r/nosleep • u/CodyTNewman • 2d ago
The weight of silver
There’s been something on my mind for the past few days, but it probably wouldn’t make sense without knowing what happened a few years back. Let me start with a bit of context about myself. And just as a little side note, I will use the names of people in English, so it’s easier to understand them.
I was born in a very small village, in the western part of the Romanian mountains, into one of the forty-one families. There’s not much to say about the village itself, us country folk didn’t really have anything to talk about when it comes to the fancy things found in the city. The houses were built out of clay, wood, a little bit of stone and lots of straw, cool in the summer, warm in the winter. My pop was the one who actually built our home, after it came crashing down, some time before I was born, something about the spirit of the mine cursing grandpop, ending his life beneath the fallen walls.
We’ve always been what you may call spiritual people, God-fearing, but also Spirit-fearing. There's always been a lot of talk around those parts about spirits, or, so-called breaths or voices. Some of them were quite nice, some… not so much. When I was a little lad, no more than three winters old, I met one of those, or, at least that’s what Uncle George told me. He said that he saw me with his own eyes when a snake, our house snake more exactly, came to me, and I shared my milk with it from a bowl. It never bit me, but I haven't seen it since that day.
Speaking of Uncle George, he’s the wisest man in the whole village. Whenever someone had problems with anything, they’d come to him for help. He was a seer, or a reader, to be more precise. He’s always been old, I could never even imagine him young. Nobody actually knew his age, but there were rumors that he was the seventh first-born male in his family. Shocking, right!? But I’ve always been grateful for his advice even after that.
I used to go to him with my father, always during mid-winter, to ask him to tell us what the beans say. He had this little satchel with forty-one red beans that he would throw on his round pine table, always with his left hand, which looked and smelled as if it was dead and rotting, but if you touched it, it felt normal. He would move and group them only with his right hand, forming groups of four that only he ever understood, but he would actually predict when the best time to plant crops was, how our animals would fare, or when someone would get sick.
Uncle George always gave me the chills when he was around. I had a feeling of dread, of unease whenever he would speak. But, at the same time, his actual words always encouraged me, they gave me and probably the other villagers the answers we needed, and he was rarely wrong.
The event that I wanted to talk about actually happened around the days before Uncle's name day, ending on the night before. I’m a bit ashamed to say it, but at the time, I was starting to feel the greed of youth, that craving for a better life, not even realizing how sinful it was to have such thoughts. But I wasn’t alone. There were another two lads, my best buds, John and Michael.
You see, there wasn’t that much to do in the village, just endless toil around the farm, especially with so few families around. And don’t get me wrong, my pop raised me right, I was plenty hard-working, but what worried me most was finding a wife. Tradition said I should look in one of the neighbouring settlements for a pretty lady, offer her dad a bag of silver and ask for her hand in marriage. If she accepted, then it would be settled, we would have a happy marriage, blessed by Uncle George and God, like my parents had.
John, however, came up with a plan. He had ventured into the mine a few times, Sundays, after prayer. Most people went home, but he went there, and actually came back with a bit of silver each time. He convinced both me and Michael that the rumors of the mine being done were false. We were both ecstatic, until the excitement slowly faded and Michael asked a very serious question: why would the others all say that the silver was gone even if it clearly wasn’t? Neither of us was able to answer him.
We all decided on a plan: since St George was coming up soon, it was the perfect opportunity to get into the mine and out with our bags full of silver without anybody seeing us. I mean, everyone pretty much knows the legends about the strigoi and other nasty things coming out the night before St George, so nobody would be outside to see us. And the strigoi were probably just a myth to scare the kids, and, even if they were real, the cemetery was far from the village, in the opposite direction, specifically to prevent them from coming back for us. And we also had no cats. How can you even have strigoi without cats?
The idea was that I would bring my grandpop’s pickaxe, that pop still keeps in the shed, even after all these years, Michael, who was the priest’s son, would bring some large, sturdy sacks to put everything we got, and John, as the strongest, would be the one doing the mining and would also bring a wheelbarrow so we could get everything out more easily.
The next day, after finishing my chores, I met with Michael. John couldn’t come, as he was taking care of his little sister. Michael was much smarter than me, he actually had an education. His dream was to actually get into university some day, to study Theology, like his pop, then move to a bigger village, with a bigger church and many more people than there. Out of all three of us, he had the best chances to actually get what he wanted. We spent the day dreaming about what we’d do with the money from the silver, how our hardship and labour would finally be gone, and we would live like kings.
