Finally, when my throat has started to choke me and my stomach has become like a collapsed cave, contracting the rest of my innards toward it, there comes a light knock on the door.

"Come in," I croak, but it appears that whoever is outside does not hear me. I walk over and open it, carefully.

"I hope I have not disturbed your forging," says Melkor. He is in full harness with a half-wrapped mace of light at his side. His expression is still and serious.

"Not at all."

"How do you find our Runethane's forge?"

"I find it very well, though I'm still sketching. Have my quarters been prepared?"

"Yes, though it sounds as if you might like a sip of ale before going to them."

I nod. "That would be perfect."

He leads me out of the forge, through the dark and empty Runethane's hall, out the great enruned gates, and along corridors to the eating hall. As before, no one else is present.

I sit down to drink and eat. Melkor watches me silently.

"I don't remember us talking much, back then," I say.

"I was skeptical of your suspicions."

"You sound skeptical now as well."

"Do I?" He shrugs. "But it is not for me to question Guildmaster Nthazes' decisions. He turned out to be correct in allying with you and Jaemes, and so we trust his wisdom deeply."

"You don't trust me, though."

"I do not know you so well. But I can tell your power easily enough. And you have been a friend to us before. Whatever my personal feelings, I must welcome you here."

He doesn't sound particularly welcoming, but I thank him anyway. I finish my ale and food, and he leads me to my quarters. Before we part, however, he does have one last thing to say:

"What script is that on your armor? Truly?"

"It's a script of my own making."

"Just as you told our guildmaster."

"That's right."

"I see. If you say so, Runeforger. Goodbye."

I sit down on the hard bed and sigh. It can't be helped, I suppose. I can't expect everyone to be as friendly as Nthazes is. Nor as blindly trusting that my abilities are what I say they are. On top of this, my reputation as the traitor is surely known. Even if Nthazes didn't tell everyone about my past, they will have heard stories from the dwarves of Brightdeep.

After taking off my armor and setting it on the stand, I get into bed and shut my eyes. For a long while I cannot sleep, but eventually exhaustion wins its battle against my vague tension and fear, and I fall into unconsciousness.

I dream of the sphere. Reflected in it is the face of the First Runeforger. I blink—he blinks too, at the exact moment I do, and then he snarls at me.

After waking up, I return to the forge directly, finding my own way this time by my legs' muscle memory and the feel of the cool breezes. I look over my latest sketch several times, redo the calculations, and though I find several fatal flaws, I decide that this particular idea holds a lot more potential than its predecessors did.

I draw in a fury. My hands itch to clasp a hammer, not a charcoal stick, and my arms and shoulders are shivering, eager to make me sweat. The black curves flow into each other, wrap around each other, nearly forming helices but parting at the last centimeter. The air-flows will touch, combine, and move past the focusing gems I will set in, before rushing down past the central induction ridge.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

I pull my hands back, calm myself. There is no need to rush. Everything must be perfect—I cannot forget patience.

Thus it is three more sleeps before I finally finish this design. I go over the curves again, then another three times, tracing my finger along how sound will flow. Once I confirm that my calculations are mathematically perfect, I take two sheets of ninety nine grade pure titanium, and ready to cut.

I place down the saw. I step back, look at my design. Is it not a little too similar to Nthazes' ears? It at least is of the same general profile.

To copy the craft of another is utter folly—even the lowest initiate knows this. Even masons, metalworkers and miners know this about runeknights. We are artists and we create works that are unique. It does not matter that I will use different runes to the others, better runes, and use better materials. This design makes me nothing but a thief.

I shout in sudden anger, thrust the papers into the furnace, turn it on, incinerate them. Inky smoke blows out then disperses into nothing. I crouch down against the wall and hold my head in my hands. Have I lost my instincts? My runic ears I crafted in Vanerak's realm were unique. Why can I not make something of my own now?

Nthazes' crafts have bedazzled me. I see them in my mind's eye, and am jealous. Here is a dwarf who has spent long-hour after long-hour perfecting his metalwork with only the most regular of materials to use, and in quantities that though great, were far from unlimited. Though he said he created and gave up on many drafts—likely after enruning them, or else he would have melted them down and hammered the titanium many times in apology—he must have done so with a heavy heart. It was the last metal of his guild, of his entire realm that he was using.

That desperation has led to brilliance. His armor is as best as a dwarf could make it without knowing the ugly secret of our true metal. And his runework is better than mine. He understands the runes of light, as well as the other limited scripts he uses, far better than I've ever attempted to understand even my own scripts.

My power was given to me by Vanerak. These crafts I hold were born from the resources he gifted me—resources he no doubt took dishonestly. My runes too are born from powers not my own. They come from the First Runeforger, and his work.

Who am I to try and compete with a runeknight like Guildmaster Nthazes? Everything he wears and wields is the fruit of hundreds of years of striving for perfection, of amassing his own resources, of gaining the trust of his fellows.

Half of my power has been gifted to me. And now Nthazes wants to gift me more!

I open the chest of true titanium again and listen to its quietly disconcerting song. I stare into its reflections, watch their subtle distortions. I don't know how to use this material. I have no idea what its properties may be, how I might work it. If I try, I will burn my hands off. If I'm to understand it, I must make some for myself. Only then might I risk using this grand gift.

No—Not even then! I won't use it even then. True metal made by a dwarf of the deep should be for the dwarves of the deep alone. Not for me. Never for me.

I spend the next few long-hours, or whatever lengths of time they are, staring at blank paper. How can I make ears that are my own, that are not mere imitations of Nthazes' creation?

The idea comes to me as I'm examining the scripts of light. As I read over the old tablets outside the Runethane's hall, drinking in the runes' sounds and shapes and puzzling at their deeper meanings, it hits me: if am to make a script of light for Nthazes, why don't I make these ears the first craft that uses them?

Halax created a way for a sense of heat to replace the sense of vision. How about I make a craft that turns sound into light? I will both hear the tones and see them. Timbre will become color, volume brightness. Light and sound as one sense. That is what I can make.

How, though? If this is the answer, then what is the exact series of questions? What process must sound undergo to become light? My runes will need to be exact in both their flow and their meaning. And I must be subtle too. Runes of light means working with almergris. If I make this craft wrong, I will be blinded.

The scars in my eyes itch, as if eager to break my pupils apart.

Back to the forge I go, and for many more hours I work on sketches and calculations. I sleep and eat and drink and don't remember doing any of them. I am in the world of metal, working out how metal might best be used to aid me in destroying our foes.

This is what it means to be a runeknight. My life in Vanerak's realm, for all its horrors, was a shortcut to power. But from now on there will be no shortcuts.

And this becomes especially apparent when it finally comes time to assemble my materials. Titanium, I have. Hammers, tongs, and a diamond cutter I have also, as well as several other, more complex-looking pieces of equipment.

But when I inspect the furnace, I see that the fuel it takes is not coal, but a kind of waxy red substance. I sniff it. It smells distilled. I've read of this substance before—crimson jammy. It burns hotter than coal, and far more evenly too, and breathing its thin fumes is said to improve concentration and endurance. I wish to use it. The mixture of fungi and insects it's made from is rare, though, and it's going to be expensive to buy.

The cost of the fuel, however, will pale in comparison to the cost of the focusing gems. Sapphires will be good, diamonds better. I need at least ten small ones for each ear, and one large to go on each induction ridge too. Twenty two in total. Rough or ready-cut, they will be hideously expensive.

I refuse to take advantage of Nthazes any further. I will buy everything myself and make something truly my own. But how much gold, exactly, are my materials going to cost me?

It's time to head up to Brightdeep to find out.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.