After the scare with the ice dragon, Celia was glad the next few days afterward remained uneventful. As they flew farther, the mountains receded into the land as if the land devoured the proud masses of stone.

Irin shifted his trajectory westward until he flew northeast, and Verbena followed his lead. 'Hael is on a peninsula, so we need to fly a bit westward for now, but we will arrive soon enough.' He promised.

After a few more hours of flying in the moonlight, both dragons finally moved to decent and land in the seemingly barren landscape. 'Here is close enough to the settlement for us to safely land, and the walk is not too far for Xan and Celia. I can construct a snow cave for us to rest in while they are in town.'

Verbena snorted, then set her vision on the fog-obscured horizon and tried to pinpoint the location of the town, but failed. 'I do not see any mountains for a town to reside in, so how can human live here without the warmth or protection from caves? It seems impossible.'

'The humans of the north live in constructions of snow and ice rather since there are fewer caverns here.' Irin calmly replied as he flapped his wings a few times to slow his descent, then softly landed in the snow.

As Verbena gently landed beside Irin, Xan smirked a bit, "You will be extremely surprised by the interior of this place. If you have only seen underground places your entire life, this place will leave you dumbfounded and speechless." He slid jumped off of Irin's back, but in an attempt to achieve a flashy landing, accidentally slipped on Irin's slick ice armor and landed face first in the snow.

Though Verbena could not prevent her chortles, Celia managed to suppress audible laughter, but her shoulders trembled a bit as a snicker escaped. Instead of attempting to show off, she stepped off of Verbena's harness as Master Peteah showed her in her first and only training session.

Once she successfully halted her giggling, she looked down to Xan, who was still face down in the snow. Her boots sank several hand lengths into the snow as she walked, but she trudged over to her male counterpart and offered a hand.

Irin did not contain his laughter as efficiently as Celia and released a hearty draconic chuckle. Small clumps of loose snow fell from his icy exterior as his body shook in his inability to remain composed.

Xan lifted up his head and looked to Celia, then stood to his feet without her aid. He shifted his focus away from Celia and rubbed his arm, "Can we pretended that did not happen?" He spoke in a low voice, then grimaced and released a strained, weak laugh as if Celia already wordlessly accepted.

Celia frowned a bit as she nodded, then adjusted her field of vision to the seemingly empty expanse of snow and ice. "So, um, where is the town? Um... Hael, was it?" Celia managed to spread a weak smile across her countenance.

Xan briefly rubbed the back of his head, then turned to what seemed to be a wasteland vacant of any signs of life. "You'll see when we get there. If you have anything to trade, you should bring that as well."

Celia nodded, then prepared her travel sack with the required items. Once she finished, she tied the pack closed and slipped the straps over her shoulders. "Lead the way," She showed him an encouraging grin.

With his confidence and ego partially recovered to their former glory, Xan flashed a grin, then began to walk in a westward direction through the snow.

Celia followed his lead, and they trudged several lengths through the snow. Soon, she spotted two strange black objects protruding from the snow. Originally, she could not see it in contrast to the dark sky, but now she was close enough to pick it our "What is that?" Celia glanced to Xan, then back to the object.

A mound of snow partially buried the tall object and pointed crystals of frost coated its surface. Gouges marked the surface of the cylindrical objects in the patterns of animals, though Celia could not recognize many of the creatures. Atop the structures, a dragon looked down to all passerby with wings spread upward.

"This is a totem a marker for the entrance," Xan assured. "Its made out of something called wood, which apparently came from bones of massive animals called "trees." Luckily, no one has seen a living one in centuries or something like that. I would hate to see the size of a living one if this is just a piece of a bone. They lived in forests and woods, but I did not see any in the Ulven lands, so I guess they are extinct there too."

He looked down to the divot in the snow between the pillars, then began to excavate the space. After a few more moments, he paused and glanced up to Celia, who watched him with a dumbfounded expression on her face. "Come help me dig. We have to dig through the snow to get inside the town. The totems mark the various entrances to the town. Usually, they are all mostly blocked with snow to keep them hidden from undesired creatures from getting in."

"Hael is under the snow?!" Celia exclaimed and jumped back a bit and her eyelashes fluttered a few times. Once her initial shock faded, she nervously laughed as she kneeled down and aided in Xan's effort. The loose layers of snow swiftly fell away as they excavated the mound of ice, but it took several more moments to finally make a hole into the cavity below.

Once the pair made the gap large enough, Xan purposefully slipped through the hole and slid to the bottom of the mound of snow. Celia followed Xan, but she comically slid into his feet and sent him hurling onto his back into the mound of snow he and Celia had just ridden down.

When Celia slid to a stop, she stood and guiltily turned to look at Xan, "Sorry," her face contorted into an apologetic grimace.

At first, Xan glared a bit, but his anger quickly subsided and he released a sigh. "You did not know that would happen," he dusted the snow off of himself, then glanced around the cavern. "No one else saw that, so it stays between us and we never speak of it again, agreed?"

"Agreed." Celia nodded, then glanced around the area as she dusted the small white dots of snow off her clothing as well.

Carefully carved rectangular blocks made up the entire tunnel from the arched roof to the floor of densely packed snow. Despite the icy surroundings, the human-made cavern was a bit warmer than the outside, though not as warm as the caves in her homeland or in the Ulven lands.

"I have never seen anything like this," the human female awed as she glanced around the dim light. She glanced down the tunnel, where a warm inviting light emanated from around the corner. "Is the main part of the town there?"

Xan nodded, "I will lead us to where we can trade for some rations so our dragons do not have to hunt for us every couple of days." He motioned her to follow and escorted her down the hallway.

After a mere minute, the two emerged into a much larger room with supports uniformly scattered about in close intervals. The people of Hael had sculpted every structure out of ice, from tables to chairs to chests and buckets. Metal, glass, and wood occasionally dotted the area, typically as holders of glowing fire or orbs of light, but Celia noticed that materials other than ice or strange cloth were rare.

All of the human inhabitants wore clothing made out of strange smooth, pelt-like material. Some of the pelts contained fur, while others seemed more like a shiny fat-like substance that Celia had never seen before.

"Welcome to Hael," Xan broadly grinned as he gestured to the town, "the largest town in the land of Roahla. They have everything we could ever think we need here, and most of it is for sale from someone."

Celia stood next to him, frozen in awe. "Are all northern towns like this?" She blinked to regain focus as she turned her head to Xan.

"There are a few differences between the three major northern towns, but for the most part, yes." Xan motioned for Celia to continue to follow him as he began to walk deeper into the settlement.

As she followed, Celia explored the town with her eyes. She noted how many of the merchant stalls sold meat, pelts, and clothing, while the largest stall seemed to belong to an ice carver.

Xan glanced back to Celia, "First we should make sure we have rations, and we can go to the inn and rest for a little while. It's still rather cold down here, but at least it is better protected from the harsh winds topside. The blankets and beds here are surprisingly soft and warm too."

He paused and felt the hunting knife attached to his waist, then to his spare weapon, a dagger, which was attached to Celia's waist. "As much as I want to get another spare dagger or knife, metal is too rare this far north and even a small blade most likely will cost everything of value on our person."

Celia nodded in understanding, "Since you already know this town, I will allow you to lead. Otherwise, I would probably simply get lost."

Xan smirked a bit with a small happy sparkle in his eyes. "Then let's go get some food, then get some rest before we head eastward."

Celia nodded in agreement as the male half of the two of them strode towards one of the stalls selling preserved, slightly frozen chunks of meat.

The vendor looked up to Xan. "Hello," the gruff bearded man stated in an almost bored-sounding monotone tone, "here for meat or pelts?"

"Preserved meat please," Xan slipped his bag off of his shoulder and reached inside, then pulled out a small pouch. After he returned his bag to his shoulder, he untied the twine around the cloth and showed the man a few pieces of irregularly shaped pieces of shiny reddish metal.

"Hmm," The bearded man hummed and stroked his beard. "I can give you three pounds of meat for everything in that pouch of yours."

"Four pounds," Xan replied, "On its own, this metal is not all that strong, but mixed with a few other metals it is incredibly useful in creating stronger alloys. So you can have all of this for four pounds of meat." Xan bartered.

The man hesitated for several moments, then crinkled his nose, "fine," he turned, then pulled out four small packages of meat from the shelves behind him and dumped them onto the table.

Xan smiled and dumped the metal onto the ice countertop. Once he shook the last bit of metal free, he lifted the hide-wrapped bundles off of the counter and carefully placed them into his bag.

The shopkeeper scooped the shiny metal off of the horizontal surface, then looked up to Xan, "Do you need anything else, sir?"

The young adult male shook his head. "I am fine." Xan flashed a smile lightly tinged with politeness, then returned his backpack to its proper place on his shoulders as he turned and left.

Celia hesitated, then looked up to the shopkeeper, "thank you," she smiled a bit in gratitude, then turned and jogged to catch up to Xan.

Xan glanced back to Celia, "is there anything you want to trade for? While we are in here? If you think of something later we could come back here if you cannot think of anything now."

Celia paused and glanced around as she contemplated her options. "We could at least see what the blacksmiths and metalworkers are willing to trade for another small weapon. Normally, knives are not all that good as a weapon overall."

"All right." Xan shrugged, then meandered through the maze of stalls, then lead Celia over to the one that sold weapons.

The weapons dealer looked up to both of them, "what can I do you for? I can fulfill all of your weapon needs." The stall had many different kinds of blades and weaponry, though not all of them were made out of metal. A majority of the blades on display were made out of blue ice or bone.

Celia shifted her focus from the blades on the back wall to the person behind the counter, "I was wondering what you would accept in a trade for a metal dagger and a metal knife."

He paused and looked at the two of them with an investigative eye. "It depends. What do you have to offer in exchange?"

Celia retrieved the bag containing the last few gemstones from her bag and pulled out a few, then placed them on the pelt-covered countertop.

"Those will definitely buy you what you want." He blurted with wide, excited eyes. "I should not have said that," he pseudo-coughed a bit into his fist, then refocused on Xan and Celia. "Are you only looking for a dagger and a knife? I have other types of metal weapons as well: swords, spears, a mace, anything."

"Swords?" Xan perked up a bit.

Celia glanced to Xan, but kept an eye on the gemstones on the counter, "do you even know how to use a sword?" She raised a skeptical eyebrow.

Xan moved to object to her skepticism, then quickly retracted whatever argument he had come up with.

Celia nodded to herself as Xan looked away, slightly embarrassed. She returned her focus to the shopkeeper, "As amazing as a large weapon sounds, neither one of us knows how to use it and it may be too much for us to carry it." She glanced to the weapons on the table, then picked out a simple but durable hunting knife and a double-edged dagger a bit longer than her hand. "I will take these two please." Celia gestured to the two blades she picked out.

"All right, how about six of those little jewels for the weapons?" The man offered to Celia as he returned the other weapons to their proper places.

Celia glanced down to the bag of jewels, then reached inside and silently counted the jewels inside. She frowned a bit and contemplated what she should do. Including the two green gemstones in her hand, she had a total of seven gemstones left. "Five," she decided to attempt to lower the price.

"I am staying at six." The man calmly stated.

"I would rather give you five."' Celia stated, then attempted to return his unwavering and ungiving stare with one of her own.

After a few moments in the standoff, Celia eventually gave in and retrieved four of the five jewels remaining in her pouch. She held six colorful objects in her hand for a few hesitant seconds, then placed them onto the tabletop.

"Thank you for your business." The weapons dealer nodded and swept the crystals into his hand, then put them into a special locked container under the counter and locked it with a key.

Celia silently nodded and picked up the blades and their sheathes as she mourned the loss of all but the last of her crystals. She placed the pouch and the blades into her bag, then looked to Xan, who gave her a slight smile.

"Let's go to the inn for now and get some rest. I'll pay for it." He flashed a grin, then lead her deeper into the town.

Author Notes!

Welcome to a new town! Honestly, I love world building, though I also love science to the point where I try to go through every little aspect of a world I can and try to at least make it seem feasible in an actual world. Hael is a town made with the same techniques as igloos, just on a larger scale!

One example is the ice that coats dragons when they are in a cold environment: the glands attached to the hair follicles of their overcoat secrete a substance that freezes. However, their undercoat is so think it prevents the ice from forming too close to their skin. Basically, they are kinda like living igloos!

If you have any other questions or comments about the story, please feel free to leave a comment and I will answer as soon as I can!

I also really appreciate votes!

Thank you for reading my story!