Across the parchment, a procession of improbable tools stands like a tiny pantheon—
each one an oath to movement, each one a riddle about force.
The Tremor-Frame
Three handles, red as startled coral,
hinged to a bowed spine of polished wood.
It is said that when all three are pulled at once,
the earth shivers politely, remembering old agreements with gravity.
The Triple-Bladed Compass
A vertical staff crowned with crescent blades,
its red-and-black beak pointing toward decisions not yet made.
When spun, it chooses a direction no map dares to mark—
a cartography of hesitation.
The Sworn Tower
A dotted conical body rises like a spotted seed of metal bark.
Eyes? Doors? Echo ports?
No one agrees.
Two wheels hum at its waist,
shifting color with mood or weather or both.
Rows of rods, raised solemnly,
their tiny red tips tapping out arguments of balance.
Below them, metal globes sway on taut strings—
a debate conducted entirely through rhythm.
And then the marginalia begins:
These are The Six Negotiators of Motion,
devices once used to settle disputes between wind and structure.
their purposes half-forgotten:
One measured hesitation,
one separated truth from rumor,
one carved invisible paths through crowds,
one counted the number of steps a lie takes before it collapses.
One speaks of a ritual during eclipses
when engineers would bring these relics to the city’s roofs,
raising them like tuning forks to the sky,
listening for the faint hum of cosmic alignment.
“Misalign the blades, and the disputing winds may return.
Stability is a conversation—never a law.”
The Maharajagar 