Mirea's Adventures The Lantern of Frozen Light

More about Mirea's Adventures The Lantern of Frozen Light

(A light that doesn't warm—yet points the way to a long-lost wish.)
The fog was strangely still that night. It didn't move, as if lost in thought—like someone staring too long at a single, painful sentence. Mirea treaded cautiously across the silver-tinged grass. Her cat crept silently behind her, fur pricked, ears alert. They had followed the sound—not a real sound, more an inkling of sound. Like a whisper of crystal, lost in the air before it was truly there. And yet it had called to them. The path led through a valley that looked as if someone had forgotten to paint the day. No colors, just shades of twilight, as if everything were made of memory. In the midst of this silent gloom, it stood: the lantern. It didn't hang—it stood. Rooted firmly on a narrow pole, in the middle of a stone rise. Its glass wasn't transparent, but cloudy, like frozen water that never thaws. Yet a light burned within it.No, it shone without burning. Mirea approached. Her cat stayed behind and lay flat on the ground. The lantern was beautiful—but not friendly. Its light was cool, and when Mirea reached out her hand to it, she felt not warmth, but a gentle tug at her heart. Not dangerous—just sad. She touched the cold metal. At the same moment, the world changed. The fog receded. A path of glittering hoarfrost stretched out before her—a trail of icy dust that disappeared between hills, to places that seemed long forgotten. And Mirea remembered. A wish so old it only appeared in dreams. Back then, she had stood beneath a blanket of stars, a golden flower in her hand, wishing that her voice might one day call back something she had lost. She had been small. Too small to understand that some things don't return through words alone. And now the lantern of frozen light illuminated that old wish—like a map drawn by something she had never quite forgotten. "We follow the light," whispered Mirea. The cat growled softly, but rose and stood beside her. The light didn't move—but the path it showed grew, step by step, the further they went. The trail led past trees that cast no shadows, water that didn't reflect, and finally to a bridge of frosted glass that seemed to lead over nothing. At the end: a small island of mist where a single shadow waited. It was silent. But in its eyes, reflected the same longing that Mirea had once seen in her own. She raised the lantern. The frozen light became clear—and yet for a moment it warmed. Not the skin, but what lay beneath. And the wish, so long lost, stepped silently from the shadow and became whole again.