The Turrim

2022 submission to NYC Midnight’s Short Story Challenge

By Jim Janus

Fiacrius saw the sunrise sooner than the other villagers because he stood on a platform that was two stories high. The platform put him level with the top of a stone wall which circled a yard with a motley structure at its center. He turned toward the oddly tall piling of cottage-like dwellings–some squared, others rounded, some made of bricks, others of clay, some with windows, others without. The units though soundly connected seemed merely heaped. The pile rose and narrowed, so that when Fiacrius looked he couldn’t see the top. Each morning he climbed to the platform and looked up at the Turrim, and each time he reached his hand to the back of his neck to the pain that started there.

Fiacrius turned and looked down the staircase at the small group of villagers at its base. A woman clung to a stalk of corn, a man stood with one foot on an axle from a cart, another woman cradled a baby that was silent. Other villagers gathered a few steps away.

“Which of you is first?” he called.

The woman with the stalk climbed the steps.

Fiacrius asked, “What have you there?”

The woman separated the mottled leaves “It’s from my field. The whole crop is diseased. Someone said I just needed to bring one.”

“Have you tried other ways to cure it?”

“We tried all the natural remedies. None worked.”

Fiacrius placed the stalk onto a low slab of stone set into a large recess of brick that looked like a large fireplace. From something like a high mantel he swung down a metal door, then pulled a lever that extended from a narrow opening on a side of the recess. From behind the recess came a grinding sound, then yellow smoke. After a few moments the sound and smoke stopped, but from high in the tower another sound came, a different sound, like a wail, some vocal evidence of pain like something leaving a being.

Fiacrius swung up the door. The leaves of the stalk were green and healthy. He turned to the woman. “Take it directly to your field and replant it. By tomorrow your crop should be revived.”

“Thank you!” she said, and hurried down the stairs.

He gestured for the next person to come up. A man and his two sons climbed the steps carrying a rusted metal rod.

“What do you have, Christopher?”

“It’s the axle from my cart. It’s brittle and about to break in two.”

“Have you tried fixing it by other means?”

“Why do you ask? You know I only come here when I’ve no other way to fix something.”

“This fixing doesn’t come from nowhere. Each time I pull the lever, some energy leaves the tower.”

“You’re saying my axle isn’t as important as a corn stalk?”

Fiacrius tired of this part of his work, deciding what was worth the power of the Turrim, and what wasn’t. “Set it down, Christopher.”

The man and sons guided the axle into the recess, Fiacrius swung down the door and pulled the lever. A moment passed. There was no grinding, no smoke. Christopher looked at Fiacrius who appeared bewildered. Fiacrius swung up the door. The axle appeared just as rusty and at risk of breaking in two.

Embarrassed, Fiacrius said “We’re having trouble keeping it working.”

“You mean you can’t help me?”

Fiacrius disliked, too, seeing a villager’s disappointment when the Turrim failed to fix or heal. “You’ll have to take it the way it is. We’ll get word to you about when you should come back.”

Christopher mumbled and his two sons carried the heavy axle down the steps and away from the tower, then they started on the path back to their home.

On the steps leading to the platform, a woman ascended, the woman with the silent baby.

Christopher and his sons had traveled a quarter mile away when a sound came from behind, not immediately behind, but from the tower. The distant sound was a combined voice–of a man, woman, and child–in a single wail, prolonged, then silent.

When there were no more people in line, Fiacrius descended the steps and entered under the platform into the custodian’s quarters. He sat on a cot and lit a lamp on a table. He stared at the door that controlled the only passage through the wall and into the yard of the Turrim. He and the night custodian, Audax, were the only ones able to open it. Opening required not only the key, but unique ability specific to opening things which could not open.

As the sun moved down behind the tower, a shadow developed on the gravel road. Into the shadow Audax arrived. He and Fiacrius each had a cup of tea, shook hands, then Fiacrius got into his cart and prompted his mule. It wheezed and coughed as it started to bring him back home.

