The Strange Round Bird: Or the Poet, the King, and the Mysterious Men in Black

by Eden Unger Bowditch

  “Nothing,” said Jasper, “just a bit of candle wax, I suppose.”

  His mother did not seem concerned. Something from their laboratory, she imagined. Wallace, however, was looking at him. Jasper raised his eyebrows and Wallace did not smile.

  “Jasper, can you help me with something?” Wallace asked, standing to go.

  Wallace’s father caught his hand. “What’s the matter, son?” he asked.

  Jasper stood quickly, hoping they could get away. But Dr. Banneker stood to join them. Jasper quickly reached over for Wallace’s coin, but it made the bracelet spark. Jasper switched hands, but Dr. Banneker got to it first.

  “Did you see it?” asked Dr. Banneker, taking the coin from Wallace.

  “The spark?” asked Wallace. It had been hard to miss.

  “No,” said his father, handing the coin back to Wallace. “The wax.”

  “It’s just like the bracelets,” said Dr. Banneker, handing the coin back to Wallace. It was becoming hot. The pieces of Il Magna were becoming more active. They could hardly stand to be near one another anymore without creating heat or sparks. The time was nearing.

  “It’s just candlewax,” said Wallace. “I must have gotten wax…we must have gotten wax…it must have been candles. It comes right off.” The warmth of the coin made it easy to wipe off the wax. He wished he had done that earlier.

  “It’s so hot,” said Jasper, and he felt his wrist. His bracelet was hot against his skin.

  Dr. Banneker looked concerned. “Tobias, Rajesh, Clarence, ladies. The coin is hot.”

  “The energy is starting to surge,” said Dr. Isobel Modest. “Soon it will be time.”

  Wallace leaned towards Jasper as the parents spoke together.

  “I don’t know,” said Wallace. “We should not have been careless. We should have cleaned off the wax.”

  “I know. But I’m so worried about Noah,” said Jasper, whispering to Wallace. “You think everything will be fine?”

  “Everything will not be fine,” said Faye in a loud whisper. “Noah has gone!”

  Suddenly, Ariana’s hand flew to her neck. “My…Excuse me. I’ll be right back.”

  “Darling, do you want me to …” Dr. Canto-Sagas stopped before finishing the question. Ariana had run from the table.

  Jasper hadn’t noticed. He turned to ask about Noah, but Mr. Bell was no longer there.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  NOAH’S ONE AND ONLY

  The two boys stood in front of Mr. Bell’s desk. They had come to say goodbye before setting off on Noah’s dark errand. The raven in the office made a funny grunting sound. Sabi jumped.

  “He is just talking in his sleep, young brother,” said Mr. Bell.

  “Well, what else did you want to say?” asked Noah, watching the big black bird who was now snoring.

  “I have said what I am going to say, Master Canto-Sagas,” said Mr. Bell. “I do not believe I can stop you. But I can insist on sending you with assistance.”

  “I’ll take Sabi with me,” said Noah. “He will be my guide through…through the Khan Il Khalili.”

  “I am knowing the Khan,” said Sabi. “I will take my brother friend.”

  Mr. Bell looked deeply into Noah’s eyes. Noah found it hard to look back. But he knew if he did not, suspicion would fall on him and Mr. Bell would renounce and prevent this journey. It all depended on Noah being able to come face to face, and on his ability to keep up his stength.

  “Very well,” said Mr. Bell. He reached out a hand to Noah. “You have worked hard with your friends on brilliant plans and on brilliant inventions. It is now your choice to walk away from them?”

  “I…I cannot take them into this terrible…I do not have a choice.” Noah did not have a choice. He knew he could do only one thing. Noah hesitated. How could he keep his hand from shaking? But he reached out and took the small but powerful hand of Mr. Bell.

  “It is now, Master Canto-Sagas, that you must say farewell to your friends. It is time, if it ever shall be.”

  Again, Noah felt Mr. Bell’s eyes upon him. He felt those eyes could see into his heart, and see both sides of it. “How…I mean, is it necessary?”

  “Trust is a thing that is earned,” said Mr. Bell. “But once it is broken, it can never again be the same. Rebuilt, it grows from a cracked foundation. Yes, Master Canto-Sagas, it is necessary.”

