Gyrfalcon's Keep Allora, pedala!

Company came to him in the form of a hunter - spry, musical, carrying a falcon in his mouth, whose head bumped against his narrow chest.

For a moment, he saw himself leaping forwards. He saw himself grappling with the man, vicious and eventually victorious. The vividness of this chain of events was so overwhelming, it nearly swept him off of his feet; when he came to, the world around him seemed submerged in molasses, so slow it was almost unreal.

Still blinking, he found it within himself to say,

Hello.

And then, quite stupidly: Dio vi benedica.

It was a wonder Pier hadn't died yet. Had he paid a bribe to natural selection?