The Weight of Small Things

“Funny how the smallest objects carry the heaviest truths—and the heaviest tempers.”

As the camp's joviality gradually began to wane, with each person drifting into their own nightly routines, Glenda and I found ourselves engrossed in a deep conversation by the campfire. The once-lively circle had thinned, laughter giving way to yawns, murmured goodnights, and the soft rustle of tent flaps being secured. The fire crackled and popped with comforting irregularity, sending up tiny embers that danced briefly before vanishing into the night.

Our discussion was as intense as the flames before us, emitting both physical warmth and the emotional heat of shared vulnerability. The conversation had taken on a life of its own—winding through topics of resilience, adaptation, the haunting uncertainties of our new lives, and the strength we each had learned to summon from places we never knew existed.

Amidst it all, I couldn't help but notice Chris.

He had positioned himself just off to the side, not quite in the shadows, but hovering near enough to be felt rather than heard. At first, I thought perhaps he was simply giving me space, allowing Glenda and me our moment. But as the minutes stretched on, my eyes were drawn to him again and again—sideways glances, flickers of attention caught between phrases and pauses in conversation.

His presence was subtly conspicuous, like a word on the tip of my tongue. He stood with arms loosely crossed, occasionally shifting his weight from one foot to the other, the motion repetitive, almost compulsive. It was unlike him—this fidgeting, this unsettled rhythm. Chris, who was usually so grounded, so deliberate in his stillness, now carried a restlessness that buzzed just beneath the surface.

I knew, instinctively, that his disquiet had little to do with what Glenda and I were discussing. Whatever was stirring in him came from within. Perhaps it had been brewing all day, hidden behind that familiar mask of calm assurance. Now, in the dying light of the fire, the mask seemed to slip ever so slightly.

Still, he said nothing. He made no attempt to join the conversation. But his eyes—his eyes never left us for long. Watching. Waiting. Listening. And though I continued to speak with Glenda, part of my attention, my awareness, was drawn inevitably to the man standing just beyond the glow of the flames—my husband, who seemed just a little too quiet tonight.

The curiosity and concern within me reached a tipping point. Something in Chris’s posture—rigid, withdrawn, shadowed with some unspoken turmoil—had gnawed at me long enough. Unable to hold back any longer, I turned to him, my gaze direct and unapologetic. “What the heck is wrong with you tonight, Chris?” I asked, my voice tinged with a mix of frustration and worry. The words slipped out more sharply than I had intended, propelled by the unease that had been building with every sideways glance and awkward fidget he’d made.

Glenda, still stood beside me with her feet crossed and a faint smirk playing on her lips, scoffed lightly at my blunt outburst. Her amusement was good-natured, but I could feel her attention sharpen, tuned now to the unfolding tension.

Standing there, with the fire's warmth kissing my cheeks and the creeping chill of the night brushing against the nape of my neck, I waited. The flickering flames crackled and spat, casting wild shadows across Chris’s face, exaggerating every twitch of his jaw, every flicker in his eyes. Beside me, Glenda shifted slightly, but said nothing—her presence a silent witness to the stand-off that had unexpectedly emerged from the quiet intimacy of the evening.

“It’s nothing,” Chris replied, but his voice lacked conviction. It carried that strained lightness he always used when he was trying too hard to sound unaffected. His hand—usually steady, precise—lifted to his forehead, swiping away a sheen of sweat. The movement was almost compulsive, and I noted it with concern. The temperature had dropped significantly; no one else around the fire looked remotely flushed.

I narrowed my eyes. I wasn't buying his dismissive response. “Just spit it out, would you,” I said, more sharply than before. The way he’d been acting—hovering at the edge of conversation, caught in some inward tug-of-war—was beginning to fray my nerves. I knew Chris. I knew the weight behind his silences, the tension in his jaw when something troubled him. Whatever it was, it needed air.

Chris bit his lower lip, his eyes darting to the flames as if searching there for an escape. That tiny gesture—so familiar to me—tightened the knot of worry in my chest. I wondered briefly if he was hesitant to speak in front of Glenda, but quickly brushed the thought aside. This wasn’t the time for guessing games. If Chris wanted a private moment, he could say so. If not, he could start explaining what was going on before my concern gave way entirely to frustration.

Then, quite unexpectedly, Chris withdrew his hand from his trouser pocket. My eyes followed the movement, curiosity rising like a tide. In his palm lay several flat, round objects—at first glance, they resembled medallions, but there was something about them, something strange. They looked old—ancient, even. The surface of each one caught the firelight and shimmered with an almost hypnotic allure. I leaned forward instinctively, drawn in by the mysterious glint.