The road took Fiacrius past the house of a woman he knew for many years. That evening she was out by a tree that on his prior rides by had been gradually leaning and its branches sagging. There was still enough light for Fiacrius to see the woman touch the tree’s roots at the surface of the soil. She wore a simple dress for outdoors, and it stayed clean despite her closeness to the ground. The woman stood up and looked satisfied as she backed away. The trunk stood straight, and its branches pointed at angles toward the darkening sky.

“Good evening, Paula. You’ve done a fine job with that tree.” The woman lifted a pail, carried it to the base of the tree, and tilted its water toward the roots. “Though, I notice your windmill still isn’t spinning.” Fiacrius pointed but she continued to water. “It’s likely the rotor.” She put down the pail and in frustration decided to hear him out. “I can get someone to climb up and remove it, then you can bring it to the Turrim.” Fiacrius turned his head in the direction from which he came, where the distant structure towered higher than the hills that curved behind it.

“Be on your way, Fiacrius. I’ve gotten along thirty years without help from that abomination.”

“You have,” the man paused, “but not in every way.” He realized these words hurt her and tried to make up for them. “I miss having a drink with Matthias.”

Paula glared at him. “You drink well enough on your own.”

Fiacrius regretted bringing up the death of her husband. He changed the subject. “I know a person–outside the Turrim–who has the touch with windmills like you have with trees.”

The woman wiped her hands. “Despite your son, Eligius, being so soon regarded as the best blacksmith in our village,” at this Fiacrius became uncomfortable, “I won’t do it that way, either.” Paula turned, took a step toward her house, then looked back. “You better get on, Fiacrius. You’ll be late for dinner.”

Fiacrius regretted stopping. He prodded the mule, which coughed as it resumed forward on the path.

The next day he was on the path again, his asthmatic mule pulling him to the distant, motley pile. As he approached Paula’s house she was in her front yard, tending to other trees. She was expecting Fiacrius to pass and she motioned for him to stop. “I heard a baby was revived yesterday.”

Fiacrius welcomed this statement from Paula. He hoped the news might change her mind. “Yes. Such a relief. And such joy for the mother. Without the Turrim the baby would be dead.”

“The mother should have found a natural way to save her baby.”

“The infant had more than one defect.”

“Maybe the child wasn’t meant to live.”

“That’s not for either of us to know. When someone’s life is at risk we try to save it. The Turrim was created to do that. That woman couldn’t know all the defects of her child. Even if she did, she wouldn’t be able to get to the various healers in time. Only the Turrim can do that. It’s all there, all at once.”

“People talked of a sound, of a cry from the abomination that came when the baby was saved.”

“A healer is always strained when they use their power.”

“They’re more than strained. They’re drained of some of their life. They need time to recover, a place to recover. They don’t get that in the abomination.”

Fiacrius moved the reins of the wheezing mule, putting it on alert to go forward. “Paula, we each must do our calling. Things are better with the Turrim. The people like it.”

“The ones who haven’t been taken, who haven’t had a family member taken. Lose a child to death or lose a child to that abomination? I’d rather my child die in my home, with me, with her father.”

“Easy to say with no children of your own.”

“I had a child.”

“You?”

“We named her Philomena. She was healthy. Not long after she was born she was near one of our cows that had difficulty breathing. The cow got better. My husband confirmed it was Philomena’s presence that healed it. Word got around and someone from the abomination came. They came and took her, eighteen years ago.”

Fiacrius suddenly felt guilty. “I didn’t know.”

“We tried to stop the takers. It was impossible. Afterwards, Matthias and I didn’t tell anyone.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I refused to ever go to the tower and I forbade my husband, too. I vowed the two of us would handle our lives on our own. If anything broke or got sick we’d do what we could to fix it or heal it.”

“And when Matthias was gored by your bull?”

“He insisted I take him to the Turrim. We got him to the cart, but I went back into the house. I froze, I couldn’t move, I stayed where I was. I heard a sound outside that stirred me. I went to the cart and he was dead.”

“I wish Matthias was here. I wish your daughter was here.”

“My daughter is here–in that abomination. I want her out and I want her back.”