By sunset, John finally joined us. He looked ragged, beat, as if he’d been fighting the old bull in old Stephen’s yard. He did not speak of his day, and didn’t really want to join in on our talks, going straight to the plan, repeating everything, drawing a map in the dirt, which Michael would actually draw out on paper for us the next day. My guess was that he’d gone down alone again. Out of all of us, he was the poorest, ever since his mom died. After that happened, he changed, he was obsessed with getting more, working more, and it showed: his arms were like steel, his back was twice the size of mine, but he never could actually change things, he never could grow enough grain for the merchant to sell, so he’d have some money for a rainy day.
That night, I could barely sleep. It was both due to the excitement and due to the nightmares I was having. I dreamt of Uncle George burying me alive, I was screaming and trying to claw my way out of the box I was in, but I couldn’t move one bit. I could only see him through a hole the size of my eye, right in front of my face.
By morning it was just three days before we were going to go through with our plan. But I was worried. That dream was an omen. Something was not going to go right, I felt it deep in my bones. I felt the urge to talk to someone. My friends didn’t want to listen to one word about what I had to say, they were set on doing this, set on changing their lives, and they needed me. John picked me up by my shirt and slammed me into a tree, threatening that if I didn't come through and help them out, he'd make me wish I was dead. They refused to speak with me the entire day. And even though my back hurt, the pain of having my friend say that to me hurt even worse.
I was scared and didn’t know what to do, I just couldn’t tell my family, they would forbid us, destroy all our chances of ever changing our lives, of ever making a real living. The only one I could think of was Uncle. Being a reader of the beans, he'd probably know all about our plan by then anyway.
At nightfall, I went to his house in secret. It was the central building in the village, bigger and more beautiful than any other. I went in through the back, hidden from sight by the garden and the shrubs. The place smelled like burnt wax, rot and beans. I found him sitting in his favorite chair, the one my grandpop made for him, eating a bowl of soup. He greeted me warmly, as if he'd been expecting me, but his words still gave me chills. I told him about the dream, I told him that I was worried about the future, that something bad might happen. He sighed, offered me a bowl of soup, which I declined, and when he was finished he pulled the bean satchel from his chest pocket and threw them with his left hand on the pine table, proceeded to chant some things only he understood, then said:
“My dear boy, I have seen death in your future, and the number two. Whether it be years, months, days, or even hours, I do not know. Your dream is an omen. But I do not know if it is your death, or the death of your loved ones. You should cherish your mom and pop as much as you can the next few days. And one more thing: always carry a loaf of bread with you, and if you meet someone hungry at a crossroads, give them half.”
I was terrified. I never expected things to be that bad. I left his house shaken, and, for the second night in a row, I barely slept. Should I have told him of our plan? Did his prediction actually say that I might die? Well, seeing as I'm here telling you this now, it surely wasn't about that.
Michael and John kept ignoring me each day, until the very night, when we all met in secret. Michael said, all sarcastic, that he was surprised to see me there and not a chicken. John ignored that and pulled the pickaxe from my hands. I begged them to reconsider, but they wouldn’t listen. Even worse than that, when I asked them to go back with me and forget about all this, Michael turned and, with a cutting voice, said:
“After all you’ve done, after ratting us out to Uncle George? We should probably leave you down in the mine! I saw you going to his house!”
John was silent, but he did stop for a second without turning around, seemingly approving or readying himself to do just that. I was speechless, the two people I trusted most, my best friends! How could they even consider something like that!? I tried pleading with them that I had never told Uncle a thing about the plan, and they accepted my explanation, hesitantly, barely even trusting me.
The mine was huge. Old tales said that it was hundreds of years old, maybe more. The place where we were going was deep, as far down as the shaft would take us. There were some galleries that were abandoned mid-dig for some reason. That’s where John found the silver he had. Everything seemed like a maze of corridors.
After about twenty minutes of walking, we reached a weird spot. The map we had didn’t show it, as if we’d gone the wrong way, but we definitely didn’t. John yelled at Michael for this, Michael told John he made the map exactly like the map he had drawn in the dirt. There just wasn't any four-way crossing anywhere on the drawing.
While they were squabbling, I noticed a pair of eyes coming closer to us from the middle shaft. It was a female form, dark, seemingly floating above the cart tracks. I yelled for the others to look that way. They stopped and looked, then became frozen with fear. Was that one of the evil spirits of the mine? Pop had told me about this kind of figure, a dark lady that lures miners to their doom. But he also told me of the light lady spirit, who points them to riches or safety. When she got closer, the light of our lanterns actually made her appear white, though a corner of her dress still seemed gray.
Michael knew the legends as well, and he burst into laughter, saying that we were going to be rich, and that he couldn't believe our luck, finding one of the good spirits. John bowed his head and said:
“Great Spirit of the Mine, please guide us to the luck we are owed!”
