Elwing rocks their driftwood cradle, singing lullabies long into the night. Her twins, her little ones are bundled together, wrapped in wool. She smiles at them as she sings, as they watch her mouth with sleepy eyes. They try to imitate the sound, their small voices squeaking. She laughs and kisses their soft cheeks, strokes their downy, dark hair. They look like her, and her brothers, her dead brothers.
She tries to forget them, but she can see Eluréd and Elurín in her sons' grey eyes. She wonders why she was saved and not they. Her fingers touch the jewel at her throat.
Shadows deepen on the walls. Candles flicker in the sea wind, but around her there is light. There is always light. She strokes the stone. It seems to answer, to sooth her. It is only thing she took from Doriath; it is the last piece of home.
She remembers her father's smile, her mother's lying lips.
"You must hide," her mother said. "Later we will come for you. We will find you."
The jewel was placed round Elwing's neck. She was kissed and petted, and then they let her go. She screamed as the guards dragged her off, but her parents turned away, faced the dark. They never found her. They never came looking. They died. All her family died, but her.
The twins are sleeping now. Their heads nestle close together. She gives each one last good night kiss then creeps out of the room, her bare feet barely touching the coarse wood floor. She walks out onto the white sand, watches the tide churn in. A thin fog sprawls over the harbor, and the moon and stars are hidden behind clouds.
Only the light of the Silmaril shines forth through the night. It is a beacon. It lives to shine. Elwing can feel its joy as it casts rays of light across the black waters. She holds it out in front of her. It loves the open air. It does not want to be confined to dry rooms and locked boxes.
"Ëarandil," she whispers, "Come home."
Ëarandil is out there looking for his father, not being a father. He is a child and a man, abandoned and abandoning.
The white stone in her hand brightens as she speaks. It seems to understand her distress. It looks further out to sea, but there is no ship in sight, only ocean.
"I need you," she says. "I can't do this alone. You haven't even seen the boys. You might like them. They're strong."
It has been months since Ëarandil came ashore. Days blur into each other, fog and sunlight. Each day copies its brother. And she ages slowly. Being Peredhel, she lingers longer, but time is still an enemy.
You aren't alone, the Silmaril says. It twinkles like a star in her hand. She puts it back against her neck. The hard edges scratch her skin, but she does not mind. At least, the stone is close.
"I love you," she says. The wind howls, and waves pound the crags. Yet she feels no cold. The jewel is warm against her skin. It fills her blood with heat.
All nights are the same. Each night, she stands on the shore holding out the Silmaril to the sea, hoping to keep Ëarandil safe on the waters, in case he ever returns home. Some mornings, women wake to find her passed out on the sand. They tell her to stop, and she will for a week, but then she is back, a light in the darkness, life fading.
This is the one way she feels in control. She and the stone are working together, to keep Ëarandil from sinking. When she was a child, the jewel saved her. It was hung round her neck, and she did not die, though the others fell down in droves. The Silmaril is her savior. It is her life.
And she is its keeper, its beloved. It lives through her hands and breathes through her body. Woman and stone are one. Dior's daughter and Fëanor's Pride. Elwing and the Silmaril.