-- Lilith POV, Skyview Monastery --

  Masons and other craftsmen had arrived at the monastery. She had been excited! They had come to build the forge! Soon she would be forging weapons and armor with John. She really wanted to watch the construction. Maybe she could even help, so the forge was done earlier?

  But no, she had to stay hidden. Superior Martins did not want to fuel the rumors that there was a demon kept in Skyview Monastery, so no one from outside must see her. At least John had come to visit her, and check on the progress that she had made with the runes. It's been nice to have him around, even if was only for a few hours. Talk to him about the runes and carving metal. There was at least as much to learn for her about metals and the alloys made from them, as there was for her to learn about the runes themselves.

  But regardless how nice that had been, while the craftsmen were around, most of the time she was confined to her cell, just sometimes working in the library, sometimes in the kitchen. Places which the craftsmen did not visit, where she remained unseen. Well, more time in her cell meant more time to study rune crafting and calligraphy. Still no paper, but John had promised to bring paper and ink for her once he was back from Laketown. But that would take at least another three days, maybe even a week. Till then the slate and chalk had to do. Or ... maybe skin. Her skin.

  To her surprise one of the later chapters in the book had been about using runes as body paint, and even runic tattoos. Apparently some warrior tribes used those to make the power of the runes their own. According to the book it was rather difficult to make it work though. A rune painted onto the skin would not have much effect. Even a tattooed rune barely went any deeper. It was a bit like the problem with the metal, make the rune go deep enough, make their power spread over the whole body. Metal had to be softened and carved while soft. Skin had to be pierced. But while metal only passively resisted, a living body tried to isolate the rune, protect its own integrity. Even tattooed under the skin it was still an influence from the outside which a living body rejected. It required certain rituals to make the body accept a rune.

  Now she sat and watched the skin on her hand and forearm. Could she even be tattooed? What ink would be needed for that? Or was body paint the best that she could have, even if it was the weakest form of body runes? She'd definitely try some of the runes as body paint once she figured out what sort of ink or paint she needed for that. The good point in painted runes was that they could be applied easily, washed off and replaced by other runes as needed. They were weak but quick to apply and versatile.

  Noise from the masons work once more tore her mind away from these thoughts. Again and again she had found herself listening to hammering, shouting and then occasionally the sound of heavy things being dragged over stone floor. What were they doing? Was this what building a forge sounded like?

  She put the sleeve back down over her forearm and tried to focus on the runes. Sequences. Directions. Strokes. Again and again she drew runes on the slate, wiped them and tried once more. The examples in the book all were immaculate. While hers were slowly improving, she felt clumsy and centuries off from mastery. Her claws didn't really help the case either, they even made holding the chalk difficult for her. Well, for carving metal they should be good. At least John had said so. He had to know.

  Her fire runes were meanwhile good enough that the slate heated to a point that made candle wax melt on it. The effect didn't last long though. After a few minutes she had to infuse the rune again. Chalk was very weak to hold intention.

  The frost rune worked too. Hoarfrost was growing on the slate like a spiky, crystal miniature forest. She imagined a vase with hoarfrost covered metal flowers. Rune powered. It would be amazing! Could John forge flowers? Could she learn to forge metal flowers?

  Hammering distracted her again. They were working since days on the new forge. How long did it take to build a forge? And when would John return? A week could be a terribly long time if one was waiting.

  But she had to focus. Practice the runes.

  -- John Smith, Traveling --

  The new forge was under construction. He had left the monastery at morning and was now on his way back to Laketown to fetch more of his equipment. Why did they have to exile Lilith this far away? He really started to dislike the time consuming traveling. Soon that would be over though, once he had gathered all the needed equipment he could stay at the monastery. Superior Martins had offered him one of the guest rooms for a little fee.

  Lilith had surprised him. An then, not at all. He was surprised how dutifully she studied the runes. He was not surprised that the first rune that she had tried was fire. And even with chalk on slate it had worked. These were about the most unsuitable materials to craft runes. Weak on even weaker stone. But the monks had not given Lilith anything better. Ink and paper were reserved for holy scriptures in the monastery.

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  He would bring her paper and ink.