  Noah nodded. It was going to be so hard to say goodbye.

  As he turned to leave Mr. Bell’s office, Sabi followed.

  “Stay here, little brother,” said Mr. Bell. “I shall give you some warm tea before you head off on your journey.”

  Miss Brett was sitting, waiting, by the door in the foyer.

  “I had a feeling you might be stepping out,” said Miss Brett. In her voice was a familiar love, but there was something else Noah could hear. Fear? Distress? Either way, another weight on Noah’s shoulders.

  “I have to, Miss Brett,” said Noah. “There’s something I have to do.”

  “Noah, please,” she pleaded. “Tell me what is wrong. Tell me what happened. Something happened and you have been keeping us all away from you. Let me help you. Let someone help—”

  “No one can help,” said Noah. “No one. I fear I am the weakness, the failing, the one who—”

  “Noah, you are a hero. All of you are heroic, in the truest sense of the word. You are like the heroes in the stories we have read.” Miss Brett could sense a growing distance between Noah and the others.

  “But I’m not, Miss Brett,” Noah said. “The stories you tell are just stories. The heroes overcome impossible things and triumph. But they are stories and only stories.”

  “My darling, my sweet angel.” Miss Brett held the boy close. “These stories give us the chance to invent possibilities we can overcome or embrace. Every time you and the others invent something amazing, you take what was once fiction and make reality of it. Who is to say there is either one or the other?”

  “It’s not always like that,” Noah said darkly. “We never truly choose among many things. Each decision is only between two things. We choose to do or not to do.” Miss Brett could not see through Noah’s darkness.

  He opened the big wooden doors and stepped into the night. Four carriages were waiting outside. When one carriage door opened, he saw Sabi waiting inside.

  His plan was that he and Sabi would wait until they were in the Khan il Khalili to escape from the first brother in black. This would leave the brother to hunt for them through the ancient market.

  Noah knelt and checked his satchel. He had done this three times on the way to the carriages. The wooden box was there.

  “Just a moment,” he said, turning his back to the carriage. He checked his pocket. He had the whistle. Gingerly, he opened the box to be sure. Noah took a deep breath and took a mental note of each precious item. There, in the box, were the necklace, the amulet, the coin, and the two bracelets.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  THE AVENUE OF THE TENTMAKERS

  OR

  THE MAPPING OF EVIL

  The sound of a snorting camel woke Sabi with a start. They had nearly arrived at the Khan il Khalili.

  “We’re almost there,” said Noah as Sabi looked around, not quite sure where he was. “You can close your eyes and rest a few more minutes.”

  Noah pulled out the piece of paper Mr. Bell had handed him as he had climbed into the carriage. He unfolded it and read.

  September MDLXVI

  Knowing there was no choice but one, the king faced his final battle. He placed the world at death’s door. He had not been able to save his beloved. The great inventors to come, who would inherit this burden from their parents, would all be part of his legacy. There had always been but one choice. With great power comes the responsibility of understanding how not to use it.

  POEM

  There will always be two roads.

  One to glory, one to destruction.

  One to safety, one to death.


  But sometimes the two roads will be

  Less defined.

  There will always be two choices.

  One to joy, one to sorrow.

  One to faith, one to regret.

  But sometimes the two choices will be

  Less defined.

  It is in this choice that we lead ourselves through life

  Or lose ourselves within it.

  —Süleyman (Suleiman) I, on the eve of battle in 1566 (the year he lost his life)

  Noah’s breath stuck in his throat. Sometimes the two choices will be less defined, he thought. Sometimes there is but one choice.

  A groggy Sabi looked at Noah and smiled. Noah tried to smile back. Sabi didn’t know. That little boy simply did not know that his whole life, all he had been raised to remember, to suffer, and do, led to one thing. Little Sabi knew only that he was the map. He knew that what was carved upon his body had been passed down through the ages. He never raised the question of why. There was only the instruction, tattooed and beaten into him, like countless others. And, like countless others, he would follow.

