The Lie That Brought Light – Act II

Theophilus first noticed it at a funeral.

The widow wept with poise and said, “He died peacefully, with no pain.”

The lantern flickered.

Not with warmth—but with hunger.

Later, it happened again. A neighbor patted her husband’s hand and said, “I’m fine.” The flame flared so brightly it cast a second shadow on the wall.

Theophilus stared at it.

These weren’t lies of fact. These were lies of feeling. Of omission. Of denial.

He began to test it again.

A child whispered, “I didn’t steal the sugar.” Flicker.

A miner claimed, “I’m not afraid to go back down.” Flare.

It wasn’t just a tool. It was a mirror. But no one saw their reflection—only the glow.

In church, the lantern pulsed behind the pulpit.

At dinner tables, its light crept through the curtains.

At confession, people paused mid-sentence, as if afraid the flame might interrupt them.

Theophilus no longer needed to speak. He only had to be present.

And still, they came to him. They sought counsel. Clarity.

“What does it mean?” one woman asked, eyes hollow. “Does the light forgive?”

“It reveals,” Theophilus said softly, unsure of the answer himself.

But not all revelations brought peace.

Marriages cracked. Secrets poured into kitchens, onto porches, into graves.

One night, a man approached the sheriff’s office and confessed he had pushed his co-worker during a collapse years ago. Said he’d been haunted by the silence. Said the flame had watched him too long.

He turned himself in.

No one had asked him to.

By week’s end, whispers followed Theophilus wherever he walked. Some called him a prophet. Others, a witch.

But the lantern still glowed.

Even when he sat alone.

Especially when he whispered, “I made this to honor my son.”

The light flared.

He tried again, voice thinner. “This was for Ellory.”

The lantern pulsed.

That night, sleep came in fragments. And when it finally held him, Theophilus dreamed.

He stood in the mine shaft. But there was no light. Just dust and breath and blackness.

Then: a voice.

“It’s not me, Father.”

A shape formed in the dark—Ellory, as he was.

Still twelve.

Still gone.

“You made something else.”

Theophilus woke with a start.

The lantern sat beside his bed.

Still burning.

Outside, a scream rang through the fog—sharp, human.

Theophilus rose, opened the chapel doors.

And the flame, nestled in the bone-glass cage, burned like a second heart.


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