The Caliph Stork a personalized book with your child as the hero

In the city of Baghdad there lived a kindly caliph named Chasid. One warm afternoon he sat in his palace garden, beside a fountain, while his vizier Mansor stood nearby. A child from the palace, with an ochre satchel on one shoulder, had come to deliver a message and stopped behind a flowering hedge, because a peddler had just sold the caliph a small closed box.

Inside the box lay a pinch of strange powder and a scrap of paper with writing the caliph could hardly read. The vizier frowned at it, and the caliph laughed softly. The paper said that whoever sniffed the powder and spoke the word Mutabor could become any animal and understand its language. To return, the person had to bow three times toward the east and say the word again. But, the paper warned, one must never laugh while in animal shape, or the word would be forgotten.

The child's heart thumped. It was a wonderful idea, but also a risky one. The child stayed where they were, at a safe distance, while the caliph and the vizier each took a pinch of the powder, raised it to their noses and said the word together.

Golden light swirled around them like warm smoke. When it cleared, two tall white storks stood on the path, with red bills, slender legs and bright, startled eyes. The child gasped, but the storks only looked at each other, then at the fountain, and clacked their bills with delight.

They had hardly stretched their wings before they heard a frog on the fountain's edge, grumbling in a perfectly clear voice about the heat. A little bird on the wall answered him, and the two storks understood every word. They began to laugh, in a clattering, bobbing way, and the vizier stork even lifted a foot to dance.

Then the caliph stork stopped. He turned to the vizier and made a worried noise. Neither could remember the word. They had laughed, as the paper had warned, and Mutabor had slipped out of their heads like water through fingers. They bowed to the east anyway, again and again, but nothing happened.

The child came out from behind the hedge and knelt beside them. They knew these storks must be the caliph and the vizier, because the vizier stork was already trying to bring his wing to his forehead in his old thoughtful way. The child said softly, "I will help you. We will find the word." The storks looked at the child and bowed their long necks, and so the three of them set off together.

They walked through the city until the sky grew pink, and then they came to an old pavilion where the paving stones were cracked and ivy hung from the pillars. Inside, a large owl sat on a broken column with great round eyes, as though she had been waiting for them. When she saw the storks she hooted gently, and her eyes looked sad and clever at once.

The storks could understand her, and they told the child what she said. She was a princess who had been enchanted by a wicked magician named Kaschnur, and she knew he would soon meet his friends in a ruined hall nearby. If he spoke of his magic, the word might fall from his lips. She would guide them, but she needed someone small and quiet who could hide well and listen carefully.

The child lifted a little lantern and nodded. They followed the owl through a crumbling archway, and the storks tiptoed on either side, trying to be as quiet as storks can be, which is not very. At last they reached a ruined hall lit by many candles. Dust floated in the golden air, and in the middle stood the magician, spreading his robes and speaking proudly to his friends.

The child crept behind a broad stone column. The owl landed beside them, and the storks pressed close. The child cupped a hand to one ear and listened. The magician bragged about how he had tricked the princess and how many clever spells he knew. Then he laughed and said, "And whoever hears the word Mutabor must never forget it!" The child held their breath, and they repeated the word silently, over and over, until it was fixed in their mind like a bright coin.

Quietly, the group slipped away from the hall and out into the moonlit courtyard. The owl hooted, and the storks looked at the child with hope in their eyes. The child stood straight, took a deep breath and said, "Mutabor!" The storks bent low three times toward the east, as the paper had taught.

Golden light rose around them. For one moment there were feathers everywhere, and then the feathers were silk robes. The caliph and the vizier stood where the storks had been, blinking and laughing, and this time they laughed only because they were happy. Beside them, the owl's wings melted into a gown, and a young princess stood there with tears of joy in her eyes.

The caliph took the child's hand and bowed to them, and the vizier bowed too. "You listened when we could not," said the caliph. "You remembered when we forgot." The princess smiled and thanked the child for the bravest kind of help: staying quiet, staying close and staying true.

The magician never learned what had happened. He was still boasting in his hall when they left, and he went on boasting to his friends long after the candles burned low.

Back at the palace, the caliph ordered a feast in the courtyard, where fountains sparkled and the flowers were opening. Dishes of fruit and honey sweets were set out on low tables, and the frog from the garden fountain was invited too. The vizier told the story three times, and each time he made the storks more graceful. The princess laughed gently. The caliph said that in future he would be very careful with magic powder. And the child, sitting between friends with the ochre satchel on their lap, listened and smiled, and never forgot the word.