  But there was more. Noah knew. Sabi was the link that would bring Noah to Komar Romak. The map was to be his guide. That was the job of any map, after all. Only this was a map to destruction.

  “I am so pleased, Brother,” said Sabi. “I do not know if any map has ever made the path as I take you, Noah. I am so pleased.”

  Noah could see real pleasure in Sabi’s eyes. Sabi simply believed that by taking Noah through the secret passage, he was finally fulfilling the purpose of the map. Sabi, and likely all the wretched map-people who came before him, never knew what they were truly created to do—to bring power to the hands of Komar Romak.

  Noah’s eyes darted from face to face as they dashed through the busy alleys and avenues of the Khan il Khalili. He tried to gauge every seller, every buyer, every man who sat drinking tea or smoking sheesha, the elegant water pipes filled with sweetened tobacco. He looked into every shop, at every passing visitor. He knew that Komar Romak could be anywhere and everywhere. Sabi was leading with pride. He was taught only to do as he was doing now.

  It was not for the map to ask why it had been written or why it must lead someone where it was leading. At the castle, Noah learned from Mr. Bell that Sabi believed he was given an honor. And the little boy was conditioned to follow the command without knowing the consequences. There were triggers—anyone who knows of Il Magna, or who claims to have a token of Suleiman, or who recites the Muhabi poem. What Sabi did not know was that he would be leading that person to certain doom. In fact, Sabi would be leading the whole world to certain doom.

  Sabi looked up at Noah. “I am so happy to take you, my brother,” he said, beaming up at Noah.

  Noah nodded. Sabi was so proud that he could fulfill this task. “Thank you, Sabi. I am content with this, too.”

  Then Noah saw him. He recognized the skinny, awkward, gangly man he had last seen almost two years earlier. The man was trying to untangle the bottom of a robe that had gotten caught in his own slipper. He wore a red fez hat, with the tassel seemingly stuck in the hair of his very bushy moustache, the corner of which had been pulled away from the man’s lip. One side was fake.

  Noah remembered that man from the other side of the world, from the farm in Ohio. They had first seen him hanging in a tree, pretending to be a birdwatcher. The man then appeared in their classroom. He called himself Reginald Roderick Kattaning then, but Noah knew who and what Reginald Roderick Kattaning really was.

  In the Khan, the man pretended to look at a large colorful glass bottle, picked it up, and then, as it fumbled in his fingers, reached to grab it. He stepped on his own robe, slipping and knocking a row of glass bottles off the shelf and tearing his robe. As his knee kicked up to catch his fall, another row of bottles slid from their perch.

  It was a disaster. Noah wanted to laugh as the flailing man was grabbed by two angry shop owners, one on each of the skinny man’s arms. But before Noah could laugh, he saw a large dark figure come and shove the two men away. Turning away, Noah saw two more men approach, both with big bushy moustaches pasted upon half of their lips. Komar Romak was everywhere.

  Where were the brothers? Had he lost them? Komar Romak continued to follow. As Noah looked now through the crowd, he recognized faces from the table at the lair of Komar Romak. And then, he saw her.

  “Noah!” cried Faye from back in the crowd. She was pushing people aside as she moved in their direction. “Stop, please.”

  She was calling out, aware that her voice could be heard. A bead of sweat hit Noah’s forehead. Could Komar Romak hear her? He saw several heads turn, including that of the skinny man now standing with his large companion. They heard Faye and were now looking back towards Noah.

  “Run, Sabi!” Noah shouted.

  The two boys ran. This is it, Noah thought. This is when it will happen. Noah had made his choice. He had made the only choice he could. They cut through a spice seller’s shop and came out into a different crowded alley. Noah stopped, looking back. Faye had not followed.

  “Come, my brother,” said Sabi. “We must go to Sharia Khayamiya, the Street of the Tentmakers.”

  Noah nodded and followed Sabi as they slipped from the center of the Khan, across Alzhar, down Al Motaz, and through the historic Bab Zuweila. The huge gate, named for the Berber warriors who had guarded it, still stood as it had since the eleventh century. Even in the middle of everything, Noah could not help but gaze at the beautiful towers that rose up above the great arch. Who will be guarding that gate tonight?

