“But be careful. Not all spices are benevolent. Clove gives power only to those who come with the intention of remembering. If you use it for power, it closes forever. And then only ashes remain.”
Alfredo pressed the second button. There was no song. But there was silence. Wise, deep. Like a pause between heartbeats.
“And then?” he asked.
Raphael stood up.
— Now you must return. To the world. To the city. To the people. And start cooking. One recipe at a time. One cup at a time. Let the clove speak for itself—to those who are ready to listen.
The next day Alfredo was standing at the market again, but now on the other side of the stall. He wasn’t selling—he was serving. With tea. Simple: water, cloves, a warm word. Some passed by. But those who stopped held their breath and looked into the cup as if into a mirror of the past.
And the song began again.
Chapter II. Those Who Hear
A week passed. Then another. Alfredo never returned to his old life. He closed his culinary shop and opened a small teahouse instead. No sign, no advertising. Just a narrow door with the aroma of spices that opened when evening descended on the city.
People came first by chance. They felt that the place was different: here the silence did not oppress, but embraced. Here the tea did not just warm – it reminded. Something forgotten. Something that never was. Here conversations began in which words seemed superfluous.
He prepared the clove tea by hand. Each button was like a key to a specific heart. Sometimes one, sometimes three, sometimes none, if the person wasn’t ready. He didn’t explain, he didn’t lecture. He just poured it into the cup and waited. The reactions were always different.
A man with trembling hands froze, clutching his glass, and whispered,
“I smelled the scent of my father’s coat again. He died in 1987. I had forgotten that smell. Now it’s with me again.”
A woman who came in one morning with puffy eyes whispered after the first sip,
“I’m no longer afraid to remember my daughter. She’s not gone. She’s just changed.”
Every day was like a little journey through the memories of other people’s souls. Alfredo wrote everything down—not for himself, but because he felt the carnation begging him: “Remember. I can’t carry it all alone.”
But once, in late autumn, when the air became heavy and the city began to smell of rain and smoke, a man who smelled of nothing entered the teahouse.
He was tall, slender, in a black coat that shone in the streetlight as if coated with a thin layer of oil. His eyes were gray—too gray, as if there was no sky behind them. Only ash.
“You are Alfredo,” he said without asking.
“And who are you?” the other replied, without looking up from the kettle.
“I have come for the book.”
The book. The scroll Raphael had given him. He kept it under the stone teapot, wrapped in linen, like a sacred object.
“It’s not for sale,” he replied calmly.
“I know. But it should have been with us by now.” Rafael knew that.
Alfredo looked up. The gray one didn’t look evil. He was… empty. Like a man whose voice had long since died.
“You came for the recipe. But not for the meaning.”
The man smiled slightly.
“We came for access. To knowledge. You opened it yourself, succumbing to the song. And now, without knowing it, you have set in motion a process. People remember. But memory is a weapon. It must be controlled.”
Alfredo stood up. He was no longer a cook. He was not just a man with a kettle. He was a guard.
“I won’t give it away. Even if I have to…”
“To die?” said the gray one. “Without pathos. We don’t kill. We erase.”
He took out a small bottle. Inside — an amber-colored liquid.
— Drink it. And you will forget. Everything. Me, the clove, Raphael. You will remain just a good tea master. You will live peacefully. Without a past. Without anxiety. Without strength.
At that moment the tea room darkened. A wind, like a strange voice, passed over the walls. The flame of the lamp flickered. But Alfredo remained standing.
“I’m not afraid to remember.”
He poured two glasses. In one – three buttons. In the other – none.
