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

by Eden Unger Bowditch

  The scientists descended, not through a door, but through the trunk of a giant cypress tree. A line of blindfolded servants followed the serpentine path from there, carrying the equipment, following down a rope that led the way. The scientists marveled that light seemed to travel down with them, for there, in the depths, they were not bathed in darkness. The architects, under the guidance of Suleiman, had built hidden shafts to bring daylight into the laboratory. At night, they lit lamps built safely into the walls.

  After the servants left their burdens, the scientists immediately began to unpack. The place was truly the most remarkable in the world. In their notes from those early days, all the scientists marveled at the genius of Suleiman’s space, but even more marveled at the invention Suleiman named Il Magna. Each inventor saw how his or her own work fit into the whole. They all knew that Il Magna was great, in theory, but seeing the plans before them, they understood how it could really work.

  With great pleasure, they lost no time getting to work. Deep in their hidden laboratory, the great machine was put together, piece by piece. Each scientist’s invention offered a part of the whole. As they tried to put the pieces together, they found that each piece linked together. And true to to the sultan’s dreams, the great sphere was perfectly balanced upon a small element, or amulet, made of a strange alloy unknown to anyone outside of the group, appearing almost weightless. A discus served as a turning key that connected a triad of broad metal fingers, seeming to float above the round body of the great engine.

  Once Suleiman and his inventors discovered how the pieces fit together in this very particular way and this very particular order, Il Magna seemed to come to life with properties that were truly mysterious and unexplainable, even to those who had helped create it. Strange things began to happen once the pieces were brought together as they clearly were meant to be or, perhaps, were never meant to be.

  Once brought together, the pieces changed, seemingly incomprehensibly. They were suddenly only magnetic unto themselves. The scientists were baffled. The pieces of Il Magna seemed to recreate themselves by their proximity to one another. No one had ever seen anything like it. The scientists had created a monopole magnet unlike anything known to exist. Once this change happened, no one could stop it. No matter how hard the inventors tried, they could not alter this strange property.

  As the weeks went by, the gyro stayed in motion. As they observed the properties of each component, the scientists found that the casing made of lead was also changing. At first, only a subtle change could be detected. But soon, things became more obvious.

  They could not understand it but, somehow, the lead was changing into gold. Alchemy had happened. While this was truly scientific magic before their eyes, they quickly saw that the gold was a conductor and would, unlike lead, protect the engine from nothing. And it would certainly only bring more interest from thieves-an engine that truly turned lead into gold?

  Not long after this discovery, the scientists made the most frightening one. Yes, like magic, this machine stayed in perpetual motion. However, that was not all. It did not merely maintain power. The engine emitted a charge like that of the most powerful lightning, and with growing strength. This machine moved and turned, without slowing, and endlessly gained strength as it turned. The power it held and emitted was extraordinary and continued to build.

  The seven brilliant inventors and their poet king had now built a machine that turned lead into gold and created an unstoppable source of energy that they could not control. They tried to find something in their analysis to show that this machine did not grow unceasingly. But they found the opposite.

  According to their notes, one evening, as the scientists were discussing their findings, a moth found its way into the laboratory. The hapless creature fluttered about, then gently landed on the device. An enormous deadly blast shook the entire field above. The creature exploded, blowing a hole the size of an elephant in the wall behind it. The scientists were blown off their feet. Every glass container in the lab was crushed. On the floor, they found a pair of tiny golden wings. It was all that was left of the moth.

  Even then, they knew. The world had never seen such a dangerous invention. If such a tiny creature could create such a charge, what would happen if something bigger were to touch it? If the machine generated energy without end, how could it be retained? Clearly, this invention held untold power, but no one knew how to harness it or, for that matter, how to protect the world from its dangers.

