Celia and Xan's boots thumped against the cobblestone streets coated in a thin layer of melting frost. The city of light surrounded them in all of its glory. Thanks the small glowing orbs, very few dark shadows lingered. Strange stringy black and green plants Celia had no name for carpeted every surface other than walkways and doors like the moss of her hometown.

Merchant and trader stalls lined the streets between the entrances to shops, and people darted between them on their daily routines. A symphony of the voices of the sellers rose like a chorus in Celia's ears as they advertised their wares to the passing public. Scarves, jackets, magical artifacts, jewelry, weapons, and more were all for sale in the extensive marketplace.

As the female rider looked around the vast area, she found that her eyes began to burn in slight pain from the bright landscape. Celia momentarily shielded her eyes as they struggled to adjust to the bright world that sharply contrasted her own. "This place is bright," she whimpered slightly kept her head low and one eye closed. She lifted the clear-lensed riding goggles off of her eyes as she walked, which helped a little, but not all that much.

"You will get used to it, eventually." Xan attempted to assure her as he looked around the shops that lined the streets. "I'd buy you day goggles, but neither one of us have the coins to do so. We're not going to be here long, so the light hurting our eyes for a little while is not that big of a deal."

Celia nodded a bit as she attempted to look up to the busy streets. Thankfully, the light no longer stung as much as it had when she entered the massive complex of buildings. "It's amazing to see so much life above ground," She awed, "I never believed it was possible."

The green-cloaked rider looked to the townspeople as she and Xan wandered around the city. Almost all of the people wore dark colors that stood in stark contrast to the green and blue cloaks of the foreigners. Also, people donned thinner clothing than people from other towns.

Celia jumped back as a bleating animal ran across her path in a frenzy. "What was that?" She stopped in her tracks and watched the black-furred animal race over to some of them dangling plants.

Once the animal arrived at the strange greenery, it ceased its senseless bleating and began to mindlessly munch on the greenery. Since it stopped, Celia gained a chance to get a good look at the scruffy creature. It had strange horizontal lines for pupils in its golden eyes and large curved horns donned its head. As it ate, it's bobtail wagged like a happy dragon. It reminded Celia of a similar animal in Rien that ate mosses of the underground town.

"Hey! Come back!" A villager ran past Celia and grabbed the strange creature. When he reached the animal, the man grabbed the animal and slung it over his shoulders while the beast continued to chew on the plants.

Celia blinked, then noticed Xan had gotten a massive lead and ran to catch up. "Xan! Wait for me!" She called her footsteps clattered against the stone as she caught up to the older boy.

Xan briefly paused, but when Celia eventually caught up to him he continued walking. "Once we look at the obelisk, then we will go get some sleep." He shielded his eyes and looked ahead of them to the spire. "The Garden of Light is free to enter, but the castle is not open to the public. We can get up close to the obelisk to see it and discuss our plans later."

Celia nodded to Xan as they entered the garden through a plant-covered archway. Once she fully entered, the human gazed around the large space full of green plants and marveled at the sight. Though there were beautiful spots in Rien, nothing in the town under the mountain compared to Urre's garden.

Tall brown pillars supported masses of strange greenery and colorful spheres hung among the wide and flat plant matter. Smaller bundles of similar plants also stood around the space beside large bundles of long needle-like bundles of plant matter similar to the trees in the Ulven Lands. In the center of the garden, a massive tower of dark stone stood with the glowing ray of light at its peak.

Celia noted nothing in the room was like the plants and mushrooms in the caves of her homeland. First off, none of the plants in the garden glowed. While there was a splattering of mosses on some of the rocks, but no mushrooms sprouted from the black soil of the area.

As she continued to walk, Celia gazed around at the glowing bubbles of light that around the walls like strings of stars just as they had done with the rest of the town.  "What are all of those light bubbles? What makes them?" She looked to Xan as he walked towards the center of the garden, which prompted the female rider to also turn her attention to the older male rider's destination.

"Oh, those?" Xan kneeled at the base of the tower and gently raked his fingers across the rough surface. "They are just light globes. They are made with magic. They absorb the light from the ray atop this tower during the day and continue to glow during the night. Some of them can even last for moons without needing to be recharged. Most people just take the ones left outside and switch them for the ones inside as the ones inside dim."

Celia knelt near one of the sides and also studied the pillar as well. Identical sets of carvings rose up each side of the massive pillar. The bottom carving showed an image of the people rejoicing around the pillar of light, while the next one up showed a crowned man putting the ray of light on a pedestal in the room atop the tower.

"Who is that man?" Celia muttered to herself. She attempted to further her understanding by studying the carving, but she did not have any idea who it could be. "He looks kinda important."

"Celia, I found the door," Xan broke Celia's concentration and snapped her attention to him. He motioned with a wave of his hand for Celia to approach and join him next to his discovery.

When Celia obliged, Xan traced a nearly invisible crack in the wall up around the engravings, then over his head and back down in the shape of a door. "This large door is how to get in, and I am guessing there are a lot of stairs up." He straightened and looks up to the top of the structure.

Celia nodded in understanding. "So now we go find an inn," she released a sigh of relief. "A nice bed sounds extremely nice right about now." Though she knew she would miss Verbena, she was currently too tired to care at the moment. 

She jumped as a hand suddenly clamped on her shoulder. "Both of you are under arrest," a stern voice stated behind the two young human riders as he tightly held both of them in his firm grasp.

After she overcame a brief moment frozen in fear, Celia slowly turned her head to see their captor in the peripherals of her vision. She attempted to defend herself and say that she and Xan were not doing anything illegal. However, her complaints were silenced in her throat by the man's intimidating presence.

His copper breastplate gleamed in the sunlight as he stared down at the two foreigners with intimidating red eyes. "Both of you, come with me. You are going to the dungeon." His firm voice had a strange power to it as he wrenched the two humans from the place where they previously stood.

As if under a spell, both Celia and Xan stumbled with the man as he led them into the castle with the man's firm grip on their shoulders. The guards manning the entrance of the door saluted as the passed and no one spoke a word against or questioned the strange man.

Celia mentally tried to resist, but she found that her limbs refused to listen. Her hands would not reach up and pry her captor's hands off of her shoulder. Despite her attempts, her feet also refused to stop. The young female rider even attempted to speak, but her mouth refused to open and voice her complaints to the man.

Celia's mind races and she managed to glance over to Xan without moving her head. She immediately noticed he acted much the same as her, but his eyes were wide with fear. 'If Xan is nervous...,' Celia mentally whimpered as her heart filled with dread, 'This must be bad.'

'Verbena!' Celia mentally called out to her friend, but her efforts seemed to be in vain as she felt her thoughts disappeared into what seemed like an empty void. If Verbena heard her, the jade dragon was unable to reply.

'Are we under a spell?' Celia's mind grasped for answers as the strange man continued to lead them down tunnels of dark stone lit by more strange orbs of light. 'Is that why I can't control myself?' The human girl looked around with her eyes as if her surroundings would offer far answers.

The tapestries that lavishly adorned the stone walls seemingly offered no answers either. Many of them depicted men wearing crowning various environments, while others appeared to depict the daily life of the people or important events.

Though the tapestries all had plaques beneath them, the man kept Celia from stopping long enough to read them. All she could see where bits of words that appeared familiar, but the lettering and spelling were strange to her.

A pair of tapestries that shared a golden plaque caught her eye as they continued to walk down the passageway.

One depicted a massive white dragon standing with its wings spread as its silver eyes watched over the silhouettes of buildings alight with red flames. The shape and size of the dragon did not match the dragons Celia had grown up with. Instead of feathered wings, the beast in the painting had wings that looked like enlarged versions of the webbed feet of the cave salamanders.

The second interesting tapestry had an image of a black version of the dragon flying over a walled city on a sea of green with tall mountains in the background. The creature watched the city with red eyes as it flew through the bright blue sky in a seemingly endless glide.

Celia was able to glimpse the words on the plaque, but the only words she managed to read were "evil and good." She wished she could go back and read the rest of the words, but their captor forced them down an empty hallway with no decorations other than the light globes. After a few steps, their armored captor caused them to turn through a door to their right.

Celia stumbled a bit as the man forced them to descend down a seemingly endless flight of uneven and warn steps that spiraled deep underground. Fewer orbs of light adorned the walls, many of which were dim, and some of the light globes had even completely lost their glow. Though her eyes were much comfortable with the dimmer light, unease still engulfed Celia as they continued to tread down the spiral staircase with echoing footsteps pounding like heartbeats.

When they reached the base of the stairwell, the three emerged into a long hallway lined with metal bars. When she saw the bars, she quickly realized where they were. 'Urre's done-gin,' Celia mentally gulped as her eyes focused on the long rows of vertical bars. 'Why does every town other than Rien have a done-gin? Is Rien unusual or are all of these towns the strange ones?'

Nothing could answer her questioning thoughts.

A face appeared between the bars of one of the cells as they passed. "The two os land and sky," the thin figure awed in a weak male voice as he stared with wide eyes. However, he cowardly retreated to the depths of the dark cell when the riders' captor glared at the strange man.

After they passed a few more cells, many of which were empty, the man forcefully shoved them into a cell. Once both riders were inside the cell, the man slammed the door behind them and walked away with a huff.