  “Come, my brother,” said Sabi, holding Noah’s hand and giving him a gentle pull through the great stone arch.

  Noah saw a tourist setting up a camera. He thought how nice it would have been to be here simply as a tourist, with nothing more pressing than taking photographs of the sights.

  They were headed south to the ancient covered market of the tentmakers. Row upon row of small open stalls were selling beautifully crafted tents. These tents were more like giant walls of colorful cloth meant to protect desert dwellers and travelers from the winds and blowing sand.

  Noah felt he had stepped back in time. He had seen sketches and paintings of ancient Egypt. Here were craftsmen who had been making their tents for centuries and likely would for centuries to come. There were also children running around, waving scraps of colored cloth. There were women arguing and men drinking tea. A young man about Noah’s age offered him a cup of tea from a tray.

  “Shokran.” Noah thanked him but shook his head. The boy nodded and moved along, handing a glass to an old man in the next little shop.

  As they continued through the alley, occasional clouds of cotton erupted from one shop as someone filled pillows or shook out great swaths of cloth. Noah worried. Could it be here? Amidst all of the cloth and dust and crowds? But Sabi became more and more excited. Noah could see it in the boy’s face and the twinkle in his eye. How will he feel when he finally understands that he is the agent of doom?

  “Ana happy, ana so happy, my brother,” said Sabi, smiling up at Noah. “Ana good?”

  “Yes,” said Noah, “you are very good, Sabi.”

  “We go like this.” Sabi cut through a group of sellers, ducking under the great length of fabric billowing from the ceiling of a large shop.

  Noah followed, having to bend to avoid the hanging tent. Sabi tried to push open a door that seemed to have been closed for centuries. They had to scrape the sand and dust from the floor so the door could open. Through the door was a narrow wooden staircase that led up. Noah followed Sabi across a cramped landing, then down half a flight of stairs.

  The space was small and stifling. The air was thick with dust. Noah wiped the sweat from his brow and coughed a lungful of dust. He looked around in the dim light that came up from open sky far above the stairs. There was nothing on the landing but an ancient wooden wardrobe. Noah looked around, about to ask if they had gone the wrong way, but Sabi pulled open the wooden
door to the wardrobe and, still holding Noah’s hand, climbed inside.

  The wardrobe had no back panel. It was empty, except for a rope that Sabi threw over his shoulder. Noah imagined, for one moment, that they would walk through and come out into a land of eternal winter. Instead, a stone archway led down to a dark tunnel.

  Noah bent over in order to keep his head from hitting the ceiling and whatever was crawling around up there. Sabi stopped suddenly and Noah almost knocked him over. Noah moved aside as the little boy took the rope and tied it around an iron ring nestled in a crevice in the floor. Sabi then looped the rope through another ring, barely visible and nailed in the wall. Using these rings and the rope as a pulley, the boy tugged. Noah helped. Up came a stone door in the floor.

  “We go down here,” said Sabi, climbing into the dark hole.

  Noah thought of Faye’s claustrophobia. He was feeling a bit tight-chested himself, but he followed Sabi down, wondering all the while if he would ever find his way out again. Perhaps that is the point of this. Perhaps that has always been the plan.

  It was totally dark in the tunnel. Sabi stopped again and Noah could hear the boy unlatch a wooden trap door above them. When Sabi opened it, a light filled the tunnel and Noah had to shield his eyes. The light came from a very small flame. Sabi climbed up into the tiny room. It had stone walls and a wooden floor. Noah could see that the ceiling tapered off into nothing but darkness.

  “Sabi, is this the final place where—”

  “No, my brother,” said Sabi.

  Noah could not even fit into the room with Sabi. He stuck his head and arms through the door and watched Sabi. The boy moved with confidence, as if he had practiced this a thousand and one times. Perhaps he had. Sabi first pulled a rock from the wall. He removed a large iron key. He placed the key in a hole beneath the small torch.

  With a metallic click, the torch released. Sabi took it out and aimed straight up. Noah could see that the torch had become a flaming arrow. The back twisted into a bow of sorts. Sabi pulled back and released the flaming torch. It hit something, and the ceiling burst into flames. The room itself became a torch.