Valdemar 11 - [Owl Mage 03] - Owlknight by Mercedes Lackey Page B

doesn’t like the alternative you offer, and goes into it reluctantly, but you don’t nock an arrow to your bow and force him into it. He can always say no.”
    â€œBut people don’t want to say no when I ask them to do something,” he protested. “It makes them feel guilty to turn me down, so they go ahead and do what I ask even though they don’t want to—”
    â€œThen it’s their job to grow a stronger spine.” As far as she was concerned, that was the end of that argument. “And here we are, wasting a perfectly lovely evening by agonizing over things that haven’t ever happened! I can think of much better things to do with our time.”
    She hadn’t expected an immediate response, but she was very pleased when she got one. “So can I,” he replied, and turned so that she was no longer resting on his shoulder so that he could kiss her.
    Her body began to tingle pleasantly as he prolonged the kiss, nibbling delicately on her lip as she responded. She shifted a little so that she could put both her arms around him, losing herself in sensation. Meeren will see that the “privacy” sign is set up by the time we need it, she thought—and gave herself up to loving.

Five

    B arian stepped back from the golden-oak wall panel he’d been holding up, and admired all of the new hertasi- work ornamenting the Companion stables. The structure was finished just in time. Thank goodness for gryphons. If we hadn’t had warning, we could have been caught in mid-addition.
    For the past several days, especially swift gryphons had been patrolling the main road to Errold’s Grove, on the watch for the approaching Heralds; even at the speed a Companion moved, a gryphon in the air traveled faster. A rough calculation gave them about a day’s warning before the visitors arrived. Last night the two had finally been spotted just before sunset, and the gryphon in question, a gyrfalcon-type with amazing speed, had come rushing back to the Vale as fast as she could with the news. She was exhausted when she arrived, but two more gryphons had been eager to take the news to Errold’s Grove and Lord Breon’s Keep, giving everyone advance notice that their very special guests were soon to appear.
    The basic structure of the attachment to the guest lodge meant to house the Companions had been finished quite quickly, but Ayshen (no mean architect) had planned for the ornamentation and elaboration to be completed in stages. No matter when the new residents arrived, the stables would appear finished. The first change had been to the fountain that supplied fresh running water; the initial installation had been a simple trough with water constantly flowing through it running along the rear of all three stalls. Utilitarian, but not very impressive; certainly not Tayledras. “There is power in style,” was all Ayshen would say concerning the redesign. Now each of the three stalls held a separate handsome terra-cotta basin, with a constant flow of fresh, clean water bubbling up from the bottom and drained by a pipe just beneath the rim at the rear. Outside, the pipes joined into one, which drained into an ornamental pond. Ayshen figured the fish wouldn’t mind secondhand water.
    The second change had been to add separate mangers for different sorts of foodstuffs; a hay rack just for hay, and smaller mangers and basins for oats, sweet-feed, and hot mashes. The hay rack had been fastened at the front of the stable for all three to share, but each stall had its own “special treat” containers; the latter were actually more terra-cotta basins which fitted into twisted-wire racks. The basins were removable, so that they could be taken away to be cleaned after use. The old wooden mangers that served for all food and were not removable for cleaning had been left in place, but trimmed with braided rope.
    Then the dirt floor was replaced with brick, laid