Ahh, gather close, friends. Draw your cloaks tight and let the fire warm your bones. Outside, the fen winds still whisper, and they are not always kindly. The marsh remembers more than most folk dare, and tonight, if you have ears to hear, I shall tell you a tale the reeds themselves will echo—aye, the story of the Silver Lantern.

Now, long ago—long before your fields were ploughed, before the chapels rang their bells, before even the oldest oak took root-this valley was a place of hunger and dark. The fen sprawled wider then, deep as any sea, and from beneath its sodden belly stirred the shades. Ahh, yes, the shades: restless things, born of men’s unquiet deaths, of oaths unkept, of wars that sank into mud. They rose like mist, thin as cobweb one moment, thick as tar the next, and they were cruel, friends, cruel as frost to a lamb.

The Ancients—those who ruled before rule had a name—sought to bind them. And bind them they did, though not by steel nor stone. They gathered a flame from starlight and sorrow, twined it with a thread of their own souls, and set it in a lantern of silver so pure no seam could be seen, no tarnish could cling. With that Lantern, the shades were chained to their sleep. The fen grew quieter. The people, for a time, breathed easy.

But nothing wrought by mortal hand endures unguarded. The Lantern’s fire must be carried, once in a generation, into the marsh, and set before the Waystone—the great standing stone that rises pale and veined from the fen’s heart. Only thus does the binding hold. One bearer alone is chosen, and to hold the Lantern is the highest of honours.

So it was, friends, that young Elira was named.

She was but a slip of a girl—bright-eyed, moon-eyed, with the courage of three and the patience of none. She had been raised in the shadow of the fen, and from childhood she felt its pull. She would sit by the reeds and hum, and the birds would quieten to listen. It was said the water stilled for her, and once, a heron bent its head as though in reverence. Mark you, such signs are not overlooked by the wise.

Her master, Caedran, saw them first. He was a man of learning and shadow, his hair streaked with silver though his face was unlined. He took Elira under his wing, taught her the chants, the breath, the bindings. He showed her how to walk the fen paths without sinking, how to weave sigils that kept the mist from seeping into one’s mind. And she trusted him, as a daughter trusts a father. Aye, she would have followed him into fire itself.

But listen well—listen well, I beg you—for not all masters are noble.

“Silver flame, steady flame,

Hold the dark, bind the name.

Shades beneath, sleep again,

Silver flame, steady flame.”

The night of her Choosing came when the moon rode full and pale as a coin across the sky. The village gathered at the fen’s edge, torches bobbing like fireflies. They laid their hands upon Elira’s shoulders, blessed her with words old as stone. Into her grasp they placed the Lantern, heavy and bright, its flame steady as a heartbeat.

Through the marsh she walked, Caedran at her side, his robes whispering against the reeds. Mist curled about her ankles, and reeds rattled like bones. The fen was not silent that night—it never is, but oh, it spoke louder then. It whispered to her in half-voices, the kind you feel in your bones more than hear in your ears. Her ancestors, she thought—the old guardians.

At last, they came to the Waystone, tall and solemn, quartz-veined, humming faintly under her touch. She set the Lantern before it, flame casting silver shadows, and waited for Caedran’s words of blessing.

Instead, his voice slid soft and low, colder than the mist.

“Now,” he said. “Unbind it. Pour its fire into the stone, and let the shades rise.”

Elira’s breath caught. Rise? The Lantern was a seal—hadn’t she been told so since her cradle? But Caedran’s eyes gleamed, black and hungry, and his smile was thin as a knife’s edge.

“Fear,” he whispered, “makes folk obedient. They will tremble when the shades wake. They will beg for safety, for strong hands to rule them. And who shall they turn to but me? Thus shall I reign, not as guardian, but master.”

Friends, do you feel it? That moment when the ground shifts beneath your feet, when the tale you thought golden reveals its rust? Elira felt it then, keen as any blade. She saw her master for what he was—not a guide, but a tyrant in waiting.

“Silver flame, steady flame,

Keep the dark, bind the name.

Shades beneath, sleep again,

Silver flame, steady flame.”

Caedran reached for the Lantern. But oh, the flame knew her. It brightened in her grasp, flared fierce and white, and the shades below stirred restlessly. The marsh shivered, reeds bending though no wind passed. The fire throbbed in time with her pulse, as though the Lantern had chosen her—not him, never him.

And so she ran. Swift as a hare, fleet as the storm, she fled through the fen. The Lantern’s glow darted like a will-o’-the-wisp, and Caedran’s curses snapped at her heels. The mists clutched at her cloak, but the flame held them back, burning steady, burning true.

What became of her, ah, that is the marrow of the tale. For none can say with certainty.

Some claim she hid the Lantern beneath a willow that drinks moonlight in secret, roots sunk deep in silver water. They say the willow still stands, its bark glowing faintly on nights when the shades stir.

Others say she melted into mist, her body dissolving like dew, her soul forever bound to the flame. Thus, the Lantern walks without a bearer, a wandering light in the fen.

Still others whisper that Elira yet roams the marsh, Lantern in hand, her face pale and lovely as moonlight, guarding the valley from Caedran—who, mark me, is not dead. No, he lingers too, bound by his own hunger, hunting still for the Lantern that spurned him.

And so the fen glows with lights that are not torches. Some are will-o’-the-wisps, some are shade-born, and some—Ahh, some are Elira’s flame.

“Silver flame, steady flame,

Guard the night, none to blame.

Shades beneath, sleep again,

Silver flame, steady flame.”

So mark me well, travellers: if you wander the marsh and see a silver glow dancing where no torch should be—tread softly. It may be Elira, watching, guarding you with her steady flame. Or it may be Caedran, waiting, waiting for a fool to unbind the fire and let the shades rise once more.

And that, dear friends, is the tale of the Silver Lantern. May its flame remind us always: trust is precious, aye, and light—light can both guard and betray.