A Typical Evening
Elowen and Old Foss spent their evenings in the home, the quiet ‘tink’ of metallic hammering, Elowen used their fireplace to heat the metal, her workbench to the side with shelves on the walls for ring mandrel, small jars of stones, coils of silver wire, a wall rack for various hammers, pliers, an awl.
Old Foss would smoke a pipe and hum or sing, sitting in the shadows. Sometimes he gives her a compliment and she smiles without looking away from her work. They are in quiet conversation by their actions rather than words.
When Lowen was there and before Old Foss left, they would stand watching by the bench, Old Foss would sing low songs and change the words to make Lowen laugh. They called him ‘Papa’, and Elowen ‘Mother’.
They would talk to Old Foss as they watched Elowen; he would sometimes give them a silly quiz or burn some herbs and ask them to identify by smell. He would make small comments about the weather or something current and relate it to plants. Almost a throwaway comment but with a teaching every time. Little comments that stuck in Lowen’s mind. They absorbed them like watering a tree.
How Elowen was when Old Foss left
She didn’t weep, not in front of anyone. She didn’t ask anyone to look for him either. But she still sometimes sets two bowls out by accident, and leaves them both there. She still sings under her breath when she works — low songs, nonsense verses. Some of them his nonsense.
She knows he’s alive. Or rather, she believes it in her bones. But she doesn’t talk about it much. She keeps a small pile of his things in a drawer — pipe, herbal pouch, a few half-finished notes. She doesn’t touch them, but she hasn’t let them go either.
Elowen and Lowen’s Relationship
Elowen is proud of Lowen. She doesn’t say it outright, but it’s in the way she leaves a certain file on the bench, knowing Lowen prefers that one. In the way she watches them work from the corner of her eye and smiles with one side of her mouth. Lowen, in turn, is often in awe of her precision. Her ability to finish something without second-guessing it. They ask her questions sometimes — but usually after they’ve already tried something and it’s gone slightly sideways. She never corrects, only demonstrates.
Their styles have diverged:
- Elowen’s work is clean, balanced, almost architectural.
- Lowen’s is more fluid, organic — almost wild, growing sideways sometimes. But both are grounded in nature, in function, in quiet symbolism. You’d know they were from the same hands, even as they branch out.
They don’t often talk feelings. But sometimes Lowen will mutter something while choosing a stone — “I can’t get this out of my head,” or “I saw someone today who reminded me of…”
Elowen doesn’t push. But she listens. And Lowen knows.