The Lantern-Men

Every night, the Lantern-Men drift through the streets.

Image found on Pinterest.

Some nights I watch from my window as they meander through the streets, a silent parade of strange specters.

The Lantern-Men.

When I was small I hated the sight of them, these eerie things that looked like people in tattered black cloaks with street lamps for heads. Dinnertime was an occasion for tears because I knew the sun was setting. Not long afterwards they’d start showing up, a few bobbing, drifting lights at first. The darker it got, the more there’d be until there was a procession winding its way through the town square.

I was convinced they were monsters that wanted to lure us away from our homes and into the woods where beasts could crunch our bones. If not that then over cliffs, into the lake, straight into the lands of the dead maybe.

One night, Grandmother brought me to the window. I whimpered and clutched at the drapes, wanting to hide. The way I saw it, if the Lantern-Men couldn’t see us, they couldn’t hurt us. She gently pulled the fabric out of my hands and nodded at something across the way.

“Look, Clara. Over there.”

I didn’t want to, but curiosity won out in the end. I peeked over the windowsill to see a man breaking into the Abernathy house, creeping in through the window. All the lights were out, the family probably settling into bed. They didn’t know that someone was sneaking in.

But one of the Lantern-Men did.

It had begun gliding towards the intruder. Usually they just bobbed along on their ghostly march through town, but this one was moving quickly. Purposefully, like it knew it had to get to the house before it was too late.

It didn’t scream. It didn’t howl. It didn’t conjure fire.

All it did was shine brighter.

I didn’t see what happened. The man gave a short, sharp cry…and then nothing. Silence. When the light died down, the intruder was gone and the Lantern-Man was drifting back to the procession like nothing had happened.

Grandmother whispered, “They keep us safe, Clara. Don’t draw their light, but don’t fear it, either.”

I didn’t understand then. I thought she meant they just scared thieves or other bad men off. But as I grew older, I noticed things — how the Lantern-Men sometimes lingered by a door when someone was dying, or gathered around the graveyard after a funeral. Their presence wasn’t always a warning. Sometimes it was a beacon.

A guiding light to the next life.

Years later, when Grandmother fell ill, she called me to her bedside. “When they come,” she murmured, “don’t close the curtains.”

That night, they gathered outside our house.

A few at first, then more and more until there were dozens of them all outside her window. The light grew brighter and brighter, almost like that night long ago. I wanted to yank the curtains shut, but Grandmother shook her head weakly at me.

“Don’t fear it, Clara,” she said.

I bit my lip, but left the curtains alone. I sat by her side, bathed in their light until her chest stilled and the lanterns winked out one by one.

Now, I keep watch every evening. And sometimes — only sometimes — I see a new one among them.

It wears a familiar shawl. Its glow is gentle, steady, and every time it passes, it stops a moment beneath my window.

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