It's disorienting, the long leaps up and the sudden springing from a freefalling drop. The world is moving in sickening waves, like the worst storms on the Treader, lifting and sinking abruptly, now green, now blue, while his heart beats a bewildered tattoo. The stables feel like a century away, seesawing closer with every leap, skewing crazily to the sides like he's being blown off course. He can't seem to get his back legs and forelegs to agree with each other; they argue with every jump, send him careening too far to the right or left, where the ground greets him like a trampoline and off he goes again.

Birds have never been a concern of his, previously. Neither birds, nor cats, nor any of the creatures prowling the grounds extending around the bar, but a shadow passes overhead and he finds himself, once again, turned to stone, nothing but the thin skin at his throat vibrating in the pattering terror of the pitifully small animal.

He might have turned into a Talking Frog, but his luck seems to have run out there, as well.

Finally, a last desperate lunge sends him ricocheting onto the clean, flat floor of the stables, where strands of stray bar his way like rope, and flutter strangely as he hops past, aiming for Aslan only knows what, or where -- the safety of the indoors, a sheltered corner, a friendly face, a worn leather wall he slams into with a thud that lays him sprawled and awkward, limbs askew, blinking and bemused, on the floor.

Leather that looks familiar, and he lands on his back as he attempts looking up, but it's enough to find a flash of gold, a hat he knows, and a strange sort of determination sinks in like a net under his skin, sending him scrambling upright, and barreling once, twice, three times into the boot in front of him, knocking whatever meager body weight he can against the ankle inside it.