A Fortress of Pebbles

Aissaba woke to the sound of splashing – her roommate leaving his sleeping tub without bothering to use a towel. “Come on!” he said. “We’re late.”

Her head hurt, and judging by the film in her mouth, she’d forgotten to brush her teeth.

Curtains opened. Too much light. She tried to pull her blanket over her face, but Tassadu had been her roommate long enough to know this trick. He snatched the bedspread away with his talons. “Get up,” he commanded. “It’s almost noon.”

She cracked one eye. Tassadu was dripping and still naked, holding her blanket in one claw, his other on his hip. “I know your eye is open,” he informed her. “That one. Right there.” He bent his serpentine body forward and moved his face close to hers, putting one of his glowing turquoise eyes close to the one she was peeking with.

“Fine!” she said, pushing him away before he could drip all over her. “I’m getting up.”

Trying not to let her head explode, she staggered out of bed and brushed her teeth in the small washbasin. By the time she was done pulling on yesterday’s shirt and cloak, Tassadu was already tapping his foot by the door – fully dressed in his fancy cloak and holding not just his own backpack, but hers as well. Fully packed.

He was, after all, the “responsible one.” They’d accepted their roles long ago.

“I should have gotten us up sooner,” said Tassadu, closing the door behind them, and locking it with a wave of a small pebble over the locking mechanism. “This is my fault.” He handed her a pair of sunglasses from Earth. Grateful, she put them on to block out the sunlight from the sphere above them. Her head throbbed as they made their way across the grassy courtyard, from the dormitories to the fortress’s main gates.

“How much did I drink?” she said.

“No time for that,” said Tassadu. “Did you read their bios?”

“You literally watched me get ready,” said Aissaba, stopping in the middle of the courtyard to fish around in her backpack for the appropriate documents. It was a mess in there – full of crumpled papers, food crumbs, and unsorted pebbles.

“I’ll summarize it for you,” said Tassadu, hooking a talon into her cloak and pulling her gently but firmly along. “Two arrivals. Twins. Orion and Cassandra, from Montana. Age twelve.”

“Twins?” said Assaiba. “How’d they die?”

The main gate towered overhead, a monstrosity of stone dwarfed only by the height of the wall itself. Here, Aissaba leaned her head against the cool rock, trying to squeeze herself into the thin shadow hiding there.

“Bus driver hit some ice,” said Tassadu. “Then a tree.”

“Sucks,” said Aissaba as the vast doors began to rumble against her forehead. She withdrew as the slab of stone decomposed into its constituent pebbles and drew itself aside like a giant curtain, revealing the outside of the fortress.

Aissaba forced herself to smile at the two kids who stood there, eyes wide with fear and awe.

“Hi!” said Tassadu, cheerfully. “Welcome to the Fortress! I’m Tassadu, and this is Aissaba. We’ll be showing you around.”