L01-03. Lantern by Chess Desalls

Author:Chess Desalls
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: middle grade, young adult, Halloween, Romance, Fantasy, folklore
Publisher: Czidor Lore, LLC
Published: 2017-09-14T14:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

Serah stirred from somewhere on the border between wakefulness and sleep.

Music touched her ears. The tune was unrecognizable, dampened and cloudy, as if funneled through a wall or door. “Who is whistling?” she murmured.

She squeezed her eyelids, keeping them shut. Please let it be Gelsey. Please let me be in my room, at Machin’s cottage. Let the nightmare inside the glass have been exactly that—a bad dream.

The music mixed with a dragging crunch. Serah groaned. Her eyes snapped open.

Glass walls reflected the yellow-orange glow all around her, capturing the scowl on her face and the translucence of her form. She watched herself flicker and glow. Trapped inside the globe, she was its flame.

Unable to control her flickering, the yellow-orange light—Serah’s light—panicked and pulsed bright waves through the glass.

“Hello?”

Her eyes squeezed shut at the voice’s painful sting. She opened them again to find a nose pressed to the glass. Above the nose was a pair of widened eyes. Large eyes—bright, clear blue, and fringed in gold lashes.

“What’s this?” whispered the young man.

He reached inside a bag and pulled out a glass object which he pressed to the globe. A single blue eye—many times larger than the eyes in the pair had been—opened and closed.

A magnification lens? Serah frowned, remembering the young man’s funny-looking torch. Is he an inventor like Machin?

With light steps, almost unconsciously, Serah receded to the back of the globe, until the lens and giant eyeball disappeared, replaced once again by the young man’s face.

Fingertips grazed his chin. His voice remained a whisper as he mumbled to himself, “If I’m not dreaming, the flame inside this lantern looks like a small person…and it moves.”

Lantern? Light flashed from inside the globe. Oh no.

The face disappeared and a fingernail tapped the wall behind Serah. The resulting clink rang and echoed inside the glass. Her hands grabbed at her ears.

“That hurt you, didn’t it, little flame-girl? I was only trying—” He pressed his lips shut as Serah doubled over in agony at the boom in his voice.

“I’m sorry,” he said, whispering. He turned his head sideways. “Do you speak?”

Serah nodded.

“What’s your name, little flame-girl?”

“Serah Kettel.”

She frowned at his confused expression.

“Hold on,” he said. He pressed his ear to the globe. “Okay, say that again, as loud as you can.”

“Serah!”

The young man tilted his head back and scratched at his hair. “We need to figure out a different way to do this. I’m Grady,” he said, pressing his hand to his chest.

Serah smiled. His gesture gave her an idea. She pointed at herself, and then lifted a knee as if stepping upward. When he didn’t respond, she tried it again, bending her knee while lifting her opposite leg with her toes.

Grady blinked. “March? Marching? March-a? Marsha?”

Serah shook her head. No. That was supposed to be stepping up stairs. Stair, Stair-a, Serah. She rested her hands on her hips.

“Try again,” Grady whispered. “I’m not that good at charades, but I don’t have a better idea.”

Her lips puckered. Finally, she smiled.

Grady smiled, too, as he watched Serah place both hands in front of her face, and then snap them away with a growl.

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