Sokni's arrival is a bit of a shock to both of us. I didn't think we could pry him away from the pub in Celtia until at least Imbolc. I just hope he doesn't want to get into another drinking contest. It's not that I mind the drinking so much... it's just the rhymes that drive me nuts. And now he's wanting to start a contest to name the baby ostrich. And everybody thinks I'll be making a good foster father. What they don't know is that the daddy ostrich takes over the primary child-care duties, once the egg is hatched.

So... I'm sitting here, sipping my kash and trying to hold pleasant conversation with Apil and Sokni. Suddenly, my gut gives a lurch and my eyes go wide. Caily looks on with concern, thinking I may be having an adverse reaction to that last batch of kash. Apil has been experimenting, again. Once more, there is a shifting inside my robes. Then comes a knock, knock, knocking which can mean only one thing. I carefully pull back a fold of my brat and look at the egg. It's rocking back and forth in an alarming manner, and the knocking is getting more insistent by the moment.

A crack appears, then another and another. A chunk of the shell as thick as a dinner plate, pops out into my lap. A plaintive peeping comes from the hole. A small black eye peers out. Then, the orangish tip of a beak starts pounding away at the edges of the hole. With a whack and a crack, the two halves of the shell part company. A damp and bedraggled baby ostrich is sitting in my lap. "PEEEEEP!!!" he says. I'm guessing it's a "he", but I have no way of telling. This is the first baby ostrich I've ever seen. He wobbles around for a moment and then makes a vicious grab for my nose. I manage to dodge out of the way, but I can tell the little feller is hungry from the sound of the repeated "PEEEEEP!!!"

"Caily!" I call out in moderate panic. "Would you be having any salad greens in the kitchen?" I don't dare ask for worms, as I'm pretty sure Apil has been picked clean, and I don't want to cast aspersions on Caily's housekeeping. Meanwhile, I'm trying to get the little feller interested in chewing on my kash-sipper. Anything but my nose!