story(unamed)--chapter 14

Chap. 14
Serenity awoke to the smell of something burning by the bushes. She groaned and pulled herself into a sitting position and looked around. She saw Jason kneeled over by the dimming fire, studying a map. Shinku and Esmera were overhead, flying and playing around.
Serenity walked over to where Jason was and bent down to study the map along with him. She saw the whole world of Alercaria laid out for her. She saw roads and mountains and cities and lakes and so much more. Jason was muttering something and lightly tracing his finger over a certain route. Then he pointed in the middle of a forest which was very close to a castle—which Serenity assumed—was Isabella’s.
“Where is the closest city?” asked Serenity.
Jason pointed to a black dot a couple inches away from where they were. “This is Erana. If we leave now, we should arrive there by noon. Come on.”

The sun was directly overhead when Jason spotted Erana. “There!” he shouted. Serenity looked ahead to see a medium sized city near a forest and a lake. There were farmers working in a farm nearby and children splashing in the waters below.
While Serenity was watching all the activities of the people below, Jason was behind her pacing. “Should I go in there? Maybe if just Serenity goes. The dragons cannot go, of course. But then again, maybe I should go, in case something happens to Serenity,” he murmured quietly.
Serenity looked back and pulled on Jason’s backpack. “Come on, before it gets dark.”
Jason hesitated, unsure of what he should do, but then he thought of Serenity and followed her into the city. 

They had entered the city of Erana half an hour later. After a while of riding on Arabella, Serenity turned back to look at Jason. “Why aren’t the dragons coming?” she queried.
Jason chuckled. “Trust me, most people over react when they see a dragon. It would be best if they stayed in the woods until we are done.”
Serenity pondered over this until they were in the middle of the city. “Here,” called Jason when he threw her a coin. Serenity caught it and stared at it. “Go over to that man over there, give him the coin, and he will watch over the horses until we are done getting our supplies.”
“Can we trust him?”
“Oh, yes.”
Serenity did what she was told and soon she was following Jason around many different stores. Jason had stopped at a place where people sold meat, and bought some smoked deer and rabbit. After a while of shopping, Serenity was getting bored so she wandered off to where a group of little children sat around an old man. The children were listening intently to a story the old man was telling them.
“And so, she took out her sword, and chipped off a piece of the Firestar. Some say to this day, Rellark put a protective spell over it, so it would not brake. Others say that she had used the Firestar to locate the Icestar, and had found it, but has been hiding it, waiting until the right moment. I say, she gave it to someone she loved dearly, and he or she still has it to this day.”
When the old man finished, the children all stood up and clapped.
“Serenity!” came the loud voice of Jason, who was storming over there at that moment. Serenity turned around and Jason stopped in front of her. “Where were you? I was looking for you when you suddenly vanished. I thought you were hurt.”
Serenity flushed. “Oh, sorry. I was just listening to a story that man was telling,” she explained, then added in a low voice, “about the Firestar and the Icestar.”
“Yes, a lot of people tell fantasies about them, but not all of them are true.” Jason replied. “But some stories are true. But I highly doubt that this one was one of the few.”
The old man came up to Jason suddenly and whacked him in the head with a stick. “Are you calling me a liar? Huh sonny?” the man shouted.
“No, of course not! I’m just saying that some stories are purely fantasies, driven far from the truth.”
Whack! Came the stick on Jason’s head again. “And now are you saying that the story I was just telling was false?”
“Well, it most likely could be true.”
“And how do you know? Eh? Were you actually there to experience all the events that happened during Alercaria’s dark days? And who are you?” The man leaned in closer to study Jason’s face, squinting. After a while of studying, he pulled back in shock. “Why, it can’t be. Rivon, is it? The thir—”
With those words, Jason pulled Serenity back and started to walk back to where Arabella and Raider were. “Wait,” protested Serenity. “What was that all about?”
Jason turned back to Serenity, face red. “Serenity, listen to me. There are a lot of people here who hallucinate in this city; they think that some random person could be a ‘protector’ or ‘defender’ or someone who can lead them to victory against Rellark. They only rely on what others have told them, and that is where all the fantasies are from. Don’t listen to them. Now ride.”

Once they had left the city, with Jason still fuming—although Serenity thought he wasn’t mad, but scared—they had laid down camp a few yards away. Shinku and Esmera had flown in from the lake, where they had been diving underwater where no one could see them; dragons could hold their breath for a long time. Serenity had eaten some of the deer Jason had bought a while ago, and then laid down and drifted to sleep, cogitating Jason’s unusual behavior back at the city.