The Iron Pillow
This is the official meeting hall for the Royal Order of Sleeping Knights. The Sleeping Knights are the elite military force in Dormia, renowned for their ability to jump rapidly between sleeping and waking states. They have mastered the precision and heightened strength that all Dormians enjoy in their sleep as well as the mental clarity and powers of reason that come with being awake. They have the best of both the sleeping and awake world.
Not surprisingly, the training to become a Sleeping Knight is an arduous process. It begins at the age of four. Only children with the most impressive sleeping skills – like being able to take six separate and distinct naps within the span of a single minute or being able to do back flips while snoring loudly – are allowed to train to become Knights. Potential knights spend the next twenty years in a training academy, with only 10 knights graduating each year.
From the outside, the Iron Pillow does not look very special. This is intentional, because the Order of Sleeping Knights is very secretive and prefers an inconspicuous façade. Inside the building, however, it is a different story. The main room is cavernous, with high, vaulted ceilings, flickering candelabras, chairs and tables, and a long bar where Knights gather to compare knowledge, engage in games and feats of sleeping ability, and of course, play the ultimate game of sleeping might: “Splitting Hairs.”
The Iron Pillow is divided evenly into two sections: The right side is reserved for people who are awake and the left side is devoted to those who are asleep. On the sleeping side, the mood is subdued. Men and women tend to mumble quietly and play games of high precision. In one game, a young man might throw small darts through a keyhole at a distance of 50 feet. In another game, two women might stack toothpicks on top of one another vertically – pointy-end to pointy-end.
The main problem with the “sleeping side” of the Iron Pillow is that Knights tend to get stuck in “sleep lock.” Basically, some Knights fall asleep and keep doing a single task – like splitting hairs – for hours and hours on end, and they can't stop. To prevent this from happening, the Iron Pillow employs a very large man, known as “the alarm,” whose job it is to walk around and wake people up when they fall into sleep lock. For example, the alarm might walk up to a man – who has been standing balanced on his cane – and say: “Time to wake up Mr. Dempsey, you’ve been perched on that cane all afternoon. Best to head on home now – your wife will be expecting you.”
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