  The scientists attempted to dismantle the engine, but could not remove the pieces from one another. Realizing they could reverse the order, they finally separated the pieces, one by one. Once each piece was brought together with the others, each piece changed. Worse, if they were allowed to stay apart, they became overcharged. If they were allowed to stay together, they became overcharged. It became a juggling act. Every aspect of Il Magna seemed to build energy just by existing at the same time. They had to figure out a way to take it apart and return it together, to harness the energy without destroying the world.

  The Darkness of Suleiman

  Suleiman began to fear he had brought doom upon his people… that his world was shattering around him. The sultan believed that Nefarious Kor, who oozed evil, was at the heart of his disquietude. Suleiman worried it was his anger speaking, but he was now coming to believe that this man had inched his way into the royal court for the purpose of stealing Il Magna. Suleiman wrote in his diary that he had two great fears. He feared that his very creation, which he dreamed would bring power to his people, was becoming a monster that he could not control. And he feared the danger of theft. What would happen to the world if someone stole it?

  The Gentle Son

  It was then that Kor’s evil nature and treachery began to seep deeper into Suleiman’s heart. Not only was Kor trying to steal Il Magna, but he was trying to steal the trust Suleiman had in his wife and in the heir he was grooming for the throne. Kor was truly trying to tear apart Suleiman’s life and loves. Worse still, the nefarious Kor demanded to be among those guarding the laboratory, a demand supported by Roxalene. Suleiman refused.

  Perhaps out of spite or cruelty, perhaps as a show of power, Kor struck where Suleiman was most vulnerable—Mustafa. Under the guidance of Kor, Roxalene accused Suleiman’s beloved son, Mustafa, of a terrible plot against the sultan. She insisted that Kor had been a hero by discovering the son’s villainy, but Suleiman did not believe it. Mustafa, the son whose brilliance as a poet and a scientist rivaled his father’s?

  Roxalene swore that Mustafa had tried to kill her own baby son, Selim. She begged that action be taken against the young man. She claimed that Mustafa was even plotting to assassinate Suleiman himself.

  Heartbroken at these accusations, Suleiman called the scientists together. He must take action immediately, he said. First, he must secure Il Magna. Then he must attend to the safety of his son, who surely is in danger from the Nefarious Kor. Suleiman, of course, did not believe a word about his son’s plotting. He feared Kor as a more powerful and resourceful traitor than he had expected. Suleiman knew now that he had been foolish to think he could keep his creation safe from the clutches of Kor, and he knew that the evil man would stop at nothing to get it.

  Suleiman shared his fears with the scientists, and they all agreed. This was not the time or place to continue work on the project. The world was not ready for it.

  Il Magna and What Had to Be Done

  Hugh Fial’s diary is among the record writings from the time. He left them with The Brothers in Black, noting that he felt it was not safe to even bring with him words on a page. He wrote of “Il Magna,” a name they gave it. As we know, in Latin it means something grand or big. But, in Maltese, it meant “the great engine.” The name was fitting. This great engine was their feral child, their wild son, their responsibility.

  And this is what Hugh wrote:

  “It was decided that Il Magna would be removed for safekeeping. It took great effort and the los
s of several lives to calm the Engine into silence. After weeks of work, we the Scientists noted that the order of placement had been the Wings, the Key, and then the introduction of the Element. The order of removal would have to be in reverse to bring it to quiet. In the presence of His Royal Highness, Suleiman, we removed the Element, then the Key, then the three Wings from Il Magna.

  “One afternoon, a strange old woman was wandering around the Field above the laboratory. She was hunched over and appeared to be admiring the Flowers, but she listened a bit too closely and looked a bit too carefully. The twitch in her lip reminded me of someone else, as did her moustache, for it covered only half of her lip. When I told the Sultan, Suleiman knew exactly who it was—Kor. I believe we all knew that that danger had found us. Suleiman decided what had to be done.

  “‘The Pieces were to be separated. The Invention could no longer pose a Danger if the Pieces were impossible to collect. Each Piece would be disguised, each in the Possession of one or a Pair or a Team of us. There were five Pieces.”