“I found these while we were out digging,” Chris said, his voice hovering between excitement and uncertainty. There was a barely restrained energy in the way he held them out, as though they carried a significance he hadn’t yet put into words.

Glenda’s gasp pierced the moment. It was sharp, involuntary—enough to jolt my senses. She leaned in beside me, her eyes already locked on the items in Chris’s hand.

“Fascinating,” Glenda whispered, as if afraid to speak too loudly and shatter the spell. She reached out with the kind of reverence you might reserve for a relic in a museum, fingers brushing one of the objects before carefully lifting it from Chris’s hand. She held it to the light, examining it closely, her eyes scanning its detailed etchings like a scholar deciphering an ancient text.

I extended my own hand, accepting one of the remaining artefacts. The metal was unexpectedly cold, its edges worn smooth by time or use. It sat heavily in my palm, as though it carried not just mass but meaning. I turned it slowly between my fingers, studying the designs—spirals, symbols, and script I didn’t recognise.

“What are they?” I asked, my voice low with awe. The question wasn’t really for anyone in particular. It just hung there between us, heavy and insistent.

“I think they might be coins of some sort,” Chris offered, though doubt lingered in his tone. He was guessing, like the rest of us, but even that small assertion seemed to bring clarity to the mystery.

“Chewbathia,” Glenda read aloud, her voice delicate but resonant. The sound of the word sent a shiver up my spine—it felt weighty, charged with unknown significance. Her eyes lifted and met Chris’s with startling clarity. “Yes. It’s a coin,” she said, as though the certainty had just rooted itself inside her.

“How do you know for certain?” I challenged, not ready to leap to conclusions. Part of me still clung to the pragmatic edge I’d sharpened through all of today’s surreal events. This felt important, but too important to simply accept on a whim.

Glenda didn’t answer immediately. Her eyes dropped back to the coin, and for a heartbeat or two, she was silent. The firelight played across her features as she licked her lips slowly, her mind clearly elsewhere—sifting through memories or knowledge too complex to articulate.

“I think the markings of the twenty cliv make it rather obvious,” Chris interrupted, pointing to the engraved numerals on the metal’s surface. His finger hovered just above it, not touching, as though he respected the artefact’s delicate history. I leaned closer and squinted, spotting the inscription he referred to. It was faint, but undeniably there.

“It means we’re not alone,” Glenda said at last, her voice quieter now, as if she were speaking to herself as much as to us. A note of apprehension coloured her words—just enough to make the hairs on my arms rise.

“We don’t know that,” I countered, my scepticism flaring in defence of the unknown. My thumb rubbed absently over the edge of the coin, feeling the subtle dips and grooves. It felt impossibly old. Worn. Real.

“But it must mean that people have been here before us,” Chris added quickly, leaning forward, his whole body animated now. “We’re not the first.”

His words struck a chord inside me. As much as I wanted to dismiss it, I couldn’t deny the growing possibility that we were standing on ground already walked by others—others who may have vanished, or worse. The silence of Clivilius had never felt louder. It loomed over us, heavy and watchful, as though the very earth beneath our feet had been holding its breath, waiting for us to notice what it had buried.

The idea that others might have been here before us, that perhaps others were still out there, sent a shiver down my spine.

“We should tell Paul,” I said decisively, extending my hand for Glenda to hand me the second coin.

“I don’t think that is wise,” Glenda countered, her fingers wrapping protectively around the coin.

Her quick resistance caught me off guard. My brow furrowed. “Why not?” I demanded, the sharpness in my voice betraying both my confusion and rising irritation.

“He is too busy,” came Glenda’s clipped reply, as if that alone was enough reason to withhold something so potentially significant.

I let out a huff, loud and deliberate, frustration bubbling just beneath the surface. My hand remained outstretched, fingers twitching in growing impatience. I felt patronised, dismissed, as if I were a child asking permission rather than a peer voicing concern.

“Perhaps Glenda is right,” Chris interjected, his shrug casual, unbothered. He reached to take the coin from me, the gesture smooth, almost pacifying. “Until we know more about them, there’s probably no point saying anything to Paul.”

“Yes,” Glenda echoed swiftly, clearly relieved by his support. “Paul has enough on his mind with trying to get the settlement up and running.”

“And dealing with Luke,” Chris added, reinforcing their joint stance with a pointed nod.

My jaw clenched. The feeling of being ganged up on settled in my chest like a lead weight. “As our delegated leader, I still think Paul should know,” I muttered, my voice stiff with wounded pride. It wasn’t just about the coins anymore—it was about not being sidelined. I felt my own conviction weakening, but I held firm, unwilling to fold under their shared opposition.

Then, Glenda’s reaction came, abrupt and jarring. “No!” she snapped, lunging forward with a speed that startled me. Her hand snatched the coin from my grasp in one swift movement.

“Give that back,” I demanded, my palm shooting out, open and firm. I could feel my pulse quicken, anger rising like a flame catching wind.

“We say nothing to anyone,” Glenda declared, her voice low and iron-hard. She tucked the coins into her bra, the gesture so bold and unapologetic it made me blink in disbelief.

“That’s not really your decision to make,” I retorted hotly, hand still hovering, daring her to hand them over. The absurdity of arguing over coins now stashed between someone’s breasts didn’t escape me, but it only fuelled my determination.

“Fuck off, Karen!” Glenda barked, stepping back, spine stiff with defiance. “I said no.”

I froze, her words landing like a slap. My eyes widened, not from fear, but from raw disbelief. The tension between us solidified, thick as wet clay, unyielding and cold. I folded my arms across my chest, my mouth set in a hard line as we stared each other down. Neither of us flinched.

Finally, like a silent truce born of exhaustion and pride, we turned and walked away—each to our own tent, our own corner of the darkness. No goodbyes, no resolution. Just an angry rift carved between us, widened by silence and unsaid words.

The fire crackled in our absence, an indifferent witness to the confrontation. As I crawled into my tent and zipped the flap behind me, the full weight of what had transpired settled onto my shoulders. My thoughts raced. About the coins. About Glenda. About what it might mean if others had been here first—and what had become of them.

Sleep would not come easily tonight.

Back in the safety and solitude of my tent, I let out a deep, weary sigh. The canvas walls, faintly rustling in the evening breeze, felt like a barrier between me and the darkness outside. A tidal wave of frustration and exhaustion cascaded over me, leaving my thoughts in a dishevelled heap. The encounter with Glenda, the mysterious coins, and the lingering air of unresolved tensions had sent my mind into a relentless spin. My fingers absently toyed with a loose thread on the edge of my sleeping bag as I sat cross-legged, nestled in the dimness, my eyes closed. I needed stillness. I needed space to breathe.

The inside of the tent smelled faintly of dust, but it was home now – our makeshift sanctuary. In the darkness, I tried to make sense of the evening's tumultuous events, but the harder I tried to untangle the threads, the more tightly they wound around one another.

And then, gently, like a ripple across a still pond, a soft, almost ethereal voice began to whisper in my mind. It was the voice of Clivilius.

Not a voice in the traditional sense – it was more like a presence that threaded through my consciousness, barely distinguishable from my own thoughts but undeniably other. It had visited me before in moments like this, cloaked in quiet, bearing no command, only observation, only truth.

Karen, the voice of Clivilius began, its tone imbued with an ancient wisdom that seemed to carry echoes of a world long forgotten. In the vast tapestry of existence, every thread has its purpose, its path. The coins you discovered tonight are not just relics of the past; they are keys to understanding deeper truths about this world and your place in it.

A tremor ran through me. I wasn’t afraid. In fact, a strange sense of calm had descended – like being held by the wind itself. I listened as my heart settled into a slow, steady rhythm.

These coins, they are symbols of connection – a link to histories and lives that have woven through the fabric of Clivilius long before your arrival. They whisper of civilisations that once thrived, of people whose stories are etched in the very soil you tread upon.

I pictured the coins again, their intricate markings and strange, worn edges. They were more than objects. They were witnesses.

The voice shifted slightly, taking on a weightier tone.

But remember, Karen, while the past holds valuable lessons, it is the present that demands your attention. The challenges you face, the bonds you forge, the decisions you make – these are the true coins of your realm. Treasure them, for they shape the world you are building.

A hush followed, and though no words came after, their echo lingered. The presence of Clivilius faded like mist in the morning sun, but the resonance of its message remained.

I opened my eyes slowly, the shadows of the tent now somehow softer, less oppressive. A deep stillness had taken root within me. The message had unravelled something inside – not an answer, but a perspective. A reminder that we were not aimless wanderers, but part of something greater. Something ancient. Something alive.

The coins, the tensions, the power plays – they weren’t just distractions or drama. They were part of the architecture of this place, the scaffolding of a story still being built. And we were its characters – flawed, determined, scared, hopeful.

I lay back, exhaling fully as I stared at the dim canopy of the tent. Somewhere outside, the fire crackled faintly. Inside, within me, a quiet determination had begun to take root.

We were part of something bigger.

And tomorrow, I would take my next step in unravelling Clivilius’s truths.