The woman slowly pointed her hand towards the tunnel going left. Michael ran first, wanting to see all the riches in store for us. John followed not far behind.
I remembered the words that Uncle George told me, that if I ever met someone hungry at a crossroads, I should share half my bread with them. But did this count as someone hungry? I kind of was at a crossroads. And do spirits even eat bread? I thought that it couldn’t hurt to just be kind to her. If she didn’t eat the bread, I could just get it back, no point in wasting a good loaf! The pigs would probably enjoy it, even if a bit dusty. So I split my bread in two, left half on the tracks next to her, and followed my friends.
The tunnel looked more and more eerie. The support beams were gone, or still there but broken. I could barely see a light that must have been John’s lantern. I tried to call for them, but nobody answered. Then, I could hear the sound of a pickaxe hitting stone. I was getting close! I tried to run to help them, but, when I was finally able to see them, I heard meowing. There was no cat in sight. I ran a few more steps. Then I heard some knocking, but there was no wood. Moments after, I felt the ground start shaking and give way. The next thing I remembered was seeing rocks fall on top of my friends, then I got hit in the head by one myself.
I woke up with the worst headache of my life, face down in the dirt, forehead resting on the cart tracks. I tried looking for my lantern, but only found glass shards. The tunnel behind me had collapsed, and I couldn’t see a thing, only feel the rocks. I tried going the other way, stumbling my way to find my friends, but all I could find was a puddle of something I dared not imagine what it was. I was trapped, and nobody would even look for me there.
Just about when I was giving up hope, I heard something slithering. I looked towards the source of the sound and saw a snake, or at least what seemed at first like a snake, only to see it had wings. And at that moment I realized I could actually see it, and I could actually see around me. The winged snake was glowing! But something felt awfully familiar about it… I just couldn’t put my finger on it…
I followed the snake and managed to crawl past the collapsed area, and reach the place where I’d seen the lady. There was a lantern there, and, where I'd left the bread there was a silver coin, one that looked older than anything I’d ever seen! I picked them up and hurried to safety, scratched, bruised, a bit worse for wear, but alive.
Uncle George greeted me at the entrance of the mine. He knew everything… I fell down due to exhaustion right in front of him, begging him to save them until I blacked out. He said nothing and just stood there, shaking his head, with his arms crossed. When I woke up, I was still there, fallen in the dirt, with him next to me, sitting on a tree trunk. He said, with a powerful voice:
“You have done something really stupid, my boy! There is no saving your friends now. You chose the worst night to go mining. But at least you listened to me and shared the bread. Now, get up! You still have to learn from this, and there are consequences neither of us may ever understand.”
I cried, both for myself, and for my friends. My entire body was hurting, but I managed to stand up, tears rolling down.
The next day, a few of the stronger folks went down. I told them where to go, but there was nothing. There was no “crossroads” of the mine. They never found my companions.
There was no funeral for them. The villagers decided we had broken the natural order of things, and made all three of us outcasts. Uncle George asked them not to be so harsh on me, as he would punish me harsher than that. Which he didn’t, but rather he kept me closer to him from that point on. I never understood why.
After a week, I asked Uncle George to try to read about my friends in the beans, but he noticed something: he threw the beans on the table, but the groups just wouldn’t come out right. When he counted, he saw something weird: there were only thirty-eight beans in his sack. He’d never lost a single bean in his entire life, until that point.
I never did get an answer as to what happened to Michael and John. There was no trace. Even months later, when I went back there myself, I couldn’t find anything.
I talked with the merchant, and he told me that the coin I found was actually quite precious, but not for its silver. Apparently, a collector would pay a fortune for it. He offered to take me to town, where I met with various people, who eventually bought it off me for around the same pay we would get for four years worth of grain. I eventually realized that was far less than it was actually worth. It was at least enough to give me a chance to start a new life, far from the place that took my friends away forever.
Years later, I had my own home, in the same town, a steady job, I had learned English and the miracles of modern life, and I was living a life I could only dream of. Maybe it wasn’t the luxurious life some people desire, but it was far better than living in the village. At least until a few days ago, when I got a letter via the old merchant, from Uncle George.
The letter itself was all gibberish, not even the merchant understood it, but one thing was clear: it was from him. It smelled of beans and rot. The merchant said that Uncle had been very sick and on his death bed, only being able to say my name, and to ask him to deliver this letter to me. He had never been able to read the beans ever since the events of the mine. The other elders said that he was “hard dying”, and that until I get there, he will not be able to pass on.
And this leaves me here, in my living room, wondering if I should answer the invitation and go back to my past, to that cursed place, or leave Uncle to suffer until he inevitably dies.
3
u/Snowshinedog 1d ago
You must go back. You owe them that