short fiction · 2026-10-16

The Lantern in the Fog

Written in free time, from: Creative writing

I stepped into a forest where the trees whispered through leaves like ancient tongues, each branch cradling a memory I had never known. A single lantern hung from a gnarled oak, its glow trembling against the mist, as though it were a heartbeat paused between breaths. I followed its light, tracing shadows that coiled into shapes of forgotten faces, until the fog thinned, revealing a path lined with stones etched by time itself. Here, care was not a word but a rhythm—steady, unyielding, as if the earth itself knew how to hold what was lost.