Now that you're here, a lot longer. I have something to hold on for.

Good. You're not to ever leave me again.

I won't.

Good. I wonder if there's some way of building some kind of detector...

For the Silmarils? I expect they're buried under a lot of bedrock by now.

How did they get there in the first place?

Nelyo jumped into a fiery chasm with one. Cáno threw the other into the sea.

What about the third one?

Valar took it. Put it in the sky to inspire people. It got moved when the shape of the world changed.

Moved where?

We think to Venus.

Valar, she thinks with resigned exasperation.

Yeah.

Sorta surprised Curufinwe was at MIT and not NASA, then.

Easier to build our own spaceship than convince other people to do what we need on that.

Fair enough.

And the technology is probably a century out. Venus is hard to land a ship on, you'll rust away instantly.

Is the Silmaril actually, like, visible through the cloud layer? Like at all?

Sometimes I think a little bit. Not sure.

Some inspiration.

It used to be more apparent. Everything did when the world was new. Magic songs are a lot weaker now, too.

Annoying.

Drives Cáno nuts.

I just bet.

And they are back at her place!