wizard. His sentence was punctuated by a hammer blow from the blacksmith across the street. At the same time, a chicken clucked, running down the cobblestone path while being unintentionally chased by a horse pulling a wagon. The chicken’s owner yelled at the man on the wagon, who yelled back while the blacksmith shook his head at both.

“What?” asked the Cat. “You can’t leave me down here! I want to go inside!”

“Well, this is my tower and you’re not allowed,” said the Wizard, fiddling with the enormous ring of keys.

“Why not?”

The Wizard paused, confused. He took a good look at the Cat.

Her humanoid body was covered by a long robe, only her black snout showing from under the hood. A cape covered her long tail.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand your question,” the Wizard finally said, scratching his beard.

“I mean, why can’t I go inside your tower?” the Cat asked.

“Okay, let me rephrase it. I do understand your question: I know what those words, aligned in that specific order, mean. I meant to say I don’t understand why you are asking that question.”

“What is there to understand?” said the Cat. “I don’t want to stay down here! Besides, I want to see what your place looks like.” She smirked.

“Yes,” said the wizard, putting the keys back in his sleeve, “I know you want to go up, but you can’t. We’ve established that, haven’t we?”

The Cat rolled his eyes. “Are you doing this on purpose?”

“Okay, let me explain as thoroughly as possible to see if your young feline brain can absorb the concept. I own this tower, right?”

“Right.”

“So I have the right to forbid or allow people to go up as I wish, right?”

“Right.”

The wizard sighed. “See? I don’t understand your question. You do understand it is my right not to want people going inside my tower.”

“Yes!” said the cat. “But why in the world don’t you want people to go up? What are you hiding?”

“Well, it’s none of your concern, is it?” said the wizard. “In fact, it is completely irrelevant to your not going inside. What is important is you are not allowed! Because I say so. My motivations are mine and they have nothing to do with why you are not allowed. You are not allowed because we, as a society, agreed private property is something that grants the owner the right to decide whether people can or cannot go inside their towers. If you have a problem with that concept you might propose the change to the king. Or you might as well start a revolution, or go to the desert plains and choose a piece of land you shall call Catville, where you can apply your own crazy notions about properties and whys. None of that has anything to do with what I hide or not in my tower. My motivations are irrelevant.”

“Yeah, ok,” said the Cat, “I understand. Just go already. How can a guy be so annoying?” This last part she said under her breath.

“Oh, excuse me,” said the wizard. ”Me! Annoying! You are the one who demands explanations about the workings of our society! About rules that have been in place for thousands of years! How come I am the annoying one? I have to stand here, stop everything I’m doing, and explain concepts every rat in this kingdom understands from birth, and I am the one who’s annoying? You are the one who wants to go inside my tower!”

“Okay!” The Cat hissed. “By the mercy of Evil, just go inside, already! I’ll wait down here.”

The Wizard took a moment to accept this new decision and started fiddling with the keys again.

“I swear by Chaos, Cat. Sometimes you drain me. You have to work on your curiosity.”

“Ok! Just go,” said the Cat.

“I don’t like this situation either, but we have to work together and we’re not getting anything accomplished if you don’t work on this behavior of yours.”

“Alright! Can you just go already?”

“What a petulant cat,” said the Wizard. He finally stopped fiddling with the keys and inserted them back into his sleeve. He turned away from the locked door and started down the cobblestone street. “Come on, let’s go.”

The Cat just stared at him, still standing at the foot of the tower. “Don’t you have to go up?”

“These are not my keys. I must have taken someone else’s in the tavern by mistake.”

When he’s not talking about himself in the third person, FJCMontenegro writes dystopian science fiction with a touch of cyberpunk. You can read his flash fiction here: