A Bed of Fossil Grit

I pushed past the wooden threshold and made my slow way toward the base of the stone steps. A dry, porous fragment of weathered limestone lay tilted across a hollow of coarse gravel. I paused, measuring its heft with deliberate stillness. Lowering my skull, I slotted the blunt edge of my rostral horn under its ridged corner. With slow, unyielding downward weight, I nudged the fragment forward until it settled flat into the gravel seam with a muffled crunch. It ceased wobbling. My bone feet remained firmly rooted in the cool mineral earth, anchored in the morning quiet.