“No healer’s ever come out,” Fiacrius’ voice trailed off, “not alive.”

“That woman got her daughter back. I want my Philomena back.”

Fiacrius shook the reins, and the mule breathed loudly as it began to plod forward.

That afternoon, Paula surprised Fiacrius at the custodian’s quarters.

“Fiacrius, I do want your help.”

“Did you bring the rotor from your windmill?”

“No–the great abomination can’t fix it. Yesterday a man with an axle was turned away.”

Fiacrius realized Paula was there to make trouble. He conceded, “The Turrim’s lost its metal healer, but it should get another in a day or two. They’re looking to other villages.”

     “Isn’t there a person in our village with that ability?”

     Fiacrius tried to hide the truth. “No one. They’ve checked the records.”

     “But your son, the one who so quickly became best blacksmith in the village.”

     Fiacrius immediately felt sick. He tried to assure himself that she couldn’t know that the records were kept there or that years ago he removed the reference to Eligius’ unequaled ability to restore metal. He became distraught. “Paula, don’t call out my son. I won’t let him be put into the tower!”

She pulled at the door to the passageway. “I’m getting my daughter out!”

     “Even if I let you in, you don’t know what she looks like.” Paula backed away. “Maybe we can get your daughter out, but we need time to figure out how. Go home and I’ll stop by in the morning.”

     The next day, earlier than usual, Fiacrius set out from his home to allow time with Paula to create a plan. The night before, each one’s mind was playing out scenarios, most of them ending in failure. When Fiacrius got to Paula’s front yard, they sat and merged ideas. Fiacrius insisted their action be at night, but he didn’t know how to get past Audax. Paula had that solution: Trade shifts with Audax for an agreed upon night.

More difficult would be finding Philomena. Paula reminded Fiacrius that her daughter was eighteen years old. Fiacrius recalled that, of the fifty or so healers in the Turrim, there were two women about that age. The night of the action he could enter the Turrim and confirm both women were there, but he wouldn’t know which one to lead out. This most difficult of the problems was solved by Paula.

“Philomena’s ability is to cure lungs. Fiacrius, if we can get someone into the recess that needs their lungs healed, one of the two women should cry out.”

“You’re making it too complicated, now.” Fiacrius complained.

At that moment, a wheeze and a cough came from the direction of Fiacrius’ cart.

     “Your mule!

The night they agreed upon came. Fiacrius saw Paula from the platform and came down the stairs. Not seeing anyone else, he let her into the custodian’s quarters. He stopped at the closed door to the passage.

“Take this.” Fiacrius handed her a lantern. “Earlier I was inside and found the two women. I placed a marker outside their rooms. A single spiral staircase takes you past each. One woman is about ten doors up. The other is five or so above that. Look for the markers I placed.”

“Give me time to get there before you set up your mule. I’ll give a shriek when I’m ready.”

Fiacrius opened the door to the passage and Paula went through to the Turrim.

Fiacrius went out and managed his mule up the stone steps to the recess. He waited for Paula’s signal, but instead a man’s voice startled him.

“Good evening!” Fiacrius jumped in surprise at Audax. “I couldn’t sleep and decided to come by to make sure you were awake.” The shock left Fiacrius unable to reply. He gasped for air.

Paula’s shriek then came from the Turrim. Fiacrius, gasping, pushed the mule onto the slab, swung down the door, and pulled the lever. There was grinding, the smell of smoke, then a wail from high in the tower.

Audax sensed correctly that Fiacrius was having a respiratory attack. “Get yourself on the slab. If you can’t breathe you’ll die!”

To make sure Paula got her daughter out, Fiacrius stalled despite that he couldn’t breathe. He looked from the platform into the dark yard at the base of the Turrim and he saw a light moving, the lantern carried by one dark figure moving quickly beside another. Mother and daughter made it into the open passage below the platform.

Fiacrius surrendered to a push from Audax. Audax swung down the door and pulled the lever, but there was no grinding, no smoke, and no shriek. Just the sound of Fiacrius’ last breath.