Owlsight

mouth in a grin.

“Well, I do not design costumes, nor artwork, nor furnishings,” he said modestly. “My talent is only equal to partitioning space, as it were.”

Kel snorted. “Parrrtitioning ssspace, indeed! Well, I have told you alrrready that you arrre a geniusss, and I ssshall not botherrr with anotherrr attempt.” He turned to Darian. “You ssshould sssee what thisss fellow callsss ‘parrrtitioning sssspace’! He had no chance to ssshow hisss talent in k’Vala, but he isss the chief desssignerrr herrre.”

“Did you design my place, too?” Darian asked, seeing a similarity in the proportions of his home and Snowfire’s. “It’s wonderful, perfect! I couldn’t have anything better! How did you know what to do?”

“I did design it,” Ayshen confirmed. “And, I admit, it was with you in mind. I am glad you like it, I tried to remember what it was that you liked and disliked about various ekele in k’Vala.”

“I’m just curious about one thing,” Darian continued. “How is it made? It’s not rock, but - ”

Ayshen laughed. “You may not believe it, but I will show you later. Willow withes and earth, little brother! Willow withes and earth! It is the easiest way to build that I know of; it holds in cool or heat, and is altogether an ideal way to make a shelter, so long as you seal the walls well.”

“Earth?” Darian did find it hard to believe. “But wouldn’t it just turn to mud in the first rain?”

Ayshen shook his head. “No, I promise you, we build that way in White Gryphon and learned it from the Haighlei, and it is much wetter in their kingdoms than here. We weave the walls, inner and outer, and support them with timber, then pack the space between with earth rammed hard. Then we make a mix of powdered lime and sand and other things into a thick paste, and apply it upon inner and outer walls to make them waterproof. The roof is similar; the drawback is that we cannot alter a dwelling so made, we can only add to it. Windows, doors, and recesses must be built in from the beginning.”

Darian knew better than to doubt the hertasi, but the idea of a house as sturdily made as his being constructed of such flimsy materials as willow withes and plain earth seemed fantastical to him.

And yet, what could be more practical?

“You will get a chance to watch and help in such a construction,” Ayshen promised. “There are many things that we must still build here, and most buildings on the ground will be made this way.”

“I’m looking forward to it,” he replied.

Ayshen laughed again. “You may regret saying that when you are in charge of a ram!” he cautioned. “But now I must go see to food preparation.”

“And I mussst go to hunt my food,” Kel chimed in.

“Then I guess I’ll go see if I can be useful to Starfall,” Darian said, and he followed Ayshen down the narrow stair, while Kel took the more direct route out by leaping from his sunning ledge into the wind.

Darian did find himself on the business end of an earth ram the very next day, for the first of the large buildings that everyone wanted put up was the one that would contain the “seed” of a new Vale. The walls had to be reinforced with rock as well as timber, for such a large building, and even with every free hand in k’Valdemar working, the walls rose with painful slowness. It was literally painful, in fact; most everyone went to bed each night with an aching back, neck, and arms, for the earth between the inner and outer walls had to be pounded until it was nearly as hard as rock, itself. Now Darian could readily believe that his house would last far past his own lifetime.

But with so many people at work, the walls were actually finished in a mere week, enclosing quite a large space of land near the lake. Water was brought up from the lake and fed into a channel at the top of the building, to flow into a series of pools and waterfalls exactly like the hot pools at k’Vala. It flowed out again through a channel at the base of the building, and from there to a purifying sand-and-charcoal pit.

Once the water began flowing, the Hawkbrothers scoured the forest for fallen trees, seasoned, but not rotten, and brought back huge beams and support pillars for the roof. Once these were in place, large squares of the skylight material were seated between the beams, and sealed against leaks. Now the communal pools were ready for their living occupants.

Tayledras with the gift of accelerating the growth of plants, including Steelmind, went to work with the seeds and seedlings the gryphons ferried over from k’Vala. When they were done, although the growth was a bit sparse, the building contained a miniature Vale, quite large enough to hold all of k’Valdemar’s current inhabitants at once. The colorful little chattering messenger-birds of the Kaled’a’in flew freely in here, as did the hummingbirds that the Tayledras used for the same purpose. A little magic would be used to heat the waters; a luxury, but one that everyone agreed was the sort of thing that made life much easier than it would have been otherwise.

The waiting Heartstone, now fully awakened, had been fed passively by the newly formed ley-lines for the past four years, and Starfall was pleased with the amount of power that had managed to accumulate in that time. There was certainly enough to set up the soaking pools, magical sentries and protections, and basic shields. Darian