  And soon they would forge runeblades. If Lilith could make runes work with chalk on slate, how much stronger had they have to be with proper spellsteel. He could not wait to try. If he had to bet what she'd make first, it would be a flameblade. She liked fire just too much.

  -- Superior Martins, Skyview Monastery --

  He had come down to see the progress of the construction of the forge. Masons had ripped a huge hole into the outer monastery wall. Apparently it was important for a forge to get a lot of fresh air in and consumed air out. He hoped the masons knew what they were doing. If the outer wall collapsed, it might tear half the monastery from the spires peak.

  Now they were busy to place an arc of stones over the hole to take the weight of the wall above. Meanwhile, strong wooden beams served to hold everything up.

  A memory brought a sour grin to his face. 'Lilith is trouble', he once had concluded. But back then he had other things in mind. Actually quite minor things, seen in hindsight. She wanted to hold hands with him. She had told brother Otto that her evil stare can kill people if she wants it to.

  Unexpected, shocking. But not like something bad actually had happened. Just disturbing thoughts.

  Then a kidnapper. Lilith as a hunter. That had been scary on a different level.

  Lilith taking a flame bath in the kitchen with ten people watching. Crazy. And again, no actual damage, but scarred souls. Well, also a burned robe.

  Now she was doing nothing at all but sit and learn runes in her cell, and still his monastery was torn apart and built again. Just because she was here and he couldn't let her go anywhere else. Admitted, not the whole monastery. But looking at the hole in the wall and all the wooden beams to stabilize it, it certainly felt like that to him.

  He didn't knew what to think about it. The king had tried to use Lilith, and she declined. She had declined in a manner that made the king exile her to his monastery.

  Now John Smith was trying to use her. She'd been a bit reluctant about the idea of forging weapons with John at first, but her love for fire had won her over to John's proposal quickly. Meanwhile she even seemed quite enthusiastic about forging.

  And it looked like even the king would get something out of this deal too. Regardless how much Lilith disliked the king, she seemed to be willing to ignore this point. Or maybe it was just not present at all in her mind. Just because she loved fire, and John Smith had promised her fire.

  Towards the left wall, he could see the foundation work for the forge being put in place. He didn't know how large the average forge was, but this one looked quite large to him. Besides that, bellows would be installed to feed air to the forge. His knowledge of forges was limited, but apparently that was important.

  Two weeks at least, he had been told, it would take for the basic construction work. Longer till the forge could be fired up a first time.

  He turned around to head back upstairs, to his office. His beloved regular days never seemed to return anymore.

  -- Lilith POV, Skyview Monastery --

  Now this was annoying. Once all the monks had gone to sleep, she had tried to find the place where the masons were building the forge. She had a rough idea of the location from the noise that they made. But she could not go there.

  The forge was being set up on the ground floor. And the geas was worded to include only rooms on the first level, and everywhere she was supposed to work.

  She was supposed to work at the forge. But not yet.

  She could not take the stairs down. Every time she tried, there was an irresistible wish in her to go upstairs again and return to her cell.

  Now she sat on her mattress. Once she was relieved that the banishment clause had not kicked in. She got a sort of warning before. Or something. She hadn't known for sure, just that the banishment clause was badly worded. As in, it could not work the way it was worded. It would try to banish her to a place, which was not where banished demons went to. It could not work.

  But apparently the geas had other methods to make her comply. She had agreed to stay in the assigned rooms. It reflected that thought on her. It was her own thought, just one from the past. Really difficult to resist a thought that was ones own thought.

  Well, she got the luxury version. There was no pain, no banishment. It wasn't so hard to comply to ones own wish. It was, actually, what one wished to do. It felt even good to comply. The wish was fulfilled.

  The frustrating part was the memory of the moment before and knowing that something had twisted ones mind.

  She took a deep breath. Nothing she could do about it right now. And probably better not to test if the banishment somehow still worked if she overcame the mind magic and forced it.

  Better to wait till the forge was made her workplace officially. Couldn't be so long from now, could it?

  She picked up the rune book again. While there were not actually that many known runes there were a lot more combinations of runes which all had their very own effect. A lot more for her to learn.