Legend has it that every year, the inhabitants of a small lagoon community hidden among Venice's islands lose the nail of their big toe-it darkens, weakens, and falls off. This never happened to Marco, known as 'Mutrion' as a child, because at twenty he left, abandoning friends and family. Four years later, he returns to mend a broken heart and rediscover the faces and landscapes he left behind. Chief among them is Maicol, a childhood friend turned fisherman, who chose to stay, following his father and grandfather's path. Maicol forces Marco to confront his uneasy bond with the place he fled, stirring old ghosts and memories that grow more vivid-and more threatening. A hostile landscape, yet one that lives inside him more than he ever thought.