9 - The Keeper of Stories.

The dregs of my coffee had long gone cold, but I remained in
the booth at The Salty Siren, the world outside the window a blur of grey sea
and sky. Arthur’s words had anchored me in place, shifting the very foundations
of the journey I thought I was on. This was no longer a simple escape from the
past; it was a pull toward a future I couldn’t have imagined. The symbols in
the cave, the pulsing light, the deep, resonant hum—it was all real, and
according to a man who looked as old as the coastline itself, it meant
something.

Leaving a few notes on the table, I stepped out of the
cafe's warmth and back into the brisk, salty air. The town of Seaview, which
had at first seemed merely a charmingly rugged port, now felt different, imbued
with a quiet significance. I saw secrets in the weathered faces of the
buildings and heard whispers in the cry of the gulls. I had a new destination,
one more concrete than any I’d had since leaving the city: Martha at the old
library building.

I asked a woman arranging a display of knitted hats in a
shop window for directions. She pointed a friendly finger down a side street
leading away from the harbor. "The Historical Society? That's the old
stone library, just past the church. Can't miss it. Martha's likely there; she
practically lives in that place."

The building was just as she'd described, a stoic, two-story
structure of dark, sea-stained stone, with tall, arched windows that seemed
like watchful eyes. A small, neatly lettered sign read "Seaview Historical
Society." Pushing open the heavy oak door, I was met not with silence, but
with the soft rustle of paper and the rich, comforting scent of aging books and
wood polish.

An elderly woman with sharp, intelligent eyes and silver
hair pulled back in a neat bun looked up from a large, map-strewn table.
"Can I help you?" she asked, her voice clear and precise.

"I'm looking for Martha," I said. "Arthur
from the cafe sent me."

A flicker of recognition crossed her face. "I'm Martha.
It's not often Arthur sends me visitors. This must be about more than the
town's fishing records."

I felt a nervous energy, the same mix of fear and excitement
I’d felt at the mouth of the cave. "He said you might have some old
journals," I began, choosing my words carefully. "Ones that mention a
place... Forgotten Falls."

Martha’s posture straightened, and she regarded me with a
new intensity, her gaze seeming to peel back layers, searching for something.
"The falls are just a local legend, mostly," she said, though her
tone suggested otherwise. "A story to spook tourists."

"I was there," I said quietly. "Last night. I
went into the cave behind the water."

The careful, professional mask she wore fell away, replaced
by the same undisguised gravity I had seen in Arthur. She placed the magnifying
glass she was holding down on the table. "You saw the markings?"

I nodded. "They glowed. I touched them."

For a long moment, she simply stared, her expression
unreadable. Then, with a sigh that seemed to carry the weight of generations,
she gestured for me to follow. "Come with me," she said. "The
journals Arthur spoke of are not for public viewing."

She led me through a maze of tall shelves into a small,
climate-controlled room at the back of the building. From a locked metal
cabinet, she carefully retrieved three thick, leather-bound volumes. They were
worn with age, their covers brittle and corners softened by time and countless
hands. She placed them on a clean, wooden table under a single, focused lamp.

"These are the private logs of the town's founders and
their descendants," she explained, her voice low. "They contain
observations, theories, and warnings. Most dismiss them as folklore. Arthur and
I do not."

With gentle reverence, I opened the first volume. The pages
were yellowed and fragile, filled with elegant, looping script in faded brown
ink. As I turned the pages, my breath caught. There, sketched with remarkable
accuracy, were the symbols from the cave wall. The complex web of lines and
curves was unmistakable.

Beside the sketches were notes, frantic and filled with
wonder. One entry, dated 1888, read: The light is not of this world. It
breathes with the tide. The pattern shifts, I am certain of it. It is a map,
but a map to where, or when?

Another entry from decades later theorized: The elders
spoke of the 'Star-Stone.' They believed the light within was a reflection of a
constellation not visible in our sky. They said it only reveals itself to those
who are lost, to guide them not home, but forward.

I traced the sketch of one particular symbol—a spiral with
three lines radiating from its center—that I distinctly remembered from the
cave. It had seemed to hum with a greater intensity than the others. Beside the
drawing, a single, cryptic sentence was scrawled:

The outside world had ceased to exist. The cubicle walls,
the deadlines, the droning traffic of my old life felt like a story about
someone else. This felt real. This search, this room, these ancient words—this
was the most important work I had ever done.

I looked up at Martha, who had been watching me silently.
"What does it mean?"

She shook her head, a sad, knowing look in her eyes.
"As Arthur said, the full knowledge was lost. These books are all that
remain—fragments of a much larger story. But they all agree on one thing."
She leaned forward, her gaze locking with mine. "That cave is a beginning.
A doorway. And it seems, for whatever reason, it has now opened for you."

#theturn