  Separating the pieces proved deadly. The machine had not only absorbed the energy it yielded, but it would perpetually regenerate that energy. Vespucci Canto found that when he touched the casing, his finger turned to gold. For the rest of his life, he was left with this strange scar.

  The machine had become the Midas curse. When a trusted assistant attempted to remove the key, the electrical shock that ran through his body turned him to golden dust in moments. In anger, Suleiman threw a lead brick at the engine. The engine spit it back out as solid gold. And then, oddly, the sound from the machine changed. It seemed to be lessened.

  Soon, they found whatever they could to throw into the gyro, feeding it. Some things were destroyed. Others were turned into gold. Quickly, they decided to use only lead and iron, and the machine responded. They understood that the gold dust left from the assistant was the lead and iron from his body being converted. With every act of alchemy, the engine calmed. Once there was enough calm, they decided to dismantle Il Magna.

  It took a delicate touch and seemingly the strength of a mountain to remove the pieces. At first, they found that even separating them did not stop the energy. Then they found that energy, even in the separate pieces, would begin building again. They had to reassemble the machine, feed it lead until it stopped moving and turning and, as they said, singing. They had to rebuild it and take it apart again and again. Since then, it has been the job of our people to uncreate Il Magna, to build and unbuild it.

  When they finally dismantled the engine, they knew it was time. They had witnessed the magic of Il Magna. They had given their hearts and minds to this project, but it was time to separate. They had grown to love the poet king. With a heavy heart, they parted ways, declaring their silence and their loyalty and shared a promise to reveal Il Magna only when it was safe—only when the world was ready. Unfortunately, the world may never be.

  The Death of a Gentle Soul

  It was then Suleiman turned his attention to Mustafa and The Nefarious Kor. He thought, first, he must bring something to catch the attention of his wife. He must make something to woo her affections. Because her head had been so turned by Kor, Suleiman must bring her something beautiful to turn it back towards him.

  He took what had once been a piece of lead, but was now gold from Il Magna, and melted it down. Using his talents as an artist, he made her a beautiful heart of gold. But he didn’t know that this gift would feel like lead in his own heart. Suleiman went to his tower, where he melted down the gold encasement. He spent hours molding it and shaping it until it was the most elegant and beautiful golden heart in the world. This, he decided, he would present to his wife.

  As Hugh Fial writes:

  My dear friend and sultan, such sorrow would come to fall upon you. Oh, the heart of gold would weigh heavy on Suleiman. Soon after his creation, as he prepared to confront his wife and Kor about the lies told of Mustafa, a servant came to him, begging the sultan to come immediately to his wife. Upon arriving at the harem, he was told that she had left. He went to her private chambers and found her there with Kor, crying in his arms. Her sadness seemed to increase at the arrival of Suleiman. She threw herself at his feet.

  “What is it, my love?” Suleiman asked.

  “She has been attacked,” hissed Kor.

  “I did not ask you, servant,” spit Suleiman. “I speak to my wife. Do not answer for her or I will have your head.”

  “As you wish,” Kor answered and feigned a respectful bow.

  Through her tears, Roxalene explained that the king’s beloved Mustafa had attacked her and threatened the life of her young son once again. An attempt to ask her why Mustafa would have done such a thing was met only with renewed sobs and cries. She told Suleiman that she had called for the guards but they had not come. She insisted that they were in the pay of Suleiman’s evil son.

  “This cannot be!” roared Suleiman. His son Mustafa was a gentle and kind boy. He had never done anything to harm anyone. He had even come to the defense of Roxalene.

  “There was nothing I could do,” she cried. “Luckily, Kor was there and he beat Mustafa, who was like a mad dog. Mustafa finally fell from me.”

  “You dare touch the skin of the prince?” roared the king. He could see his wife bore neither bruise nor torn clothing. She quickly claimed that she had changed and had burned the torn and bloodied clothing. She refused to let him see her body, declaring that the ugliness would turn him against her. Suleiman called for Mustafa to defend his actions.

