The Gutted Lantern

I’d been in Copper Falls for three years, ever since my uncle died and left me his old house. The town had maybe ninety souls on a good census year, and the roads were more gravel than asphalt, with streetlights that flickered like dying fireflies. The nearest real city was an hour’s drive, and at night, the silence was so complete you could hear your own heartbeat. I didn’t mind it. I liked the quiet, the way the dark swallowed the mountains whole, and the fact that my neighbor, June, was the first person in ages who didn’t make me feel like an outsider.

We’d become fast friends, bonding over shared miseries and a weird habit of finishing each other’s thoughts. It was uncanny, the way we’d think the same thing at the same moment, and then one of us would say it, and the other would grin, ‘I was just about to say that.’ It was a little game we played, and it made the isolation bearable.

The night of the storm, I was supposed to go to her place to pick up a book I’d lent her—some old horror novel she’d been dying to read. The sky had been a bruised purple all day, and the air felt thick, like the town was holding its breath. By nine, the wind had picked up, rattling the windows, and the faint hum of the old power lines was replaced by a low, groaning moan. I should have stayed put, but I had a restless energy, a feeling I couldn’t shake, like I needed to move.

I had two ways to get to June’s: the road, which wound around the hill, past the abandoned church and the overgrown cemetery, or the shortcut through my backyard, up the slope, and across the old wooden footbridge that spanned the creek. The road was longer by a few minutes, but it was lit by streetlights that actually worked, for the most part. The shortcut was faster but pitch black, with only my flashlight and the uncertain glow of the moon behind clouds. I chose the shortcut, because the road had this way of stretching out, and I was eager to see June.

The backyard was a tangle of weeds and dead grass, and my flashlight beam cut a weak path through the dark. The wind whistled through the trees, and I could smell rain coming. I crossed the footbridge, the wood groaning under my boots, and the creek below was a black ribbon, swollen with unseen water. On the other side, the path was barely a suggestion, a narrow dirt track that wound through a thicket of pines. I hurried, my heart thumping with that inexplicable urgency.

That’s when I saw it, lying in the middle of the path: a lantern. It was old, made of rusted metal, with glass panels that were cracked and smeared with something dark. The flame inside was a sickly blue, guttering as if it were dying, but it threw off a cold, sharp light that made the shadows seem deeper. I’d never seen it before, and I had walked this path a hundred times. I stooped, my hand hovering over it, and a chill ran down my spine. The flame flickered, and for a moment, I thought I heard a whisper, but it was just the wind.

I left it there, telling myself it was probably junk someone had dumped. But as I moved on, the feeling of being watched grew stronger. The trees seemed to lean in, their branches scraping like claws. I quickened my pace, and soon I saw the dim rectangle of June’s kitchen window, glowing warm and yellow. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding, and I ran the last few steps, eager to get inside.

June opened the door before I knocked, her face pale and her eyes wide. ‘You saw it, didn’t you? The lantern?’ She spoke in a hushed, frantic voice. I nodded, confused. ‘I thought I was the only one,’ she said, pulling me inside and locking the door behind me. ‘It’s been appearing all over town. Two days ago, it was on the porch of the old Gillespie place. Yesterday, it was in the middle of the main road, just sitting there, no one around. And every time, something bad happens.’ I didn’t know what to say. The book was forgotten as she told me about the fires that had broken out in the boarded-up houses, the power outages, and the strange sounds, like a child crying, coming from the woods.

We decided to investigate, because that’s what you do in a small town—you try to make sense of the senseless. We bundled up and went out into the storm, which had started to rain in earnest. The lantern was still there, but it seemed to be pulsating now, the blue flame growing brighter, then dimmer, as if it were breathing. The light cast long, distorted shadows of the trees around us, and I noticed that the shadows didn’t quite match the shapes of the branches. One shadow, in particular, looked like a hunched figure, and it seemed to move independently of the tree it should have come from.

We watched, frozen, as the shadow detached itself from the tree and began to crawl along the ground toward us. It was a black shape, roughly human but wrong—limbs too long, head too large, and it moved with a jerky, unnatural gait. June grabbed my arm, and we backed away slowly, but the shadow came faster. I felt a cold draft, and the lantern’s flame flared up, casting that distorted light everywhere, and the shadow split into two, then three, circling us.

We ran, but the shadows were swift, and they seemed to be everywhere, slipping between the raindrops, reaching out with grasping tendrils. I tripped on a root, and June pulled me up, and we stumbled into my backyard. I thought we were safe, but I saw the lantern had followed us, sitting at the edge of my porch, glowing. The shadows were closing in, and I realized they were all converging on the lantern, as if it were a beacon.

My mind raced. The lantern was the source. If we could put it out, maybe the shadows would disappear. I lunged for it, ignoring June’s scream, and I grabbed the hot metal handle. The pain was searing, but I didn’t let go. I hurled it into the creek, and with a hiss, the water swallowed it. The blue flame died, and the shadows flickered, then vanished, leaving us in the rain and the dark.

We stood there for a long time, panting, not moving. The storm began to ease, and the clouds parted, revealing a sliver of moon. I looked at June, and she looked at me, and for a moment, we were silent, and I knew she was thinking what I was thinking. But this time, I said it first. ‘That lantern,’ I said, ‘it was a warning.’ She nodded, and then she said, ‘But a warning for what?’

We didn’t have an answer. The next day, the town was quiet, as if nothing had happened. But a week later, a fire broke out in the old church, and all that was left was a charred husk. And I could have sworn, in the smoldering ruins, I saw something glinting—a flash of blue, like a flame. I haven’t told June, but I’ve started taking the long way around town, always in the daylight, and I never go out at night without checking the creek bed for any sign of an old, rusted lantern.