Brine Lake

Flat black water fills the floor of a cavern so wide that the far shore is only a guess. A vault of grey salt arches overhead, ribbed and glittering, and its reflection hangs upside down in the still lake. Lamps on tall iron posts march along the near shore. Each one is doubled in the water. Past the last of them the shore curves off into darkness. Salt crust rims the edge in thick white ledges, brittle as old ice. On the walls, faint pale bands step up the rock one above another, tide lines left by a lake that has no tide. A small flat-bottomed boat is tied to a post beside a wooden pump housing and a coil of hose. The air is cold and tastes of salt. Somewhere far out, well below the surface, a faint ghostly glow drifts like pale coral in deep sea water.