Tale 62- The Night Light

 The Traveler wandered from the previous town, following the forest path and finding a young boy sitting and collecting bugs. He smiled and approached her, before a yellow butterfly fluttered around her head, much to her surprise. The boy began trying to grab at it, but it flew high in the sky and away from them, to his disappointment. He pouted and sat on a rock, the Traveler remembering how Richard used to act much like this when he was angry. He could be very dramatic sometimes…her mind wandered back to that day at the lake. She’d loved skating as a child, it was her favourite, and Richard was angry because she’d thrown a snowball at him. A faint chuckle began in her throat from the nostalgia, before she quickly cut off the memory and focused on the boy in front of her. Gently, she reached out and patted his head, the child looking up at her in surprise. “I want to find more bugs…” he mumbled, the Traveler offering to help him look. They picked up logs and rocks galore, the Traveler remembering her old garden and how she and her brothers would crawl for hours in the soil, finding worms and caterpillars and ladybirds…though now the memories made her a little wistful. The boy smiled as he picked up a caterpillar, one which seemed to glow on the inside of its body, despite it being dark on the outside. “It glows!” the child exclaimed, the Traveler giving a little chuckle and nodding as he enthusiastically showed it to her. He was so much like Richard, almost a mirror image… she shook her head and let the little creature crawl on her palms, it was almost the same colour as her cloak, yet glowed internally. Perhaps, she too glowed internally. The boy smiled down at the creature as its legs tickled the Traveler’s fingertips, before remembering something else that glowed, offering to tell her the tale of ‘the Night Light’.

‘In a small house by the edge of the swamp, there was a small family who lived together happily. At night, they would light the lamps and keep the creatures of the night at bay, sleeping safe and warm as the night air tickled their faces. Though their house was old, the lights shone bright and prevented any danger from coming close, willow fronds sheltering them as if the forest itself was embracing them. However, one night, the light belonging to the young boy went dark, monsters sloshing through the swamp that had been awaiting this moment. Fearful, the boy tried to fix the light, but the creatures were coming too close, and would devour him the second they were close enough. When all seemed lost, the forest granted the child mercy, sending a firefly to light the lamp, its glow gleaming brighter than any candle or bulb a human could manufacture. In one bright flash, it dispelled the shadows and hovered inside the frame, perching and staying there for the entire night. The young boy tried to ask his parents to change the light to keep him safe from the monsters, but they told him to stop pretending and that they would change the light when they had time to do it. To them, it was a trivial thing, but for the child, his survival was on the line each night the lamp was unlit. But, to his fortune, the forest smiled upon him and protected him, the firefly now arriving each and every night to send the shadows away, allowing the boy to drift into dreams in peace.’

The boy watched as the Traveler wrote, before being startled as the caterpillar walked on the page, the girl gently plucking it off and handing it to the boy, who laughed as it tickled him. Gently, they put the little bug back under the log and the Traveler began to walk away, the boy waving goodbye. Smiling a little, the Traveler walked further down the path, and imagined Richard meeting that boy. Something told her they would be best friends.