The prompt I picked is "lantern". This ended up being a lot spookier than I thought but it still has that wintery vibe to it. 1519 words total.
Gentle snow fell from the sky and rested on your hat. The trees protected you from most of the elements and still let some light in. The entire forest you were walking in was covered in snow. Not so thick that you couldn’t walk in it, but thick enough to make you thankful you wore boots. The lack of light gave the forest a mysterious atmosphere, especially with all the animals asleep in burrows and trees. You refuse to use your phone’s torch: battery life is important to preserve. It was fine anyway; you could clearly see up ahead. The light was cold and blue, but still bright enough to show you the path to take. On and on you keep walking, until you feel something in the sole of your boot. It doesn’t hurt but you look down anyway to see what it could be. You nudge the snow out of the way with your foot to reveal a broken lantern. You must have stepped on it during your journey. You don’t think too much of it, it’s just glass and metal after all. You take the glass shard out from the soul of your boot, and you continue on walking. You had to continue on as you were still looking for it.
A couple steps later and you come across another lantern, fully formed and half buried up ahead. Then another lantern just like the previous. And another one. And another one. You keep coming across these empty lanterns until you see some sort of mountain up above. Could it be the thing you were searching for? Excited, you run towards the ambiguous shape. The sun sank lower and lower with each step. You abruptly stop. Could it be? You go and check to see if this meant your quest was finished. Your hands were starting to freeze up, but you had to check anyway just to be sure. No, it was just a false alarm; you’re just delirious. You sigh and were going to continue on as normal, until you saw a glow, a warm glow. It was on top of the mountain like structure and shone like the sun.
You decided to walk towards it only to realise that it wasn’t a mountain at all: it was a massive pile of lanterns just like the ones from before. These weren’t junk as all of these lanterns were still perfectly functional with no cracks or missing pieces. You wonder why on earth someone would make a pyramid of such a random item. Excess stock? This would mean that there’s a shop or at least a warehouse nearby. But you know from your journey that there’s no sign of civilisation for miles so where could these have possibly come from? You stop questioning it and decide to climb it: the light was enticing. It wasn’t easy trying to climb a massive pile of lanterns, but they seemed to behave and stay in place. As you ascended, the light gradually went duller and duller. It dwindled into the size of a candlelight. It was too dark to see without any kind of light and you still refused to use the torch on your phone. As you reached the top you realised the light was just another lantern, but this one had a burning candle in it. You pick up the lantern and carefully climbed back down the same path that you went up. You seemed to have forgotten that your boots had snow on as you slipped down the pile and fell into the snow. Phone still in pocket, yourself in one piece, everything’s okay. There’s some cuts and scratches in places but nothing broken or sprained. You frantically dug around in the snow to find the lantern. Somehow it was still lit. You didn’t question it; you were just thankful you still had a light.
You continue to walk forwards. 10 minutes pass. Still couldn’t find it. What were you looking for anyway? It’ll come back to you eventually when you see it. The light seemed to be a little brighter. Odd, but you didn’t care. It was pitch black now anyway, you needed that light to be as bright as possible. It seemed to have snowed a bit more as the layering on the floor became a little thicker.
You continue with your journey. Where were you going? You must have been going somewhere, why else were you walking in this forest? The light was significantly brighter. It was a simple candle, yet the wax was untouched. The cold used to be more of a slight annoyance, now it was trying to make itself as known as possible. You check your phone to see where you were trying to go. Weird, it doesn’t say anything about going somewhere. What were you doing here then? You couldn’t seem to remember. Just continue walking.
At this point you’ve been in this forest for…how long exactly? It feels like hours, but the sky is still as dark as it always was. Your legs start to ache. Must have been a while. You look around but everything still seems to remain the same: trees, dirt, snow. You checked your phone for the time but…did you have a phone? It’s not unreasonable to assume that maybe you wanted to be isolated. Some people like to live in the middle of nowhere as a way to escape from the loud cities and live a more peaceful life. This may explain why you don’t seem to remember where you live or where you are in the world. Nevertheless, you didn’t check. You continued to walk in the same direction you always do. The cold was starting to attack you, but you had the lantern to keep you warm. The flame was more like a miniature campfire at this point. You could feel it escaping its simple glass container as it looked like it was going to burst. Just continue.
Just keep doing what you know, and you’ll reach some sort of conclusion. It worked then and it’ll work now. Walking along this path is the only thing you seem to remember. But then a realisation occurred…who…who are you? You stop dead in your tracks. Over and over, you muttered those words to yourself, but in the first-person tense. Your eyes turned into the shape of panic and despair. The cold had decided that it wants you dead, so you’re muttering session was interrupted by violent winds and snow dragging you in all directions. Just…just…
You’re not going to make it out of this place, are you?
Your hands hurt.
Your feet hurt.
Your face hurt.
Everything hurt.
You started to scream. It was a pointless exercise as nobody could hear you, but it made you feel a little better about your situation. You tried to continue but each step felt like a chore. Simply existing was agony to you at this point. You tried so hard to progress, but it got too much. However, you needed to carry on: it’s all you knew. Wait…carry on doing what? This state of obliviousness tortured you. The lantern’s flame engulfed its glass and metal body and proceeded to surround you in its warmth. Its heat was so great it seemed like it changed the season entirely as all the snow melted into steam and trees burned and barbecued. The snow you collapsed in melted as well but you were unharmed somehow. You continued to lay on the floor waiting for something, anything, to end it all. Cold, fire, wind, snow, whatever would kill you first. As your eyes were slowly closing, you saw a familiar mountain like structure up ahead, its warm glow enticing you, but you didn’t have the willpower to get close to it.
Everything was dark. Did the fire die out or yourself? No, that’s not right: you woke up. If you were dead, then you wouldn’t have done that. Where or when did you wake up? Open your eyes.
Everything is much brighter now. You weren’t lying on the burnt earth, but on an icy road. You seemed to be on the side of a mountain, a real one. To your left was a car. It was sticking out of a tree and had certainly seen better days. You remembered how it got into that state and let out an awkward laugh. Nobody else was there. The road wasn’t a big one, it was the kind you would only go down if you were going through a rural area. There seemed to be no phone signal around and you needed to call someone to help fix your car. You double checked to see if it was wrecked, maybe it just needed to be plucked away from the tree? It didn’t even start. You looked towards a forest to check if there’s any signal in there: possibly a phone line was installed for a local village. You put on your boots and decide to walk in. You reassured yourself by saying this wouldn’t take too long, the forest was only small after all.
