She woke to a strange squirming sensation against her thighs. She shifted, a bit startled, and a wrapped weight slipped down between her legs. Only its head poked up out of the scarf-lined canyon made from her legs. Their eyes met, hers brown and plain, his bulging, gold, and clear, but mostly wet pupil.

The beak opened. “Good morning.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, pulling her legs back and standing beside the bed. “Um…” She didn’t know how to strike up conversation with a rat-bird. “How are you feeling?”

He looked himself over as well as he could. “Clean and warm,” he said. “Thanks to you, big one.”

She smiled at that thought. I’m the big one now?

“What are you called?” asked the rat-bird.

“Oh, me? I’m Maj.”

There was something powerful, wise, and formal in his tone, noticeable even through the high-pitched squeakiness of it. It was as if an old dragon had been shrunk, its deep growl turned to a twangy screech with the shortening of vocal cords.

“Thank you for helping me. I owe you.”

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She nodded and blushed. “And…” she said, twisting her hands in her shirt, still brown from the day before. She had so many questions and didn’t know where to begin.

The rat-bird explained himself over the course of those next few minutes. His name was Piloncilus, a feather-tailed opinicus from some place called the Upperwind. He had fallen from his nest, cracked through a weak spot left by Il-Jun, and ended up in what he termed the Lowerwind, what she called Tufaltha or Rhentarri.

“It was a long fall, big one, that must have lasted days; maybe even a week.”

“Was your nest in a cloud, then?”

“Higher than a cloud.”

“Or a star?”

“Higher still.”

She tried to imagine what it would be like falling through stars for a week. “Did you get hungry?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Where I am from eating is optional.”

“But…” She frowned. “How?”

“There is no hunger or starvation. Neither is there sickness or death.”

“So, you only eat when you want to?”

“Yes. But I think I am understanding what hunger is now. Something happened to me when I got stuck in the mud.”

“You want to eat?”

“I think I must in order to survive here.”

“I’ll bring you something,” she said. “I can bring… um… grass, bugs?” Her frown deepened. “What do you eat?”

Piloncilus would have been smiling if his face muscles were designed for it. “Not grass. Bugs, worms, bits of meat or fish will do.”

“I’ll find something. Are you okay here alone?”

“I am, Maj. Thank you. Humans make excellent nests, it seems.”

“It’s just a scarf,” she said, stopping at the door. “But maybe that does beat sticks and mud.”

Again, Piloncilus would have been smiling. “Soft and warm.”

“Goodbye, Piloncilus.”

“Goodbye, Maj.”