Chapter 7.5 — The Container of the Sea

The black container vibrated like a giant drum. It sounded as if a whole ocean was beating against its walls, impatient to be set free. Poseidon stroked the sheet metal with an almost tender gesture, as if he were soothing a colossal beast held in a cage.

— "Every sea is a memory. This one remembers its storms, its shipwrecks, its drowned prayers. Open it, and you will see that water never forgets."

I didn't answer. The notebook burned against my chest, as if it wanted to protest, but my hands were frozen. Poseidon drew back a heavy iron latch. A damp breath escaped immediately, saturated with the smell of seaweed and salt. Then he swung the door open.

The inside contained nothing solid. Just a liquid darkness, a deep, bluish black, vibrating like a taut surface. I expected a wave, but what emerged was stranger: a tide without gravity, a mass of suspended water that refused to fall. Silver fish swam in circles, jellyfish pulsed like lanterns, and at the center, an invisible current drew the eye.

Poseidon smiled, proud. — "That is my merchandise."

The sea took a step forward. Yes, a step. The waves slid out of the container but remained compact, as if they had learned to walk. The water flowed and stood upright at the same time. The liquid dockworkers bowed, acknowledging their origin.

I stepped back. The notebook opened by itself: Do not touch. The salt erases. The letters seemed hastily written, trembling.

Poseidon plunged his hand into the liquid mass. His skin became covered in reflections, as if he were dipping his flesh into a mirror. When he pulled it out, a seashell rested in his palm. He handed it to me.

— "Here. Listen."

I held the shell to my ear. Not the sound of the sea, like in the stories. A voice. Dozens of voices. Muffled cries, interrupted prayers, drowned secrets. All those who had been lost in the abyss, condensed into a conch. I dropped the object, horrified. It fell to the ground, but instead of breaking, it melted into a puddle. The puddle evaporated instantly.

Poseidon burst into a calm laugh. — "Every contract signed in salt gives me the right to their memories. The past is my cargo, Inspector. Not just the water, but the memories it erases."

The notebook vibrated again. In its margin, a new phrase inscribed itself: Fiora knew. The seas store the forbidden archives.

I looked up. The water, still alive, spread across the quay, snaking between the cobblestones like a curious beast. Shapes formed in its flow—drowned faces, outstretched hands. Some were whispering my name.

I stepped back further. Poseidon, however, remained serene, master of this captive tide. — "The sea never lies. It signs. And every signature is a debt."

He snapped his fingers. The waves retreated, docile, and returned to the container. The door closed with a dull thud. Silence returned immediately, but a wet, heavy silence, laden with echoes.

Poseidon turned to me. — "You have seen, Inspector. Now you understand why the gods no longer beg for prayers. They don't need them anymore. The sea itself is their ledger."

He tapped the container's metal, satisfied. — "And soon, Vetranta will have to sign. In salt. Or dissolve."

The Salt Debt

When I left the quay, the night had taken on a murky color. Not the usual black, but a gloom streaked with reflections, as if the sea had started breathing right into the air. The wind, instead of bringing the smell of iodine, carried whiffs of wet rust. Even the street lamps seemed to be moistening from the inside, their bulbs crackling like seashells closed the wrong way.

I crossed the alleys towards the center. Every step made something crunch under my soles. At first I thought I was walking on eggshells, but looking down, I saw they were grains of salt. They had spread everywhere, as if the city had received an invisible, corrosive rain.

An old woman, sitting in her doorway, was sweeping frantically. Her fingers trembled. The salt reformed as soon as she swept it away. She looked up at me with a desperate gaze. — "It's not dust, Inspector... It's my memory."

I wanted to answer, but the words died in my throat. I looked at her again: her eyes were already losing their shine, as if a part of her had dissolved. Fiora's notebook opened in my pocket, abruptly, scribbling a phrase on its own: Every grain weighs a memory.

Further on, in the Piazza dei Girasoli, the children who had played under the rain of feathers the day before were there again. They had built piles of salt like sandcastles. But when their hands touched them, the salt dissolved into their skin. The kids stopped dead, a void in their gaze, forgetting mid-sentence what they were saying. A little girl burst out laughing, then suddenly asked her sister: — "What's your name again?"

The sister stayed silent. Her name had been erased.

I hurried towards the sea. On the quays, the boats were rocking strangely. Not because of the waves, but because they seemed to remember other ports. The hulls changed names before my eyes: Santa Maria became Horizon IX, then Ilha Perdida, then a simple mathematical symbol. As if every signature in salt was blurring the world's records.

A dockworker passed near me. His skin was damp, shiny, and his eyes gleamed with a seaweed-like sheen. Brushing past me, he whispered: — "You let the sea sign, Inspector. So the city will pay."

I thought I recognized Poseidon's voice in his anonymous lips.

The wind redoubled, carrying a drizzle that was no longer quite water. When I held out my hand, I saw salt crystals forming on my palm. The notebook, meanwhile, weighed like a burning stone. I opened a page at random: numbers, equations, and a warning written by hand: The debt always begins with a grain.

And already, Vetranta was cracking under this white dust.

The Sea Demands

The next morning, the city awoke with a taste of iron in its mouth. Although the cafes on the piazza served their burning espressos, the bitterness of salt settled at the bottom of every cup, like a persistent dregs. No one commented on it aloud, but the exchanged glances said enough.

The newspapers distributed by Hermes all spoke of the same phenomenon: Saline Invasion. In the printed photos, you could see the steps of the town hall covered in a fine white dust, the facades cracked by crystals like mineral spiderwebs. In the margins of the articles, the letters were gradually fading, as if the salt was gnawing at the ink.

At the market, the fishmongers were shouting louder than usual, but their tanks were overflowing with species that didn't exist in this sea. Translucent eels, crabs with legs of seaweed, jellyfish folded like sails. People bought them anyway: hunger demands it. Some claimed that by eating them, you recovered a lost memory. Others swore the opposite: that they stole the names and faces of your loved ones.

Mara, meanwhile, watched the crowd from the threshold of her bakery. The salt was infiltrating even her bread, hardening the crusts, making the crumb brittle. She said to me, in a grave tone: — "It's a contract, Ivo. You don't sweep away the salt. You pay it."

I didn't dare taste her bread that morning.

At the port, Poseidon was nowhere to be found. But his liquid dockworkers continued their rounds, silent, their steps leaving wet trails behind them that dirtied the ground like signatures. The black container was closed again, locked, but I could still feel the pulse of the captive sea through its walls. Each beat gave me the impression that Vetranta itself was breathing too hard, too fast.

At night, the lighthouse blinked three times. Then three times again. A silent SOS, but addressed to whom? Offshore, the sea began to glow, as if constellations had drowned in its waves. I felt certain the city was now inscribed in a ledger beyond its grasp.

Fiora's notebook scribbled a phrase by itself, in dark letters: When the sea signs, the land forgets.

And already, in the streets, some inhabitants no longer knew how to get home.

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