Legend XLII – The Lost Ship in the Desert

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In those days, when the desert devoured stories like a greedy god, tales were told of a ship that had never seen the sea, yet smelled of salt. A ship of dark wood, its planks covered in shells, though around it was nothing but sand and silence. The nomads called it only the Lost One, and those who approached it did so in hushed voices, as if the ship itself could listen. It is said to have appeared on a moonless night. The dunes lay still like sleeping animals, until suddenly a wind arose, smelling of the deep, cold sea. When the storm subsided, there it stood: a three-masted ship, half-buried in the sand, with sails flapping in the wind, though there was no breeze. The first to find it was a young caravan leader named Rafi. He was a seeker, one of those rare people who relied more on questions than on water. When he caught sight of the ship, he sensed it wasn't deserted—it was waiting. The planks creaked as he stepped aboard. Not a footprint in the sand, not a rope moved, not a single frayed hawse. And yet, everything seemed…inhabited. Inside, the ship smelled of storm, of salt, and of something he didn't recognize: memory. On the deck, he found a lantern whose flame wasn't burning, but hovering like a drop of light. Beside it lay a compass, its needle pointing not north, but in a direction Rafi couldn't name. As he picked it up, he heard a faint whisper, like the hushed commands of a captain long since turned to dust. But the ship carried him further into the depths. He opened a door that gave way like a breath. In the cabin, he saw something that shouldn't be there: Seawater, still as a mirror, filled the space to chest height—and yet it didn't leak out. Images floated above the water's surface: a crew battling a storm, a captain scarred by salt, a compass that betrayed their course had never existed. Rafi slowly understood: the ship had never sailed. It had been cursed to search for what it could not find. When he left the cabin, the sky had changed. The stars above the desert were closer together, brighter, as if they had held their breath. And the ship, which had just been half-buried in the sand, now stood higher—as if slowly rising from the desert. The wind turned cold. The deck began to creak. The sails billowed without air. And Rafi heard it for the first time: the distant, deep crash of waves. But there was no ocean. The desert itself began to flow. Sand moved like water, dunes rolled like waves. The ship lifted, climbed onto a shifting dune, and glided through the night as if the desert were becoming a sea of golden waves. Rafi clung to the railing as the compass in his hand began to glow. The needle no longer pointed into the void—it pointed downwards. Into the depths. Beneath the sand. There, where a sea must exist, one that no one had ever set foot on.