The Lantern Maker’s Vigil

I’ve always been the quiet one, the observer. My grandmother called it ‘the watcher’s gift,’ but I think it’s just that I’ve never felt the urge to shout into the dark. When my best friend Priya insisted we take the old ferry to the mainland for a ‘spirit night,’ I went along, not because I believed, but because I’d promised to keep her company. She’d found an antique planchette at a yard sale, and she was determined to use it in the ruins of the abandoned paper mill on the island. The mill had been closed since the ’70s, when a fire had killed three workers, and locals swore it was haunted. Priya was a skeptic, but she loved the thrill of a challenge.

We took the last ferry out, the sky bruised purple and orange as the sun bled into the ocean. The island was smaller than I remembered, a scrub of pine and rock, with the mill’s rusted skeleton looming against the skyline. Priya carried the lantern—an old oil lamp she’d found in her grandfather’s shed—and I carried the board, which was wrapped in a cloth and tied with red ribbon. We climbed the hill to the mill, the grass crunching under our boots. The air smelled of salt and decay.

Inside, the mill was a cathedral of shadows. Broken machinery loomed like frozen giants, and the floorboards creaked under our weight. Priya set the lantern on a steel table and unwrapped the board. It was beautiful in a terrible way—dark wood, painted with a sun and moon, the alphabet in gold leaf, the numbers in crimson. ‘It’s gorgeous,’ she said, her voice echoing. I lit the lantern, and the flame cast long, shaking shadows. ‘Let’s do this,’ she said, and we sat cross-legged on the floor, the planchette between us.

I had no intention of touching it. I’d seen the sessions before, seen how the board seemed to breathe, how the air grew thick with something unspoken. So I sat back, arms crossed, while Priya placed her fingers on the planchette. She closed her eyes, took a breath, and asked, ‘Is anyone here?’ The planchette didn’t move. She asked again, louder. Still nothing. I could feel the minutes stretching, the silence growing heavy. Priya sighed. ‘This is useless. It’s just wood and paint.’ I was about to suggest we leave when the lantern flickered. The flame bent sideways, as if someone had blown on it, and then straightened. A chill ran up my spine. Priya gasped. The planchette slid—just a little—toward the letter ‘J.’ She looked at me, eyes wide. ‘Did you…?’ I shook my head. ‘It’s moving,’ she whispered. She placed her fingers back on it, and it began to move in a slow, deliberate circle.

This was the part I’d never witnessed before. In the other sessions, the board had been a prop, a way for people to scare themselves. Here, in this place, it felt like a door. The planchette stopped at ‘J,’ then ‘O,’ then ‘H,’ then ‘N.’ Priya spelled it out loud. ‘John. John. Does anyone know a John?’ The lantern flickered again, and the planchette spelled ‘H E L P.’ My heart started to pound. ‘Priya, let’s stop.’ But she was transfixed. ‘Who needs help?’ she asked. The planchette flew across the board, so fast that it tore the felt, and stopped at ‘M E.’ Then, with a shudder, it spelled ‘Y O U.’ Priya pulled back as if burned. I stood up, ready to grab her and run. But the lantern went out.

In the darkness, I could hear something—a faint, wet sound, like dripping water. But the mill was miles from the shore. Priya fumbled for the matches, and I heard her gasp. ‘The lamp… it’s cold.’ She struck a match, and in the brief flare, I saw her face—pale, petrified. I took the matches from her, and we relit the lamp, but the flame was small, blue at the edges. The planchette was still on the board, pointing to ‘Y O U.’ A draft moved through the room, and the flames on the board—the painted sun and moon—seemed to glow. The board itself vibrated, a low hum that I felt in my teeth. Then, from the corner of the room, I heard a voice. It was not Priya’s. It was a man’s voice, hoarse, like he’d been screaming for a long time. ‘You should not have come.’

We ran. We stumbled down the stairs, through the broken doors, out into the night. The ferry was at the dock, its horn sounding as if it had been waiting for us. We didn’t speak until we were safely on the boat, trembling in the cold salt air. I looked back at the island, but the mill was just a silhouette. Priya was crying. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t think…’

But the horror wasn’t over. When we got back to the mainland, Priya noticed something in her jacket pocket—the planchette. She must have instinctively grabbed it when we ran. It was still in her hand, dark and warm, and I could swear, in the dim light of the ferry, that it was moving. Just a little, as if alive. I took it from her and threw it into the water, watching it sink below the black waves. Priya hugged herself. ‘It’s gone,’ I said, but I wasn’t sure.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about the board, the voice. I called Priya early the next morning. She sounded groggy, but normal. ‘I’m fine,’ she said. ‘Just a weird dream.’ I told her to stay away from the mill, but she laughed. ‘As if. I’m done with that stuff.’ I wanted to believe her. But when I visited her that afternoon, I saw the planchette on her coffee table. She said she had found it in her bag that morning, wet, as if it had been pulled from the sea. I didn’t touch it. I left.

A week later, I received a letter. No stamp, no return address. Just my name in an old-fashioned script. Inside was a single sentence: ‘The board remembers.’ I didn’t show it to Priya. Instead, I burned it. But that night, I dreamt of the island, of the mill, and of a figure standing in the window, holding a lantern. It was watching me, waiting. I woke up in a cold sweat, but what terrified me most was that the lantern in my dream had been lit, and the flame was the same blue as the one on the ferry. I looked at my nightstand, and there it was—the planchette, resting on a piece of paper, which read, ‘Now you are part of it.’ I haven’t left my apartment since. The door is locked, the windows barred, but I can feel it, humming outside, like a lighthouse beam searching for me. And I know, one day, it will find me. And when it does, I’ll be the one holding the light.