The Glass Lantern of Lorong Tiga

When I was a boy in the late 1960s, my family lived in a narrow two-story shophouse along Lorong Tiga, a quiet lane in the older part of George Town, Penang. The street was lined with durian trees, and every evening the air smelled of rain, kerosene, and boiling tea from the coffee shop at the corner. My parents often worried about me, saying I had ‘the eye’—a gift, or maybe a curse, passed down from my father’s grandmother, a jungle medicine woman from the deep south of Thailand. I never knew her, but I carried her name, Kamal, as if that alone bound me to the unseen.

On Sunday nights, we would walk the short distance to my paternal grandmother’s house, which stood at the end of the lane, its façade cracked and stained with damp. The walk was pleasant enough, though I always felt a shiver when we passed the old well, a circular stone mouth where the street light never quite reached. My sister, Aisha, who was older and bolder, would skip ahead, but I clung to my mother’s hand, my eyes scanning the shadows that pooled between the houses and under the wooden balconies.

One evening, I was four, maybe five, and we were returning from grandmother’s after dinner. The moon was a pale coin, and the street was almost deserted, save for an old man wheeling a cart of vegetables, his bare feet slapping the wet stones. As we neared the well, I noticed something that made me stop. There, resting on the edge of the well, was a small glass lantern, unlit but glowing faintly from within, like a firefly trapped in amber. It was unlike anything I had seen, with a brass base and a glass chimney etched with tiny figures that seemed to move when I blinked.

I pointed and said, ‘Look, a lantern.’ My parents glanced, but their faces showed nothing. ‘What lantern?’ my father asked, his voice sharp. ‘There’s nothing there, Kamal. Keep walking.’ But I saw it, and I felt a pull, a soft whisper that sounded like my own name, but not from my parents. I let go of my mother’s hand and stepped closer to the well. The lantern grew brighter, and I could see that the etching depicted a woman with a long braid, reaching out into the dark.

My mother yanked me back, her grip tight. ‘Don’t touch it,’ she said, her voice trembling. Aisha was silent, her eyes wide. My father hurried us along, and I looked back to see the lantern still there, now casting a long shadow that seemed to stretch toward us. That night, I dreamed of the woman in the etching, her face half in shadow, and she spoke to me in a language I didn’t know but somehow understood: ‘You must return it, Kamal. It is not yours to keep.’ But I had not taken anything.

Weeks passed, and I tried to forget the lantern, but I couldn’t. I would see it in my mind’s eye, and sometimes, in the corner of my vision, I would catch a glimpse of it glowing in a window or under a table. My parents grew more protective, warning me to avoid the well after dark, but I was drawn there, almost against my will. One afternoon, while playing alone, I walked to the well, and the lantern was there again, bathed in a sickly sweet light. I reached out, and my fingers brushed the cold glass. The moment I touched it, the world tilted, and I saw a flood of images: a clearing in a thick jungle, a fire burning, a ring of women chanting, and at the center, my great-grandmother, her face smeared with ash, holding a lantern just like this one.

The vision shattered, and I was back, but the lantern was gone. In its place, a small brass bell lay on the ground. I picked it up, my heart racing. I hid it in my pocket, feeling its weight, and a warmth spread through my chest. My mother noticed the bell when I got home and grew pale. ‘Where did you get that?’ she demanded. I told her the truth, and she began to cry, saying my father had thrown the bell into the well years ago, after his mother died, to sever the family’s connection to the spirit world. But now I had brought it back, and with it, I had opened a door.

The bell began to ring on its own, at odd hours, a soft, insistent chime that only I could hear. And in the nights, I would see the woman from the etching standing at the foot of my bed, her braid swinging, her eyes hollow. She did not speak, but she pointed toward the window, toward the street, toward the well. I knew she wanted the bell returned, or perhaps, she wanted something else—something my father had taken from her. I could not sleep; I grew thin and pale, and my parents took me to a bomoh who lived at the edge of town.

The bomoh, a wizened man with a missing ear, listened to my story and nodded. He said the lantern was a ‘vessel,’ a captured spirit of a guardian, and the bell was its anchor. My great-grandmother had bound a spirit to protect our family, but my father, in grief and fear, had tried to break the bond by throwing the bell away. Now, the spirit was loose, and it wanted either to be bound again or to be released completely. ‘You must decide,’ he said, ‘or it will consume your family.’

I knew what I had to do. That night, under the full moon, I walked to the well, the bell heavy in my hand. The lantern was there, waiting, its flame a ghostly blue. I approached, and the woman from the etching materialized beside it, her face now clearer—stern, sad, beautiful. She pointed to the lantern, then to the bell. I understood: I had to light the lantern with the bell as its wick, and then the spirit would be free, but the protection would end. Or, I could ring the bell three times, and the spirit would be bound again, but then I would be its keeper, forever tied to the spirit world.

I trembled, thinking of my family. My father had tried to escape the legacy, but I had been chosen. I raised the bell, and for a moment, I heard my great-grandmother’s voice, not from the woman, but from deep in my bones: ‘Kamal, you are not alone. The spirit is your guardian, not your master. Choose with a pure heart.’ I looked at the woman, and she nodded, as if giving me permission. I rang the bell three times.

The sound was like a hammer on an anvil, echoing through the night. The lantern’s flame flared, and the woman vanished, pulled back into the glass. The lantern began to float, rising to the sky, and as it ascended, the bell dissolved in my hand, turning to dust. I felt a warmth spread through me, and then a great weight lifted. The well became just a well, and the street quiet, and I was alone.

I never saw the lantern again, but sometimes, in the flicker of a candle or the glint of a firefly, I feel a presence—a protective gaze. My parents grew less anxious, and I went on to live a normal life, or so it seemed. But I have kept our story to myself, until now. The loyalty of the guardian is eternal, and the bell will ring for its keeper when the time comes. I only hope I am ready.

Years later, after my father’s death, I traveled to the old village in Thailand, seeking the source of our legacy. I found the house of my great-grandmother, now a ruin, and in its courtyard, half-buried in the earth, lay a tarnished brass bell—identical to the one I had held. I knelt, and as I picked it up, it rang, a sound that seemed to unravel the years. I knew then that the cycle would begin again, and that I was not the last, but the first of a new line. The lantern still burns, somewhere, and it will be found by the one who carries the eye. I only hope they are strong enough to face the dark.