We need a map.

Raisel watched as his chest heaved as he deeply slept. One of his hands was behind his head. His hair was overgrown and a few locks were drooping just over his eyes. She carefully pushed it backwards. It fell forward, she moved it again. This continued for a while. He stirred in his sleep but he did not wake up. She loved watching him sleep but they had a long journey ahead of them and they needed to leave immediately.

She pushed him slightly then shouted into his ears, “How do we find a dragon?”

He got up abruptly with a start, “What? What do you mean?”

She rested her chin on her arm and peered closely at him, for some reason she didn’t understand he seemed pretty haunted, “There’s a lot of questions that need to be asked. Where do we find a dragon?, How do we know it’s a dragon? What if they don’t even want to be found at all?”

He sat up and relaxed, “Someone seems to be very excited this morning”

She smiled at him and played with the trinket on her neck, it was her heart-shaped ruby, the one her father had given her, “You gave this back”

“It belongs to you”

“You bought it for a fair price so you didn’t have to”, she stared at him from underneath her long lashes.

He shrugged, “I saw it meant so much to you and I know you needed to have it”

She smiled again and wiped a stray tear from her eyes, “It does. Thank you”

“Okay please don’t cry”, he pleaded.

She shrugged nonchalantly, “Well I’m excited to see a real-life dragon and I happen to see some guards outside the window, walking in a large group, they wore similar dresses with the ones…”

He shot up quickly, “You saw what?”, he grabbed his cloak.

She stood up, She had changed out of the dress and she was dressed in leather clothes, “Yes I…”

“We need to get going, right now!, Immediately!”

“Okay slow down…”

***

Soon they were riding out of Mercia at a very high speed. She had not had any time to tie her hair before they left and it was getting in his face, “Raisel!”, he called out loudly.

She didn’t answer however, she couldn’t hear him over the sound of the hooves and the strong wind.

“Raisel”, he called out even louder.

“What?”, she shouted back.

“Your hair is in my face, get it off my face”

“How do you expect me to do that when you’re riding like a possessed maniacal beast and I have to cling unto you to stop myself from tipping over”, she replied.

However, he couldn’t hear her clearly and couldn’t make out what her exact words were, “What are you saying”

“I’M SAYING YOU ARE RIDING LIKE A POSSESSED MANIACAL BEAST!”

“Oh really?”, he chuckled, “Well this possessed beast is about to run into a ditch because he can’t see ahead of him”

“What?”, she asked genuinely scared, “No!!!”, she screamed and buried his face into his back.

He slowed down immediately she leaned into him in fear, he hadn’t meant to scare her. They got down from the horse to rest.

She stretched her arms, “That was indeed a refreshing ride…”, she faked a smile, but then it gradually turned to a frown, “Except of course the part where you tried to kill me!”

He raised his arms in surrender, “I was only trying to save us…”

“From what exactly?”, she questioned.

“From going to a dungeon or from being killed, either way, I don’t like the idea”

She looked on puzzled before she caught on, “Oh…”

Dragomir turned to look at her, “Raisel?”

“Yes?”, she avoided his eyes.

“Did you see the guards outside the window?”

“Well yes I did…”, she trailed off.

“Just tell me the truth Raisel, did you…?”

“Okay no!, I didn’t okay”, she blurted out.

“What?, Why?”

“I thought it will get you out of bed and going quickly and I was right”

“Why would you even do something like that?”, he asked, “Did it occur to you that we might have passed the wrong impression leaving Mercia like we are thieves?”

“We are looking for a dragon, we have to get going early, we don’t have all day…”

He massaged his forehead, “Why do I have to deal with you even?”

“Simply, I’m the brains of this team and you can not do this without me”

He ignored her and saddled Fury and strapped the bags on him.

“Where are we going?”

“We are going to need a map”

***

They walked into the bookstore that was in town, it was the typical store. It was occupied by snobbish women, who talked through their noses. Dragomir doubted that they read any of the books they bought. Most of them liked to think and act like they were learned when in actual sense they weren’t, so they only came to browse through the books.

“Excuse me…”, her eyes darted towards him from his head to toe, she looked at Raisel and didn’t give her much glance, when she was done evaluating them, “Mister, what do you need?”

Dragomir snorted, “I need a map covering all the cities in this region”

“Oh that will cost a silver, can you afford…”

He dropped three pieces of gold coins on her table and moved on along.

Raisel walked quickly behind him and whispered in his ears, “Why do you bother with these things?”

“She was rude…”

“You should stop caring about what anyone thinks about you. Their opinions should not matter at all”, she shrugged, “Except of course you have a lot of money for charitable purposes, who am I to complain?”

They browsed through the maps displayed on the shelf.

“What did you do in Torenth?”

He glanced at her, “Say what’s on your mind Raisel, shouldn’t the question be how did you come by such a huge amount of money you are willing to spend…”

She stared at him, “You do carry around a lot”

“My father was wealthy, he left me a fortune” his tone was bland.

“Seems plausible”

He picked up one map, “Ah!, Here’s the one”, he opened it and scanned through, “Raisel are you ready to travel the world with me”, he asked in a low deep voice, it was a beautiful sound.

Raisel couldn’t help but smile back at him, she nodded vigorously. He crooked his arm, “Be my guest”

"Supposed to be the other way round but okay"