  “I threw him in the cell below the kitchens,”sneered Kor.

  “How dare you touch the dirt upon which my son stands!” bellowed Suleiman. “He is the future sultan and you will bow before him.”

  But Kor was never to bow before Mustafa, nor would Suleiman free his son. The gentle Mustafa, the boy who would be king, the boy who, like his father, loved poetry and beauty, was put to death before Suleiman could stop Kor’s unjustified command for execution. Suleiman knew it was Kor who had given the order in the king’s name.

  Roxalene swore that it was a misunderstanding on the part of the foolish prison guards, that no one had intended this to happen. Suleiman was ready to kill Kor for this treason. Only because he loved Roxalene beyond reason, and because his heart was crushed by the death of his son, did Suleiman put his dagger in his belt and turn from Kor, leaving his wife’s advisor unslain.

  Heartsick and despondent, Suleiman lay in a fever for days, taking only sips of cool water brought by timid servants. Roxalene, on the other hand, spent many hours telling Selim, her baby boy, of how one day he would be sultan like his father. In his fever, Suleiman did not immediately notice that the heart of gold he had carried for his wife had mysteriously vanished.

  Perhaps the truth behind that theft shall never be known. Perhaps the golden heart evaporated into thin air. But Suleiman believed it was the Nefarious Kor, murderer and thief, who took it. Afterward, life would never be the same for Suleiman. He would always question whether had he gone to his son first, he could have saved Mustafa. Many in his palace believed the sultan himself had called for his son’s execution. But Suleiman was determined that Kor would never get his hands on Il Magna.

  Suleiman and the scientists made plans for the strange round bird. Each piece would be given to a different scientist. The pieces would be disguised as personal tokens. When the pieces began to show that they were building in energy, the scientists would come together and rebuild Il Magna, feed it, and calm it. They would dismantle it again and separate. With a heavy heart, they would again go their separate ways.

  After their departure, the inventors met again only three times before Suleiman was killed in battle in 1566. Each time was to rebuild and dismantle Il Magna. Twenty members of the Order of the Knights in Black were sent to collect the scientists on each of the three occasions when the power began to build again.

  The first time, it took two years before the pieces of Il Magna became restless, sparking energy,
demanding to be put back together, and fed lead and iron. The second time, it took ten years. Eventually, it took a generation (or thirty years) for the energy to start growing, and that has remained the interval ever since. The great engine would silently regenerate over those decades until its element, key and wings, could no longer be kept apart. Literally pulling towards each other, the strange round bird begins to draw itself back into one whole.

  Komar Romak

  Sadly, none of the scientists escaped unharmed. All became victims of villainous plots, in every case, at the hands of a pair of villains. And always, the villains escaped. In every case, the thieves were distinguished by their strange moustache, but in every case the men couldn’t be described otherwise. They were tall, short, fat, thin, dark, fair, fast, crippled, or bespectacled. They were in more than one place at the same time. Kor was invisible and everywhere. And nowhere.

  Several attempts were made to steal the engine. Suleiman knew that Kor and Rustem were at the heart of those attempts. The king decided that it would not be safe to always return to the laboratory and, by 1550, more remote and secret laboratories were built for the scientists. They moved their first meeting from the Citadel to Istanbul. The second gathering of inventors took place in Athens, the third in the mountains of Abruzzi, in the chateau Suleiman had built as a young man.

  In Abruzzo, there was an attempt to take the life of one of the Knights in Black. In Athens, the murder of another knight was a success. No one place was deemed safe enough. Suleiman wrote only, “It is not safe to rest as such, beknown only unto me.” He knew that he had to find a way to share the knowledge and, with that, find safety for his invention.

  Upon returning to Istanbul from the laboratory in the Abruzzi, Suleiman found Roxalene very ill. She was unable to speak, but she seemed quite agitated. This is their conversation, as he remembered it: