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Chapter Text

The raids were the worst part of it all.

Living near humans—Vikings, as the Queen calls them—is dangerous enough as it is. They are naturally destructive creatures, after all. They kill for sport even during the bountiful summer season, they tear apart the land and carve into the very mountains to fit their needs, and they hold grudges that are rather impressive even to a dragon such as myself.

The Vikings are dangerous. Every dragon recognizes this simple truth. Yet, almost on a nightly basis, we find ourselves heading out to their islands in a desperate search for food, always trying to sate the Queen’s appetite.

I have seen dragons gored before my very eyes, their heads bludgeoned off in a single swift strike, their fire leaving their body for the last time. I have seen the celebration that ensues, the yammering in human tongue and congratulations for the first kill, or a good kill, or just any kill. I have seen helpless youths cornered and slaughtered just for the sake of killing a dragon, their bodies deemed unworthy of trophies of victory and tossed into the ocean where the gods cannot find them.

I have taken in the scent of blood, fear, and rotting meat on the battle field. The choking, chalky thickness of ash and smoke. The alarming smell of death ever-present during battle.

I have heard the nest mourning its numerous losses, the Queen rising from below to address us and tell us pretty little lies about sacrifices and honey-coated nonsense. I have heard the screams of terror and wails for mercy, the laughter that would surely follow. The sudden silence.

Indeed, the raids were truly the worst part of it all.

Although it really was hard to beat living through everything as the only sane dragon around.

The Queen appeared one day on the horizon, looking for all the world like a moving island. She took the nest by force, picking their minds apart with the strongest weapon a dragon had at their disposal: magic. So powerful was hers that she could steal a dragon’s identity and personality, forcing them to become nothing more than little helpless leaves clinging to a sturdy branch, claiming it as necessary and proper.

I was the only one who was unaffected. I have always known the reason why, of course. As a Shadow-Blender, the strongest of magic-wielders and relatively rare in the far north, I had a distinct advantage over my brethren. I had the magic to fight back, to make sure that the Queen did not control me. Rest assured, I never allowed this to slip past anyone…although I always wondered what would happen…

My best guess is that I would be forced to flee from my death. Dragons who gain enough magic, either through simple aging or learning from their elders, will often disappear if they start to question too much. The Queen can’t have some nay-sayers, now, can she? It isn’t like the thousands of other dragons who look to her with adoration and love aren’t enough.

It was with that exact attitude she had enforced on our nest that she so easily took it over, as silent and swift as death. The Queen was so loving, the Queen was so kind, the Queen was so wise—the least we can do is hunt for her, to follow her orders so we may live! And in doing so, in following that ‘law’, our nest was plummeted into famine. The Queen had about as big an appetite as anyone would expect, and by the Dragoness of the Moon, did she enforce it.

I still remember the first time she ate a dragon. As a ‘sacrifice’ so that the nest may continue to survive through that unforgiving winter.

It didn’t take long for humans to begin settling islands further and further north (or south, by the nest’s location). It took and equal amount of time for the Queen to get a bright idea: steal from the humans to keep their population under control, so that they may never hunt dragons to extinction, and keep the nest well-fed in the process. Thus, the raids were born in all of their splendid glory.

Come to think of it, it’s almost funny. The gods must have had some sort of vendetta against me, as I do not recall what I could have possibly done to earn a fate like mine, as the only dragon not afflicted by mass mind-control in a nest of thousands. For the longest time I believed that this was a test, that it was my duty as a Shadow-Blender to take down the Queen and free my nestmates! But that time had long passed, and I had come to the harsh realization that some things were simply out of my control.

And so the raids continued, and I was left alone with my thoughts, the only dragon with any power to save the others but never possessing enough strength.

On a gloomy, clouded night, I burdened myself with the task of leading a raid to one of the southern islands. It was not that I wanted to—in fact, I would rather throw myself into the ocean! But the Queen demanded a daily food offering from each dragon, and my tribemates and I had waited long enough to fulfill the wonderful little status quo.

I led the formation at its front with an admittedly inferior group of dragons—it was overly filled with both elderly and young, and most of the latter did not understand basic flight structures. Which meant that it didn’t take long for the pinpoint, neat design that I had started with to muddle up into a tactless pod of dragons, creating drag for the unlucky ones in the back.

I glanced over my wing at the hulking cluster that had once branched out from me in two straight lines and sighed. See, this was why I liked smaller groups. The dragon who had been on my direct right as the second-strongest dragon and faithfully stuck to my side, an ancient Two-Walker, noticed right away.

“What is the matter, Shadow-Blender?” She asked, tipping her head aside. “Are you worried we will not find enough food for the Queen?”

“Like she even needs it…” I mumbled, only to clam up when the Two-Walker bristled and bared her teeth despite her lower status (as a Shadow-Blender, I am the highest dragon, after all!). “What I meant to say is, I am worried that she will refuse the offerings we bring back to her and force us to eat them?” Oh, how the words burned.

The Two-Walker considered this and clucked her tongue. “I would not fear, Shadow-Blender. With you here, there is not much that can go wrong.”

I nodded and turned my attention forward, silently cheering to myself for such a believable lie thought up on the spot. It was one of many qualities of mine that had helped me survive “under the Queen’s control”. Dragon of the Sun, was I lucky that I had an amazing straight face.

Our flare passed on in silence for about a few more seconds, tops. Then a squabble arose from behind, making me groan in frustration. I shot a glare over my shoulder at such a display of disrespect in a Shadow-Blender’s presence—especially if said Shadow-Blender was the leader!

Luckily for me, a Flame-Skin had already taken it upon himself to intervene between the two opponents. He pushed himself between a Two-Head and a posse of Little-Biters and snarled, “Do not fight over worthless causes! You must save your energy for the island!”

The elderly, gray-scaled Two-Head snorted. “Bold words for one so young,” one head said with an upturned snout.

With an exaggerated eyeroll, I opened my wings and let myself fall back until I was just above the group. “It would do you well to listen to what he says.” I stared down my nose at both the Two-Head and the much more guilty Little-Biters. “There are times when you need to know your place. But if someone beneath you has to correct your actions, you should feel nothing but shame.”

Leaving the stricken Two-Head behind, I pulled myself back to my rightful spot in the front, the Flame-Skin close behind.

“Shadow-Blender,” he scolded. “I had the situation handled. It is expected of you not to meddle with lower affairs. Remind yourself that I am superior to you in age and magical ability—I did not need your assistance.”

Oh, ouch. And to think that I had once considered him my friend. Scrunching up my face, I hissed, “It is I who is leading this flare—not you.” That certainly put him in his place, and he bowed his head just a little bit before opening his wings and taking his position behind me.

The argument had taken up more time than I had intended; the familiar shape of the island had come into sight. I rose in altitudes and shouted, “We’re about to arrive! Elders, engage the Vikings and protect the young! The young must steal food while the humans are distracted! Those in between, choose which job will aid the nest the most! I will be above—if you need anything, call for me!” Spinning into a hover to face them, I said, “Understood?”

“Understood!” Came the roar of dozens melted into one voice. Smirking, I began pumping my wings to rise in altitude, taking myself high over the flare and the island. Below me, a group of elders led by a wrinkled Hum-Wing banked away. The young separated into two groups: one for the fields where the humans hoarded their sheep, and one for the humans’ nest. Each was governed by a Flame-Skin, and they each flew over to their respective spots and pulled into hovers.

For a moment, I closed my eyes and took in the peace, inhaling the sweet late spring air and just enjoying being under the Dragoness of the Moon. I flipped over, tucking my wings and legs in, and let the sound of the wind rushing past fill my ears.

Below, the elders launched the attack.

As I sheathed my teeth and filtered gas into my throat, giving off the banshee scream that was unique to a Shadow-Blender’s fire, any humans outside immediately ducked for cover like the insects they were. A large tower used to light the sky and give away where my fellow dragons were came into view, already being attacked by a Flame-Skin. With a flick of my igniter, a ball of plasma lit up the sky in a blinding blue-white starburst. A human—the King of this tribe of Vikings—screamed an order to his inferiors, jumping straight off of the tower I’d just hit.

I swerved out of sight and climbed through the air. Just off to my left, there was a group of young dragons that had somehow found themselves without any experienced dragons around to protect them. They were cornered, and needed help fast!

Luckily for them, I was just the dragon for that kind of speed.

I forced gas into my mouth, grinning at the obligatory “nightfury get down!”, and sent the explosive blast into the wooden structure. The young dragons took off after me, calling out their gratitude before flying off to a hopefully safer place.

The town was now alit with fire and chaos, allowing me to use the updraft to gain altitude. A quick scan showed that the raid was going to be one of the fast ones; those that had food were flying off, and the only ones who stayed behind were the few unfortunate dragons that had been captured. I drooped at the sight, but knew that to go down and help them would insure my own death. Some sacrifices, it turned out, were necessary.

Still, I wanted to spite those awful creatures for daring to capture a dragon like a wild animal. I was forbidden to participate directly in raids—the Queen thought myself too valuable to risk being killed at the claws of a Viking—so I flung my eyes back and forth for a target. “Come on, gimme something to shoot at, gimme something to shoot at…ah!” My target came to me as a tower positioned on a small, secluded cliff cast in shadow. Nobody was around to see the destruction, though. Oh well.

I swung down hard and used up my third shot on the tower, banking in front of the fire to admire my handiwork—

Fwap!

The sound was accompanied by the terrifying sensation of a coiled serpent tightening itself around my entire body, digging into my limbs! It wrestled with my wings and clamped them down, sending me plummeting! I could do nothing but roar in terror and confusion as the snake bit down, scraping at my torso and wings and legs, and dragged us to the island!

I hit the ground chest first and blacked out. Blinking rapidly moments later, I gained my senses only to be greeted with the sight of the remains of a structure that had once been made of unnaturally-carved wood. The snake pulled us down into it and the world erupted in agony as thick splinters and sharpened branches dug into every single scale!

That wasn’t enough for the snake, though; with one more vengeful hiss it took us over a hill, where I rocketed into the ground and skidded deep into the soil, mercifully coming to a stop in the center of an open area in the humans’ nest.

My entire world came to an earth-shattering halt.

I had fallen.

All things considered, I was having a pretty good day.

I mean, really, I’m not sure what puts a spring in my step more than an early morning dragon raid where I, oh, I dunno, shoot down a Night Fury!

Nothing could keep the grin off of my face as I jumped for joy, whooping, “I hit it! Yes, I hit it!” Spinning to face Berk, I shouted, “Did anyone see that?!”

A torrent of warm air nearly scalded my backside, followed by a low growl that was more of a bone-shaking rumble than anything else. Spinning on my heel, I was faced with the sight of…a Monstrous Nightmare. Lowering my eyelids, I said, “Except for you.”

The dragon bared its teeth and snapped, barely giving me time to jump out of the way! I yelped and sprinted towards the village, screaming all the while. The stupid lizard followed right at my heels, and when I looked over my shoulder, it shot a stream of molten lava right at me! Even with my sort-of fast speed and sort-of clumsy dodge out of the way, the heat alone carved a small burn into any of my skin that was exposed.

I shrieked again in a desperate attempt to gain someone’s attention, wondering where the hell they all were! We were in the middle of a dragon raid, it’s not like they decided to take a break to get a snack! I couldn’t outrun a dragon forever!

The answer to my desperate question came as a large group of people huddled around something in town center. Apparently whatever rock they were looking at was a lot more important than some teenager about to be eaten by a dragon.

“Hey!” I shouted, gaining the attention of a few of them. “A little help would be nice—ah!” My cry for help halted when foot decided to catch on something at literally the worst moment possible and I was sent sprawling to the ground. Rolling onto my back, I stared up at the bared fangs of the Nightmare, the disgusting saliva dripping down onto my cheek and neck, the big gaping hole that was slowly lighting up with fire—!

A brownish blur, a loud grunt, and a mighty force struck the Nightmare clean off the ground! It stumbled away and rose to its feet, roaring at no one other than…my father.

Oh, man. I was so grounded. I could just see it on his face. It had slightly more disappointment than usual.

The dragon pawed at the ground, scraping deep gouges into the soft earth, and shot a tiny flame at my savior. Dad sidestepped it with ease, the terrible heat not even fazing him. With a sneer he held up his hammer and flung it with all his strength, hitting the Nightmare right in its forehead! The dragon fell to the ground like a sack of coal, eyes fluttering. It didn’t stay down for long; snorting, it climbed onto its hind legs, spread its wings out wide, and its entire body erupted into flames as it thundered in rage!

Dad’s response was to throw a handy-dandy wagon at it.

The dragon fell over from both shock and force, its fire extinguishing and now significantly more bloodied. It spat another stream of lava at Dad that didn’t cover nearly as much ground as the previous, and a look of surprise seemed to settle in its horrible face. With a final snap of its jaws, it thrust itself into the air and flew away, leaving me on the ground and Dad standing off to the side.

Dad turned and pinned me with his special scowl that he reserved just for me. I gave a nervous laugh. “Yeah, well, I hit a Night Fury!”

“Hiccup!” Dad snapped, marching over and lifting me to my feet. “What have I told you about going out during dragon raids?!”

“I know, I know!” I said, holding my hands up. “But this time was different! It wasn’t like the others—I actually got it!”

Dad sighed, putting a hand on his forehead. “Hiccup, for the last time—“

“Eh, Stoick?” A one-legged, one-armed man interrupted us from the crowd, sauntering over and placing a hook on his shoulder. “Ye might want ta see this.”

I beamed up at my mentor. “Gobber—you must’ve seen it, right? I told you it was a mild calibration issue.” Gobber merely rolled his eyes with a sly grin, pulling his reluctant childhood friend behind with him. The crowd part for them, and I just barely saw a still form lying in the center of the group. A very large, very rope-covered form.

Jogging to the gap, I couldn’t help but sigh in relief as my eyes met with the most beautiful sight I had ever seen: a downed Night Fury, all bundled up like a present. My very salvation was sitting there right in front of me. No more Hiccup the Embarrassment or Hiccup the Useless. No more being the black sheep. No more being made fun of by my peers and having people give my father sympathetic looks while they thought I wasn’t looking. In fact, maybe I could finally get a date now…

Dad and Gobber both stood at my sides, the former gaping down at the offspring of lightning and death itself that was now completely immobile under the hands of his son. He was having a tough time believing it, judging by his pale face and wide eyes—but then again, I was still having trouble with it, and I was the one who captured the darn thing!

“But…how…”

Gobber smirked. “It was the darndest thing. You’d think that Thor himself had been caught, from all the screamin’ this thing was makin’. It just fell outta the sky wrapped in bolas. Saw it happen with my own eyes.”

“And I used a bola-throwing machine!” I interrupted quickly, poking a finger in the air. “I hit it right after it hit the third tower. It flew in front of the fire, and that’s when I got it.”

The crowd mumbled a bit, and someone stated, “That’s exactly when it came down here.”

Dad stared down at the unconscious dragon, with its irregular breathing and fresh wounds. He faced me and put a hand on my shoulder, disbelief coating his features. “Is it true?”

I nodded vigorously.

With a chuckle, Dad shook his head and mumbled, “And to think that the first Viking to shoot down a dragon was someone like…this.”

“You just gestured to all of me.” I rolled my eyes, and Dad laughed—he actually laughed!—and gave me what he probably thought was an affectionate punch but was really actually painful and probably bruised me. “So you…believe me?” I asked, rubbing my arm and giving him a hesitant grin.

“Well, unless anyone else thinks that it wasn’t Hiccup,” Dad announced to the crowd, staring into each and every person’s eyes. Nobody spoke, everyone just as shocked as Dad was, and a wide grin settled across his jaw. Clapping a hand on my back, Dad led me towards the Night Fury and praised, “Well done, son. I knew you had it in you! And to think that I thought you were being irrational all these years!” His voice rose in excitement with each sentence, something that quickly rubbed off on me.

“I know, I told you they were great ideas!” I said, drawing a chuckle from him. We stood over the downed dragon together, the first Vikings to ever see a Night Fury and survive. I just grinned down at it, all of the doubts and feelings of guilt and inadequacy falling away, leaving me light and ready to take on the world.

Dad unsheathed his sword and handed it to me, an expectant and proud glimmer in his eyes. “You do the honors, son.”

I almost flinched away from the weapon. “Uh, what?”

Dad pressed the heavy thing into my arms, ignoring that I nearly dropped it. “Go on! Kill your first dragon! You were the one who brought it down, after all.”

“Oh! Well, if you say so…” My heart skipped a beat. Struggling to pull the sword’s handle into my hands, I stepped over to the beast’s vulnerable, exposed neck. For a second I felt pity…but no! I am a Viking! Vikings do not feel guilty over killing dragons.

I raised the sword. The Night Fury’s eyes snapped open.

Great Dragon of the Sun, you had to be kidding me.

There was no way this…this fishbone was the one responsible for the snake that had flung me to the earth! How was it possible that he could control a creature so powerful?!

I had only translated some of the conversation—but it was enough to know that it was truly this puny, disgraceful slime that had dishonored me, that had shamed me! The weak runt gasped loudly under my paw after I’d pinned him and cried out for the King, but I wouldn’t let him get away so easily. I spun towards the demon and shot half a fireblast right into his midsection. Then I used the other half on the approaching humans, successfully keeping them at bay but also using up another full shot. I would either half to use more half-shots, or be very conservative.

It was just me and this idiotic human now. There was a precious moment that I had grasped in my claws…where I could do anything I wanted.

I full-toothed grin settled on my jaw. Of course, I could always kill the devil and put it out of its misery. Buuut, then again, he had done the honors of bringing down a Shadow-Blender. He deserved a reward, no? A little something to be remembered by?

After all, nothing hurt a human’s pride more than taking their source of honor away. What’s more, nothing turned a human’s life into a failed wreck more than guaranteeing that they suffered. I knew just the trick to fulfill both.

The magic that I called forth wasn’t exactly forbidden—just discouraged, as such a feat would usually kill the dragon attempting it. I was a Shadow-Blender, however; I had the magic reserves to perform the spell, and since I had wisely held my magic in all night, I had plenty to draw from. Taking a moment to draw in a deep breath, I closed my eyes.

Then opened them and slammed my paws on the human’s chest.

The magic poured from my legs into his body, the concentrated mass of power scalding everything—the human’s fake fur, his skin, even my fire-resistant scales. It poured right into the human’s chest, infiltrating deep until it came upon his soul. I clucked, baring my teeth in a wide-open grin, and forced it to change.

The human didn’t scramble and fight like I’d expected. No, he just stopped moving altogether, his mouth open wide and gaping, yet no sounds could escape from deep within. His eyes became distant and glassy. Nothing else happened. Narrowing my eyes, I forced more magic away from his soul and to his body itself, deciding that it was much faster that way. I didn’t have all night, after all!

To my deepest approval, the change was immediate. The Viking wailed with an unending misery that I had never heard before, flinging his body back and forth under my strong grip. He clawed at my scales as his furless skin began to crack, splinter…grow…

His entire form shuddered and I watched on in fascination, the draining of my magic becoming secondhand. Scales were not growing—no, they were forming in likely the most painful way possible, his skin tightening in clumps in some places, leaving bloody rips where it had been drawn away and fresh flesh filling those little rivers of red. His teeth fell out all at once, dyed crimson on the edges, and his real fur popped right off of his head as if some dragon had come over and yanked it out.

His entire form began to bulge in odd places, muscles growing out of sync with each other and protruding into the open, some ripping through skin and others finding resistance against newly-formed scales that stubbornly held them inside his frail frame. The familiar sound of bones snapping—the groaning, then sudden SNAP!—punctuated the air with jolting frequency, and the screams just continued coming and coming.

The human’s fake fur tore off his body when he’d outgrown them, revealing a mesh of blood, reddened skin, and shimmering scales beneath. His face contorted as the bones within rearranged themselves, becoming more angular and streamline, and the bones of horns and his new ears burst out like a sea-dragon breaching the ocean.

A loud, grinding crack splintered the air, and all at once bones burst from his shoulders and hind end, spraying blood and muscles creeping from his body to meet up after them. They quaked and hardened with scales, and from the creases of his newly-born wing bones, membranes rushed forth like a tidal wave. His now-thrashing tail received the same fate, bones pulsing out from the edges and quickly overtaken by the required flesh necessary for tailfins.

You are being quite cruel, I thought all of the sudden, but shook it off. This human deserved this treatment!

The transformation was near-complete. The not-so-human’s legs migrated down to their respective positions, and he grew just a little bit more…and it was done. My magic reserves were all but gone, but thank the gods, I had done it! I had completed the impossible spell!

I stepped off of him, swaying in dizziness and glancing around with a proud smirk. Unsurprisingly, the large majority of the crowd had fled for their lives, although a group of smaller Vikings close to the human’s age were standing nearby. I was ecstatic to see that the King was one of those who stayed behind; he was standing right where I’d last seen him, his puny weapon discarded on the ground, eyes glossy with tears.

“That’s right,” I said to him, flicking my eyes down at the barely-conscious Shadow-Blender I had created. For a second I studied him, frowning; he was supposed to be black like me, not brown with freckles still on his face. Shrugging in dismissal, I stated, “I can do anything I want. Never forget this.”

With that, I rose into the air, pushing my exhausted wings…

…and…fell?!

I almost buckled under my own weight when I hit the center of the passageway a distance away from the King. I felt tired enough after that spell already. I suppose I overestimated my own strength. But now was not the time for that; I had to get back to the nest!

Off I went again, flapping my wings as fast as I could force them. I rose up and up and—gah! It felt like something had smacked me right in the side, knocking me over midair! I was forced to fall to the ground again.

Pain settled across my body as I stood there, panting. Most of it was concentrated on my tail.

“Oh, Dragoness of the Moon,” I choked. I swung my tail over and saw that…oh, gods…oh no!

I was missing a tailfin!

I almost broke down right there in the center of the humans’ nest—but I was a calm, rational dragon, and kept the hyperventilating to a minimum. Spinning in a tight circle, I located where the nearest forest was and sprinted.

The unnatural structures gave way to the equally uncomfortable cover of the pines, masking the open sky where I belonged, but I ran and ran until I could no longer hear the humans or the fires. The flare had already left by now—if it hadn’t, someone would have gone down and helped me when I crashlanded. I was on my own.

So I ran, setting my mind on one task: I was going to find that human, and make him regret the day he ever laid his venomous eyes on me.

Chapter Text

I was shaking like a leaf in a storm. I could hardly make sense of everything around me, I was still in pain, and I was horribly aware of what had happened to me.

What had happened…it was the worst thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life. I had never felt so much physical and emotional pain ever. Both were increased tenfold when I realized that the Night Fury had escaped. I was a failure again…but this time, I was a dragon.

I groaned, slowly opened my eyes. I was momentarily shocked; everything was crystal-clear. Not only could I see as if it were daytime, but I could make out more details and see farther than I had ever been able to before. I even saw a few dragons flying overhead, frantically flying after the swarm that had just struck us. A few were hovering off in the distance and staring at me with mixtures of shock, awe, and horror. I repressed the urge to growl at them.

I wrinkled my nose. I could smell them! In fact…I could smell a lot of things. My nose hurt at the sudden assault. I could recognize simple scents like fire, ash, wood, and sweat. But there was hundreds of other smells that I’d never even imagined until now. It was like being blind your entire life and suddenly being able to see.

My hearing was incredibly strong, too. I heard every word, even if they were whispered, as clearly as if someone had screamed them in my ear.

Slowly, I rolled over and attempted to stand up like a normal person. I got about halfway up before loosing balance and falling down onto my sore muscles, whimpering weakly. This is a dream, I thought, I got knocked out or something, and this is a dream. Come on, Hiccup, wake up! Wake up! I attempted to sit up again, but failed again. I lay belly-down on the earth, panting. I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling the beginnings of hysteria come upon me.

I heard footsteps coming towards me. I cracked my eyes open. “Dad…” I weakly raised my head to look up at him. “Dad, help me. Please help me.” My eyes widened in horror when I heard that, instead of words, I was growling. My chest heaved, and I let out a chocked sob. “Dad?”

Dad was staring at me in absolute horror. He was tense, and only got more so when I called out to him again. He looked over his shoulder at Gobber, and for the first time in my life, Chief Stoick had no idea what to do.

I bent my elbows and started to crawl towards him, belly, wings, and tail dragging on the ground. “D-Dad. Please, help me!” I reached one massive forepaw out to grab his leg…and I realized that I didn’t have fingers anymore. I squeezed my eyes shut in pain and settled for a small little croon, hoping that the message was perceived. More like praying.

Dad flinching away from me like I was fire hurt more than the transformation. “Dad! It’s me, Hiccup! I’m Hiccup!” I cried out to him. I felt my ears and side frills flatten against my head and lowered myself on the ground, chin resting in the dirt.

He shook his head, backing away from me. “Dad…”

Dad stopped when he reached Gobber. He looked at his friend with the strangest expression I’d ever seen on him. With a pang, I realized it was sorrow. My chest constricted, and suddenly I found it hard to breath. I felt my muscles tighten in response to my emotional stress. I unwillingly pricked my ears, dread filling my every bone.

“Gobber…”

“…I…I can’t…”

Oh GODS, no.

“We can’t leave a dragon here.”

Gobber recoiled in shock. “What? But that’s…that’s Hiccup!”

Oh no, oh no, oh no! No! Please no! Please!

Dad’s voice turned hard. Emotionless. “Hiccup is gone. That’s a dragon that took over his body. And we can’t let one, especially a Night Fury, get loose.”

I felt the fragile mental wall I had built up shatter into a million pieces. Dad grabbed a sword out of a nearby man’s holster. The sound of the weapon being sheaved sent shivers down my spine.

I shook my head frantically. “No! I’m Hiccup! Stop, Dad!” I sprang to my feet, swayed at the unfamiliar feeling, and crouched low. “It’s me, Hiccup! Stop! Stop!” I continued to shake my head, staring right at him.

Dad walked towards me. His grip on the sword tightened.

I screamed bloody murder in fear. I backpedaled until I hit the torch-tower. Crouching low, I desperately pleaded with my father. “No! Please, stop! Don’t hurt me! I’m your son, Hiccup! I’m Hiccup!”

Someone called out, “Stoick, stop! You’re being ridiculous!”

Another yelled, “Hiccup, calm down!”

I shivered when Dad came within striking distance. His eyebrows were pulled down and his teeth were clenched even when he started to raise the sword. I stared at it, mouth agape.

A female voice I recognized reached my ears over the chaos of the situation. “Hiccup, run!”

I spun around and dashed away so fast that I could barely even register what had happened. I was suddenly surrounded by houses instead of a crowd of people. I let out a sorrowful wail, clenching my eyes shut. I had no idea what Dad was going to do…but exiling me? What did I do wrong?

I pelted into the forest on the outskirts of Berk, the only place a human-turned-dragon could ever hide.

Once I had calmed down, I tried to assess my situation. I spoke aloud to try and help my thoughts jumble together.

“Okay, Hiccup. Take this easy. I’ve been turned into a Night Fury…but it was with magic. Magic always can be reversed, right? So, I just have to find that dragon.” I sighed. Like that would ever happen. It had run off, and was probably off of the island by now. And considering how a Night Fury had never been seen before last night, I doubt I’d be able to find another. The other dragons would probably attack me if I asked them to change me into a human, too.

I still couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that I had been banished. I had done the unthinkable: I had shot down a Night Fury! Even more so, I survived a direct attack from one! Why did I have to be outcasted? Why was I a traitor for trying to win my father’s approval? It wasn’t like I was willingly turned into a dragon.

I sat down and covered my eyes with my hands—no, paws. Gods, I couldn’t stop thinking that I was human. It was like adding salt to an open wound. A loud, painful reminder that my entire life was over. Shattered in a blink of an eye.

What did I do wrong?

I know that the Night Fury was angry…but wouldn’t it know the kind of burden this was? Why would a creature do such a thing? I was only trying to impress Dad. I just wanted to be a real Viking.

Now they were all probably getting a hunting party out to find me. For all I knew, they were spying on me. I wished with all my heart that I would just take a deep breath and open my eyes and I’d be back to normal. But that was nonsense. In this cruel world, there is no such thing as miracles.

I had no idea how long I moped in that spot, waiting for either a Viking or predator to take me out. What was the point? I’d never be able to fight my own people, the ones I grew up with. Even if they did hate me.

My ear twitched and I picked up the faint sound of something heavy crashing onto the ground. I lifted my head and unknowingly pricked my ears towards it.

Was it that Night Fury?

I narrowed my eyes. If that Night Fury was still on this island, then I still had a chance. I had shot it down from a high speed and distance. Maybe it was sore, or even better, injured! I could corner it and force it to change me back! Then, everything would be normal, and I could just shoot it down again at the next raid.

Filled with newfound hope, I sprang to my feet and clumsily made my way towards the noise. I still hadn’t gotten the hang of walking on all-fours yet.

It didn’t take me long to realize that my wings and tail couldn’t just drag on the ground. They would bump into things or get caught in them, which was very painful, by the way. With a lot of concentration, I finally figured out how to move the muscles and managed to fold the sturdy wings and lift my muscular tail off the ground. Once I had accomplished this, I immediately recognized the change in my movement. With my tail above the ground, I was far more graceful than any Viking could hope to be, and much faster.

I scurried between tree trunks, jumped over ditches, and swerved out of the way of sinkholes. I could hear footsteps. As they got louder, I grew more and more excited. I went into a jog, tongue loping out of my mouth as I all but pranced towards the Night Fury. I could be normal again!

I burst out from behind a large bush. I crouched low and sent a glare to the evil creature that had just ruined my life.

Except…it wasn’t a Night Fury!

I recoiled in shock. So did Astrid.

She was in her typical outfit, with a blue shirt, spiked skirt, boots, and armor. I eyed her trademark double-axe warily and slowly moved my posture from aggressive to submissive. The last thing I wanted was the best teenage dragon-killer to be mad at me while I was in the body of a Night Fury.

Astrid blinked her beautiful blue eyes at me in shock. She brushed her golden hair out of her eyes, trying to pull her bangs back towards the braid that reached the small of her back. She shifted into a slightly defensive position, making me tense. We stared at each other for a tense moment.

Finally, she broke it. “Hiccup.”

Hearing her say my name like that was unbearable. It didn’t have the usual scorn or holier-than-thou attitude with it. It was sympathetic and full of pity. Her sing-song voice echoed slightly around us and I instinctively pricked my ears to pinpoint the sound.

Astrid slowly took one step towards me, mirroring my cautious look. I admired her bravery. My father had told everyone that a dragon had taken over my body. Astrid clung to every word he said, so there wasn’t really a reason for her to doubt him. But here she was, approaching a seemingly-deadly Night Fury with nothing but a measly axe to protect her. A draconic smile spread across my face and I crooned, stretching my neck out towards her.

Astrid’s axe was up in seconds. I jumped and slunk back in surprise.

It took one look at he face for me to realize that she didn’t trust me. She was trying to trick me! I bet she was going to wait for me to come within striking distance and lop my head off to put an end to my misery. Eyes wide, I spun on my feet and bolted off into the forest as fast as I could. Everything around me became a senseless blur, but that didn’t stop me from hearing one last thing from Astrid.

“Hiccup!” She called to me. I ignored her.

There is one thing that is the worst fate any dragon could ever think of.

That, my friends, is losing the ability of flight.

I roared in anger and took to the skies for the hundredth time. I tightened my wings and tried to curve myself away. But my tail, incredibly unbalanced and flailing wildly, knocked me off-course and grounded me. Again. I landed in a giant black heap of feet, wings, and a tail. Groaning, I got to work untangling myself to try and get into the air again. I had to get back to the tribe!

No Shadow-Blender should ever be dishonored like this!

I shook my body to fling the grass sticking between my scales. When I was done, I crouched low and stretched my wings out.

A sharp throbbing in my tail stopped me. I hissed in anger and pain and brought it towards me. The stupid thing had stopped bleeding long ago and had already scabbed over, but it was still very painful. I sat down and licked it to try and make the pain go away. It worked somewhat.

With a sigh, I let my head drop on the ground. This was hopeless. My magic was considerably low, and would be for a long time. I wouldn’t be able to fix my tail without potentially handicapping myself even further. I shuddered at the thought of losing my magic abilities, or worse, becoming mentally insane. I’d seen too many dragons attempt something they simply could not do and pay the ultimate price for it. There was no way a Shadow-Blender such as myself would be as stupid as to do that.

So, my best chance was to wait. If I stored my energy as long as I could, I would be able to heal my tail a lot sooner.

I growled, staring at it. That damn human…I hoped he was killed by his own father. There was no possible way he could escape from a crowd that big without my expertise. At least I had one comforting thought.

I hate Vikings, I thought miserably.

It was still dark out, but I knew the sun was going to rise soon. Once it did, I would probably have to retreat into a cave or hide myself in a large cluster of trees. Knowing the Vikings, they’d be swarming the forest all day long in search of me. I grimaced at the thought of having to fight off a village of angry humans carrying pointy sticks. Those weapons may seem like a joke at first, but gods, do they hurt!

My ear twitched at the sound of something soft crushing dead grass, giving out a delightful cracking sound. I held still and looked over at it. Cautiously, a little fawn stepped out into the field, sniffing at the air and swiveling its ears. It was obviously lost. The little spotted creature stamped the ground with its hoof and bounded forward once. It halted in its tracks and looked off into the distance, not even casting me a second glance.

I started to stalk towards it. I knew it would hear me charge up a blast and take off into the forest. So, I had to stick to the shadows and stay in only the tall grass. Eyes narrowed, I slid along the ground with my wings pressed against my body and my tail slightly hovering off the ground.

The deer’s neck swiveled and it looked right at me. I pounced.

The fawn let out a little yip and tried to bolt in the opposite direction. But I was too smart; I had already swerved to where I had predicted it would go and blocked its only path to safety. It bumped into my hide and stumbled back, losing its footing against the rocky ground and exposing its tiny little neck to me. I was feeling generous, so I quickly bit down on its throat for a quick death.

I sniffed the fawn’s body to check for anything out of the ordinary. When it passed my regulations, I bit into it. I devoured the meal in less than a minute, leaving only the bones, head, and a little bit of meat that would probably fill up some scavengers. I licked my teeth in satisfaction. That deer had tasted good!

My stomach rumbled loudly, demanding more food. I stood up and began to sniff the air, searching for more deer to hunt down.

I caught a very faint scent on the opposite side of the field I was at. I glided a short distance across and, crouching low, made my way into the pitch-black shelter of the woods. My ears were sticking straight up, waiting to pick up even the slightest sound. My eyes searched for any sort of tracks left behind by prey, and I inhaled deeply every few seconds.

So, it wasn’t much of a shocker when I found a herd of deer.

Rumbling in happiness and excitement, I picked up my pace. They were resting in a little creek not too far ahead, drinking as much fresh water as they could before they would have to move on. Unfortunately for them, they had decided to visit the creek for a moment too long.

I hid myself in a shadow and allowed my teeth to silently slide out of my gums. A large male, a stag, was wandering near me. I didn’t dare move a muscle.

Two more steps, one more step…just a little bit closer…now!

I leaped into the air, intending to the pin the stag to the ground.

At the same time, another dragon jumped out of the bushes!

We both stared at each other in shock as the deer herd scattered, prancing away in neat little jumps.

This dragon was male. He was a Shadow-Blender like me, only he wasn’t black. He had brownish-black scales and lighter spots adorning his nose, cheeks, and side frills. I stared at him curiously, sniffing the air. It took me a few seconds to realize why he looked strange, and why the scent I took in was so familiar.

The human!

My jaw all but dropped in shock. How the hell was he still alive?!

“You survived?!”

His eyes widened a fraction. “I can understand you?” He whispered, ears standing straight up.

I was surprised, too. The human’s scales were brownish, and he still had those freckles. That meant that my magic hadn’t worked all the way. But judging on this new little fact, I’d say that he was far more dragon than he was human. I must have changed all but a small part of him, so small that all it did was change his color. I growled in annoyance. “Unfortunately, you can.”

“But how?!” He wailed. “I’m not a dragon!”

I let out a long, sarcastic laugh. “Oh, but you are! And not just that…you’re a freak of a dragon! Look at your scales!” I collapsed into laughter, my mirth only growing when he made an annoyed sound.

“Shut up!” He cried, jumped out into the little clearing. His voice shook in what sounded like pain.

“Make me, freak.” I shot him a tooth-filled smile. Sarcasm was dripping from my voice. As long as he was still alive, I might as well torment him.

His answer wasn’t what I was expecting from such a timid little thing. Roaring in fury, loud enough to make me cringe and send a small flock of birds scattering, the Viking rushed at me. I shook off the ringing in my ears and leaped aside. He barreled right past me and into a tree, hitting his nose and forehead against it. I laughed loudly at him, raising my head and tail and pointing my chin up to the sky. “Are you really trying to fight me?” I taunted.

“Yes! I am!” The human-dragon growled, shaking his head furiously. He pawed at the ground with one foot and charged again with the full intent to headbutt me.

Imagine his surprise when I jumped over him! While I could not fly, I could still get pretty high into the air, and even glide short distances. His expression when I was suddenly gone was priceless. I’m sure the gods would be proud of me for giving him what he deserved.

Taking my chance, I leaped on top of him. My victim screeched and instinctively tried to throw me off, but I held fast. All I did was clamp my jaw into the spot his scruff was and tighten my grip to a death-hold, digging my claws into his skin. I stayed in that position until he tried to roll on the ground.

Perfect! His sensitive belly now exposed, I jumped off for a second and leaped onto him again, pinning him to the ground. I reared my head back, building up a fireblast that would take care of him once and for all. The high-pitched scream that signaled a Shadow-Blender’s strongest attack sounded like music to my ears. I grinned, retracted my teeth, and pursed my lips.

The Viking flapped his wings close to his body, hitting my square in the head. My concentration completely put off, the blast I had built up disappeared. While I was distracted, my enemy clawed at the base of my tail with his hind legs and leaned forward and snapped at my front two. I jumped off of him, gasping slightly.

My eyes narrowed in anger. “You will pay for that!” I screeched, spreading my wings out to their full length and rearing up on my hind legs.

The Viking made a move to scratch my stomach open. I pulled my wings in and crushed my front paws at the base of his neck when he got close to me, sending him into the ground. His entire body began to tip over from the sheer force of the impact. He cried out in agony. When his tail came with reaching distance, I grabbed him and used it to fling him aside.

The valiant little thing struggled to stand up. He backed away from me. “C-change me back,” he gasped through his pain. “Just ch-change me b-back.” His entire body was shaking and he crouched low to the ground. I towered over his skinny frame, giving him a harsh glare. “Please! Change me back!”

“Why should I,” I deadpanned, “when you just attacked me? Why should I not just,” I smirked, “punish you further?”

His ears dropped and his frills pressed tight against his head in shock. “W-what? W-w-what are you talking about?” He stood up, arching his back slightly and slowly began to walk backwards.

I casually followed after him. I heard his heart rate speed up. “Oh, nothing,” I cooed. I leaped in front of him when he turned to try and dash away. He backed up and cringed in a very humanlike way, attempting to bring a paw up to defend his face. Of course, since he was a dragon now, it only went up to his chest. I flattened my ears against my head and gave him a full-blown snarl, showing him every single one of my teeth. “Except this!”

The human let out a terrified wail. I grabbed him by the neck and pulled my head up as far as it could go, forcing him to walk with his forepaws hanging slightly above the ground. I backed up, shoving him along with me, and checked behind me for something I could throw him at. A large rock, preferably. Even a tree would do! Just something to knock the annoying little thing out.

What met my eyes was even better.

A gorge! There were steep rocky cliffs on all sides. A large lake filled the center, and a small cluster of trees hung off to the side. There were several cracks and small caves in there, maybe just big enough for him to fit. But I didn’t really care about that; what only mattered was the fact that this Viking was about to be pushed over a cliff that would certainly kill him.

With a mighty pull, I threw the screeching male over the edge. He flipped in the air once, saw the ground, and…!

He spread out his wings a few seconds before hitting the ground, but it was enough. Instead of hitting the ground at a bone-crushing speed, he simply landed as hard against it as my landings were when I was trying to fly earlier. He grunted loudly and held still, groaning in pain.

I growled in annoyance. How hard could it be to kill this guy?!

While he was still stunned, I began to filter gas into my mouth. I snarled loudly, the screeching of my flame rising in pitch and volume. I saw the Viking freeze under me and look up helplessly. He squeezed his eyes shut after a moment and dropped his head in solemn acceptance.

I spat out the fireball. At the same exact time, something hard and metal hit me in the side of the face, knocking it to the side! The blue-white blast screamed as it briefly flew over the gorge. Then, it hit the wall of one of the cliffs, creating a huge hole in it and sending vibrations running through the earth. I heard the scuttle of terrified animals fleeing the direct area.

“Get away from him!” A loud, feminine voice screamed. I looked over just in time to see a blonde-haired human run at me with an axe raised over her shoulder, screaming her little lungs out. My eyes widened a fraction at her sudden appearance.

Sidestepping her, I growled a warning. “Stay out of this, human! This doesn’t involve you in the least bit.”

Below me, I heard the Viking-dragon call out, “Astrid! Run!”

I looked at him in surprise. He was on his feet again, gesturing wildly to the girl to run. His eyes were the biggest I’d ever seen on a dragon and were full of fear.

The Viking girl was of importance to him? I set my eyes on her. She was shaking her head stubbornly at her grounded companion and easing into a fighting position. We locked eyes. I hissed at her and charged.

I was too fast for her to dodge. She tried to jump out of the way, but I was too quick! I grabbed her midair and flung her towards a nearby tree. To my surprise, she grabbed the bark and swung around it using only a hand. Even though her palm and fingers immediately started bleeding, it was a bit impressive. I quickly shook off the emotion, though, reminding myself that this monster had just attacked me out of nowhere. I was only ridding the world of a certain evil!

I charged up for a fireblast. She spun on her heels, fooling me into thinking she was running and making me falter. But she wasn’t! The evil girl continued on with her spin and thrust her axe at my head. I barely had enough time to duck. The familiar chopping sound of the weapon being thrown into something came up behind me. It turned slightly and flared my nostrils in surprise. The axe was sticking into a tree!

If that had been my head… I shuddered. It would have killed me!

The girl screamed again, sheathing a small dagger that had been on the side of her belt. I crouched low, roaring in outrage.

She swung at me. I jumped back to avoid the hit and then stepped aside to dodge another. While she was still swinging, I pulled a paw up and swiped at her chest, sending her falling onto the ground. I went to pounce on her, but she rolled away and kicked me in the cheek! While it didn’t hurt me physically, it certainly wounded my dignity. I bared my teeth at her and grabbed her foot, rising on my hind legs and spinning my body. I let her go halfway through. The Viking girl screamed until she hit the ground with a loud ‘thump’.

Panting, she got to her feet again and patted her sides in search of a weapon. Her expression slowly melted from brave anger to horrified fear when she realized that she had nothing to defend herself with. I sent her a grin, tail swishing back and forth. “Looks like I win, human,” I told her.

I doubt she understood me, but she took off running anyways. I immediately gave chase, ignoring the Viking-dragon’s cries.

The girl was a lot more agile than I had expected. She ducked under things and swerved at angles a dragon as big as myself couldn’t hope to do without getting hurt. I growled in annoyance when she used this strategy again. And again. And again.

“Stop moving!” I demanded at the top of my lungs when I had eventually lost sight on her. Now all I could depend on was my sense of smell (which wasn’t a help; by now, she was covered in plants and smelled just like one) and hearing (how in the god’s name can a human be so quiet?!).

After awhile, I stopped, slightly out of breath. I narrowed my eyes and let out a wordless bellow of outrage. How dare a human defeat a Shadow-Blender! I would make her regret this day for the rest of her life! I made this message very clear to every living thing around me by shooting a fireball at a tree, causing it to explode and run into a bunch of other trees. I sniffed warily at the tiny fire that had started.

Eh, there’s some rain coming in soon. That’ll fix it, I reassured myself. Besides, the fire wasn’t that big. It wasn’t even medium-sized!

My ears pricked at the sound of shouting voices. Human shouting voices.

Aw, damn! I didn’t realize I was this close to their nest! They probably heard and saw that. Stupid, stupid! I berated myself. I slunk back as the voices started to get louder, and when they were very close, I turned and silently fled into the forest.

 I dropped to the ground, chest heaving and skin sweaty. I pushed my long hair back and rolled my sleeves up in an attempt to cool off. Rolling onto my back, I closed my eyes and thanked every single god I could think of that I was still alive and not some miserable wreck of a dragon’s breakfast.

Images of what had just happened flashed before my eyes. Finding the dragon…no, Hiccup, in the forest. Scaring him off by accident. Searching the woods until I heard him fighting the Night Fury responsible, and then defending him from it.

Why in the world was that Night Fury still around? I squeezed my eyes and clenched my teeth and fists at the thought of the demon. I bet it wanted to turn more people into dragons, or even eat Hiccup. Why else would it attack him? I wouldn’t be surprised if we Vikings found out that Night Furies would practice cannibalism. It would only add to how terrible, sickening, destructive, insane, evil, and selfish they are!

That dragon…it was a monster.

Because of it, Hiccup was gone. Because Hiccup was gone, Chief Stoick was a mess!

He’d locked himself up in his house after Hiccup had run off and hadn’t come out since. To make matters worse, he wasn’t even talking to anyone! Even his best friend, Gobber, couldn’t get him to come out of his shell. It was awful. What’s a tribe to do without its leader?

The village itself had fallen deathly silent, as if the Night Fury had taken us all prisoner. People would huddle in their own groups and whisper to each other, stopping whenever an outsider came close to them. The remaining villagers were holed up in their houses, trying to work to get their minds off of what had happened.

While I don’t like Hiccup in the least bit (he’s a sorry excuse for a Viking), he did matter to Chief Stoick, no matter how much the man denied it. Anyone would go into such a shock after seeing their one and only son, albeit weak and scrawny, being transformed into a dragon right before their eyes. So, the obvious solution is to get Hiccup to come back, make amends, and possibly break the spell!

That’s why I had gone out into the forest. I repeatedly told myself that I had done it for the tribe, not Hiccup. The only thing that mattered was getting everything back to normal, or we’ll become as weak as the other tribes around us and get forced to flee our homeland.

The distant sound of something exploding pulled me out of my thoughts. I sat upright, instinctively reaching for the axe that I would never see again. Far off in the distance, within the forest, smoke was rising. I heard a faint caterwauling coming from within. Several of the brave villagers who lived close to the forest yelped in shock, grabbed the nearest weapon, and started to advance on whatever had made that happen.

I scoffed at their panicky movements. I knew that it was that Night Fury throwing a hissy-fit because I’d managed to escape from it. A small smile tugged at my lips while I stood up. How many people can say that they beat a Night Fury in a game of hide-and-seek? Deadly hide-and-seek, I might add.

My eyes widened in sudden realization. I had to tell someone about Hiccup! I should have told the entire village by now instead of just lying in the grass to regain energy. I cursed at myself. I should have never put my own needs before everyone else’s.

I went to head for Chief Stoick’s house, but stopped myself. Chances are there was still a big crowd around his house, and I didn’t want the entire village to go into a panic when they learned that the Night Fury that cursed Hiccup was still wandering about. Plus, I needed more information. Not just, “I saw Hiccup in the woods with another Night Fury”.

Who could I go to for information? Who could I trust not to tell anyone?

I plopped down next to Fishlegs, who was staring out his window worriedly. He hadn’t moved an inch away from it since this morning. I flipped my bangs back and forced my expression to become impassive. I was here to get information. Nothing else.

“So, u-u-uh, what is it that you want?” He asked uncertainly, glancing over at me and back out the window.

“Tell me about dragon magic.” I got right into business. No beating around the bushes for me. I needed information, and I needed it fast. “Like, how it works. Is there a way to reverse it? Can dragons do other things?”

Fishlegs stopped in his worrying and cast me a suspicious glance, showing a brave side of him that usually only came out during raids. He glanced at my hands and where I usually kept my extra dagger attached to my skull-and-bones skirt. Then he stared right into my eyes.

“You chased down that Night Fury, didn’t you.” It was a statement. I blinked several times in shock. Fishlegs was a lot smarter than I gave him credit for. I had never expected him to get it dead-on like that. I’d even come up with an alibi!

“How did you know?” I asked, genuinely impressed. ‘Brave’ Fishlegs disappeared under my admiration and was instantly replaces by timid, shy, nerdy, slightly starstruck Fishlegs. He dropped his gaze and looked out the window again, tapping his chubby fingers against the wood paneling.

I kicked him none-too-gently in the side. “I noticed that you didn’t have your axe or dagger, and you look kind of winded,” Fishlegs struggled to get out. He tapped his fingers together. “It’s not hard to figure out, considering how you were ranting earlier about the Night Fury messing everything up.”

I nodded, eyes glazing over slightly as I remembered what he was talking about. Refocusing, I told him, “Well, now that that’s in the open, can you answer my question?”

Fishlegs turned and gave me a small—very small—glare. “Astrid, you can’t go fighting a Night Fury when you haven’t even had any real training yet! It’s suicide!” He threw his arms into the air and shook his head wildly when he reached the last word. “I won’t let you!”

“Really? When did it become any of your business?” I demanded, standing up angrily. I squared my feet, raised my shoulders, and lifted my head.

“Uh, I don’t know, since you just told me?” Fishlegs shot back. Looks like brave Fishlegs has made a reappearance. “If you go, then I’ll tell everyone. It doesn’t matter if I can’t stop you, but I’m pretty sure the entire village can. And, really, Astrid, I doubt Chief Stoick wants anybody going missing in the woods right now. We need all the warriors we can get.”

His speech over, he stopped to wait for my reaction. I considered this for a moment. I’d never thought of it like that. I grimaced at the memory of the Night Fury throwing me at a tree, just barely missing my head against the trunk.

“So,” Fishlegs decided, “I’ll tell you about dragon magic. But you can’t use that knowledge anywhere. Not in the woods, not in the village, and definitely not fighting some crazed dragon with a lot of magic power. Deal?” He stuck his hand out to me.

“Deal,” I grudgingly agreed, grabbing his hand and shaking it a bit too hard.

“Alright!” Fishlegs jumped off of his bed and walked over to a desk covered in books. He shuffled them around, talking loudly to himself. “Dragon Encyclopedia, Dragon Fighting Techniques, How to Kill a Dragon, Fishing—oh! Here it is!” He grabbed a medium-thick book with a faded cover and worn pages. “The Analysis of Dragon Magic! I’ve read it, like, seven times.”

I raised an eyebrow. Hadn’t he just been scared out of his mind a few minutes ago?

Fishlegs sat down on his bed, making it creak loudly and dip under him. He opened the book to its glossary, running a finger along the runes written into the yellowing paper. I looked over his shoulder curiously. “Aha!” He exclaimed. “Magic on humans, page 45.”

He flipped through the thin paper quickly until he stopped on the designated page. I blinked at it. The page was almost completely covered in sentences. Unlike many books on dragons, there didn’t seem to be pictures. I squinted to try and see what was on the page, but Fishlegs began reading it aloud.

“Dragon magic is usually very hard to learn about it, since most captured dragons appear to be unwilling to use it when confined. On occasion, there has been times when dragons use magic to make their attacks stronger, but there is debate on that subject because—“

“Can you get to the ‘magic on people’ part?” I interrupted impatiently.

Fishlegs flinched slightly and quickly skimmed, making his finger race back and forth along the page. “Uh, here it is. Dragons have not used magic on humans very much in the past, suggesting that it is too risky for them to do it. The only known uses of dragon magic on Vikings is possessing them, or changing their general appearance.”

He stopped and looked at me. I raised my eyebrows in surprise. “That’s it?” He nodded. “You sure?” More nodding.

“What the hell?!” I leaped up and threw my arms into the air. “That’s the only thing we know about dragon magic?!” I paced around the room angrily, kicking at the chair that was resting by the small desk. It clattered to the floor, and I picked it up and threw it into a wall. “How are we going to fix things, then?!”

“Fix things?” Fishlegs parroted. “Astrid! We just made a deal! What were you planning on doing?”

I glared at my feet. Oh. I’d forgotten about that little part. I heard him get up from his bed swiftly and walked over to me. He closed the book and set it on the dresser, picked up the chair, and set it back to where it had been before. In the awkward, tense silence, he sat down and stared at me. When I refused to speak, he sighed and murmured something about ‘stubbornness issues’.

“Astrid. You can’t possibly think you can break a Night Fury’s magic by yourself.” I looked up at him, eyebrows knitted together. “Well, you see,” Fishlegs explained, “if that dragon could change a human into a dragon, then it’s obviously incredibly powerful. How can you face something like that? Do you want to become a dragon, too?” His voice turned fearful at this.

I sighed. “I…guess you’re right,” I grudgingly admitted. I turned to him sharply and jabbed a finger at him. “But this isn’t going to be the end of this! Unlike everyone else, I’m going to try and solve this! I might not have to face the Night Fury alone!”

Fishlegs rolled his eyes. “How exactly do you plan on doing that? Are you forgetting that this is a Night Fury, the only thing that any Viking has every feared, that we’re talking about? The only reasing you’re going after it is because you’re too stubborn to admit defeat. Who’s going to help you?” He raised a blond eyebrow and crossed his arms.

“The rest of the gang, of course.” I replied. A plan was already formulating in my head. At Fishleg’s disbelieving snort, I added, “And you.” He gasped loudly.

“W-w-what?!” He grabbed my arm, eyes wide. “No!”

“If we can just convince that dragon that it’s outmatched,” I jerked my head towards the forest, “then we can trick it into changing Hiccup back.”

“No. Too dangerous. You don’t even like Hiccup!” Fishlegs shook his head wildly and backed away from me.

I glared. “Do you want Chief Stoick to be a mess the rest of his life? No? Well, then we should probably help Hiccup.”

It was Fishleg’s turn to give me a dirty look. “You don’t even care about him! All you’re thinking about is the village’s welfare! Hiccup could die, and you wouldn’t even bat an eye at it!”

I scoffed. “That’s untrue. I just happen to like, I don’t know, living in a place that isn’t falling apart at the seams? Face it, Fishlegs, if Hiccup doesn’t come back, we’re done for! The other Vikings will find out eventually, and we’ll be attacked!”

Fishlegs fell silent again.

I was a little surprised at his accusation. Sure, I didn’t like Hiccup and had said numerous times, out of his hearing distance, that the village would be better off without him. But not like this! While Hiccup was annoying and clumsy, he had the best intentions and always tried his best, even if he ended up failing every single time. That’s why I never teased him like the others; because I could see more than they could. I respected the fact that he wasn’t trying to do everything he did on purpose. Unfortunately, Hiccup’s ambition was what got everyone into this mess. I doubted that he’d be in any shape to try and help himself right now, Chief Stoic was out of the count, and the village was scared out of its wits. That left me.

I know that basing the entire thing off of the greater good seemed ridiculous. I admit it, what happened to Hiccup was wrong. I wanted to help him, too. But the entire tribe was far more important than one wayward person who never did anything right. Thinking about it, though, maybe I should have told Fishlegs that part, too. He probably thought I was some goody-goody that didn’t care about anyone else, which is a lie!

“I think you should leave,” Fishlegs murmured. Crap. I should have explained myself further. The exact opposite of what I had wanted just happened.

“I’m going to go tell the others,” I told Fishlegs, standing up. “I’ll see you later.”

“Mhm.”

I walked out of his house into the cool morning air. A few birds were flying overhead, swirling around each other in eccentric patterns. A few stray villagers were walking around. None of the were really doing anything. I sighed.

Now I had to find Snoutlout, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut. We needed to get to work.

Chapter Text

So far, this has been the worst day of my life.

First, I get turned into a dragon by a crazy, borderline insane Night-Fury that apparently is too arrogant to notice his own mistakes. Second, my own father outcasted me for something I did not do. What fun! Third, I found the crazy Night Fury, only for him to make fun of me! I even attacked him! And he kicked my ass with a grin on his face the entire time!

To make matters worse, I got stuck in this stupid gorge. Oh, and Astrid knew where I was, and probably would be returning soon. It’d be just my luck.

I couldn’t help but worry about her, though. I’d had another full-on panic attack after the Night Fury had disappeared into the woods after her. I must have been a sight: a Night Fury attempting to climb out of a ravine, running back and forth and screaming at the top of its lungs. I’m surprised some hunters didn’t come along and take me out; I was making such a ruckus!

I’d just calmed down when I’d heard the Night Fury shoot off a fireblast. My heart had plummeted.

It was impossible to describe how relieved I was when I heard the evil dragon let loose a long string of curses. Astrid had survived! In response to this, I had promptly plopped to the ground in exhaustion.

I didn’t even realize I’d dozed off until the sound of thunder boomed above me.

My eyes snapped wide open. I looked up in dread, staring at the dark, angry clouds above me. With a second boom, they opened up, sending a horribly cold shower of rain onto me. I shivered and pulled my wings and tail in for warmth.

Another lightning strike. The noise was so loud, it actually distorted my vision.

“Come on!” I cried out. “Give me a break already!”

The only answer I got was for the shower to become a torrent. I whimpered. Why did things have to be like this? Why did everything have to go wrong for me?! I threw my head back and nearly wailed. Everything that could possibly go wrong was happening to me, and I didn’t even know why!

I sat there until my paws had started to go numb. Deciding that getting in shelter would probably be the best idea right now, I stumbled towards the outcropping of trees and squeezed myself between them. Absolutely no difference. It was then that my mind helpfully informed me that standing under a tree in a thunderstorm is the worst thing that you could possibly do. With a somewhat irritated sigh, I stepped out from the outcropping and tried to get a good look at my surroundings.

There! There was a hole in the side of one of the cliffs, where the Night Fury had missed me earlier.

I began to sprint towards it. Halfway there, an enormous gust of wind blew right behind me, so strong that my hind legs actually got lifted off the ground. I screeched in surprise and instinctively spread my wings out. Bad choice. Another blast of wind hit me from the front and threw me into the air. I don’t think I’ve ever yelled louder in my life. I tumbled midair, twisting my wings back and forth to try and get myself to land. I was rewarded with another windblast shoving me into the side of the cliff opposite of where I was going.

I dropped to the ground and groaned. My back and wings were incredibly sore, and now I was dizzy.

This is definitely the worst day of my life.

But I couldn’t just sit there in the rain! I’d get sick!

I shook my head fiercely, and with a mighty effort, stood up. I pressed my wings against my body, and my belly onto the ground. I began to crawl my way around the lake and towards the big, gaping hole in the center of the cliffside. By then, the rain had found itself a new friend: hail! Hooray! Yippee! What a great party we’re having down here in the Outcasted Viking/Dragon Cove!

My eyes were only slits now, to try and avoid getting scratched up. I felt hail scratch against my hide, but, strangely, it barely hurt. I know that the Vikings down at Berk would be all scratched up if they went outside right now. I guess dragons were just more durable than humans. Thinking about it, it did make sense.

I sighed in relief when I got to the cliffside. I stared up at it. Looking from directly under it, you couldn’t even tell there was a hole. It was very high up; taller than the houses in Berk were built. I couldn’t tell how deeply it was in the rock face, but I didn’t really care at that moment. All I wanted to do was get into the shelter! Then, at least, I’d be out of the hail and rain, and I would be able to think straight.

More lightning flashed above me. I froze, stunned, and tried to shake it off. Still slightly disoriented, I reared on my hind legs and tried to grab the edge of the cave.

Except, I didn’t. I wasn’t even close.

I tried again, and again, and again. Frustrated, I backed up and tried to leap into the shelter. I was the opposite of lucky with that try; I jumped right into the area below it, not even close to the entrance!

This time, I did begin to wail. All my pent-up emotions crashed in on me. I was still Hiccup the Useless. I couldn’t even get into a cave! The village probably hated me, Astrid included, the Night Fury enjoyed my misery and wanted me to die, and I was being rained and hailed on! I’d never be able to change back, or even try to help myself, if I couldn’t even get into a damn cave!

I glared up at the cave entrance. It was just barely out of reach, taunting me. I half-heartedly tried to get into it again, my survival instincts pressing me to get out of the rain and hail. I reared on my hind legs and stretched my front paws out as far as I could possibly get them. I tried to dig them into the cliff and jump at the same time. For a few seconds, hope filled me when the powerful claws actually punctured the wall and gave me leverage. I had climbed about halfway there, when, suddenly, a blast of wind knocked into me so hard, I fell off, hit the ground, and rolled into the lake.

I jumped out of it, gasping for air and coughing up the water I’d swallowed in my shock. Damn that wind! I was almost there! I was so close!

Wait…the wind!

That’s it! Why hadn’t I thought of this earlier?! All I had to do was wait for a powerful wind blast to blow in the direction of the cave, jump, stretch out my wings, and I’d fly right into it! I’d just have to remember how that Night Fury had moved his wings when he’d jumped over me in our battle. Maybe there was a good thing that had come that fight. That Night Fury was the one who’d made the cave, anyways.

I jogged over to the edge of the lake and turned, tensing. I waited for the wind to begin to blow in the direction I was facing.

The entire plan was easier said than done. Not only would the wind only blow in one direction for a short time, but by the time I realized that it was in the direction I wanted, it was already too late. To make matters worse, it was all completely random, and it was still raining and hailing. I growled when, for the third time, I missed my chance.

That’s it! I thought, too stressed and outraged to even care about what was happening. I’m trying it anyways!

With an unnecessary battle-cry, I charged, leaped into the air, and stretched my wings out. I stayed airborne for several seconds longer than any human could have, and a feeling of elation spread through me. I grinned widely. I didn’t dare try to move my wings any further, and just tried to aim myself towards the cave/hole in the cliffside. A few more seconds and I’d be there…

FWOOOOOOOOOOSH!

“Aaaaaiiiiiie!”

The wind blasted me from my left. I somersaulted midair and tried to twist my body around so I’d be able to face upright. I surprised myself by actually accomplishing the act. But then, another wind blast hit me from the front. I gasped when my wings caught the air and I went flying backwards. With great effort, I turned around and brought them in closer to me.

I was shocked to see that the cave was right in front of me! Not wasting a second, I reached out with my front paws and grabbed the entrance of the cave. The moment I did, a gust of wind hit me in the side, nearly knocking me completely off. I gritted my teeth and dug my claws in further. When the wind stopped blowing for a few seconds, I scrambled into the cave.

The cave went deep enough into the crag that the far end was completely dry. I gratefully dropped down on the ground, now safe from the hail, rain, and wind. After a moment of staring out into the gray weather, I noticed that the cave I was in didn’t have any stray rocks anywhere. It was one big, smooth dent. I ran a paw over it, amazed at how hard and smooth it felt. If that Night Fury’s blast had done this to the cliff…

And to think that that blast that did this was aimed at me…

I flinched and physically tensed. That Night Fury really, truly wanted me dead. Not a comforting thought. Especially when he was powerful enough to make a cave in a cliffside and simultaneously melt all the rock in said cave.

Well, at least I’m out of the rain, I thought to myself. I lay my head on my paws and curled up tightly. Slowly, my shivering stopped. I never took my eyes off of the entrance of the cave. Something was telling me to be on my guard. I wasn’t sure if it was my new dragon instincts or just my gut, but I wasn’t going to ignore it. For all I knew, that Night Fury had been watching me the entire time. It wouldn’t be that hard to just shoot a blast into the cave I was in to finish me off.

The resulting mental image completely unnerved me. I stood up abruptly and began pacing, talking frantically to myself in an attempt to calm down.

A flash of lightning made itself known by hitting the edge of the cave. That, plus the resulting boom, made me scream at the top of my lungs. I ran to the very edge of the cave and pressed myself up against it, shaking in terror. I whimpered when I heard the lighting begin to get more violent.

Oh, Berk is such a wonderful place to live in. It rains and hails nine months of the year and snows the other three.

I spent the rest of the day pressed against that wall. I know that, eventually, I settled down and started to just watch the outside world.

Around the time the sky was darkening, the rain was starting to let up a little. Emphasis on ‘little’. The only thing that really completely stopped was the hail. By then, my body had decided that it would be a good idea to shut off. My eyes started to droop and my hearing got fuzzy. I struggled to fight off the sleep, but, in the end, couldn’t.

I didn’t dream about a single thing.

I woke up the next morning to a whitish-gray coat of clouds covering the sky and a light drizzle gently tapping the earth. I sat up, a solemn expression on my face when I remembered what had happened the night before. At least it wasn’t raining as hard. In fact, I sort-of liked it when it drizzled like this.

I stood up and bent down to stretch. I pushed my wings out as far as they could go and slashed my tail a few times. Ah, that felt much better. My jaws widened in a massive yawn, and a small whine escaped from me. That whine became incredibly loud, when, suddenly, my teeth grew! They shot out of my gums lightning-fast, causing me to jump and try to bring a paw to my mouth.

These teeth were so…long! I thought they were big before, but this was ridiculous!

Dragons are crazy, I thought. Experimentally, I tried to see if I could retract the teeth. If they come out, then they can come in, right?

It took me a few seconds, but I finally found the muscles above and under my gums that pushed and pulled my teeth around. This led me to finding out that Night Furies can be completely toothless! Who would’ve thought? I couldn’t help but wonder why a dragon would need an ability such as this.

I popped my teeth in and out several times. I have to admit, it was a bit amusing. That is, until I realized that I was sitting in a cave playing with my teeth. I felt a little dumb after that.

Shaking off the embarrassment, I walked to the edge of the cave. The grass was covered in dew, sparkling slightly. The trees all seemed to be weighed down by water that had not fallen off of their leaves in the storm. The air was filled with the heavy scent of rain, and the humidity of the air was incredibly high. The air itself was a pleasant chill; not too hot, but not too cold, either.

I popped my head over the edge of cave and gulped. That was a long way down.

“Okay, Hiccup…you can do this…” I pulled my claws out to their full extent and dug them into the cliffside. I did the same with my hind paws. Slowly, I started to skid down the slightly-slanted surface. My claws slipped on something and I gasped, jumping the remainder of the way down to avoid falling face-first into the ground. I landed clumsily and nearly lost my footing on the slippery grass.

Several birds flew above me. They went up and out of the canyon. I watched them enviously. At least they weren’t trapped in here like I was. All of the cliffs were incredibly high and steep. I’d barely been able to get up to the cliff-cave, and that was a little below the middle of the cliff’s height. Although each cliff in the cove stopped at different heights, all of them would be impossible to climb. I scratched the idea of flying, out, too. After last night’s experience, I didn’t even want to look at my wings anymore.

I was so done with all of this. I wanted to go home.

My heart panged in loneliness and homesickness. I wish I had never shot down that Night Fury. It would have been better for everyone.

I growled at the thought of the Night Fury, teeth unsheathing to their fullest. I hated him. The second I thought that, my eyes widened.

Shaking my head several times, I walked over to the lake to get a drink of water. Hopefully that would clear my mind. I plunged my mouth in and took a long gulp of the ice-cold water. It felt wonderful as it slid down my throat and into my belly. I brought my head out of the water and gasped.

There was a Night Fury!

I felt instincts inside of me awaken. Something in my chest constricted, and my mouth opened wide. My teeth retracted. I felt something barely tangible float around the back of my throat. I didn’t even realize what I was doing until a high-pitched scream made itself known from the back of my mouth. I reared my head back in shock, and the fireblast I had unwillingly conjured shot up and out of the gorge, exploding above the forest in a great fireball. I gaped at it.

Why did I just…no. NO! I’m not a dragon! I can’t do things like that! I bolted away from the lake, humiliated and furious at myself for getting so worked up over my own damn reflection that I’d actually lost myself. I’m not a dragon! I…I have to…

I stared at my feet. I have to act human…but how? I can’t just pretend. It’ll only make all of this hurt even more. But I’m not a dragon! I don’t and shouldn’t ever act like one!

I lowered my head in shame. I’m such a wreck. I’m even starting to act like a dragon. I need to get my bearings straight. How can I do that when I’m trapped in here, though?

I looked around helplessly for an answer. My eyes rested on the shortest overhang. It had a sort of dip in the middle of it. I narrowed my eyes, debating with myself. I had an idea…but would I really want to carry it out? I weighed the consequences of both decisions. If I decided not to, I’d still be in this cove, and I’d starve. If I did go through with it, then I risked becoming more of a dragon…but I could get out, escaping the Night Fury, if it were ever to come back and try to kill me. I was a sitting duck down here, with little to no shelter, and absolutely no fighting experience.

After thinking long and hard, I decided on the latter. I grudgingly walked over to the dip and closed my eyes, preparing myself. I needed to be as mentally stable as I could while I did this. I didn’t want to become less human at all. I opened my eyes in newfound determination.

“I can do this,” I told myself. “I know it. Or…I think I know it.”

Praying that this worked out, I retracted my teeth all the way. I felt what I know knew was gas filter into my mouth. Rearing up on my hind legs and sitting back, I opened my mouth wide and sent a large fireball at the dip in the cliff. The force of the powerful energy-blast knocked me flat on my back. I grunted and rolled over as fast as I could. At the same moment, the blue-white ball hit the general area of the dip. It had somehow expanded halfway there, and exploded with significantly less force than the Night Fury’s had.

The rock on the crag crumbled and broke off in large chunks. I yelped when they began to fall. Turning, I started running as fast as my legs would carry me. More crumbling noises sounded behind me, and with fear in my eyes, I looked over my shoulder. I had caused an avalanche of rocks! They were raining down on me! I was going to get crushed!

I faced towards what was in front of me and made a mad dash for the lake. When I got to the edge, I jumped over it, glided for a few seconds, and landed dead-center in it. Several splashes sounded when the rocks fell into the water, but none got as far out into the lake as I had. Panting, I slowly began to paddle my way out of the water, using my tail as a sort of rudder to propel me forward. When I finally reached dry land, I shook my body and finally fully looked at what I’d just done. (I had to suppress a grin; a small part of me was cheering over the fact that I, Hiccup, had just shot an explosive fireball out of my mouth, and still knew that my mind was perfectly human!)

The small dip now covered the entire cliff. Rocks of all sizes covered the entire area under it. I couldn’t help but stare at the boulders that could have easily crushed me. Suddenly, I was very thankful that I had decided to run away.

The rocks were mostly dark brown in color, but there was many tannish-yellow, gray, and even white rocks littering them, too. I think I saw a few shiny black ones, too. A giant pile of rocks lead from the top of the precipice to the ground, where it flattened out and spread out the entire length of that ‘wall’ of the gorge. It was slanted very slightly; it would still be near-impossible for a human to climb it.

But I wasn’t a human anymore. I was a dragon. I was very powerful and strong compared to my human body. I might, just might, be able to scale the massive pile of rocks and save myself.

Wings folded against my body, I carefully walked over to the rocky area. I bunched up my leg muscles and leaped onto a large rock a few feet taller than myself, sticking my tail out when it began to wobble.

I looked straight up. Several rocks were sticking out, many of them big enough for me to climb on. Each was halfway-sticking out of the pile. I could easily jump my way through the maze. I could just as easily make it all come crashing down, too.

“Be careful, Hiccup,” I told myself. I jumped at a rock resting directly to my upper left. It groaned under my weight as I scrambled onto it. Trying not to waste any time, I clawed my way up the rocky wall on several medium-sized rocks, frantically kicking them all to the bottom. When a boulder I could actually sit on came into view, I launched myself at it with lightning speed. Gradually, I managed to pull myself onto it. I looked up at the long way to go and grimaced. It was so tall!

I jumped on a rock above me. I paused mid-crouch when I felt something under it give. Before I could make a sound, it started to collapse. Gasping loudly, I sprang as high as I could and hit the rock-wall hard. My claws dug into several cracks in the stone I was clinging to and pain shot up my paws and elbows. I struggled to get onto the boulder I was hanging on, and when I finally did, took several deep breaths. While I wasn’t even close to the top, I was high enough in the air to seriously injure myself if I fell the wrong way. I peeked over the edge of the rock.

Scary!

With a sigh, I got back to work with much more caution. A majority of my wonderful climb was me nearly falling and digging my long-suffering claws into the rocks until I could sit on one big enough to hold my weight.

When I was about halfway up, I heard something that made my blood freeze.

I quickly squeezed myself into a smaller hole in the wall, camouflaging myself against the dark brown rock. The sound of footsteps continued to get closer and closer. I concentrated, pricking my ears. From the way it was walking, I could tell that it wasn’t a human, and that it was heavy.

My heart skipped a beat. And then it dropped when I saw the Night Fury from before appear on the opposite edge of the gorge.

Even from the large distance between us, I could see every detail about him, from his rippling muscles to how his evil almost-glowing green eyes widened at seeing the gorge’s new feature. I froze when he traced his eyes around the pile of rocks. He didn’t notice me. For once, I was glad that my scales were dark brown. They matched my surroundings perfectly.

The Night Fury stalked around the edge of the gorge, not missing a single detail. His eyes narrowed dangerously and he snorted. I thought I heard him say, “Impossible.”

Suddenly, he projected his voice out. “Come out, human! I know you’re there! I can smell you!”

I froze, but said nothing. How could he possibly be able to catch my scent? Could he get past the rain-smell, or was he lying?

He paused, and when I did not react, continued, “How was last night? I bet you had fun down here in the cold, cold rain and hail. Especially when that lake started to overflow!” He grinned maliciously. “I bet you spent the whole night trembling under those trees, acting like the weak human you are. Or, should I say dragon? It’s strange how you insist on being called a human. Of course, you are sort of a freak.”

My eyes flashed. I wasn’t a freak! It was him who did this to me!

“Oooh! I almost forgot to ask you! How did it go with your nest? Was it fun being banished by them? Surely you wouldn’t be this deep in this forest on a hunting trip. I bet your own father and mother hates you! How wonderful!” He laughed loudly, throwing his head into the air.

I growled. His laughing halted, and he looked in my direction with ears pricked. I squeezed my eyes shut, the only part of me that stood out, and tried to calm myself down. He’s just trying to taunt you. He wants a reaction so he can kill you. Stay put! Don’t! Move!

“Hey, human.” I opened my eyes. The Night Fury leaned over the edge of the gorge and grinned. “Guess where I slept last night?”

Judging by his tone of voice, I really didn’t want to know. That didn’t stop the dragon from carrying on in his one-sided conversation. Lucky me.

“Well, freak,” he crooned, tossing his head. “I saw the rain coming far before it came here. So, I was walking in the woods…and I found this human-made den…” He trailed off. My eyes widened. I knew exactly what he was talking about. It was abandoned, but since it was said to be haunted, people of all ages would climb up to it and look around for the ‘ghosts’.

“There were these little humans in there, unfortunately. So, I just chased them out. All but one.” He licked fully-unsheathed teeth.

I gasped in horror.

“Was the long-haired blonde girl a friend of yours? Because she certainly was a friend of mine. I’m glad we had a rematch.” He chuckled.

He—killed—ASTRID!!!!!!!

I roared loud enough to wake the dead. It took one glance at the Night Fury’s smug expression to send me completely off the edge.

My body went through the pre-fire steps faster than I could even imagine. Apparently, the Night Fury was surprised, too, because when I shot the blast, he was just starting to react to the attack.

I didn’t hit him, though!

My aim was off, and I hit the area directly below the Night Fury. He jumped and tried to fly away from the explosion, but the resulting shockwave knocked him back…and right into the gorge.

He screamed a long string of (very) colorful phrases as he fell. The Night Fury spread his wings and fins out, leaned forward, and forced himself into a painful-looking roll that sent him straight into the lake. For a few seconds, I wondered if he would actually come up from a fall that hard. My hopes fell when the evil creature burst out of the lake, gasping and sputtering. He shook his head wildly and climbed out of the body of water, shaking his scales to get the water out of them.

I couldn’t help my reaction. He looked like a drowned rat.

So I (stupidly; Gods, I’m an idiot) laughed.

Unfortunately…he wasn’t a drowned rat. The Night Fury stood up, eyes mere slits, and proclaimed, “Human! I will make this moment your last!”

Damn. That. Human.

I was a fool for underestimating him. While I had achieved my goal of getting the annoying little thing out of hiding, I’d ended up trapping myself in the process!

My muscles, mostly those in my front legs, were sore now. It hurt a little bit to stand up, but I chose to ignore it at the time. I had more important matters at hand. Two, in fact.

One: get rid of that annoying human once and for all. He was a thorn in mine and probably every dragon’s side. Sparing his life in that village had been a mistake. I needed to fix it.

Two: get out of this idiotic gorge.

I glared at the human, baring my teeth. While his aim was terrible, he’d hit me faster than I’d ever seen. I had a lurking suspicion that he’d just unknowingly used magic to force his fireblast into superspeed. I’d seen it been done before, but had never really thought of doing it myself. Shadow-Blenders have the fastest and most powerful strike; what use would I have to make mine quicker?

I couldn’t let him know this, though. I hated to admit it, but if he figured out how to use magic, then he could actually get the upper hand. My magic level was a little over ‘barely usable’, and would be for the next couple of days. Even then, I was planning on saving every last drop. I needed to fix my tailfin as soon as possible, which would take a tremendous amount of energy, concentration, and power. I couldn’t do any of that if I knew a Dragon-Viking that was out to get me was still roaming about.

So, I attacked.

It was my turn to throw a blast at the Viking. I charged one up, not even bothering to make it fast, and started to aim it at him. My eyes narrowed in confusion when the Viking, although he was shrinking in fear, started to lean forward. Was he…watching me?

My eyes widened, and I quickly let my fire loose. I wasn’t about to let him learn how to aim better.

He yelped loudly and looked around wildly. With a terrified squeal, the human jumped off of his perch before my blast hit him. I began to sprint around the lake, snorting in annoyance when I saw him try to mimic the landing I had done earlier—and fail. He hit the ground with a loud ‘thump’.

I was pouncing when he finally noticed me. The human rolled out of the way and began running as fast as he could in the direction I’d just come. I lashed my tail at his leg, tripped him, and tried to claw at him. He jumped away nimbly, eyes wide, and fled. I growled in annoyance and called him every single curse I could think of. What a coward! He wouldn’t even look me in the eye!

He’d had a headstart and was much smaller than me. I needed to speed up, and fast.

I broke out into a run, jumped into the air, and glided a long distance forward before landing and running again. The human rounded across the lake with me hot on his tail. I went to jump onto his back, but when I was halfway through the leap, he stopped, skidded, and bolted in the opposite direction that we were going. Unable to change directions, I could only watch helplessly as he escaped from my claws. I landed on one paw and spun on it. When my hind feet touched the ground, I immediately sprinted towards the brown human-dragon. He cried out in terror.

Somehow, the little thing got faster. I found (to my great annoyance) that he was keeping up the same pace as me. The problem was that he was much farther away from me. When I reached the side of the lake, he’d already crossed the halfway point. And that lake was huge. It covered half of the gorge. Panting, I forced my legs to move faster and faster.

We were on our second lap around the lake when the human began to falter. I was beyond irritated by then, grunting as I leaped over a rather large rock on the side where the cliff had seemingly exploded. The human was staying as close to the lake as he could to avoid me. He began to round around the edge of the water.

I suddenly changed directions and snapped my wings out, gliding the short distance between the areas before and after the curve. The pleasant result was me landing right into a shocked Viking. He screamed for help that would never come and wildly thrashed beneath me. His claws came dangerously close to slicing my neck open.

Woah, I thought, flinching out of the way. Time to change tactics.

I jumped off of him and shoulder-slammed him to the ground. He crawled away from me, shaking his head wildly.

“W-w-wait! No! Stop, please! Don’t hurt me!”

I chose not to respond to this, seeing as he was the one who started this, and all that would end up from that conversation was him begging for his life. I stalked towards him, head lowered, teeth bared, and wings slightly opened. He continued to back up until his wings touched the edge of one of the cliffs. I stopped moving.

“Well, this was fun,” I told him, slightly out of breath. The human, on the other hand, was gasping for air. “But the playing stops here. You’re clearly outmatched, human. Or, should I say, Shadow-Blender?” My smug expression fell at the look he gave me. It was as if I’d said something crazy…did I have a bit of meat stuck between my teeth?

“You mean Night Fury?” He piped up. His eyes darted left and right.

I snorted in amusement. “Night Fury? Why would a Shadow-Blender be called that?” I chortled. “Please don’t tell me that that’s what you humans named us.”

“You think Shadow-Blender is better?” He narrowed one eye in disgust. “It makes you sound like you literally take the shadows and blend them together.”

“We do not! It means—hey!”

I gasped in surprise when the dragon-Viking charged straight at me, crawled under my stomach (which was very awkward, since he lifted my body up in the process), and glided the entire expanse of the lake. He didn’t even bother to try to land and simply let himself collapse once he’d gotten over the lake, tumbling on the ground for a few seconds and skidding to a halt next to a tree.

He glanced over his shoulder at me, pine-green eyes turned gray from exhaustion. I was a bit surprised at this. I was tired, too…but not like that. Then again, he had been climbing that rock wall when I had come around. But I’d never seen a Shadow-Blender run out of energy so fast in my life.

So…he was quick, agile, and strong when under threat. But he had very little stamina or will to fight.

I stored that bit of information in my head for later. Standing up, I angrily stormed over to the edge of the lake and roared out to him, “Coward! You attacked me first! Why in the world would you run away from me?!” I stamped the ground several times to emphasize my point.

He struggled to sit up. His entire body was shaking in exhaustion. He turned around to face me, and I reared my head back as if I’d been slapped. He looked…devastated. Hadn’t we been joking earlier? What brought this on?

Unless he’d only started that off-track conversation to distract me.

“B-because…you…you killed…” He took in a deep breath and let out a sob. The Viking lowered his head and turned it away from me, as if embarrassed to show sadness around me. (I didn’t see the big deal; when dragons cry, their brethren usually try to help them instead of laughing at them. Were humans cruel enough to ridicule their own kind for being so badly upset?)

My eyes narrowed at that thought. So, I had succeeded to cause him the pain that I had wanted to.

…but…I didn’t like it.

I shook the feeling off violently, trying to convince myself that I had wanted this. I watched him calculatingly, sighing when the dragon-Viking finally collapse into tears, throwing himself to the ground and wailing his soul out. I couldn’t feel anger towards that.

I backed away from the lake in uncertainty. I did this.

Kill him, you idiot, I thought to myself, he’s vulnerable. He wouldn’t even see it coming.

But what if killing him in that state of mind affects his afterlife? My mind shot back. He’d be ruined forever.

That’s what you wanted, Shadow-Blender! Now kill him!

I shook my head wildly. One part of me was outraged at myself for showing pity to an evil human. Especially when their kind had shown so much cruelty towards mine. The other half, though, argued that he was in emotional pain and that I should not end his life. It whispered that he was just a hatchling, judging from his size and voice, and that he had never chosen this. It repeated, I did this.

True, I had changed him into a dragon, which I now realize was a mistake—a very stupid mistake (killing him would have been much faster and easier, and it would have left this entire drama-fest out of my life). Why was I being blamed for this? He was the one who shot me down! I was minding my own business!

I sighed, squeezing my eyes shut.

He was a human. Humans were evil. Except this strong display of emotion proved that wrong. I hadn’t realized that that human female was so important to him. I had found that shack in the woods and had stayed the night, but the bit about the girl was a complete lie. I’d only used it because it was necessary! It had gotten him out of his hiding place.

Unfortunately, it also had this side effect.

How could I kill something that was in so much trauma?

He’s a human, I thought off-handedly. We dragons kill them all the time. What makes this one different?

If the situation hadn’t been so difficult for me, I would have rolled my eyes. Well, for one thing, he is a dragon. And if he shot me down…then he must be different from his tribe. No Viking has ever seen a Shadow-Blender before. We’ve lived in hundreds of years of mystery. So, this must be some sort of child prodigy…or outcast. He was treated with doubt and repulsion when he caught me, so did that mean he caught me as a last-ditch effort to avoid getting outcasted from his nest?

For some reason, I didn’t like that. Am I really to blame? I thought hard about the recent past. If I’d just run away, I would have been a coward. Killing him would have been fine. But turning him into a dragon…?

I should not have done this.

That human had tried to look good in front of his tribe. And I’d gone and hurled their hate and disgust at him hundreds of times stronger. Which, while not a bad thing, could be seen as uncalled for.

I hated how I felt so happy and angry with myself for all of this. I couldn’t decide on what to do or feel!

I’ll just…I’ll leave him. That means that I’m no longer responsible for his death, since he’ll just die in here. His tribe will find him eventually, too. That girl got away. She knows where this place is. Staying here is suicide.

I silently turned towards the rocky cliffside that had been blown apart. Trying to be as quiet as possible, I jumped up onto the first available rock and started to climb up the giant wall.

“Wait!” The shrill, chocked call echoed throughout the entire canyon.

I turned around on my perch to stare at the Viking. He was running his way over to where I was. I sniffed at him. “What?”

He landed close to the rocks and walked a few paced forward. He stared up at me with huge, sad eyes that strongly resembled a kicked puppy. When I got a closer look, though, they held many more emotions. There was resolve, nervousness, fear, agony…too many to count.

“Don’t leave me. Just…wait.” He stared at the ground, pawing at it nervously. With a small grimace, the human looked up at me. “I know I’ve said this a thousand times by now. But…I’m serious. I need to be changed back. I don’t know if you understand how important this is for me. Please, I can’t be a dragon.” Gradually, his voice switched from timid to confident. “I was born a human. The gods made me that way. You can’t just switch up their decision out of spite. I know that you were angry, and I understand why. I really am sorry…for both of us. We both made mistakes, and we both are paying a price for it. But…I’m paying a higher price. You’ve lost a tailfin. I’ve lost my family, friends, village, and body. You took my life away from me and enjoyed—every—second. How is that remotely fair?

“I’m able to admit my mistakes, dragon, and I’m pretty sure that you can, too. I know that I’m a human. I am not a dragon, and I will never be one. You know that, too. You only call me a dragon when you are digging for a reaction. So, I ask you, Shadow-Blender,” he made direct eye contact with me. “Please change me back. I don’t want to die, or live as something that I’m not. What kind of life is that? If you change me back, it will be as if none of this ever happened. I know that if you can change me into a dragon, then you can fix your tail.

“Let’s strike a deal. You change me back into what I really am and leave here, and we can just pretend that none of this ever happened.” He suddenly dropped his head.

“I…I can’t forgive you. You killed Astrid. But I can forget about you. Just…please. Think about it, very carefully. What do you really want?”

Dead silence.

I was, to put it lightly, shocked. Apalled.

Nobody had ever spoken that seriously to me. Nobody had ever stood up to me as dignified as that, ever. Period.

I had to respect that aspect of the Viking. He, though timid and in desperate need of self-confidence, was a very strong individual. His bravery and clear-mindedness shone like a beckoning star in his speech. He also pointed out many important things…but one thing was bothering me. I had to get it out of the way.

“I didn’t kill her,” I breathed. The human’s head shot up and he gasped. “I lied to get you out of hiding. I haven’t seen her since yesterday.”

The Viking looked like he had a mixture of happiness, relief, and outrage swirling inside him. He didn’t say anything, though, and gestured for me to continue.

“Human…” I sighed. “Why do you think I turned you into a dragon?”

He frowned. “I shot you down?”

“More than that,” I corrected. “You dishonored me.”

The human tipped his head to the side. “I apologized for that.”

“No, you didn’t. You said you were sorry for both of us. And while I appreciate the long speech, which was very impressive, by the way, I still stand the same. I’m not going to sit here and let you go after only one day. What kind of punishment is that? Hardly any, I’d think. All you’ve really done that’s truly terrible for you is getting attacked by me…and probably having to sit out in the rain last night.”

“Well, I’m sorry!” He snapped. “Isn’t that good enough? Can’t we make amends?”

I silently debated with myself. On one hand, getting this annoying thing out of my scales once and for all would be wonderful. On the other…he was still a human deep down. He’d just told me. I didn’t trust him in the least bit, and there was no reason for me to after hearing him say that. Turning him back into a human, which was impossible at my current state, would only lead to disaster for my tribe. The Vikings would learn more about dragons—and Shadow-Blenders—if this human were to ever return. He couldn’t go back. Not now. I was still trapped on this gods-forsaken island.

But I couldn’t just tell him my magic was low. Knowing that, he’d try to take advantage of me. I knew that if he had the proper motivation, he could probably get out of the gorge. The thought of him running back to his village and somehow telling them that I was vulnerable made me go still with unease. It would be the end of me.

Plus, I definitely did not want to see if he had open access to his magic.

I frowned seriously. What could I say that would deter him? What would buy me more time? Something that wasn’t a complete lie, preferably (I didn’t want to have to deal with a million different alibis.)?

With a small smile, I finally responded.

“When you brought me down to the world of humans…you destroyed the life’s work of my species. We make sure we aren’t seen for a reason. Not only are we powerful, but we are also rare due to being hunted down. Centuries ago, the elder Shadow-Blenders decided to cut off all connections to any threats, including humans. We were down to our last fifty. Now, I realize that this was a long time ago…but Shadow-Blenders have not recovered that well. We are only in our hundreds. The species hasn’t advanced in numbers very much at all. We were completely dependent on the fact that nobody knew what we were. And then you shot me down.

“I was angry because you shot me down, yes. Like I said, you dishonored me. But I was also scared. Word travels quickly with humans, and now that there’s a solid description of a Shadow-Blender out there, the entire species is in danger. People will begin to think, ‘hey, I saw something like that in the mountains’, and go and look in that spot. Before you know it, Shadow-Blenders will become widely-known and hunted. It’s quite hard for a black dragon to run from anything if it isn’t in the dead of the night.

“Now it’s time for you to think hard. Is endangering an entire species of dragons punishable by becoming one of the dragons?”

Perfect. The best part about this was that it was true. While the thought had never crossed my mind (Shadow-Blenders generally like warmer climates over the arctic oceans and their islands, so I was the only Shadow-Blender around for quite a distance), it was a good cover-up. It made me look like I was incredibly loyal to my species (which I was) and that I was placing their importance over the humans’ (not so much).

He gaped at me. “You’re seriously telling me you’re doing this because of a number you can’t be sure about?”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure. I doubt that you’d understand how, but we Shadow-Blenders always try to keep in touch.”

“So,” the Viking growled, “you won’t admit your mistake? You’re blaming it on a number. A tiny, insignificant thing that in no way affects what goes on in Berk. You can’t possibly be serious!”

“Why can’t I?” I asked, raising a brow.

The human exploded. “Just because your species is low, doesn’t mean that you’ll all die! We’ve known what the other dragons have looked like for even longer, and we haven’t even killed half of them! Unlike your beliefs, I doubt that anyone will remember exactly what a Night Fury looks like. It was dark, and they were kind-of shocked because you turned me into a dragon! The only other person who’s seen you is Astrid, and she was fighting you! I doubt she was busy cataloging your appearance! So, no! Your species is in no danger! That’s just an excuse to not turn me back!”

“Such arrogance!” I snarled. “How would you know such things?! That group of humans was staring at me for quite some time. Not to mention, several of them were more focused on keeping me off of any other Viking when I had pinned you to the ground. Many of them did get a look at me! Shadow-Blenders aren’t very complicated-looking dragons, so I doubt they won’t miss any details!” I lashed my tail angrily. I wasn’t lying! This was an actual problem! Just because it ranked low on my to-do list didn’t mean that I should completely ignore it!

“That’s not fair! You can’t base your decision off of that!” The human slammed one foot down on the ground. Hard. Several rocks beneath it cracked. “We are here! This is about us! Not these other Night Furies that apparently live far away! It’s just---I can’t believe--!” He trailed off, at a loss for words. The human glared at me with the strength of an army of dragons.

“It is fair. You’re asking me to take everything I did back, just like that.” I calmly sat down and curled my tail around my feet. “Plus, I still can’t fly. If I were to change you back, you’d run home to your home, yes?”

He paused in his glaring, confused, and nodded.

“How do you think your tribe will react to you suddenly appearing as a human?” I asked seriously.

“Well, that’s easy. They’ll…” He stopped in his explanation abruptly.

“They’ll outcast you again?” I supplied. “But that time, you’d be a human. Something weak and vulnerable in the wild that doesn’t have a chance of survival. Dragons, on the other hand, can go days without food or water, and are generally resistant to the weather.” He snorted sarcastically. I chose to ignore it. “Dragons are so much more capable of living in this world than humans, so why bother? You know that that’s going to happen if you do go back as a human.”

“That’s not true!” The Viking cried out defiantly. “They’d accept me!”

I rolled my eyes. “As what? The freak who turned into a dragon for a day, ran off, and then came back? Nobody would treat you the same ever again. You’d be ridiculed, harassed, and, most importantly, watched. Nobody would ever let you out of their sights again. Say ‘bye-bye’ to privacy, and wave at it as it leaves!”

I stopped short for emphasis, then started up again. “Also. What can you possibly say to make me believe that you won’t try to shoot down another dragon in the next raid? Namely, me.”

He glared, bared half-unsheathed teeth…and stopped. He looked deep in thought for several moments before saying, “I can swear an oath to the gods. I’ll promise that I’ll never try to shoot you or your dragon friends down again. If I do…well, then I’ll be damned for eternity for going back on an oath and a sworn promise.”

He stared at me hopefully. Gods, could those eyes get any bigger? I resisted the urge to baby him, reminding myself that, even if I wanted to, I could not change him back into a human for a very long time.

“Tempting, but no,” I shot him down. “You said you won’t shoot any dragon down. You never said anything about fighting. And!” I interrupted him when he opened his mouth to fight back. “I wouldn’t believe you if you did. Put yourself in my place. Would you trust me?”

“Put me in your place?!” The dragon-Viking all but shrieked. “Why don’t you take your own advice! If I turned you into a human and dropped you off inside a nest of human-eating dragons, wouldn’t you be desperate to fix things? Wouldn’t you try everything in your power to get back to normal? There are so many things wrong with your argument! Just listen to me!”

I stared at him, twitching my tail. This Viking was very good at persuasive talking. It wasn’t enough, though.

“I’d do things in my own way. My answer is no, and it won’t be changing anytime soon.”

He dropped his head and wings in defeat.

Without a word, I turned to leave. I flapped my wings expertly to give me lifts to the higher and more stable boulders above. I was halfway up the steep slope in no time. It was about then that I started to hear something that sounded very similar to…growling? I stopped, pricking my ears. Yes that was definitely growling. Very close growling.

Alarmed, I spun around. The human was far below me, but I could clearly see the anger and hurt shining in his eyes. I could also clearly see the fireball that he had built up. With a gasp, I turned and jumped to the nearest boulder…just as the fireblast crashed into the stone, sending a shockwave that knocked me over the rock’s side. I scrabbled helplessly, gasping in shock when I saw a large area of the wall begin to give way. I needed to get up now!

I leaped onto a large rock. It crumbled under my weight, causing me to fall on another. I jumped away when several stones fell from above. I landed on one of the few stable areas of the cliff, several meters away from the rockalanche. I stared at my crumbling escape route as it collapsed in on itself and made it nearly impossible to climb. While it was less steep, it was far more rocky, and I doubted I would be able to climb it without severely injuring my paws.

I bared my teeth. I was trapped!

I turned to yell at the human.

What I didn’t expect to see was a fireball hurtling towards me.

I only managed to let out a gasp-turned-scream before it hit me dead-on. I remember feeling a tremendous burst of pain…and then the beauty of unconsciousness took over my form. I welcomed the darkness as it took over me, slowly letting go of my problems.

The only word to describe what I was feeling right now would be ‘horrified’.

I had not meant to actually shoot the Night Fury down. I’d only wanted to hurt him a little bit, not send him flying off the cliffside!

I felt my cheeks burn in shame. I’d let my emotions get control of me…again. I had been so upset and so mad at the Night Fury for his irrationality, that I’d lost control of myself. I’d done something that I normally wouldn’t have, and that made me outraged at myself. I shouldn’t have reacted like that!

Above all, though, I was scared. I had reacted just like a dragon would.

I hunched over and squeezed my eyes shut, trying to fight off the emotions threatening to take over. I was so upset and angry and confused and sad and ashamed and—!

I took in a deep breath and emptied my mind—not an easy task. I needed to calm down and asses the situation. Maybe if I hadn’t acted like a two-year-old, I would have been out of the gorge a long time ago.

I raised my head and looked over at the still form of the Night Fury. I sniffed in his direction cautiously as fear clenched my heart. Was he…dead? The thought made me shudder.

I stood up abruptly and carefully made my way over him. (I failed to notice how I arched my back completely and sidestepped the entire time, letting out a low moan.)

The Night Fury’s eyes were closed, but they weren’t being squeezed shut. Looking at his chest move up and down very evenly, I realized that he was alive. I sighed in relief and dropped down from my toes and onto the palms of my paws (when did I get into that position?). I didn’t want to deal with a dead dragon in my temporary home, nor did I want my only chance at becoming normal again to be ruined because of my stupidity.

I stared at the Night Fury’s form for the longest time. What should I do? Leave him there and hide?

Or…

An idea presented itself into my head.

The Night Fury had said that he didn’t trust me. But what if I gained his trust? We could form an alliance of sorts, and then he’d change me back. I’d keep the agreement between us and fix everything back to normal in the village, and, soon, we’d both just forget about each other and move on with our lives.

I thought about this for a moment.

That sounds…cruel…

I let out another sigh. I didn’t want to turn back into a human through trickery, especially if it involved earning the dragon’s trust. Although he was a monster, I didn’t want his heart to break as much as mine had. Nobody deserved that under any circumstances. This dragon was no different. I couldn’t just become a fake-friend and then turn on him once I had got what I wanted.

I stared at his sleeping form in deep thought.

“I don’t want to fight anymore,” I whispered. “I just want to go home.”

I turned my green eyes on the rockalanche (great name, right?). It looked downright painful to climb. So many rock shards were sticking out, sharp as swords, that it would be impossible to get over the steep hill without hurting myself. So I was stuck in here with a grounded dragon that probably hated me after knocking him out.

I vaguely remembered someone telling me, “A downed dragon is a dead dragon”. Or, someone else. I’m not sure if I was eavesdropping or if I was just overhearing something. Either way, it made me feel a twinge of guilt. It was my fault that all of this had happened; I’d shot down the dragon, which had caused him to freak out and do all of this. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t at fault. This mess was as much his burden as it was mine. I shouldn’t be the only one who has to solve it.

But you can’t force the pieces of a puzzle together. If you do, they bend out of shape, and eventually break. Then you have a broken, uneven, and uncompleted puzzle that you can never use again.

Maybe…if I showed him kindness…

I replayed the Night Fury’s words in my head. Most of the time, he’d sounded spiteful, arrogant, or holier-than-thou around me. Even during his talk with me about what I’d do if I were a human, he’d been speaking to me with a skeptical tone of voice that had an underlying message of ‘you’re an idiot’. Not once had he shown a positive emotion towards me. And not once had I shown a positive emotion towards him.

What if all we needed…was a push?

What if we fixed the puzzle?

The thought was ridiculous, but I certainly liked it a lot more than my trickster plan. It was the only other thing I could think of, too. Even so, the ‘act kind and receive kindness’ idea was much better than ‘gain his trust and use it to your advantage’.

His single-finned tail flicked in his sleep and pulled me out of my thoughts. I jumped, slipped on a rock, and threw out both paws to catch myself. The landed square on the edge of a rather sharp boulder. Yelping in pain and surprise, I pulled them back and hissed. Augh, pain. Love it.

“We can’t stay here,” I groaned. “It’s too…rocky.”

I carefully made my way over to the Night Fury’s neck and grabbed the area that was his scruff with half-unsheathed teeth. With great effort, I began to drag him over to the more grassy area of this side of the gorge. It hurt like hell, walking blindly among sharp stones. It also took a very long time, since I’d only really rested during our argument.

Eventually, I made it over to the soft-grass section of the gorge.

I dropped the heavy Night Fury and fell to the ground. My eyelids grew heavy in exhaustion and started to flutter.

No, I can’t…I can’t…

I closed my eyes.

Sleep…

%MCEPASTEBIN%

Chapter Text

“So…you’re saying you found Hiccup with the Night Fury? And you managed to get away from it?” Ruffnut raised one of her long, blonde eyebrows at me. She turned to stare fully at me, not even caring in the least bit that her feet were hanging off of a drop-dead cliff and that she’d just scooted towards the already-precarious edge.

I nodded, kicking my feet in midair slightly. “It looked like they were fighting.”

Snotlout whooped from his cross-legged position behind me. “Hah! You beat a Night Fury?! That’s amazing!” He gave me a toothy grin and leaned in towards me. “You’re amazing. Is there nothing you can’t do?”

I was saved from more horrendous flirting by Ruffnut’s brother, Tuffnut, smacking Snotlout upside the head. “Smooth,” he commented with a roll of his eyes, “but I think we were here for a reason?” He looked over at me. I nodded, and he sent the scowling Snotlout a sarcastic smile. “Hah, told ya’.” (I rolled my eyes; for a minute, I thought he was actually paying attention instead of being competitive.)

“Oh, shut up!” Snotlout cried. He tackled Tuffnut in the side, forcing the two into a roll downhill. Ruffnut, Fishlegs, and I all stared with raised eyebrows as the two tumbled over a small cliff and out of sight, most likely rolling down towards the village. Faintly, I heard the bigger of the two Viking boys give a victory cry that was suddenly cut off with a shout of pain.

“Looks like Tuffnut kicked him,” Ruffnut announced, sounding as if the entire thing was boring her. To be honest, I was a bit unamused myself. I’d called this meeting here to stay away from anyone from the village. The cliff we were on was perfect--you had to climb up an incredibly steep hill and take a short hike through the forest to get to it. The precipice dropped right into the icy ocean, guaranteeing that nobody would be able to sneak up from behind. But what was the point of bringing us here if those two Neanderthal boys fought their way down to the village?

“Um,” Fishlegs spoke up for the first time since we arrived. “Maybe we should follow them.”

“No!” I scooted away from the edge and stood up, wiping my spiked skirt carefully to get the dirt off of it. “We’ll just wait for them to come back.” I glared at him when he started to protest. The overweight Viking stopped and crossed his arms, glaring at his feet. As he was doing this, two familiar voices began to weave their way from below. I looked over my shoulder at Snotlout and Tuffnut, who were joking around and acting as if nothing had happened.

Tuffnut pushed his friend in the side. “You should’a seen it! It was amazing!”

“I’ll bet!” Snotlout laughed. “But—“

I looked over at Ruffnut for help. In response to this, she smirked, picked up a rock, and hurled it at her brother’s face, hitting him right in the cheek and cutting off the conversation he and Snotlout were having. The male twin yelped in shock and pain.

“If you don’t mind, we’d like to get this show on the road.” Ruffnut absentmindedly studied her nails. “Astrid, you were saying?”

“Thank you, Ruffnut,” I pointedly glared at the two men, who flinched and glanced at each other.

I began to pace, frowning slightly. “So, as I was saying, I found Hiccup—“

“How did he look like, by chance?” Fishlegs suddenly interrupted me. “W-w-well, I-I mean,” he stuttered at everyone’s dirty looks, “I just had an idea. Did he look like the other Night Fury, or was he different?” He tapped his fingers together, something I had quickly learned was a nervous habit of his. The other three turned to look at me while I scanned over the memory in my head.

I blinked. “Actually…he was different. He had brown…scales, I guess, and he still had his freckles.”

Snotlout rolled his eyes. “Leave it to Hiccup to still be a screw-up. He can’t even blend into the sky with scales like that!”

“Weird…would that mean that the magic didn’t work all the way?” Fishlegs mused, staring off into the distances with glazed-over eyes. He lowered his voice and seemed to talk to himself. “I wonder what it’s like, though,” He murmured, kicking at a stone in the ground. “He must be miserable. I can’t even begin to imagine…”

I frowned. I remembered that when we were all little, Hiccup and Fishlegs would do everything together. But once Hiccup became more of a screw-up and the tribe began to treat him harsher, the bookworm gradually switched ‘sides’. Sometimes I’d see him having short conversations with Hiccup, but Fishlegs would quickly end it and get away from Hiccup once he realized that someone was watching. Thinking back on it, I realized that every time that happened, Hiccup had looked so hurt…

It bothered me.

I noticed that Ruffnut looked troubled, too. Her twin, on the other hand, snorted.

“If he isn’t dead. I doubt he survived that thunderstorm we had last night. I mean, we barely got through it all in one piece!” He waved his arms about. “I think that looking for him is pointless. All we’re going to do is find a cold, dead, rotting body that used to belong to the town screwup. Not much of a loss to me.” He crossed his arms and leaned back on his heels, giving Fishlegs an arrogant grin.

“Hey!” Fishlegs snapped in an uncharacteristic bout of anger. “Don’t say that!”

“Lighten up, fatty,” Snotlout waved his hand dismissively at the steaming Fishlegs. “He’s only telling the truth.” He slouched slightly, adding more flair to his ‘I don’t care’ attitude. Fishlegs gritted his teeth and clenched his fists.

“Maybe he’s not, idiot,” Ruffnut pushed Tuffnut to the side and directed her attention towards her twin. “Quit acting like you know everything!”

Tuffnut pushed her back with equal force and pressed his forehead against hers, locking the horns on each of their helmets together in a vice. “Maybe I do! How would you know?!”

Ruffnut leaned towards him. “How would you?!”

I rested my forehead in my hand when the two began to squabble. It was downright impossible to have a normal conversation with these people.

Why am I friends with them again…?

Fishlegs seemed to have the same thought patterns. He heaved a long-suffering sigh and walked over to me. “I really don’t think we should be doing this,” he looked me right in the eye. “And I don’t appreciate you using me in the least bit.”

“You chose to come here yourself,” I pointed out, “and you care about Hiccup. I called this meeting to help him.”

“No,” Fishlegs hissed, lowering his voice and leaning towards me, “you came here to help the village.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but Snotlout (who had been standing aside and eavesdropping) beat me to it.

“Hey!” He spoke as if he were scolding Fishlegs. The muscled teenager pushed his way between us and glared at the smaller boy, but made sure to look over his shoulder, grin, and say, “Don’t worry, babe, I’ve got this covered.” Swiftly turning towards the cowering Fishlegs, he went right up to his face and shouted, “Who are you to command Astrid around?! She’s the one who called this meeting, and she’s certainly higher-ranking than you in skills! That means that she tells you what to do, not the opposite!” He raised a fist, face scrunched up in sudden anger.

“Enough!” I pushed between them, shoving both of them to the side. Fishlegs squealed when he came close to toppling over the cliff, bunny-hopped to the side, and jogged over to a safe distance. Snotlout crossed his arms and raised his chin proudly, nodding in agreement as if he’d let me say all that.

Choosing to ignore it, I continued to rant, “HEY! Stop it! If I wanted to listen to you all fight with each other, then I’d have just stayed at home! We’re here for a reason!” I held my arms out, palms facing up, and I raised my eyebrows at them. “Don’t you all even care? One of our own got turned into a dragon, and you’re busy having little catfights?! The entire village is a mess! We should be trying to fix it instead of fighting! Plus,” I added at Fishleg’s pointed look, “we seem to be the only ones even trying to help Hiccup.”

( I still don’t understand why Fishlegs keeps pestering me about Hiccup. I do care for his well-being, and I do want him to be normal again. But if the entire tribe is wrecked, under no circumstances should one person be put in front of everyone else.)

The all looked at each other guiltily. I heaved a deep breath and massaged the corners of my eyes for a few seconds to calm down.

“Look, with Chief Stoick out of the picture, we need to act fast. What if a trading-ship comes by and sees us?” I motioned towards the vast ocean as if there were boats on the horizon.

“Well, Astrid,” Ruffnut reasoned after a few silent moments, “we have to give him time. It’s only been two days, right? We should just wait. Chief’ll get better.” She leaned back and crossed her arms behind her neck, sticking her elbows up into the air. “We just need to wait!”

I shook my head defiantly. While Ruffnut was a good friend, I couldn’t help but be mad at her. Of all times, she chose to be lazy now? “And while we do, the Night Fury runs loose!” I pointed at the forest. “What if it attacks a little kid, or a fishing ship? What if it decides to lay waste to the village? What if,” I paused for a split second before continuing, “what if it turns Hiccup against us?”

“…I don’t think Hiccup would do that,” Fishlegs stated after a long silence.

“Yeah,” Snotlout agreed. “I mean, you’re making perfect sense, Astrid! But…I can’t imagine my cousin turning into a traitor. But if he does…” He held up a fist and growled, “I’ll make sure he wishes the Night Fury killed him instead!” Tuffnut loudly voiced his agreement and high-fived his friend, grinning widely.

“Heh, he wouldn’t know what hit ‘em!”

“Anyways,” I regained their attention. “Since nobody is doing anything, and I know where Hiccup stayed the night, I think we should go find him and try to get him to come back. If he came back with us, then we’d show the village that they can trust him, and Chief Stoick would finally be able to step up and lead us again. Then, everything would get back to normal…sort of.”

“Astrid!” Fishlegs reprimanded. He shook his head wildly. “It’s impossible for that to happen.” He slouched, eyebrows pulling down. “Nothing’s ever going to be the same again.”

“Yeah, so why bother?” Tuffnut chimed in.

“I think she’s right,” Snotlout declared. “Besides, it’s not like we’re going on without a leader. My dad’s doing just fine for now.”

I frowned. Spitelout, Snotlout’s father, was Chief Stoick’s brother. While Spitelout was doing alright for now, his decisions were rash and usually never thought-out. I was more worried about this than anything; a weak leader makes a weak tribe. And a weak tribe gets wiped out by the stronger ones. We’d be vulnerable to both the dragons and the other Vikings!

“Yeah, for now,” Fishlegs glowered at Snotlout. “Do you really think he could handle a dragon raid right now? I mean, Astrid does make a few points. The village is still trying to recover from…you know…and it’s the perfect chance to attack us. Spitelout wouldn’t be able to get his bearings straight if the dragons suddenly decided to strike. Besides, I’m really starting to doubt his leading skills after this morning.”

Ruffnut, Tuffnut, and I voiced our agreement. Earlier today, Spitelout had tried to send out a hunting part towards the forest for the Night Fury. He’d rallied a huge mob together and charged into the forest…completely forgetting to wait for his group. About an hour later, members of the mob had started to return to the village in confusion; apparently, nobody could find Spitelout. He’d appeared later, very frustrated and embarrassed, and went to Chief Stoick’s house for the gods-know-what.

Snotlout grudgingly crossed his arms and looked away. “I see what you’re getting at,” he muttered darkly.

“Don’t you guys see now? This tribe needs Chief Stoick, and he’s not doing anything because Hiccup is gone. Plus, as I’ve already told you, I have a plan.” I smiled determinedly and push a fisted hand into an open palm.

Ruffnut turned to me. “I know that look. Are you coming up with some more crazy ideas, or is the plan the same?” She grinned widely. I smiled back. Well, it looks like someone suddenly found their courage. At least she was actually agreeing with me.

“Just as I said before. Find Hiccup and take him back to the village.”

“And after that?” Fishlegs pressed worriedly.

I shrugged. “We’ll play it by ear. But I’m sure if Hiccup comes with us, then he won’t get attacked. Especially if we surround him without any weapons when we bring him into the village.”

“I’m in,” Snotlout declared. “You’re right. If nobody is doing anything, then we should!”

Just as I had hoped, Tuffnut caved at seeing his best friend side with me. “I’m going, too!” He grinned maliciously and pounded his fist into the air. His blue eyes shone with a dangerous glint from behind his long locks of golden-blond hair. “We’ve got all we need, now. I can totally handle this!”

We all looked at Fishlegs. He flinched under our gazes and seemed to try to shrink into himself like a turtle would. “U-uh, I think I should go home, my mom needs—“

“You’re coming.” I stated flatly.

The overweight teenager’s eyebrows pulled down and he opened his mouth to speak. We all cut him off with equally harsh looks, stopping him in his tracks.

“…Fine.”

Don’t you love it when a cold blast of wind wakes you up?

I jumped to my feet with a start, misinterpreting it as an attack. It took me a few seconds, but I finally got my sleep-fogged brain to jump into reality. Remembering that I was in the gods-forsaken gorge, I calmed down. Once I had, I noticed right away how the clouds above covered the entire sky.

When I started to look around, a sharp pain in my head made me gasp and stop. I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head, trying to get rid of the throbbing in it.

Ugh…what hit me?

In a flash, my memories leaped out at me.

Finding the human. Taunting him and getting him out of hiding. Him attacking me. Our long conversation. Being knocked out by a too-powerful fireblast.

I spun around wildly, snarling. Where was he?! If he ran away, I’d--!

My tail lashed and thumped on something behind me. Something hard and warm. Startled, I looked over my shoulder at the mysterious object and nearly jumped out of my scales in shock. The human was right there! Was he mad? Why had he decided to just sleep next to me?! (Unless, of course, he passed out from using too much energy for that blast of fire.)

I glared at his sleeping form. His wings were folded against his body and his long tail was wrapped around his side. He was resting his head soundly on his two front paws and was curved slightly inward, making him look much smaller than he usually was. I could tell from his breathing that he wasn’t faking.

This is the perfect opportunity! I thought. He wouldn’t even realize I was killing him until it was too late.

I lowered myself into a crouch, eyes narrowed.

Come on! Do it! You want this!

Yet I still didn’t move. It was like I was faking out, like I did when I needed to jump into the ocean but didn’t want to. Something in the corner of my mind was telling me that something was very, very wrong. After depending on my gut instinct for so many years, I was a little reluctant to go against it.

KILL HIM!

I squeezed my eyes shut. What’s wrong with me? I thought in desperation. Yesterday, I would’ve done this without hesitation…why can’t I do it now?! Come on, Shadow-Blender! It’s not that hard! I opened them and glared at the sleeping Viking. Do it NOW! He shot you down twice! He made it impossible for you to fly! You’re not going to get into the sky again – Ever! Your magic alone cannot fix your tailfin! He deserves it! He is a vile, horrible creature that the world could do well without!

I decided to go with that train of thought. I opened my mouth and retracted my teeth, trying to conjure the fireblast up as silently as possible. Gas flew out of my throat and into my mouth, my chest tightened, and I started to lean harder into the ground so I wouldn’t get knocked back. The tiny, high-pitched sound of the fire being built up and heated started to emerge from the back of my throat. The human’s ears twitched a few times, but he didn’t wake up.

Killing something while it’s defenseless is dishonorable, a part of me brought to my attention, and something still isn’t right. I immediately hated myself for thinking that—since when was killing a human dishonorable?! But it made me falter, which my mind took as an opportunity to start flooding my head with memories of the previous day, as if it were controlled by something else.

“I’m paying a higher price. You’ve lost a tailfin. I’ve lost my family, friends, village, and body. You took my life away from me and enjoyed—every—second. How is that remotely fair?” The human’s voice echoed in my head. My fireblast abruptly died in my distraction.Losing a tailfin is a death sentence for a dragon of my kind. It was devastating when I found out that I wouldn’t be able to fly; the thing I loved more than anything in the world.

“So, you won’t admit your mistake?”

Suddenly he was screaming. “We are here! This is about us!”

And then he was wailing. “Put me in your place?! Why don’t you take your own advice! If I turned you into a human and dropped you off inside a nest of human-eating dragons, wouldn’t you be desperate to fix things? Wouldn’t you try everything in your power to get back to normal? There are so many things wrong with your argument! Just listen to me!”

I groaned and lowered my head, rubbing it with my left forepaw. I wanted the voice to stop! I should not be feeling this way! He deserved it! He was sentenced to death the second he shot me down and revealed me to the entire human tribe—and broke my tailfin.

Out of nowhere, I heard his voice whisper sadly, “I don’t want to fight anymore.”

Startled, I shot my head up and stared at him. He hadn’t moved an inch. In fact, the only thing around him that seemed to be in motion was the tall grass lightly swaying in its own random beat, giving out a pleasant ‘swishing’ sound that I usually loved to listen to.

Woah, woah, woah. Hold up. Grass? Didn’t I pass out over…there? I turned around as I thought this, slowly feeling pieces of this strange puzzle coming together. I could clearly find the spot where I’d been hit; there were scorch marks on the cliffside that surrounded a dragonlike shape that had been protected by my body. It almost looked as if someone had painted the wall black and then erased parts of it to look like a Shadow-Blender’s silhouette. How did I…?

I gasped softly. On the ground, there was a deep trail that cut into the earth and ran from the cliff to the grassy area I was standing in now. Next to the deep, wide scar in the ground was equally deep footprints that looked similar to my own. Judging by how far into the soil the footprints were, and how their sides had slight scratch-marks, I could tell that whatever had been moving was putting all of it’s weight—and more—onto its feet.

Like it was…dragging something…heavy…

I padded to a footprint and sniffed at it warily. The human’s scent leaped into my nose, along with a very faint fear-scent (he’d been scared? I thought he’d done that on purpose.), and blood. I could see little red dots littering the ground and stones. I quickly glanced over my shoulder and behind my left wing to look at the human. His feet were dirty, and I could see dried blood on his claws and the undersides of his paws. The scales on his feet were covered in a fine layer of dirt, making him look as if he’d stepped in mud and not even bothered to clean it off.

The realization hit me as hard as the weapon that had brought me down.

The Viking had dragged me here. On purpose. He’d managed to get the two of us to the more comfortable grass-filled area before passing out from exhaustion, and has not awakened yet. And when I woke up, I immediately tried to kill him…

I shook my head at the guilt. Guilt! I was so angry and ashamed at myself. What, so one kind action and my heart just melts?!

I’m such a disgrace, I snarled to myself. Feeling guilty for a human. Damn.

I was so confused. Why would he do that? Why would he even care? It’s not like I had been kind to him. In fact, I’d done the opposite in hopes that he would start a fight and wear himself out, so I could kill him easier. But that conversation…it had…it had done something, for sure. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to accept it. I was in the right! He’d done this to himself!

That didn’t stop me from wondering why the hell he’d helped me. I wanted to know! It was eating away at me!

Well…the only way to know is to wait, I reasoned with myself bitterly.

I grumbled several curses and sat down, glaring at the human in irritation. He was definitely going to pay for this. (He really needed to make up his mind on how to treat me; one minute, he’s attacking me, the next, he’s begging, and then he’s attacking me again, and finally, he’s being nice! What the hell?)

Stupid human, I thought darkly, tail twitching wildly. I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’m so weak. He twitched in his sleep, making me halt and prick my ears up. The human-dragon went back into his peaceful slumber. I rolled my eyes in exasperation. I wonder why he did that? He certainly didn’t have to. Most humans wouldn’t even care about a dragon’s comfort when it woke up. But he did--wait a minute.

For the second time in a short time, realization hit me like a cold, hard blast of icy water that made my entire body freeze and tense up.

The human had had time to drag us all the way over here—a good few hundred meters.

He’d had time.

He could have killed me…and he didn’t.

I blinked several times as sudden confusion came over me for the second time. We obviously hated each other. It couldn’t be any clearer. And yet, he’d decided not to kill me. I doubt the idea never crossed his mind; he’d shot me down, for the gods’ sake! So…this human was up to something. He’d chosen to bring me to a more comfortable area and spared (ugh, I hate to say it, but it’s true.) my life when I was weak and defenseless.

Was he trying to trick me?

I narrowed my eyes at the thought. It was the only reasonable answer.

Well, two can play at that game. I’ll return his little game twice as hard. Even if it does mean being nice to him.

We’ll see. But for now, I guess I can repay my debt (we Shadow-Blenders are very honorable dragons.) by not killing him until he wakes up.

I allowed myself to lie down, folding my wings up and swishing my tail slightly. I never took my eyes off of the Viking. The clouds above us crawled at a slow pace, the wind blew slightly, and the few birds that hadn’t migrated south chirped loudly to each other. It was a peaceful scene, and I was thankful for the momentary quiet.

Little did I know that it wouldn’t be so silent for very long.

Several hours later, as my patience was wearing thin, the human finally started to pull himself out of dreamland. I never moved an inch, simply watching him as he slowly uncurled himself, opened his eyes, yawned, and began to stretch. I raised an eyebrow when he looked right past me with a dull, sleepy expression. It took a few seconds for his deep-green eyes to finally rest on me.

“AAAAH!”

I flinched at the loud noise. The human scrambled to his feet and backpedaled away, tripping over his tail and falling onto his back, leaving his wings in a very uncomfortable position.

“…oooow.”

I burst out into laughter. Oh, gods, that was good! I’d never seen anything like that before! It was priceless!

I continued to snicker when he slowly rolled over, shook his body, and looked at me in embarrassment. He sheepishly turned his body towards me and tipped his head to the side, probably wondering why I was lying on the ground instead of attacking him (to be honest, I still wasn’t so sure myself).

“Well done, human,” I said after I’d stopped laughing. I rolled my eyes and let a goofy, lopsided grin cross my face. Sometimes, humans could be so stupid. But hey, if they give us dragons free entertainment, then I’ll take it.

“Not my fault,” he muttered in an irritated tone. He walked back to his previous resting spot (tumbling slightly) and sat down, eyeing me suspiciously. He looked like he wanted to say something, but was holding himself back because he was too afraid to say it. I felt a familiar spark of giddiness light up inside me a t scaring him. I’m still a true Shadow-Blender, I still scare him! The only problem was that it suddenly died away and left an empty, blank feeling. I frowned.

Pushing it away, I stared into his eyes. After a long silence that he obviously wasn’t going to break, I spoke up.

“Why did you do it?”

He blinked. “Do what? What are you—oh. Heh.” He smiled sheepishly. I gave him an annoyed glare and motioned with my head for him to continue. His grin disappeared and he looked down at his feet.

“Well…I don’t really know how to explain this…”

I won’t even bother trying to translate the stuttering he said for you, dear reader. All you need to know is that the little human-dragon let loose a bunch of sounds that didn’t sound in the least bit like rational speech. I watched silently as he vocally tripped over himself--just as badly as before--again and again, took a deep breath, and calmed himself down. I wasn’t sure whether to be amused or annoyed.

He finally spoke up, his voice confident but shaky. “I don’t want to fight anymore.”

I froze. Hadn’t I heard him say that earlier?

I looked deep into his eyes, the window of every creature’s soul. They held honesty in them. But…

“How do I know you won’t trick me?” I turned my head to the side slightly and narrowed one eye at him. “What can make me think you aren’t trying to earn my trust and then use it for your own good? Because this is certainly what this all looks like.”

His eyes widened. “I did this,” he stated in a highly annoyed and slightly angry pitch, “because I didn’t want you to sleep on all of those rocks. And because I actually don’t want to fight. There is no other motive behind this!” He snapped the last part out at me. I narrowed my eyes in anger and opened my mouth.

“Wait!” He cut me off. “Just…stop. Please.”

I abruptly stood up. He tensed, but didn’t move otherwise. I began to circle around him, and while I did, I growled, “That wasn’t very convincing. Do you take me for a fool? I know that you just want to earn my trust so I can change you back. Then you’d run off to your village, which I still doubt will even accept you. You’re pathetic.” I stopped in front of him. “And if you are telling the truth, then tell me the actual reason.”

I saw his tail flick, and his ears and side-frills pressed back slightly. “I-I-I am telling the truth. It’s just…it’s really hard to explain.” He tipped his head to the side and his eyes glazed over slightly as he went into deep thought. “I don’t want to fight…I’d give anything in the world for everything to get back to normal. But who am I kidding?” He mumbled the last part. I pricked my ears.

“What was that?” I asked innocently. Did he just admit that he’d accepted his dragon body? Disbelief washed over me.

“Nothing!” He looked away from me.

“Tell me,” I pressed. “I heard you say something.”

“I said that nothing would be the same!” The Viking suddenly snapped. He spun his head towards me. “I don’t know anything anymore!” He got up and started pacing a distance away from me, ignoring my bewildered stare. “For the love of Thor, I’m a dragon! How could I ever expect my village to take me back?! They’ll…they’ll outcast me…I’ll never get to see any of them again…I’ll never feel loved again…not like I did before—well, sort of, but…” He abruptly stopped and dropped his head low to the ground. “Why didn’t you just kill me? It would have been easier for everyone!”

Well, didn’t see that coming. Thought he was going to yell at me to change him back. Damn. I mused. What did he mean by ‘not like he did before’? Does that mean I was right about him being an outcast? It explains why he’d been able to shoot me down in the first place—he was acting out in a last-ditch effort to avoid being exiled!

A part of me was shocked that he’d just voiced what I’d been thinking yesterday. I brushed it off, though, and replied as emotionlessly as I could, “I have my reasons.”

“Well, tell me!” He turned around towards me and snarled, baring half-sheathed teeth. I jumped to my feet on impulse and arched my back, sheathing my own teeth to their full extent. “Why are you keeping secrets?! What do you have to lose?! Just tell me why you did this!” He screamed—no, roared. I heard the entire forest around us go silent at the terrifying noise he’d just made (terrifying for them, not me, of course.).

I instantly was on the defensive. “I already told you! You shot me down! You dishonored me and endangered my species! I can’t fly anymore! Isn’t that enough reason?!” I crouched low and hissed at him, lashing my tail wildly behind me.

“No!” He yelled back just as angrily. “That’s your reason for turning me into a dragon! I want to know why you chose to do that instead of killing me!” He briskly walked over to me. I let out a warning growl that he ignored. Stopping just out of striking distance, he spat out, “Tell me! What’s holding you back?!”

I weighed the pros and the cons of telling him the truth. If I told him, he’d be pissed. If I simply refused…he’d be more pissed. And much more whiney. But more importantly, I didn’t want him to activate his magical abilities again. By now, I’d already figured out that they were linked to his emotions. Making him angry would only end up with me being hit with another supercharged fire blast, which I could hardly get away from without my beloved flight--not exactly on my ‘to-do’ list.

I decided on the truth. He was starting to get on my nerves, and I wanted to silence him for a bit. He needed to learn his place.

“I wanted you to suffer.” I spoke slowly and calmly. He recoiled as if I’d slapped him. Backing up, he regarded me with the coldest look I’ve ever seen.

“Well, congratulations. I’d clap, but I’m no longer in my correct body.” The sarcasm and accusation dripped off of his voice like rain in a fierce storm. “You’ve doomed me! I can no longer go to my family and friends and home. I doubt I’ll ever get a good spot in the afterlife now, either. Good job, Night Fury!” He gave me an evil look. “I really, truly hope that this is what you wanted. Are you happy now?”

‘No’ was the immediate answer that came to mind. And I hated it. This is what I wanted. He was suffering! He was in pain! Things had gone exactly as planned! So why was this human making everything so much harder?! I felt as if I were caught up in a storm, flying through the air, unable to get into shelter. Somehow, impossibly, this human was becoming a significant influence on my decisions and thoughts on them. He was just so…different.

I despised him with all my being for it. He was changing me, a Shadow-Blender! We’ve only had two real conversations and he’s already making me question myself! It made me realize just how much of a trickster human he was. What if he was planning this?

“Yes,” I all but snarled.

“Then turn me back to normal! You’ve had your fun!” The Viking cried. Gods, he wasn’t going to stop saying that, wasn’t he?

I shook my head forcefully. “No.”

He glowered. “Why not?”

I spat out the first thought that came to mind. “Because it’s impossible! Once you change a creature’s form once, it can never be turned back again. No dragon is strong enough to reject the type of magic that is flowing through your body, not even me. You’d be lucky if a group of Shadow-Blenders tried to take it out of you.” Okay, maybe that was pushing it. I stopped myself there, worried that I’d contradict myself, and settled for a pointed glare.

The human’s expression had slowly grown from outrage, to horror, to a deep sadness that nearly came off of him in waves. He stared at me with wide eyes and slitted pupils, as if seeing me for the first time.

“Oh.”

We fell into silence again. The Viking hunched over, and his shoulders, wings, and legs began shaking. I squinted at him in confusion. What was he doing?

It wasn’t until I saw tears sliding down his face that I realized he was crying. An involuntary croon escaped me in surprise. The human looked up at me…and in his eyes, I could tell that I’d broken him. No, shattered. It was as if I could see his soul being destroyed, shredded right before my eyes.

I sensed a (unfortunate) temporary link, formed by magic, rush between us. I could feel all of his emotions. I didn’t hear his thoughts at all, but more felt them. I gasped softly. I felt as if my heart was being ripped right out of my chest before my very eyes.

I had crossed the line. It was me who had made everything worse. How ironic; I was thinking about that just before he shot me down, and I was the one responsible. I’d done what I had specifically pointed out to myself that I never wanted to happen.

What…what do I do now? I thought helplessly, staring into his eyes, unable to unlock our gazes. He sniffed once and closed them, releasing me of his hold. Instead of crying loudly like he’d done before, he just lied down and covered his face in his paws, wrapping his tail around his head to block everything out. His entire body heaved and he curled into himself even tighter until he looked smaller than I thought possible for a dragon his size.

I was really getting tired of all this confusion. I officially have no idea what to think of this Viking. I was right before. He was different. He was unlike any human in my entire life.

I was expecting him to get angry. I had wanted him to get mad at me, so I could justify an attack. I had wanted to fight him and get rid of him once and for all. But at the same time, I’d wanted to do nothing more than just leave him and forget about him forever.

I took in a deep breath to try and clear my head. It didn’t work.

What do I do? I certainly wasn’t going to comfort him. Attacking him seemed reasonable…yet I couldn’t after literally staring into his soul and feeling the internal turmoil within.

For the second time, the human was crying, and I had no idea what to do. I had never needed to comfort another dragon for anything—all of the ones in the tribe were brainwashed. They barely felt anything. I’d never had to deal with an emotionally scarred dragon…especially with me being the one who’d done it to said dragon.

In the end, I backed up several paces and sat down. I settled on watching the lake. The only sounds I could hear were the human’s soft gasps of agony.

I covered my face with my paws and wrapped my tail around myself. Sleep felt good right now.

When we first heard the roaring, we’d all stopped dead in our tracks.

Fishlegs had gasped loudly. Snotlout had let out a small whimper and tried to cover it up with a cough, stepping in front of everyone in a fake show of manliness. The twins had stopped in their fight and grabbed for anything they could use as a weapon. I’d gripped my newly-acquired axe and gritted my teeth.

“M-m-maybe we should go back,” Fishlegs stuttered.

“No,” I rejected, “we didn’t come in here for nothing.”

“Yeah!” Snotlout instantly agreed. “We’re going through with this!”

Tuffnut let out an unsure sound. “I don’t know,” he tried to reason with us, “maybe we’re out of our league. I mean, we haven’t even started dragon training yet, and you want us to go against two Night Furies?!”

“One,” I corrected. “And if Hiccup helps, then I doubt it’ll win.”

“Still…”

Ruffnut spoke up. “What if—“

A loud, deafening caterwaul split through the air. I gasped loudly, covering my ears. My ears rung painfully.

“Ow! My ears!” Tuffnut complained. “There is no way I’m going close to something that angry!” He glared in the general direction of the sound. Another dragon had responded to the scream and was matching it with equal volume, and dare I say, more force?

“I never knew dragons fought like that…it doesn’t sound like they’re battling at all!” Fishlegs pondered aloud. He flinched when another scream ripped through our ears and suddenly seemed to realize what exactly the sources of the terrible sounds were. “Uh...I’m not that curious. Maybe we should go,” he repeated himself.

“Seriously, Astrid!” Ruffnut grabbed my shoulder. “We’ll get killed if we go there right now! Let’s wait for them to cool off!”

I shook my head. “Hiccup is doing half of that screaming. That means he’s mad, which means he’ll be more willing to fight that Night Fury with us! Now is perfect! We have to corner it right now!” I leaned down and picked up my axe, shifting into a battle stance. “Are you all cowards?”

Snotlout looked uncertain. “I don’t know, Astrid. I-I mean, of course I’ll go with you, and I’ll beat that dragon senseless! But the others aren’t so sure.” He offered me a weak grin.

Tuffnut scoffed. “Please! You seem to be the most scared. Besides Fishlegs.”

“Hey!” Said teenager exclaimed indignantly.

I huffed, blowing my bangs out of my face. Were these people really that spineless? Excuse the audacity, but where were the people like me?

“I’m going,” I stated. I continued to walk towards the grove, where I’d last seen Hiccup, and where the noises were coming from.

“Astrid, wait!” Ruffnut pulled me back. I looked over my shoulder at her. “Please, Astrid, just think this through. You’re a great fighter and all, but I doubt a dragon that powerful would have trouble defeating us! Even with Hiccup’s help! We need to rethink this, and tell Chief Stoick about it so he can send out a party!”

“What, are we not good enough?” I countered. Ruffnut let go of me and frowned. “We’re Vikings! We were born to fight! And you’re going to stop because you think that we’ll lose? You’re not even going to try?” I gave the now-uncertain Ruffnut a grin and held up a fist. “Plus, if we do fight, we’d get some pretty cool battle scars. And we’d be treated with great honor and respect for taking down a Night Fury without any training! Just imagine!”

My best friend immediately brightened up, a devious smile crossing her face. She held up her own fisted hand and bumped it against mine in our ‘secret handshake’ that we’d created years ago and continued to do out of tradition. “I guess you’re right,” she finally agreed. In a too-serious tone, she added, “But if anyone gets too hurt, I’m blaming you.”

“Fair enough.” I lowered my hand.

“Woah, woah! Wait!” Tuffnut chimed in, “You’re actually going through with this? Astrid, you’re not as good as you think you are! You were lucky to get away from that Night Fury! Don’t push your luck!”

Snotlout shoved him harshly in the back. “Hey!” He yelled. “Don’t talk to her like that! Astrid wasn’t lucky, she was skilled! You’re just jealous because you could never do what she did!” He pointed an accusing finger at the blond twin, making him go slightly cross-eyed.

Tuffnut pushed the hand away with an annoyed scowl. “Yeah, well, I’m not planning to! I am so out of here!” He spun around on his heel and started to march back the way we’d come, slowly disappearing into the underbrush. He was halfway out of our sight when his twin sister sprinted out after him, grabbed his arm, and yanked him back.

“You’re the first one who agreed to this, moron!” She shouted at him.

“No, you were, buttelf!” Tuffnut countered.

“At least I’m staying with the group!”

“At least I’m trying to save my own skin!”

“At least I actually care!”

“I DO care!”

Ruffnut raised an eyebrow.

“What?! I do!” Tuffnut crossed his arms.

Annoyed, I interrupted them. “Ruffnut! Tuffnut! Focus!”

“Um, hey, guys?” Fishlegs spoke up in a tiny voice.

We ignored him. “No! You’re being ridiculous, Astrid!” Tuffnut pointed at me, knocking Ruffnut aside simultaneously. “You want us to fight a Night Fury! A Night Fury! And what, to help the village? We should just tell everyone where Hiccup is and let them do the rest. Plus, we don’t even know if he’s alive!”

“What, so that Night Fury is just loudly scolding itself?” Ruffnut countered. She narrowed her eyes in false anger and made her voice low-pitched and scratchy. “Stupid me! I wanted to jump, dive, and then roll, not dive, roll, and then jump! And what the hell is wrong with me, stepping right-left instead of left-right?!”

Fishlegs tried to regain our attention again. “Guys?”

Snotlout grinned widely at Ruffnut’s commentary that had happened to fit perfectly in with the roars. “I’m still in!” He shook Tuffnut in the shoulder. “Come on! Man up! Or are you not Viking enough? Are you going to do what Hiccup always did?”

Oooooh snap.

Tuffnut stuttered. He glanced between us, and his annoyed and grudging expression slowly melted into nervous grin. “Alright…but I’m with my annoying sister. If anyone gets hurt, you’re responsible.” He pointed at me.

“Guys!”

We all looked at the now-irritated Fishlegs.

“Aren’t any of you paying attention?” He asked in exasperation.

“To what?” I asked, tilting my head to the side slightly in confusion.

Fishlegs gestured to the forest. “Just listen!”

We all lapsed into silence. My eyes widened slightly when I realized that the draconic screaming had stopped. “They’re not fighting?”

“Only one way to find out,” Ruffnut announced. She shifted her weight and gestured for me to lead. “Would you mind showing the way, Ms. Ambitious?”

“Don’t make me throw you into that tree!” I grinned at her. She scoffed dramatically, leaned back, and made ‘oh no she didn’t’ gestures with her hands. Everyone started to laugh. Tuffnut and Snotlout even started wolf-whistling.

Recollecting myself, I waved my arm towards myself in the universal sign of ‘follow me’ and started to stalk my way deeper into the forest and closer to the gorge (looking over my shoulder, I was happy to see that everyone was following.). We all fell silent as we got closer and closer to the Night Fury and Hiccup’s hiding spot. I took notice of the sheer quietness of the forest. Everything was still, as if someone had drawn an enormous, lifelike picture. The sound of the undergrowth moving beneath our feet was like booming thunder compared to the abnormal silence of the otherwise dangerous forest.

I realized that we were about to cross out into the small clearing just in time. Gasping softly, I dug my feet into the ground and spread my arms out eagle-style, gritting my teeth when all four of my friends bumped into me and nearly pushed me out towards the hidden area. I hissed a warning to them and dropped down low, motioning for them to do the same. We all started fanning out, each one of us positioned about a meter away from each other. I pushed Fishlegs when he crouched down right next to me, but he shook his head defiantly.

I moved the undergrowth to the side and slowly began to belly-crawl towards the edge of the cliff. I calculated each step to be in time with any other background noise, silently sending a thanks to the gods for deciding to make today windy. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw everyone else doing the same thing. We crept towards the edge.

Everyone gave soft gasps. There were two new additions to the bottom of the canyon. One, there was an enormous hole in the middle of one side of the cove. Two, an entire wall was broken apart and crumbled. It looked…shattered.

I narrowed my eyes at it. What had happened to it?

I finally tore my gaze away from the wall when I realized why we’d come here. I looked down into the canyon and felt my heart skip a beat.

There wasn’t a dragon in sight.

What?! How could Hiccup have possibly been able to get out? I doubt he’d want to try to fly out of there…

I continued to search for the dark-brown Night Fury with pine green and silver-flecked eyes. There were certainly hiding places for him, and judging by the last time we’d actually seen each other, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him trying to keep out of sight. But we’d heard another Night Fury, so where did it go? Had it flown off and abandoned Hiccup?

A cold dread creeped up on me. Did it kill Hiccup?

I shuddered at the thought.

Tuffnut startled Fishlegs and me (we both jumped and covered our mouths to avoid from squeaking) by whispering, “This is pointless!” He began to stand up, staring down into the cove cautiously. “I don’t see anything down there.”

“Get down!” Snotlout, Ruffnut, Fishlegs, and I all hissed in unison. If the circumstances were different, I’m sure we would have all looked at each other with surprised expressions and burst out laughing. Lucky for us, we were trying to stop one annoying Viking from getting himself blown up by a hiding Night Fury.

“I’m sure Hiccup’s just trying to hide, so get down!” I rushed to explain. I continued to make ‘get down’ gestures at Tuffnut until he finally complied with an exasperated sigh and roll of his eyes. I sighed myself, placing my head in my unoccupied hand. There is not enough face to palm…

I felt my face drained of all color when, as Tuffnut placed all of his weight on his hands while sitting down, the rock beneath him cracked at lightning-speed and fell apart.

Tuffnut screamed. Ruffnut shrieked his name with an unnatural amount of fear in it, lunging towards her brother’s feet. She grabbed him, but he had already gone over the edge. His greater body weight began to drag my best friend down to her death.

That wasn’t going to happen if I could help it.

“No!” I lunged for her, took hold of her thigh, and began pulling. Snotlout and Fishlegs were at my side in an instant. “Hold on, you two! Ruffnut, don’t let go!”

“What do you think I’m doing?!” She hollered at me.

“Why don’t you concentrate more on me?!” Tuffnut wailed. He suddenly gasped, and for one terrifying moment, I thought Ruffnut had dropped him.

It wasn’t until I heard Fishlegs whisper a certain Viking’s name that I realized what had happened.

I risked a glance out into the gorge. A sleek, mud-covered Night Fury was leaping down from the cliffside, uncamouflaging himself from it (so that’s why I didn’t see him! His scales blended in perfectly!). Hiccup’s eyes were wide, his pupils were mere slits in fear, and he let out a high-pitched, fearful warbling sound when he finally reached solid ground. The side of the cove he was on formed a right angle with ours, so it took him only a few seconds to sprint the short distance to where Tuffnut was dangling.

The human-turned-dragon situated himself under Tuffnut, who had gone as still as if he were dead, letting out tiny anxious sounds. Hiccup paced slightly, never taking his eyes off of the male twin.

“A-a-aaah! Night Fury!” Tuffnut started to visibly shake. “Don’t drop me! Pull me up! Pull me up!”

Hiccup visibly winced and deflated, yet he stayed right where he was.

“That’s Hiccup!” I wheezed.

I gasped when I began to feel sweat build up on my palms. “Pull!” I commanded as fast as I could. The three of us still on solid ground heaved back as one, slowly lifting Ruffnut from her half-fallen position, and onto solid ground. She was gripping Tuffnut’s feet so hard, I was sure that if she’d grabbed skin, he’d be bleeding. Snotlout and I leaned over and took hold of one of Tuffnut’s legs for each of us, while Fishlegs wrapped his bulky arms around Ruffnut’s chest to keep her in place. “PULL!”

We all groaned as we leaned back, struggling to keep a grip on the rapidly-slipping Tuffnut and keep ourselves from falling at the same time. Hiccup cried out from below, anxiousness and dread coloring his voice. Vaguely, a part of me registered that, even in dragon form, he still sounded as if he talking through his nose.

I thanked every god willing to listen when we finally pulled Tuffnut over the edge. Ruffnut tackled him, sending him flying away from the cliff. They embraced each other tightly, burying their faces into each other’s necks. The heartwarming moment lasted for only a second, though, and the two quickly separated and sat up. I fell back on my knees, leaning over slightly to try and regain my breath faster. I heard Snotlout and Fishlegs doing the same.

“That was…too close…” Fishlegs gasped.

“No kidding!” Tuffnut shakily replied. He stood up and looked over the edge warily, staring at Hiccup. “That’s…Hiccup?”

I nodded, unable to respond.

With a massive intake of air, I forced myself to stand up on shaky legs and stare down at Hiccup. He looked confused and unsure of himself. I noticed that he was crouching slightly, keeping his head low to the ground and arching his back. His wings were folded up against his body and his tail was held straight out. The fact that he was trying to creep away did not escape my attention.

At least he’s alive, I thought in relief. But why does he look so scared?

“Hiccup!” Fishlegs let out an overjoyed whoop. “You’re alive!”

The outcast’s ears perked up at his name and he stopped. He stared at Fishlegs for several seconds before turning his green eyes back on me. He looked into my eyes and trailed them down my body, stopping them at the axe that was by my feet. He looked between me and my weapon until I finally made the connection. I lifted one foot and kicked it behind me.

“Astrid? Are you sure?” Snotlout whispered fearfully. He hadn’t taken his eyes off of Hiccup since we’d gotten Tuffnut to safety. “What if he’s the wrong Night Fury?”

“He looks and sounds like Hiccup. It’s definitely him.” I met Snotlout’s gaze. “Don’t you recognize your own cousin?”

Snotlout didn’t respond. A long, tense silence ensued for several minutes. Hiccup began to get nervous and averted his gaze from us several times, staring from the ground in front of him, to the cliffside he’d just come from, and back to us.

Suddenly, his right ear twitched, and he looked back at where he’d been hiding earlier. The Viking seemed to listen to something (he tipped his head to the side and perked his ears). Suddenly, his ears and side frills flattened, and he crouched low to the ground and let out a short hiss. He arched his back high off the ground, giving him a pantherlike form, and spread his wings out slightly. His tail lashed in long, wide arcs.

“That’s a defensive warning!” Fishlegs gasped in sudden recognition. “I think the other Night Fury is—“

We heard it give a strange, throaty call before the evil Night Fury leaped out of the shadows. It jumped onto a rock, baring its teeth at us and crouching low, completely ignoring Hiccup. On the edges of my vision, I saw Fishlegs reach out and grab Ruffnut’s arm and squeeze it.

Hiccup ran a few paces forward, placing himself between us and the snarling Night Fury. He gave a long hiss that was followed by a snap of his jaws and high-pitched trill. The Night Fury focused on him, shifted its weight back and forth a few times, and jumped to the ground. It stalked towards him at a fast pace, making Hiccup mimic it in the opposite distraction. The entire time, the Night Fury gave out a low rumbling sound. Hiccup responded with a somewhat defiant growl.

“What are they doing?” Snotlout asked Fishlegs worriedly.

“I think they’re arguing,” he breathed. “That means that they’re speaking to each other…and that means…” he trailed off. We didn’t need him to fill in the rest.

Hiccup suddenly yelled loudly, shaking his head wildly. The Night Fury growled, leaning in towards him and pointing his nose down. The Viking did the same, and they nearly pressed their foreheads together, each one roaring loudly.

Hiccup suddenly reared his head back and jumped sideways and backwards, lowering his head to the ground and baring his own teeth at the Night Fury. His eyes were mere slits.

Outraged, the demon lifted itself up on its hind legs and spread its wings, flapping them. Hiccup gave another ‘defensive warning’, as Fishlegs put it.

The Night Fury leaped at Hiccup. The teenager scrambled backwards, falling. He rolled over and began to sprint away from the quickly advancing dragon, weaving along the ground like a cat. A clumsy cat, I noted - he tripped several times.

“We have to help him!” Fishlegs howled. “That thing is bigger than him! If it pins him, it’ll be all over!”

I did the first thing that came to mind. I reached behind me, grabbing my axe. Throwing it into the air, I spun on one foot and used my momentum to take hold of it and send it flying through the air towards the Night Fury. At the same time, Snotlout, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut, and Fishlegs threw their own weapons (consisting of a club, knives, and another axe) at the beast. Mine and Tuffnut’s were the only ones that hit their target, but it worked.

The Night Fury (not Hiccup) gasped in surprise and gave the weapons a shocked look. Its shock melded into raw anger when it seemed to make the connection, and it stared right at us. We made eye contact. (Strangely, the dragon faltered, but it literally shook it off.) To my horror, it opened its mouth and started an all-too-familiar noise that made me freeze on instinct.

Hiccup was on the thing in the instant, letting out a ferocious snarl so powerful, all of us flinched. He tackled the Night Fury to the ground, using his front two paws to pin its chest to the ground. He looked at us and swung his head to the side, giving us a clear message:

“Get out of here!”

“Run!” Ruffnut shouted. She and her twin turned and sprinted off into the forest, closely followed by Snotlout and Fishlegs. I turned to follow and stopped. Looking back, I saw Hiccup jump away from the Night Fury just as it tried to snap at him. He growled loudly at it, making it pause. Then, the teenager looked over at me with fear in his eyes.

I turned and ran away.

I drooped the second Astrid ran away. Great. Just great.

“What the hell?!” The Night Fury shouted in his charmingly loud voice. He rounded towards me and paced around me furiously. “They were threatening us! And you want them to survive?! Are you insane? Do you want them to come back?”

“Yes, because I really have a choice in the matter!” I snapped sarcastically. “Thanks for the attack, by the way! I really enjoyed that, too! Love it when you do unnecessary things like that!”

The Night Fury seemed taken aback by my bold remarks. Recovering, he argued, “I started it? You were the one who started that fight!”

I blanched. “What?! How?”

He snorted as if the answer was obvious. “Yelling ‘don’t you dare hurt them, or I’ll hurt you’ seems like a good enough threat.”

“I was defending them! They were tired and scared and you were going to kill them while they were weak!” I paused. “And how is that a threat?”

“You told me you would attack me if I tried to defend both of us from a group of humans carrying weapons.” The Night Fury stalked towards me and stared right into my eyes. “How do you know they didn’t want to kill us? I know for a fact that they were planning on going after me. I heard them speaking of it in the forest. Wouldn’t you want to defend yourself if you heard your enemies planning your death?”

I blinked. “What?” I hadn’t heard anything…then again, I’d been crying until the dragon had suddenly pushed me in the side and commanded that I ‘hide unless I wanted to be killed by a group of humans that was heading this way’. Confused, frightened, and uncertain, I’d listened to him and had followed him to the rocky area of the cove. We’d both huddled in a tight little cave and planned to wait for them to leave. Of course, I ditched that plan when I saw Tuffnut almost get killed. I’d left our hiding spot without warning, ignoring the dragon’s hiss. Even though Tuffnut and I were never friends, I couldn’t just let him die! I knew him!

Then the Night Fury had yelled something about it being a trick and how he was going to handle it, and I defended them. And then we’d gotten into a fight.

And now we were in another one. Again.

“Well?” I was pulled out of my thoughts by the incredibly patient Night Fury. He had his paw raised, as if getting ready to slap me.

I stared at him, feeling the sinking, drop-dead feeling of sorrow fill my chest. I didn’t want to have another fight. It may be light-hearted(ish) now, but knowing us, we’d probably end up trying to break each other’s hearts. I just couldn’t handle that right now.

I closed my eyes and answered his previous question. “Yes.”

The Night Fury quieted. I opened my eyes in confusion and saw him studying me with a scrutinizing gaze. I tensed, waiting to see if he would decide to attack.

Coming to a decision, the dragon sat back down. “Alright, then.” He was hunched back slightly and his wings were folded loosely behind him. It made him look very relaxed, which was strange since he was giving me the most serious look I’ve ever seen on any intelligent creature. It was unnerving and weird.

I grimaced under the distrustful look he was sending me. I stared at my feet for awhile, and when I looked back up, he was doing the exact same thing! The tension filling the air wasn’t exactly helping, too. If either of us made a sudden move, the other would tense up. But other than that, I’d say we spent a good thirty minutes just staring at each other, neither sure what to do.

It was awful.

I was actually starting to daydream about a better, happy place when the Night Fury suddenly snorted. I looked over at him immediately, perking my ears.

“Humans are annoying, aren’t they?” He asked softly. “That group of hatchlings looked to be as stubborn as any other of your kind. They’re going to come back.” He wrinkled his nose at the spot where the group of teenagers had been in disgust, as if he were looking at them right this very instant. “Stupid humans.”

“Hey!” I said, offended. “Don’t say that! How would you like it if I went around insulting your kind like that?” I stood up quickly and walked a short distance parallel of him, nearly tripping over my tail in the process… again. In anger, I kicked at a small stone. It flew a small distance, ricocheted off of a large boulder, and flew right back at me. It squeezed my eyes shut for a second when it hit me right in the nose. What is it with my luck? Why am I the butt of every joke at the moment?

“Hah!” The Night Fury barked. I frowned at him, trying to look harsh and make my pupils look like itty-bitty slits (you know, the disturbing-scary thing?) like I’d seen him do before. I’m not sure if it worked, since the Night Fury continued to laugh at me. I felt my scales go hot in embarrassment.

“Cut it out!” My voice shook slightly. Surprisingly, the Night Fury actually did stop, and gestured with his head for me to go on. I knew he wanted to continue the conversation, but for the life of me, I could not remember. “What were you saying, again?”

It took him a few seconds, but the Night Fury continued very calmly, “You are a dragon.” He lowered his eyelids at my immediate rejection, his ears dropping and giving him a perfect ‘unamused’ look that made me halt in my tracks. “How can you still consider yourself a human after all of this? Though I hate to admit it, you were right before; you are a dragon. An annoying one, at that.” He snorted dismissively.

“Change me back?” I asked hopefully. I widened my eyes and flattened my ears, hopefully pulling off a damn-good ‘cute’ look. I’d done it before and it had actually made the Night Fury waver; maybe if I was adorable enough, he would change me back! (End sarcasm.)

“For the last time, no! Do you think I just go around changing people into dragons for the fun of it?” He twitched his tail irritably. “Asking me a million times does nothing but harden my opinion on it, and you can’t pull of the ‘cute’ look. Seriously…stop…it’s creepy.”

I would have laughed if he hadn’t been serious. Instead, I settled for, “But why can’t you—!“

I stopped myself. If we continued on with this conversation, then it’d end up like the last one. I didn’t want to get into another fight. Chances are I wouldn’t get as lucky. Plus, I was trying to make amends, not widen the gap between us.

The Night Fury gave me a calculating look. As it became apparent that he wasn’t going to talk anytime soon, and that I was waiting for him, he started to change. His eyes went distant, like he wasn’t even here. I noticed that he stopped moving altogether when he got deeper and deeper into whatever he was thinking about.

I sent him an exasperated look in return. If you didn’t count those last few sentences, then we’d been having a generally harmless conversation (By ‘harmless’, I meant that neither of us were getting ready to attack the other.). And now he had to go and ruin it by just cutting himself off from me? Gee, thanks, Night Fury. I’m not trying to be nice to you or anything.

Trying to keep up my sulking attitude, I dropped to the ground, rested my chin on the ground, and wrapped my tail around my side. I stared at him the whole time. His eyes followed me as I moved, but I don’t think the dragon really registered it; he just continued to watch me unblinkingly, as if trying to decide on a major decision that involved me. (Little did I know that that was exactly what he was thinking about.)

Unfortunately, since the Night Fury was so focused on thinking, it made me have no choice but to ponder on what had happened. I gave a sigh, once again feeling depression creep up on me.

I never asked for any of this…I wish I wasn’t here. I just want to go home. I want things to go back to normal. I looked up at the Night Fury and then down to my feet. I wonder what he thinks about this? Does he still think that this was the right thing to do? Or did I convince him otherwise? I hope so…but I’m not willing to make any bets.

I wonder…does he still think I’m trying to trick him? I sucked at my explanation, but I thought that he’d just be able to infer what I was trying to get across. I don’t really blame him, though…I should have just told him my thoughts the second I woke up. It must have been suspicious seeing me stutter and then come up with that. No wonder he doesn’t want anything to do with me… I half-covered my eyes with my paws. But at least I’m trying! Why can’t he see that? Why doesn’t he try to understand? I don’t get it. I mean, he could have killed me, and he didn’t. What made him do that?

I looked up into his lime-green eyes. They were still distant, elsewhere. Maybe he’s thinking about the same things…

This is stupid, I told myself. Here I am wondering on what this Night Fury is thinking, and he’s standing right in front of me! Maybe I should ask him. I pondered over this for a few seconds. He’s never really given me much of a straight answer, though. I’ve always had to dig for them, and by then, we’d both be angry and start another fight. I sighed again, a bit louder. I moved my head to rest my cheek on my paws and stared out into the still lake.

I want…I want things to be normal again. I want to go home and be able to see Gobber and Dad. I just… My mind trailed off into soundless sorrow. I closed my eyes.

I heard a soft ‘whumph’ over to my side. I straightened, opened my eyes, and moved my gaze over to it. The Night Fury had mimicked my position and was lying down, too. He was even staring out into the lake. I heard myself give a small noise in response, which caused the Night Fury to immediately turn towards me with narrowed eyes.

He doesn’t trust me. I want to trust him, but it’s so hard when he won’t even consider it, I thought.

Out of nowhere, an idea popped up in my head. A crazy idea, but one nonetheless. Besides, I’m Hiccup Haddock III; I always do crazy things.

Maybe I have to show him that I want to be on good grounds with him. He certainly isn’t listening to words. Besides, what’s that saying, again? ‘Actions are louder than speaking’? Nevermind.. I started to climb to my feet. The Night Fury didn’t move. Well, here goes nothing. Sort of.

I silently walked over to him, trying to look as unthreatening as possible. He didn’t seem to notice me. Slowly, I sat down besides him and returned to my previous expression, cautiously watching him the entire time. The dragon still didn’t seem to notice me.

I huffed loudly. His ear twitched and he raised his head, twisting his neck around to stare at me. His brows lifted high above his eyes in surprise. I blinked at him.

“Hi, there!” I offered him a small grin and nodded once in greeting.

“…What are you doing?” The Night Fury looked at me as if I’d grown two heads. I shrugged unhelpfully, settling down into the comfortable grass below us.

“Well, it was kind of awkward…”

He gave a short laugh. “And this makes it better? Sorry, human, but I don’t cuddle. Now get out of my spot.”

I raised a brow, lifting my head to look fully at him. “Since when is this your spo—ah!” I yelped when he nonchalantly brought his single-finned tail around and slapped me upside the head, stinging my cheek. “Ow!” I complained, holding a paw to my face and glaring at the Night Fury. “What was that for?” I whined somewhat angrily.

He regarded me with a serious look, but I could detect some amusement playing behind his eyes. “My spot. Out. Now.”

(I noticed that his voice sounded more confused than anything else, and it was painfully obvious that his ‘anger’ was forced. Had his opinion on me somehow changed? What was he thinking about?)

I complied. There was no way I was going to sit around and let myself get slapped. As I walked away, tail dragging on the ground, I made sure to mumble loudly, “Not your spot.”

“It is so!” The Night Fury called from behind me.

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever.” I plopped to the ground. I kept my ears tilted behind me towards him. Just in case.

I’m glad I did. If I hadn’t, I would have never heard him give a loud puff and stand up. Then I wouldn’t have turned around to see what he was doing. And if I hadn’t done that, then the resulting conversation would have never happened, and the chain of events that snowballed afterwards would have become nonexistent.

I leaped to my feet when I saw him turn towards the blown-up cliff. “Hey! Where are you going?”

He looked over his shoulder, but did not slow his pace. “I’m leaving.”

I blinked several times. “W-what?” He was leaving? He was just going to abandon me? A small part of me was hurt. I didn’t want to be left alone again, especially after I’d decided to try and put an end to our problems. I knew it was to be expected, though; I suddenly realized that I had nearly come to depend on the Night Fury, the thing that had ruined my life. And this particular Night Fury didn’t seem to care a bit about my well-being. (I believe the proper word for this would be ‘ouch’.)

I didn’t bother to try to convince the dragon to stay. He seemed to have come to a solid decision, judging by his tone and body language. I lowered my head and hunched over, watching as my only chance to ever be normal again walked away mercilessly. Don’t cry, I ordered myself, it’ll only make things worse.

The emotional turmoil I was feeling before came down on me and struck like a deadly snake. It was sudden and unexpected. I closed my eyes and gasped. It had felt like someone had actually hit me in the chest. My legs began to shake. I squeezed my eyes shut as hard as I could.

This can’t be happening… I heard the dragon begin to jump onto the rocks. I should stop him. I need to stop him.

Yet I felt no strength to do so. He hates you, my mind informed me, and wants you to suffer and die. In that order. What would make him stay? You’re just another evil human to him. You’re his victim. He doesn’t feel any sympathy towards you.

I listened to him skid down the incredibly steep hill. He gasped, and I suddenly heard a loud ‘thump’. I snapped my eyes open and looked over at him. He was a few meters away from the cliff. The little bit of hope that had built up inside me died down when I realized that he’d just jumped to avoid falling off of it. The Night Fury tried again, heaving himself back up the rockface. The cliffside, now consisting of very small rocks compared to its previous state, did no good for the gigantic beast trying to climb it. It crumbled under his claws and he was forced to run away from a small landslide.

Like the stubborn thing he was, the dragon continued to try and climb the cliff as if nothing had happened.

I stood up, turned, and walked in the opposite direction, towards the tree-covered area of the gorge. I walked with my head lowered and my wings and tail dragging on the ground in defeat. There’s no point in sitting there and watching him, I reasoned somewhat guiltily to myself. A small part of me was still screaming for me to try to reason with the Night Fury, to make him stay.

I lied down when I got underneath the miniature forest. The leaves were rustling gently above me, playing with each other in the wind. I closed my eyes and let the sounds carry me away.

The low sunset was quite the view. Or, it would have been, if I weren’t so distracted from it.

“Gods damn it!”

The Night Fury let out a terrifying roar of outrage, shooting a blast of fire at the ground standing in front of him. He walked parallel to the cliff, holding his wings out and flapping them a little bit. Suddenly he leaped into the air, trying to climb up the cliff and fly at the same time. He fell to the ground.

“ARGH!”

I cowered beneath the trees, hoping he wouldn’t notice me. Once again, it became very clear to me that I was trapped with my enemy. But this time, he was angry enough to start shooting off fireballs in random directions, though he was smart enough to aim them towards the ground. The dragon let loose a wild string of curses that would have made a sailor blush.

The Night Fury tried to climb the precipice again, very desperate now.

He tried again.

And again.

And he attempted to pull the task several more times, but ended up nowhere near success each time.

He’s not going anywhere , I thought somewhat smugly. Oh, look! It’s karma! Nice to meet you, I’ve been fine, thanks…

The Night Fury fell again. He got up and screamed at the obstacle as if it would just apologize and step aside. “Stupid! CLIFF!”

I snorted. There were a few things that I had grown accustomed to seeing in my recent past. A Night Fury screaming at a rockface was not one of them.

The Night Fury turned swiftly around to look at me, eyes aglow with something akin to evil.

I jumped, shrunk back, and averted my eyes sheepishly. Oops.

My light-hearted emotions quickly turned to dread when the dragon began to jog over towards me. Oh, crap! I scrambled to my feet and searched desperately for cover. Nothing that would be useful showed itself to me.

I was in the beginnings of breaking out into a run when the Night Fury leaned down and leaped off the ground, using his wings to propel him at an incredibly fast speed. He landed right in front of me, making me skid and stumble backwards.

“Do you think this is funny!?” He hissed, cornering me against a tree. I leaned into it, trying to slip around the pesky plant-life to safety. “You think that this is a joke?!”

“Uh—uh--!” I was shocked. He looked just as angry as he had when he’d turned me into a dragon. It was…scary.

“Wrong answer.” He growled darkly. The Night Fury reached up and slapped me across the face with his paw (I was crouched low to the ground and he’d raised himself off the ground and onto his hind legs). While I was still on the ground, trying to recover from the shock, he grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and flung me aside. “Don’t you dare laugh at me!” He screeched. The beast didn’t give me another chance to react, and threw himself at me, pinning me to the ground. “At least I’m trying to get out of here, human!”

I gaped at him. “I-I-I—“ Swallowing, I demanded, “Get off me!” I brought my hind legs up and kicked him in the stomach. Using the few precious seconds I had, I rolled swiftly and tried to sprint out of the cage-like trees and out into the open area. I’d barely made it a foot when the Night Fury gripped my tail in his jaws and flung me back towards him. I felt his paws wrap around my neck and fling me to the ground. My head made contact first and caused stars to swim in my vision.

I felt more than saw the Night Fury begin to build up a blast of fire. I just froze in fear.

“S-stop!” I cried out desperately, suddenly finding my voice. I flipped over and backed up as quickly as I could, not daring to turn my back on the dragon.He’s mad with anger! I realized when he showed no reaction but to turn his body towards me. I need to break through to him, or he’ll kill me!

“STOP!” I screamed. I lunged forward, spun my body sideways when I landed, and slapped him across the face with my tail. The Night Fury gave a high-pitched yelp of surprise. Slowly, he turned his head towards me, face wrinkled up in fury.

“Wait! Just think! Listen to me!” I spread my wings out in an attempt to look bigger. He paused. Feeling rage starting to build up inside me, I continued, “Quit taking your anger out on me! You of all people have no right! If anything, I should be the one attacking you!” I crouched low to the ground and swished my tail wildly, looking fiercely at him.

Suddenly, the Night Fury’s eyes dilated to the regular size. He rubbed his paw on his face, looking slightly surprised for a split second. Then, he gave me the evil eye. “Well, at least I’m not moping around, waiting for death! I have every right to be mad at you!”

I reared my head back as if he’d slapped me. Waiting for death?

I wasn’t doing that…was I? I mean, I was upset, but it’s not like I’d be elated at all of the current events. But I wasn’t suicidal! I would…never…

I thought back to how I’d been acting. With a jolt, I realized that if I wasn’t fighting the Night Fury, I was usually wallowing in self-despair or sulking. And I couldn’t bring to mind one time where I wasn’t bitterly wishing that I could be a human again, or that I should have never shot the Night Fury down, or that that it should have killed me instead of changing me into a dragon.

I realize this is bad…but how am I supposed to feel?

It’s no excuse to be…suicidal, I grimaced at the last word. Oh, gods! What’s happening to me?

I faltered, the defiant words dying on my lips. I stared into the Night Fury’s eyes. He was definitely angry, but there was something else…frustration and worry was hiding just beneath the surface. Whether it was for just him or the both of us, I wasn’t sure.

“I have every right to be mad at you!”

His last sentence replayed in my head. I narrowed my eyes slightly and tipped my head to the side. “You’re mad at me for being upset?” I asked. “And for not doing anything? Why?”

My fellow cove-captive said nothing for a few moments. Finally, he answered, “Giving up doesn’t help either of us if we’re both stuck in this canyon.”

“How can I possibly help to get us out of here? It’s not like we can just blow up another side of one of the cliffs,” I pointed out.

The Night Fury lapsed into a thoughtful silence. Suddenly, he brightened, and looked over at me.

Oh. He thought that I’d been serious.

Maybe this is a good thing, I thought. He thinks you’re suggesting getting out of here together. Maybe this can be the end of this long battle we’ve been having!

A wide grin spread across the Night Fury’s face. “Maybe I can’t get out of here…but you can.”

I shook my head a little bit. “What? If you haven’t noticed, I’m in the same position as you.”

The Night Fury said nothing. Instead, he brought his tail forward. I tensed for a split second. Forcing myself to relax, I stared at it. It took me a few seconds to realize what he was trying to get across.

His tail only had one tailfin. Mine had both.

“No!” I immediately cried out. “I can’t fly!” I shuddered at the memory of the thunderstorm that had destroyed my will to even use my wings on my first night as a dragon.

“Why not?” He looked at my quizzically.

I shook my head again. “I just can’t.”

He paused, frowning, and then sighed and shook his head as if the solution to the problem was obvious. I barely detected kindness in his voice. “I’ll teach you.”

I gasped. My ears stood straight up. “What?!”

He got up and walked towards me until we were almost touching nose-to-nose. “But, in return, you must come back. I’m assuming that you’d be hungry by now. Well, I am, too. If I teach you to fly, and you get food and come back, then, maybe…” The dragon gave me a mischievous grin that made me a little more than uneasy, “…maybe I can find a way to change you back to your human form.”

I jumped to my feet. “But you said that was impossible!”

“Right, now, yes,” The Night Fury sat down and leaned back casually. “But as the magic in your veins grows less concentrated and evens out, which means it’ll get weaker, by the way, it’ll be easier to extract it. I’d say it’d take about…oh, a month? Then it would be…” The dragon suddenly stopped. He got that far-away look in his eyes for a split second, and then seemed to get angry at himself. The Night Fury looked down at his feet, took a deep breath, and then looked up at me with an expectant expression.

I gaped at him. Was he lying to me? I mean, this conversation just came out of the blue. And he’d made it blatantly clear why he’d even started it: he needed food. But, on the other hand, I was starving, too. I don’t care if dragons could survive days on end without food; with each passing hour, I could feel my body grow weaker due to lack of nourishment. But that was a minor problem compared to what he was proposing.

Are you really going to pass up an opportunity like this? My mind asked. Earlier, you were devastated when the dragon tried to leave. Not only is he offering to stay now, but he’s also giving you a chance to go back to normal! How can you possibly let that go?

I looked into the eyes of the beast, still unsure.

Summoning up my courage, I demanded in the most serious tone I could muster, “Look me in the eye and tell me that you’re not lying.”

He met my gaze evenly and straightened. “I swear on the Dragoness of the Moon and the Dragon of the Sun that every word I’ve spoken is truthful.”

For a few seconds, I felt something almost tangible go between us. In it, I felt a great sense of truthfulness that was surrounded by a sea of apprehension and…nervousness. I had only registered this when the brief connection shattered.

He’s not sure what to think, I finally figured out. Right now is my chance to show him that I don’t want things to continue on like this. Right now, I can show him that I’m willing to trust him, if only he would do the same!

Besides…I really can’t pass this up. It’s my only hope.

With my eyes still fixed on him, I answered, “I…agree. We have a deal, Night Fury.” I spoke the last part softly and lowered my ears, feeling all my anger and pent-up agony from the entire day leave with something that I wanted to welcome, but was a bit unwilling to: hope. Maybe…I can only hope for things to work out. “I’m putting my trust in you…don’t break it.” I offered him a small grin. I felt my brows lower down in a slant, most likely making it look sad.

He hesitated; obviously, he wasn’t expecting me to answer like that. The dragon sniffed at me warily, never taking his eyes off of mine. Something I’d never seen before sparked beneath the green orbs.

To my great astonishment, the Night Fury closed his eyes, leaned his head down, and pressed his forehead against mine. My breath hitched in my throat and my body immediately tensed up, expecting an attack. But the dragon didn’t move otherwise. He stayed stock-still, his warm forehead barely pressing against mine. His scent became very strong: the smell of firewood being burned on a chilly autumn evening.

Was it…a gesture of peace? Being dragons, we couldn’t exactly shake hands. (Though it would be awesome if we figured out how.)

Show him. If you refuse now, you will never get this chance again.

I lightly pushed my own forehead against his. I’m putting my trust in you.

That weak bond from before presented itself again. I felt my uncertain, shy faith reaching out to him. The dragon’s own emotions slowly crept out towards me. Shocked, yet excited anxiety. He wasn’t exactly celebrating something…it was more like he’d been given a pleasant surprise. The two distinct emotions coming off of us clashed, and I felt a new one coming off of him: a faint fear, like a creeping suspicion that something was very, very wrong. I felt the dragon mentally brush it aside, and heard something I thought I’d never hear coming from him:

“Damn this. I’m going to at least try.”

Excitement and joy bubbled up in my chest. I tried to contain it from the dragon, but I felt him huff from the supposed amusement of it.

After a few more seconds of doing this, the Night Fury leaned back. He looked at me with half-lidded eyes, snorted, and silently dashed away from me. Halfway across the lake, he stopped and turned towards me. The bright green eyes glanced up at the rapidly darkening sky and back to me.

“Tomorrow,” he told me with a large amount of authority to his voice. I noticed a faint grin on his lips.

I nodded in agreement. “Tomorrow.”

Chapter Text

When I woke up, three things came to my mind.

First: My tail hurts.

Second: I’m hungry.

Third: Why in the gods’ names is that human sleeping next to me?!

I blinked dazedly at him, wondering if I was still dreaming. But as my vision went from blurry to crystal-clear and the cold air woke me up further, I realized that the human really was lying besides me. His tail was curled around himself and his wings were pressed in tightly. He was leaning heavily on me. I could feel him shaking.

…How does he keep sneaking up on me like this? I thought in irritation.

I continued to stare at the human, but quickly grew bored. Out of lack of anything to do, I sniffed the air for anything suspicious. I could smell autumn’s slow descent into winter, the old scents of the humans from yesterday, and, of course, the metal-smelling human. I wrinkled my nose. When was the last time he bathed?! He smelled awful.

Humans, I thought with a roll of my eyes.

Almost as if in response, the Viking shifted and pushed himself even closer to me, resting his head on my forearm and letting out a small, contented purr. His tail flicked once and his eyelids moved slightly in deep sleep.

Yesterday, I would have reared back in repulsion and bitten him.

But this was today.

In those long hours of thoughtful silence yesterday, I looked over my actions and options very carefully. I forced myself to view the situation as an outsider; not a dragon, not a Shadow-Blender, not even a human. I put myself in a formless being’s place, a creature that simply evaluates what happens in the world and does nothing else. And what I saw had shocked me to my core.

I had thought that the Viking was sucking up to me in a feeble attempt to get on my good side and win my trust. But as I thought back on it, replaying the memories in my head the best I could (which wasn’t a lot, but enough), I quickly realized something I thought was impossible. The human was trying to make friends with me, deliberately putting himself in danger to try and show me that he was serious.

I hadn’t even considered that back then.

And then, realizing that this would become something more if I stayed, I got scared. I decided to leave the cove and rid the human of my mind forever. I hadn’t wanted to make friends with the human at all. I wanted him to get out my life permanently. Lucky me, my plan to leave had failed miserably.

I’m not proud of the way I attacked the human in my mindless anger. It paid off, though.

I went into the conversation (the one that took place directly after the human literally slapped me out of my rage) cold-hearted and sneaky--like a dragon. I was planning on using the human to my advantage.

I hadn’t expected for him to look at me the way he did - to speak with his heart, to give me the complete and absolute truth, unlike myself. He made me look like a shadow in comparison to the light that he’d held. He had done something unheard of in my kind; he had opened up and poured out his soul to me in a single sentence, giving himself up to my mercy.

“I’m putting my trust in you…don’t break it.”

…How do you respond to that? Dragons are naturally distrustful creatures. Only mates rely on each other like that. But here this human was, putting everything on the line to show me that he wanted a change. And I had just tried to kill him. Again.

In that instant, I finally figured out what had had me so confused and upset and scared all morning yesterday. The fog my mind was in separated, showing me the answer. I realized that maybe, just maybe, I wanted this as much as the human did. I realized that I didn’t want to leave the human to die at all; that was why I hadn’t been able to kill him. I had, in a way, known this, and tried to deny it by being the biggest ass in the world.

I also realized how gods-damned prideful I had been, how I had walked through these past few days completely blind to the others around me.

Now, don’t take me wrong. I was right on some things, like what would happen if I did change the Viking back and how he did start all of this. And I still have the right to at least be annoyed at the human for crippling me. He had taken away the thing I loved most. But I had done the same thing and more to him.

So, I did the unspeakable. I had gathered up all of my hate and anger towards the human into a tight mental ball…and I’d banished it. I’d cleared my mind of the haze that had taken over me and had made physical contact with the Viking, calling a truce. And as long as that truce was still intact, I would not harm him. It was an unspoken dragon law.

The act of pressing foreheads is commonly called a ‘seal of trust’. It’s a deal, a final note. In a sense, it makes whatever the two dragons are agreeing to official. Legend says that any dragon who goes against a promise made with a seal of trust would be cursed for eternity for betraying the poor creature that had believed them.

It was a big deal when I’d done the seal of trust. I had said to the human, “I’m putting my trust in you, too”. Even if he didn’t know it.

And then that connection between the two of us, the strange thing that linked our emotions, had come up. It was like an air current; you could feel it, but you couldn’t control it. You could choose to leave or stay on it. You couldn’t see it, but you always knew it was there.

All my doubts of the human, the fear of him tricking me the entire time… they had been washed away like a great wave. I had known right then and there that the Viking was not lying. Because the magic was obviously not of my doing, and the human seemed to have no idea how to control it, it was impossible to lie with the ‘bond’ taking place.

I’d like to say that I was angry at myself for trusting the human. But I just can’t bring myself to it. I know that if the other dragons found out about this, then I’d be exiled or killed. I don’t even want to think of how our ancestors would react to this.

All of that seems… unimportant, in a way. Something far away that I couldn’t even hope to reach. So why bother?

A bird chirped loudly above me, pulling me out of my thoughts. I pricked my ears and watched it as it flew away, turning my head to follow it.

The human shifted beneath me, giving a small moan. I snapped my head around…just in time to hit my head on his own as he awoke with a start and attempted to jump to his feet. The two of us yelped and held our dominant paws (mine being my right, his being his left) to the areas that we’d been hit. Opening one eye, I looked at the still-groaning human and gave him a glare.

“Good going,” I grumbled. I leaned forward and stretched my back and wings out, then pushed on my lower half to stretch my front legs. Feeling a little more refreshed, I stood up and shook my body to get rid of the grass that had stuck to me.

I looked over at the human. He immediately averted his gaze. He glanced up at me several times and looked away, suddenly fascinated by a rock lying on the ground. “Awkward!” The Viking mumbled to himself.

I raised a brow. The human-dragon clearly was not going to make the first move.

I gave an internal sigh. Well, here we go. Time to jump into the ocean blind. I thought. Dragon of the Sun, if you’re watching, then make this work.

I spoke up in a calm voice, trying to gain the human’s attention without startling him. “Come on, we should get to work.”

The human snapped his head up and looked at me, standing up. “Really? Now? Uh, okay…”

I wrinkled my nose at his scent when it filled my nose, and my earlier thoughts on his metal-like smell returned to me. There was no way I was working with that. It smelled worse than carrion. “But first, you’re going to wash yourself,” I added as an afterthought.

“Huh?” His ears stood straight up. “I don’t smell bad!”

“Yes, you do, human. I can barely stand next to you!” I smirked when he glared and sniffed his chest.

The human turned his head away from me. “I don’t smell bad at all…uh…”

“What’s the matter, lost your adjective?” I asked with a grin, already lining up several sarcastic insults and passive-aggressive statements in my head. I blinked when the human shook his head and looked up at me seriously.

“No,” he answered. “It’s just that I don’t know your name.”

“Name?” I dumbly repeated. How absurd for a dragon to have a name! What’s the point when you can just tell who they are by scent and sight? Only the most important of things have names, like the Dragoness of the Moon and the Dragon of the Sun. Mere mortals have no need for a name, especially a rare Shadow-Blender such as myself.

“Yeah!” The human exclaimed, suddenly excited. His green eyes lit up like the stars and he padded towards me quickly. “So, what is it?”

“I don’t have one. What, are you saying that you do?”

He gaped at me for several seconds. Pulling himself together, the human said, “I’m Hiccup. But what do you mean you don’t have a—“

He was cut off by my roaring laughter. I leaned back on my feet, entire body shaking, and fell to the ground. “That’s,” I gasped, “your name?!” I continued to hoot for several minutes, limbs flailing in the air. I only rolled to my feet and stood up when I had finally calmed down.

“You done yet?” The human—no, Hiccup asked my dryly.

“No!” I chuckled. I sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Okay, now I am.” I grinned. “I can’t believe that you were named that! Why would you pick that, of all things?” I giggled.

Hiccup sat down across from me and sighed as if he’d explained this a million times. “It’s supposed to ward off trolls and evil creatures.”

“Oh, no! It’s Hiccup!” I jumped to my feet and ran around the irritated Viking in mock fear. “Everybody run! His eyes alone can freeze you on the spot!” I burst out laughing again. You’d think that humans, being incredibly self-centered, would name themselves after a mighty god or force of nature. Not a hiccup, of all things!

I was so distracted that it took me several seconds to process what the human told me next.

“Toothless. That’s your name.”

I stopped dead in my circling, eyes wide, ears sticking straight up, tail and wings frozen in spot.

Oh hell no.

Hiccup gave me a kind grin, like one of a father to a naïve child. “Toothless…yeah, that’s a good name. I like it!” He congratulated himself.

“Are you out of your mind?!” I gasped. “I don’t need a name! Nor do I want one! Especially one like that!” I unsheathed my teeth and yelled, “And I’m not toothless!” I felt my cheeks warm up when I realized that, underneath the embarrassment of such an awful name, I was flattered. But, in my defense, it’s not every day when a human gives you a name. Does that mean he wanted to be equals?

“You were just now!” Hiccup pointed out. Literally. He picked up his left leg and gestured it at me in an odd fashion.

“I don’t care!” I retorted. “So were you!”

“Yes, but I already have a name. You don’t. I’m not going to go around calling you ‘Night Fury’ or ‘dragon’ all day long. It’s a bit rude.” Hiccup smiled at me again.

“What? No, it isn’t! I’m perfectly fine with that!” I tried to reason, but it was no use. Hiccup’s grin widened, most likely deepening his will to use that stupid, idiotic, dumb, annoying, false, terrible, insolent name. He stood up and stretched, talking to me with that snarky smile I was growing to despise.

“Whatever, Toothless. I’m sticking to it. Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it!” He said after taking in my expression. “Besides, it’s not that bad. I know someone named Gobber. And I know another person named Fishlegs.”

“But fish don’t have legs,” I said in disbelief, caught off-guard. “Why on earth would you name yourselves things like that?”

Hiccup frowned. “Well, there is this one girl I know…”

For a few seconds, I thought he’d drop right back into that depressed cloud that the human had been hovering in for the past few days. To my relief, he seemed to snap himself out of whatever emotion had come over him. “Her name’s Astrid. I think it’s a really pretty name. It suits her.” At this, Hiccup’s eyelids drooped slightly, and a goofy grin slid across his face.

Well, someone’s been love-struck.

I opened my mouth to say that exact sentence. And right before I did, a piece of my memory flared to life.

When I had thrown Hiccup into this cove, a human had followed us. A female human. And Hiccup had screamed that word, ‘Astrid’, to her. At the time, I’d thought that maybe it was some strange human term for ‘go away’. But now that I realized that it was a name…

Was Astrid Hiccup’s mate? Sure, he’d been an outcast, but every female has her type. What if they had been secret lovers? What if they’d been arranging for hatchlings?

My heart skipped a beat. I’d been so close to killing her! I was pretty sure that humans, like dragons, have one mate for life and no one else. And he was so young! They both were! If I had succeeded in killing Astrid, would I have ruined Hiccup’s life forever?

“…of course, she hates me, so I’m not sure why she came here. It’s weird, because everyone else was here, too, which I don’t get. Maybe Fishlegs, but definitely not Snoutlout. Stubborn, hard-headed jerk he is. Great cousin. I always feel the love coming off of him.”

I snapped back into reality, my panic fleeing me like a fish from a strike. Relief washed over me seconds later.

Oh, thank the gods, I thought. That was almost bad. So it’s one-sided. Well, that’s not exactly great, either, but it’s better than those two being paired and me almost killing one of them. Damn, that was close!

I frowned when I suddenly realized what I had been thinking. Since when did I care that much about the human?

“Are you even listening to me?” Hiccup was suddenly right in my face. I yelped in surprise and jumped back, tensing on instinct. The human-turned-dragon couldn’t have looked more unimpressed. “I could have been telling you my life story, and you wouldn’t have even known.” He rolled his eyes. “I can feel the love coming off of you, too, Toothless!”

“I’m not Toothless,” I rejected, “and I was just thinking.” I sat down and curled my tail neatly around my feet, mimicking Hiccup’s position.

“About what?” He asked, tipping his head to the side.

“Just…names.” I finished lamely. There was no way I was going to tell him that I’d thought that he was mates with the girl he’d just said hated him. That would make him mad…or he’d get even more lovey-dovey with her. I really had no interest in human love affairs, or, on that note, any love affairs, and I definitely didn’t want to hear about the drama that came with them. There was enough of that going on here, in the cove.

Hiccup gave me a scrutinizing look. His sigh told me that he’d dropped the subject. “Uh, anyways, what were we talking about?”

I quickly went through our conversation. Back from the human names, the actual naming of myself (which I still refused to accept), Hiccup’s name, the name-calling, to…

“You smell bad.” I said bluntly. It was Hiccup’s turn to burst out laughing. I tried to keep a straight face, telling him that I was serious.

I was shocked to suddenly find myself joining the human in his amused peals. We were both lying flat on the ground, me on my back and Hiccup on his side, heads inches apart from each other. Even after I realized what I was doing, I couldn’t…stop…

I sucked in a deep breath and held it, trying to stop my now-gasping laughter. My entire body still shook with little fits, which I viciously fought down. After several seconds, I finally cleared my head enough to see that Hiccup was doing the same thing. He heaved and lightly batted my wing off of his chest (when did I do that?) and rolled onto his stomach. I turned around, also, and got to my feet.

“That was…” I trailed off, slightly alarmed. Not normal would be a good end to that sentence.

“Hysteria?” Hiccup suggested. “These past few days haven’t been exactly relaxing. You can’t just bottle your stress up and expect for nothing to happen…” He dropped his head, allowing it to plop on his forelegs. “I blame you for that, by the way.” He looked up at me and grinned slightly.

I snorted. “Go clean yourself.”

“But I don’t smell bad!”

“Don’t make me do it myself. I’m not afraid to treat you like a hatchling.”

At this, Hiccup’s brows furrowed and he frowned. Raising his head and turning it, he asked, “What do you mean—ooooh...No! I’m good!” He grinned cheekily, as if he were trying to reason with someone who was about to attack him. When the human still didn’t make any movements to do anything, I leaned swiftly towards him.

Hiccup jumped to his feet. “I’m up! I’m up! No need to do that! I’ll just…uh, I’ll go take a bath. Bye!” And then he tromped away, only looking back at me once.

I blinked. What was a bath? And why was he so repulsed by good hygiene? Personally, I enjoyed the feeling of cleanliness.

I simply put it off as a ‘strange human thing that I will never understand’ and watched as the brown Shadow-Blender made his way towards the lake. What is he doing?

The human nodded to himself, crouched, and jumped out towards the lake. His wings expanded for a split second and then shuddered. His tail bent the wrong way, and instead of going towards a small, secluded pool coming off of the lake, he spun midair and swerved to the side, landing in the deep end (not in the center of the lake; more off to the right.). What is he doing?!

My jaw all but dropped in shock and horror. Dragon or not, the lake was obviously cold. The shallower parts were frozen over, for the gods’ sake! Plus, neither Hiccup nor I knew if there were any undercurrents, and if there were, if they were strong enough to pull a dragon down. Only the strongest of our kind can survive in the water; our wings are hindersome beneath the waves, and they drag us down. Even I have trouble getting out of deep water—both literal and metaphorical.

So it wasn’t a big surprise when Hiccup didn’t resurface long after he should have.

I sprinted towards the lake, jumped a meter before the lakefront, and pushed off the edge. With a neat dive that sent several fish bolting, I crashed beneath the waves. The sudden onslaught of sheer cold and lack of oxygen almost made me lose my focus and rise to the surface. I gritted my teeth in an attempt to ignore it and started paddling towards the bottom of the lake, keeping my wings in and using my tail as a rudder. I prayed that there wasn’t any undercurrents; we’d both be done for, and our bodies would never be found.

A huge cloud of silt emerged in the dark water around me. I heard a muffled, slow-motion swooshing sound. I forced myself to pick up the pace. And as I did, I felt the one thing in the world that I didn’t need: a current. It had dragged Hiccup here, to the center of the lake, and he couldn’t break free of it. I flailed madly, forcing my body up and over it before I was sucked into it by greedy, invisible claws.

When I finally caught sight of Hiccup, my heart sank. He was struggling so hard, but it wasn’t enough. He was being dragged down. Looking at his body, I started to doubt myself. Hiccup was small for a Shadow-Blender, but I wasn’t sure if I would be able to grab him and pull him out of an undercurrent strong enough to hold a dragon down.

My mind flashed the alternative: leave him to die and save myself.

And then it went over the conversation we’d just had - Hiccup had given me a name. Me. A name. While unimportant to him, it was so much more to any dragon. I don’t know of any named dragon that isn’t the stuff of legends and dreams, whispered by mothers to hatchlings to inspire faith and courage. And these legends were only named because they were beloved dragons—beings that had done the best for dragonkind, saviors of the species and pure-hearted. Hiccup giving me a name meant that I was important to him—very important.

And if that were so, then he was very important to me, too.

The fact that we’d had a non-malicious conversation without any strings attached also fought against the alternative. We were making progress. We were…becoming friends.

I have to try! I swam above the panicking human and treaded, waiting for the right moment to dip in and grab him. He stilled as my shadow came over him and looked up at me with desperate, terrified eyes. Now!

I arched my back and sheathed my teeth halfway, plunging my head into the current and grabbing the human by his scruff. His body impulsively went limp.

I opened my wings, and with a great effort, began using them to push against the water. I paddled furiously, pulling my head up, trying to stop myself from being entombed in the current. Hiccup suddenly seemed to snap out of his numbness and began to struggle, fighting the current with all of his might. The silt around us kicked up again, quickly shrouding everything around us and rendering me blind.

It was sudden. One moment, we were fighting for our lives. And then we were spiraling out of control, flipping underwater, disoriented, unable to tell which way was up or down or right or left, quickly loosing oxygen. I blinked rapidly and tried to stop the spinning and still my head, hoping at least to tell what direction I was facing.

As my velocity decreased, I finally caught a glimpse of weak autumn sunlight. I pushed as hard as I could towards it, using my front paws to propel me foraward, then my hind paws, and then pulling all of my legs in a streamline position against my body to gain more distance. I stopped halfway and looked down, suddenly realizing something. Where’s Hiccup?

My lungs felt like they were on fire, begging for oxygen. I knew that I had been down for too long…The probability that Hiccup had passed out was very, very high.

Despite my pain, I ducked down again. I looked in every direction, begging the Dragon of the Sun to show me where my human companion was.

For once, my prayers were answered. I saw Hiccup, still trying to resurface, a few meters below me. His dull eyes were half-shut and his movements were weak. Without hesitation I swam behind him and grabbed the closest thing to me: his right shoulder. I turned and swam towards the sunlight, ignoring my aching muscles.

Come on! I thought. We’re almost there! You can see the sunlight!

When we were four meters away from the surface, Hiccup’s movements came to a near-standstill.

When we were two meters away, his body relaxed in my grip and a stream of bubbles shot out of his mouth.

One meter away, my vision began to darken.

I broke the surface and gasped heavily for air, trying to get some in around the bundle of flesh in my mouth. I quickly let go and lunged for Hiccup’s scruff, pulling his head into the air. I shook it wildly. Breathe! I ordered internally. Don’t you dare give up right now!

Hiccup’s body shuddered. And then he began to wheeze, coughing up the water that had filled his lungs vomiting the water he’d swallowed in an attempt to avoid drowning. I paddled furiously, feeling my muscles beginning to give out on me. In my position, I couldn’t turn and check for land without dropping Hiccup into the water or falling underwater again.

Hiccup gasped above me, taking in deep, shaky breaths. His ears shot up and he kicked his feet wildly. I let go of him.

“Woah!” Hiccup sunk and then resurfaced several seconds later, barely keeping his head above water. I turned around onto my belly, spotted the fastest way to the lake’s edge, and gestured soundlessly for Hiccup to follow. We both began to swim over to the precious land. It took maybe a minute or two, but it felt like eternity had passed when I shakily climbed out of the water, stumbled several meters, and fell down on the squishy grass in exhaustion. The cold air bit my scales, but it was more of an inconvenience than anything else.

Hiccup landed besides me. He silently crawled towards me, belly and tail dragging on the ground, and pressed himself up against me. His body was shaking violently.

He’s not completely dragon, I realized. He’s not as durable. That’s why he’s shaking, and I’m not, and why he’s much more skinnier than he should be. And that’s why he’s brown in color. He still has some human characteristics…

He’s hypothermic.

Without saying a word, I extended a wing and placed it over the Viking’s small body. I brought my tail over and wrapped it around Hiccup in an attempt to keep all the warmth inside him and not out. I gave a tired sigh and rested my head on my forelegs, looking at him.

“Thanks,” he mumbled. The human’s eyes closed. He didn’t open them.

I shifted. At least we were both safe now. What an exciting morning.

I would have addressed the fact that Hiccup was suddenly much more important to me than I’d thought earlier. I would have thought of the significance of giving me a name—no matter how dumb it was. I would have gone over my thoughts during the lake incident and worried over what could have happened, making me realize again how much I cared for him. I would have reflected on how I should be rejecting all of this and then reasoned with myself that we had a deal that, after recent events, wasn’t important to me at all. I would have decided to go all-in, doubt myself, and then stick with my original decision.

But I was just so tired.

Unlike earlier this morning, I didn’t wake with a start. I didn’t snap my eyes open, panic for a few seconds, and jump up and knock my head on Toothless’ chin. I very slowly returned to the world of the living, my mind gradually coming out of the haze that it was in.

At first, I thought it was night. It was dark. My sluggish brain took a few seconds to register that no, it was not night at all; I was under Toothless’ wing, and the gap between his shoulder and the ground showed that it was sunny outside.

I closed my eyes in contentment. It was really warm and calm and quiet. I wished that I could just go back to sleep.

Of course, my stomach chose that exact moment to growl. Loudly.

Oh, come on! I groaned internally. Externally, I squeezed myself together more, hoping to somehow muffle the sound.

The wing above me twitched, and, to my disappointment, lifted. Toothless looked at me with sleepy eyes, as if he’d just woken up, too. I smiled tiredly. Every muscle I had ached.

Toothless lifted his head and stared up at the sun. Slowly, as if moving his neck hurt him, he looked down at me. “Are you injured anywhere?”

“Mm-uh,” I hummed, only lifting my eyes to look at him.

“Well, now you’re just being lazy.” He gave me a pointed look and I let out a short laugh. “Come on, let’s get up. Sore muscles don’t go away by sitting around and doing nothing.” He lifted himself off the ground, wincing slightly, and began to stretch.

Reluctantly, I got up. I grimaced at the dull pain. “Can’t we just sleep some more?”

“No. What we can do is get to what we were supposed to, though.”

I gaped at him in disbelief. Toothless obviously was in pain, too. And he wanted me to fly?! Was he out of his mind?

He seemed to understand my line of thoughts. “You’re going to have to learn, anyways. Plus, you’re not going to be at full energy every time you have to take off. I’ve flown in worse conditions.” As he said this, the Night Fury began to turn around and pad off towards the rocky area of the cove. His pace started slower than usual, but he forced himself to walk at a steady trot.

“But I’m so tired!” I whined, chasing (slowly) after him. I let out an exaggerated moan at the pain. Trying to imitate Toothless’ deep voice, I said, “Hey, Hiccup! I just saved you from drowning! You actually passed out! But now that you’re awake, I’m going to teach you how to fly, even though we both hurt all over!” I halted in my ranting when I tripped, hissing in pain. Far ahead of me, Toothless laughed. “Oh, shut up!”

Toothless stopped near an outcropping on the cliff, where there was a ledge sticking out of the side. It was low enough that both of us could jump on it, but high enough that it would be easy to get a view of the entire gorge.

When I finally managed to get where Toothless was at, I sat down and bent over slightly. “What, you expect me to jump off that?” I joked.

“Yes. As you clearly demonstrated earlier, you don’t seem to know how to control your tail or wings when you’re in the air. We’re going to work on that first.” Toothless told me, dead-serious. I groaned. That sounded like a lot of work. Even though flying was exciting, I’d had enough of that for my day. I don’t see why we couldn’t just rest and wait until tomorrow.

To answer that, my stomach growled again. My cheeks grew warm in embarrassment. At least they couldn’t turn visibly red; I’d never hear the end of Toothless’s teasing – thank the gods for scales.

“Well, if we wait for tomorrow, we’ll both be hungrier.” Toothless chuckled, relaxing for the first time since we woke up. “Come on, Rumbles. Get up and onto the ledge.” The dragon then turned and jumped straight off the ground, flapping his gigantic wings once and landing on top of the ledge and out of sight. His head appeared over the edge. “Hurry up!”

I stood up, wincing at the pain that shot through my legs. I guess I have no choice, I thought in irritation. The more hungry I get, the weaker I’ll be. If I wait, I might never get the energy to do this at all. If that happens, we’ll both starve. A picture of the two of us lying next to each other, so thin our ribs could be counted and our legs looked like mere sticks, flashed through my head. I shuddered. Now that was a motivator.

I jumped up onto the side of the ledge and clambered my way up, kicking several stones behind me. I managed to get my chest above the edge of the ledge, but my hind legs had kicked a gap in the middle of it and were now stuck in it. I felt myself slipping.

Toothless casually leaned over and grabbed me by the back of my neck. He leaned all of his body weight to the side, holding his tail in the opposite direction for balance. I managed to scramble over the edge, and the dragon let go of me.

Toothless looked at my seriously, fixing me with his lime-green eyes. “You need to learn how to use your body less like a human, and more like a dragon. You’re still thinking, ‘this is taller than me, so I can’t jump on it’. If you keep believing that your strengths are constricted in the way a human body is, you’ll never fly.”

“How do you expect me to do that?” I asked, my tone annoyed. “I haven’t been a dragon for very long. There isn’t just a switch I can press.”

“Well, I’m going to cut out the cheesy ‘believe in yourself’ speech and just give it to you straight: trust your body and ignore your instincts. It seems you still have some of those annoying human ones.” He grinned. I didn’t.

“Annoying?” I stood up. “How are they annoying?”

“Well, I noticed that when you glided over the lake,” he nodded his head towards said body of water, “you seemed to panic once you were midair. You’re still stuck in the ‘I’m going to fall’ mindset. You need to get out of it, which brings me to the lesson!” He interrupted my (angry) response loudly at the end of his sentence, clearly getting tired of the argument. I gave him a weak glare, but didn’t say anything else. Even though I wanted to. Toothless really had no right saying that human instincts were annoying; if they really were, then we wouldn’t be alive. Then again, he isn’t the most modest dragon in the bunch.

“We’ll do hatchling-steps for now, since this is new to you,” Toothless started. “You’re just going to glide across the length of this cove right now. You need to get used to stabilizing your wings and tail.” He turned away from the lake and faced the destroyed wall of the cove. “To do that, you just need to tense them up, and, like I said before, trust your body. There’s several different angles you can do to do different things, which you will learn, but right now, we’re sticking to the basics. All you need to do is focus on keeping your wings straight and open, and your tail straight out behind you and flat. I’m going to repeat that: flat. The slightest tilt will send you crashing.”

I struggled to remember everything he’d just said. That was a lot of information. But I’d never known any of that…maybe that was the reason I’d always crashed when I tried to use my wings. I nodded to Toothless, albeit uncertainly.

“Alright. I’ll do it first. What I want you to take note of is how I launch,” Toothless instructed. “Watch me.”

He leaned down into a crouch, his right paw in front of the other. He was leaning forward on his front half, making his hind legs stand taller. His wings were half-stretched out (or else his right wing would smack me in the face) and his three tail fins were spread out to their full extent. I looked guiltily at his missing tailfin on his tailtip, but he snapped me out of it with more instructions.

“This is important. If you don’t lean like this, your hind legs won’t be able to push off the ground as powerfully, and you’ll have a very hard time getting into the air. Your hind legs are the strongest part of your body, then your shoulder muscles. They are used to push off the ground when walking, running, pouncing, and leaping. Remember that.” He suddenly tilted the two tailfins at the start of his tail. “These are one of the two pairs of tailfins we, as Shadow-Blenders, have. There the base-fins—“ he wiggled the pair of tailfins directly behind his wings—“and the tailtip-fins.” The Night Fury then fanned his single tailtip-fin at me. “The base-fins work as extra tailtip-fins. They’re used the most in landing, speeding up, slowing down, and taking off, but otherwise, keep them straight with your wings. If you’re tilting your left wing, tilt your left base-fin. Don’t try to flap them, because you’ll look ridiculous and strain them.” He looked at me, taking in my expression. “Are you getting any of this?”

I nodded. “Yes!” I paused, and grinned sheepishly. “It’s just so much information, though. Do you have to tell me the extras? I’m sure I’m gonna forget some of this…”

Toothless shook his head in an exasperated way. “Yes, I do. You need to know what they do, so you can use that information to fly in different ways without me telling you how. It’s kind-of like how my ancestors learned magic.” He snorted. “Plus, even I know that you’d end up asking ‘what’s that do?’ or ‘why?’ eventually.”

I looked down at my paws. He was right.

“Anyways, we’re almost done. All I need to tell you about are the tailtip-fins.” He wiggled his tail for emphasis. “These are the most important part of your body after the wings. They control what direction you turn in and keep you balanced. Because mine has gone, my tail is unbalanced, and my left base-fin isn’t enough. I can’t turn because the air under my body is unbalanced, and it sends me either crashing or spiraling out. I can glide for a distance, though, because it only requires for you to keep your body straight.”

I grimaced. “I am sorry about that.”

Toothless stopped. He lifted his head, relaxing out of his crouch, and stared into my eyes. After a few tense, awkward (at least for me) moments, he smiled, though it was strained. “It’s alright.”

My eyes widened.

I sensed that strange connection come between us again. I felt the truth in his statement. I could sense uneasiness behind the words, though, as if he was unsure if it was too soon. But before I could even try to find the rest of his emotions, Toothless turned his gaze away and broke the bond. I felt myself grinning nonetheless; he really, truly was on his way to forgiving me.

“Okay,” Toothless said, turning his head around and crouching again. “Now watch me.”

The Night Fury leaned back on his haunches and wiggled them. Then, he leaped into the air, keeping his front legs in and stretching out his wings. His wings quickly beat the air three times, and then Toothless leaned down, leveling his body out. His wings were perfectly straight, the tips barely moving. All three of his tailfins were parallel to the ground and looked almost flattened.

Toothless moved surprisingly fast. He’d only been about five seconds into his flight before he suddenly reared up, spread his base-fins up and backwards, and flapped several times. He landed neatly next to the remains of the landslide, folded his wings, and turned around to look at me.

“Now you try!” He called out, his voice echoing across the canyon walls.

I tensed. My heart drummed loudly in my chest. This was it.

“Okay, I can do this…I can do this,” I murmured to myself, leaning down as far as I could on my front legs and stepping close to the edge. “I just have to—“

“Don’t lean that much! You’ll never take off!” Toothless shouted. I let up, lifting my chest several inches higher. “Good! Now take your dominant paw and put it in front of you! You’ll use that to start your launch!” I placed my left paw in front of me and felt my claws dig into the rocky ledge beneath me. I took a deep breath and spread my wings out.

“Stop!” Toothless cried. I halted. “Weren’t you listening to me at all?! You’re forgetting your tailfins!” His tone had an underlying message of ‘you’re an idiot’. I grinned in embarrassment, shut my eyes, and concentrated on my four fins. I moved each one individually before spreading it out. Then, I worked on moving two in the same manner at the same time, and, finally, four. I gave a lot of attention to keeping the individual fins straight.

After a few minutes of making sure I knew how to move my tailfins, I opened my eyes. Toothless was pacing rather impatiently.

“Okay…crouch, lean, paw…” I checked my position, smiling slightly when it seemed to be right. “Tailfins…” Again, I opened and closed them to test them before straightening all four of them out and parallel to the ground. “Hind legs…” I tensed the muscles in my back feet and shoulders and spread my wings. I held my position for a second, trying to take it all in. If Toothless wasn’t correcting me, then I had to have it right.

I leaned back, pushed with my left paw, and then used the bundled-up energy in my hind legs to push me into the air. Instantly, I was overcome with pain. I gasped and grit my teeth, pushing past the unpleasant feling to try and straighten out my fins. Elation hit me when I realized I was midair, and I grinned widely, opening my mouth to call out to Toothless—

THUMP!

I screeched in surprise and pain when I fell to the ground less than halfway there and rolled. Groaning, I sat up, letting my wings simply spread out across the ground. I couldn’t help the disappointed frown as Toothless bounded over to me.

“I don’t understand. I did everything you did!” I told him in frustration. I glared at my feet. That split second before I’d crashed…it was like nothing I had felt before. I had felt so light and careless. I’d felt so free. It was as if I could do anything in the world. Nothing could have stopped me, nothing could have kept me trapped or confined. I was able to do whatever I wanted, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

Obviously, gravity wanted to teach me a lesson.

“Almost. You were distracted by your pain and forgot to lean forward, so you got unbalanced and fell.” Toothless leaned down and nudged my chin up, forcing me to look at him. “Quit moping! Did you really expect to get it right on the first try?” He tipped his head to the side slightly and gave me a small grin. “Though, I am impressed by your lack of mistakes. Maybe you do have some hope after all…Hiccup.”

I grinned at the encouragement. Pulling myself together, I fought off my aching muscles and stood up. “Thanks, Toothless.”

He nodded absentmindedly, then snapped back to attention. “Thank me later! Do you think that saying that will magically give you the ability to fly? Back to the ledge and try again.”

And that was the drill for the next two hours. Shake the pain off, go to the ledge, and take off. It doesn’t matter if you fail or do it right, you’re going again, and that’s that. Apparently, Toothless is a very strict teacher that focuses more on learning how things work and using it to your advantage; no muscle-memory. I’m so glad he doesn’t teach a class. (If he does, I pity the poor little things.) No matter what I did or what I was feeling, it was ‘go again, go again, go again’. Sometimes, I’d be given breaks, but that was only when Toothless seemed lost in thought…

My fails greatly outnumbered my successes. While I did make it over to Toothless’ spot near the landslide a couple of times, I would always forget something. Some of them were very basic, like my paw positioning before takeoff. Others were complex; at one point, my left base-fin and tailtip-fin weren’t aligned properly, and I spiraled midair and crashed into the cliff wall. Toothless had allowed me a break after that; probably because I was screaming how I’d broken my shoulder and was in near-tears. (I’m not weak! It had been agonizing!)

But no matter what, he’d urge me to go on, to keep moving, to ignore the pain. Sometimes, he’d offer encouragement. Others, he would outright call me an idiot. (Though, he can sort of justify it; some examples of him doing that are when I forgot to unfold my wings all the way or when I tilted my body in the wrong direction and flew into the cliffside. The rest of the mistakes that weren’t my fault were probably because he wanted to make fun of me.) But the whole time, even though he was very impatient, he kept a very calm air about him, and his eyes always shone with understanding at my pains. This strange, kind behavior from him confused me more than any of his teachings.

So, when I’d finally managed to get the entire thing right after a long string of painful failures, my mind was elsewhere.

 “Good job!” Toothless congratulated me, a broad smile fleshed across his muzzle, but it soon faded at my failure to move. “Chop, chop! I’m not getting any younger; let’s see if you can keep that up…” He sat up, pushing his belly and forelegs off the ground to be at my eye-level.

“Okay,” I replied, completely out of breath. “But first, Toothless, I need to ask you something. Just, please…don’t get mad.” I lowered my ears and ducked my head slightly.

Toothless’ smile vanished. “What is it?” He asked warily, shifting his weight from side to side.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I blurted. At his shocked expression I rushed to explain myself, “I mean, it’s not like I don’t like it or anything. I-it’s just different, because yesterday you were trying to kill me, and now you’re teaching me how to fly with no strings attached.”

He spoke up quickly. “Well, you do have to bring food back.”

“I would have anyways,” I said softly.

Toothless’ cautious expression melted. After a moment of silence, he said, “Let’s just say that the incident in the lake this morning made me reconsider a few things. I woke up long before you did and had time to think.”

I hadn’t realized that he’d fallen asleep in the first place. I pushed that aside, though. “Can’t you just tell me?” I pleaded. My brows tilted down. “Please.”

Toothless opened his mouth—and stopped. He studied me carefully. Then he dropped his eyes from mine and stared towards the lake, eyes distant. “There’s nothing to tell.”

“But there is,” I pressed. “And I think I should know. It’s about me.”

“It’s unimportant,” Toothless calmly said. “What matters is right now.”

My tail slashed across the ground. “But I want to know!” Toothless met my glare evenly, and I continued, “You can’t just make such a big change and not tell me about it!”

“What if I don’t want to?” Toothless snapped, getting to his feet. He trekked towards me menacingly, but I refused to budge. “Do I have to tell you my every decision? Do I need to explain why I want to sleep in one spot over another? Why do I have to justify everything I do?! I certainly don’t question you about your actions!”

“But this one involves me, so you should tell me!”

Toothless’ lime-green eyes narrowed. “I’ve never asked you about your decisions in the past, and all of them involved me! Why can’t you just accept that things have changed and move on? Let it go!”

“Why are you so secretive?!” I cried. “We’re practically living together! Wouldn’t you be curious, too, if I suddenly changed how I acted around you?” I felt my face wrinkle up in anger and clawed at the ground. Sometime during our conversation, my teeth had unsheathed fully. I quickly drew them back halfway, not quite sure if fully sheathing them would be the safest idea.

Toothless scoffed and threw his head back. “Hypocrite! You think you haven’t changed?” He began to pace around me in a short circle, his wingtips nearly touching mine when he came close. “You tried to attack me several times, too! And I believe it was you who got me trapped down here in the first place! But yesterday, you called a truce! For the sake of the Dragon of the Sun, you even named me!” He cried.

“Is that why you’re so snappy? The name? Because if you really hate it that much—”

Toothless shook his head. “It’s not about the name! It’s about you minding your own business!”

“But it has to do with me, and it’s confusing me! I want to know!” I yelled. I flinched slightly at the volume of my voice. I hadn’t meant to be that loud.

Toothless stopped in front of me. “Well, sometimes you just don’t get to!”

I gaped. Out of nowhere, a tidal wave of anger flooded my entire body. “Really?  That’s why you’re keeping this from me? So you can hold on to some illusion of power—“

Toothless tried to interrupt me. “—What? No—“

I didn’t let him. “—so you can still feel like you can control me—“

“I never—“

“—so you can find a way out of this gods-damned hole—“

Toothless’ eyes widened. “Hiccup! Sto--”

“—so you can use me—“

Toothless suddenly rushed forward, turning and slamming me with his shoulder, stopping me mid-rant. I stumbled, and he reared up on his hind legs and slapped me across face with his right paw, sending me tumbling to the ground. Sprawled across the dirt, I stared up at him wide-eyes, breathing in short, heavy gasps.

My heart panged when I realized what I’d done. I didn’t mean all that, I thought, so why did I say it?! Anger boiled up within me again, but not at Toothless.

“It’s because I care!” Toothless roared, landing on all fours and jumping back to avoid a possible rebound attack. “Is that such a crime?!”

My mouth moved up and down, but no words came out. The anger vanished instantly, quickly replaced with shock and fear of our fragile relationship being broken.

“So, this whole time, you thought that I was using you?” Toothless growled, standing straight and narrowing his eyes into slits. “Have you been using me? Were you planning on leaving forever once we were done with your training?” His voice shook, and hurt flared up beneath his eyes.

I shook my head wildly. “N-n-no! Of course not! I just…I don’t know why I even said that!” My voice took on a pleading edge. “I really didn’t mean any of that, I swear! I wasn’t thinking!”

“Obviously,” Toothless looked away from me. “Or you wouldn’t have told me how you really feel.”

“Toothless,” I whispered. His right ear, the one closest to me, twitched, but remained flat. “I’m so sorry. I truly did not mean that. I swear to all the gods.” I finally got to my feet and walked towards the unresponsive Night Fury, keeping my head and tail low. “I care about you, too.”

The dragon turned and glared at me. “How do I know you’re not lying to me?”

I flinched at the venom dripping from his words. “Because…” I scrambled for something that sounded reasonable, something that would help. “I was just overcome with anger,” I finally sighed, hanging my head. “I was mad because you wouldn’t tell me.”

“Obviously,” Toothless grunted. “Why must you want to know everything?”

“I just like to. It helps me understand things I don’t get,” I mumbled. To any passerby, it would have looked like I was talking to the ground. “And whenever I’m part of something, I want to know why. Before, I never really had a friend. Everyone thought of me as pathetic and wasn’t afraid to say so. For some reason, that made them think that they could make all of my decisions for me. The problem is that all of them were made specifically to get me out of the way…” I shifted my weight back and forth slightly in nervousness, waiting for a reaction. When none came, I continued, ”I don’t like it when people talk about me behind my back or make decisions related to me without telling me.”

“Why not?” Toothless asked, his voice cautious. “As long as it doesn’t hurt you, it shouldn’t matter.”

I finally raised my head and met Toothless’ gaze. He didn’t look angry anymore. He looked hurt and confused. Most of all, he looked wary. “My father went behind my back and told one of our blacksmiths, Gobber, that I was to be his apprentice,” I confessed, “and he didn’t tell me about it until my starting day. He didn’t even give me a choice. I like Gobber and all, but still, it hurt.”

Toothless paused, and then said in disbelief, “So, you’re mad at me because I hit one of your issues, and then refused to solve it?”

“It’s not an issue!” I said indignantly. “But, yes, that’s the basic part of it.”

The Night Fury didn’t say anything. He leaned away from me and began to stare at the lake, as if the answer would come up and fly out of it.

“Toothless,” I said, trying to sound as confident as I could, “I wasn’t lying when I said I cared.”

“I know,” he said quietly. So quiet, I could barely hear him.

I sighed in relief. “I really am sorry. I didn’t mean a word of it.” I paused when Toothless only nodded. “This is where you say you’re sorry for keeping secrets.” I nudged him with a paw, grinning to show him that I was joking.

Toothless gave a nervous laugh; the kind you give to someone when you know they’re about to beat you senseless, but they’re being nice before they do it. But then he shook his head, and raised his voice in a careful, uncertain tone. “Hiccup?”

I blinked, confused. “Yes?”

He stared at his feet and shifted his weight. “If you could be a human again, right now…would you? Would you leave all of this?”

I froze.

Would I?

Of course I wanted to be a human again. It was my true nature, the thing I had been all of my life until just recently.

But Toothless...

He was just as important to me as I was to him. We were two pieces of a gigantic puzzle, and each of us was made of smaller pieces. When we tried, we worked together effortlessly, as if we were always meant to be together.

When Toothless tried to leave, I was broken. I had no doubt in my mind that he’d feel the same way if I abandoned him. Even if he had problems showing his emotions to others, he’s just told me that he cared about me. And I had done the same, and I had meant it.

Still…I did want to be a human…but at the same time, I wanted to be with Toothless. I’d never felt this way around anyone else. I’d never felt open. I felt like I could be myself and not have to worry about the consequences. I didn’t want to give that up. I didn’t want to give up the only person who’d even tried to understand me.

I didn’t want to hurt Toothless, not after I’d just come within inches of breaking apart our relationship forever. But I didn’t want to lie.

Unfortunately, in this case, there is more than black and white. I was stuck smack-dab in the middle of the grey. Black? White? I couldn’t decide. Especially such an important question as this, sprung out of nowhere.

“Toothless, I…” I took a deep breath. Toothless winced, and looked away, shoulders hunching and wings drooping. I grimaced, as if trying to prepare him for what I was about to say. “I don’t know.”

Toothless looked up at me, hurt clear in his eyes. “You don’t know?” He repeated bitterly.

“No,” I gently replied, “because I want to stay with you and fix all of this. But I miss my family. I just…I don’t know.”

“Your family? That’s what’s holding you back?” Toothless looked into my eyes. I quickly saw the disbelief behind them. “From what I’ve got, they’re unappreciative towards you and shun you for being different.”

“…Yes,” I sighed. “But don’t you miss yours?”

Toothless’ ears twitched. “I got better.”

We lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. Toothless ducked his head, hiding his eyes from me.

I felt so angry at myself. I should know the answer. But I couldn’t decide! And now, because of my uncertainty, I’d just severely hurt Toothless. Again. As in, for the second time in the same conversation. It looks like I win this year’s ‘Soulless-Jerk-of-the-Year Award’.

I have to make this right, I thought. He’s never going to want to be near me again if I don’t.

I got up and stepped towards the Night Fury. He refused to look at me.

With a deep breath, and leaned down and pressed my head against his, rubbing my cheek on his face. “I’m sorry, I really am,” I told him. “I honestly don’t know. I can’t…I don’t know how to answer that, not this suddenly.”

For a moment, I was afraid that he would ignore me. Then, he pressed his head against mine. “I understand,” he murmured. “I shouldn’t have asked.” The dragon leaned down and pressed his forehead on my neck, and the base of his neck on my chin. Then he leaned back, out of my reach.

“Toothless…” I started, but he shook his head.

“It doesn’t matter. I couldn’t have expected an answer,” Toothless sighed, closing his eyes momentarily. He lifted his head and opened them, offering me a small and obviously forced grin. “Let’s just get back to training, okay?”

“You want to ignore this?” I asked softly.

“...No,” the dragon responded in a tone equal to mine. “I just want to address the things we’ve established, and ignore the rest. They’re irrelevant.”

“Those things being…?” I asked warily.

Toothless gave me a real smile this time. “That we care about each other, and…” He sighed again, and continued in a slightly exasperated, half-joking tone, “we have to work a lot harder at this if we want it to work out.”

I said the first thing that came to mind, unable to withstand the tension of the situation any longer. “That was a terrible attempt at a hint.”

Toothless laughed. “Alright,” he chuckled, “now let’s get back to work.”

About an hour and a half had passed since Hiccup and mine’s argument.

While I had been very upset at first, I got over it. Hiccup had apologized, and I’d long-since learned from recent events that holding a grudge did nothing but make everything worse for you. If we wanted this friendship to work, then we’d have to make amends. For me, that would be letting things go.

Still, I was troubled by our conversation. Would Hiccup leave me if given the choice? His ‘I don’t know’ answer had been infuriating…but truthful. And while I was still a little angry about that part of the conversation, I knew that it was only to be expected. I had gone out of line, asking a serious question like that, so little into our relationship. It was like requesting to be mating partners with a dragon you’d just met: rude, disrespectful, awkward, and, most of all, only ending with someone getting hurt.

I was still a little surprised at myself for outright telling Hiccup how I felt. It was a spur-of-the-moment, reckless sort of thing, something I hadn’t planned on doing. I’d been consumed by rage and a strange desperation to prove myself right to Hiccup.

I guess I really can’t deny his importance to me, huh?

But Hiccup had desperately tried to prove himself to me, too. That meant that he cared about me just as much as I did to him. That alone made me calm down and even try to trust him, even after he’d said that maddening ‘I don’t know’ answer. Hiccup cared about me, and I cared about him. I didn’t want to turn our relationship back into the two of us out to kill each other. So, I forgave him, and pushed all my doubts to the side.

We had work to do, after all. Flying is hard to get down. I was surprised at Hiccup’s progression in it, but something in the back of my head told me that something was off. Hiccup didn’t seem like…himself. He was the same sarcastic, oversensitive, chatty fishbone that I’d met on our first couple days together. Still, there was a part of him that seemed to be dying off, like a brave little flame clutching to its ember. I couldn’t place it.

I pushed the unsettling thoughts away and focused back onto the lesson.

“Okay, Freckles, now that you’ve got the gliding part down, we’re going to take the next hatchling-step,” I told Hiccup after he’d done his thirteenth successful landing in a row in front of me. He groaned and flopped to the ground, breathing heavily.

“Why?” He whined. “We’ve already done so much work! Can’t we wait until tomorrow?”

My ears pricked involuntarily when the lazy human’s stomach suddenly roared, demanding food. I smirked. He cringed in embarrassment.

“Your stomach says no, Rumbles. Besides, we haven’t done that much! And,” I paused and looked up at the sun, judging the time by its position, “we still have several hours of daylight left. That’s plenty of time to get this part down, at least. We’ve passed the hardest part already!” I grinned overenthusiastically, enjoying every second of Hiccup’s dismay.

“Ugh!” He exclaimed, shakily pulling himself to his feet. “I can’t believe you’re making me do this.” He rolled his eyes in exasperation.

I raised a brow. “I’m not making you do anything.” I felt my smile widen. “Your stomach is.”

Hiccup mumbled something along the lines of ‘stupid, arrogant dragon’, and began to turn around to head towards the takeoff-ledge. I quickly darted ahead of him, taking the lead to our designated teaching spot. I stopped, waited, and remained on the ground while Hiccup finally scrambled up the ledge.

He tipped his head to the side and leaned slightly over the edge. “Why are you down there?” Hiccup asked.

I frowned. I couldn’t show him what it was like to turn because, obviously, I couldn’t. I’d be knocked off-balance and fall.

A sudden torrent of regret and sadness hit me hard. Ever since Hiccup had shot me down, I’d purposely ignored the loss of my flight. I’d even tried to kid myself into thinking I could use my magic to heal it, but more than one dragon is always needed when fixing wounds such as amputations. And now, it was all coming towards me at once, completely unexpected. The only reason this hadn’t happened before was because I could still glide, even if it was only in a perfectly straight line.

I missed flying. A lot. I missed the feelings of the wind rushing past you and how small and insignificant everything looked from above. I missed the freedom and the power that came with it, the ability to do whatever you wanted.

“Toothless?”

“Huh?” I snapped my head up, looking at Hiccup’s quizzical expression.

“…is something wrong?” He worried, leaning over and beginning to jump off the ledge.

“No!” I said quickly, stopping him. Hiccup scrambled back just in time before he fell face-first to the ground. “I was just thinking, is all. And…on second thought, you should come down here so I can show you what to do.”

Hiccup shrugged and jumped off the ledge, using his wings to cushion the once-dangerous fall into a soft landing. I started to back away from him, causing him to shoot me a confused and slightly-wounded look. I laughed to try and trick him into thinking that I was just fine.

“I need to have room to show you what to do. I can’t turn, remember?” I explained. My somewhat-genuine smile vanished, and I tried to force a fake one.

To distract the Viking, I spread my wings and tailfins out to their fullest. Hiccup’s mouth opened slightly and he let out an almost-silent ‘ooooh’, finally realizing what I was intending on doing. My tail panged slightly, reminding me once again on how I would never fly again. I shook off the treacherous thoughts as quickly as I could and focused on telling Hiccup what to do.

It wasn’t hard, since he already looked like his was dreading the lesson. Honestly, that human could be so lazy. So his muscles were a little sore!

“Alright, Browny! Guess what you get to learn what to do now?!” I shouted in an overexcited, cheery voice. I made sure to stretch my smile as far as it could go.

Hiccup groaned. “Getting higher?” He said dryly.

“Close, but no. Actually, not close at all. We’re going to focus on turning.” Hiccup nodded warily, having already seen what would happen if he tried to turn and do it wrong. I’d attempted to change my direction in flight several times while I was trying to escape the cove, failing miserably each time.

I twisted my body down to the side so all of my weight was situated on my right legs. I moved my wings, tail, and tailfins along with it, ignoring when one wing hit the ground. “You’ve already got the basics of keeping your tailfins straight and aligned with your wings. Now, you’re going to use that knowledge to teach yourself how to turn mid-flight.” I grinned at the human’s shocked expression. “Don’t worry, I’ll tell you the basics. But then, you’re on your own. Glad you listened to me earlier?”

Hiccup nodded, but then shook his head. “I don’t know…what if I fall in the lake again?” He pawed at the ground nervously, tail flicking.

I snorted. “You won’t. And if you do, you’ll only land in the shallow parts and get covered in ice and water. The deep part’s on the opposite end, see?” I nodded towards the lake and continued without pausing, “Now listen carefully. I won’t repeat myself.”

All traces of doubt gone, Hiccup nodded determinedly. “Okay.” He trained his pine-green eyes on me, the same color as the trees around us, and stopped moving altogether.

I tilted my wings and body in the opposite direction. Out of habit alone, my base-fins and tailtip-fin made the proper adjustments. “Like I said earlier, you always keep your base-fins aligned with your wings. They help you catch more air beneath your body and let you fly faster. It’s the best feeling in the world to ride on top of a warm air current and not have to do anything…” I trailed off into thought for a second. Realizing what I was doing, I snapped myself out of it.

I continued on as if nothing happened, “The trick to this is your tailtip-fins. While you keep your base-fins the same as your wings, your tailtip-fins work individually. You’ve noticed by now that they are much more flexible than your base-fins, right?” Hiccup nodded. “Good. You see, with turning, there’s a lot of things you can do. Sometimes, your tailtip-fins will be straight with your wings, but other times, you’ll have to angle one straight towards the ground and the other flat. But that’s only in extremes, like when you’re falling or making a very sharp turn. The basic form you use for flying is this.”

I held my tailtip-fin out at an angle above the ground. All of the spikes pointed at the sky and would have been opposite to my other tailtip-fin—had it been there. In the past, both the fins would have formed a shape that started wide, went down on two slanted lines, and tapered to a single point that looked similar to an upside-down mountain. I looked up at Hiccup, who, thank the gods, managed to figure that part out all on his own and was currently mimicking my solitary tailfin.

“Why not just use the same position as I do when I’m gliding?” Hiccup spoke up, very confused.

I grinned. I was hoping that he’d ask that. “Gliding and flying are two completely different things,” I explained. “Gliding focuses on catching air underneath your body and moving a short distance. Flying focuses on moving the air around you and covering longer, wider distances. If you tried flying with the gliding tailtip-fin position, you’d be much slower, and you wouldn’t be able to turn very well at all. ” As an afterthought, I sarcastically added, “You should have known that!”

Hiccup nodded, completely unfazed, and I continued with the lesson.

“For now, you should always fly with that tailtip-fin position,” I instructed, nodding at Hiccup’s tailtip-fins for emphasis. “At the speed you’re going to go, you shouldn’t worry about changing angles or positions. That’s used for gaining or losing speed and doing tricks like flipping, which I really don’t want to see you try to do. So keep it simple for now.

“What you do need to worry about, though, is your tail. If you try to keep it straight in a turn, you’re going to go nowhere but the ground. Always twist it with your body.”

“What about sharp or wide turns? How do I do those?” Hiccup interrupted, eyes twinkling in curiosity.

I nodded. “Good question. That has to do with the angles of your tailtip-fins. If you want to make a wide turn, then flatten out your tailfins more, but be careful not to make them too straight, or you’ll get stuck going in one direction. To make a sharp turn, you have to pull your tailtip-fins, base-fins, and wings in a little and tilt one tailtip-fin straight down and the other in the regular position.” Hiccup looked at me like I was speaking an alien language. I sighed. I was never that good at teaching. “Here, I’ll show you. This is a wide turn…”

I ran in a straight line, wings and tailfins out as if I were in flight, and began to slowly turn, flattening  my tailtip-fin out and angling my wings and base-fins. I felt a pang of embarrassment flow through me, knowing full well how idiotic I looked. It was quickly replaced by longing. I tried to shove it away. Now is not the time to mourn over my losses!

In an attempt to get rid of the distracting emotion, I stopped, and said, “And this is a sharp turn.”

Again, I ran in a straight line, pretending to be in flight. I made sure to head towards Hiccup. Then, I pulled my wings, base-fins, and tailtip-fin in slightly and turned right. I pushed my right tailtip-fin straight down. The result was me seemingly spinning in a tight little circle and stopping halfway. I came to a halt in front of Hiccup, who still looked confused.

The brown Shadow-Blender nodded slowly. I had no doubt in my mind that he would not remember any of that. But still, I asked, “Are you ready to try now?”

Hey, I might not be a good teacher, but I do know that learning from experience is the best way to go. Hiccup won’t learn how to fly properly without making some mistakes.

Hiccup nodded much more enthusiastically this time, suddenly eager to get out of my teachings. “Yeah!” He turned and scrambled back up to the ledge. “Watch me get this on the first try!”

“Remember to flap your wings before or during your turn,” I advised. “If you don’t, you’ll just keep losing altitude and turn it into a fancy glide.”

Hiccup nodded absentmindedly. He crouched low and went into the proper pre-flight positionings. Then, the Viking wiggled his rump for a split second and took off into the air. He started to glide down the same path he’d done at least a hundred times.

I took off running, kicking dirt up with my feet. I stayed below Hiccup, in his shadow, sprinting to stay directly below him. “Do I regular or wide turn for now!” I called. “Sharp turns are too complex!”

“Okay!” Hiccup answered far from above, his voice tiny. He flapped his wings, gaining altitude. We were getting very close to the cliffwall now. I panted somewhat nervously, tongue hanging from my mouth, and glanced up at the human to make sure he hadn’t somehow fallen asleep midflight.

Then, he began to turn. Hiccup tilted his body to the left, keeping his wings in a straight, vertical line. His base-fins followed the same motions, but I only looked at them for a split second. It was his tailtip-fins I was more focused on.

They were in the default position I had shown him, though his left tailtip-fin was angled slightly down. I grinned in excitement. I hadn’t told Hiccup to do that! I’d specifically left that part out so he would learn to do it himself. But it seemed my ‘learn-by-knowing-how-it-works’ tactic payed off.

Halfway through the turn, Hiccup flapped his wings once, letting out a victory cry. I joined him, only pausing to catch my breath when I needed to jump over or swerve around a boulder. Then, the Viking straightened out, reared up, and flapped several times, holding his tailtip-fins back straight. He landed straight from that spot onto the ground (very clumsily, I might add.) and turned to me with the biggest smile I’d ever seen from him. I knew I was mirroring it.

“I did it!” Hiccup cried, bouncing on his feet like a hatchling. “That was awesome!” He leaned forward and rubbed his face against mine quickly before pulling back and dancing around me in a half-circle. “Let’s do it again!”

I blinked several times, watching as the Viking turned and began to run around the lake, rambling the entire time, not even giving me a chance to react. My cheek still felt like he was rubbing against it.

I had felt that same way on my first success, I thought solemnly. But seeing Hiccup’s overjoyed expression, though it brought another wave of nostalgia, ruled out the sadness with pride and…happiness. I closed my eyes and allowed myself to just feel. I knew I would not get over losing my flight in a single day, and that it would hurt. But I would deal with it, just like everything else in life. And like all tragedies, it would slowly stop hurting, until it barely did at all. Right now, I couldn’t wallow in self-despair. Besides, the fact that Hiccup had actually flown on his first day was making me just as happy as he was.

Well, maybe not just as happy, but pretty damn close. Did that mean we were making progress? Were we forming…a friendship?

I opened my eyes and saw that Hiccup was already waiting on the ledge for me. I seemed to have been thinking for too long, though, since he took off again.

I watched as the Viking went into another ‘regular’ turn, flapping his wings several times to speed up. He’s going too fast, I realized. His tailfins aren’t angled correct—ooooh, that had to hurt!

I began to run towards the grounded Hiccup, the concern washing away when he got up and shook his body in frustration. Stopping in front of him, I told him, “You were going too fast. You should have widened your tailtip-fins out more or brought your wings and tailfins in and tried a sharp turn.”

Hiccup nodded sullenly. His wings drooped and he hung his head. “I thought I got it,” he murmured.

“Nobody gets it right on the first go,” I tried to sound comforting. I pushed my single-finned tail under his chin and forced him to raise his neck. “Don’t be a sore loser. Practice makes perfect!”

Hiccup brightened considerably. Boy, this human perks up at just the slightest bit of encouragement!  I thought in amazement. Maybe I should change my teaching tactics a little.

The Viking folded his wings behind him, panting slightly. “Will you come with me this time?”

I nodded. “Of course.”

Hiccup swooped above me, his brownish-black form highly contrasting against the red-and-orange sky. He pulled his wings in, tilted his body sharply to the right, and twisted midair, flying perpendicular to his original direction. Then, he tucked his wings in and headed straight for the ground, landing awkwardly and sprinting to avoid falling head-over-tail.

I silently made my way over to him, eyeing how his wings and tailfins were trembling. The human’s head was bent low and he was panting heavily.

“That was good,” I said, “but you’re overworking yourself.” I rolled my eyes when the persistent little thing shook his head and straightened in a false act of power.

When Hiccup had gotten the basics of turning down, which had taken several hours and lots of crashes, he had seemed to make it his personal mission to learn how to fly in a single day. It was an impossible task. We still had to cover gaining altitude (it may seem simple, but it did have complex tailfin movements, and if one did them wrong, they would crash. It was why I couldn’t just fly straight out of the cove.), landing properly, gaining and losing speed at will, diving, and so much more. It was just too much.

Hiccup, being the incredibly stubborn Viking he is, had refused to believe it, and had resumed practicing. He even continued to do it after I had simply stopped giving him instructions. Of course, I still talked to him, but I never told him what he did wrong or right.

Stupid human.

“I’m fine,” Hiccup gasped. “Really.”

“No, you’re not.” I flashed my wing out, slapping him right in the shoulder. Hiccup flinched and took a sharp intake of breath, using his own wings to block his body from me. “See? You’re in pain. Now, for the love of the Dragon of the Sun, go sit down and rest!” I gave him a glare, staring him down when he tried to resist. “Seriously, Hiccup!”

The fight immediately went out of him. Hiccup just stood there, panting, and then nodded. He turned away and began to walk towards the tree-covered area of the cove (moving out of the stray pine-trees in the process), tail dragging on the ground. After a few seconds of internal debate, I followed after him, running until I caught up to him and walked side-by-side with the Viking. We finished the short walk there in silence.

Hiccup dropped to the ground heavily once he was under the trees. He curled up in a ball, slowly regaining control of his breathing. I was shocked that he hadn’t just passed out. (I’ve actually seen dragons do that midair…it’s pretty funny. If they don’t get hurt, that is!)

I sniffed a spot next to Hiccup before sitting down. Blankly, I gazed around me, a little bored by the situation. If Hiccup fell asleep, there really wouldn’t be anything for me to do. Maybe I could try to catch some fish…

“Hey, Toothless?” Hiccup spoke up after a long, boring, awkward silence. I turned to look at him, perking my ears slightly to show that I was listening. “What’s the Dragon of the Sun? You keep mentioning him.”

I felt my jaw drop. Who was the Dragon of the Sun?! That was like asking what the sea was!

“How can you not know?!” I gasped, jumping to my feet.

Hiccup blinked in surprise. “Well, I wasn’t born into dragon culture or anything.”

Oh. Right.

I felt an embarrassed smile form on my face. To cover it up, I said, “He’s one of the two gods who formed the world. He lives in the sun.”

Hiccup ‘s ears twitched, interesting alight in his eyes. “He formed the world? With who else?”

“The Dragoness of the Moon, of course!” I laughed. Surely Hiccup would at least know that one. There was always a god or goddess of death in any culture. But Hiccup’s blank expression told me that he had no idea who even the Dragoness of the Moon, the most divine of the gods, was.

“Does she live in the moon, then?” Hiccup asked, furthering my belief that he was in need of some serious religious teachings. How could he possibly be walking around as a dragon without knowing about the mighty duo?

I shook my head, grinning. “The moon is her eye.” I snorted at how quickly Hiccup’s interested expression evaporated. “Her other eye was torn out by the Dragon of the Sun. That’s why he’s in the sun, because she put him in it as punishment.”

“Woah, woah, woah!” Hiccup cried. “I thought you liked the Dragon of the Sun. Why is he seen as…”

“Bad?” I finished. Hiccup nodded. “Well, not everyone is perfect. Even the gods.”

Hiccup gave me another blank look. I sighed. “I’m going to have to explain this one, aren’t I?”

Hiccup nodded sheepishly. “Well, yeah. You can’t just tell me one part of it and expect me to get the rest. It’s like going up to someone and saying, ‘wanna hear a story?’, and then walking away!”

I gave him a warning glare. “Quiet, or I won’t tell you.” When the Viking instantly fell silent, I began:

“In the beginning, the earth was just a dark, rocky place that could hold no life on it. It was flat and smooth all the way around, like an egg. Which, actually, is exactly what the earth was. The egg floated in the heavens for millions of lifetimes, nurturing the creatures within, the only two living things. This time is usually seen as an evil place, since the gods weren’t born yet. It’s called the ‘Prebirth’. If someone wishes you to that place, it is the greatest insult. Dragons have killed each other over it. And it’s completely…well, the only term for it would be ‘legal’. Don’t give me that look! Yeah, that’s what I thought…

“Aah…where was I? Oh yes! The Prebirth ended. The top and bottom of the world cracked, and a blinding light spread across the entire planet. Two dragons, fully-grown, crawled out of the cracks and collapsed onto the ground. The Dragon of the Sun came out of the top of the earth, and the Dragoness of the Moon the bottom. When they came out of their shared egg, the sun and moon began to form. The sun took shape above the Dragon of the Sun, and the moon above the Dragoness of the Moon.

“But there was a problem. You see, the Dragon of the Sun and Dragoness of the Moon weren’t exactly best friends. In fact, they hated each other. They only knew the other existed because they would catch a glimpse of the other’s heavenly body, but it was enough to send them into a rage. Both of the two wanted the earth for themselves.

“So, they set out on a journey towards each other. They flew across the egg of the earth and met halfway, clashing in battle. The Dragoness of the Moon was smaller than the Dragon of the Sun, but faster. The Dragon of the Sun had brute force and sheer size on His side. He was two times bigger than the Dragoness of the Moon, so when He fought Her, He overpowered and beat Her. Afterwards, He started to destroy everything in His path in a show of power. When the Dragon of the Sun was done wrecking their home, though, He turned His sights on the Dragoness of the Moon. To humiliate Her, He struck Her and ripped out Her left eye.

“The Dragoness of the Moon, in a fit of rage, gathered up all of Her power and shot the Dragon of the Sun in the chest. She grabbed him, spread Her enormous wings, and began to fly Him off the earth. The Dragon of the Sun, too weak from His rampage and stunned by the sheer force of the blow, wasn’t able to do anything. Then, the Dragoness of the Moon became the first of our kind to use magic, and thrust the Dragon of the Sun in the sun and sealed Him in it. After that, She flew to the moon and used Her magic to become one with it, replacing Her right eye with the moon so She could see everything on earth. She reformed it as it was before the Dragon of the Sun had destroyed everything.

“The Dragon of the Sun wasn’t done yet. He begged the Dragoness of the Moon for mercy. Eventually, the Dragoness of the Moon succumbed to His constant pleas and released Him. This is seen as the Dragoness of the Moon’ biggest mistake in history; because, instead of going after Her, the Dragon of the Sun set to destroying the earth, knowing that the Dragoness of the Moon’ magic was far greater than His own. He wanted to get rid of Her possessions, so She would have nothing, just like Him. He dug deep caverns, formed sharp mountains, and flattened almost everything until only a few islands remained.

“The Dragoness of the Moon was horrified at what She had done. But whenever She tried to stop the Dragon of the Sun, He simply put a shield around Himself, rendering Her attacks useless. Her magic was still too weak to break it, and the Dragon of the Sun refused to listen to Her when She cried out for him to stop.

“When the Dragon of the Sun eventually came to a halt due to exhaustion, the Dragoness of the Moon called a truce. She told the Dragon of the Sun that She didn’t want their home to be wrecked any further, and if no single dragon could have it, then they should both share it equally. The Dragon of the Sun grudgingly agreed, knowing that if He refused, the Dragoness of the Moon may unleash another torrent of magic onto Him.

“After the truce was formed, the Dragon of the Sun began to reshape the earth. He built larger islands, enormous continents, gorges for rivers, and everything else. Then, He opened his mouth and breathed water onto all of the earth, filling the entire planet up. The Dragoness of the Moon then took Her part, and used her own breath to give life to the creatures of the world. Plants sprung up, fish began to swim, and animals like dragons and humans began to walk the earth. The stars are Her footsteps in doing all of this.

“The Dragon of the Sun went down on the future leaders of the more intelligent creatures and taught them about laws and order. He showed them how to run a civilization, pack, or even a family, depending on the species. He taught them about sins and truths and about Himself and the Dragoness of the Moon. This knowledge was supposed to be passed down to all species, but only the dragons remembered it.

“The Dragoness of the Moon, in turn, told the world of lies and rejection. She knew that the Dragon of the Sun was starting to win their subjects’ favor, and that He was tipping the scale in His direction. The Dragoness of the Moon evened it out by teaching all who were willing to listen how to fight, kill, steal…pretty much any negative action. In doing this, She inspired fear and admiration of Her, making her even more influential.

“It’s common knowledge that the Dragoness of the Moon is more powerful than the Dragon of the Sun. But this isn’t because of the fear of Her; it’s because She carries the heavy burden of death on Her shoulders. The Dragoness of the Moon created life, and, therefore, She has to take it. She only comes to take those away when it is their time, and it is said that She is very kind in doing so. The Dragoness of the Moon is loved because, instead of being cruel, She waits until She no longer can to take out any living being. The Dragoness of the Moon loves us, you see.

“The last thing the two did before fully returning to their roles was make smaller, weaker gods. They sent those gods to specific places, like forests, or oceans. Some of the gods were given topics to rule over, like wealth and secrets.

“When the Dragoness of the Moon and the Dragon of the Sun were finished with the mortals, they returned to their heavenly bodies, where they earned their names from. The Dragon of the Sun went back inside the sun to keep it burning and warm, so He could keep his subjects alive. The Dragoness of the Moon wrapped around the globe and allowed Herself to become one with the moon again. The two came upon an agreement where the Dragon of the Sun would come out in the day, so He would be worshipped in the day, and the Dragoness of the Moon would come out at night, so She would be worshipped at night. The only exception to this is when one prays about something similar to death or war; the only god they pray to for those two subjects is the Dragoness of the Moon. But, dragons may only pray to the two in times of great emotion, or both of them will think that they are just lowly gods in our eyes. And…that’s how the world came to be, I guess.”

Hiccup stared at me in awe, clearly having not expected such a detailed backstory. I guess he’d just assumed that all dragons were barbarians, since a dragon and human had never really bonded or have been able to communicate with each other. Of course, us dragons had assumed that humans were just overdramatic monkeys that knew how to kill very well.

“Wow,” he said. “That’s pretty cool. I never knew any of that…do you truly believe all of it?”

“Of course!” I grinned at the absurdity of the statement, shifting my position slightly so I was lying next to Hiccup and still able to get a good view of him. “What, you think I’d just go running around without any gods to look up to?” On a more serious note, I added, “You believe in them, don’t you? I mean, you are a dragon now…you should believe in the dragon gods.”

Hiccup shrugged. “I don’t know…it doesn’t sound much like my gods, but then again, it could be my culture that is wrong…”

I easily picked up the hint. Hiccup wanted to tell me about his world.

And I so did not hear about it. My explanation of the origins of the Dragon of the Sun and Dragoness of the Moon would be considered very short, and the Dragoness of the Moon was already showing Herself over the horizon. With Hiccup’s tendency to overdetail everything, we’d probably end up talking about his gods the entire night and into the morning.

So, instead, I just smiled cockily and said, “It probably is.”

Hiccup raised a brow at me. “You, sir, are modest.”

“I know!” I declared overenthusiastically. My tail swished and my ears stood up in a diagonal slant. I started to say something about me always being right, but an enormous yawn cut me off.

Hiccup began to do the same. He inhaled deeply and squeezed his eyes shut, as if fighting off tears.

“I think I’m going to call it a day,” I decided after a moment of awkward staring. I stood up and stretched a little to help loosen my legs and wings.

“What? But we’re barely into the night!” Hiccup protested.

“Well, we have a lot to cover tomorrow. And if you think you’re sleeping in, you’re crazy.” I raised an eyebrow at the human, who blinked several times and feigned horror. Well, I think he feigned it. Sleeping is serious business for humans.

I turned, and in a neat jump, leaped up onto the strongest pine-tree, which towered over us a couple meters away. I climbed up the trunk using my claws, wrapped my tail around a strong-looking branch, and allowed myself to drop, using my hind claws to hold me in the air. My tail helped hold me up and I swayed slightly. I wrapped my wings around my body, tucked my chin into my chest, and closed my eyes. Sleep sounded very good right now…

“Why would you do that?!”

I opened my eyes and sighed.

This was going to be a long night.

“Wake up, Shorty! Rise and shine! The early bird gets the worm…or something. Come on, hurry up!”

I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that Toothless’ obnoxious wake-up call would stop. I wasn’t very lucky. The dragon stopped with his leaping over me (and coming inches of landing on my wings) and unceremoniously grabbed my scruff and hauled me to my feet, forcing me to stand up. Then he pushed me forward, causing me to stumble out from under the trees to avoid introducing my face to the ground.

Lovely.

With a groan, I slowly opened my eyes only to blink several times in disbelief. It was still dark out! Very dark! Even if the moon was no longer visible, one could easily see the stars! Was Toothless out of his mind?!

I glared at him. He gave me a full-toothed grin.

“Hey, it’s you who wants to learn to fly so fast. If we get up early, you learn more,” Toothless told me. I blinked stupidly, trying to pull myself out of the sleepy haze I was in. After a few seconds of (tired) silence, the dragon grunted in exasperation and slapped me with his tail. “Come on, go to the ledge!”

“Can’t we just sleep until the sun comes up?” I asked sleepily, slowing walking towards the starting ledge. “I mean, there really is no rush…”

Toothless laughed besides me, slowing his pace down so he wouldn’t go ahead of me. “Really? Yesterday, I had to force you to stop.” His smirk couldn’t have been any wider. I suppressed another groan. Gods, this dragon just loved to torture me! He was enjoying every second of this!

How in the world is he so…happy? It’s so early! I thought in exhaustion. Watching the Night Fury lose patience with my slow pace and run ahead, I considered, Maybe he’s just as hungry as I am. Or he likes to be a show-off and flaunt his morning-dragon-ness to me.

I think that’s it.

When I finally reached my destination, I was a little more awake. Key word: little. I still felt like I was half-asleep, like what was going on around me wasn’t quite real. I stood, staring tiredly at Toothless as he launched into an explanation on top of the ledge. I didn’t even realize that what he was saying was important until he jumped off the ledge, straightened out, and flapped his wings several times. The Night Fury managed to gain quite a height before suddenly falling. He flipped midair and easily recovered, gliding a short distance away and landing softly on the ground.

I shook my head and blinked. Aw, crap! What was he trying to show me?

“Alright, your turn.”

“Whuh?!” I gasped. My eyes darted back and forth, unwilling to rest on Toothless’ face while he walked over to me. Judging by his expression, I think he had easily figured out that I hadn’t been listening. At all. Cover blown, I settled for a sheepish grin, lowering my ears and head. “Uh, sorry,” I apologized, “I’m really tired.”

Toothless sighed. “I can see that. Did you at least look at my fins?”

I gave a nervous laugh. “Uuuh…”

Toothless opened his left wing and pushed it against my shoulder. “You should pay attention more!” He scolded, “what if I had been running from some humans? You wouldn’t have known until they shot you! And,” he flashed his wing out again, hitting me much lighter this time (I don’t think he noticed.), “I just spent a good ten minutes explaining it to you, and you were just sitting there daydreaming?”

“Well, I’m tired!” I defended myself. “I never get up this early!”

Toothless snorted and started to walk away, gesturing for me to follow. “You should! It would help you!”

I arched my neck slightly. “How could that possibly—“

“Pay attention this time!” Toothless loudly interrupted me as he stopped in front of the starting ledge. He turned away from me, crouched, and jumped up, flapping his wings until he could just drop down on the ledge. I began to follow, but quickly stopped when Toothless ordered, “Stay there!”

I rolled my eyes and sat down, wide awake. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the tree branch today.

Well, I did sort-of ignore him for awhile there… I thought somewhat guiltily. When Toothless called out to me impatiently, I pricked my ears to show him that I was listening.

Toothless nodded and spread his wings and fins. “Alright. We’re going to work on takeoffs right now. You’ve already got the basics, right?” He asked.

I nodded. “Yeah. Flap my wings a lot, angle my body up, and…” I narrowed my eyes, struggling to remember. “Flatten my tailtip-fins out a bit? But keep them in the default angle?”

Happiness washed over me at seeing Toothless’ proud smile. I was actually getting this right!

“Yes, perfect!” Toothless laughed. “I’m surprised you got that! But there’s more to it,” He added quickly, making my smile dissolve quite a bit. “You see, taking off is hard because it takes the most energy. You have to focus on keeping everything right and use your muscles in the correct ways to actually get in the air. That’s why I was talking so long…but since you weren’t paying attention, I think you can just figure it out on your own.” An evil smile spread across his jaw. I died a little on the inside. “So, why don’t you come up here and give it a go?”

“W-what?! That’s hardly an explanation!” I complained.

“Well, if you had listened earlier, you would know,” Toothless said with a raised brow. He jumped off the ledge and dropped down next to me, gesturing with his head for me to go up. “Just get as high as you can and come back down.”

I huffed loudly and climbed up on top of the starting ledge. Closing my eyes, I tried to replay Toothless’ takeoff earlier, hoping to remember what moved and what didn’t.

With a deep breath, I opened my eyes and fixed them on the treetops on the opposite side of the gorge. I paused for a second and then leaped into the air, pressed my legs in, and pumped my wings, trying to put as much power into each of them as I could. I angled my tailtip-fins slightly down from the default angle, and almost immediately felt the urge to flatten them out completely. I fought the muscle-memory as fiercely as I could, narrowing my eyes and clenching my teeth.

I heard the sound of wind rushing past something moving fast below me, and looked down. Toothless was gliding swiftly across the lake, watching me from below. “Keep going! Don’t get distracted!”

Easier said than done, I thought. I turned to stare up at the treetops and nearly froze in shock. They were so close!

I flapped my wings wildly this time, holding my front legs out and trying to position my body backwards, desperate to keep myself from slamming into them.

I realized too late that I wasn’t angling myself properly. I could only cry out in pain as I hurled straight into the upper branches, losing balance and spinning out of control. Branches of all different kinds smacked into me, broke, and hit me again when I flew right through them, screaming the entire time. I opened my eyes slightly to try and see where I was going. An enormous tree trunk that I was heading straight for greeted me.

“Oh, come on—Gyah!” I covered my head with my paws and flew headfirst into the trunk, snapping it. My body painfully curved around and slid across the destroyed tree before I fell flat into the ground. I bounced once and tumbled head-over-tail for a few seconds. When I finally came to a dizzying halt, I couldn’t think straight. Stars surrounded my entire field of vision, and my side hurt like hell...

In the distance, I heard Toothless cry out, “Hiccup!” His voice was small and faded. I could barely hear it.

I groaned loudly in pain. My muscles, especially my shoulders, were all sore. I shouldn’t have pushed myself that hard and just focused and gaining height for more than a few seconds. Cursing myself for being an idiot, I began to untangle my wings, tail, and feet from each other so I could just get back to Toothless. Even though the fact that I had managed to get out of the cove was exciting, it was also dangerous. I knew that there could be Vikings hunting at any moment, and if they saw me, it would be over. I also had to be on the lookout for wolves and panthers.

Besides, I couldn’t just leave Toothless.

“Hiccup!” Toothless shouted again, his voice strained.

I hastily got to my feet and checked my body for injuries. I had a visible scratch running from behind my elbow and about seven inches across my side. Many of my scales were shattered or chipped. But my tailfins and wings were fine, which was all that mattered. I sighed in relief. Even if the scratch hurt, it was already scabbed over. I’d just have to be careful.

“I’m okay!” I called back. My voice echoed several times, making me flinch. I’d better get back to the cove, and fast.

I turned towards the path I’d come from, eyeing the destruction I’d created. Shattered tree branches were everywhere and several small tree trunks (plus the thick one I’d just flown into) were lying on the ground or leaning on another. It was fairly easy to tell where I’d come from.

I followed the path, warily watching my surroundings. I continued to check behind me for any signs of something following me, pricking my ears and tensing whenever something moved. It wasn’t until the trees thinned out that I finally calmed down. I heard something crackled far behind me, jumped, and sprinted the rest of the way there.

I skidded to a stop at the ledge, panting, and looked down. Toothless was busy clawing his way up the cliff and had somehow managed to get about halfway up. His head shot up and he looked at me. We locked eyes for a split second before the dragon lost balance and fell, only avoiding a painful fall by flipping over and gliding across the lake and to the other side. He landed and looked over his shoulder at me, a small, relieved smile on his face.

I jumped into the cove and glided down towards Toothless. When I landed, I quickly glanced behind me towards where I’d come from. I still felt like something was waiting, hiding in the depths of the shadows, preparing to strike like a viper to an unsuspecting mouse.

“Are you alright?” Toothless asked beside me, circling around me and sniffing at my scales. “You’re edgy. Did you see something?” He nudged me worriedly when I took a few extra seconds to respond.

“No,” I said. “I…I don’t know,” I sighed. “It’s really stupid, but I feel like something’s watching us.” I tried to grin at Toothless, but his completely-serious face ruined my joking mood. The Night Fury stared in the direction I’d come from and perked his ears. After several seconds, he relaxed.

“We’re fine,” Toothless reassured me, “it’s probably because it’s dark in the forest. The sun still isn’t up.”

“No way, Captain Obvious,” I said dryly. The dragon scoffed in a false offense and slapped me in the face with his tail. “Ouch! Why?”

Toothless chuckled. But then he frowned, and sniffed at me. I blinked when the dragon went to my side and seemed to take a great interest in it, watching it like it was about to snap at him. It took me a few seconds to realize that he was looking at my scar.

“Oh, I hit a tree,” I explained.

Toothless looked at me, and then back at my injury. “…it smells infected,” he finally said after a long silence.

“Huh?” I reared my head back in surprise. “But I just got it!”

“So?” Toothless brought his nose close to me, still studying my wound. “You probably rolled around in the dirt, and a virus of some sort latched on…” His face wrinkled, and he brought his head back. “I don’t know how you didn’t notice. It smells awful. Surely it would be deadly…” He seemed to catch himself midsentence and trailed off, staring at my injury.

I stayed silent, at a loss for words (half out of confusion; what the heck was a virus?). Even when I was concentrating, I couldn’t tell that my scar was infected. To be honest, I thought that Toothless was just overreacting. Maybe I rolled in some foul-smelling plants earlier.

Something flashed across the dragon’s face. Then, Toothless adopted the thoughtful expression he always wore when he was about to make a big decision. The same glassy-eyed, ears-tilted-back, completely still look to him that made him seem like he was in a state of eternal pondering. I tipped my head to the side, wondering what he was so worried about. Sure, the injury was rather big, but it had stopped bleeding. I was fine.

“Lay down,” Toothless ordered me.

My ears stood up. “What?”

“Lay down!” The Night Fury repeated forcefully. I blinked several times in shock. His eyes held a worried, angry fire in them that I had only glimpsed in those terrible moments under the lake.

Completely confused, I stood still until Toothless harshly repeated the command. Only then did I so as I was told. Toothless walked in a circle around me and stopped at my side, ignoring my alarmed questions. Is something wrong? Is there a bug in it? Why are you overreacting? I’m getting up—ow! Ow! Never mind, just get off of my tail! Gods!

I watched Toothless as he sucked in deep breaths, closing his eyes. He sat down right in front of me, his right paw half-raised into the air. My eyes widened at the familiar actions. What is he--

Suddenly, Toothless’ eyes opened, pupils mere slits, and he slammed his paw down on me.

I squealed, squirming under the firm grip. Toothless’ paw was right on top of my cut; I didn’t care if it had scabbed over or not, it still hurt! “Get off! You’re hurting me!” I cried, falling onto my side and batting at the Night Fury’s leg in vain.

When Toothless’ paw heated up to an unbearable temperature, I froze. There was little warning before the magma-hot fire suddenly grew and attacked my wound, running over, around, and under it.

The pain was unimaginable. Even though the sensation seemed to be aimed at one spot, it filled my entire body up, panging in time with my heartbeat. Every movement intensified it, making it grow stronger until I felt as if my insides were boiling and I was being cooked from the inside out. It was like a fire had been lit inside me, and not the metaphorical kind that usually has some great symbolic meaning. I’m talking about burning, hungry, devastating fire; the kind that wracks the body and destroys it, rendering all medicines useless. The only thoughts I could manage was Oh gods it hurts so much and Why is Toothless doing this?!

I howled in agony and terror, violently kicking at Toothless with my feet and trying to slap him with my wings. The dragon only squeezed his eyes shut, held me down with his front legs, and gritted his teeth.

It felt like centuries had passed when Toothless removed his foot. The second he did, all the firey, burning sensations inside me disappeared, as if nothing had happened at all. I lay on the grass, panting and frightened, feeling as if all my energy had been drained from me.

Toothless sniffed at my side and nodded in approval. He looked at me and offered a small, uncertain smile.

“There,” he said softly, speaking exactly like a person would to someone else if they were panicking. “It’s fixed now.”

Huh? I thought. I could only stare and watch Toothless while he lied down besides me, neatly folding his wings.

Toothless took in my expression and explained in the same tone of voice, “That infection, coupled with your stress and malnutrition, would surely have killed you. And…well, never mind.” He paused, and added, “I’m sorry for scaring you. I didn’t know that it would hurt that much.”

I sucked in a couple of deep breaths. All I could see was Toothless’ worried face and the slowly-getting-brighter sky above me.

With a grunt, I used my forelegs to push myself up. I twisted my neck to look at my scratch.

I could only manage a disbelieving expression at what I saw. The wound, which had stretched from below my elbow and along my side, was gone. What’s more, the scales around it, which had been cracked and splintered, were completely renewed. There wasn’t even a scar.

Toothless…healed me? I turned my head to gape at the rather smug dragon. He was panting slightly, too, but other than that, he looked very proud of himself. He cared that much?

My eyes met his.

Pride. Uncertainty. (Should I trust him like this?) Worry. Fear. A memory hidden deep, slowly resurfacing. (Was it safe to do that?) Anxiety. (Has he lost trust in me?)

I broke the connection, closing my eyes. I didn’t want to invade Toothless’ mind. Not now. We shouldn’t depend on that strange, unspoken connection to tell if we really are fully trusting each other, or if one of us is telling the truth. There’s this magic thing called ‘words’.

But, as I’ve said before, actions are louder than speaking!

I closed my eyes and  leaned into Toothless, rubbing the side of my face against his. I had to stop right after when a painful shock zipped through my body. I gasped, and simply settled for leaning against my friend’s side. “Thank you,” I breathed.

Toothless shakily nodded above me. We lapsed into silence. Then—

“Alright, Spotters, I’m pretty sure I’ve already told you that I don’t cuddle.”

---

The wind screamed against me while I bolted through the air, only growing louder as I got closer and closer to the cliffside. I pumped my wings one more time, pulled them in, and flipped midair, turned down and spinning sideways to alter my direction. I almost pulled off the newly-learned trick perfectly. Key word: almost. Halfway through the spin-flip, I lost my balance and dropped. I caught a glimpse of the afternoon sun before the ground gave me a lovely ‘hello’.

I groaned and pushed myself to my feet. I was really getting tired of all of this training. I had mastered my mid-flight tail positions, turnings, takeoffs, and landings. The multiple scratches and chipped scales covering my body from nose to tailtip were enough proof of that. But, for some reason, Toothless insisted that I knew at least some ‘escape maneuvers’ just in case. I didn’t see the big problem if I already knew how to do sharp turns; a quick volley of them, plus a carefully-aimed fireblast at the ground would easily give me the time to escape from any Viking hunting party.

I just wanted to get food! I was starving! And I’m pretty sure Toothless was, too, but he was too stubborn to admit it.

Toothless ran up to me and skidded to a halt. “Almost,” he told me, “you didn’t turn your base-fins with your wings in time. It made the air catching under your wings and your base-fins uneven, which caused you to fall.”

“Cool,” I quickly said, “but I’m really thinking that I don’t need to know how to flip when I’m just getting food.”

Toothless raised a brow. “And where exactly are you going to get that food? You have no hunting experience. At all.”

I frowned. I hadn’t really thought about where I would get the food. Instead, I’d focused more on the ‘holy shit, I’m learning to fly! And I’m getting food out of it!’ factor that had dominated all of today and most of yesterday. “Uh…”

Toothless sighed. “Do you at least know where you can get food?”

“Wait!” I exclaimed. “Are you suggesting that I steal? I’d rather try to fish in that lake!” I nodded towards said body of water.

“If you haven’t noticed, the fish in that lake aren’t big enough to be even a snack. And, yes, that’s exactly what I’m suggesting. I don’t really know how to teach you how to hunt without having any test subjects around. And I’m certainly not letting you test your predatory skills on myself.” Toothless scoffed, as if the idea was completely absurd. “So, do you know where there is any spare food? Fish, perhaps?”

I did. There was a storage-house in between my old house and the village, right outside of the forest. People would store food there for short-term times after hunting and fishing trips before rationing it off between themselves (well, you didn’t expect us to work at that right away, did you? A good hunt causes for celebration! And an extra day to recoup from the hangover.). I knew exactly where the barrels of freshly-caught, putting-it-in-there-because-it-won’t-go-anywhere-else fish were.

“But…stealing?” I asked, looking at my feet. “I mean, that seems a bit…”

“Reasonable?” Toothless intervened. “The fish in this lake won’t do any good. I can’t get out of here. You can, but you have no idea how to hunt and would probably get caught in a trap. But, you know where to go for food. How else are we going to eat?”

I stuttered. My argument had sounded a lot better in my head, but now, compared to what Toothless had said, it just felt stupid. I sighed in defeat.

Toothless patted me with his wing, gaining my attention. “Don’t worry. It’s for the greater good!”

I just gave him a raised-eyebrow stare.

“What? It’s true.” Toothless rolled his eyes. I chuckled and straightened up, shaking my body to get rid of the bits of dirt and grass that had stuck to it.

“But I think you seem to know enough to get out of an emergency,” Toothless commented casually, suddenly changing his opinion on what we would do. He looked at me expectantly. I gaped.

“Now?”

“Well, I’m not getting any younger.”

I laughed. And stopped when I realized that Toothless wasn’t being a jerk and messing with my head. I blinked large, owlish eyes at him. It was his turn to laugh.

“Oh, your face! Ahaha!” Toothless shouldered me in a good-natured way, throwing me off-balance. “But, yes, I am being serious. I’ve noticed that you’re losing energy a lot quicker than normal lately. And you’re really skinny. And your scales are dull and…not-shiney.” He made an ‘eugh’ noise at this and wrinkled his face.

“Thanks,” I said sarcastically. “Want me to bring back some tasty sauce back, too, honey?”

Toothless turned wide, inquisitive eyes one me. “Saw-us? Is that some kind of exotic fish?”

“…AHAHAHAHA—OW! STOP! I’M SORRY!”

 Just a reminder: if you have a Night Fury for a friend, don’t laugh at him when he makes an unintentional joke. No, he will not think that you are laughing with him. Yes, he will pin you to the ground and sit on you, and it will hurt like hell.

The sound of metal meeting and clashing filled the air. The stronger of the two overtook the smaller’s sword, and he fell to the ground. Snotlout promptly dropped his weapon and tackled Tuffnut, sending the two in a squirming, rolling fistfight while Tuffnut, Ruffnut, and I rooted them on.

Ah, afternoon strolls after dragon training really are amazing. After you get over the unsettling ‘giant-demon-wants-to-eat-you’ factor, of course. And the annoyingly long walks from the Kill Ring back to town. Half of it was almost completely made of mud, for Thor’s sake! And nothing was around except trees, grass, mud, and bridges.

“Get off! Alright! You win!” Tuffnut exclaimed, one side of his face squished against the ground by Snotlout’s giant hand. He kicked at his friend’s groin, instantly turning him into a little girl without a shred of dignity. I slouched and laughed as Tuffnut got out from under Snotlout and kicked him again—in the same spot—for good measure.

While Snotlout was assuming the fetal position, Tuffnut proudly walked over to Fishlegs, Ruffnutnut, and me. All of us awarded him a highfive—Snotlout had been a big pain in the ass during dragon training, and we were still a little peeved at him. Second day or not, he shouldn’t have made the idiot mistakes that he did. Like trying to deflect the Gronckle’s fireball with his wooden shield. And then throwing the flaming object towards the rest of us in a panic. And then trying to tackle said Gronckle when it charged for him.

Snotlout wasn’t the only one who’d made mistakes, though. Ruffnut and Tuffnut had fought over the same shield, resulting in nearly getting their arms ripped clean off when the Gronckle gave them a well-aimed ‘pay attention’ fireblast. Fishlegs had been too busy asking them if they were okay to notice the Gronckle fly towards him, and when I jumped out of the way, I rolled right into the wall.

Obviously, we had a lot of work to do. But, hey, practice makes perfect, right?

Tuffnut laughed and pointed at Snotlout, lifting his chin into the air arrogantly. “Heh! That’ll teach ya!”

Snoutlout stopped in his groaning and glared up at the male twin. “Don’t insult me in front of my woman!” He growled.

“Snap.” Ruffnut commented as I reared my head back in shock.

“Ex-cuse me?!” I shouted. “Who the hell died and made you king?” I stormed over to Snotlout and leaned over, glaring at him. “I’m sorry, but I don’t date bossy know-it-alls who can’t even take down a Terrible Terror.”

Fishlegs, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut howled in laughter behind me while I stood straight, placed my hands on my hips, and smirked.

“Do you need ice for that burn?” Ruffnut shrieked.

“He needs a whole iceberg for that!” Tuffnut joined in.

“Yeah!” Fishlegs piped in. “He needs so much ice that…that…that his fingers will fall off!” He grinned. We all looked at him, each of us with an expression that simply said, “No.”

Snotlout pushed himself to his feet, snorting in amusement. “Sorry, babe, but I was doing it on purpose! I have to let Tuffnut win sometimes.” His voice rising to a near-squeak mid-sentence ruined his false bravado. “And I could easily take down ten Terrible Terrors!” He struck a pose, showing off his muscley arms. I wasn’t very impressed.

“What?!” Tuffnut exclaimed, shifting into a square-legged battle stance, arms held out apart in front of him, hands fisted. “I could easily take you down again! Ya’ wanna go?!”

Snotlout grinned and settled into a crouch.

And he immediately fell to the ground, holding his groin and letting out a high-pitched moan.

Everyone burst out into laughter again. Snotlout glared at all of is and rocked back and forth slightly.

“Y-You guys are lucky my dad isn’t in charge anymore,” he gasped, struggling to sit up again.

It was a huge relief when Chief Stoick took charge again, replacing Spitelout. Unfortunately, he wasn’t really himself. He’d get lost in thought during meetings, and when something happened, he’d only do something when someone directly asked him what to do.

I guess, under the circumstances, it’s understandable. But Berk needs its leader.

I frowned when Hiccup crossed my mind. The last time any of us had seen him, he’d been defending us from the evil Night Fury. I’d tried to find a way to sneak out, but with dragon training starting, I really had no time. And neither did the others.

For all we knew, Hiccup was dead.

A thin hand waved in front of my eyes suddenly. Ruffnut’s voice called out, “Astrid! Hey, you in there?”

I blinked several times and gave her a short scowl. She ignored it and continued in a slightly worried tone, “Hey, you alright? You usually don’t space out like that.”

I shrugged. “I was just thinking about whether Hiccup was alive or not.”

Ruffnut’s expression mirrored my own. Behind her, Fishlegs and Tuffnut, now helping Snotlout stay on his feet, looked at me like I’d just ruined a good moment. (Which I probably did.)

We all lapsed into an uncomfortable, awkward silence. Hiccup wasn’t exactly the favorite topic of conversation in Berk, especially for us. Before any of us had seen him in that cove with the Night Fury, it had felt…unreal. Like a dream. Hiccup getting attacked by the demon for the second time was like a slap to the face, telling us that it was real, and that things can and will go terribly wrong.

It wasn’t until we reached the crest of the largest hill in Berk, just outside of the village, did someone talk. Fishlegs must have happened to look over at the forest, because he suddenly cried, “Hey, look over there!”

We all followed where his finger was pointing. Off in the woods, barely noticeable, was a gap in the trees that started from the tops and trailed down to the roots. It looked strange; at one point, the uppermost branches suddenly broke off, but as you moved your gaze downwards, the destruction occurred lower and lower until a couple of trees looked like they’d been snapped. A couple were even leaning on each other.

“What happened there?” I asked nobody in particular.

The others murmured random guesses, none of them really making any sense. I looked over at Fishlegs, by far the smartest, to see what his opinion of it was.

The overweight blonde caught my gaze and shrugged. “It’d be helpful if we were closer,” he told us, “because then we can tell what exactly happened. It’s weird, though, since it’s right in the middle of the forest…”

“Yeah, smack in the middle,” Tuffnut added. His eyes suddenly widened, and he asked, “Hey, how far into forest did we go the other day?”

Ruffnut tch-ed. “Pretty far. Why?”

Fishlegs suddenly gasped. It took the rest of us a few seconds to figure it out.

I shifted my weight back and forth. “You think Hiccup escaped?” I asked, leaning forward.

“It could be any number of things,” Fishlegs said. “For all we know, the cove is east of there or something. And that’s a few hour’s worth of walking, and we’re expected to be back at the docks to help with the fishing party soon.”

“I still think we should check it out,” I declared.

“Me, too!” Snotlout agreed. He walked over to me and swung an arm around my shoulder, grinning cockily and lowering his eyelids halfway. “You always know what to do.”

I shrugged him off, making an ‘ugh’ noise. This was so not the time for that.

Ruffnut pushed Snotlout aside and raised an eyebrow at him when he glared. “Anyways,” she casually said, turning her blue eyes on me, “are you wanting to go down there later, then?”

“Yeah,” I told her. “If Hiccup escaped, then we should probably try to find him.”

“It might not be Hiccup at all,” Tuffnut interrupted in a know-it-all tone.

Ruffnut crossed her arms and looked over her shoulder at him. “You only know that because Fishlegs told us.”

“Did not!” Tuffnut exclaimed.

“Did so!” Ruffnut shouted back just as loudly.

“Guys,” I said in a scolding tone, forcing myself between the two twins. “Come on, let’s stay with the conversation here!”

Both of them scoffed and glared at each other. I rolled my eyes in exasperation, ignoring Snotlout’s speech on how the two needed to grow up ‘like Astrid said’.

When the annoying Viking was done, I said, “How about we just get to the village?” I didn’t wait for an answer and began to walk back down the muddy trail, quickening my pace when I saw the fishing ships sailing very close to the dock.

When we all got down there, the ships had already been docked and people were busy unloading the giant vessels and putting the fish into barrels for storage. Later, they would be strung and hung to dry, which would preserve the meat. I could already tell that most of the fishers and preservers (who also served as merchants) would be celebrating hard tonight; the nets were very, very full. And that meant that most of us had to take the very, very long walk to the storage-house.

“Hey, you!” An older female Viking called over to us, stalking over to us like an angry cat. “You five were supposed to be here a long time ago! Astrid, Snotlout, you two take those barrels and put them in the storage-house,” she demanded, nodding at two large weaved baskets that were bulging slightly, “and the rest of you help pack the fish. And this time, don’t crush them!”

Lecture finished, she shoved Snotlout and me over to the baskets, and the other three scared teenagers were sent to climb aboard the ships and do the hard task of heaving the nets up and carefully putting the cod in the basket. I would have been relieved had I not been paired with Snotlout.

I grabbed my basket and used the straps to heave it onto my back, silently watching Snotlout as he easily picked his own basket up. We quickly left the dock of scrambling sailors and made our way through the main road of the village, which happened to head straight towards the storage-house.

Well, on the bright side, it wasn’t that far away. On the down side, you had to climb an enormous hill up and down it, and sitting there at the base of said hill was the storage-house. Talk about placement failure!

Snotlout cleared his throat and grinned. I started a mental countdown. Five, four, three, two—

“So, I was thinking, do you want to hang out later on today?” Snotlout asked me in a smooth, inviting voice.

One.

He didn’t give me the chance to answer, and continued, “My parents have this really awesome basement, and I totally moved in and claimed it as my own. It’s so awesome! I mean, it’s a bit chilly, but a little cuddling never hurt anyone, right?” Snotlout gave me a toothy smile. I tried to keep myself from cringing.

“I don’t know, I’m a bit busy,” I politely said, “Plus, we still need to make sure Hiccup’s okay.”

It was amazing how fast the Viking’s smile was replaced by a scowl. “Hiccup is really that important?” He asked glumly, staring at the ground.

“If he’s loose in the body of a Night Fury he is,” I said. “And what if it wasn’t him who got out of the cove, but the Night Fury? The whole village would be in danger!”

Snotlout misinterpreted that as fear. “Don’t worry, babe!” He laughed. “I’ll protect you from both of them if I have to.”

“I kind of doubt that.” I rolled my eyes and fixed them squarely on the hill. Gods, was it running from us?

“No, don’t!” Snotlout exclaimed. He clasped my arm and brought his face close to mine. His breath smelled like rotten eggs, and, ew—was there actually meat stuck in his teeth? “I’d protect you from anything, no matter what! You can always count on me!”

“Ookay!” I loudly said, ducking under the boy’s arm and giving myself a few feet of distance. The flirtatious boy failed to receive the message and promptly scooted closer to me. “I’m fine, really. I believe you. Just stay there. No--! Stay there.” I backed up again and held my palms up, grinning out of nervous instinct. This was way too awkward.

Snotlout frowned and backed off. I breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

We were at the base of the hill now, and started to scale it in silence. The road was muddy and slick, making our boots get covered in filth and greatly stalling our process.

I tried to step over a muddy patch, but the heavy fish basket pulled me back, and I began to slip and fall backwards when I stretched my leg out and lost my balance. I managed to let out a startled shout before Snotlout dramatically dove forwards and caught me.

“Woah, careful there! Don’t want to hurt yourself!” He gave me that strange ‘I’m flirting with you’ look again. “You’re too beautiful to get covered in mud!”

Blushing in embarrassment and anger, I threw my hair over my head and snapped a thanks to him, quickly regaining my footing and marching the rest of the way up the hill. I was determined to complete the rest of the trip in silence.

“H-hey, wait up!” Snotlout cried behind me. I was already skidding down the hill, digging my feet into the mud and leaning back just at the right angle to keep from falling. I heard Snotlout grunt as he did the same thing and nearly fall back.

Halfway down the muddy hill, I dug my feet in and stopped dead in my tracks. Snotlout caught up with me and began to ask what was wrong, but I just pointed at what I was looking at. Seeing it, Snotlout fell silent, too.

The storage-house door was slung wide-open. This wasn’t really a big surprise; we’d passed some sailors on the way through town, and they’d probably dropped off some fish and left the door open because they knew we were coming. But the problem was that the door handle was ripped clean off. It was lying several feet away, reflecting the weak autumn sunlight like a beacon. A chunk of wood was still attached to it.

“What the…” I trailed off, cautiously approaching the building.

“Woah, wait! Be careful!” Snotlout gasped, rushing to catch up with me and stand by my side. We heard something topple over inside the storage-house and stopped. Slowly, I shrugged the basket off and set it lightly on the ground.

I crouched and side-stepped to the open door, fingering my axe. I waited, and then withdrew it, shouting loudly and throwing myself into the entrance. Seconds later, I gasped and dropped my guard.

Hiccup.

He jumped several feet into the air, arched his back, and turned to face me faster than I could blink. The Viking-turned-dragon was holding one of the fresh baskets by its straps in his mouth. He was crouched low to the ground, wings held halfway out and tail raised above the ground. I noticed that the fins on the end of his tail were held out at an angle instead of just being folded up.

Snotlout gasped loudly besides me, announcing his appearance. Hiccup’s wide pine-green eyes couldn’t seem to decide on looking at me, my axe, or Snotlout.

I couldn’t keep my eyes in one spot, either. I wanted to reassure Hiccup that everything was fine, but Snotlout was too unpredictable. When I looked up at him again, I saw a deep hatred burning in his eyes.

Uh-oh.

Hiccup’s cousin suddenly dropped his basket and charged across the tiny space towards Hiccup with a loud battle cry. Hiccup gave a muffled cry and brought his wing forward to protect himself from Snotlout’s reckless punches. He backpedaled away, turned, and bounded until he’d cornered himself against a large stack of assorted goods.

“Snotlout, stop!” I demanded, running towards him with the intent to tackle him to the ground.

“No!” He cried. “He’s stealing!” Snotlout struggled against me when I wrapped my arms around him in a vicegrip. “Let me go! He can’t just get away with this!”

Hiccup shifted his weight back and forth and let out a small, tiny moan. His eyebrows—I had no idea dragons had those—were bent down, and his eyes seemed to be begging for forgiveness.

“Wait!” I told Snotlout. “Think! If Hiccup’s out of the cove, then that means that we can go through with the plan—Ah!”

Snotlout suddenly yanked free of my grasp, jumped to a nearby weapons-stack, and sheathed an old sword. Upon hearing the noise, Hiccup went dead-still, and his normally wide pupils retracted into slits. His ears stood straight up and his gaze rested unwaveringly on Snotlout’s hand.

With a shout, Snotlout rushed at Hiccup. Said dragon screeched in fear and spread his wings out, bumping them into several different things and knocking them down. His tail lashed, and the area behind him cleared, giving him room to jump out of the way of Snotlout’s slice.

“Stop!” I screamed. But I didn’t dare go towards either of them with a weapon. That would end up very bad for at least one of us.

Hiccup continued to leap on random piles of food, leather, and weapons, knocking them down in an attempt to halt Snotlout’s path. The entire time, Snotlout valiantly avoided or jumped over each obstacle, proving how useful he could be if he just focused. I cried out at the two of them again, and, just like the last time, I was ignored.

Finally, the human-dragon seemed to have had enough. He dropped the fish basket, turned to face Snotlout (who was behind him), and roared. Hiccup’s cousin stopped dead in his tracks and wasn’t given any time to react before Hiccup’s muscular brownish-black tail rose and swept him off his feet. The sword went flying.

“You traitor!” Snotlout screamed, bolting to his feet and desperately looking for a weapon. Hiccup gave him a defensive warning, baring his enormous teeth and letting out a short hiss. While he did this, he also grabbed the fish basket in his left claws. My jaw dropped.

It was only seconds later when Hiccup turned and charged right towards me. With a gasp, I dodged aside. I could only watch the brown Night Fury as he burst out the door, jumped, and began to rapidly fly away. He suddenly dropped and was out of sight within seconds, sheltered inside the forest that easily camouflaged him.

I slowly walked out of the storage house, shaking my head in disbelief. Behind me, Snotlout was raging on how much of a mess this was and how he couldn’t believe that Hiccup had actually done that.

I knew for a fact that the direction Hiccup had been flying in was towards the cove we’d last seen him in. But it didn’t make any sense. Why would Hiccup try to befriend the monster that turned him into a dragon? Surely he hadn’t killed the Night Fury; he wasn’t that experienced in fighting while in dragon form. But there he was, carrying an entire fish basket back to his hiding spot.

Was it possible that…Hiccup switched sides? Fishlegs had commented earlier that the two seemed to be communicating in very humanlike-manners. He said that, even though the noises dragons make sound strange, they make them to each other as often as we do to other people. What if Hiccup and the Night Fury had struck a deal? What if the Night Fury had brainwashed Hiccup into thinking that he should side with the dragons?!

One point was bothering me the most. I didn’t know Hiccup all that well, but I did know enough of him to realize that he would hate every second of being a dragon and try to reject it. The way Hiccup had just acted, though…he’d reacted like I would expect a regular dragon to act. Not humanlike in any shape or form. He’d seen a weapon, realized he was trapped, and…panicked. The Hiccup I knew would have tried to talk his way out of it, or at least make sure he didn’t break anything. And he would have definitely not attacked and threatened his own cousin.

Why was Hiccup acting less like a human, and more like a dragon?

Chapter Text

The crowd standing before Town Hall was menacing in its fearless, outraged, and unorganized glory. The crowd surged like the ocean, full of people of several heights moving back and forth like a ship being wracked by choppy waves. Everywhere I looked, there were scowling faces, rigid body language, and eyes shining with the desire to hunt down and kill.

I wrung my fingers together in a rare act of nervousness. While these people were my own and I should have been one of the more furious people of the bunch, I couldn’t bring myself to hate what had happened. Because, unlike everyone else of the Hairy Hooligan tribe, I was one of only two people who knew the whole, entire story. At least, that’s what I think.

I sighed, paced back and forth, and wrung my hands through my blonde hair. Normally, I would have played it nice and smooth, but right now, my nerves were on complete edge. My head was fuzzy and it became increasingly hard to pay attention. As I sunk further and further into my own little world, the sounds of the mob became echoed and far-away, the colors twisted in distortion, and the feelings of several Vikings bumping into me and the cold, harsh wind screeching past became nothing more than an afterthought.

In my mind’s eye, I was back in the storage-house with Snotlout. Hiccup was fleeing away from us and I was shocked to my core. Snotlout, on the other hand, had very different feelings…

“We have to tell the Chief!” He hollered, palms fisted. His entire body shook with ferocious anger. He stormed straight past me, eyes hardened.  I was intimidated for a split second.

And then I remembered who I was. I, Astrid, did not get intimidated by puny show-offs.

“No!” I ran and stood in front of Snotlout to block his path. He seemed to be snarling just like Hiccup had been as he stared me down. I defiantly dug my feet into the ground to make sure he didn’t push past me.. “Hiccup stole because…well, I don’t know! Did you ever think that he’d get hungry, too?”

I knew I sounded completely confident. But, in reality, my mind was swamped with theories. Was Hiccup really a traitor? Did he just do it out of hunger? Was he just getting payback? Had he somehow known we were there and was attempting to communicate with us? If so, were those sounds and eye gestures he was making his way of asking for permission to take the food? Had he been decieved? Had the Night Fury tricked him?

The last theory immediately stuck in my head, forcing the others out aggressively. I blinked, trying to comprehend it, but was brought back to reality by Snotlout’s and mine argument. I pushed it aside.

Snotlout snorted. “He could have waited for us to come back! And he STOLE!” He side-stepped me and pounded up the hill, his shoulders set and head high. I gritted my teeth and ran after him as fast as I could and was suddenly grateful for my long legs.

“Snotlout! Wait!” Again, I tried to stand in front of the teenage boy. Fortunately, I succeeded. Unfortunately, I had managed to halt completely at the slope of the hill. The very, very steep hill that required people to skid down it.

I took in a sharp intake of air and fell straight into the bewildered Snotlout’s arms. He squared his feet and managed to keep the two of us from rolling down the hill, thank the gods.

“Woah!” The boy exclaimed in shock. “Astrid…Astrid…Astrid…ASTRID!”

I blinked in shock when the world around me suddenly shriveled into a horrifying, confusing mess. The hilly ground beneath me leveled out. The colors of the world suddenly blurred and spread slightly in each direction, standing out against a suddenly pitch-black sky filled with blood-red stars—or, at least, that’s what I wanted to call them. In reality, they looked like blotches of sickly red randomly painted throughout the sky.. There was a pause, as if the world forced itself to stop.

Two figures emerged from thin air, dropping to the ground in front of me. They were a blinding white and glowing strongly, masking out any features they had. Even so, their general shape looked familiar…

The taller of the two jumped. It seemed to tense as the other turned its face towards it. Then, both of the figures turned and high-tailed it out of my line of sight. I attempted to follow them, desperate for information.

Out of nowhere, a hand grabbed me and pulled me back. I immediately whipped around, ready to fight. What I didn’t expect was to be greeted by a crowd of blackened silhouettes silently marching towards where the cliffs of Berk were supposed to be, fading off into the distance. They looked like Vikings, but they all walked with the exact same body posture, rhythm, and perfect stance. It took me less than a second for me to want to get away right now.

I flipped around and sprinted, gasping for air that suddenly wasn’t there. I felt more than heard a fire start, the intense flames playing behind me, casually following from behind. I stumbled and tripped, crying out.

Groaning, I pushed myself to my feet and opened my eyes, which had been squeezed shut the second I fell to the blurry ground. I wish I hadn’t.

A deep red, bloody monster stood before me, the two white figures making a reappearance at its mercy. The monster towered over me and the entire village; it must have been the size of a mountain. Blood dripped off of every edge that I could make out, the disgusting, sloppy drip-drip-drip the only sound to be heard. It began to open its mouth, a black hole right in the center of its throat. I helplessly watched as the beast swooped down to swallow me whole—

“ASTRID!”

My body jerked sideways. Suddenly, the normal world was around me, sharply contrasting the blurred, monotone place I had suddenly found myself trapped in. I hissed as the landscape flipped sideways, holding my arms out and stretching my legs out into a near-split to avoid falling into the muddy earth. Slightly disoriented, I straightened my body and rubbed my eyes that were still having trouble with the sudden onslaught of color and detail.

“Astrid, are you okay?”

I turned towards the familiar voice. Ruffnut’s worried eyes were focused on me, her hands raised, ready to catch me if I fell again. I smiled weakly at her, trying to hide how shaken I was. But it didn’t work on my best friend since childhood; she glared at me, grabbed my arm, and dragged me aside, away from the Town Hall. I noticed that the rest of our group was nowhere to be found amidst the confusion.

“Where is everyone?” I asked, eyes flicking back and forth to try and find the rest of our friends. I pulled my arm away from Ruffnut’s grip easily and walked parallel to her.

The blonde twin turned to me with a raised eyebrow. “Don’t try to get out of that. You were standing there for minutes, and when I finally got fed up with it and tried to talk to you, you wouldn’t respond until I pushed you!” She pointed a finger and me and narrowed her ice-blue, worried-fueled angry eyes at me. “Spill, girl.”

I cringed. How could I explain something I didn’t even understand? Was it the lack of sleep? Or the stress? I didn’t know.

“I just…spaced out,” I said, pausing midsentence to try to organize my thoughts. Shrugging, I added, “It’s been a rough couple days, ya’ know?”

Ruffnut frowned and abruptly stopped walking. She faced me, her face set in a very serious way that I’d never seen before. “Astrid,” she began softly, “if you ever need something, you know I’m there, right? I’ll listen to whatever you have to say.”

I smiled at her. “Thanks, Ruffnut.”

A huge, mischievous grin went across her entire face, baring all of her teeth. “Good. Now, maybe, if we’re lucky, we can get to that evil, no-good dragon before everyone else! If it makes you feel better, I’ll let you kill it!” She giggled and her eyes glinted.

Her gaze suddenly darted up and behind me, and before I could react, she exclaimed that she saw Fishlegs and Tuffnut and had run off to them.

I sucked in a shaky grin, thankful that she’d run off before I’d had to plaster on a fake smile. The thought of killing Hiccup with my own hands…bothered me. I couldn’t explain it. Even though he had attacked Snotlout, it was out of self-defense, right? And you couldn’t really expect the clutziest Viking alive to be able to hunt something as skittish as fish or deer, right? And there was always the theory I had on why exactly he’d done it…

I frowned, feeling very much like a traitor. I was siding with a dragon that had just stolen food! That was the last thing Berk needed!

But it’s Hiccup, my mind informed me. He’s different.

I sighed and rubbed my face with both hands, massaging my temples in circular motions. Focus, Astrid! I scolded myself. Get your head straight!

The Night Fury did something to him. Hiccup was stealing because he was hungry and had been tricked by that monster. He attacked Snotlout in self-defense at the last second. He went back into the forest to hide, and there isn’t any proof he’s still with the Night Fury. Therefore, he’s in the clear, I told myself. But even though the internal pep-talk was supposed to make me feel better, it did the complete opposite. Hiccup had defended himself, yes. But he’d defended himself like a dragon would. That was…that was just…

A fist suddenly pounded into my shoulder. I grunted, held the throbbing area, and looked over my shoulder and glared at whoever had just punched me. Ruffnut was behind me and grinning. It was strained, though, and she seemed to be trying very hard to control her expressions.

Oops, I thought. Must’ve spaced out again.

Aloud, I said, “Thanks, Ruffnut. My life is incomplete without your daily punches.” Immediately after saying this, I threw my fist back and knocked my best friend right in the collarbone, smiling innocently when she promptly cursed and doubled over dramatically.

There was movement and yelling behind her, and, without further ado, Tuffnut burst out from within the mob. He glanced between Ruffnut and me and grinned toothily. “Oooh, catfight?”

Ruffnut straightened and scoffed at him. “The only catfights around here are the ones that you and Snotlout get into.”

“What?!” Tuffnut exclaimed. “That is so not true, liar!” He turned around, cupped his hands around his mouth, and called into the crowd, “Hey, Fishlegs!”

The obese teenager eventually pushed his way into our little circle, looking very much worried. “Guys, do you think the dragons are going to start attacking the village more often, now?” He asked the three of us before Tuffnut could give him the chance to enter the argument. The unsettling question immediately quieted the squabbling twins. The only person unaffected by it was me, and I didn’t dare explain the real situation with almost every Viking in Berk in hearing distance.

So, I reluctantly pulled on a worried expression and pretended to be just as upset as everyone else. Hopefully, the ‘gravity’ of the situation would mask my terrible acting skills.

“I guess we’d just have to get better at fighting,” Tuffnut responded with a casual shrug. “I can totally handle it!”

Ruffnut laughed sarcastically. “And I can ride on a dragon’s back!”

Tuffnut started to say something sarcastic, paused, and burst out laughing. Fishlegs and Ruffnut chuckled and I grinned. Ride on a dragon’s back? Ridiculous!

The nerdy one of the group eventually stopped and shook his head, his grin disappearing. “Seriously, though,” Fishlegs began to tap his fingers together, “what if they steal all of our food? We’ll be doomed.”

“Like I said, we’ll just get stronger,” Tuffnut answered as if it were the easiest thing in the world. “If we start killing more of them, like the one who stole from us, then we’ll send them a message and they’ll back off!”

The female twin, for once, nodded in agreement with her brother. “Yeah, I think that we should hold off the searching party for the nest.” At our confused looks, she gestured at Town Hall and continued, “I managed to sneak in there and heard that they might plan one. But them that fat buffoon kicked me out!”

I blinked. “Who?”

Ruffnut rolled her eyes. “Spitelout,” she said. “Really, he can just be so—“

A voice belonging to one of the few people that I really did not want to see erupted behind me. “He can be so what?”

Ruffnut cringed, Tuffnut laughed, and Fishlegs tapped his fingers together again. I turned around to look at Snotlout, trying to keep my despairing expression off of my face.

Snotlout glared at the startled twin behind me, arms crossed and head held high. It took him a few seconds, but his eyes ended up resting on mine. He gave me a sly, wicked grin and winked. A tingle went up my spine; I knew very well what message he was trying to get across.

See, there was a reason that the whole village did not know that Hiccup was the dragon responsible for the thievery…

I dug my fingernails into Snotlout’s arm and pressed my feet into the ground, leaving two foot-sized trails behind me. The bulky teenager struggled to climb down the hill without tripping. Eventually, he gave up and turned around, glaring at me.

“Astrid!” He shouted, “What is the matter with you?! We have to tell the others that Hiccup stole!”

“No!” I rejected, wrapping my skinny arms around Snoutlout’s elbow. He paused, and I took the momentary distraction to pull back and hurl him into the mud-covered ground at the apex of the hill. I rested my hands on my hips and scowled at the shocked Viking. “Hiccup wouldn’t have attacked you if you hadn’t just freaked out like that and ran after him with a sword! Didn’t you see how scared he was? And,” I added, “I was sitting there yelling at you the whole time!”

Snotlout slowly rose to his feet, rubbing mud off of his arms. Frustration was evident in his tone and face. “But he stole! And winter is going to come in just a couple weeks and we barely have any food to feed the village! If it had been anyone else, even a person, you’d be out for their blood!” He pointed an accusing finger at me. “I know you!”

No, you don’t, I snarled internally.

Instead of saying that, though, I went on, “Hiccup was turned into a dragon only five days ago! How do you expect him to be able to feed himself? He can barely do that when it’s given to him!” My mind flashed to the numerous times when Hiccup would trip whilst holding a plate of food, ruining it.

Despite the situation, Snotlout grinned at this. I narrowed my eyes at his immaturity, feeling very much like a mother scolding her children. The boy faltered a bit at my angry look and struggled a bit with what emotion he was trying to get across. He soon settled for a glare.

“Well, either way, he could have waited for us!”

“How could he possibly know that we were going to come back?” I returned easily.

That’s right, Snotlout, I thought, you can try to win this argument.

Even if Hiccup may already be lost.

I violently shredded the confidence-shaking afterthought, firmly telling myself that Hiccup had only acted like a dragon because he’d been terribly frightened. But the sentence stayed there, lurking in the back of my mind, whispering doubtful things and feeding off of my uncertainty.

Snotlout threw his arms in the air. “Hiccup always seems to know things! Like, remember that one time when he shot that stupid device and it hit that tree right where he said it would?” The teenager scoffed and then continued, “He may be a cheater and a fraud, but he is smart. He could have easily figured it out.”

My palms fisted. “You don’t know that for sure,” I growled, but I could already feel my resolve beginning to dissipate and weave itself away from me.

“I do! He is my cousin! I see—I mean, I used to see him all the time!” The burly boy slouched and made motions in the air with his hands as he continued, “And he could always predict what people were going to do! Like when me and Tuffnut would gang up on him, he would always know how we would go after him and he’d get away! If he can tell what’s going to happen in the middle of a fight, then he can definitely tell what’s going to happen when he’s just sitting in a ditch!”

Gods damnit, he’s right! I realized.

I opened my mouth to argue back, but I had little time to say anything before Snotlout continued in his outraged rant, “And how in the name of Thor did he learn to fly?! This is Hiccup we’re talking about! He’s far too clumsy to learn it by himself! And he was going really fast, too!”

“U-uh,” I tried to answer, but the question had caught me completely off-guard. I’d hoped that Snotlout, being more tuned on the here and now, wouldn’t bring that up. He had seemed very focused on the loss of food over everything else…

“Hiccup obviously has made decided to be a traitor because he was exiled!” Snotlout said for me. “How can you defend that?”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Do you really think he would turn on us that easily?” I asked seriously, opening my blue eyes to stare into the angry brown ones in front of me.

“No,” Snotlout said truthfully, “but I would have never thought in a million years that he would steal or attack me.”

There was a pause of uncomfortable, tense silence.

“Why are you even defending him, anyways?”

I frowned. “Because Hiccup needs our help. If anything, this should—“

Snotlout snorted loudly. “He needs our help? Obviously not, since he stole food from us!”

I held up a hand and cut him off. Even with the little time I could think about Hiccup’s reasons, I’d already singled out the only logical conclusion. When the boy put his hands down at his side, I explained, “I think the Night Fury might have brainwashed Hiccup.”

I was serious, too. The real Hiccup would never have stolen. Period. Something happened there, in that cove, and it managed to change who Hiccup truly was.

Snotlout’s glare fell. He looked like he’d just had some great epiphany.

Grimly, I continued, “You’re right…Hiccup doesn’t have the stuff to learn to fly on his own. And remember how Fishlegs said that dragons could talk to each other? Well, I think that there’s a big chance that the Night Fury tricked Hiccup into getting food for the both of them. Soon, it’ll try to convince Hiccup that attacking the village will benefit them!” I held my arms out slightly above my waist, eyes wide. “And do you really think that that would do any good to us or Chief Stoick? More people might get turned into dragons! Or they’ll get killed!”

We were both silent for a moment. I took in a breath, grateful for the chance to reconstruct my thoughts.

Finally, he spoke up. “Even though that does make a lot of sense, I don’t see why we have to keep it from everyone else.”

“They’ll kill Hiccup.” It wasn’t a question or guess, it was a statement. “If there’s still a chance that we can save him, and we don’t use it...” I trailed off, grimacing. Not only would that be dishonorable to us in the eyes of the gods, but it would also make us responsible for Hiccup’s death. Snotlout easily picked up on this and lowered his eyes to his feet.

Then, to my despair, he looked up at me, eyes glinting viciously. “But, wait!” He exclaimed, straightening his entire body and grinning. “What if we just tell everyone that he’s been duped? Then they’ll only go after the Night Fury!”

I brought a palm to my face and shook my head. “You are so underestimating how brutal everyone will be.”

Snotlout grabbed my wrist and held my hand firmly. “With me, maybe, but not you!” He stared hopefully into my eyes and leaned forward. “I mean, you were so convincing just now! If we do it together, then they’ll definitely believe us! And maybe the elder or medics could reverse the spell and turn Hiccup back to normal!”

I shook my head. “It’s too risky,” I rejected. “They might not even believe us. And how do we explain how we knew Hiccup was with the Night Fury in the first place?”

“I’d rather take that punishment than have this happen again!” Snotlout declared. His grip on my hand tightened. I stared at it as an idea lit up in my mind.

But I was going to try everything else before I used it. “Snotlout, I don’t want Hiccup to get killed. And we’re just two teenagers to them! Even if we both tried our hardest, I honestly think they’ll just treat us like kids complaining about trolls! They’ll just hear that we know where Hiccup went and that the Night Fury might be with him and send a kill-party out for him!”

Snotlout shook his head. “I don’t think so, Astrid. We are in dragon training now. Now that we can fight, they’ll take us way more seriously!”

“But what if they don’t?” I countered. “Then they’ll kill Hiccup!”

Snotlout paused. Then, to my disbelief, he said, “I still think we should tell them. This is really serious, Astrid! And besides, Hiccup was never—and isn’t—useful. What good would it do?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Well, he IS your cousin. And he’s the Chief’s son! If all of this made him almost incapable of his job, what do you think Hiccup dying would do?!”

I watched Snotlout’s grin completely wipe off his face. He stood there, thinking.

“…I still think that it’ll work!” Snotlout stubbornly complained, shaking his head. He released my hand and brushed past me, heading back towards the village. “Now, are you coming or not? We need to tell everyone that the food’s been stolen by a dragon!”

I gaped at him as he skidded down the hill. For a moment, I wanted to give up.

And then I mentally slapped myself, remembering that Hiccup would die if Snotlout went on with his plan. Even if the teenager was right about Hiccup being useless, we were talking about the life of someone from our Viking clan! What kind of village gives up on its own people?

I sprinted down to the base of the hill and stood in front of Snotlout. He looked annoyed at having his path blocked yet again for reasons he couldn’t fathom. I, on the other hand, was determined to get him to see my side of the argument at any cost.

“I won’t let you do this!” I hissed. “How are you not understanding any of this?! Don’t you realize the consequences of telling everyone? Hiccup. Will. DIE!” I quickly quieted myself and glanced around to see if any bystanders had heard us. The only people around were the few adults and children that were in their houses, and none of them were paying attention to us.

Snotlout sighed. “You don’t know that for sure!”

“I do! We’re Vikings! Iit’s in our blood!” I exclaimed.

The teenage boy frowned heavily at me. “I’m telling them, Astrid.” He walked past me and I moved in front of him. “There’s no way I’l—mmff!”

I leaned forward and planted my lips right on top of Snotlout’s, cutting off his sentence and his path. The warm kiss lasted for only a few seconds before I pulled away. Snotlout stared straight ahead, flabbergasted, and slowly brought a hand to touch his mouth.

“Don’t tell anyone,” I told him, feeling very defeated all of the sudden. “About Hiccup.”

Snotlout nodded absentmindedly with a dreamy look on his face.

 Before he could do anything else, I turned around and sprinted away.

I yanked my gaze from the buff teenager’s and walked away from him, stopping when I was at Ruffnut’s side. She looked at me, giving me a look that clearly screamed, “Help me!” Besides her, Tuffnut was trying his hardest not to double over in laughter and Fishlegs just looked…worried. He was always worried these days.

“Sooo…good at keeping things in order!” Ruffnut shakily said. “I mean, he kicked me right out! He’s so good at…aw, who am I kidding?” The blonde twin rolled her eyes. “Your dad sucks.”

“Hah!” Tuffnut hooted. “Ain’t that the truth?” He gave the irritated Snotlout a toothy grin and placed his hands behind his neck, elbows sticking up in the air.  He didn’t seem to mind how Snotlout was slowly approaching him with a very offended expression. “Come on, Snotlout, cheer up! You know he can be a pain in the—“

Fishlegs suddenly interrupted Tuffnut. “Alright, uh, I think he’s gotten the message!” He stepped between Snotlout and Tuffnut despite being shorter than both, holding his hands up in a peaceful gesture. Both teenagers, already pumped up for a fight, tried to get around the overweight Viking, but he would move in front of them or push them back whenever they tried to get around him. “Let’s not start any fights, alright? We have more important issues to be worried about!”

“Don’t be a loser, Fishlegs!” Snotlout growled. “Let us settle this like men!”

Aw, shit.

Immediately after hearing this, Tuffnut assumed a battle-crouch and held up his fist. “Yeah! Mind your own business!”

Ruffnut and I groaned. I brought a palm to my face and shook my head in exasperation.

“He had to mention being men, didn’t he?” Ruffnut sighed. “Now there’s no way we’re going to stop them.” She grinned and turned to me. “Half your dinner says that Snotlout’s gonna win!” She bargained mischievously.

My worries momentarily vanished at the challenge. I raised an eyebrow and looked at Tuffnut, who was glaring at his sister’s betrayal. The guy’s entire body was tensed and coiled like a python ready to strike. “Nah, I think Tuffnut’s got it in him!”

Fishlegs was visibly annoyed. “You guys really aren’t helping!” He struggled to say when Snotlout tried to zoom past him at Tuffnut, just barely intercepting the attack with a swift block with his arm.

“We’re not trying to!” Ruffnut shot back cockily, leaning back and resting one hand against her thigh. She gave Snotlout a huge grin and yelled, “Go get ‘em, hotshot! You’re the Viking!”

I sent my friend a dirty look and shouted to Tuffnut, “Don’t listen to her! You can do this in your sleep!” I clapped my hands together and whooped in an attempt to be as encouraging as possible.

Their egos successfully filled, both Tuffnut and Snotlout overtook Fishlegs and thrust him to the side. Each of them wore a grin that rivaled that of a wolf about to give the final blow to its prey. Ruffnut and I pushed each other around, murmuring to each other about how our chosen teenager was going to win. Fishlegs stood up, crossed his arms, and pouted.

Tuffnut suddenly leaped into the air and hurled towards Snotlout. The bigger of the two tried to block him or push him aside, but the close range couple with Tuffnut’s heavy body weight sent them both tumbling to the ground. Tuffnut had Snotlout pinned in a couple seconds and raised a fist, cackling. Snotlout narrowed his brown—almost black—eyes and brought his own arm up to grasp Tuffnut’s shoulder—

RIIING! RIIING! RIIING! RIIING! RIIING!

Tuffnut’s head shot up mid-swing. In his distraction, he punched the ground besides Snotlout’s head. The twin yelped and growled in surprise and pain, only to scream when Snotlout kneed him in the gut and hurled him off of him.

Fishlegs, Ruffnut, and I all gathered in a tiny group next to the wrestling boys, staring at Town Hall. Eventually, Snotlout and Tuffnut figured out that nobody was watching and scrambled to their feet, faces red.

Like everyone else gathered before Town Hall, we waited for the summoning bell to stop ringing. I could see it at the top, its dragon-decorated body swinging back and forth. One could tell that it used to be painted from the subtle shifts in color, but the weather had torn it away so many times that everyone had just given up and left it gray. The enormous bell, big enough for me to fit in, continued to ring for about a minute before shuddering to a stop and leaving the entire village in a deathly silence.

The entrance to Town Hall—the biggest building in the entire village, resting bravely on an overhang above the ocean and towering over everything within sight—began to creak and moan as it was opened. Two Vikings hung on to each door and pulled with all their strength to drag the heavy things across the ground. The crowd shifted a bit to allow them room.

We all remained completely quiet, transfixed by the abnormal serious air around us. Everyone suddenly knew that this was very, very serious business that should not be taken as a joke.

The doors seemed to let out a final, roaring boom before they were locked in place by the workers. The four of them went to the entrance and silently gestured for everyone to come in.

The entire village, minus the mothers and children, began to filter into the dark, dimly-lit room. A golden carving of a rare sea-dragon proudly swooped over us, hanging over our heads as if by magic. It was glaring down, about to spit fire, at a roundtable that also served as a fireplace. The table sat straight in the center of the building and held a fire in the middle of it. It imitated a dragon’s eye, with the fire being the ‘pupil’. Currently, a map was spread out across the curve at one end of the piece of furniture.

I grabbed Ruffnut’s arm and dragged her along with me as close to the roundtable as I could, fighting my way to the carved piece of wood. Ruffnut muttered a complaint to me, and Fishlegs, who she had been holding on to, cried out for us to stop moving so fast. He was quickly shushed.

The doors began to close behind us and, consequently, cut off the light supply. I frowned in alarm, turning to see if we were somehow being attacked.

FWOOOOM!

Everyone who had never been to a Town Hall meeting—basically, my friends and I—gasped loudly and jumped when the ceiling suddenly came to life. We stared in awe at the slender, golden dragon. It’s huge, gaping mouth held an inferno in it, its eyes literally blazed with fire, and it had a mane completely made of flames. The firelight lit up the steel pillars it was connected to to show that the building was in no danger of burning to the ground. Instead, the steel pillars reflected orange-red light across the room, leaving random spots glowing momentarily and dimming out. It was like how water shone light onto a ship…only much more harsh and violent. I liked it.

Some people began to light torches hanging from pillars in pairs of two, and, soon, the entire Town Hall was filled with hues of red, orange, yellow, and off-white. A huge, amazed grin was plastered to my face, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get it off. I ducked my head in embarrassment.

“That was so cool!” Ruffnut hissed in excitement next to me. She shook my shoulder for emphasis and I had to take a step back to steady myself.

“I know!” I whispered right back, giving her a random fist-bump.

Fishlegs popped his head in between us. “Wasn’t it? I mean, sea dragons don’t breathe fire, but—“

He stopped abruptly when we harshly glared at him.

“You’re ruining the moment,” I told him, unimpressed. Ruffnut just rolled her eyes.

I had barely finished the sentence when someone nudged me none-too-gently in the side. I straightened, turned around, and craned my neck to look into the eyes of the man standing next to me. His blue eyes pierced straight into my skull like a hawk. Strangely, though, he had black hair that trailed down his face into a long, braided beard. He held an oversized finger to his bright red lips and hissed at the three of us, thick eyebrows pulling down in irritation.

“Quiet, you three!” He reprimanded us. “This is important!”

We all fell silent and bowed our heads in shame. The unknown man nodded in approval and turned to face the front of the table.

It was then that I noticed that there was some sort of commotion up front.

I leaned forward, ignoring the intense heat from the fire in the table, and tried to look down the entire length of furniture to see what was going on. A bunch of people were moving back and forth and looking around in confusion. Several of them were shouting at each other. The group of heavily-armored Vikings swayed for a few seconds and suddenly collapsed, opening a gap to allow a certain red-haired man to step through.

Chief Stoick’s eyes looked glassy and distant in the firelight. He nodded at Spitelout, who’d been walking besides him, and they walked to the front of the table and stepped onto a pedestal resting on the floor. It wasn’t long before the two of them were joined by Gobber, who took his position at Chief Stoick’s left-hand side.

Town Hall plunged into deathly silence. This would be the Chief’s first public announcement since the incident with Hiccup.

The Chief took in a deep breath and closed his eyes. We all waited in (confused) patience. No one dared interrupt him. As he slowly exhaled, our leader seemed to pull himself together and gradually opened his eyes. They flicked back and forth, taking in the massive crowd.

“We’re all here to address the recent…events that have fallen upon our village,” Chief Stoick began, his voice catching slightly. “The main problems being the thievery that Snotlout described…and—and—” His entire body shuddered and Hiccup’s father took a tiny step back. My jaw dropped.

“And…’eh, what happened ‘ere with Hiccup,” Gobber spoke up gravely and cautiously. He glanced at Spitelout, who was cringing, and assumed a somewhat panicky expression. He tried to discreetly nudge Chief Stoick in the arm—which didn’t work, since he used his hook and everyone could see it. A few people chuckled, assuming that the blacksmith was trying to add some comedic relief to the otherwise tense situation. Ruffnut, Fishlegs, and I remained silent, faces frozen.

Chief Stoick suddenly found himself again and blinked several times. He raised his voice and announced, “We can only assume that Hiccup is d-dead. That MONSTER that took over his body is merely a dragon that…that possessed him. We—“

“Are you sure?” A deep, male voice interrupted the speech. “I was there when it happened, and that dragon looked a lot like him.”

Chief Stoick’s eyebrows twitched and his palms fisted and clenched together, knuckles white. “That’s because a dragon took over his body,” he said coldly, giving the man (that we couldn’t even see) a harsh glare. “It’s trying to trick us.”

The man pushed his way to the front of the table to get a better view. He was skinny for a Viking, wasn’t too tall, and had two giant blonde locks of hair that were braided down to his chest and ended in frizzy puffs of hair. His outfit consisted of a greenish shirt, a red and black vest made from a fox, a pair of pitch-black pants, and a huge, buckled belt with a giant bull’s horn, several knives, and one hammer attached to it. His helmet’s two horns doubled back and pointed forward, easily allowing him to move through the crowd. His most unique feature was his necklace made completely of little dragon skulls; most were of Terrible Terrors, but some were of what looked like baby dragons from much larger breeds like the Monstrous Nightmare. One could just barely see the metal chain connecting the horns of each skull to each other.

He spoke up, eyebrows pulled down and a grim frown slicing across his face. “I saw him crawling—no, dragging himself towards you in complete submission. He tried to reach out to you and grab your leg. No sane dragon would do that.”

“What is my dad doing?” Ruffnut whispered in astonishment. I was a little surprised, too; Ruffnut and Tuffnut’s father was strong and fierce, but he preferred to stay on the sidelines than speak up. As far as I knew, he wasn’t ambitious at all. The twins had gotten that trait from their mother, Smallelf.

Chief Stoick’s head went back and his glare softened. The two initiated a stare-down, to the shock of every Viking present, and I suddenly realized that our Chief may no longer have the support of the entire village anymore. My heart dropped to my stomach; we needed our Chief, and he’d been our Chief for years. He’d been the best leader Berk had ever seen. Why would one of our own try to humiliate him in public?!

Spitelout finally spoke up and broke both the awkward, dreadful silence and direct challenge to Chief Stoick’s authority. “You need to learn your place, Belch. You have no right saying those things after all that’s happened!” The Chief’s brother’s face turned bright red in unexpected, vicious anger. “What have you done to help the village?”

Belch crossed his arms and his eyebrows bent down. “I’m surprised at your audacity, Spitelout, after that horrendous hunting expedition you sent half the village on.” He smirked slightly when the short-haired, muscled man flinched. “And, if you haven’t forgotten, I was the one who led that hunting trip, I was the one who spotted that school of fish, and I was the one who brought them all back here. Because of that, we don’t have nearly that big of a dent in our food as everyone’s making it out to be.”

Everyone was silent, and Ruffnut’s father held his arms out, palms up. “Yes, we have a shortage because of the dragons, but we’re not dying. We should focus more on Hiccup and the Night Fury then that random Nadder that stole a basket of fish. One that wasn’t full, at that.”

“A Nadder?” Ruffnut questioned. I looked at her and raised an eyebrow at her devious grin. “I love killing those things!”

“I prefer Gronckles,” Fishlegs piped up.

“Shhh!” The man who’d yelled at us earlier rounded on us, glaring daggers at us. My opinion on which dragon was best to kill died on my lips.

We all cast our eyes downwards, getting a lovely view of the rum-stained floor and our mud-soaked shoes. After a few seconds, I glanced up to see if the man was still staring at us. He wasn’t. Breathing a sigh of relief, I nudged Ruffnut to let her know that the coast was clear and that we were out of trouble.

Ruffnut couldn’t seem to contain herself for too long, though. She leaned in close to my ear and whispered, “That was close!”

I shook my head at the awful feeling and sent her a glare, trying to silently tell her that we needed to listen. That guy who kept yelling at us was watching us like a hawk!

Ruffnut lowered her eyelids and gave me an unamused look, clearly not caring whether we got in trouble or not. She opened her mouth to speak again and I shook my head wildly.

Fishlegs saved the both of us by lightly punching us in our arms and gesturing to Belch wildly.

“…leave. For now, that is,” Belch was finishing. He fell silent and several people murmured to each other, avoiding eye contact with Chief Stoick. I tipped my head to the side slightly, puzzled. We’d only been distracted for a couple seconds! What had Belch been saying?

I looked over at the three men at the pedestal for an answer. Gobber’s jaw looked like it was about to hit the floor. Spitelout’s face was scrunched up and looked similar to a wrinkled tomato, rivaling the fire’s intensity. Chief Stoick looked…forlorn. Deeply upset. Confused.

“That’s not right!” A woman standing close to us called out, her high voice shaking in outrage. “It’s only been a few days, Belch! You ca’an’t expect everything to be fine’ and happeh’! How would you feel if, Thor forbid, young Ruffnut or Tuffnut were changed into a dragon? I doubt you’d be out fishin’ or huntin’!”

This sparked even more little debates. The quiet conversations quickly escalated into an uproar, with Viking turning on Viking to get their points across. I looked back and forth in shock, having not expecting such a huge divide in opinion. And I didn’t even know what everyone was talking about!

“Uh, what’s going on?” Ruffnut calmly asked, leaning on the table and observing two obese men as they tackled each other to the ground. They were quickly pulled apart by their friends and pushed in opposite directions.

“I think they’re…uh, arguing about Hiccup,” Fishlegs awkwardly told us. I placed myself next to Ruffnut so that I was facing Fishlegs, who simply stood in the same spot as before and looked between the both of us.

“Of course, stupid,” I said. “We got that when that lady asked Belch about Miss Chatty here being turned into a dragon,” I nodded at Ruffnut and tried not to smile when she cackled. “We’re talking about this huge debate.”

Fishlegs grinned nervously. I narrowed my eyes.

“Do you know?” I demanded, picking up my new axe and pushing the center point towards Fishleg’s throat. “Tell us!”

Ruffnut straightened and walked to Fishlegs, casually slinging an arm around his shoulder. He tensed and blushed, turning his wide blue eyes at her.

“Yeah,” Ruffnut drawled, observing her nails. She swiftly pulled her arm around Fishleg’s neck in towards her, pushing him into a chokehold. The twin took great care stepping on our friend’s foot and pushing her knee into his gut to keep him from struggling. “Or else…”

At Fishleg’s terrified look, we burst out laughing. Ruffnut released him and gave him some space, holding her sides to keep from collapsing. The poor boy just couldn’t figure out what had just happened. He tapped his fingers together and let out a nervous, wary laugh, trying to keep his shock from us.

I snorted and shook my head. “Seriously, though,” I continued, “tell us what happened.”

“Oh! Um,” Fishlegs leaned back on his heels and bounced a bit under our intense stares. “Well, uh…I think your dad,” he pointed at Ruffnut, “suggested that the Chief…eh, that the Chief…step down?”

“What?!” Ruffnut and I screeched. We both whipped around and leaned over at the dragon’s eye table in unison to stare at our leader.

Chief Stoick, Spitelout, and Gobber were all aghast, caught off-guard from the crowd’s reaction to what Belch had said. The Chief heaved a sigh, shook his head, and placed his arms on his hips. His head hung in defeat.

Gobber hobbled over to Chief Stoick and slapped him none-too-gently in the side. At the Chief’s glare, he launched into a huge speech, gesturing wildly and apparently drawing out words as long as he could without sounding like an idiot. I could hear his voice rising in pitch and volume but I couldn’t make out the words. Spitelout spoke up multiple times, too, and Chief Stoick had to swing his head back and forth to keep up with the conversation.

Gobber smacked his hook into an open palm and said something with an encouraging grin. I barely made out the word ‘Hiccup’.

Chief Stoick straightened and his face set into a mask of determination. He nodded at Gobber and walked to the edge of the pedestal, eyes alit.

“Enough,” Chief Stoick called. I barely heard his voice. A few people around him stopped abruptly and looked at him, eyebrows raised in surprise.

“ENOUGH!”

The voices died down until only a few people were left arguing. They were quickly stopped by their friends or the realization that nobody else around them were fighting. I held my breath.

Chief Stoick stared at us, eyebrows pulled down and a grim frown on his face. “I will not be stepping down,” he announced. A few people began to speak up and he quickly cut them off, continuing, “This was a warning that the dragons are getting more confident! They think that they have the upper hand because we’ve been traumatized!”

“No, he’s been traumatized,” someone bitterly whispered behind me.

“Shut up! He isn’t a god!” Their friend snarled.

Having not heard the tiny exchange, Chief Stoick went on, “Do you want to appear weak? We need to show them that we’ve been unaffected! The dragons need to learn that nothing stops our tribe from anything!” Several people cheered in approval at this.

At the encouragement, our leader’s voice boomed even louder and echoed wildly around us. “We have to find their nest, or what happened to my s-son will become common! They’ll take our food, steal our children, and kill any one of us that might be a threat!” Green eyes like tiny fires, he slammed a fist onto the table, sending a resounding CRACK! throughout the entire building. “If we show those devils that we’re still strong, then they will leave!”

Even more people shouted out this time. Ruffnut, Fishlegs, and I were just a few of them.

“We will go with last week’s plans and set for Helheim’s Gate! We’ll show them what true Vikings can do!” A multitude of proud yells filled Town Hall. “We’ll wipe those beasts off the face of the earth! We’ll do it for everyone in Berk and in its future!” The cries of everyone became nearly deafening. Somehow, the Chief managed to get one last sentence in. “We’ll do it for Hiccup!”

I swear to Odin that the intensity of the screams most of the people in Town Hall could be heard on the opposite end of the globe. Chief Stoick stepped down, looking satisfied as everyone began to filter out of Town Hall. Even though the majority (from what I could see) of the people here seemed to agree with Chief Stoick, I could make out a few stragglers grouping together and shooting glances at him before they, too, walked out. I frowned heavily. One inspirational speech wasn’t going to win the village over, it seemed.

I looked over my shoulder, back to Chief Stoick. He was talking to Gobber, his back facing me so I couldn’t see his face. The blacksmith’s eyebrows were bent down and he waved his arms to and fro. He tried to smile, but it was a miserable attempt that, even from the distance I was standing, looked way too fake and cheery. The Chief simply shook his head and shouldered past Gobber, slowly walking towards the back exit of Town Hall. Gobber solemnly watched his friend, Spitelout at his side.

The two exchanged a few words and separated, each heading towards the front entrance of Town Hall. Apparently, Chief Stoick wanted to be alone. I watched him for a few more seconds in confusion before turning to Ruffnut, who was having a heated discussion with Fishlegs.

“We can totally show off how well we’ve been doing in dragon training!” Ruffnut exclaimed.

Fishlegs rolled his eyes. “What changed your mind all of the sudden?”

“Well, back then, I was still a little tired from dragon training,” Ruffnut explained. I smirked at her logic. “But now, I’m feeling pumped!” She jumped up and held a fist. “Aren’t you, Astrid!”

I nodded vigorously. And then my smile faded when I finally remembered what had been bothering me before the meeting. My worries about Hiccup had been the last thing on my mind since the fight between Snotlout and Tuffnut—until now. “Guys,” I caught their attention quickly with the tone of my voice, “we need to go and talk about something. C’mon!”

I began to exit Town Hall. Ruffnut and Fishlegs scampered after me and walked side-to-side with me, both of them on my right.

“What’s the matter?” Ruffnut asked, completely serious for once. Something dawned on her, and she pressed, “Is it the same thing as when you were all spaced out before the meeting?”

“What?” Fishlegs asked, completely in the dark.

I nodded at Ruffnut. She pressed her lips together and scrutinized me. “Don’t worry, it’s not bad. I mean, it could be worse, but…” I trailed off, realizing I had said too much. We couldn’t discuss this while we were still surrounded by half the village! “Where’s Snotlout and Tuffnut?”

My best friend scoffed. “Like I care. Can’t we just hide somewhere and you can tell us now?”

“No,” Fishlegs joined the discussion. “Everyone should know at once so we don’t have to explain everything twice.”

I nodded in agreement. I hated repeating myself. “Yeah. Let’s just find them first. It won’t be too hard…they’re probably trying to finish that fight!” I joked weakly. Fishlegs’ lips twitched and Ruffnut just looked unaffected. I sighed.

We stepped outside of Town Hall. I squinted at the sudden intensity of the sun, rubbing my eyes to try and help them adjust better.

So I was caught completely off-guard when a large, bulky hand grasped my shoulder and pulled me back.

“Ah!” I snapped my eyes open and spun around on my heel, already raising my axe up to chop away at whatever the hell was dragging me around.

Gobber rolled his eyes and swatted my axe away with the back of my hand, even though I had relaxed my stance the second I’d seen him. “Don’t get too skittish ‘ere, Astrid. You’ll get paranoid.”

He pushed me behind him, and I finally noticed that Snotlout and Tuffnut were standing aside. They were chatting with each other with huge grins on their faces, probably excited about the chance to prove themselves in front of the remainder of the village. Gobber called out to Ruffnut and Fishlegs, telling them to come over.

I waited for Ruffnut and then walked with her to Snotlout and her brother, Fishlegs close behind. They both greeted us and began to launch into an overdramatic speech on how they’d kill every single dragon that came into their paths. I was a little disappointed when Gobber interrupted them; it was becoming very funny. (For example, Snotlout had said, “And then I’ll rip it’s heart out…with my face. And after that I’ll take its skull…with my face!”)

“Welp, we’re off to dragon training!” He announced to the five of us.

“What?!” Snotlout gasped. “But the sun’s barely even out anymore!” He gestured to the darkening sky above us, where a few stars were starting to wink and glimmer.

“You can’t expect every trainin’ lesson to be in the day!” Gobber exclaimed in amusement, his unibrow peaking. He waved a finger at the black-haired teenager and explained, “Almost all of the dragon raids are at night! Besides,” he added as an afterthought, “I had the arena switched up after you all left in the mornin’, and you need the practice!”

We all shared a look with each other. Two training sessions in one day?

Awesome.

Tuffnut chuckled and rubbed his palms together. “I’m the most stealthy out of all of us! Prepare to be amazed!” He ‘warned’ all of us, sweeping a finger between Fishlegs, Snotlout, Ruffnut, and myself.

“Hah!” Ruffnut laughed. “Coming from the guy who fell down the staircase two times in the same night last week!”

Tuffnut’s face contorted at the revelation. He blushed as red as a Nightmare while we all laughed our heads off. “You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone that!” He exclaimed furiously.

“Oops.” Ruffnut said in monotone. Of course, this only made us laugh even harder.

Her twin began to say something—probably an insult—but Gobber cut him off, shoving himself into our little circle.

“Alright, that’s enough! Go get to the ring, I’ll meet you there!” He ordered us, making sweeping gestures with his arms and pointing towards the path that led to the training arena. “Faster!” He cried out when we began our walk at a pace that wasn’t fitting to his delicate needs.

I glanced over my shoulder and saw Gobber nod in approval before disappearing into the slowly-dispersing crowd. I was a little curious as to where he was going, but after a few seconds of brainstorming, it was obvious.

So, I’d say that that gave us about an hour of free time.

I trailed in the back of the group, listening in on the conversations. Snotlout and Tuffnut were doing their own thing in the front, trying to show off to each other. Fishlegs was nervously talking to Ruffnut, who was enjoying every second of his embarrassment and smirking. I considered talking to them about Hiccup, since Snotlout seemed to be waiting for me to make the first move.

“Hey, Astrid!” Ruffnut suddenly turned to me. “Fishlegs here says that I can beat you in a race. Wanna test it out?”

A wide smile spread across my face.

Eh, Snotlout and I could explain the situation with Hiccup later.

“You’re on.”

I fell to my knees, entire body shaky and sweaty, and gasped for air as if I were dying. I struggled to remain upright, but, eventually, my body gave out on me and I fell sideways. I was immensely grateful for the cold stone of the arena’s gate. We had to wait for Gobber to actually unlock it, so we just settled down right next to the nice, cool entrance.

Ruffnut simply allowed herself to fall facefirst into the ground directly besides me, groaning in exhaustion. I scooched away from her, sweat-soaked strands of hair sticking to my face and neck. The last thing I wanted was her warm body right next to mine when I was trying to cool off.

“I can’t believe,” I paused to inhale deeply, “we ran all the way here.” I closed my eyes and tried to calm my heart down. The steady ba-thump, ba-thump, ba-thump continued as loud as ever. That was the last time I ever all-out sprinted a distance that took nearly forty minutes to walk.

“I can’t believe I lost!” Ruffnut moaned. I heard some shuffling, the pit-pat of boot toetips hitting rocky ground, and then a soft thump besides me as my friend leaned into the wall next to me.

We sat there for several minutes, panting for air. The only other sounds were the chirps of the midnight bugs, hoots of owls, and an occasional predator’s call.

My mind began to flow between reality and my own little dreamworld in the peace. I didn’t even realize that I had drifted off into sleep.

I awoke to the sound of Tuffnut’s obnoxious laughter, rapidly followed by comments made by Fishlegs and Snotlout. I forced my eyes open and rubbed them, unblurring my vision. A sharp glance to my left showed that Ruffnut had dozed off next to me. I jabbed her in the side to wake her up before the boys could see that she was asleep.

She quickly woke up, snorting slightly and eyes snapping open. The twin turned around to yell at me in irritated, but I cut her off, pointing towards the men. They were slowly becoming visible in the moonlight. Ruffnut gave me a confused look and turned around.

“Oooooh!” She gave me a grateful grin. “Thanks!”

“Any time!” I said. “Promise not to tell them we fell asleep?”

“Yup!” Ruffnut chirped, every trace of exhaustion in her gone. She stood up and stretched, raising her arms high above her head and arching her back. I followed suit, knowing that if I didn’t, I’d move a lot slower in the ring.

Snotlout caught sight of us first. “Hey!” He called, waving. He broke out into a jog towards us, Tuffnut at his heels and Fishlegs lagging behind. Ruffnut and I waited for all three of them to get to where we stood before we said anything.

“Hey, guys!” I greeted them.

“’Sup?” Ruffnut asked, nodding her head once at them.

Tuffnut returned the nod. His smile disappeared, though, and he sniffed the air. “You guys are all sweaty!” He cried, wrinkling his nose and taking a dramatic step back. He held his hands up in front of his face as if he were being attacked by some terrible monster.

“Now, what did you just say?” I growled, narrowing my eyes at Tuffnut. He raised an eyebrow and smirked.

“Well, you are. Just stating the facts!” He sighed, holding his hands behind his neck and leaning to the side.

Snotlout intervened, trying to reassure us. “Not that it’s a bad thing! I mean, sweat means you worked out real well, and I know it’s sort of a manly thing but—ouch!” I punched him straight in the jaw, effectively cutting him off. Even though my knuckles immediately began to hurt from hitting something as hard-headed as Snotlout, I refused to massage them or show any sign of pain.

I turned my gaze on Tuffnut, who yelped and jumped behind Fishlegs. Fishlegs, in response, ran away from him, shouting that he didn’t want to get involved in a fight. Every time the shorter would move, Tuffnut would scamper after him like a lost little dog.

Of course, Ruffnut was chasing him around by then, screeching aloud that he was a coward.

I laughed when my best friend finally managed to catch up with her brother and promptly tackled him to the ground. The two wrestled on the ground until the female twin pinned Tuffnut.

“One…two…three…four…” Ruffnut drawled, a huge smirk playing on her face, while Tuffnut furiously struggled beneath her. “Five! I win!” She nimbly jumped off of Tuffnut before he could kick her. Laughing, she walked towards me and we exchanged an epic highfive.

Snotlout, groaning, made his way to his feet, swaying slightly when he moved his head too quickly. “Wow,” he gasped, giving me a dreamy-looking smile, “you sure have a strong arm.” His eyes twinkled, and he continued, “Do you work out? Maybe you’d want to work out with me in my basement!”

“Uuuh,” I stalled, shooting Ruffnut a glance for help. I deeply regretted kissing Snotlout now; not only did it make him think that I like liked him, but if I flat-out rejected him, he’d probably tell the Chief about Hiccup!

Thank Odin Ruffnut managed to get the message I sent her. “That was some crazy stuff with that dragon, huh?” She asked loudly and dramatically. Snotlout gave her a funny look, clearly wanting to ask her “what the hell is wrong with you?”, but Tuffnut and Fishlegs had already taken the bait.

“I know! I mean, most dragons are afraid of people during the day because we can see better!” Fishlegs exclaimed. “It’s, like, never been put down in any dragon manual I’ve read. It’s almost like they’re going against their own instincts!”

“And to think it was only a Deadly Nadder!” Tuffnut growled, kicking a stone. “Those devil-hearted beasts are going to pay for that! I’ll kill every single one of them and turn them into ash! I’m the legendary warrior of Berk, ya’ see?” He posed in front of us, trying to look godlike. It didn’t help that he was almost as scrawny as Hiccup had been.

I looked at Snotlout. He mouthed to me, “you tell them!”

I shook my head slightly, glaring. “No, you!” I mouthed back. Even though I didn’t care about what people did most of the time, I hated being the bearer of bad news. See, for the past couple days, the topic of Hiccup was only brought up by me. A girl needs a break every once in awhile! You can’t expect me to do everything!

I sighed in relief when he slumped in defeat.

Snotlout cleared his throat. Loudly. “Uh, guys, Astrid and I need to tell you something,” he announced. The other three fell silent, each one apparently assuming the same thing and giving me a shocked look.

“Not that, stupidheads!” I said in an exasperated tone. “It’s about the dragon who stole from us earlier this afternoon.”

A chorus of “oooooh!”’s came up in perfect harmony. Snotlout laughed a little.

“You three would make a nice choir!” He joked. Everyone, even me, giggled at the resulting mental picture. I could just imagine Ruffnut, Tuffnut, and Fishlegs decked out in robes and singing from a little handybook.

Fishlegs spoke up, saying, “Okay, so you were saying?”

Snotlout’s mouth opened and he paused, staring off into space. Then, his body jerked, and a look of realization slid onto his face. “Oh! Right!” He grinned goofily and ignored Tuffnut’s jibes, continuing in a much more serious (and angry) tone, “It wasn’t a Deadly Nadder that stole the food, it was Hiccup!”

There was a shocked silence from the three. They stared, mouths wide open.

And then they all chose the same exact time to start rattling off questions.

“What?! Hiccup would never do that! Are you sure?” Fishlegs.

“What’s his problem?!” Tuffnut.

“Why?” Ruffnut.

Snotlout held up a hand, a grim look on his face. He pointed to Fishlegs and said, “Yes, he would do that, and I was absolutely sure,” his finger moved to Tuffnut and hissed, “he’s a traitor,” and finally gestured at Ruffnut and finished, “because he’s switched sides. He’s abandoned us and is fighting alongside the Night Fury!”

I didn’t know it was possible for the three of them to be more surprised, but they were. All of them shouted in shock, desperately trying to deny Snotlout’s accusation. I was about to intervene, to say that Hiccup wasn’t a traitor and had been brainwashed, but was cut off by Tuffnut suddenly rounding on me and firing a question at me:

“Wait, were you there?”

I nodded and opened my mouth—

“What?!” Ruffnut gasped. She glared at me. “Why didn’t you tell me?!”

My mouth moved up and down, but no words escaped. The truth was that I’d been completely absorbed in trying to get my theories on Hiccup straight that I’d decided not to tell anyone for the time being. Saying that to Ruffnut, the person who I told everything to right when it happened, would hurt her. Immensely. She’d never held back with me; what right did I have to hold back with her?

I looked at my boots guiltily. I didn’t want to lie, but I didn’t want to tell the truth. It was the best I could settle for.

The awkward quiet was broken by Fishlegs. “Wait, Snotlout, can you tell us what happened first?”

I looked up just in time to see Snotlout nod. He launched into his explanation, using exuberant hand gestures and sometimes even acting it out:

“Well, me and Astrid were going to put the fish away in storage, right? So, when we’re down there, Astrid noticed that the door was open. We went to check it out, and Hiccup was in there stuffing his mouth with the fish baskets!” The others blinked and murmured, and he continued, “So, I was like, ‘HEY! What are you doing?!’ and Hiccup just GROWLED at me! He GROWLED at ME!” Snotlout waved his hands around, disbelief written across his face. “After that I grabbed a sword because he was getting really angry, and he started to knock everything down on top of me! If it hadn’t been for my great  agility,” he winked at me while saying this, “then I would have been crushed! Anyways, I was gaining on Hiccup, and he turned around and whacked me with is tail and sent me flying into the wall! And then he laughed and ran away!”

I felt my eyebrows shoot up further than possible. “Woah!” I cried, gaining everyone’s attention. “That’s not what happened! Hiccup got scared when we saw him and backed himself into a corner, and the first thing that Snotlout did was grab a weapon and charge at him! So Hiccup—“

“Panicked,” Fishlegs interrupted me, “and eventually felt threatened and scared enough by Snotlout that he tried to get rid of him.”

I gave him a surprised look. “Yeah,” I confirmed. “How’d you know that?”

Fishlegs sighed and stared at the ground for a second. In his hesitation, we clearly saw the fear in his body posture. He held his hands together close to his chest, lightly drumming his pointer fingers back and forth in a steady rhythm. The Viking cleared his throat, and, with his eyes still on the groud, he muttered, “That’s what a dragon would have done.”

The air itself seemed to tense and creep away like a frightened dog. While I had been well aware of this fact, having Fishlegs, the self-proclaimed dragon expert, validate Hiccup’s condition was unsettling—at the least. There was a part of me that was hoping that I’d been wrong, that I’d miscalculated, anything! And now the truth was beating down on us like a Thunderdrum’s fatal scream.

Tuffnut spoke up first. “So, we have to kill Hiccup, too?”

“NO!” Fishlegs and I shouted all at once. Tuffnut gave us an irritated glare, Snotlout gave me an uncertain look, and Ruffnut continued with her harsh glare (though, knowing her, it probably had nothing to do with the conversation).

“Astrid, why do you even care about him anymore?” Tuffnut directly asked me. He stalked up to me and stopped a foot away, pointing at my face. I stood my ground determinedly, trying to hide the uncertainty that I felt about Hiccup. “Even if you and Snotlout don’t agree on what happened, you both told us that Hiccup attacked Snotlout!”

I said with as much conviction in my voice, “Hiccup’s probably been brainwashed by that evil Night Fury. He’s just a puppet! He doesn’t know what he’s doing!” I spread my arms out high above my head. “It would explain why he was growling, and why he whacked Snotlout—“ I said this pointedly, narrowing my eyes at the aforementioned teenager, “—and why he flew back towards that giant cove.”

“Huh? Wait!” Ruffnut stalked up to stand next to her brother, quickly followed by Fishlegs at her side. Snotlout moved so he was standing parallel to me. From afar, it would look like the twins and the bookworm were teaming up on Snotlout and myself—especially since Ruffnut was giving me an ice-cold look. “He went back to the cove? Where the Night Fury last was?”

I nodded solemnly. “That’s what I think. We seem to be the only Vikings here who know about it, and walking around the forest might’ve put him in danger of getting caught by a hunting party.”

Ruffnut leaned back and away, hurt clearly written across her face. “I can’t believe you weren’t going to tell me,” she hissed.

I grimaced. “No, it’s not like that!” I exclaimed. “I was waiting to tell all of you. The only reason Snotlout knows is because he was there! I mean, you didn’t tell Tuffnut, right?” I desperately asked Snotlout. He shook his head.

“I don’t care!” Ruffnut shouted, angrily swinging at the air. “I flat-out told you that I knew that something was bothering you, and you lied! You said that nothing was wrong, when, obviously, there is! And you said it straight to my face!”

I let my left arm dangle uselessly to the side and held onto it with my right hand. I cast my gaze downwards. “I’m sorry,” I murmured, trying to be as sincere as I possibly could.

I felt my friend’s eyes boring into my head and winced. Nobody said anything.

“I guess,” Fishlegs timidly spoke up, once again being the first, “we should just go find Hiccup and ask him. We don’t know if he did that because he was brainwashed. The Night Fury could have easily left that cove, and Hiccup might feel comfortable there because he knows there’s hiding spots that we can’t see. Let’s just…go tomorrow. Hiccup will explain everything to us.” He looked at each of us for any sign of disapproval. When we all nodded in agreement, the fat Viking smiled, proud of himself.

I finally raised my head after a few seconds. Ruffnut had her arms crossed and was pointedly looking away from everyone. Fishlegs was tapping his fingers together and staring at Ruffnut. Tuffnut had his hands behind his neck, elbows sticking in the air, and was watching the forest intently. Snotlout slouched besides me, too uncomfortable to try and make everyone laugh or hit on me. I stood straight up and resumed looking at my boots, an enormous wave of guilt crashing down on me.

How could I just leave Ruffnut in the dark like that?

A loud, familiar call broke through the coiled atmosphere. We all looked up and towards the path, waiting expectantly for our teacher to come into view. It took a few seconds, but Gobber’s hulking form became clear as he made it halfway across the bridge that connected Berk to the training arena. He waved at us, showing us the keys, and then threw them into the air.

Snotlout jumped into action, backing up and catching the keys. He fumbled with them, nearly dropping them, and finally managed to get a good grasp on them with a sheepish smile on his face.

“You need to work on your catchin’ skills, Snotlout!” Gobber scolded when he reached the group a couple seconds later. “Nothin’ useful in a Viking that can’t retrieve anything.” He hobbled over to the Kill Ring’s gate, motioning with his hook that we needed to follow.

“Why do we have to do this right now?” Tuffnut complained. “I just want to sleep.”

“How much experience do you have with fightin’ at night?” Gobber asked, raising one half of his unibrow. He smirked when the male twin stayed silent in embarrassment.

The dragon-fighting expert turned his attention to all of us. “Today is about stealth!” He announced. “Sometimes, a dragon will have the upper hand in a battle. That’s when you switch tactics and launch a sneak attack to at least distract it. You need to work as a team, fight like a team, and think like a team!” He instructed, knocking Snotlout (who was closest to him) in the head.

“Wait!” Snotlout said, shaking his head slightly. “How are we going to be stealthy in the Kill Ring? I mean, don’t those dragons know that they fight people when they’re let out?”

Gobber grinned knowingly, turned his back to us, and unlocked the gates of the arena and thrust them up in one swift motion. He motioned for us to stay quiet, and we cautiously crept into the Ring. Everyone gave a soft gasp.

The arena looked like…a forest. A bulky layer of leaves and branches was strewn everywhere, making the floor impossible to find. Boulders—obviously ones from the small mountain the Kill Ring was precariously located on—were littered on the ground and on top of each other. On top of that, tall, wooden, vertical boards were dotting the entire arena. Each was about as tall as I was and wide enough for Snotlout and Fishlegs to duck safely behind.

“Alright, you five!” Gobber called to us. I blinked in shock. How had he managed to get on the complete opposite end of the Kill Ring without any of us noticing? “Ya better find yer cover quickly!” And then he took the handle from the Gronckle’s cage and began to push it down.

I gasped and looked back in forth. Right there, besides me, was a huge pile of foilage that had been built up next to one of the wooden beams. I dove into it, pushing the dead leaves on top of my body, and took in short, shallow breaths. I heard scattering around me, including the twins fighting over a fighting spot. Tuffnut shrieking in pain confirmed that Ruffnut had won. Snotlout called out that he’d forgotten his weapon, and I heard Fishlegs throw one of his knives (they were the only weapons he had on him today, so I knew that that’s what he threw) at him in an attempt to be helpful.

“Thanks, Fishlegs!” Snotlout cried out sarcastically.

“No problem!” Fishlegs’ voice cheerfully rose from somewhere to my northeast. I snickered.

SNAP! Ka-chchchchchchch….

Bzzzzzzzzzzzz!

I held my breath when the Gronckle crushed the doors open with its powerful body. Its wings were easy to hear, thank Odin, which made its location so much easier to find. But even so, the general lack of light, the conversation we’d just had without Gobber, and the fact that my head was completely covered in leaves made the situation not only difficult, but stressful.

I shifted in distress as Gobber shouted, “No direct hits! You must hit it as a group sneak-attack! Learn to locate where everyone is and communicate with each other without the dragon’s notice!”

I silently cursed. I couldn’t see anyone! I couldn’t see anything!

From what I could tell, the Gronckle was circling the Kill Ring like a hungry vulture. After reading the Dragon Manual, I knew that it had a good enough sense of smell to detect us—so that meant we needed to stay covered, to keep our scents hidden. I squeezed my eyes shut and focused, straining my ears to tell when the beast was the furthest away from me.

When the sound had faded as far as it would go a couple seconds later, I stealthily pushed the leaves slightly off of my body and crouched against the wooden board, gripping my axe until my knuckles felt like the skin was about to rip off of them. Across from me and a little to my right, Ruffnut was taking cover under a group of three stones—two were side-by-side, and one was on top, and she was situated inside the tiny cave. I tried to wave my hand at her, but she didn’t notice me.

Something bright lit up in my eye and I jumped. My eyes shot down to the source and my body relaxed; it was just the moonlight reflecting off of the sharp steel of my double-axe.

Wait a second! I realized. I pushed myself lower to the ground, stuck the side of my axe into the ground, and began to move it back and forth facing Ruffnut. As expected, a beam of light shot around the ground, illuminating tiny spots of leaves and twigs. I aimed the light at Ruffnut, who started just as I had.

When she figured out that it was me screwing around with the arena’s lighting, she sent me a particularly evil look. I lowered the axe and mouthed, ‘I’m so sorry!’ I didn’t want to be in a fight with Ruffnut; she was far more stubborn than anyone else I knew, and could hold a grudge for a spectacularly long time. I didn’t want to deal with the drama of my life without my best friend.

Ruffnut’s harsh look fell. She mouthed something back to me, but the only thing I caught was ‘later’. I grinned in relief.

BzzzzzzZZZZzzzzzz!

I gasped and ducked, pulling my axe in towards my body. The Gronckle had come over to investigate the area between Ruffnut and myself, apparently having somehow sensed us. Had we been talking too loud?!

The bulky, beelike dragon studied the ground with comically large yellow-and-red eyes. Its gaze wasn’t going anywhere near Ruffnut or me. Directly under the monster, Ruffnut was looking off to my right, mouthing words at someone and glancing up every few seconds, the moon turning her eyes a milky blue. She then looked straight ahead and waved at someone with an irritated look on her face. The twin rolled her eyes in exasperation, checked the Gronckle’s position, and carefully began to slide her own single-bladed axe from her belt and in front of her. It clinged loudly when she accidentally hit it onto a boulder.

The dragon, which had been in the process of turning around, halted in its tracks. It turned its gigantic head towards Ruffnut’s hiding spot and sniffed warily. Its pupils became mere slits in surprise. I tensed when it began to slowly hover over to her, claws extending to dangerously long lengths.

My eyes searched for anything to help my friend. She had backed up inside the little boulder outlet, but the Gronckle could easily knock it down and crush her to death. I had to do something!

A gentle breeze swept through the arena. The leaves scattered slightly. A few to my direct left stayed in one spot, though. I stared at them, an idea surfacing. And then I figured out that they were connected to a gigantic tree branch.

My arm shot out and my fingers took a hold of it. I turned around and thrust the branch towards the Gronckle’s head, purposely missing just in front of it. The dragon squeaked in surprise and flew back a little. It watched the stick intently when it landed, probably wondering how it just up and appeared out of nowhere. Slowly, its buzzing faded, telling me that it had flown away to investigate.

I took the chance to roll across a short distance behind a boulder. My head whipped back and forth to search for anyone near me. Ruffnut’s hiding place was barely in sight, and I could see Tuffnut hiding behind a giant stone of his own to my right. He pointed at something behind his hiding spot, and even though I couldn’t see it, I knew that he was telling me that Snotlout and Fishlegs were over there.

Not good, I thought, that means we’re spread out across the entire arena.

The steady hum of the Gronckle’s wings rose in intensity as it flew as high as it could. I scrambled for cover under the leaves when I heard the evil being growl loudly in frustration. It began to fly around much faster, making loud, gurgle-y noises.

My left eye twitched as light struck it. I leaned slightly away from the boulder to look at Ruffnut signaling me with her dagger. She moved it in a tight circle, positioned her hands at the edges of the invisible sphere, and then jutted her hands inwards, forming an upside-down ‘V’ with her skinny, pale fingertips. I nodded in understanding, waved at Tuffnut, and passed on the message.

The twin flipped over onto his hips, and using the same tactic as Ruffnut and myself, he reflected light back and forth at someone, scurrying to tell them the plan without the Gronckle’s notice. Halfway through signaling the remaining Viking of our group, both of us were forced to duck under the leaves and hold our breath when the Gronckle flew right over us, having seen Tuffnut’s moon-reflections.

Snap! Shhhhhhhh…crunch!

I smiled gratefully at Ruffnut, who’d thrown a small stone in the general direction of the eastern end of the Ring, which was off to her left and behind her. Apparently nobody was hiding there. But the Gronckle didn’t know this, and shot over to where it thought its prey had tripped. A snarl echoed across the area when it found nothing. Tuffnut began to laugh and had to cover his mouth while I furiously mouthed at him to shut the hell up.

I flapped my wrist at Tuffnut in an attempt to tell him to hurry up and finish signaling. He smirked at me and rolled his eyes, waving a hand casually at me. I made a mental note to kick him later; I knew that throwing even a pebble at Tuffnut would alert the dragon of our whereabouts. Tempting as it was, I’d rather not fail this lesson.

The Gronckle circled about us again, making us freeze on the spot. Tuffnut quickly buried his hands—the only things completely out in the open—beneath the leaves. We patiently waited for it to continue its fruitless search. Once it had moved away, flying to a large boulder to the east and sitting on top of it, Tuffnut finished telling Snotlout and Fishlegs, looked over his shoulder, and gave me a thumbs up.

I signaled Ruffnut with my axe and quickly hid it beneath the leaves, having realized that it might give us away if it continued to reflect the light anywhere without needing to. I gave her a thumbs up like Tuffnut had done and she nodded with a huge grin on her face. I held up ten fingers, waited for her to nod, and then turned around and sent the message to Tuffnut. As he passed it on through a series of hand motions and light reflections (that thoroughly confused the Gronckle, which had now assumed its circling), I picked up a moderately-sized rock in my hand and shot it in the middle of the arena. The monster was there in seconds.

I counted down in my head…

And, one! I thought, narrowing my eyes and grinning in determination.

Ruffnut and I leaped from our hiding places in a single, smooth movement at the same exact time. A second later, Fishlegs and Snotlout jumped out and Fishlegs lagged behind a moment too late.

We all screamed at the top of our lungs and charged the beast at once.

The Gronckle blinked several times, disoriented from the sudden loud noises. Even so, it desperately tried to fly up and away—and failed miserably. The beast spun around once and began to speed right towards me in its confusion, giving a low-pitched cry of fear. I gasped and leaped sideways, rolling sloppily to get out of the way.

Thunk! Someone smacked the dragon with something. It fell to the ground with a huge thud, moaning. I pushed myself to my feet and grabbed my axe, joining my friends in a tight circle around the Gronckle.

It rose to its feet on clumsy, oversized feet and snarled at us. Fishlegs, the one closest to it, backed up a bit. Even though it was one of the smallest of the dragon species, its head was still towering over all of ours. The sharp teeth hanging out of its mouth glistened dangerously, and then a hissing noise rose up inside the creature’s throat.

“DUCK!” I screamed, jumping away just as the Gronckle fired. But I realized it hadn’t gone after me when not a single flaming ball went my way.

My heart plummeted when I heard Ruffnut scream and something explode.

I flipped over on my back, a horrified expression on my face while the beast took to the air and fired another fireball—this time, at Fishlegs, who screamed and ran for any cover he could find. Snotlout and Tuffnut shouted something at each other, Tuffnut holding a hammer and Snotlout a knife. The male twin was standing over something. Something that was very, very still.

I gasped, narrowed my eyes, and slowly rose to my feet, head bent down. My hand clenched around my axe. “You’ve just made a big mistake,” I murmured darkly.

I snapped my head up and sprinted towards the Gronckle, screaming my lungs out. It abruptly stopped in its attack and twisted around midair. The thing gurgled uselessly at seeing me—I could even see my reflection in its pupils—and then I hit it straight in the face with my axe. A long, bloody cut formed from its ear to lower jaw and instantly began to bleed like a waterfall, but I didn’t care. I hit is with the blunt side of my axe, snapping its head around and forcing it to fly away, and ran next to Tuffnut and crouched menacingly. I wasn’t about to let Ruffnut get hurt any more!

“Hey…guys…I’m not hurt too bad…”

Tuffnut and I jumped and swiveled around. Ruffnut was pushing herself up into a sitting position, squeezing her eyes shut and groaning. He head swung to the left and right and her body followed her movements like a snake. The entire time, she cringed and pushed her hands against her side. I ran to her and forced them away, ignoring her hissed protests. I gasped.

There was a long slice along her side going from her ribs all the way down to her hips. The wound was slowly seeping blood. I instantly pressed Ruffnut’s hand against it again and turned my eyes up at her. I knew that my face was pale and that my pupils were smaller than normal with worry. Ruffnut just gave me a weak grin.

“I blocked the blast with my axe. It kinda exploded and a piece slashed across me,” she explained shakily. Obviously, the girl was in major pain, but she seemed more excited than anything else. “I’m definitely getting a good battle scar from this!” She wheezed.

The Gronckle screeched behind me. Ruffnut looked up with a frown and I glanced over my shoulder. Snotlout was wildly swinging at the demon with his knife, Fishlegs right besides him with his hammer. The double effort was working splendidly; Snotlout was moving in to cut at the dragon, and Fishlegs was making as much noise as he could. That didn’t stop the dragon from suddenly spitting two fireballs, leaving only two left. Both nimbly dodged it, and I swiveled my head around to Ruffnut and Tuffnut.

“C’mon, let’s get you out of here!” Tuffnut demanded, pushing his sister’s arm over his shoulder and walking her away. “Astrid, I got her, you help the other two!” At my hesitation, he roughly shoved me. “Now!” He ordered.

“I don’t need help! I can still fight!” Ruffnut growled, trying to push her way out of Tuffnut’s grip. Neither of us paid her any mind; I was too busy gaping at Tuffnut’s rare act of maturity, and he was too busy being an overprotective brother. I shut my mouth and nodded.

“Don’ let her get hurt any more!” I warned him.

Tuffnut scoffed. “You’re telling me that?”

I smiled at him. He weakly returned it and began to help Ruffnut to the opposite end of the arena, towards the gate, where Gobber was standing.

Gobber grabbed her, concern on his face, and helped her sit down. I watched helplessly as he pulled a piece of cloth out and wrapped it around the wound. Then Gobber ordered Tuffnut to get back out in the ring, and Tuffnut outright refused him. Eventually, after a short, heated discussion, Gobber gave up, running a hand over his face and shaking his head.

I spun on my heel, determined. No dragon was going to hurt my best friend that badly and get away with it.

The Gronckle was hovering over Snotlout and Fishlegs, trying to get a clear shot at them. They would constantly duck behind a boulder or wooden beam, though, ruining its so-called perfect chances at getting them. Not only did it completely frustrate it, but it absorbed all of its attention.

I ran to the wall of the arena and hugged it, crouching in the shadows and swiftly making my way over to the fight. Fishlegs noticed me and realization seemed to dawn on him; he barked a warning at Snotlout, and the two pumped their distracting acts to the extreme. I hid in the shadows, only a few meters away from the Gronckle, coiled up like a panther waiting to pounce.

The Gronckle’s disorientation hit its peak when Snotlout and Fishlegs began to shout at the top of their lungs, stomping their feet and hitting anything within reaching distance. Once again, the dragon crashed to the ground and stood up shakily, desperately trying to get a good hold on its surroundings.

I let out a battle cry and sprinted at the devil, axe raised above my head, prepared to strike. The Gronckle perked up at my voice, and two wide, fear-filled eyes met mine. I showed no mercy, swinging the axe down…just as the normally-clutzy dragon leaped back. I used my momentum and pushed my axe sideways, banging the Gronckle in the temple with the blunt side of my axe. Snotlout leaped in front of it when it bolted away and hit its wing with his hammer. Immediately, the Gronckle swerved back towards me, letting out an agonized shriek.

I hit it again in the same spot with a loud grunt, also with the blunt end. The beast’s legs and wings turned limp, and the fight was over; it slumped to the ground and moaned weakly. The only sign of life it gave was its weakly-fluttering eyes staring up at Snotlout, Fishlegs, and me as we surrounded it. I spat on the ground in front of it, disgust written clearly across my face and body language.

“Alright, you three! We’re done here.” Gobber shouted to us. We all backed away from the Gronckle, eyeing it evilly, and made our way over to the twins and our teacher. Ruffnut was as white as the moon and was sweating. Her eyes were shut and she was leaning her head on Tuffnut’s shoulder, who was gently rubbing her back and biting his lip worriedly.

“Is she going to be alright?” I asked Gobber fearfully.

He nodded. “It’s deep, yeh, but she’s strong. Ye might want to get a doctor to check it out, though.” He added to Tuffnut.

“How bad is it?” Fishlegs anxiously spoke up.

Ruffnut’s eyes slowly opened. She grinned at us. “It’s fine,” she rasped, sucking in a deep breath before continuing, “just a little scratch.”

“I think we should take her to the village,” Snotlout said uncertainly. He suddenly changed subjects and beamed at me. “You were amazing, by the way!”

I bared my teeth at him. “How can you say that when Ruffnut’s hurt like that?!”

The teen held his hands up at me, palms up. “I just wanted to cheer you up!” He defended himself. I just shook my head.

“Snotlout’s right,” Gobber said, limping his way over to Ruffnut. He gently grabbed her arm and hoisted her to her feet. She swayed slightly and bit back a cry of pain, holding her injured side tenderly. Tuffnut was at her side in an instant, ready to help her. She scowled and uselessly pushed her unbending brother away. I felt my respect for him go up by a lot.

“Tuffnut, hold onto her while you walk back,” our instructor told us. “Fishlegs, if she can’t walk, carry her back. Snotlout, Astrid, you two make sure nothing happens. I need to put the Gronckle back and lock up the arena, but I’ll catch up with you five.” He turned and began to trek hurriedly into the Kill Ring.

We hadn’t made it five seconds out of the arena before Gobber spoke up again. “Oh! And Astrid,” he gave me a bright smile. “Nice work out there, las. If I didn’t know better, I’d say the ye’ve fought against somethin’ like a Monstrous Nightmare in the past.” I gaped at him, blushed, and nodded in thanks. Gobber returned to his work, and so did we.

“Told you so,” Snotlout bragged to me. My mind was elsewhere.

Sure, I hadn’t fought a Monstrous Nightmare before. But I had beaten a Night Fury in a fight.

I sighed and forced myself to focus. Right now, my job was to protect my best friend from getting hurt any more.

I shifted my weight slightly, trying to get the blood in my legs to circulate properly again. Even though the whole incident had come and gone hours ago, my heart was still thumping a mile a minute, my breathing was ragged, and my body was involuntarily shaking.

I glared down at the fish basket. It looked so innocent, how finely woven it was, with its simple painting of a sea serpent, how small it looked to me as a dragon. “This is all your fault,” I growled at it.

The only response the sleeping wilderness gave me was the wind gently breezing past, moving the leaves around me and scattering anything on the ground. My ears pricked when I thought I heard something yell, but after straining my hearing towards the sound, I decided that it was just a trick of the mind, a psychological defense to keep me on guard.

The giant tree I was perched on swayed and moaned more than the others due to my sitting on it. I crouched low and dug my claws into it, desperately trying to stay on the branch. The fish basket hung above me on another sturdy stem—I knew that I wouldn’t be able to hold it while sitting in the tall plant, so I’d taken the wildcat route and just put it a little bit above me for safety.

Wings folded up against my body and tail hanging straight down, I could easily be mistaken for a broken tree limb in the darkness. I was suddenly grateful for the color of my scales and eyes; from what I could tell from my reflections in the lake of the cove, I was covered in dark brown scales that matched the color of tree trunks perfectly. And, lucky me, my eyes were the color of evergreen leaves—the most popular kind of tree in Berk’s forests during the winter and summer. I blended right in.

“At least that means nobody will find me now,” I sighed. “Looks like I’ve found an advantage to my dragon body. Among other things…” I stared up through the leaves at the star-dotted sky, watching mournfully as a comet flew past my vision and onto the horizon, dipping out of sight just under the moon.

I’d been so close. Everything had gone perfectly. And then I had to go and stall a little. Now, Snotlout and Astrid have probably told the entire village about my little thievery. I’m pretty sure the gods—no, the universe hates me now. Whatever chances I had at redemption, and, possibly, regaining my father’s love—all of it was now gone. They thought I was a traitor. Just another dragon that didn’t have morals, thoughts, or feelings.

I hung my head and took a deep breath. Closing my eyes, I uselessly made a wish onto the shooting star that I’d just seen. Maybe it was a lonesome god that was just waiting for some faith to be put into it. Maybe it was just a star. I didn’t know. But then again, I didn’t know that much at all anymore. Right now, all I wanted to do was curl up in a little ball and go to sleep.

But I didn’t want to risk a hunting party catching sight of me, even with my camouflage. Then I’d doom Toothless, too. After all that the two of us had been through, I didn’t want him to die a painful and merciless death. He was a very unhappy, confused person—from the way he talked and moved, it was like he’d never had anyone he could really trust. Before this whole wonderful adventure, he probably had been even lonelier than me.

Toothless, I thought to myself. In our last conversation, I promised you that I’d be back in a couple hours at the most. You tried to hide it, but you were so scared that I would never come back. Now it’s almost morning…you must be so upset. I dropped my head even further in shame. I hope you understand the need to wait.

The leaves around me rustled loudly. I slowly opened my eyes and raised my head. From the look of the moon, there were only a few hours left before the sun began to rise. I figured that, around this time, most hunting parties would be put on hold until the morning. Hopefully, that would give me enough time to explain to my draconic friend the situation. We’d either have to find a really good hiding spot in the cove, or somehow figure out a way to get Toothless out of there. Then, I’d try to figure out a way to redeem myself to the villagers of Berk.

Nodding in approval of my decision, I raised my tail, crouched low, and spread my wings halfway. Then, with one strong flap, I jumped on top of the branch directly on top of me—the same one the fish basket was hanging on by the little ring at the top. I vaguely wondered how in the world I would manage to flip the latch on the cover open later, but pushed that to the back of my mind. If worse came to wear, I’d just pop it open with my teeth and take the sting of it like a man.

I inched towards the fish basket, not realizing how much of an idiot I was being as I got closer and closer to the thin part of the branch.

But I found out real quick.

The tree limb suddenly separated from its parent with a quick, loud SNAP! I shrieked liked a banshee when I was suddenly falling in the air with nothing underneath me. For a second, my instincts demanded that I spread my wings and rise up. But then I remembered the container that I’d given up everything for.

I dove and grabbed the basket with my front paws, spreading my wings and swooping up at the last second. My body halted midair and I flapped several times, managing to hover for a second until I dropped to the earth. I sent the tree branch, still connected to the metal hoop on the basket, the most evil look I could muster.

Leaning down, I gripped it in my teeth and slid the basket off of the end. Then I turned around and flung it at the nearest trunk extra-hard.

A smile of satisfaction spread across my maw when the branch promptly shattered. Twisting around, I picked up the basket with half-sheathed teeth and began to walk at a moderate pace towards the cove, slowly rehearsing to myself what I would say to Toothless.

The moon was hard to see from here, but that didn’t mean it didn’t have an affect on the forest path I was taking. Instead of being completely dark, the thin leaves of the coniferous trees allowed the moonlight to go right through them, leaving beams of pale, mint-green light littered across the ground. The shadows of the woods were intensified and the lights were soft. It felt like I was walking through a dreamscape.

An owl hooted above me, causing me to jump a little. I looked up at the creature, locking my eyes on its own yellow orbs. It took flight and swooped over me, heading in the direction towards Berk. I frowned a little and then shrugged it off, telling myself that I was being paranoid.

I spent the rest of the short trip to the cove mumbling to myself, solidifying my reasons for taking so long and my worries. And even though I was well-prepared (in my opinion), my body still began to tense as I reached the cove.

Toothless was going to kill me. How ironic, that I’d go through all of this only to meet my demise at a hungry, bi-polar Night Fury’s worried anger! I smiled at the thought, easing a little bit of the tension in the air that only I could feel.

When I finally reached the cove, I looked over the edge first, perking my ears. The lake was still—so still. It looked like a mirror more than anything else, like someone had gone and taken a patch of the night sky and planted it right there in the center of my recent home. The trees, both those that were gathered in a corner of the cove and the random ones dotting the landscape, looked like silent, judging giants.

I couldn’t see Toothless anywhere.

Pushing off the ground, I snapped my wings open and glided down towards the ‘forested’ area of the cove. For some absurd reason, Toothless thought it was a good idea to hang upside-down from tree branches. Maybe he was already asleep?

When I didn’t see his pitch-black form hanging around anywhere, I tilted my head in confusion. I sniffed the air, trying to pick up his scent. It was here, but it was…dry, rusty, dull. Oh, I realized, he hasn’t been here in awhile.

I dropped my head a little and walked a couple steps ahead, trying to see if I could actually follow his scent to his position. I’d seen dragons do that to find people and sheep during dragon raids, so why couldn’t I?

Crouching low and nose inches from the ground, I followed the old scent-path through the trees, ear involuntarily pricking when it became more vivid and pronounced. I rounded around the lake and looked up, searching for my friend in confusion. I was in the area across from the broken wall. Where could Toothless be?

Then I saw a large, black lump that seemed to be reflecting light, hidden in a small crack in the wall. I kicked the ground up with my feet and ran over to him, happy to see him for no reason other than that he was there. I dropped the basket and stopped just outside of the crag once I got there.

“Toothless!” I happily called. There was no response.

I blinked, straining my vision…and then I felt my body grow fire-hot with mortification when I realized that I’d been talking to a shadow. The ‘light reflections’ that I had mistaken for Toothless’ scales were just pieces of stone that were facing the moon. I sighed, turned, and picked up the basket. As I lifted my eyes while still leaning down, I noticed something that I hadn’t been able to see earlier.

Beneath a solitary tree resting besides the lake, hiding within its roots growing above the earth, was a dark, Toothless-sized…thing. I hadn’t seen it when I’d been looking down on the cove because it had, from my perspective, been behind the tree and out of sight.

I trotted swiftly over there, double-checking that it really was my dragon friend. When I had confirmed that it was the elusive, hot-tempered Night Fury, a huge grin grew across my face. I quietly went towards him, playing with the idea of startling him awake with a prank—and then I paused when I took notice of his body positioning.

Toothless was folded in on himself, wings folded tightly against his back. His head was lying directly on the ground, his two gigantic paws brought slightly over his nose. The dragon’s tail covered part his face, pressing against his body and covering his left cheek and forehead with his single extended tailfin. Ears flat against his neck, eyebrows pulled down, and eyes squeezed shut, he looked as if he was having some terrible nightmare. The fact that Toothless’ face was wrinkled slightly didn’t help at all. In general, he looked like he’d just plopped onto the ground and hadn’t even cared that he’d been in such an uncomfortable position.

A wave of guilt rammed into me hard enough to greedily knock my breath away.

Thud.

The container fell to the ground.

“Toothless?” My voice was soft and unsure. I leaned down and nudged his cheek with my left paw. His eyes shut themselves even tighter, but other than that, he didn’t move. I called out the Night Fury’s name again, this time a little louder.

Toothless’ eyelids didn’t snap open, but they certainly didn’t gradually come up. They opened as if he’d just been blinking slowly, like when you’re sleepy and close your eyes for a second too long. It took a short moment for his confused lime-green eyes to take in the area and, of course, myself. I grinned sheepishly at him, laughing a little bit. Every witty, sarcastic “I’m back!” comment I’d come up with died on my lips—it felt almost cruel to say any of them.

“H-hi, Toothless. Uh, I’m sorry it took so long…funny story, heh…” I shuffled slightly on my feet when Toothless sat up with an unreadable expression. His wide pupils (when had they ever been that big?) didn’t drop to the fish basket besides me at all. He just looked at me like he couldn’t believe I was there, mouth slightly open, ears standing straight up, brows pulled down onto his eyes.

I frowned worriedly. “Toothless, are you okay? You look really—EEP!”

I yelped when the dragon suddenly charged into me and tackled me to the ground, causing me fall flat on my back, wings and tail bent at awkward angles. Toothless’ paws cornered my face to the grass and his legs were on both sides of my hips, completely cutting me off from squirming away. He rubbed his face against mine and purred loud enough for me to hear without actually touching him…something that I didn’t know he - we - were capable of. I gaped at the sudden act of affection, legs hanging uselessly in the air and eyes wide.

After a few seconds of awkward dragon-hugs, Toothless raised his head and stared down at me. He sat still for a second and then jumped off and away from me, looking over his shoulder to glare at me. His eyes looked sickly yellow in the moonlight. I rolled over and sat up, stunned by the mood swings.

“Woah, what—“ I began.

“Where in the name of the Dragoness of the Moon have you been?!” Toothless screeched, eyes quickly becoming the slits I had been accustomed to. He stormed over to me and pushed his face right into mine. “You left hours ago! You said you wouldn’t be gone too long! I thought—“ He abruptly cut himself off and turned away from me, chin facing down, a shadow falling across his entire face. I cringed.

“Toothless, I’m so sorry. Something happened…I saw Astrid and Snotlout!” I hurriedly explained to the hunched-over Night Fury.

He gave me a sidelong glare. “So you just decided to go off and frolic with them? I hope you had fun. Did you only come back here because you felt obliged to do so?” He pointed at the fish basket with his nose. Then he turned his back to me and sat down, shoulders jutting up at harsh angles and wings splayed uselessly onto the ground. His ears drooped down past his cheekbones as he murmured, “I knew you wouldn’t want to come back.”

I shook my head. Then, realizing he couldn’t see me, I said, “Toothless, no. It’s nothing like that.” I moved over to him, leaning down to his eye level about a foot away from him and holding my gaze—even though he was stubbornly staring at the ground. Sighing, I reached out and lifted his chin with one of my not-very-flexible-at-all fingers and forced him to look at me. The Night Fury narrowed his eyes and the middle of his face folded darkly; hurt flared through his every movement. I smiled grimly. “They attacked me.”

Halfway through the sentence, my voice cracked with emotion, and I felt my face mirror Toothless’ own. I dropped my paw and sat back with a forlorn sigh, eyelids falling halfway.

In the immediate quiet afterwards, the harsh look slowly warped off of Toothless’ face. He watched me silently in…pity? I internally cringed; I didn’t want pity. I just wanted this day to be over. And I wanted Toothless to believe that I wouldn’t betray him…

I looked at my feet. “You thought I’d left you?” I whispered. “Is your faith in me that little?”

Toothless took in a deep breath. “I-I,” he stuttered, something so unusual for him that I raised my head. Toothless’ face was creased and he had his eyes locked on something off to his right that I couldn’t see. It took me a few seconds—but I realized that he was staring at the moon. The dragon deflated, giving me a somewhat desperate look momentarily. He wanted me to figure something out on my own, but since I hadn’t really gotten Dragon Body Language 101 down yet, I had no idea what he was trying to tell me.

“What is it?” I asked, bewildered by his odd behavior. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach…

Toothless shook his head, stopped, and seemed to reconsider himself. He brought his gaze to mine, temporarily allowing our link to reform. But I didn’t pay that any attention; because, as he did this, he also told me the reason why he’d been acting this way:

“I was scared.”

My jaw dropped. Toothless was scared?

Despite the situation, I felt flattered. And I hated it; that’s like saying that I was happy that he was so distressed to actually tell me. Toothless never talks about his emotions.

He took my silence the wrong way, standing up and walking towards the lake and away from me. “Fine. Sit there and laugh!” He snarled venomously. “It’s not like I actually thought you cared. Apparently not. No, not at all,” he whispered. The Night Fury’s voice shook, betraying his harsh words.

“No!” I cried, jumping into a jog to catch up with him. “It’s nothing like that!” He didn’t run away from me, but he definitely wasn’t letting me get too close to him. Whenever I’d step near him, he’d turn his back to me. He ignored my protests no matter how many times I said them.

Eventually, I just got annoyed. Sure, I’d been gone for a lot longer than I said I would. But Toothless was making a mountain out of a molehill.

After the millionth consecutive treatment of the cold shoulder, I snapped. I took one bounding leap, stretched my wings midair, and sailed right over him. Spinning midair and folding my wings in, I dropped directly in front of Toothless.

Pushing my forehead against his, I screamed, “I wasn’t betraying you!” At Toothless’ immediate angry look, I growled, “No! Stop it!”

Surprisingly, he did just that, snapping away from me and replacing his hurt expression with a strategically blank one. He watched me emotionlessly, as if he were daring me to say the exact opposite of what he wanted.

“Look,” I breathed, trying to calm myself. I sat down in front of him, bringing me to his eye level. “I was in there, and everything was going fine, but then I got caught by Astrid and Snotlout. Snotlout attacked me and I guess Astrid guarded the exit, so I ran out of there as quick as I could. But I had to knock down Snotlout first, and that really got him angry…” I explained, lowering my head. “As I was flying away, I heard him tell Astrid that they had to tell the others about me, so I hid in the forest until a couple minutes ago to make sure they didn’t come back here and find you.” I raised my gaze and gave him an even look. “I’m really sorry about making you worry like that. But, gods, Toothless, you’re really being a baby right now! What did you expect me to do after the girl I’ve been attracted to all my life and my own cousin turn around and attack me without even asking? Of course I hid! And I did that because I was worried about you!”

The Night Fury blinked several times. Then, Toothless looked at his feet. He was silent for a several long, tense, betrayed, broken moments.

“You know I wouldn’t do that,” I seethed, too lost in my own hurt to see the affect I was having on him, how every word made him sink lower to the ground. “You know. Why would…” I trailed off, shaking my head.

Toothless took a sharp intake of air, his eyes slitting even further. He looked at me with an awed expression—the unfortunate kind, when you can’t believe that something had happened to you, when you think that what happened to you should be illegal. Then, abruptly, he dropped to the ground in front of me, one side flat on the ground and head half-buried by his paws that were stretched out in front of his head. I blinked in bewilderment and quickly tiptoed around to face him.

Had he really had that much of a rough time? I thought in disbelief.

Toothless seemed to have read my thoughts, since he looked up at me and quietly told me, “I spent the majority of what was left of the day trying to climb out. I thought that you’d been captured or injured. But I began to doubt, and then I thought that you might have left me…I stopped trying then.” He sighed while I lay down next to him with a soft grunt.

“I understand. I know I was being immature. It’s just…” his voice dropped to below a whisper and he stared at his outstretched arms. “I thought I was alone again.”

I honestly didn’t know what to say to this. Toothless was completely opening up to me for the first time.

It saddened me that I was the only person he’d ever felt able to talk honestly to; why else would he say that he was ‘alone’? And what did he mean by ‘again’? We’d known each other for barely a week, and yet both of us were attached to each other like glue.

Maybe we weren’t all that different. (Pop in another puzzle piece.)

After a few seconds, I scooted closer to him until our sides were touching and rested my head on the ground next to his. “You’re not alone.”  I looked straight into his troubled eyes. “You know I would never leave and not come back like that. Right?” He hesitated, and slowly nodded. “And you understand why it took me so long, right?” I asked softly. Toothless nodded again. “Then you have nothing to worry about.”

The worried dragon attempted a small smile. “Alright.”

We lapsed into silence. Toothless twisted around and rested his chin on his paws with closed eyes, though he clearly was awake by how he would twitch his ear up towards me or shift his weight.

Although it wasn’t too uncomfortable, I spoke up anyways. “Hey, want to—“ A yawn cut me off midsentence, causing me to pause for several seconds. My jaw stretched wide and I let out a tiny squeak. I blinked several times at the tears that flooded my vision.

“How about we sleep?” Toothless tiredly suggested. He cracked open an eye—one that was much more dull than usual—and gave me an almost pleading look.

I silently nodded, lowering my head onto my own arms. I tilted my head to the side, cheek pressed up against my leg, to observe the Night Fury. He was looking at me with barely-open eyes, exhaustion swirling inside of them.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. Then I shut my eyes, staring into the darkness.

“…Hiccup?”

I raised my eyelids a little, perking my ears. “Yeah?”

“I’m sorry, too.”

(and add another)

You know how sometimes you’ll wake up, but not really? You’ll still be in your dream, but you’re completely conscious and aware of your surroundings, but unable to actually process them, like you’re a bystander watching from afar?

Unfortunately, the couple hours I had of sleep were only like that. I suppose it was a good thing, in case someone tried to sneak up on Toothless and myself, but still. A growing teenager needs his sleep!

I groaned something incomprehensible when Toothless shifted besides me. I knew he was awake and very irritated with my sleeping choice. Sometime, during the night, I’d managed to crawl under one of his legs and rest my chin on the other, wrapping my arms around it. While it was probably very cute…Toothless really did seem annoyed and I was pretty sure I only had a few minutes of ‘sleep’ left until he finally got fed up with me and stood up. But hey, in my defense, autumn and winter nights in Berk are freezing!

“I know you’re awake.” Toothless’ voice was loud and perfectly clear above me. I attempted to look more asleep, voluntarily evening out my breathing and relaxing my facial muscles. My friend didn’t notice it. “I already told you, I don’t cuddle!”

I cracked an eye open while Toothless lifted the leg I had situated myself under. “It was really cold last night,” I yawned. After a second, I added as an afterthought, “You know you like it.”

Toothless barked a sarcastic laugh and rose to his feet, forcing me to plop to the ground. I watched him as he shook his body violently and stretched, flapping his wings several times to get any kinks out of the delicate muscles. I contented myself with closing my eyes and—hopefully—trying to go back to sleep. From the few seconds my eyes were actually focused, I could tell that Toothless, as always, had woken up super-early. Again.

If he expected me to follow his sleeping habits, he was crazy.

But then again, he may have woken up because he couldn’t sleep. Like me. I groaned, unwillingly opening my eyes and raising my head. Toothless was currently running his thick tongue over his paw and the pushing it over his face, knocking dead scales off and polishing the new ones. I watched him for a second, perplexed, and then stared at the ground.

“Toothless?” I asked, raising my gaze. He stopped mid-lick, glanced up at me, and slowly finished pushing his paw over his head before setting it on the ground.

“Yes?” He murmured as he shifted his weight until it was centered. I sat up, assuming the same position.

I took a second to collect my thoughts. Then, I asked, “Are…are we okay?” I lowered my eyes, unwilling to look Toothless in the face. I felt my brows lower over my face.

I waited in silence.

The grass swished when the beast walked close to me, stopping only a few feet away. “We are,” he softly confirmed. “It was just a big misunderstanding. Holding a grudge won’t help at all.”

I raised my head, staring into his eyes. At the truth behind them, I felt a real, genuine grin spread across my lips. Toothless hesitantly returned it.

We stared at each other for a couple more moments. Then it just got awkward, and Toothless began to resume his dragon-made bath. I slumped back to the ground, mostly out of relief than anything, and closed my eyes. We had nothing else to say to each other; we’d somehow already spoken it.

I don’t know how long we were like that, comfortable in the quiet. I drifted in and out of sleep, unaware of my surroundings until Toothless eventually got tired of it and woke me up.

Thump. “Hiccup, what is this thing?”

I forced myself to open my eyes, slightly startled to see that the sun was up. Usually, Toothless would give me some dorky nickname and stick to it for about one sentence. I knew he was trying to reconnect with me, since our bond had seemed to have been ripped apart and stitched together with strings.

But we’d just told each other that everything was alright, hadn’t we? Didn’t that fix it?

I raised my head, glancing between the fish basket and Toothless’ inquisitive face. He was sitting next to me, the container sitting upright by his right paw. After a few seconds, his head tipped far to the side and he nudged the basket. It wobbled and fell in slow-motion, landing on Toothless’ foot.

“Ick!” He cried, jumping up and arching his back, glaring suspiciously at the basket. “It touched me! There’s something in it!” He turned slitted eyes on me, giving me the most expectant look in the world.

Well, it’s was fixed, I decided, considering he trusts me again. I felt myself relax.

I grunted and sat up. My muscles felt very sore—probably from all the practicing I had done yesterday. And, of course, being chased out of the storage house.

“That’s what I brought back,” I mumbled, dropping my head low enough to rub my eyes with my left paw.

“Yeah, I figured that out already,” Toothless grunted sarcastically. “But why didn’t you bring back food?”

I smirked at his…innocence. (Who would’ve thought that I’d describe a Night Fury of all things as innocent?) The way he shot daggers at the harmless piece of woven wood, slowly backing away from it and unsheathing his teeth—it was too much. I burst out laughing. My mirth only intensified when Toothless gave me one of the evilest looks he could voluntarily muster.

Between giggles, I gasped, “It is our food, silly!” I doubled over when, instead of giving me a dirty look, Toothless’ mouth dropped open. He gaped at me and the basket, unable to wrap his mind around the concept that something was inside the container and that I had no intentions of eating the wooden part.

I was on my back, rolling in the grass and watching Toothless upside-down, when he gathered up enough courage to go back to the basket. He sniffed it warily. The dragon’s head reared back, eyes slitting slightly and ears shooting straight up and lifting a paw a little into the air. He tipped his head back and forth, making sure to fully examine our dinner, going over every inch of it with his nose and giving it an occasional nudge.

Toothless had already sunk his teeth into the wood before I’d had any time to react. He held the basket down with both paws and thrust his head up, ripping the wooden basket to shreds. The remainder of it that had not been bitten off quickly turned to limp, useless tendrils. My friend showed no remorse in attacking them anyways, cheerily tearing the remains to itty-bitty woodchips. He completely ignored the gigantic pile of fish that had been sitting inside the basket and was now spilt across the ground, content in his plagiarism.

I stood there, open-mouthed, frozen in shock. Quickly getting over it, I flipped over to my belly and leaped to my feet. “TOOTHLESS!” I cried. He stopped abruptly, pieces of wood falling from his mouth. “What are you doing?! Those take forever to make!” I ran over to where the basket once stood, sullenly pushing the twigs and stems into a tiny, misshapen pile. The only thing that remained intact was the lid, and the only reason that had survived was probably because Toothless hadn’t wanted to chew on the metal.

I thought I saw a wicked smile flit across his face, but probably imagined it.

“Huh?” His voice was thoroughly confused. “It’s not a game?”

“How in the name of Thor could you possibly think that you were supposed to rip it to shreds?” I whined. “That was made so you could carry stuff around! And now look what you’ve done!”

Toothless shrugged large, muscular shoulders. “Sometimes, when dragons want to encourage their young to develop strong jaw muscles and fire-aiming, they would encase some food in a hallow stone and then put a weak magic spell on it. It could easily be broken by an adult, but to a little one, it was a challenge. A fun one, at that! Sometimes, we’d have contests to see who would break their stone the fastest.” He grinned, eyes slightly dazed over at a pleasant memory.

I raised a brow. “That seems kind of abusive.”

It was Toothless’ turn to laugh. He walked over to me and patted me on the shoulder with his wing in a “there, there” fashion. “That’s coming from someone whose culture is centered on killing.”

“We’re Vikings,” I said with a roll of my eyes.

“That’s no excuse,” Toothless countered evenly.

I snorted and rolled my eyes. “Dragons are weird,” I declared.

Toothless tch-ed. “That makes no sense. You are a dragon.”

I paused, frowning. “But I’m still human, sort of,” I defended weakly. “In the mind.”

Toothless, who had been walking away from me towards the pile of fish, tail dragging on the ground and ears lowered, looked over his shoulder with wide pupils. He had a thick frown plastered across his face and his eyebrows were slightly raised. I flinched under the gaze, refusing to deal with the certain parts of my mind that were telling me I was dead-wrong. I didn’t want to think about that; not here, not now, not after yesterday and last night. And I knew that that was exactly what he was thinking about.

So I pushed it aside, got up, and joined Toothless at the pile of fish. “Promise not to rip these apart?” I asked, cutting off whatever he was going to say.

Giving me an annoyed look, like that of a parent that was about to scold their child but ended up distracted, my friend moved his massive head towards the pile of fish and sniffed them. After a few seconds, he said, “They’re a little stale.”

I scoffed. “No, they’re not! I watched some people put them in the storage house straight from a fishing boat. They can’t be more than a day old.”

Toothless turned his head at me, looking at me like I was crazy. He shifted through the large pile, and, after a few seconds, picked out something that seemed to pass his regulations. “I prefer my fish fresh, myself. Tastes less…rotten.” It did not amuse me that, as he was saying this, Toothless leaned down and bit the fish, tilted his head up, and swallowed it whole.

I gasped, five seconds away from tackling his chest in an attempt to stop him from choking. But the dragon just turned to me and tilted his head to the side, most likely wondering why I looked like I’d just seen a ghost. I laughed nervously, not having expected for a dragon with a mouth full of teeth to not even bother chewing. I mean, was it really that hard?

“…Are you alright?” Toothless asked me cautiously. I nodded, still giving him a strange look. Shrugging it off, Toothless continued, “Well, I’m waiting.”

“Waiting for what?” My brows scrunched together in confusion and I felt one ear raise slightly higher than the other.

“Pick your fish!” Toothless commanded, as if it was completely obvious. His impatient look only deepened when I only gave the pile a blank look and returned my eyes to him. Realization flashed across Toothless’ face, to my relief. “Oh, wait, you probably won’t be able to digest this,” he mumbled to himself, staring at the pile thoughtfully. “You haven’t eaten once…it’ll put you in shock…”

Oh, good, he’s figured out that humans don’t eat fish raw, I thought, not quite registering his last comment. Maybe he’ll start a fire somewhere so I can cook the—wait. What the—is he choki—what is he doing?!

I felt my entire body rattle up when Toothless began to heave, his throat bulging and moving up and down slightly. His eyes were half closed, looking up, completely blank. I jumped over to him, raised myself on my hind legs, and slapped him right in the middle of his back. Toothless gasped, and the head, spine, some desperate internal organs and fishmeat slid to the ground from his huge, pink tongue. I breathed a sigh of relief, dropping back to all fours. I didn’t notice the deathly look the Night Fury was giving me.

“I knew you were going to choke!” I rubbed my eyes with a paw. “That’s what you get for swallowing that thing whole!”

“…I wasn’t choking.” Toothless said slowly with a half-amused tone. “Thanks for hitting me, by the way.”

I ignored his sarcastic comment, straightened up in my seated position. “What do you mean you weren’t choking?” I questioned. “Why’d you want to spit up what you just ate?”

Toothless gave me a pointed look and shook his head in exasperation. “Honestly, sometimes…” he muttered. He silently picked up the fish remains between his claws and thrust them at me. I flinched in repulsion when they slapped me in the chest and fell to the ground, leaving a little stain. “Now, eat it.”

My head snapped up. “What?”

“Eat it.” Toothless couldn’t have been more serious. “You just went through hell and back to get this food. I’m not going to let you put it all to waste.” He nodded at the fish, adding, “Plus, you need to gain some weight there, Scrap.”

I glared at him. “I wasn’t going to waste it! I was going to cook them in a fire!”

He raised a brow calmly. He didn’t look put-off by my excuse in the least bit. “And how would you do that?”

I paused with a small frown. “Well, obviously you won’t do it, so I guess I’d just light it myself,” I admitted, shrugging.

Toothless’ jaw dropped and he leaped to his feet. “What?! Are you crazy? Look at what happened the last time you tried to use a fireball!” He exclaimed, nodding towards the toppled-over side of the cove. “You have no control over your firepower! You’d start a fire in here and get us killed, or worse—you’d attract all the Vikings here, and they’d get us!”

I felt myself blush. “I’d be able to do it!” I scrambled for something that sounded reasonable. “You could tell me how to or something!”

Scoffing, my friend shook his head. “There is no way I’m letting you practice your fire-breathing in the place I’m living in.” He gave me a cocky, toothy grin, showing that his name was completely false. “Besides, with how skittish you always act, half the island would be blown up because of you.” He smirked when I hissed in annoyance. It faltered a little for a second, though.

“I wouldn’t—“ I started.

“Just eat the fish, Hiccup,” Toothless cut me off, sighing. “It’s not that hard. All you have to do is swallow it.”

I stared at the half-digested, slobbery excuse of a meal in front of me. Hell no!

The dragon groaned in irritation when I wildly shook my head. “Don’t make me force-feed you! Geez, I have to do everything for you. Bathe you, feed you, teach you how to move…It’s like you’re a little hatchling!” He ranted whilst walking towards me. I backed up. “Now come here!”

I balked. “No! Get that away from me! I’m not touching it!” Toothless scooped it up in his teeth, giving me a look that said, “yes, you are, in fact, eating this disgusting mess of internal organs and flesh, and you’re GOING to like it”. I inched away from him further.

Toothless quickened his pace. I bolted away from him, screaming the entire way around the lake that I absolutely would not put that in my mouth and swallow it. Toothless yelled back in equally—but muffled—loud exasperation that I had to eat or I’ll lose more weight and that I need to take it slow because I’d never eaten in this form and something about how regurgitated dragon food had some gross acid in it that apparently helped those who hadn’t eaten actual meat in awhile not go into something called ‘shock’. I didn’t believe the latter in one bit—I even tried telling him I’d just grab a new fish, but the dragon was convinced that my automatic rejection of them was a sign that I ‘hadn’t developed a strong stomach yet’ or some other such nonsense.

I was perched on a rock when he said this, having used my ability to fly to latch onto an overhang well into one of the walls of the cove, desperately trying to not slip off it.

“Don’t make me come up there, Hiccup!” Toothless roared at me, having dropped the fish to his side.

“No!” I countered, “I can just get a new one! I’m not eating that!”

“But you need to!”

“No, I don’t!”

“Yes, you do!”

“I’m pretty sure if I’m nearly as big as you, then I can eat a regular fish!”

“Well, I’m pretty sure that your body won’t be able to handle the sudden food!”

“Then what do you suggest, genius?”

“Eat the gods-forsaken fish I have here, you idiot!”

“I’m the idiot? At least I wasn’t afraid of a basket!”

By this time in our argument, Toothless seemed to have grown tired of our rather one-sided conversation. I watched in confusion when he stepped back and retracted his teeth. “What are you—“

A small, thin ball of blue fire raced through the air and onto the ledge I was standing on. On impact, it let loose a small—yet powerful—explosion, knocking me off my perch. I screamed as I cartwheeled through the air and hit the ground hard, landing on my back and bouncing a little. Groaning, I began to sit up—

—only for a massive paw to crush down on my chest, knocking me back down onto the ground. I blinked up at Toothless, mouth slightly open, as he threateningly stood over me, giving me an irritated glare. His other paw rose, the regurgitated fish dangled limply in his claws. He casually dropped it, which caused it to land right next to my neck.

“Eat. It,” Toothless ordered darkly. “I’m not about to watch you waste away because of your picky human eating habits. It’s either this or nothing.”

He slowly lifted his leg and settled back, allowing me to flip over and stand back up. I desperately tried to find a way out of this situation. Something—anything—that meant that I didn’t have to eat the fish.

Toothless slowly advanced on me. Our eyes met, and I could sense that he had the full intent of pinning me to the ground and literally shoving the fish down my throat if I didn’t make a move towards it. The desperation—the thought that I might starve myself…

I was touched by his concern.

With a defeated sigh, I leaned down towards the fish. I hesitated and grimaced when my nose and mouth came within inches of it. But not because it smelled bad—no, it was just the opposite. It was because the scent actually made my belly roar with hunger, demanding that I fed it.

Might as well get over it, I thought, squeezing my eyes shut. I opened my mouth and took the fish in, trying to move it with my tongue to get over to one of the sides of my jaw so I could crush it. But instead, my body suddenly seemed to develop a mind of its own; my head tilted back, powerful throat muscles greedily pushing the slimy, disgustingly warm fish down my esophagus in seconds. My eyes snapped open—confusion filled every fiber of my body. Why had I done that?

I slowly pulled my head down when Toothless nudged me, a worried look on his face. I attempted a grin that I knew looked completely fake. My mind was still having trouble coming to terms with the fact that I’d just eaten something so repulsing—and liked it.

Toothless’ face softened, somehow understand my inner turmoil. He sat down besides me, looking away, but making sure that I was in his peripheral vision. His wing barely touched my shoulder, offering a tiny bit of comfort while my head whirled and spun in a hurricane of a million new thoughts and questions.

I used to be so determined to be as human as possible—what changed—what caused this—why don’t I feel repulsed by it—am I losing myself—will I completely turn into a dragon? How do I feel about that?

I stared at my feet and leaned into Toothless’ side, head resting on his neck and underneath his chin. He didn’t move an inch. We stayed in that position for a long time, me leaning on Toothless, and Toothless having no idea what to do—and during it, I wracked my brain for answers (What’s happening to me? What do I want?) and came up with none. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get one single, straight, truthful answer. Everything I came up with had forced, unsolved, wrong logic behind it. It was the ‘would you turn back’ question all over again.

“Hiccup…” Toothless murmured. I lifted my gaze from the ground and moved my head up slightly. Neither of us broke contact. “I don’t expect…I mean,” he struggled for the correct words. Eventually, he just sighed, and said in the same soft tone, “It’s perfectly natural for you to feel that way. You haven’t eaten in days. You’d probably act that way…” he paused, almost painfully, “…in your human body under the same circumstances. You’re not forgetting who you are.”

“But I am changing,” I whispered fearfully.

“If you weren’t, I’d be worried,” Toothless chuckled a little. “Maybe it’s for the better.”

I pulled away from him, gazing into his eyes. After a couple seconds, I looked away, ears drooping. I don’t understand anything anymore.

Toothless stared at me and I stared at the ground. Why the sudden…regret? I know that acting human in a draconic body is a death-wish itching to come true. But I shouldn’t have acted like that…

“Me neither,” Toothless sighed besides me. I jumped, realizing that I’d accidentally spoken aloud my realization. “It’s just a strange thought, how I wanted nothing more than you to be dead only a couple days ago.” I nodded dismissively. “Strange how the world just shifts right in front of you,” he continued, talking so quietly that I had to strain to hear. “If someone told me I’d end up having a human…dragon…something as my friend, I’d have attacked them for their insolence.”

I cringed at being called a something. But that’s what I was, wasn’t I? Not quite a dragon, definitely not a human.

I turned to Toothless slightly. He was watching the lake. I followed his gaze. “The same goes for me…except for the attacking part. I’d probably get floored,” I laughed weakly at my joke. Toothless’ mouth quirked, but the thick, serious atmosphere about us quickly killed off any attempts at humor.

“Look,” Toothless finally looked me right in the eyes, leaning down to my eye-level. “You’re not going to know how you feel in this situation right away. Hell, even I don’t!” He widened his eyes and unraveled his wings and tailfins a little. “Don’t worry yourself into depression. You’ll figure it out eventually. And,” he gave me an honest and real, albeit sad grin. “… and I’m not going anywhere. You’ll have a little trouble getting me away.” Saying this, he unsheathed his teeth to their fullest and grinned widely, attempted his own joke to lighten the mood.

He doesn’t know, either, I thought to myself. And he’s really trying. Unlike me, who just ran off for hours on end without telling him what I was doing. Way to go, Hiccup…

Moved by his kind words, all I could do was nod, furiously blinking to get my eyes to clear back up. I felt my cheeks go fire-hot when I realized that I was crying. I ducked my head and covered my eyes with my left paw in humiliation. The emotion only deepened when Toothless rose to his feet and nudged me, causing me to jump.

“Hiccup?” Toothless was bewildered. “What’s wrong?”

I shook my head, sniffing. “It’s nothing,” I mumbled. Stop crying, you idiot! I scolded myself. What are you, some emotional teenage girl? Man up!

Toothless poked me again, this time more pointedly, demanding an answer. I sharply turned my head away from him and used my right wing to cover my face up, blocking the Night Fury out. “I-I’m fine,” I said, “just…got something in my eye. Had to yawn,” I finished lamely.

“You’re a terrible liar,” Toothless huffed besides me in slight annoyance. Small vibrations in the ground told me that he was walking around me. Then, he was right next to me, using his paw to push mine off of my face and then forcing me to look up—just as I’d done last night. I blinked at him, waiting for an amused look or joke.

Instead, Toothless just stared at me with an unreadable, wide-eyed expression. He looked like he wanted to say something, but was too afraid to voice it. After a few seconds, he dropped his leg back to the ground and backed up. “Let’s go eat some more,” he decided distractedly. “But you have to take it slow.”

“I’m not eating another one of those ‘special fish’,” I told him seriously.

The dragon chuckled humorlessly. “I know.”

You never know true hunger until you’ve starved for five days.

I learned the hard way that my dragon instincts—ones that I’d managed to repress this entire time—awoke very, very quickly and very, very strongly when I suddenly came in contact with food for the first time.

I hadn’t even realized what I was doing until I’d wolfed (or dragoned—haha, get it?) down half of my portion of the food, much to Toothless’ surprise. Had he not pushed me aside, I’d probably have gulped the entire pile down, leaving Toothless with a belly full of one measly fish.

Sighing guiltily, I wrapped myself up into a little ball even more, eyes half-lidded. I flinched a little when pain whipped through my midsection. Toothless had been right about taking it slow; the second I’d actually realized (in horror) what I’d done and retreated from the pile of fish, my stomach had clenched painfully, knocking my breath away. The situation was made into a much more embarrassing one when Toothless decided to give me an “I told you so” speech, telling me how he’d constantly repeated himself even after I’d had my first fish.

While irritated with me at first for ignoring his advice, Toothless got over it a lot quicker than I expected. He’d just sighed, shook his head, and taken a couple of fish for himself before walking over to me and sitting down next to me. Currently, the two of us were simply sitting in the noon sunlight, comfortable in the silence.

Of course, I was upset at myself for how I’d acted. But Toothless had brought up a point about how anyone—even a human—would have reacted that way. It brought up memories of when I’d walk into Town Hall to see the most recent members of a raid or nest-search shoving as much food into their mouths as the could. That alone—and, maybe, Toothless’ support—had allowed me to pull myself together and not mope all day long. Though I was still angry at having decimated the supply by nearly a quarter.

I guess I’ll just have to get over it, I told myself. Toothless was right. It’s perfectly normal that I wanted to eat a lot. There was still a part of my mind that pointed out that maybe it was because I was a dragon—and I slapped it away, telling myself that it was completely wrong. It’s perfectly normal, I repeated. I forced myself to stop thinking the unsettling thoughts, focusing on my surroundings instead.

The sunlight shone down on the entire cove, bathing everything in shades of gold and slightly glowing. A soft breeze blew, the grass swayed, and leaves rustled. A couple birds swooped ahead, spiraling and twirling, lost in their own little world where everything was safe and wonderful. The lake glistened like sapphire and soft shadows fell from the cliff walls and trees. Flickers of sunlight bounced between the branches of the giant oak Toothless and I were situated under, leaving colorful prints of vivid color where there were gaps. I shut my eyes and let out a contented sigh, enjoying every second of the peaceful moment that I never wanted to end.

It wasn’t until Toothless nudged me roughly in the shoulder that I realized that I'd fallen asleep. Still, I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to retreat from my swiftly-fading dream.

“Hiccup!” Toothless hissed. “Get up right now! There are humans approaching!”

I snapped my eyes open, sitting upright. Toothless was crouched defensively besides me, tail swishing, ears and side-frills flat against his head, and staring intently towards one of the longer cliffs of the cove. I pricked my ears and barely—just barely—heard the unmistakable sound of human voices playing through the trees. They were coming from the cliffside closest to us.

“Oh, no!” I gasped, leaping to my feet. Dread filled my entire body; last night, I’d told myself that we had to figure out a way away from here before another hunting party set out—and I’d completely forgotten! I ran towards the fish and shredded basket, desperately nudging them with my nose and front paws towards the edge of the cliff, where there was a shadow. “We have to hide all of this!” I continued to push the food away, mind working a mile a minute. How big was the party? What would we do if they came down?

A strong, sturdy set of jaws clamped down on my scruff and pulled me back roughly, forcing a startled squeak out of me. I turned around with wide eyes to see Toothless dragging my semi-limp body across the ground, towards the more tree-filled area of our home.

“No,” Toothless growled, “we need to hide ourselves! Now get over there and sit in one of the trees—you blend right into them!”

I shook my head and Toothless dropped me. Ignoring the pain in my stomach and neck, I desperately glanced over my shoulder to see the pile of food sitting in broad daylight. “If they see that, they’ll come down here!” I tried to reason with the Night Fury. His ears raised straight up and his slit eyes traveled up towards where the hunting party was approaching. Fear flashed through his lime-green orbs like lightning and he dropped his gaze to me with a firm look.

“We’re hiding, now. Get over there!” He ordered, pushing me harshly in the side. I stumbled a bit and moved a couple steps forward. Then I stopped and gave Toothless a half-hearted glare.

“There’s no use in hiding when they know that we’ve been here! We won’t be able to not come out of hiding!” I exclaimed, turning my body towards the mess again.

Toothless stepped in front of me. “No! They might not even make the connection!”

“It’s a giant pile of fish!”

Shaking his head again, the Night Fury held his place like a stone in a river. I paused and bolted around him in a desperate attempt to cover our tracks. Unfortunately, Toothless saw this coming, and turned around just as swiftly as I had and grabbed the midsection of my tail, digging his feet into the ground and pushing back. I strained to move forward, even by an inch, but the determined dragon would see none of it. He held firmly in place, his superior strength easily overpowering mine.

“Lemme go!” I cried, whipping my tail back and forth and glaring over my shoulder. Toothless cried something muffled back at me, shaking his head and pulling back even more, causing my body to drag unwillingly across the ground. I groaned. “We don’t have the time for this! Toothless, come on!”

“No, ‘oo comf onf!” He shouted back at me.

I turned around and squared my left feet, pushing off the ground as hard as I could with my right and trying to swing my tail back. Toothless lost grip for a second—and then he pounced onto my tail again, even further up, and yanked me back hard. I let out a squeak when I toppled over, unbalanced and having not expected that.

“Come on, hurry up!” Toothless jumped over to me and nudged my in the side, helping me (shakily) stand up. I swung my tail back and forth until I finally straightened out. Toothless began to run down towards the other end of the cove, pausing halfway there to make sure I was following. With a defeated sigh, I began to sprint after him, suddenly realizing that the humans sounded incredibly close.

But I was too late.

A small, shiny object whizzed over my head and onto the ground, sticking up and vibrating loudly before settling in its upright position. I shrieked in surprise and fear, halting and forcing myself to half-sit down to avoid touching the long, sharp dagger. Toothless screamed my name, rushing towards me as fast as his long legs could carry him. He easily dodged another dagger thrown at him, and, suddenly, he was right in front of me, knocking me to the ground and standing over my body protectively and letting loose a terrifying snarl. I cowered.

A couple seconds later, I realized what was happening—I had finally caught sight of who exactly was paying our cove such a nice little visit.

“Stop!” I shouted, scrambling out from under Toothless and shaking my head wildly and deliberately, staring straight into the eyes of Astrid.

She hesitated with her throwing knife, eyes glancing down at the still-growling Toothless. The Jorgenson twins were on her left, and I immediately took notice of how Ruffnut was leaning heavily on her brother and panting. At Astrid’s right, Fishlegs watched me with inquisitive eyes, not holding a single weapon, and Snotlout was giving me the dirtiest look I’d ever seen and clutching a sword in his grip. I felt my breath catch.

Toothless turned towards me and demanded, “Why should I?! They’re attacking us!”

I shook my head again. “This is all a big misunderstanding! Just let me talk to them!”

“No!” Toothless crouched low and glared at the Vikings for a second before turning his angry eyes on to me. “I’m not letting them hurt you—us!”

“They won’t!” I cried. “Just let me talk to them!”

As I said this, I began to move my neck back up, towards where Astrid and the others had been standing.

But they were gone.

My ears swiveled back and forth, barely detecting the sound of rushing footsteps and whispering voices. I snarled, pushing myself in front of Hiccup and snarled in the general direction of where the humans currently were. There was no way, in the name of the Dragon of the Sun, that I would let them anywhere near us.

Behind me, Hiccup was having a full-blown panic attack; apparently, he did not realize that the humans were still around us, and that they were close. I snapped a command to hide at him again, but he either ignored me or didn’t hear me over his ramblings.

It didn’t bother me in the slightest, though. Because, right as I pinpointed the sounds, a human scrambled out from between a tiny crack in the wall of the cove. I immediately recognized it as the ‘Astrid’ girl that Hiccup was attracted to and that I had chased. She was followed by a male, muscley, and black-haired boy. A set of two humans who looked completely identical to the each other (though one had a more feminine shape to it and was incredibly pale in comparison to the others) pushed their way in next, and finally, the fat Viking that had foolishly come unarmed squeezed himself into our home.

I jumped, bounced off a rock, and raced my way towards them, letting out an angry battle shriek. The humans all tensed, ‘Astrid’ withdrawing a double-bladed axe from her belt, the black-haired Viking holding his sword up, and the other two males covering the wilted human with their bodies. I grinned maniacally.

They were going to die.

“NOOOOOO!” I barely registered the sound of rapidly flapping wings being pulled into a dive before I was suddenly tackled into the ground, my entire body dragging through the filthy dirt for a short distance. I cracked an eye open and stared at Hiccup in disbelief while he bounced off of me, standing with his body facing the cliff so he could watch both me and the evil humans. His wings were spread out so that one was blocking me from moving and the other was mere inches away from ‘Astrid’’s blade.

He doesn’t know he’s that close! I realized, jumping to my feet. “Hiccup, run!” I screamed, knowing full well that he was far too gentle to attack any human without being hurt first—and that he wanted me to follow the same morals. But the boy just shook his head. My jaw dropped. What was he doing?! “RUN!” I repeated, lowering my body to the ground and preparing to jump over him to tackle the humans down. I considered shooting a fireblast, but immediately threw it aside—Hiccup could move very fast if he wanted to, and I didn’t want him jumping in the line of fire.

“No! All of you! Stop!” Hiccup slapped me right in the face with his wing, abruptly cutting off my snarl and forcing me to sneeze. When the Vikings began to laugh, he gave them a look of some sort (I couldn’t see his face) that made them stop. I continued on with my outraged growl, pretending that nothing had happened. Hiccup’s head whipped around with a look of warning so quickly that I actually faltered. “That means you, too, Toothless!”

“We should just kill them!” I rejected. “They were just attacking us! And you want to befriend them?! And for the love of the Dragon of the Sun, get away from them!”

Hiccup shook his head defiantly. “They’re already my friends! I know them! They just think that you’re trying to hurt me.” I reared my head back and scoffed. “What? It’s true!”

I glanced over at the humans. ‘Astrid’ had her arms extended out, blocking the sword-wielding boy and the male look-alike from getting past her. The chubby and weak one were behind the three of them, holding on to each other nervously. The fear-scent coming from them made me feel slightly giddy, but I pushed it away. There were more important matters at hand.

Like getting Hiccup the hell away from danger.

I took a step forward, tuning Hiccup’s shouts out. Those humans were either going to die or never come here again out of sheer terror alone. Preferably the first option. I would make sure of it.

Hiccup turned his back fully on the humans and rose slightly on his hind legs in front of me, wings extended. “Toothless!” His pine-green eyes blazed like the moon. “Listen to me! They won’t hurt any of us! But for that to happen, you have to stop threatening them!”

“They’re tricking you!” I shot back, moving to the left slightly. Hiccup evenly straightened out with me again. “They just want you to trust them and then slash at you like there’s no tomorrow! Two of them know you stole, yes?” Hiccup’s determined look waved for a second, and he nodded cautiously. “Then that means they probably came here for revenge!”

“Or,” my friend said, “they came here to ask what in the gods’ name I was doing? If they were here to attack us, then I’d already be down by now!” To accentuate this, he brought his tail forward and waved it in my face. It took me a few seconds to realize that he’d purposely put it directly in front of the humans to prove a point.

I growled. “Just let me kill them,” I repeated, “and then we won’t be in any danger at all. You told me they attacked you! I’m going to return the favor. And ten times worse,” I added darkly, a cruel grin slicing my face. Hiccup narrowed his eyes at me—and, suddenly, the bond was there again. I felt his emotions: fear, nervousness—and shock at how I was acting. And then annoyance when he sensed how I truly knew that my side was justified.

We stared at each other for a few seconds, neither of us giving up on the fight. Eventually, I won, since Hiccup broke the bond and shook his head. “Toothless, please,” his tone had suddenly acquired a begging plea to it, “just let me speak with them. They really mean no harm! Nobody has to kill anybody!”

“I don’t care,” I told him casually. “I want to. They made you sit in that forest for hours in utter fear.” I snapped my teeth and claws to their full extent, pulling my wings in and letting my ears and frills lay flat.

Hiccup choked for a second. “I-I wasn’t scared, just worried.”

I shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. From the way I see it, you were distressed for all that time and then some, and it was because of them! And they did the same to me!” I hissed.

Hiccup’s head tipped to the side slightly. “…you care that much?” He murmured. I paused, caught off-guard, and gave him a small grin. I was a little hurt that he hadn’t realized this earlier—I mean, you’d think that after this morning, he’d have realized that I was all-in for this to work. I didn’t want him as a friend for food; I wanted him as a friend because he was one. But there’s no point in having a friend when they’ve gone and killed themselves by jumping into the enemy’s arms.

The human-dragon gave me a small smile. “Oh…me, too.”

I beamed, and, taking this as his acceptance for me to kill those annoying, repulsive humans, I simply straightened out and walked past him and towards the humans with the most dignified air I could muster. I stood beside Hiccup, staring coolly down at ‘Astrid’. Her eyes were wide with intimidation, to my pleasure.

I grinned, showing her all my teeth, and lunged. All at once, the humans shrieked, ‘Astrid’ leaped backwards, and Hiccup jumped at my neck and grabbed my scruff, jerking me to the side so that, instead of hitting my target, I grabbed at thin air. I gasped in amazement when Hiccup pulled me aside, hauled me off my feet, and threw me a couple feet away. I rolled on the ground several times and allowed myself to lay there, sucking in air and shaking in astonishment.

Hiccup, having not noticed his supernatural strength, stormed over to me. “What is wrong with you?!” He screamed. “I just told you that I didn’t want them to be killed!” He crouched low, tail swishing back and forth and shifting his weight side to side. Behind him, the male look-alike was hugging his female look-alike to his chest and ‘Astrid’ and the fat Viking were holding the black-haired male back. I gave him the evilest look I could muster, and he attempted to send one right back. I snorted at him, which caused him to become as red as a Flame-Skin.

“You told me,” I groaned, sitting up and slowly pushing my feet to the ground, “that I could.”

Hiccup’s mouth dropped open. “I most certainly did not!”

I narrowed one eye at him and raised a brow. “But you said that you cared about me, too.” Betrayal washed through me, and something slowly dawned on me. “Are…are you siding with them?”

“No,” Hiccup growled. “I’m apparently the only one here thinking straight! I care about you—I truly do, more than I imagined—but me saying that was not a go-ahead to kill my friends! And I’m not siding with anyone here!” He added when I began to interrupt him for an answer.

“But they attacked you. Just now, and when you were getting us food!” I defended myself. “At least let me get payback! Or guarantee that they won’t tell anyone else!”

My friend, apparently having sensed something, straightened out of his aggressive position. I hesitated, glancing at the group of humans (who all seemed to have calmed down and formed a protective circle around the crippled look-alike, who was looking significantly less unhealthy, to my despair), and did the same, eyeing them viciously. One wrong move, and they’d be dead. I had a very clear shot, since Hiccup had folded his wings and was now positioned more to my left.

I almost hoped that one would foolishly aim their weapon towards either of us.

“Toothless, please, just listen to me. I know it’s hard for you because they did do that. But Snotlout was the only one who attacked me, and he’s just a huge jerk who’s always bullied me in the past. And Astrid threw those daggers because she probably saw you dragging me around and thought you were trying to kill me,” Hiccup tried to explain to me.

“I would never,” I snarled. “And if ‘Snotlout’ has attacked you in the past, then he’s long-deserved this!” I pawed at the ground anxiously, rocking back and forth on my hind legs and unfurling my wings halfway.

“No! He doesn’t!” Hiccup finally noticed his position in relation to the humans and myself and moved so that they were completely blocked from view. I growled in frustration and disappointment. “I don’t mind at all, really! This is ridiculous!”

“…look, he’s convincing it to not hurt us. Just give him more time, it might be a little hard for the Night Fury. We can’t do anything until it stops attacking us,” someone was saying behind Hiccup. I disregarded it. Hard for me? No. Hard for them? Yes.

“Yeah, because you won’t let me kill them!” I countered.

Hiccup’s face lowered until I could only see his thin, furious eyes. “They don’t need to be killed.”

“Yes, they—“ I started.

“Toothless! Just trust me!” Hiccup shouted, cutting me off and squaring his feet.

I stopped mid-sentence, watching Hiccup’s eyes. He clearly did not want the disgusting humans to die for reasons I couldn’t fathom. But he was determined enough of his decision to leap in front of me and fight me off tooth and claw. That meant something.

I dropped my head in defeat. “Fine,” I hissed bitterly. “But if they attack either of us—“

“I know, I know,” Hiccup interrupted me, looking more relieved than anything. He turned his body towards the humans, paused, and looked back towards me. “Thanks, Toothless.”

I only nodded and took a few steps forward, making sure to keep my distance. I was no fool—I knew that the humans trusted me even less now, and would probably take any attempt to get near them as another stealthy attack. Which, admittedly, it would be.

Hiccup walked towards them, and, to my despair, let himself fall to his belly in front of them, completely exposing his neck and leaving him in a very hard-to-get-out-of position. To make it even worse, all of the humans were now as tall as him or barely at eye level (well, a few of them were still like that when he was standing, since he tended to slouch, but that’s besides the point). I tensed, tail twitching and ears raised slightly. One wrong move…

Immediately after he sat down, before either of us could react, ‘Astrid’ broke away from the group and took a pace towards him. “Hiccup?” She asked warily. The two look-alikes watched on with curiosity and the overweight boy tapped his fingers together and stood in front of the glaring black-haired boy. I decided to keep an eye on him, since he seemed to be the only one who was a direct threat.

Hiccup nodded seriously at her, causing all of them to gasp and murmur. ‘Astrid’ gulped, and continued, “What just…what just happened here?” She dropped her voice to a whisper, apparently thinking that I could not hear her, and added, “Don’t worry, it’s going to be okay. We’re going to stop that evil dragon from brainwashing you.”

I barely suppressed a deathly snarl. Hiccup reared his head back in surprise and glanced at me with an amused look.

“No!” He laughed, shaking his head. “Toothless hasn’t brainwashed me!” At Astrid’s confused look, he stopped, a thoughtful expression on his face. Then, he purposely shook his head and dropped it, bringing his left arm up over it and tapping it with his paw.

“What the heck?” The male look-alike drawled, face scrunching up.

“Ssh! Idiot!” The female look-alike scolded weakly, shoving him lightly.

The black-haired Viking stepped around the obese one. “Wait!” He held up both his hands. “Are you saying that you chose to steal? Because it sure does look like it!” At the other humans’ confused looks, he scoffed. “Oh, please, did you guys not see how Hiccup was completely in control the entire time?”

“Uh, we were kinda being attacked by a Night Fury.” The male look-alike replied sarcastically.

‘Astrid’ turned to Hiccup, who was giving the black-haired boy a pleading look. “Is it true, Hiccup?”

Hiccup opened his mouth, paused…and hung his head.

“I knew it!” The arrogant boy exclaimed, throwing his well-toned arms into the air. He pointed accusingly at Hiccup and shouted, “You traitor!”

Hiccup’s head shot up, eyes glossy. “No, Snotlout, I didn’t mean—“

“Shut up! You’ve forgotten about us!” ‘Snotlout’ cried. ‘Astrid’ turned around and pushed him back, growling a warning, and the chubby Viking placed his hand on ‘Snotlout’’s shoulder. This didn’t stop the outraged human from continuing, “You’re a traitor! You don’t care about any of us anymore! That’s why you stole the food from us and brought it back to that!” He pointed a finger at me. I hissed menacingly.

“Snotlout, stop it!” The chubby Viking shouted, knocking ‘Snotlout’ back. The black-haired boy turned around, fists raised, but the other human didn’t flinch. He narrowed his eyes, sidestepped around him until he was between him and Hiccup, and said, “You don’t get to automatically assume that! Maybe they made a truce!” At the blank look he received, he went on, “That would mean that Hiccup isn’t a traitor!”

The male look-alike spoke up. “Uh, I’m not sure about that.”

“Yeah,” the female counterpart added, though her voice was quieter than the rest. “I mean, he still stole.”

“But he’s still a person!” Fishlegs shouted, palms fisted. “He’s not perfect!”

I glanced at Hiccup. He was silently watching, dread spread across his face. He looked over at me for a second, but the conversation regained his attention before I could do anything else.

 “Guys!” ‘Astrid’ called, her tone angry and commanding. She waited for the argument to settle. “So, Hiccup isn’t brainwashed. Right?” She swiveled her head around to look at him. He nodded. Skeptically, ‘Astrid’ continued, “So, that means that he came to some sort of agreement with the Night Fury,” she spat the words out as if they were trash, “like Fishlegs said. But that’s all we know, and here you guys are, talking as if Hiccup isn’t here!”

“He isn’t!” Snotlout exclaimed. Hiccup cringed and let out a soft, low moan.

Astrid didn’t agree or disagree. All she did was turn around to Hiccup. “We need to talk.”

Hiccup’s expression—so full of hurt and desperation—was impossible to ignore. I threw my ‘stand aside’ plan right out the nest and trotted over to him, smiling when the humans all tensed and backed up a little. The only thing that bothered me was how the chubby Viking stared at me inquiringly, as if I were a thing to study. I also noticed that the male look-alike was holding onto his female look-alike, an uncertain look on his face. I gave him a glare to put him in his place—and he smiled. I shook my head at that, deciding that he’d hit his head once too many times, and stood proudly besides my friend.

“Toothless? What are you doing?” Hiccup asked me warily, pushing himself to his feet. He glanced back and forth between me and the humans, leaning forward slightly.

I gave him an encouraging smile. “I’m not going to attack them.” I said truthfully. Frowned slightly, I reconsidered my decision. “Unless they attack us…” I growled in a low tone of voice.

Hiccup seemed to stop holding his breath and deflated in relief. He settled back into his lying-down position, much to my irritation. “Okay,” he said, and nodded reassuringly at ‘Astrid’ and the large Viking who’d stood up for him. I decided that, if I were to put stereotypes on the humans, then those two would be the ‘good guys’. They were the only ones who were actually giving Hiccup a chance.

They all looked at each other, silently deciding what to do. After a short debate, the two look-alikes backed up, closely guarded by ‘Snotlout’. The fat Viking stood in front of the three of them, and in front of him, closest to Hiccup and myself, was ‘Astrid’.

I refused to sit down, though, and glowered down at the humans. My gaze rested on ‘Astrid’, and I smirked. “Well, we meet again, don’t we?” I cooed, though I knew she could not understand me. In the corner of my eye, Hiccup rolled his eyes, causing the female look-alike to snicker and ‘Snotlout’ to growl, face beat-red.

I was baffled when ‘Astrid’ coolly replied to me, “Nice to see you, too, kitty. Did you miss me?” My face wrinkled with anger.

“You’ll regret that--!” I stopped abruptly when Hiccup pushed me in the chest with his wing, obviously trying to remind me of our previous conversation. Annoyed, I sneered at ‘Astrid’, trying my best to send the threat to her. She raised a brow, but did nothing else.

“Alright,” she declared. “Let’s get down to business.”

Chapter Text

Who-who-whooooooooo. Hoot. Hoot.

Twee! Twee! Twee!

Arf! Arf!

Briefly glancing at the wildlife, I couldn’t help but envy them. Their lives were so simple, so basic…and mine…wasn’t. The pressure of the situation—one that would probably determine the rest of my life—made me feel like a bird caught in a trap: helpless, weak, and panicky.

I quickly looked over to my right side at and back to Astrid, the only of the five Vikings to be even remotely near both Toothless and I at the same time, and waited for her to say something. It had been a minute since she’d ‘started’ the conversation, stating that we should ‘get down to business.’ And then she’d lapsed off into silence without a single word.

Using the quiet to my advantage, I trailed my gaze over to the others. I could easily smell a wound on Ruffnut—it was a sour and bitter smell, with the stench of sweat added in—and from how she was gripping her side, I’d say that she’d been caught in the ribs and stupidly come here anyways. It worried me a little that I wasn’t too surprised by this…but, hey, we’re Vikings. What can you expect?

To my relief, the group hadn’t swayed from their ‘stronger Vikings in front and back’ formation, if only because it meant Ruffnut would have some protection if the worst-case scenario really did happen. I saw the way Toothless took notice of her; if he wanted to take out as many of them as he could instead of going for Astrid and Snotlout first, he’d beeline right for the poor girl. Said twin’s brother was holding onto her, keeping her upright, and giving me a cautious look. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Fishlegs was smiling at me, which, strangely, helped to calm my frayed nerves quite a bit. I genuinely attempted to return the kind gesture. I doubt he noticed it, with me being a dragon and all, but it was worth the shot and made me feel like I was doing something right.

I avoided looking at Snotlout altogether. It took one glimpse of his hate-filled, level stare for guilt to seize my heart and make me weak-kneed. I so desperately wanted to tell him I was sorry; even though what he said was horrible, he was my kin, and I’d always felt a naïve attachment towards him born from childhoods spent playing together. I still felt quite a bit of the family loyalty towards him that is drilled into every Viking child’s head. Obviously, he wasn’t on the same page as me. (Can’t you just feel the love?) Plus, something about him seemed off…he wasn’t acting normally.

“Alright, then.”

I snapped to attention, my head whipping towards Astrid so fast that you’d think I’d get whiplash. I felt my ears stand nearly straight, at an angle, and my side-frills push outward, away from my head, and twitch—but it was all subconscious. I was completely focused on Astrid, who was giving me an unreadable stare that I just knew wasn’t going to end well for me.

Beside me, Toothless growled.

Astrid casually held her axe with the blade facing Toothless, causing a hot rush of fear and anger to shoot through my veins. “I guess we’re going to have to do with ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions. Alright?” I shook off the abrupt, confusing feelings enough to nod and tip my head to the side, telling her to go on. The beautiful woman suddenly narrowed her eyes and leaned forward, growling, “And don’t you dare lie, Hiccup Haddock. If you really aren’t under a spell, then you better have a good explanation.”

I winced at the harsh tone. After a second, I realized that she was waiting for me to respond, and sheepishly nodded. I noticed Toothless moving on the edges of my vision and jerked my head to the side a little to see that he’d settled into a crouch. My muscles tensed, preparing to tackle him again if—the gods forbid—he tried to attack any of them again.

Astrid opened her mouth to say something—

“Why did you steal?”

Toothless, Astrid, and I all jumped and, in a rare act of agreement, gave Fishlegs (who’d spoken up) identically annoyed looks. He self-consciously deflated when the attention of everyone present swiveled to him in mere seconds, and stuttered out, “I-I mean, I just…ahem,” he cleared his throat, and went on in a slightly more confident tone, “Why would you steal if you’re at a truce with the Night Fury? Surely it could just hunt something for you guys, right? Why default to taking food from us?”

I looked over at Toothless for his reaction. The link between us burst to life, carrying over his feelings towards me so strongly that it took my breath away. There was nothing but hate. There was a clear message within the emotion: Do not tell them.

I slowly turned my head away, shaken. Standing as he was just behind Astrid, it was easy to see curiosity twinkling in Fishlegs’ eyes. Everyone was looking at me.

I hummed nervously, trying to figure out how to get the message across without flat-out lying or getting Toothless any angrier than he already was. Oh gods, what do I do?

It quickly became apparent to me that it was an impossible task.

I slumped, giving Toothless—who had settled for glaring at Astrid—a pleading look. “I have to tell them.”

I really shouldn’t have been surprised when his anger suddenly redirected towards me. But it was still startling to see that expression on his face aimed at me after days of him being actually sort-of okay with me.

“What? No! We can’t let them know!” He shouted. The teenagers all jumped and readied their weapons. I shook my head at them and was quickly rewarded with glares and Toothless yelling even louder, “Are you even paying attention?!”

“They’ll figure out eventually! I mean, it’s kind of obvious if you take a look at your tail!” I pointed out in irritation, nodding towards said one-finned appendage for emphasis. “Plus, I just told Astrid that I wasn’t going to lie!”

“I don’t care. I don’t want them to know!” Toothless exclaimed. He crouched and half-opened his wings, turning fully to face me, and spat out, “If they do, they can use it to their advantage!”

I scoffed, knowing exactly why the stubborn dragon didn’t want the others to know. It certainly had nothing to do with what he was claiming. “They won’t do that! In fact, I think that if they knew you can’t get out of here, they’d be a lot calmer!” I took a deep breath to calm myself down and continued, “I know it sucks, but it would make you less of a threat. They’d be a lot less prone to attacking us if they knew that you were defenseless.” My eyes widened the second the last word left my mouth, body filling with dread and making me wish that I had never even said it.

Toothless glared at me and turned his head away. “Fine. Tell them. If you can.”

I sighed. “Toothless, look, I didn’t—“

“I said fine!” He snapped. He was still where he’d been earlier, but he was making it clear from his body language that he was very upset with me. He looked like he didn’t want to be anywhere near me. I felt my face wrinkle up in anger at his over-sensitivity and let out a long breath, reminding myself that—while still at fault—Toothless had never been placed in this type of situation before, and if I could take anything from how he’d acted in our first few days together, I’d bet I had just said the dragon equivalent of “screw you”. More still, if I hadn’t known better, I’d have even said he was scared.

Whispering voices rising in volume interrupted my reply, forcing me to pay attention to the situation. I turned to face the teenagers, whose expressions ranged from awe, to fear, and to anger. Snotlout abruptly pulled away from Astrid, who shook her head harshly at him. All of them kept a wary eye of Toothless, who was still immaturely pouting and most likely coming up with a list of insults. I shook my head, memories flashing to last night. Toothless was scared that I would switch sides on him; he was scared of abandonment. And, apparently, fear made him even more short-tempered, snappy, and passive-aggressive. Yippee.

But he had to learn to put his trust in me like I did with him. If not…well, then we were one fight away from a shattered puzzle. And neither of us would recover.

Okay, Hiccup, you can do this, I encouraged myself. All you have to do is keep Toothless from attacking them, get them to understand why you had to steal and why they shouldn’t attack Toothless, and make amends with all of them. Especially Snotlout and Astrid. No biggie.

…I am so screwed.

Slowly, I stood up, making sure to keep my movements deliberate and predictable. Bringing my tail forward, I flexed the muscles on my tail-tip, causing the tailfins to fan in and out. Then I made a grand show of whipping my tail around (intentionally smacking Toothless lightly in the side, which made him to grunt and twitch his ears and side-frills in embarrassment) and pointed with my nose at his single-finned tail.

I returned my gaze back to Astrid, probably the smartest out of them all, with an expectant look. They’d been having their own conversation for awhile and I didn’t know what to expect. She looked surprised at the discovery—but that was it. Just surprise.

“What does that have to do with anything?” Tuffnut asked in annoyance, as if I’d just gone through an insanely long explanation that had bored him half to death. I shot him an impatient look and shook my tail again, flinging the tip back and forth like a ragdoll. This produced a raised eyebrow from the male twin, who obviously did not comprehend what I was trying to get across.

“So what? You have one more than the Night Fury,” Ruffnut wheezed. She straightened a little, holding less tightly onto her twin and narrowing weakened eyes at me. “Why does that mean you stole from us?”

“Ugh, really?” I moaned in exasperation, mostly towards myself. I let my head drop. How could I possibly explain this to them?

“I told you those humans are idiots,” Toothless ‘reminded’ me. With a sidelong glance, I saw that he’d straightened out his entire body posture and was giving me a very smug look.

“Are not,” I childishly disagreed. “They just don’t know dragon anatomy like you do. And me, sorta. You have to remember that this is the first time all but one of them has really seen you up close. When you weren’t tied down.” Toothless snorted and, after a couple seconds of staring at him, I felt a heavy frown stretch across my muzzle. “You really don’t mind, right? I mean, I don’t want to lie, and—“

“I said fine,” Toothless interrupted me. “If that’s what you want to do, then do it.” When I said nothing, he tipped his head to the side slightly. The dragon opened his mouth and seemed to have an internal war while the other five and I watched him in silence. After a few seconds, he lowered his eyes to his feet. “…fine.”

“Tooth—“

“Quit acting like every single argument is going to destroy our friendship,” Toothless raised his head and gave me an aggravated—but strained—look. “You can’t expect us to agree on everything…” He trailed off and suddenly perked up with hope. “Though I’d rather you not tell them…”

I smiled grimly. “How else can I explain why I stole without lying? I mean, Fishlegs is right about how it would make no sense otherwise.”

Toothless’ eyes glazed over for a second as he tried to figure out something that I’d been trying to find the answer to since the beginning of the meeting. He blinked out of it and slumped slightly, shooting each of the teenagers a look that clearly said that he wanted them to freeze in the deepest pits of Helheim. “I don’t know,” he bitterly told me while still giving them the evil eye, “But I’ll have you know that I don’t like this in the least bit.”

“Sorry,” I tried, feeling completely useless. If I could just explain the situation to Astrid and the others, then Toothless and I wouldn’t be sitting in a state of paranoia all day long because of a hypothetical attack. We’d be able to have protection from the inside while we worked this whole…situation out. So it was worth it if his pride was bruised; we’d be safe.

It did suck that Toothless wasn’t going to be cooperative at all, though, because of what I was about to do.

I chirped wordlessly at all of them in a high-pitched tone and unraveled my wings as far as I could (which forced Toothless to duck to avoid being smacked). I crouched down and paused to wiggle my rump, carefully eyeing Astrid and the others as I did. With a deep breath, I leapt into the air and starting to fly in a tight circle around the ‘popular’ Vikings, staying several meters above them. Everyone watched me silently until I got flustered enough to land next to Astrid and run over to Toothless to avoid falling. He raised a brow at me and grinned. I decided to ignore it and sat down next to him, pretending nothing had happened.

“Show off! Do you think that makes you better than us, that you managed to have it teach you to fly?” Snotlout scoffed, crossing his arms and turning his chin up. I felt my ears and wings droop, and, at the same time, Toothless let out a deadly snarl. Even so, my cousin still managed to look arrogant and generally pissed off while he held up his sword and turned all attention to my Draconic friend. I cringed and stared at my feet for a few seconds, anger and embarrassment rushing through my veins. I wasn’t even thinking about that; I was just trying to show them my point. And I seriously wanted to get across to Snotlout that I really was sorry.

I wasn’t sure what to make of the situation when nobody said anything. Instead, Astrid stepped forward, cleared her throat loudly, and spoke. “So…you were flying…” She grew quiet, forehead wrinkling slightly. “…and you stole by flying…Snotlout’s right about the teaching thing, yes?” She asked with sudden clarity. I paused for a moment and nodded, smiling and eyes brightening. “So it was the Night Fury that taught you?” I   nodded my head more vigorously than before. She was finally getting it! I knew that this would pay off!

“Then why didn’t the Night Fury steal instead of you? I mean, you’re obviously talking to it when you to start to stare at it and make weird sounds…and completely ignore us.” Astrid raised a delicate eyebrow and frowned heavily. My excitement found a nice little corner to curl up and die in. “Why couldn’t you have just told it where the food was?”

Toothless chuckled. “These humans are sooo smart.”

“They are! They just don’t…get it,” I defended them.

“Well, get them to! Or make them leave!”

“Oh, okay. I haven’t been trying to communicate with them for the past fifteen minutes or anything.” This earned me a slap to the face via tailfin. Snotlout and Tuffnut burst out laughing when I let out a rather unmanly yelp and leaned down to rub my face.

I felt a little bit of relief come to me when Astrid whipped around and snapped at the two to pay attention. At least that meant she wasn’t completely mad at me.

Shaking my head, I moved back into my sitting position and wracked my brain for answers. How could I tell them? It was made painfully obvious that I couldn’t just act it out. And Toothless definitely wouldn’t demonstrate his crippled flying no matter how nicely I asked. If only there was a way—!

Oh.

Oh.

I am such an idiot.

I couldn’t help it. With the stress of the situation, feeling way too high-strung for way too long, and the absurdity of my realization all weighing down on my shoulders…I burst out laughing. Toothless jumped about five feet in the air at my unexpected mood swing and blinked several times, head whipping back and forth between me and Astrid and the others so fast it became a blur. Of course, this made me laugh even harder.

“Hiccup?!” Toothless shoved me in the shoulder, effectively cutting off my hooting. “What’s wrong?” He turned sharply and sent a very worried-looking Astrid and Fishlegs (plus everyone else, who just looked freaked out) a glare that could kill, hissing menacingly, “Is it them?”

“No, no!” I giggled, shaking my head and grinning widely. I leaned down close to the ground and raised my left leg, extending the claws to their sharpest. Pushing out the claw that would line up with a human’s index finger and curling the others as far as I could, I began to create runes in the dirt perpendicular to myself and the teens, smile deepening when they all let out gasps and crowded in close—even Snotlout. How could I possibly forget that I could write?!

I sat back up and nodded proudly at my work. Not only would this disprove Astrid’s ridiculous theory of Toothless controlling me—a dragon doesn’t know how to write, so one couldn’t make me do it either—but it would also make communication so much easier...which would eventually disprove Snotlout’s theory that I was controlling Toothless as well. Charades had lost its fun about a minute into our failed attempts at talking to each other.

Toothless leaned in, too, though he stayed closer to me than the writings. “Huh?” He asked, raising a brow. “What’s that?”

“Night Fury can’t fly…I went instead…made truce?” Astrid read aloud, brushing a stray strand of hair out of her eyes and eyebrows shooting up in surprise.

“…Huh?” Toothless repeated, giving me an utterly confused and frustrated look. He leaned down closer to the scratches in the dirt (causing all of the others to back up) and sniffed at it, his head tilted to the side. “I don’t understand.”

“I can speak to them now,” I told him, grinning proudly as he stared at me in disbelief. After a few seconds, I realized that what I said would make absolutely no sense whatsoever to a dragon and hurried to add, “The symbols mean words.”

“Oh,” Toothless said flatly in false understanding, wasting the precious few seconds we had before the others fully processed what exactly my message meant. He still looked confused, and, for a second, looked almost ready to ask another question. But then he hesitated and stopped himself, pulling a stony expression on his face that hid all emotions—except for one. He stared purposely towards the writings, looking as if he were wishing they could self-combust right then and there.

There was a moment of silence—but just a moment.

Fishlegs exploded into questions first: “How did you make a truce? That’s, like, plus ten intelligence on the Night Fury right there! Do you have all your memories then? Can you talk telepathically with the Night Fury? Because it certainly doesn’t sound like it and you’re only making around fifteen different sounds—oh! Ohohoh! What are your senses like? Is your main sense your sight, smell, or something else? What’s your hearing like? This is amazing! Can you completely understand us?!”

He was overlapped easily by Astrid, who asked a simple-yet-loud, “Why in Odin’s name would you do any of that if it’s not controlling you?!”

“How can you trust that dragon? It’s tried to kill us on every raid! And why would you steal instead of asking?” The twins seemed to be on the same page, each asking questions so similar that I couldn’t tell who said what. Even above the chaos, Ruffnut managed to make her raspy, weak voice heard. Both got sidetracked by Fishlegs’ and Astrid’s questions, realizing that they were repeating and paraphrasing what had already been said, and paused for a few seconds. Then they burst into questions of “How did you learn to fly so fast?” and “Do you have fire?” and a quieter, meek “Are you sure you really want to trust the Night Fury?” from Ruffnut.

But the loudest of them all—to me—was Snotlout. He spoke quietly in comparison to Astrid and the twins’ yelling match, but directly addressed me, “How could you betray us like that?!”

The sudden onslaught of sound from the otherwise quiet situation broke any calm within me. I felt my ears and side-frills bristle for a split second before pressing against my head. Something in the back of my mind told me that extremely loud noises—all delivered at the same time and continuing without mercy—were terrible things to avoid and that I needed to get away now.

I backed up. My vision slightly doubled and my body staggered backwards—I heard myself give out a shaky moan when I bumped into something (Toothless?)—and then stumbled over something else (…Toothless?)—and somehow ended up only a few feet away, not the several meters I wanted, shaking my head in an attempt to stop a swarm of mixed colors and sounds and hallucinations and double-visions and an absolutely terrible migraine. No matter how hard I pressed my ears against my head, my side-frills seemed to act as receptors to the noise and made me feel the noise more than hear it.

The questions died down considerably for a second like fading thunder and picked up just as swiftly as the next boom that would surely follow. I heard concern behind the voices but could not understand anything except that there were sounds coming from all around me. My eyes felt like they were rolling in my head and I began to ignore my vision in an attempt to coordinate myself, focusing more on my hearing and smell. I swayed and bumped into something, possibly for real this time, and yelped in surprise. It felt solid and warm and alive.

A familiar, low-pitched voice barked in surprise, “Hiccup!”

I turned my head towards it—

—and for some reason, the noises had stopped, and the colors were no longer swirling in a tornado around me, and doubles were merging into singles. I blinked, and it was like everything that had confused and knocked me completely off from reality had disappeared. Sometime during what was really only about ten seconds—but felt like a nightmarish ten hours—Toothless had come to stand in front of me and take up a very defensive position.

What just happened? I frantically shot through every bit of information on dragons I knew. What was that?!

In my desperation, I tried to search through the last couple seconds—but all I could decipher was everyone’s first few questions before it all crumbled away. I sat back up on shaky limbs, only just realizing that my legs had collapsed under me.  Astrid, Fishlegs, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, even Snotlout—all of them—were giving me equal looks of alarm, though the reasons may have varied from person to person.

I shook my head again to guarantee that every bit of whatever had struck me was gone. “Ugh,” I moaned, “Toothless, what was that? Did it happen to you, too?”

I knew, from observation in dragon raids, that sound had some sort of affect on dragons. I’d see some of the villagers shouting and hitting their shields with their weapons, and a dragon would stall midair or even fall to the ground. But I’d always thought it was from sheer fear alone; not that it actually affected the poor things in such a physical and mental manner.

The dragon frowned. “No…I got a headache, but that was it. Are you alright?” He took a step towards me, but I shook my head.

“I’m fine,” I reassured him, my ears pressed against my head. Toothless snorted and twisted his head around towards the eerily silent teenagers, baring his teeth at them. This seemed to break the spell over them; Tuffnut moved closer to Ruffnut, who pushed back at him in irritation, Snotlout went back to sending evil looks at Toothless and me, and Astrid and Fishlegs both stared at me in confusion. There was a calculating glimmer inside of Astrid’s eyes that I couldn’t quite place.

Taking in a shaky breath, I walked back to the spot I had previously been in. I have to do this, I reminded myself. We need to come to an understanding, or they’ll tell everyone about Toothless and me. As I was thinking this, I began to scribble into the ground: “One at a“—

Fishlegs spoke up very quickly, interrupting my sentence. “You get disorientated like other dragons do?” My head snapped up in surprise and I stared disbelieving at him, realizing that he was implying a lot more than just what he’d said. His pale brown eyes were worried and nervous and he tapped his fingers together. “…Hiccup, uh…do you not like getting wet anymore—specifically, your head? And…what do you feel about us being here? Like, do you feel…uh, defensive?” He cringed slightly after saying this. The others looked at me expectantly.

I narrowed my eyes and felt my face wrinkle up in pure anger and hurt. “What?” I exclaimed. Lowering the volume of my voice, I added, “I am not—“

“Can’t understand you,” Ruffnut butted in, sounding a little more anxious than she looked. I watched her for a couple seconds, anger fading away when I realized that she was holding her side and her body was shaking. I was suddenly reminded of the injury she’d sustained, and with it came worry that washed everything else away.

What had happened?

The female twin scowled at me and I jumped back into reality, realizing that I must have looked like I was just staring at her. I shifted slightly and went to answer the question, hunching over. My handwriting was very shaky and harsh while I wrote it. For a second I wondered if anyone would be able to read it. I didn’t get a chance to fix any mistakes, though; I hadn’t even finished writing before everyone had crowded in once more, making me skip a step back to avoid getting an accidental head-butt from an unsuspecting Tuffnut. Not exactly on my to-do list, considering he was wearing a horned helmet…

There was another short, uncomfortable silence while the five read my message: I am not a full dragon. You surprised me.

Tuffnut, despite the situation, laughed. “Surprised? You looked drunk to me.” Ruffnut smirked at this and nodded in agreement. In the corner of my vision, I saw the now-silent Toothless tip his head to the side.

Snotlout crossed his arms and frowned heavily at me. Any concern for me that he had held had completely disappeared. “He looked like that Gronckle to me. And he should be treated like one.”

I blinked.

Gronckle?

Huh?

“What does that mean?” Toothless asked, turning his head towards me but keeping his eyes pinned on my cousin and slowly shifting into an aggressive, ready-to-fight posture. His wings were raised and half-opened, his feet were squared, and his tail was raised high off the ground. I let my rump hit the ground hard and flicked his side with my tail, nodding towards the teens. They had stopped briefly to examine us—well, Toothless—and only calmed down once my actions made it clear there was no danger.

“I’m…not quite sure. Uh, stand normally unless you want to get attacked,” I added when I finally took notice of his body language.

 “What do you mean?” Astrid asked Snotlout, her voice tight and controlled and unsure. “I know all dragons act that way, but—”

“That’s the point!” Snotlout exclaimed.

Toothless glared at me. “No. He’s obviously sizing you up. Look at his face and his body posture! He didn’t like you in the first place, but it’s only gotten worse the longer he’s stayed here! I don’t want you to get too trusting with your little friend here and end up with that weapon through your throat.” As he said this, he pushed his wing against my chest and backed up considerably, forcing me to get up and follow him. We stopped several meters away from the others. It was only after that did he somewhat relax his stance.

I grimaced. “Snotlout’s not going to do that…” I glanced at him briefly and back to Toothless again. “…I think.”

The Night Fury gave me a pointed look. “You think,” he repeated. “See! I was right! You just can’t trust these things! We should make them leave!”

“Well, he still has some of himself left if he can still write,” Astrid pointed out. She lowered her voice to a whisper. “So maybe there’s still some hope.”

“What?” Ruffnut and Tuffnut asked in unison, probably having not heard her, or just surprised that she was still standing up for said ‘traitor’; even if she did sound like she was changing her mind.

Fishlegs hopped into their conversation. “He has his reasons. Just let him say them! We’re wasting time; we have to be back at the village before sundown! And, Astrid,” his voice became flooded with irritation, “you just told us that we shouldn’t be acting like they aren’t even there. So why are we having this conversation?”

“No!” Snotlout hissed to Astrid, ignoring everyone else and cutting off her reply. “He’s a traitor!

I groaned and threw my head back a little. “Toothless!” Giving him the most annoyed look I could muster, I moaned, “Have you not been listening?! The reason they’re here is because they saw me steal. If Snotlout is ‘sizing me up’,” I tried to imitate Toothless’ tone of voice when he said that, “then that’s all the more reason to let them stay. If we don’t clear up why I stole, then they’ll just go and tell the whole village that we’re here, and then we’ll get killed!”

Toothless grunted, his ears and side-frills twitching and claws extending. “We could always find a way to get me out of here if that were to happen.”

I shook my head. “No! If the village knew that we were here, they’d surround the entire cove and then close in. You’d climb out to hoard of angry Vikings with swords and axes and hammers.”

“If the Night Fury can’t fly, then how else would they get food?” Fishlegs’ voice was desperate in his plea to settle the argument. “That must be the reason why Hiccup stole. And you did say he was scared at first, right?”

Tuffnut groaned, and there was a sound of someone hitting themselves with the fleshy part of their palm. “This is just too much to take in at once.”

“No, it isn’t.” Astrid’s voice was back to its normal volume again. “You’re just over-thinking it. Hiccup stole only because he was hungry and the Night Fury wouldn’t—or couldn’t—do it for him. And he’s obviously human enough to write and to deny being more…dragon-like. I can see why he would do it if the dragon wouldn’t help him.”

“And?” Ruffnut pressed. “I still don’t see it as an exception. Hiccup stole: end of story. But the traitor thing may be a little much.”

My dragon friend rolled his eyes again, a gesture from him I was quickly learning to dislike. “One word, my friend: fire.”

“No!” I scolded him as if I were reprimanding a child. “No fire!” Toothless’ head reared back in surprise; I cut him off before he could say anything. “We shouldn’t even be talking about that, since it’s not going to happen! You agreed to this. You can’t go back on your word just because Snotlout got snobbier than usual!” My ears pinned against my head and I narrowed my eyes halfway.

Toothless glared right back. “I can take back my word if I want, esp—“

“No, you can’t! You…!—ugh.” I shook my head at the stupid, stubborn Night Fury’s words. “Listen. We’ve already had this argument once. Let’s not have it again. You don’t want to take your attention off of them, right?” I asked sarcastically, nodding towards the other teens that seemed to be engrossed in a conversation of their own, huddled together a short distance away and, ironically, completely ignoring us. “Well, the same goes for them. As long as we don’t attack them, they won’t attack us. Nobody is in danger.”

“No, it isn’t!” Snotlout cried. “He made a truce with the enemy. Why is that so hard for you to get? We should be killing them!”

“No, we shouldn’t!” Astrid snapped. “Even if Hiccup made a truce with the Night Fury willingly and stole, we shouldn’t attack. I doubt we would win with that thing so mad at us. And if we did, we’d probably be too hurt to get back to Berk.” There were a few gasps at the usually-confident teenager’s revelation that she didn’t want to fight. But at least that proved that she was competent and humble. In a quieter tone, she added, “And right now, we don’t know for sure which side Hiccup’s on. We’d surely die with two Night Furies out for our blood. Right now, we have to agree and try to be less threatening. Then we can think it over later if we have to.”

Tuffnut hummed, gaining everyone’s attention. “What if he made the truce to try and get the Night Fury to turn him back?” He asked vaguely.

“Doubt it,” Ruffnut bluntly countered. “He could have switched sides just as well, considering he was banished the second it happened. Really, we don’t know anything. But I think it would be safe to say that Hiccup is in the wrong, especially if he doesn’t have any other reasons for the truce except that he wanted to be best friends forever! with that Night Fury. Which may or may not be smart, right?” At this, a few of the others let out sounds of agreement.

Snotlout tch—ed in response to this. The sound of metal whistling through the air could be faintly heard, but very easily ignored. “Well, I don’t care! I’m going to—“

Suddenly, Fishlegs, sounding completely stressed and fed up with the whole situation, spoke up and cut Snoutlout off in a rare act of authority: “That doesn’t mean attack him! Just wait, Snotlout! Don’t you realize that sitting here and throwing accusations around will do nothing? Let Hiccup say his side of the story without sending him dirty looks every few seconds! You know what that would accomplish? An understanding! We’d be able to help him!” He paused, and, still hyped up on his uncharacteristic rant, added, “Really, you have no reason to be any angrier at him than us! What’s the matter with you?”

There was a silence after that.

The stubborn dragon and I glanced over at the others, still in their own little group and whispering to each other. I heard Snotlout say something harshly at them but couldn’t quite make out what it was—nor did I want to. He sent me an awful glare and spun onto everyone else in their group. All of them (but Astrid) shuffled around nervously, sending wary glances towards Toothless and I.

I was about to turn back to said dragon, when, out of nowhere, Fishlegs exploded, ranting off at Snotlout and storming right up to his face, despite being a full head shorter than him. He began to scream at my cousin about his generally rude behavior and—to my great surprise—began to stand up for me!

An awkward, uncomfortable quiet spread across the entire cove when he had finished, leaving everyone stunned.

I gaped at Fishlegs’ outburst; not only was he going out of his way—despite his nervousness with speaking up when he didn’t need to—to defend me, but he was also asking Snotlout exactly what I had been wondering this whole time. But more importantly: he was putting his faith in me to still be ‘good’. He still knew that I was me. And this touched me a lot more than I’d ever thought it would. It meant that there was still hope for me if—

…if…

I wordlessly looked over at Toothless, forcing my facial muscles to relax into nothing more than a startled stare. But it didn’t work; he noticed my distress right away and interpreted it as my reaction to what Fishlegs had said to Snotlout. The dragon glared daggers at my cousin and growled in a very low, quiet tone, pinning his ears and side-frills up against his head. He paused to look at me with an attempted supportive smile—most likely trying to tell me that he wasn’t angry at me and that he was just as done with our argument as I was. While he clearly didn’t know exactly what was going on, he did realize that our fight had become meaningless and that this situation had suddenly become very real for me. And he cared. My heart panged.

Would I…

Snotlout recovered from the shock of the speech first, squaring his shoulders and pushing Fishlegs in the chest. “Who are you to talk to me like that?!” He growled. “What makes you think you’re better than me? Is it because you’re a nerd? Do you think your little books will help you? Why are you even defending him, anyways?” With each question, he pushed Fishlegs roughly back and advanced on him, making the fat Viking stumble backwards.

Fishlegs was generally a pushover. But when provoked, he could bite back with teeth of steel. “It’s because he’s obviously still Hiccup!” Fishlegs cried. “Yes, he stole! He made a mistake! But that doesn’t make him a completely different person! The only reason you hate him so much is because he knocked you down or something and your stupid pride was hurt and now you’re trying to make Hiccup suffer for it!”

Snotlout’s response was swift. He reared his arm back and punched Fishlegs right in the gut. I froze in shock, having not expected such a reaction. It was so unlike Snotlout to react that way, especially to someone in the ‘in crowd’. He fought with Tuffnut all the time, but not as brutally as just now. That punch would probably send me reeling if it had been aimed towards my head. Something was definitely wrong with my cousin, but I couldn’t figure it ou—

“Hey!” Ruffnut cried, pushing off of her brother and grabbing Snotlout in the arm when our friend doubled over and was left completely vulnerable. “Leave him alone!”

Snotlout whipped around at her. “Why should I?! He’s talking about something he knows nothing about!” He snarled at her, yanking his arm back and causing the weak twin to stumble. Tuffnut was at her side in an instant, using his body as a leaning post for his sister and physical block from Snotlout. He squared his feet and clenched his fists, teeth bared in a strangely animalistic fashion.

“Don’t you dare do anything to my sister,” The blonde threatened in a voice that could have easily matched Toothless’ growling in ferocity. “Not everyone is going to agree with you.” His voice was low and even, so strange for him that it actually made Tuffnut sound scary.

I looked over at Astrid—and jumped when I saw that she was staring right back at me, ignoring the fight with only a trace of surprise on her face. She wore a heavy frown on her face, uncertain, and she seemed like she was at a loss with what to do with the bickering teenagers. Whether it was because she didn’t know who she was siding with or she just didn’t want to get involved, I didn’t know. Either way, I knew that I was completely unnerved by it and really wished that the Astrid from earlier was here instead of this one. She’d suddenly changed after I’d written in the ground—and for the worse. It was…unsettling. And the worst part was that I’m pretty sure I know why: she’d asked me if I was under a spell. She thought I was being controlled, and when she realized I wasn’t and still had managed to befriend Toothless…

I became the enemy.

“Yeah? Well, that doesn’t matter, because I’m right!” Snotlout shouted, dragging my attention back into the fight. “Hiccup chose to do all of this, so he’s a traitor and deserves to die! Even Astrid agrees with me!”

“No, she doesn’t!” Fishlegs exclaimed, shaking his head wildly and grimacing as he forced himself to stand up.

“Yes, she does!” Snotlout managed to get out before Fishlegs had even finished his sentence.

"Hey!” Astrid turned on him. “Don’t say I did something I didn’t!”

And thus, a round of “No! Yes! No! Yes!”’s started, with everyone shouting accusations and defenses that did nothing but spin the argument in and endless circle. Snotlout, like all Vikings, wouldn’t back down, and arrogantly argued against each and every single one of others. There was a trace of panic in his voice. It didn’t take long for their delightful conversation to reach a point where everyone was shouting at a deafening volume. I was suddenly grateful for the distance Toothless had pushed between us and the gang; if I’d been at my previous position, I would have had the same sound-induced malfunction as before.

I shook my head, growing aggravated with all of the fights. I was so done with them! If I had known that so many arguments would come up with this confrontation, I would have just hidden! I’d never expected any of them to be this affected. “Guys, come on!” I tried, but was completely ignored. To my disdain, the teenagers—now completely at war with each other, shouting sentences that could barely be heard over the next—became even louder. “Guys! Seriously, this is so pointless, it’s not even funny! I mean, it kinda was at the beginning, but now it’s just---ugh! Guys!”

Toothless snorted besides me. “You need to learn to assert your dominance,” he seriously told me, “if you ever want them to listen to you and actually believe you. You’re acting like a subordinate underling, which makes your word worth nothing. Underlings get eaten in the real world. Watch.”

I’d barely been able to think the words “oh, no”. In a flash, the Night Fury had jumped a full body-length forward, crouched to the Vikings’ eye-level, and screeched louder than anything else I’d ever heard before, “QUIET !” A flock of birds sprang to life overhead and an owl gave out a low call in the resounding silence

In an instant, the teenagers had teamed up together, all weapons were pointed at Toothless, and I was rushing to stand between him and everyone else, wings and tail flailing to keep me from falling over. I gasped and finally straightened out so that each wing was half-stretched and facing each opposing group, acting as an effective barrier. There were several tense moments in which I thought the teens—or, at least, Snotlout—would attack, which would cause Toothless to go after them as well.

The stillness of the cove was constricting.

I waited a couple more seconds and plopped down into a sitting position with a sigh. Slowly, the others lowered their weapons and Toothless shifted behind me into a hopefully less-aggressive position.

I couldn’t help but stare at Astrid, taking note of the distrust in her eyes. A quick scan over the rest of the group showed that all of them, except Fishlegs, did not look like they were exactly happy with me. For a moment, I truly hated Snotlout; he’d managed to make almost an entire group of people think of me as an opponent despite pissing them off. Now I would be lucky to convince them to not tell the village about mine and Toothless’ hiding spot

This isn’t going nearly as well as I wanted it to, I moaned to myself. What should I do? I don’t want them to get even angrier at me!

“Well, are you going to do anything?” Toothless impatiently asked from behind. I felt him push me in the small of my back. “I’m pretty sure staring at them isn’t going to help.”

I would have been annoyed if Toothless didn’t sound, for some reason…worried? A swift glance over my shoulder showed nothing out of the ordinary. But, to my immense relief, the dragon had somehow gotten the message through all the arguing and screaming and was giving the group of teenagers a significantly less hostile look.

I nodded at him and twisted my neck around to look back at everyone else. Doing my best to ignore the repulsion-filled gaze Snotlout was giving me and the slowly-diminishing trust in the others’ eyes as they began to really think about their little debate, I bent down and began to scratch terribly-written runes into the earth again. I heard the shuffling of feet and saw five pairs of boots walk into my peripheral vision, quickly followed by shadows as all of them leaned over and tried to read my message before I’d actually finished it. (Have I mentioned that, along with being hard-headed and stubborn, Vikings are impatient? Of course, I don’t count, but I was never really one of them in the first place…)

After at least a minute of me trying my best to write decipherable words with my clumsy ‘natural pencil’, I finally finished the sentences that would—hopefully—clear things up.

Astrid was kind enough to read them aloud for Toothless’, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut’s sake (even though the latter two could read but avoided it like the devil): “Please, don’t fight…If you don’t attack him, then he won’t attack you…I admit that it was wrong of me to steal, but the only other option was to starve since the Night Fury can’t fly and I can. There is no controlling going on here.”

She hadn’t even taken in another breath before her head whipped up and she pointed her axe at me, demanding, “Even so, why would you bring the food back to him?” Toothless snarled behind me, causing me to jump, but Astrid didn’t move an inch. At my hesitation, she pressed, “Well? It makes no sense that you, the victim, would pass up the chance to kill off the thing that did this to you! And without any effort!”

Toothless suddenly became very quiet.

I felt my lips press together in a grim line. I could see her point…but how could I explain how Toothless wasn’t what she thought he was when she was thinking in that mindset? It would make me look like a traitor, which I wasn’t. But I wasn’t going to lie and say I was doing it to trick him. But I couldn’t say that it was because we were friends…couldn’t I? Surely they’d attack—or, at least, Snotlout would. And then it would go downhill, and Toothless and I would be dead within days.

Ugh, this is all such a big mess! I bent over again, barely having come to a decision, and wiped out my previous sentences with my paw. I hesitated for a moment, and then began writing:

I couldn’t leave him to die. Fishlegs is right about us speaking; we managed to come to a truce. He would teach me to fly and wouldn’t attack anyone else, and in return, I would bring back food. He’s mad because you attacked me. You aren’t in danger.

I smiled in approval at this. I wasn’t lying and I wasn’t making it sound like I’d up and abandoned them all. Plus, it let them know that I could convince Toothless to not attack anyone—even though they’d seen me do it before but could have just blown it off as me being overprotective—and that he was not just a mindless killing machine. On top of all of that, it eased them into the ‘he’s an actual person’ concept instead of flat-out telling them.

To tell the truth, though…the main reason I was so satisfied with those sentences was because I was dying to tell them the truth. I was sick of the tricks, mind games, and distrust. I just wanted a peaceful understanding. Too hard to ask? Maybe. But at least I have some hope.

Fishlegs beamed at my confirmation about dragon communication, jabbering about it until Tuffnut stared him down and he quieted. Astrid blinked and jerked her head back, angrily (angry?) flicking a strand of hair out of her eyes. I felt most of the hope I had dissipate.

“Why not? That wasn’t nearly a proper answer!” My cousin nearly shouted. “What, so that monster teaches you how to fly so it can use you for food, and you decide that you want to let it live? Have you forgotten what it’s done to you? Or your tribe? Or your father? How do you think it affects my family? Our fathers are brothers, you know!” He pointed an accusing finger at me. I was so shocked that I didn’t even notice that it was inches from my face, and that Toothless was letting out the most terrible noise I’d ever heard. “Admit it! You’ve only thought about yourself and that dragon! That means you’re no longer one of us!”

I slowly shook my head, jaw hitting the dirt. Snotlout responded with a glare that would send the gods running. And, now that I really looked, I could see that the resentment towards me was only the surface of what he was feeling; it was suddenly obvious that Snotlout had taken a much more direct hit from this entire thing than anyone else here besides me. While Spitelout, my uncle and his father, had been about as close to me as my Dad and I, I could still see that he had cared for me. He’d be upset about it, too…and, maybe, Snotlout had been as well. When we were little kids, we had actually been good friends before it became apparent that I was a failure as a Viking.

He’s right, I weakly admitted to myself. I didn’t even bother to worry about how they’re coping after my first day, I only focused on myself…but…Dad banished me… I squeezed my eyes shut and gritted my teeth, lowering my head in shame. …but Dad isn’t the entire village…what else was I supposed to do, though? Starve? Let Toothless starve? The thought sent shudders down my spine. If I didn’t regret one thing, it was befriending Toothless. He was so much more than we’d realized. If only they would try to understand—!

Said dragon poked me in the shoulder with his nose. “Are you going to let him talk to you like that?” The dragon’s voice quivered with barely-constricted fury. “Nobody has the right to do that. Except me.” When I still didn’t respond, he snarled, “I swear to the Dragoness of the Moon—!”

With the mentioning of the dragon goddess of death, I finally snapped back to reality. “No!” I turned my heard sharply towards his but didn’t bother to raise it. Toothless held his ground besides me, uncaring of the angry Vikings only about a meter away from him and myself. His face was set with determination; determination to protect me. I stared at him for a couple seconds, transfixed…and accidentally broke a link I hadn’t even known had formed. For a second, it was like Toothless and I were the only ones in the cove, and all emotions—hate, fear, desperation, nervousness—were drifting through the air like the wind.

It was disorientating, to say the least.

“Are you going to answer him?” Astrid suddenly demanded, her voice as sharp as a sword.

I jumped and raised my head, taking notice of how Toothless did the same. Lamely glancing between Astrid and Snotlout, I couldn’t tell what was worse: the fact that Snotlout positively hated me right now, or that Astrid was quickly reverting back to the previous way she treated me—not willing to go near me if she was on fire and I was the only person holding a bucket of water. My ears pricked when I heard Fishlegs, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut go into their own conversation; something about me, presumably, since they were shooting discreet glances at the four of us doing all of the talking and apparently coming to a universal decision to stay out of it and watch. I’d have rolled my eyes at how smug Tuffnut looked at not having to do any work if the situation had been less serious.

I looked back at Snotlout and winced. His face remained smug and arrogant and cruel. The way he was standing, with his arms crossed, sword casually resting in the nook of his elbow, and feet squared, looked odd. He was treating me exactly how any other Viking would treat a traitor, but it almost seemed like a front. I swallowed heavily, blinking rapidly. Gods, I felt so guilty…

I centered myself to fully face my cousin for the first time to fully address him. He realized this and his position faltered slightly, along with the grip on his sword tightening to a noticeable extent. My breath caught in my throat and it took a moment for me to remind myself that he was standing in a non-threatening position on purpose. No sane person would casually hold a sword like that, in a position where a swift movement from them would cause self-harm, without reason. It was very possible that this was Snotlout’s subtle chance for me. Maybe the only window of opportunity I would have. And if I blew it…

…well, let’s not think of that, okay?

I took a deep breath, trying in vain to loosen the tightened muscles of my body that already knew what I was going to do, and making sure I had recollected my nerves.

I closed my eyes and leaned right into Snotlout, pressing my forehead against his neck and chest. My wings were drooped and tail fallen to the ground, ears nearly pressed against my head and curving inwards a little. There was a unanimous gasp of shock (and horror, in Toothless’ case).

“I’m sorry,” I murmured.

Snotlout dropped his sword and it tilted over his elbow and to the earth, where it clattered to the dirt by my handwriting with a sharp clang! On instinct, his hands flew up to my cheekbones, forcing my back to arch and make me cringe away. I slowly opened my eyes, getting a pleasant view of Snotlout’s dirt-and unidentified-substance-stained shirt. My body screamed at me to flee, but I didn’t dare move.

Snotlout carefully pushed my head up to his eye level, making my entire body rattle when his fingers flexed and strayed too close to my neck for comfort. By some sort of miracle, I managed to hold still and gaze calmly into Snotlout’s cerulean eyes, easily noticing the downwards angles of his eyebrows and the way he bit his lower lip.

I felt like time had stopped. Nobody moved. It seemed like the gods themselves had stopped the wind to watch. The wildlife around us, having been its regular volume the entire time the others were here, suddenly grew very quiet and still. The lake grew silent and the clouds overhead slowed down to a subtle crawl.

My cousin lowered his eyes, his hands limp against my cheekbones. Staring at the ground, he let his arms fall to his side and backed away. Then he turned around…and began to walk…

“Snotlout?” I trailed off and took a sharp intake of air when he started to sprint away. Despair filled my core, and I shrieked, “Snotlout!”

Astrid and the others all began to shout out to him as well. The burly teenager stopped abruptly, palms clenching and unclenching and body shaking. I cried out to him again, desperate now, heart sinking to my stomach. With his back still turned to us, Snotlout shook his head fiercely and brought his hands up to rub it. It was almost as if he’d been struck.

Slowly, he continued to walk away, only stopping when he reached the crack in the cove where the group had entered. There, he sat down, still not facing us, and held his head by his ears and hunched over his knees.

My mouth hung open limply. I took a deep breath to steady myself, entire body shaking. What did I do wrong? I desperately tried to think of what was going through his mind to do that…but couldn’t. In truth, I really didn’t know Snotlout well at all.

I lowered my head and hunched over in defeat, rubbing my eyes. Great. Just great, I thought bitterly. Not only does my only cousin hate me for reasons I barely know, but now there’s nothing holding him back from telling the village about Toothless and myself. We’re dead. Ugh, the gods must despise me. What did I do wrong? I asked myself once again. I drew a complete blank.

I’m not sure how much time passed. One minute I was in a state of mental numbness that I couldn’t fight off, and the next…

“Ignore him, Hiccup,” Fishlegs huffed, stepping forward with new confidence. “He just doesn’t know how to take it all in.” I raised my head and gazed at him warily, unable to relax even when he gave me a tentative smile. Too many things were rushing through my head all at once, and I couldn’t keep track of them all. I just wanted to go off somewhere nice and quiet to think.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree with him,” Toothless spoke up for the first time in quite awhile. I gave him a shocked look, which he sniffed at and smirked. “What? I am a sensible dragon. Unlike him,” he nodded at Snotlout, “I can accept situations when I realize the reasons behind them.” He paused, and added much more quietly, “I…don’t quite understand why you’re as attached to him as the female, but I am sorry.” With that, he gave me what was supposed to be an encouraging head-butt, but felt like an…actual head-butt. I flinched and gave him a mocking glare, unintentionally taking the bait.

“Thanks, that felt really nice,” I told him in monotone. Toothless just gave me a toothy grin with a knowing look in his eyes that I couldn’t place.

“And he’s a douche bag,” Ruffnut added when nobody else spoke up, unable to take the tension any longer and obviously still upset over his earlier treatment of Fishlegs. I cracked a small grin, a real one only forming when the other three—even Astrid—made noises of exasperated agreement. Toothless snorted and mumbled to himself something about renaming Snotlout that, which in turn caused me to laugh.

I didn’t feel better at all, but at least I knew I had some support. If I didn’t, then they would’ve followed Snotlout. I glanced over at him to see that he was in the exact same position as before. Maybe…Fishlegs is right. Maybe he just needs some time to process it all? I thought with fake hope. A voice in the back of my mind helpfully informed me that Snotlout, being the biggest grudge-holder in the world, would probably never get over this. I chose to ignore it.

Astrid stepped closer to me than ever before, only about a yard away from me. My neck hurt looking down at her. “Anyways…we’ll just get on with this without him. Hiccup,” she scowled at Toothless for a second and then returned her sharp blue eyes back on me, “you said you ‘couldn’t leave him to die’. What exactly made you make up your mind like that?” She brushed a stray piece of hair out of her forehead and looked at me with such scrutiny that I had to avoid eye contact.

I briefly glanced over at Toothless, who currently had resumed his defensive crouch in preparation for some awful circumstance that only he could come up with. He wasn’t reacting otherwise.

“Hurry up!” Tuffnut impatiently commanded. “We don’t have all day, you know.” His casual smile suddenly fell and he looked over his shoulder in uncertainty, staring at Snotlout for a long second.

I did as I was told, scratching nearly incomprehensible runes in the earth faster than ever, feeling like I was about to lose another person who still had some faith in me. I paused halfway into the message, debating with myself. If I told them that I’d befriended Toothless…surely they would abandon me and tell the villagers about he cove. With a shake of my head, I continued to write in the same careful way I’d always been, skirting around the truth by a hair. It didn’t help that my entire body was still shaking.

Fishlegs leaned around Astrid, refusing to leave his position between the twins and Toothless. “’Like I said we made a truce, he spared me and I spared him, and he doesn’t act anything like you’d think he would. Please, I beg you and I know it’s hard but I need you all to trust me.” He read it so fast, I wouldn’t have known a single word he said had I not been reading along with him. The obese Viking looked up at me with wide eyes, but said nothing.

“So you…befriended it?” Astrid placed her hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at me. “What about that makes you think we should trust you?” Ruffnut nodded in agreement, followed by Tuffnut. Fishlegs was the only one who seemed to have some faith in me. I didn’t know exactly why he was so kind—probably in favor of a close friendship we used to have, still somehow wanting to connect to me but unable to if he wanted to be ‘popular’—but I was thankful to the gods that he was here. If not…then this meeting would end up disastrously.

I focused on the ground, once again forced to write out a vague—yet truthful—statement. If I even dared use the word ‘friend’ and ‘Night Fury’ in the same sentence, it would be all over. The little shard of trust Astrid had in me would be shattered, and she’d join Snotlout. It wouldn’t take long for the others to cave and follow her lead. Even Fishlegs, bless his attempts to be understanding, would choose them over me—the supposed ‘traitor’. Or, maybe I really was…

The thoughts were violently pushed aside. I couldn’t doubt myself. And they absolutely could not know about my relationship with Toothless other than our truce. It would be the death of us. And I would not allow that!

I’d just finished writing my sentence when a sudden thought seemed to come to the lovely blonde. She ignored my message, which was really just a repetition of all of my other ‘we made a truce’ statements, and began to speak.

“Oh, and there’s something that has been bothering me. I don’t usually pay attention to dragons’ antics, Hiccup, but I know that you’ve acted more like one and less like a human several times in the past. What’s keeping you from being one of them?” Astrid’s brilliant blue eyes didn’t have a trace of sympathy in them. Toothless’ growling faded, a sole breeze blew, and the others stopped in their little conversations with each other. Far back, still near the cove’s entrance, Snotlout turned slightly and looked over his shoulder.

Toothless groaned. “Ugh, this again. Good going, female,” he hissed at Astrid.

I stared, speechless, not even registering what Toothless had just said. Of course I knew I’d been acting dragon-like…but to have it pointed out to me and accused by someone who’d seen me for a grand total of about three hours in this body…it was a slap to the face. Reality’s nice way of telling me to pay attention and stop using sarcasm and bad jokes as a shield for once. And I didn’t like it.

I’d been avoiding the unfortunate fact for as long as I could, even when it had been brought up earlier today. I’d pushed it off, telling myself I’d think about it later; and it was coming back to bite me. I didn’t know how to respond. Once again, I suddenly found myself in doubt of my already-fragile humanity. Most important of all: I had no idea if I was losing myself. Once Toothless had come along, and he’d taught me to fly, and he’d told me about his religion and stories of the ancient past in the drowsy minutes before we’d fallen asleep, my resolve to be ‘human’ had started to…waver. And he’d become an unintentional influence on me.

A realization struck me hard: Toothless had known. He’d dropped hints to me and I’d ignored them. My thoughts began to become scattered and frantic.

How exactly did I feel about this? Why, for the second time today, could I not answer that important question?

Was I turning into a dragon? My heart sank when I couldn’t bring myself to say “No” right away. I was changing at an immense speed and didn’t know how to react to it. I couldn’t just turn around and return to normal, though; the deed was done, and the window was closed.

And I wasn’t quite sure if it upset me more that I hadn’t seen this question coming, though now it was obvious I should have, or the fact that I wasn’t feeling too remorseful about it when I began to really think about it. Especially when compared to my reaction to being changed on that terrible first day.

I lowered my eyes from Astrid’s, unable to take the calculating spark in them any more. I had no answer. Everything I could think of had an easy defense. My humanity? Well, where did that go when I attacked Snotlout in mindless terror and fed the ‘enemy’? My knowledge of my human past? I was banished, so what significance would that hold other than fuel for more anger and hurt, speeding up the ‘process’? How could I possibly convince someone like Astrid when I’d stolen right in front of her with no reason other than to help myself and the enemy?

“Stay back!”

I pulled myself to attention, raising my head and twisting to face Toothless as quickly as I could. He was baring his teeth and snarling at something, one paw raised in a ready-to-swipe position and wings extended. Confusion and fear hit me hard, and my mind immediately rushed to one outcome: someone is attacking us.

But when I turned around towards the teenagers, backing up slightly, they were all in the same positions as before. Except for Fishlegs.

I could only stare in stunned silence as he meaningfully walked right up to me, determination stronger in his body language than I’d seen in my entire life, even when we used to be best friends. He curved his body to face the others and gave them a meaningful, pointed look. “Enough. This misunderstanding gone on far too long.”

I’d barely had time to process what he was trying to do when his hand appeared far too close for comfort, right in the middle of my vision. I hesitated, pulling my head back a few inches and glancing up at Fishlegs. He gave me a small smile...one that made me want to trust him.

And one second later, he placed his hand right on my muzzle. The exact spot that instincts I didn’t know I had told me I could snap his hand off in milliseconds.

As with Snotlout, my entire body tensed and my back arched upon human contact. My ears and side-frills pressed against my head, my eyes widened, and I shifted my feet so that I could jump away if I needed. Toothless screeched in outrage besides me, pawing at the dirt and glowering at Fishlegs with such intensity that, for a second, I half-expected him to burst into flames.

The second the shock of the action wore off, Toothless seemed to decide that that was where he crossed the line; he jumped forward, knocked Fishlegs’ hand off of my snout with a paw, and proceeded to grab me by my scruff and drag me away. I gave out a wordless cry of resistance, struggling to be set free and utterly humiliated by how my body went limp from instinct. In the background, I could hear Ruffnut and Tuffnut laughing and making ‘jealous dragon’ jokes, something about Fishlegs being the third wheel in a seriously-screwed-up fantasy world.

“Thaf ‘s it!” The dragon growled through his muffled mouthful of…me. Sigh. “Why wouf ‘ou lef ‘em ‘oo that?!”

I broke free of Toothless’ hold and rounded on him. “Stop it!” I yelled, tail whipping and crouching low. The dragon gave me a deadpan, irritated look; one that I would always see on Gobber when I asked him a rhetorical question that he didn’t get or just said something stupid. With this, my face burned even more with embarrassment and anger. Fishlegs was trying to prove something, and now Toothless had gone and ruined it with his overprotectiveness—!

“See?! This proves my point!”

—or not.

Both of us halted our slightly-prepared speeches and gave a very proud-looking Fishlegs identically confused looks. He had his bulky arms crossed, hazel eyes twinkling, and a grin threatening to tear his face in half. The twins still looked amused at their jokes, but I could see that Astrid was wholly trying to comprehend what had happened. And even from my distance away from him, I noticed that Snotlout was still half-turned towards us, looking as confused and wary as Astrid.

Fishlegs turned to me and waved towards him, a gesture to walk over. I paused, giving Toothless a look that I hoped said ‘don’t screw this up’. He just snorted and jerked his head to the side disdainfully.

I did as I was told, the Night Fury reluctantly following behind, and obediently stood besides Fishlegs. Oh please let him convince them, oh please gods I need a break, oh please let this work.

“What do you mean?” Astrid asked cautiously, shifting to put all of her weight on one leg. I relaxed at the non-threatening posture, and, for once, Toothless didn’t decide to hiss at her.

Fishlegs waved at me and Toothless. “Didn’t you see the huge differences in their reactions? That Night Fury,” he pointed at Toothless, making the dragon perk up and wrinkle his face, “nearly attacked me just for touching Hiccup—not it. It was aggressive, and protective, and, like, plus five defensiveness. But Hiccup,” he turned to me and grinned, pointing an open palm at me like I was a showcasing, “not only let me touch the most dangerous spot on his body, his mouth—oh, by dangerous, I mean he could have easily burned or bitten my hand off before I could have reacted, since Night Furies must have plus fifteen speed and—nevermind. Anyways, he let me keep it there, and even though he was scared, he didn’t move until the Night Fury moved me for him.”

“And?” Ruffnut asked dryly with a flat face.

“That means?” Tuffnut continued in the same tone with a slightly raised eyebrow.

Fishlegs slumped a little at their lack of understanding. I, on the other hand, was cheering on the inside. It took all I had to not butt him in the back, for fear of knocking him over and ruining his ‘Hiccup’s not a dragon’ argument.

“Well,” he tapped his fingers together a couple times and regathered his courage. “It means that Hiccup is still Hiccup. He can write, understand us, and let us touch him without freaking out or attacking us. And he apologized to Snotlout. That’s unheard of with dragons; my book says they just fight to the death when they don’t agree. A normal dragon that could somehow understand what was going on would have killed Snotlout, since he was the enemy. That’s why I’ve been defending him!” Fishlegs turned to me, beaming, and continued, “You shouldn’t have stolen because it doesn’t take much to realize that we’d come back, but,” he returned to addressing the others, “it’s understandable, and it still means that he is human.”

Tuffnut looked over his shoulder again for a split second. “Well, not all the way. You said earlier that his, uh, actions in the shed was what a dragon would have done. What changed your mind?” He gave a coy smirk at Fishlegs, as if daring him to respond.

Fishlegs’ argument was swift and certain; he’d known this question would come up, and had prepared an answer. “Yes, Hiccup has acted like a dragon in the past, but what can you expect? He is in dragon form. But his human traits outweigh his draconic, and I know he’s truly sorry about the entire storage shed incident, as I’ve already mentioned how he let himself be vulnerable in front of Snotlout. This also means that I know, without a doubt,” he raised his voice loudly at this, turning to face Snotlout, who had his arm crossed and was scowling at us, “that Hiccup is not a traitor! We’ve all done something wrong in our lives. If you told me you’ve never stolen anything, then you’d be lying, too. Especially about a certain something yesterday.” He added when Tuffnut opened his mouth with an aggravated expression.

The male twin’s mouth clicked shut, and his female counterpart burst out laughing.

“Busted!” She chuckled, punching him lightly in the chest. Tuffnut rubbed the spot dramatically and scowled.

“Don’t tell me you stole another model catapult. You don’t even know how to use or make one!” Astrid pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation and shook her head.

“That’s not true, I do! And they’ll come in handy someday! Just wait and see!” Tuffnut whole-heartedly defended himself, face red and eyebrows twitching. “…and now, I didn’t steal one,” he added on in embarrassment. This caused the others to laugh at him.

Using this tiny exchange to my advantage, I began to scratch a sentence in the dirt. A surge of excitement shot through my body as I did; Fishlegs’ argument had been clear and truthful. He’d managed to say his opinion in such a way that even I found myself wanting to agree with him. And from the hesitation in Astrid, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut’s expressions, I could see that another window had been opened while one had been shut.

The thing I was most excited about, though, was that Fishlegs had managed to inadvertently give me some answers to questions that I had been slaving over. I couldn’t help it; when he put so much trust in the reasons behind my behaviors, I began to feel the same way.

He’s right. I’m not a traitor. I’m not. People make mistakes. That’s what I did. I…made a mistake…yes, I made a mistake.

Toothless leaned down next to me while I was writing, making it very clear that he didn’t feel the same way as I did. “Please tell me you’re telling them to leave,” he whispered.

“No, I’m not,” I quietly told him as I finished my message. “I’m making sure they don’t come back with the intent to kill. You have to at least not hiss at them all the time or they’re not going to believe me and we’ll both be doomed.”

Toothless’ harsh look softened. He frowned deeply at the writing, longing flashing in his eyes. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

“Yes,” I said with resolve. “I just needed to show them I’m still me and I can be trusted, and, thank the gods, Fishlegs did that for me. We’re done with the hard part.”

Toothless sighed. “If you say so,” he mumbled, pulling back. “I just wish…” He shook his head. “Never mind.”

I smiled at him after I’d straightened my own posture. “We’re going to be fine.”

Toothless blinked at me several times, surprise easily readable on his face. He hesitantly returned the grin and turned his gaze to the teenagers, lime green eyes resting on Fishlegs. He stared at the one Viking who’d put faith in me for a long time, and then looked over at me again. “I’m glad he made you feel better. He…he seemed to help you.”

He’d said it so softly, I’d barely heard him. But, by some miracle, I had. I grinned at Toothless, the first one I’d done since the teenagers got here. “Thanks.”

“Hey! Hiccup wrote something else!” Ruffnut suddenly exclaimed, pointing at the ground and completely ruining the moment. She abandoned her brother and scrambled over with Fishlegs and Astrid. Unfortunately, she didn’t seem very well-adjusted to walking on her own, and tripped over her feet, falling right onto…Toothless, who’d also stepped forward to get closer to me.

The dragon recoiled like she was a demon, hissing loudly. Ruffnut stumbled back into Tuffnut’s arms, who quickly pulled her away, and Astrid and I got ready to stop a possible attack. Toothless looked like he was actually going to for a second, death radiating off of him through his body language—and then he stopped, jolting in place. He gave me a sidelong glance and sighed, backing up and sourly licking the areas that Ruffnut’s hands and body had stumbled upon, sending her an evil look the entire time.

I couldn’t help but grin when I faced Astrid, Fishlegs, and the twins again. They were all crowded around the message that would—hopefully—convince them that all was well right now.

“’It is true that I have changed, but I am still me. I’m not going to turn into a traitor, I swear to the gods. I just need your trust and mercy right now. I’ll do anything.’” Astrid mumbled. She blinked and looked up at me, her mouth a straight line, and brushed that one stray strand of hair that always fell in front of her face behind her ear.

Fishlegs smiled again, probably the happiest out of all of us. Ruffnut looked more relieved than anything, and Tuffnut had a mischevious grin across his face.

“Anything?” The male twin drawled, rubbing his hands together. “You could help me catch babes! Oh, and helping me become the ultimate warrior wouldn’t hurt.”

“Ultimate warrior my ass,” Ruffnut rolled her eyes and smirked. “You got tackled by a Terrible Terror today. And it won.” She cackled.

“No I didn’t! I just let it, so, uh, you wouldn’t feel bad about being hurt and sitting out!”

“I’m pretty sure you didn’t.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure I did!”

“Right. Well, I’m pretty sure that you—“

Astrid grabbed the horn on Tuffnut’s head and yanked it back, effectively cutting off their argument. He promptly fell to the ground, yelling about how hurt he was, and she grabbed onto Ruffnut before she could fall. The two stared at each other for a second—Astrid pleading, and Ruffnut angry—until the latter finally relaxed and gave the former a calm smile and leaned fully on her.

“How graceful,” Toothless commented darkly. I glanced over my shoulder just in time to see him give Astrid a surprisingly feral smile that could almost pass for something humanlike.

“Oh, shut up, kitten,” Astrid commanded wryly, much to mine and Ruffnut’s amusement. Fishlegs, on the other hand, cracked a wary grin and moved to stand in front of the two girls. Not exactly an overreaction, considering Toothless had taken several steps forward and snarled as loudly as he could, adding a strange hissing noise in to make it sound generally frightening.

“Speaking of which,” Astrid straightened and suddenly became serious. “Even if we can trust you for now, what about Mr. Cranky over there? Even if Snotlout’s right about you controlling him or something, he’s still a threat.”

I shook my head, even though I couldn’t keep the relief out of my face and body posture. Astrid had said “even if we can trust you”. That meant that she’d finally accepted the situation!

Feeling much less stressed and more thankful than anything, I crouched down and began to write: ‘I never controlled him in the first place. He’s willingly holding himself back now, and knows the consequences of attacking.’

Fishlegs gave me a startled look. “He knows the situation? Like the possible outcomes?” At my nod, the nerdy Viking’s jaw dropped, flabbergasted. “Wow! That’s, like…I’m speechless, that’s, like, amazingly intelligent! I don’t even know how to put a number on that! I just thought he knew the general idea, but not specifics!”

Ruffnut and Tuffnut seemed to accept this, but still, Astrid looked doubtful.

“I don’t know…” she trailed off, turned her head to look at Snotlout. I tensed when she took a step back. When she took another, I let out a loud chirp and shook my head, bending down and scribbling as fast as I could in the dirt. I refused to let another person walk away.

Fishlegs read it once and then repeated it very loudly, most likely so that my cousin would hear. “’Please, I made a mistake. We were hungry and he couldn’t get anything, and I didn’t even know how to hunt in my human body. It was the only way and I swear to the gods that it won’t happen again.’”

Far back, Snotlout stood up, holding his hands behind his neck and pacing back and forth. I tried to catch his eye, but he refused to look at any of us—even Astrid. He looked terribly upset. An immense wave of sadness rushed through me at his distress, followed by an unmistakable feeling that it was all my fault.

You could almost see Astrid’s resolve wavering. I gazed at her pleadingly, trying my best to get across how sorry I was.

“I believe him,” Fishlegs confidently announced. He looked me in the eye and held out a hand to me. “You swear?”

I fixed my eyes on his and nodded, sitting down and bringing my paw up to rest in his hand. I could just barely make my claws and underdeveloped ‘thumb’ wrap around Fishlegs’ wrist and lower arm. We both ‘shook hands’, with him doing all the work and me doing my level best to not accidentally claw and/or bruise him. His skin felt so fragile…

“I believe him, too,” Tuffnut piped up, quickly followed by Ruffnut saying the same thing. The male twin held out his own hand to me. I blinked in surprise at his immediate willingness to touch me. Hesitating slightly, I held up my own arm and clutched his the same way as I’d done to Fishlegs, constantly reminding myself to not even flex my claws in fear of hurting him. Instead of shaking my hand like I’d expected, though, he slid his hand from my grasp and fisted it. Then the twin gently punched me where my ‘knuckles’ would be, just above my claws. I felt my ears stand straight up. A fist bump? That was unexpected. Nobody had done that to me in years, not since Fishlegs had ‘switched sides’, so to speak. It felt very encouraging, and I couldn’t stop a goofy grin from spreading across my face.

I chuckled, giving Toothless a sidelong glance to see how he was reacting to all of this touching. His eyebrows were higher than I though biologically possible, utter disbelief written all across his face. When the dragon realized that I’d started watching him, he purposefully jerked his head to the side, towards Snotlout. I got the message loud and clear, through language and our strange bond: They’ve agreed to trust us. Now make them leave.

I nodded at him hesitantly. There was still one more thing that I needed to do, and then this would be perfect. We’d somehow managed to fix everything!

Astrid was still where she’d been standing, watching me warily. I slowly walked over to her, pausing when I passed the other three and got within range of the axe that she’d never released. With a deep breath, I continued until I was right in front of her. I stared down at her and cautiously raised my paw, having the heel of it facing towards the ground.

The Viking shifted her weight. After a few seconds, she let out a sigh and grabbed my paw, strongly shaking it once and letting it go. “Fine, Hiccup Haddock, I’m going to trust you. For now.”

Her face suddenly became aggressive and she’d pushed her axe up and into my neck in one swift, fluid movement before I could even smile. Astrid leaned in close, ignoring Toothless’ cries, and continued in a low voice, “But if you even think of betraying us…if I have any reason to doubt who you side with or if we really are safe…” She narrowed those brilliant ice-blue eyes at me. I could see my own reflected in them, pupils mere slits in fear. “It won’t be your father who deals the final blow, but me.”

Astrid released me and backed up, allowing me room to gasp for air. I nodded rapidly at her. “A-a-alright, I get the message! No problem! Heh,” I laughed shakily, backing up from her. Toothless ran to my side and stood below and in front of me, crouching, tail whipping back and forth.

Ignoring the furious Night Fury, Astrid glanced up at the sky. “It’s almost sundown. We need to leave, or we’ll be late and Gobber will punish at us,” she announced. I felt my ears perk; dragon training? They started it this early?

I couldn’t help but watch Snotlout while the other three all scrambled, each convinced that they were going to be late. He was still standing, arms locked behind his neck and watching us with an unreadable expression. Fear sprang up on me; what was he going to do? Would he betray us? Was all of that hard work for nothing?

Fishlegs caught my gaze and correctly interpreted my thoughts. “Don’t worry, we’ll talk to him.” He smiled at me, which I hesitantly returned. “As long as you keep your end of the deal, nothing bad will happen.”

I nodded at him and he turned to leave, following Astrid and the twins.

Toothless and I stayed rooted to the spot, each of us not quite believing that this conversation had gone so well. There had been so many possible outcomes to this—and, by some stoke of luck, the gods had decided to give us a break. Thank Odin.

One by one, each of the teenagers clambered up an array of boulders and slipped through the tiny crack in the cove. Astrid was the last, helping Tuffnut and Fishlegs get Ruffnut through. As she began to leave, she stopped and pulled herself back out.

“Hey, Hiccup!” She waved at me to get my attention, though she didn’t need to. “We’ll be back.”

I nodded, hoping that I hadn’t forgotten something. I went over every little detail in a second. But it didn’t ease my worry, especially since I really wanted to seal the deal. I watched the blonde teenager, automatically looking at her—her…single-edged axe? I thought it was double-edged.

“Wait!” I cried, leaping to my feet, an idea lighting up in my mind. Astrid hesitated, confusion flitting across her face. I wasted no time, running over to her and skidding to a stop at a comfortable distance, pointing at the ground several times with my paw in a ‘stay here’ gesture. She frowned, but stayed put.

I spun on my heel, opened my wings, and flew out of the cove. Toothless let out a banshee cry, demanding to know what in the world I was doing, but I was too busy to answer. I spun in a tight circle, glancing at each tree lining the cliffs of our home, searching for the specific one…there!

A couple flaps of my wings and I landed right next to the desired tree—the one that still had Astrid’s axe in it.

I gently grabbed it with half-sheathed teeth, pulling it out with ease that my human body could have never accomplished. Then I returned back to where Astrid was standing, preferring to glide this time, and half-stepped onto the stone.

Astrid’s shock was almost comical. Her mouth dropped open, gaping at the weapon she’d probably thought she’d never see again. “I…” Astrid took it from my hands, examining it from top to bottom with an eagle’s eye. She looked up at me and mumbled, “Thank you. It was my mother’s…”

“Hiccup, quit delaying us!” Tuffnut’s voice carried into the cove. “We’re gonna be late and I so don’t want to deal with Gobber being angry!”

Both Astrid and I ignored the impatient teen. I beamed at her. Still frowning, Astrid stared at me. She gave me an appreciative look—or tried to—and nodded once. Then she turned and climbed her way out of the cove. As she did, I left my own spot and trotted over to Toothless, feeling very jovial about the situation in general.

And then there were two.

Toothless and I were silent, each of us listening to the sound of the retreating posse that we’d somehow aligned with. When I could no longer hear their soft footfalls, I hunched over, feeling as if the weight of the world had been lifted off of my shoulders. Toothless sat down besides me, and, on a random impulse, I crouched on my hind legs and rubbed my face against his.

“Huh?” He looked at me in confusion. “What was that for?”

I grinned and let my rump hit the ground hard, tail raised in the air and swishing. “For not eating them.”

Toothless laughed, but it sounded forced. I gave him a questioning look.

He got right to the point. “Two things. What was that thing with the axe?” He narrowed his eyes at me, and scolded in an exasperated tone, “You shouldn’t give your enemies their weapons back, Hiccup.”

I smiled. “I know, but…that just showed her that I trusted her enough to give her back the axe she’s had for years. And it also let her know that I would fulfill my part of the deal. It’s…kind of like the Seal of Trust.”

Toothless’ eyes widened and understanding swept across his features. “Oh,” he said blandly. “Is it customary for humans to give things to each other to do that?”

I shrugged. “Well, not really, but I wouldn’t say it was rare. And what was that other thing you wanted to talk about?”

“Well…it’s…” He sighed and shook his head. “We can talk about it tomorrow. But there is one thing I want to speak to you about.” He shifted to face me.

“What?” I asked warily, hoping that it wasn’t anything bad.

Toothless snorted at my concern. “Relax. I’ve just decided that you need to learn how to properly shoot fire.”

I sat up straighter, smiling. “What? You told me you didn’t want me blowing up the entire cove.” I laughed, assuming he was joking. It quickly died down when he pinned me with a serious look.

“Your method of firing is reckless; so, yes, at first I was wary of it, since I knew it would catch the entire place on fire. But now that these…circumstances have come up, I don’t want to risk us getting caught by a hoard of demons and you having no idea how to defend yourself.”

“But I know how to shoot fire,” I told him. “Put gas in your mouth, light it with that…thing in the back of your throat, and let it out of your mouth. That’s it…right?”

Toothless laughed. “It’s called an igniter, and of course not! The amount of gas and the shape of your mouth will be all the difference between a concentrated, smooth blast or an explosive, wide blast, or something in between. You have no method, so yours is the latter, which is never a good thing. It means the power is dispersed, but when you have it concentrated, it becomes much more effective.” He gazed at me expectantly and I nodded, though I didn’t quite understand.

The Night Fury abruptly stood up and began walking away. “Okay, so the first thing you need to know about shooting is the shape of your mouth, which can either be wide open or closed shut except for one point, which is always in the very front. I’m sure you can figure out how to—“

I leaped to my feet. “Wait!” I interrupted him. When he turned to look at me, I gasped, “Are you saying you want me to practice now?” I couldn’t help but feel very unwilling towards this. We’d just finished the most stressful, the most emotionally and physically draining conversation I’ve been through in my entire life, and what did Toothless want to do? Blow things up! Yay!

The dragon grinned with half-lidded eyes. “Aw, is little Hiccup tired? Does he want to go sleep all day?” He teased, somehow managing to slur all of his words together and still sound completely serious at the same time.

“Yes, he does!” I complained, lying down. Toothless trotted over with the same look in his face as when he’d forced me to eat that disgusting fish, and I tensed. Digging my claws into the ground and pressing myself against the dirt, I yelled, “I’m not going to shoot fire around! The Vikings would see the smoke! You just told me how, so I don’t need to practice, anyways!” I added.

I was rewarded with Toothless grabbing my scruff and yanking me to my feet. I yelped and took a few clumsy steps away from him, shaking my head to try and get rid of the weird feeling I always got whenever the annoying dragon did that.

“Of course you need to practice!” Toothless scoffed. “Now get over here and show me how you’ll position your mouth. I still don’t want you setting this entire place on fire.”

I stood very still, tail flicking once or twice and side-frills extended from my head.

Then I bolted!

My shorter legs didn’t do me much good with the speed; Toothless caught up to me in less than a minute, thoroughly annoyed with how I was ‘acting like a hatchling’. I couldn’t stop laughing, dodging back and forth and zig-zagging to successfully escape the Night Fury’s ‘intense wrath’. I just stuck my tongue out at him when he said this and called him stuck-up.

To my shock, though, I began to hear Toothless laughing behind me. To make sure I wasn’t imagining things, I made the mistake of glancing over my shoulder, unknowingly slowing down. This gave my friend all the extra distance he needed and he jumped me, bit my ear and tugged it, and then sprang away from me. I was still on the ground by the time he’d managed to make it halfway across the cove, shouting ridiculous insults at me and calling me a slowpoke.

“Challenge accepted!” I cried, leaping to my feet and taking to the skies.

“Cheater!” Toothless screeched, making a break for the destroyed wall of the cove for a hiding spot. My only response was to laugh.

I’m not one for gazing at landscapes and marveling at their beauty. For me, what’s there has always been there, so why bother calling it ‘beautiful’ or ‘mysterious’ when there was an endless amount of time to explore it? Why put so much attention into something that you’ve lived your entire life with?

And yet I found myself sitting in the uppermost branches of the tallest tree of the cove, watching the faint outline of the Dragon of the Sun make His way into the waking world.

I sighed, watching my breath fog and mist around me, swirling a couple times before disappearing into the sky. I couldn’t sleep.

Hiccup, on the other hand, was out like a rock, curled up contently on a bed of hot coals that I’d taught him how to make. It was really the only thing that he’d actually enjoyed about the firebreathing lessons we’d gone through. He’d whined and whined and whined about it, choosing sleep in favor of protection. And when he’d actually practiced, he’d shown that he was quite an, for lack of better words, absolutely awful pupil when it came to shooting fire. For instance, he’d managed to choke on his own igniting gas when he’d filtered too much out and closed his mouth too tight. And he’d also accidentally ignited the fire inside of his mouth, leaving him with a swollen throat and tongue and an endless drinking session. And at one point, I’m pretty sure he forgot how fire works. He shot a blast directly at a tree! If I hadn’t body-slammed the burning trunk to smolder the fire, then it would have burned and toppled over, and then the entire cove would have been alit.

And his aim. Oh, Dragoness of the Moon. His aim.

It didn’t help that I knew why Hiccup wasn’t taking to it too well and could do nothing about it. It was his lack of motivation. The hybrid saw no reason to use his fire, since, Hey! the humans trusted him! I hadn’t had the heart to tell them that they could have been lying. Easily. He’d been so happy, so at peace with his body, that it would have been cruel. ‘Fishlegs’ had done wonders to Hiccup’s tiny self-esteem in his winning argument against ‘Astrid’ and the others. Maybe I wouldn’t try to kill him if he came back.

For a second, I considered waking my friend up to teach him how to use his senses properly—I’d been reminded of how he hadn’t heard the human gang coming. He seemed to have trouble using his senses. It took one look at him to decide not to. Hiccup was in desperate need of his sleep. He needed to rest and relax for once.

I continued my watch alone.

A sudden noise came from the general direction that the humans’ nest and I instantly perked my ears towards it. But it only proved to be a handful of small, lesser birds attacking a rather large hawk that was carrying away one of their young. I grunted, readying a blast to shoot down the bird—who knew how long it would be since Hiccup and I would eat once we went through the fish supply?—when something caught my eye. I let my attention drift from the birds to…

From here…I could just barely see the ocean…

I shook my head to clear my mind. I’d already been over this with myself! I wasn’t going to mourn in self-pity.

I did miss the feeling of the ocean spray, though. And the smell. And the hoards of fresh fish ripe for the picking…

Stop it, I growled to myself. You’re only going to make it worse.

I couldn’t help myself. I began thinking about my handicap.

The magic inside of me felt like it was crawling to its previous point. But after much thought, I knew that no amount of power would bring my tailfin back. I’d been on and off about repairing it, convincing myself that it would be possible one day and then realizing it would work the next. Dragon magic, although thousands of years old, is unnatural. Legends say that the dragons blessed by the gods of magic passed the traits down to their offspring, and, eventually, it boomed into the entire population. It came at a cost, though.

Since magic is a foreign energy, it causes the body to attack itself with extreme overuse. Healing simple scratches causes incredible pain if you help another dragon. Attempting to fix an amputation by myself would be agonizing and potentially lethal; if I passed out or lost my concentration midway, the lump of unfinished flesh and scales could easily become cancerous.

Becoming dependent on magic would get a dragon addicted, and they would be unable to function without it, abuse it, and eventually wipe their minds of all rational thoughts. The consequences all depended on the type of magic. There is one well-known form that enhances the body and its abilities; for instance, when I healed Hiccup’s wound, all I was really did was push his body’s natural healing process to superspeed. Hence the pain.

The only other type of magic is very debatable. Some dragons say it exists; others say it doesn’t. It doesn’t apply to the physical world, but the mental, spiritual, and energy aspects of the dragons that it affects. Because it doesn’t have any physical evidence, and very few dragons have ‘used’ it, most of my kind is skeptical. I personally believe that the Queen uses this magic to keep control of the tribe.

I don’t know why my magic didn’t hurt me when I transformed Hiccup. Thinking about it now, it bothered me. I didn’t know the exact moment I noticed my tailfin had been gone…

…had I—?!

I banished the thought from my mind and beat it into submission, once again staring at the Dragon of the Sun. Forcing myself to mull over something else, I chose the first topic that came to mind: humans. I struggled with it, but eventually reminded myself that I was supposed to be looking for danger. I shuddered.

Any moment now, the Viking tribe could be here, out for the kill. Even if Hiccup was convinced that his little ‘friends’ had bought his disgusting tame act, I knew to be on my guard. Those humans had changed their minds so easily, I wouldn’t be surprised if they managed to undo what Hiccup had done on their way back from our home.

I just hoped that Hiccup was right about them. Even from here, the tallest point in the cove that I could reach, I was only about halfway up the cliffside closest to it. It seemed almost like I was mocked; the cliff wall directly parallel to where I was sitting wasn’t too much taller than the tree. It had giant tree roots growing all over it, desperately trying to hold the earth in place, and it was nearly a vertical incline. Still, I could have easily come and gone from this area if only the tree I was sitting atop was on the opposite side of the lake.

Anger boiled up within me for a second at the unfairness of it all. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, dispelling it. I’d learned to accept situations as they were in the past days, and I was keen on keeping myself that way. No need throwing a fit over something that no dragon could fix.

For hours, I stayed on my perch, keeping watch over the cove and observing the Dragon of the Sun as He rose. Clouds were rising over the horizon, promising a cloudy day at the least. The ocean sparkled and swayed, so unlike the lake, which was calm almost all of the time and perfectly reflected everything above it.

The sun was about a quarter into the sky when Hiccup began to shuffle in his sleep. Knowing that meant that he was about to wake up, I carefully clawed my way down the tree trunk and jumped off, landing lightly onto the soft, green grass. Settling down next to Hiccup, I watched him for a moment and rested my head on my forelegs. He stirred again and slowly brought himself into the waking world.

Hiccup rubbed his face with one paw and smiled in greeting at me. “Morning,” he mumbled sleepily, stretching out his front legs as far as they would go and arching his back.

“Sleep well?” I asked. Hiccup answered me with a jaw-popping yawn, which I guess is a ‘yes’ for humans. “Good. Because if you think you can just waste away an entire morning like that, then you’re stupider than a Little-Biter.”

“Huh?!” Hiccup turned to me, bewildered. “But we were up all night doing your ‘training lessons’!” He gestured with his tail at a series of scorch marks along one of the stronger walls, all of which were caused by him in the middle of the night; like he’d said, we couldn’t just practice fireblasts in the day, where the smoke could be seen! So the only logical conclusion was to practice fire-breathing at night.

I nodded. “Yes, but that’s no excuse.” Hiccup’s left ear twitched in annoyance and I smirked. “You really can be lazy sometimes.”

Hiccup got to his feet and stretched, grumbling, “There’s a fine line between being lazy and wanting to rest.”

“Yup, and you’re on the lazy side!” I purred. Hiccup scoffed and sat down to scratch at a spot behind his ear. As he did, his eyes closed into mere slits and his tongue stuck out a little. So, I, like any other sensible dragon, walked over to him and tipped him over as a punishment. Impulsive? Me? Pfft. My older brother would do it to me all the time.

The human-turned-dragon stumbled and dropped to the ground, squirming for a couple seconds before standing up. “Ow! Toothless!” He whined, pushed me in the chest lightly with his paw. I snickered.

“Sleep in any more and you’ll get that. All day. Every day.” I forced an overly cheerful smile onto my face, laughing when the brown Shadow-Blender stared at me in horror. “Oh, you poor thing. Next time, go to sleep earlier! Or take a nap in the middle of the day when you’re done doing whatever you need to do.”

Hiccup scowled at me. “Yeah? Well, I’m still going to sleep in, since we really don’t need to do anything today…or the next…or the next.” He straightened and puffed out his chest proudly, as if he’d won some great award or honor. I didn’t know whether to think of his naivety as hilarious or startlingly stupid.

I stood as well, making my way over to him and patting him in the back of the neck with my wing. “You’re silly. We’ve got plenty of things to do.” I paused, remembering the cut-off conversation we’d had last night. With a sigh, I added, “We need to talk about something.”

Believe me, I really didn’t want to have this discussion. I didn’t want Hiccup to lose his hope in those disgusting humans because of how much their trust meant to him. But I didn’t want him to get stabbed in the back and never see it coming. That would crush him. He needed to be prepared, and it seemed that I would have to be the one to do it.

Be as gentle as possible, I told myself. When Hiccup had sat down in front of me and I’d done the same, I began, “I know that you’re excited about those Vikings making a truce with us, but I really don’t understand why you did.” Hiccup’s eyes widened in shock and hurt. I cringed. “I’m not disagreeing with you. But I do find it very hard to figure out when their way of ‘making a truce’ was throwing their weapons at us when they first saw us and then yelling at you for a good portion of that conversation.”

“They weren’t yelling at me!” Hiccup immediately snapped to defend them. “And I trust them because they agreed to an alliance. If there’s anything Vikings do well, it’s keeping their word. And killing things, but that’s besides the point,” he babbled, shaking his head. The freckled dragon gave me an angry look, ears pressed against his head, and continued, “You of all dragons should know that, Toothless!”

I bit back a growl. “I do know that,” I insisted, “but those Vikings might change their mind! How can you be so sure that they aren’t going to tell their superiors where we are?” I stared into Hiccup’s eyes, and suddenly I could easily see the frustration and confusion swimming within them. Guilt rushed through me. I shouldn’t have started this conversation. Damn it.

“Well, how were you so sure that I wouldn’t attack you after we made our own truce?” Hiccup shot back evenly. His voice was rising in pitch and volume. “That’s the same thing with them! We promised each other something and stuck to it. Astrid and the others will do the same thing!”

I narrowed my eyes in suspicion. “But how do you know? Sure, they agreed to you and did that…thing…with your paw. But how—I mean—ugh.” I glared at the ground for a second and then returned my gaze to Hiccup’s. “What makes you think they won’t change their mind?” I finally got out.

Hiccup’s eyebrows raised and he stared at me. “I trust them,” he declared after several seconds, “and I know that we’ll be safe. If anything, Fishlegs would warn us if an attack were to happen. And since Astrid was the one to agree to it, the others will follow her lead.” He took a deep breath and made a visible effort to calm down before quietly adding, “…and Snotlout has always gone along with Astrid, so we know we’re safe from him, too.”

I allowed myself to think this over. It didn’t take long for my mind to immediately come to a conclusion. Was ‘Astrid’ their group’s Queen? It sure did sound like it. Thinking back on it now, I realized that, even though she didn’t directly address anyone as much as the others did, they’d all hung on her every word—except ‘Snotlout’. But his challenges to her authority were beat down rather quickly by the Queen herself, and whenever she did something, the other four (or three, when ‘Snotlout’ ran away like a little coward) were sure to follow.

So was Hiccup actually playing it smart when he focused most of his attention to ‘Astrid’? Or was it solely because of his attraction towards her? Either way, I could see how he would think that we were safe based on that reasoning. But…

“Are you sure your ‘Astrid’ just wasn’t playing a dirty lie to raise her rank?” I blurted. Such an action wouldn’t be unheard of, considering she attacked me not even five hours after I’d changed Hiccup from his human form into his present one. That female had ambition and wasn’t afraid to use it for her own good. It unnerved me to think that our fate was resting in her disgusting, greedy hands.

Hiccup leaned forward and locked me into place with his eyes. “Yes.” The link formed again, fierce and strong.

“Well…but…” I struggled to come up with anything else; I knew that whatever I said, Hiccup’s unwavering trust would provide him with an answer. He was so strongly committed to it that I knew that all arguments I had would fail. With a little bit of effort, I looked away and broke the connection. “Fine. I’ll trust you, Hiccup. But not your friends,” I hissed. I felt like I was saying some curse, admitting to believing those disgusting humans! If it weren’t for Hiccup’s upset, passionate response to my first question, then I probably would have continued the conversation just to defend my honor.

“Thanks, Toothless,” Hiccup breathed in relief, blowing away my feelings of rage and embarrassment. “I have something I need to ask you, too.” When I looked up in surprise, he smiled sheepishly. “I sort-of hinted at it, but you didn’t get it.” I continued to be silent, not recalling one word that could have possibly ‘hinted’ at a question. What was Hiccup saying?

He pawed at the ground nervously. “So, uh, when I left the cove the other day, you were acting…well, normal. Your usual self. Later on that night, though, you…er…” he trailed off, eyes glazing over momentarily while he tried to figure out what exactly he wanted to say, “…you started to sincerely care about me. And I you. What made you change your mind about me?”

My eyes widened and my ears stood on end. I was not expecting that. I’d thought that Hiccup had just accepted it as how I was going to act from now on. It struck me as odd that he choose the incident a couple nights ago as the day I began to care about him; that had happened when Hiccup had nearly drowned. Then I realized that he wouldn’t have figured that out, since I’d tried to stay as impassive as possible to not seem soft.

I lowered my gaze, tail twitching slightly. “Like I said…I thought you had left me after awhile.” I grimaced at the memory of the panic attack I’d had: flying against the cove walls and slamming myself into them over and over, screaming wordlessly, and desperately trying to escape. I noticed in the edge of my vision that Hiccup, too, had flinched at the sentence. “When I couldn’t get out…well…I don’t know,” I sighed in frustration. This conversation was more uncomfortable than the one from yesterday!

“Go on,” Hiccup encouraged lightly. I looked up at him to see that he was giving me kind, understanding look, as if he knew what words I were struggling with. It suddenly hit me that Hiccup may have as hard a time as I do when talking about himself; he’d implied that he’d been something of an outcast even before all of this happened. Realizing that I was dealing with something that he’s been facing for years, and that I had no right to complain in comparison, I mustered up the courage to continue on.

“I…guess I realized that I missed you. A lot,” I grinned hesitantly. “Once I ‘figured out’ that you’d left for good, I started to panic because I thought I’d been abandoned and couldn’t handle it.” I looked up at Hiccup, who looked immensely upset with himself, and went on, “I was the happiest I’d been in a long time when you woke me up. Trust me, it caught me off-guard, too,” I snorted. “I guess I finally understood how important you were to me then, which is what caused my, as you call it, change.” I purposely made my voice as high-pitched and nasally as I could, making an impressive imitation of my friend’s voice.

Hiccup giggled and got up, trotting over to me. “I know I’ve been saying this a lot, but thanks. I really appreciate you telling me, particularly since it’s so hard for you to talk about your feelings.” He butted my chest affectionately and rubbed his cheek against mine while I stayed frozen in shock. After a second, I cracked a smile, not really knowing how to react to the hybrid’s immediate acceptance of my emotions. It felt…nice.

“Thanks for understanding,” I murmured, leaning on him and closing my eyes.

It was then that Hiccup’s stomach decided to growl. We both jumped and looked at his stomach, watching it as it rumbled and complained for food.

I burst out laughing when said dragon attempted to cover up the noise by hunching over and hiding his face underneath a wing in mortification. “Why don’t we go have breakfast?” I suggested, playfully pulling on Hiccup’s ear to get him to stand up.

“…okay!” He squeaked, ducking his head and trying his level best not to smile.

So that was how we made our way over to the forgotten pile of fish on the opposite end of the cove. I grimaced at smelling how some of the fish had rotted in the sun. Neither of us complained, though; we were too happy to have something to put in our bellies that it didn’t really seem to matter.

I let Hiccup start the customary sharing routine, taking one fish, and then letting me take one, and then him, and so on. For awhile, we just talked about…things. We didn’t mention yesterday or the conversation we’d just had. I was surprised at how easily the words left my mouth, like nothing was holding me back. We talked about the weather, favorite types of food (I warned him to stay away from those damned eels—not only did they have a repulsive scent, but they were poisonous, too!), told stories to each other, commented on the local wildlife and played a roleplaying game of Hiccup’s design…everything, really. I’d never had such a conversation in my entire life. Most dragons…don’t feel so open around each other. Never, actually.

I felt like I’d been missing out on something.

“So, I thought, ‘well, this sounds like a perfectly reasonable idea!’, and managed to make my way all the way across the tree log, only for it to break and leave me stranded on the other side of Raven Point! I was like, ‘well, didn’t see that one coming’!” Hiccup was saying between laughs as I struggled to remember ever having a talk like this. I eventually gave up and became engrossed in the story, disbelief etched across my face.

“You managed to get lost in your own forest?” At Hiccup’s bewildered stare, I roared with laughter. “Oh, Hiccup!”

Hiccup threw a fish at me, one of the last. We’d agreed to finish off the supply before the rotten parts made the food inedible. “I didn’t get lost, I was just…forced into finding a creative way out. Nothing wrong with that.” He nodded to himself. “In fact, now that I think about it, I’m glad that I got lo—sidetracked. Because then I found a nice little trail in the forest.”

I snickered. “By sidetracked, you mean you stumbled over a hill or something and got covered in bugs and weeds.”

The smaller dragon slumped. I nearly fell over, I was laughing so hard!

“I’m gonna steal your fish,” Hiccup mumbled, trying his very best to not laugh. It wasn’t working. At all. I shook my head, beyond words, and scooped up the tiny meal and swallowed it in one swift movement. “Well, fine, Toothless. Now you’ve got to tell me an embarrassing story!”

I snorted, still not quite over my amusement on Hiccups “not lost, but creative walking!” story. “Fine. Let’s see…hm…well, a long time ago, I was crawling through some caves by the seaside. I remember that I was young and still dependant on my family. I wanted to prove to them that I wasn’t useless, so I’d decided to hunt for a troll.” As I said this, I tapped my right paw on the ground to animate my story.

Hiccup leaped to his feet excitedly. “Trolls exist! Nobody believes me! Well, my mentor does, but still, it’s true!”

“I know!” I gasped, sitting up straighter. Finally, someone who knew the truth! “And I swear I caught one, but by the time I’d brought everyone to see him, he was gone! They never stopped making fun of me for that. It was mortifying.”

We looked at each other wisely, holding equally sage expressions and nodding delicately. It took about three seconds for the two of us to burst into amused peals.

With a snort, I nudged the last fish towards Hiccup. When he protested, I interrupted him, “No, you haven’t eaten as much as I have. I managed to hunt down a few deer before getting caught in here, so you take it.” When the tiny Shadow-Blender still refused to take it, I smiled. “It’s fine, really.”

Hiccup reluctantly took the fish and swallowed it. A small, shy smile rested on his face.

I returned the gesture. The two of us fell into a calm, slightly awkward silence then, neither of us quite sure where to look and both of us quickly looking elsewhere when we caught each other staring. Out of lack of anything else to do, I turned my head towards the area that the Vikings had come in the previous day, ears perked. I couldn’t hear anything out of the ordinary, still…

…So, maybe they had kept up their end of the deal.

“Hey, Toothless?” Hiccup piped up eventually. I turned to look at him, and he continued, “How can you understand human speech?” He tipped his head to the side, eyes narrowing slightly and forehead wrinkling a little. “I’ve thought it over for a long time, but I can’t figure it out.”

I sat down and wrapped my tail around my paws. “Well…uh…” I flicked my ears, struggling to remember. I knew the answer; I just couldn’t find the right words to explain it. “The dragon ancestors knew that humans were becoming their main enemies, and they were losing,” I explained slowly, hoping that I was making sense, “so they sent out their smartest spies to observe humans, especially the young ones, to see how they would communicate. What they did was concentrate on the words and their immediate meanings, and then took into account their learned words and the situation. It took several years and even more fatalities, since several of the spies got caught, but they eventually mastered the language. Norse is what you call it, right?” At this, Hiccup grinned and nodded, and was there…pride in his eyes? I preened, continuing with a big smile, “So, it became a custom for all of the older dragons to learn Norse. Once that had happened, the spies took off south to teach other dragon nests how to do the same. Eventually, instead of waiting until dragons came of age, parents simply taught their young the language.”

“How?” Hiccup asked, confusion flickering across his face. “I mean, it seems kind of hard to explain a language.”

I shook my head at this. “The sentence structure and the basic grammar were explained, but most parents taught their hatchlings by taking them down to human settlements and having them observe, like the ancient spies. They also used magic to speed up the process by inserting memories of learning and ideas of the grammar in small intervals. That’s how I learned, anyways.”

“Oh. Creepy.” Hiccup laughed at my deadpan expression. “But, hey, you know what that means? I’ll bet that men can learn dragon language, too! It can be called…Dragonese!” He ‘popped’ at this, jumping on his hind legs and spreading his wings and tailfins. I rewarded him with a sarcastic expression.

“How clever,” I said dryly. Hiccup beamed.

A thought suddenly came to mind, interrupting my next sarcastic remark. I straightened up and asked, “Hiccup, can you explain to me that whole scratch-marks thing you did yesterday?”

Words could not describe how furious I had been when Hiccup had switched to his ‘silent language’ during the conversations with the humans. I’d been left in the dark, only able to understand what exactly was going on by the hatchlings’ reactions to what Hiccup was writing, or if I was lucky enough to hear one speak out loud. I’d never felt so vulnerable; here I was, inches from the enemy, and I had no idea what they were saying to each other!

Hiccup grinned widely at this. “It’s called ‘literature’. See, human languages have two forms: verbal and written. How the written language works differs with the specific languages, but with Norse, the symbols—or runes—represent sounds. When you mush the sounds together, you get words like the ones we speak.”

I nodded in understanding. How…interesting. Dragon language was only partially verbal. Now I wanted to look at his ‘writing’ again, to see for myself! I got up and sauntered my way over to where the meeting had taken place, looking at the faint scratches that Hiccup had made in the dirt. I scrutinized it as best as I could, walking around the runes by moving only my hind legs and leaning in very close to them. Very carefully, I began to copy the ‘words’ underneath them, struggling to use my longest claw as Hiccup had done yesterday.

“See, there you go! Not exactly legible, but you get the point.”

I paused, glancing up at the freckled Shadow-Blender standing above me with a smile. “I think I see a pattern. But it’s so complicated…” I sighed in frustration, glaring at the ‘runes’. “I can’t figure it out, but I want to.”

There was a laugh and a playful push to the side. “You can’t learn an entire language in one day, Toothless! Especially off of one sentence.” I snorted and shook my head stubbornly. “Here, I have a better idea. Watch this!”

I yelped when a shadow appeared over me and flattened myself to the ground. Hiccup landed a few feet from me and continued with his running off in a random direction. I huffed in irritation; he’d nearly knocked my head off!

He was already coming back when I’d sat up with as much dignity as I could. The smaller of the two of us held a small stick (about a meter long) in his mouth, and attempted to grin at me without looking stupid.

“What are you—“ I asked, but never finished.                                           

Hiccup leaned down and dug the stick into the ground, moving it in a strange pattern. I got up and leaned over his shoulder, head bobbing to follow the wood’s path. My mouth dropped open and I had a sudden intake of air when I realized what exactly my strange friend was doing.

He was creating a Shadow-Blender in the dirt!

“Let me try!” Before Hiccup could protest, I’d grabbed his stick from his mouth and run off a distance to a new patch of dirt. I mimicked Hiccup’s posture earlier, determined to place a perfect picture of our kind in the earth for all to see. I started with the eyes, then the head, and the wings—oh, I forgot the nose—now the legs, and the tail, and the tailfins…done!

I dropped the stick and sat back to view my work at a different angle, nodding in approval. Now that was an accurate representation of the best species on earth!

When Hiccup walked over, I leaned back, pointing with one paw at the dirt. “Look! I drew an entire Shadow-Blender.” He sat down next to me and tipped his head to the side, a slight frown on his face. I blinked, confused. “What’s wrong?” I inquired, “Do you not think it’s good?”

Hiccup looked at me and smiled sheepishly. “Y-Yeah, I think it’s good, Toothless!” He told me cheerfully…too cheerfully.

“You think it’s bad,” I realized, slumping. I couldn’t believe it! My picture was amazing!

“Well…there are some parts that are anatomically incorrect…” Hiccup trailed, “Like the legs…and wings…and chest…but other than that, it’s great! Especially for a first try!”

“First success,” I corrected him. He just raised an eyebrow at me, amused, while I smirked. “Thanks, though,” I said modestly, dropping the ‘I’m perfect’ act.

With a nod, Hiccup got up and started a little doodle of his own, using his claw to add to my picture. “It’s strange, though,” he said dreamily, “to think that you guys knew all along what we were saying. If only you knew how to write…we’d be able to form a truce between dragons and humans.”

I hunched over for real this time. “It would never happen,” I told him softly. “The others wouldn’t be able to agree.”

I hadn’t really meant for Hiccup to hear it; I was just talking to myself, really, wishing for the millionth time that the spell could be broken. He caught onto it easily, though, and perked up, concern written across his face at my sudden drop of a good mood. “What do you mean, ‘wouldn’t’?” He asked, stopping in his drawing of the two of us flying and turning to face me fully.

I hesitated. Should I tell him about the Queen? I didn’t want to bring him into the core of the war. Knowing him, he’d want to do something about it; Hiccup was kind-hearted enough to worry about people who wouldn’t care if he were alive or dead…I doubt he’d want to stand around and do nothing, knowing about the massive spell pushed over the entire nest.

“…Toothless?”

I snapped back to attention. Hiccup was right in front of me, concern shining in his eyes.

The link between us burst to life. Hiccup knew something was wrong and genuinely wanted to help me. I, on the other hand, was worried about what he would do when he knew. The clash of emotions left both of us feeling touched, but wary of the story nonetheless—especially when determination set in on the Viking’s side.

With a forlorn sigh, I gave in. “I…I don’t know how to explain this without being blunt…” Hiccup gave me an encouraging nod, egging me on. I took in a breath and calmed my nerves. We were going to be okay. Telling him wouldn’t hurt anyone. “Okay, then.” I straightened and looked my friend in the eyes, refusing to reveal the truth while looking away—a coward’s act.

“There is a gigantic dragon—no, a monster—controlling the entire nest with her magic. Once a dragon is pulled in, there is no escape, and they lose all of their free will and thoughts.”

Hiccup’s reaction was to be expected. He jumped back and away from me with wide eyes, ears and side-frills pinned against his head. “What?!” He cried, leaning back and whipping his tail back and forth. “But…but…It’s never seemed that way before…and you weren’t affected…” An unspoken horror seemed to flash before his eyes. “Were you?” The Shadow-Blender whispered.

“No,” I sighed, and he immediately relaxed and straightened out, albeit still wearing an extremely unsettled look on his face. “But, sometimes, I wished I was. Since Shadow-Blenders have the strongest magic, besides the Queen, I was unaffected. I was helpless to stop her, and by the time I realized she grew stronger and bigger by each day…it was too late.” I hung my head. “I had the chance, and I missed it.”

“You can’t put the weight of an entire nest on your shoulders,” Hiccup pointed out gently. He leaned forward and pressed his forehead against mine, staring into my troubled eyes. “It’s unfair to yourself.” He pulled back, sadness etched across his face, and asked, “Toothless…you were the only one free of the spell, weren’t you? Were you the only Nigh—I mean, Shadow-Blender in the entire nest?”

Despair hit me hard. I wanted to speak, but felt like I couldn’t, like I wasn’t allowed to. Why did I pull Hiccup into this? Why didn’t I just skirt around the subject? He would’ve understood. And all I could do was nod grimly at him, wishing fiercely that this conversation had never come up. The bond formed again, and Hiccup visibly recoiled under the memories of emotions that I had felt; fear, loneliness, anger, confusion, grief…all of it. I scrambled to get a grip on myself, to hold any of it back, but I couldn’t break it up even when I looked away. Hiccup bravely kept the link up on his own accord, letting himself drown in the tales of an unspoken past.

When it cut off, we were both quiet for a long time. My eyebrows were pulled down low over my eyes, a thick frown planted on my face, ears drooping. I looked down, to my side, avoiding Hiccup’s gaze. I…didn’t want to remember…It was too painful. I needed to recover—I needed to think of something else—those humans were awfully stupid—

“How long?” His voice quivered, and he winced, like he was about to be struck.

“Before the Great War,” I murmured, staring at Hiccup’s picture on the ground. We were flying in it. My throat constricted and I heaved a breath.

“And you were alone.” Smiling, in the clouds.

—Well there weren’t clouds there but I imagined them and it would be so nice to be able to fly again—

“Yes.” I could barely even hear myself say it, much less form the word. A rush of emotions flooded over me, a wall I’d so carefully built broke down. I felt a lump form in my throat and swallowed harshly with rapidly blinking eyes. It was no use; years upon years upon years of having absolutely no one but myself attacked me all at once, grabbing my legs and wings in greedy, clawed arms and rushing me down into darkness. I squeezed my eyes shut and gritted my teeth. I wanted to slap myself; I was a Shadow-Blender! We do not wallow in despair. This was humiliating—

I heard him take in a deep, shaky breath. Hiccup stepped up to me and paused. Then he brought a paw up, grabbing my shoulder, and tightly wrapped his wings around me. I gasped, eyes snapping open, but all the strange little once-was-human did was bring his other arm around my neck and bury his face into the top of my head. What was this? What was he doing? I squirmed out of instinct—were those monsters dragging me back down?!—no, it’s Hiccup—calm down, Toothless. All Hiccup did was tighten his hold on me, murmuring soft comforts.

I stared into nothingness, struggling to breathe. My heart was hammering like a Buzz-Wing’s wingbeats. Hesitantly, I brought up my paw and gripped the arm that was on my shoulder. A second later, my entire body wracked, and I buried my face into Hiccup’s chest. My body shook from nose to tailtip so hard, I thought my scales would fall off. Hiccup squeezed my shoulder and fell silent.

We sat like that for a long time.

“I’m sorry for overreacting.”

“No, don’t be sorry at all!”

I moved my head from its resting position on the ground and onto my leg so I could see Hiccup. He was standing in front of me, glaring. The harsh look fell when he took in my solemn, tired expression.

“Don’t be mad because you actually opened up and talked to someone, Toothless,” Hiccup said. “It’s a good thing.”

I pushed against the ground and sat up, saying, “I know, but for me to completely lose it like that was uncalled for…and unfair to you.” Shaking my head, I gave him a truly apologetic look.

I was furious at myself for breaking down like that. That was, in no way at all, acceptable. Yes, ‘opening myself up’ is good and all, but I should have done it in another way. Maybe by talking or slowly over time. I should have known better than to let my guard down and let all of my emotions hit me like a tidal wave. Now I’d dishonored myself in front of the gods and Hiccup by acting so recklessly. Even if he had held up to the custom of comforting another dragon in distress, he shouldn’t have had to in the first place.

Said dragon groaned and shook his head at me. “No, it isn’t.” He leaned down to my eye level and said, “Toothless, if you didn’t let go eventually, then you would have imploded. You would ‘lose it’ in a way a lot worse than just letting your emotions out. I don’t know why you think otherwise, but it’s really a good thing.” He offered a soft smile that I warily returned.

I didn’t really believe that, but I did want Hiccup to feel better; he was almost as upset as I was throughout the entire time, offering comfort nonstop. So I guess I would…try to go with it.

I glanced up at the noon sun, praying for guidance. My instincts and gut told me to act with what my past had taught me…but something else, just as strong, said to follow Hiccup’s lead. I just hoped that I made the right choice…or at least one that would redeem me.

“Toothless,” Hiccup started, but I stopped him.

“I’m fine now. Really,” I gave him a weak grin—a weak grin that slowly melted into a real one. I wasn’t ‘fine’, but I was feeling better. Maybe he was right.

I let out a breath of air, closing my eyes. I let the harsh, coiled up emotions within me unknot themselves, exposed. It didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would.

When I finally felt I could handle returning to reality, I reopened my eyes and gazed at a confused, concerned Hiccup. It suddenly hit me hard how worried he was. He cared about me. He deserved my trust, not my instincts.

I had no right to keep him in the dark after he’d done his best to make me better. Taking this thought, I acted on a sudden impulse to let things go as he’d said. I began to talk.

“I…I think the reason I was so upset,” my body tingled with sudden nervousness, “was because it brought up memories.” I cringed at how dumb I sounded and continued awkwardly, “I mean, speaking of the Queen forced me to remember the terrible things she’d do. When she was small enough to fit in and out of the nest, she’d direct groups of dragons to float just above the ocean. When a sea dragon came by and she forced it to jump out of the water to eat them, she only grabbed onto it when it was done and the entire group was dead. Did you know that sea dragons are cannibals, too? I would’ve never thought—ugh, I’m getting off-point. Whenever she found a dragon strong enough to resist her spell, she’d rip off their wings and throw them out to sea. It didn’t take long for me to become the only one left that could resist. To make it worse, whenever other dragons with strong magic would come by, like Forest-Cutters and other Shadow-Blenders, she would make them go through a test of endurance, and if they failed, she killed them. But it was really just a fake act, because she was only making sure if she could enforce all of her will on them. I saw a friend of my older brother die because of that—he openly resisted. And this other time, she—“ I stopped abruptly, realizing that I was rambling.

My thoughts swirled around in my head with no rhyme or rhythm. I struggled to right them, to get them to work the way I wanted them to. I had the idea of what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t find any words. It was frustrating, gods damn it!

“What I’m trying to get at is…” I trailed off, concentrating. After several moments, I gave an aggravated sigh, shaking my head. “It’s not that I was forced to watch her do bad deeds!” I growled, nose wrinkling slightly. I knew the answer. It was on the tip of my tongue, but I felt like my language had escaped me, and I was left with a description but no way to say it. “I mean, that is a part of it, but it’s not the one that should be focused on…I can’t word it—“

“I think I know,” Hiccup interrupted me, holding a paw up from his seated position in front of me. Understanding clear in his face and voice, he said, “You were lonely.” I was silent, and he continued, “I understand that…I didn’t really have anybody growing up. I was kind of the village screw-up.” He shrugged passively, as if it didn’t matter. I tipped my head slightly, but when he showed no reaction, I took the hint and ignored it.

I pawed at the ground. He was right. I didn’t need to say it. A small part of me remembered that I’d already realized this, and had forgotten due to the stress of the situation.

The Viking continued on, feeling the need to explain himself, “Even before my mother died, I’d never been able to get things right. But afterwards…it’s like my dad pushed all of his and her expectations on me at once, and I couldn’t handle it. I wanted to do things right…but I always seemed destined to screw up.” He gave a little smirk along with the sarcastic remark.

“You lost your mother?” I gasped, feeling a tingle go down my spine and my muscles tense up.

Hiccup grimaced. “She got sick,” He explained, getting up and pacing around me. “The elder said that a wound from a dragon bite got infected…something about that species’ saliva being poisonous.” He shook his head at this, closing his eyes momentarily. “I don’t know. She fought it as long as she could, but nobody could do anything. She passed in her sleep.” He bit his lower lip, pine-green eyes faded over with memories.

I stared, open-mouthed. Was this…a coincidence? Had the Dragoness of the Moon played this out specifically?

Shifting slightly to get the blood rushing through my legs, I tipped my head to the side and studied the brown Shadow-Blender.

“It’s…uncanny,” I spoke up gravely, causing Hiccup to come to attention. “My own mother died from illness, too.” Flashes of old places and dragons—my mother, my father, a fire in a forest, my older brother flying off forever, a village on lookout—all swept before my eyes. I gulped, taking in a deep breath through my nose and letting it out through my mouth. When I spoke, my voice was soft. I attempted to distract myself by trapping a rather large grasshopper between my paws and keeping it from escaping. “We were spying on the nearby human village because we’d seen a bunch of them wandering around our caves. I remember that it was one of my first missions to help our group and that I was the most excited I’d ever been in my entire life. But I was young and didn’t know the way back...so when we were spotted, we tried to run instead of leading them directly to the others. Something hit my mother and she fell down, so I lit a fire to block off the humans and we somehow managed to get away.”

It felt like it had just happened; like I was reliving those terrible moments. I picked up the grasshopper delicately, between claws, and looked up at Hiccup. He briefly glanced at it, a hint of pity in his eyes. I looked back at it, sighed, and dropped it to the side, where it immediately hopped away in frantic little bounces. “We ran into the open fields, where my mother collapsed from exhaustion. I thought that we were going to leave by morning, even though her wounds were deep, so I wasn’t too worried. I didn’t expect her to be unable to get up by sunrise.” Hiccup’s breath caught in sudden realization, causing my left ear to twitch towards him. “I tried to bring back food since she couldn’t hunt. For days we sat there…through thunderstorms and dry, terrible heat. And then, one day, I woke up...and she was gone.”

“So that’s why you freaked out when I got that scratch,” Hiccup whispered. His surprise gave way to understanding, and then what looked to be a sad form of happiness. “I…I…Thanks, Toothless.” He got up and dealt a swift head-butt to my chest. I brought my head back a little, surprise written across my entire face.

I nodded lamely. “Of course. It happened long ago, and it didn’t ruin my life. I survived and got over it…” As an afterthought, I joked, “And you’d better be grateful! Or else.” I really didn’t want to talk anymore.

Hiccup snorted and settled into a crouch, as tired of the incredibly serious, draining conversations as I was. “Or else what, O mighty dragon? What can you do if you can’t catch me?” He wiggled his rump at this with a daring look in his green eyes.

I smirked. Challenge accepted.                                 

I pushed off the ground and leaped at the unsuspecting Viking, a battle cry ripping from my throat. He screeched and scrambled away, but I was too fast! I grabbed his tail and dug my feet in the ground, holding my wings out for balance. With a massive heave, I pulled him close to me until he was close enough to pounce on. I sat on top of his shoulders and pushed his neck and chin into the earth, laughing maniacally.

“I win!” I cried. My tail swished and my ears slanted diagonally.

“You’re-crushing-my-neck,” Hiccup wheezed out, his tongue sticking out slightly.

I stepped off of him, rolling my eyes. A fish flipped out of the lake and flailed midair, immediately drawing my attention to the reflective pool of water. I didn’t forget to add in an insult, though. “You really need to learn how to move fast! I’ve seen quicker snails!” I boasted, licking a paw and running it over my cheek. “I mean, you’ve got wings and—AAAAH!”

I couldn’t help but let out a (manly) squeal when a certain freckled Shadow-Blender charged right into me and somehow managed to knock me over! I rolled away from his front paws when he tried to slam them down on my chest. “Ha! You think I didn’t see that coming?!” I spun on my front paws, pushed off the ground with my hind legs, and catapulted myself into a shaky glide across the lake.

“Actually, no. You didn’t.” The swift sound of wings flapping told me that, once again, Hiccup had decided that he liked to cheat. I snorted, watching him clumsily fly towards me, determination set in his entire body.

When my unsuspecting victim got closer, I began to back up onto a boulder behind me, clawing my way up it. Hiccup had barely any time to turn when he realized my plan; all he could do was rear midair, hold out his paws, and let out a wordless cry that might as well have meant, “oh, shit! I’m doomed!”

“Amateur!” I teased, leaping in the air and knocking Hiccup in the stomach. He fell harmlessly to the ground and I dove, snapped my wings open, and swooped over the deep end of the lake and into the shallow.

“Don’t think you can get away with that!” Hiccup yelled, his voice shaking with laughter.  His shadow swooped over me just as I managed to crawl out of the freezing depths of water. His plan almost made me fret, but unfortunately for him, the hybrid decided that simply stopping midair and dropping on top of me would be a good idea. He obviously didn’t expect me to see his shadow get bigger and roll out of the way! “Oof!”

I cackled at the way the human-turned-dragon’s wings and legs were splayed out. He scrambled to his feet and shook his head to clear it, eyes squeezed shut. Taking my chance, I turned and sprinted away, jumping onto one boulder, and then a higher one, and then onto a ledge in the cliffside. There was a slight dip in it, just big enough for me to crawl into and hide my form. Once I’d situated myself, I froze, watching Hiccup as he looked around in confusion.

“Toothless?” He walked around warily, eyes wide and pupils becoming less circular and more like wide slits. I grinned widely, creeping up the rock when he walked past me. Then I leaped, flapped once, and folded my wings into my body, silently launching into him in seconds.

Toothless, one! Hiccup, zero!

The Viking shouted out in dismay when I leaned right over his head and smiled darkly, allowing him only a second to retaliate. I easily jumped off and away from him. “You’ll never catch me, fool! I’m superior!”

Hiccup took a battle stance, wings and tailfins held out wide, and shook his rear end playfully. “Thanks for the support. Really appreciate that!” With a heave, he pushed himself into the air, moving as fast as a dragon that just learned to fly could. “But prepare to lose anyways!” He dove for me, just barely missing when I ducked and rolled out of the way. To my great surprise, he managed to recover and swoop back into the air!

“I think you should be the one preparing!” I retaliated, shooting a tiny fireball at him and missing (on purpose, of course!).

We continued this for hours, one of us tagging the other and ending up being chased. Usually, Hiccup, the poor thing, would try to make a joke, but he really only ended up failing miserably at each and every single one of them. I felt it my duty as a Shadow-Blender to punish him for saying, “This is going to drag-on!” My method? Say nothing but terrible dragon puns until he finally gave in and apologized to get me to shut the hell up.

I lost count of the score, but I’m pretty sure I won. Actually, I’m very sure, despite what Hiccup would probably say.

It was only because of a fierce thunderstorm breaking above us that the game actually stopped. We both scrambled for the cover of the trees, but when the storm became irregular and violent, we were forced to take shelter in the cavern I’d created in the cliff wall nearly a week ago. It made me realize just how fast I had changed for Hiccup…and I was suddenly grateful to the gods for him shooting me into the cove.

We stayed inside the cavern the entire night, watching the storm swirl and boom and shake the earth. By the time we’d fallen asleep, though, it had calmed. Overnight and into the early morning, the clouds parted, giving room for the sun to rise once more.

KRA-KA-BOOOOOM!

A couple drunks in the corner of the room raised their glasses, cheered loudly, and downed an entire glass of mead each. I was amazed that they hadn’t fainted yet from their ridiculous drinking game. Then again, watching them take a giant gulp of alcohol with each thunderclap was hilarious.

RrrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRR!

“Aaaar!”

“How are they doing that?” Snotlout gasped in amazement from across the table.

“Like this!” Ruffnut reached over me and took the last of the two cups of mead she’d managed to sneak to our table. Before anyone could protest—we hadn’t gotten much of a chance to drink from any of the smuggled goods, after all!—she’d managed to swallow the entire thing and slam the container on the table with a proud smirk. “It’s a fine skill.”

Tuffnut snorted, leaning back and into Snotlout and throwing a goose bone at her. “A fine skill you learned just now!” He laughed when his twin’s face contorted into one of bewilderment. “Also, I’m pretty sure that won’t help with you being hurt and all,” he added more seriously with a frown “I think. I dunno, Dad drinks whenever he feels bad,” he added with a shrug.

I rolled my eyes. “It’s a flesh wound now. She was sick for, like, three hours. I doubt it’ll do anything…except make her act funny.” I added the last sentence warily, hands folded in my lap and an eyebrow raised, when Ruffnut burst out into a fit of giggles. She held a hand to her lips, shaking her head at me. Behind her, Fishlegs tried his best not to howl with laughter.

“I don’t think ‘funny’ would describe it well,” said Viking commented around a mouthful of half-chewed meat. “How about…hmm…maybe…tipsy?”

“We know she meant that,” Tuffnut informed the ‘outsider’ with annoyance.

Snotlout chuckled, having ignored the exchange. “I bet she’ll pass out by midnight.”

Tuffnut responded almost as soon as he’d finished talking, saying, “I bet she’ll pass out before we leave!”

“Naaah. I’ll be fine, guys!” Ruffnut crowed. She waved her arm at us, accidentally slapping me upside the head. I grunted in surprise and leaned away from the blond, irritation crossing my face for a moment. “I’m a woman who can hold her liquor!”

(Ruffnut ended up winning that bet, by the way.)

Her brother smirked. “I’m sure you are.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You’re just jealous.”

I snickered and grabbed onto Ruffnut when Tuffnut threw his hammer at her, causing her to scramble to catch it and nearly falling out of her seat and onto the ground. “Easy, now!” I scolded. “We don’t want you getting hurt again.”

“Nooo! Not again!” Ruffnut wailed, hand flying to cover her forehead dramatically.

“Hahahaha!” Snotlout grinned widely at me, forcing himself to laugh at my ‘joke’. I struggled not to grimace. “You always know what to do, don’t you?” He purred, leaning over the table and holding his chin on two fists.

Another blast of thunder reverberated through the building. The group in the corner shouted, Ruffnut straightened out and stole my plate of food, and I awkwardly avoided responding to Snotlout’s flirting and completely missed my chance to get my precious meat back. It didn’t help that Tuffnut and Fishlegs said nothing, watching on with amusement in their eyes.

To distract myself, I grabbed one of Ruffnut’s chunks of mystery meat that she stole from me and took a massive bite out of it (snorting when she shrieked in protest) and shrugged at another compliment given to me via Snotlout. He added a couple more, and each time, I pretended to have my mouth full (Well, actually, it was. Maybe.). I still hadn’t figured out how to fix the whole ‘I kissed you’ thing with him, and I really didn’t want to address it now.

Thank the gods that Snotlout has the shortest attention span in the world.

He got tired of receiving no response and twisted in his seat, towards Ruffnut’s brother. “By the way, good job with that Nadder today!” The burly teenager punched Tuffnut in the arm. “I mean, really, you were right there and didn’t hit it!”

I rolled my eyes at this. I was pretty sure that they’d already had this conversation. But, hey, whatever. As long as it kept Snotlout from trying to pull a move on me in public. Now that was terrifying! I’d rather be trapped in the Monstrous Nightmare’s cage with nothing but a measly dagger.

“At least I didn’t ‘get distracted by the sun’,” Tuffnut made his voice sound comically dull and stupid, making air quotes with his fingers, “and completely miss it!” He grinned and ducked under a punch, backpedaling away from Snotlout to avoid being thrown off of his seat.

Fishlegs immediately went to work with his peacemaker duties. “Hey, guys! C’mon!” He moved forward and reached across the table. As he did, Ruffnut, grabbed his arm and pulled it as far back as she could, yelling about how she wanted to see the fight. Fishlegs let out a rather girly cry and stumbled backwards, falling out of his seat and hitting his head on the table’s leg. It took a few seconds, but the bulky teenager managed to climb his way under the table and in between Snotlout and Tuffnut, who both looked at him in utter shock.

“There you go!” I praised, laughing as I talked.

Tuffnut leaned over Fishlegs, his face threatening to rip in half from his smile. He continued the argument as if nothing had happened, “What’s wrong, big guy? Can’t accept your mistakes?”

“Shut up!” Snotlout tried to punch Tuffnut, but was quickly intercepted by Fishlegs. “At least I’m good at keeping my head instead of freezing up like you did!” He sat back, crossing his arms across his chest and looking very prideful. Ruffnut and I let out a long string of “Oooooooh!’s.” We shared a glance, silently agreeing to see how far we could watch this until it got out of hand. Snotlout and Tuffnut’s fights were the most comical thing you could see on Berk.

“I think you both—“ Fishlegs attempted to calm them down, but was quickly interrupted by the male twin.

“Keep your head? Yeah, that’s what you did when you ran away from Hiccup yesterday!” Immediately after saying this, Fishlegs, Ruffnut, and I cringed. Tuffnut frowned, looking between the three of us in confusion. I checked to make sure Snotlout wasn’t looking, and when he wasn’t, sent the twin a fierce glare. It took him a few seconds, but his eyes widened and his mouth opened in a perfect ‘o’.

The second the words had left his best friend’s mouth, Snotlout’s smile and playfulness had seemed to vanish into thin air like a delicate smoke. He stared at his food directly in front of him, eyebrows slightly pulled down and a dangerous look on his face. His hands were firmly clenched together and he was sitting straight up in his chair. I’d never seen him so still in my life.

“Uh…uh…” Fishlegs stuttered, eyes darting back and forth. “Well, um…about that, guys…” He looked over at the unmoving Snotlout to his right and rapidly tapped his fingers together. “What are we gonna do, anyways? I mean…uh, I dunno…Like, are we going to do anything?”

I leaned forward and crossed my arms over the table. “What do you mean?”

We’d already established the fact that nobody would know about Hiccup and the Night Fury except for the five of us. It had taken awhile to convince Snotlout, but we’d ended up successful. A deal’s a deal; we may be Vikings, but we are honorable. And if Hiccup could somehow tame the Night Fury as he had down in the cove, then that meant that one of the biggest threats to the entire village was now gone. I was willing to sacrifice my pride—and the honor of telling the adult Vikings that I knew where both Night Furies were—if it would, overall, help everyone on Berk.

And he’d specifically gone out of his way to give my mother’s axe back to me. That meant a lot, and not only because I really missed it. He’d willingly given me my most valuable weapon, standing not even a full meter away. He obviously trusted me to hold up my end of the deal. Even when his stupid friend was yelling at him and nearly attacking me in the process—which he didn’t seem to even notice. This caused a mental eyeroll on my part.

I was still very suspicious, though; I still wasn’t sure if Hiccup was being genuine or not. He did seem very sorry. But he also made friends with the Night Fury. I really wasn’t sure of my opinion yet; I needed more time to think about it. I was leaning towards him truly trying to make amends, though.

Still, that one fact about Hiccup’s friendship with the Night Fury kept me from making a clear decision. It also served as another grounds to not tell anyone, though. Chief Stoick clearly loved Hiccup, going as far as to dedicate the next nest-hunt in his name and prepare the attack weeks beforehand—the longest delay we’d ever had, and cutting it very close to winter. If he learned that his son had gone and become best buddies with the very thing that ‘killed’ him, well…I doubt even our Chief could handle that. And then the entire tribe would be at war with itself, desperately searching for a new leader and trying to find a way to kill off both Night Furies.

The sealing factor was that Hiccup had proven that he was still himself, as Fishlegs had explained. If Hiccup somehow managed to stay that way, even after banishment, then I couldn’t find it in myself to want to kill him. If you thought of Hiccup as a human in a dragon body—which he was, for now—then you could easily see that his friendship could be a brilliant plan to keep him safe. And Hiccup was well-known for his intelligence, even though he always screwed things up.

So the chances of him trying to convince the Night Fury to reverse the spell was very high, obviously. I was going to give it more time, to see if he really could accomplish that.

I was still going to keep a close eye on him, though. If he lost himself enough or turned on the Vikings, then I wouldn’t feel any guilt in killing him.

Fishlegs frowned and continued tapping his fingers. “Well, he agreed not to steal, and he said that the only reason he stole in the first place was because he would have starved if he didn’t. Are we going to bring back food or something?”

I could easily feel the surprise on my face. I hadn’t thought of that.

Ruffnut shrugged, resting her chin in her palm. “I guess so. That gives us an excuse to go back and check on Hiccup, anyways, and see if he really can hold his word.” I nodded in agreement at this. Couldn’t have said it better myself!

“Maybe he can help us get better at dragon training!” Tuffnut piped up excitedly. And loudly. We all shushed him loudly, causing him to shrink back and pout. Luckily for us, the only other people in the building were the drunks in the corner.

“Somehow I doubt that,” I said sarcastically, remembering how the Night Fury had nearly attacked Fishlegs when all he’d done was touch Hiccup. It really was strange how attached that thing seemed to be towards the Chief’s son.

Fishlegs calmed down and suddenly perked up. He grinned and excitedly told us, “Maybe we can see if Hiccup can find where the nest is? I mean, that would make the nest-hunt so much easier!”

“But we’re not going. And how could we tell Chief Stoick without telling him we know about Hiccup?” I pointed out. The building began to vibrate around us from the intensity of the storm.

Fishlegs slumped over. “Oh. Right.”

Ruffnut pushed her emptied plate away from her and on top of Tuffnut’s (who scowled and pushed both of them back towards her.). “I wonder if there is anything we could do to help five of us? There must be something, right?”

I shrugged unhelpfully. “Like what? All I can think of is training, and I’d rather not get blasted by that Night Fury.”

“I’d love to document more about that species, though,” Fishlegs groaned. “If only the others knew! Then we could learn so much! I’m no professional, but I’m positive that we could figure out so many things from those two. We’ve never really seen how dragons normally act around others.” He waved his hands and made odd gestures while saying this. Everyone gave him a blank stare.

BOOOOOOM!

I flinched at the loud noise, looking up at the ceiling. It was starting to leak heavily. Outside, the storm began to pick up at a very fast pace, promising to keep at it until late morning.

Ruffnut patted me in the shoulder. “Uh, do you think that we should all be heading home before we get stuck in here?” She rolled her eyes and smirked. “I don’t want to spend the entire night with those idiots.” At this, she gestured with her head towards the drunks, who were currently having…not a food fight…not a verbal fight…not even a real fight…but a chair fight.

All of us made noises of universal agreement. We so did not want to get involved in that.

I stood up, wiping some crumbs and dirt off of my armored skirt, and addressed the rest of the gang. “I think, for now, that we should bring back food sometime. Like Ruffnut said, it’ll help us watch Hiccup without making it obvious that we are. But we’ll have to wait, since it’d look suspicious if another basket went missing. Other than that, I think that we’ve got it all figured out,” I concluded. “I mean, we made the deal and told Hiccup that we’re coming back. Everything should be fine if Hiccup keeps up his end, right?”

“Right!” Fishlegs confirmed. “And he will,” he added confidently. As he said this, he and everyone else began to stand up, piling their plates in the middle of the table and walking towards me.

Tuffnut laughed. “Wow, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m glad that we went down there and almost got killed!” He moved around me and besides his sister, a cautious look momentarily crossing his features.

‘Do you got her?’ I mouthed at him, to which he nodded. Ruffnut may think that she was fine, but she was technically supposed to be spending most of her time resting. Just because a little food and a lot of mead in her belly made her feel better, didn’t mean that she was fully healed. Thank Odin Tuffnut knew this.

The girl in question chuckled as well. “I’m saying! I’m not the hopeful type, but we may actually find a way to work things out.” She beamed at me, which I hesitantly returned. I wasn’t about to go all in, after all. I needed more proof.

We reached the door and pushed it open, carefully looking out into the storm. The rain was barreling down and lightning was flashing frequently. The wind nearly knocked me back and I had to readjust my stance to keep from toppling over.

“Well, it’s now or never,” Fishlegs decided. He turned to us, grinned, and waved. “See yah!” And then he took off into the black storm, quickly becoming invisible behind the rain.

“Bye!” We all called out.

Ruffnut nudged me. “We’re gonna go, too. See you tomorrow!”

“I’ll go with you,” I rushed. My house was very close to hers, and I was worried that Tuffnut couldn’t get my best friend home before she got sick. Behind her, he gave me a thankful look, confirming my doubts.

With a wave at Snotlout, the three of us ran out into the storm. The rain was cold and the wind irregular. At times, it would rush at you and take your breath away. I’m not quite sure how, but Ruffnut somehow managed to keep up a moderately good pace. Eventually, though, she became too exhausted, and Tuffnut was forced to carry her the rest of the way home.

I stopped by their house, greeted their parents, and chatted with them for a couple minutes. Then Smallelf shooed me off, saying how my parents must have been worried sick.

The sprint home was short and uneventful; my house was less than a quarter mile from the twins’. In minutes I was inside, saying hello to my parents and then bidding them goodnight. The house was silent and warm, the only sounds being my father’s snoring and the rain and thunder.

It wasn’t until I’d nearly fallen asleep did I realize that Snotlout hadn’t said a word since Hiccup had been mentioned.

Chapter Text

One week.

One week since we last saw the humans. Two weeks since Hiccup turned into a dragon.

Surprisingly, nothing out of the ordinary happened. Most of the time Hiccup and I just spent the day doing random activities. He likes to initiate elaborate games of hide-and-seek-tag out of sheer boredom. Sometimes, I can’t use my wings at all and neither can he. Others, it’s an instant ‘point’ loss if either of us climbs on anything. We even had a game that was restricted to the shallow lake, which, in my opinion, was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. Hiccup was too stubborn to get out of the water and we ended up huddling for hours because he got so cold his entire body went numb. Mostly because he thought he was clever for hiding underwater, but couldn’t seem to stop himself from waving his tail in excitement and thus disturbing the water. Also, he had a strange habit of blowing air out of his nose instead of just keeping it inside him to stay under longer. And for some reason I always had to count to one-hundred-thirty.

Damn, I was rambling. Picked that nasty habit up from Hiccup. Anyways. The most important aspect of this entire week: Hiccup and I did not get into a fight. It may not sound big, but to me—admittedly the most argumentative dragon in the northern hemisphere—it really is a big achievement. I didn’t blow anything out of proportion like I did when Hiccup first returned with the food. And he didn’t lose his temper like when he threw me down and told me off during our meeting with the humans. The strange thing, though, is that neither of us had to make an effort to do either of those. We agreed. And if we didn’t, we respected each others’ opinions. Even in the more serious conversations; magic had been brought up a lot, reminding me of the promise I’d made so long ago. We’d also talked several times about the humans. Hiccup still has faith in them.

However, he is beginning to worry. But certainly not as much as me.

The mornings were the worst, most nerve-wracking parts of the day. I could only catch a few hours of sleep—no big deal, I’ve dealt with worse—and was constantly on the lookout for any raids. It is the Viking way to attack an enemy when he is most defenseless. With that logic, every time I heard a twig snap, or a group of birds bolt out of a tree in a panic, or just felt a complete emptiness in the forest around me, I would awake with a start and promptly climb my lookout tree to seek out invaders. There never were, thank the gods, but it didn’t calm my nerves.

Hiccup still doesn’t know about my morning routine. I make sure to climb down my lookout tree before he wakes up, lying next to him in the same spot that I have been for the past couple days. It always baffles me how happy he is every time he wakes up and sees me. It’s almost like he’s grateful that I haven’t run off in the night and abandoned him. I know it’s selfish, but I’m always glad to see that look in his eyes, the way it makes me feel important. Needed.

After that, we’d go through the usual day. And then the nights would come and my paranoia would rise like a hungry fire, slowly consuming me, and the whole cycle would start over again. It was driving me insane.

But the worst, most humiliating part of this entire situation? We have no food. Because of the fish ‘basket’ that Hiccup brought back, I am in no immediate danger. Shadow-Blenders are small and have slow metabolisms, allowing us to live long off of a small amount of food. Hiccup, on the other hand…

His human portion of his body, the part that keeps his color and freckles present, affects him terribly. His senses are less than perfect and his size is laughable. What worries me, though, is that the human part of him seems to make his magic either more powerful than normal or regenerate very fast. But that’s something that I can worry about later.

The problem is that he gets malnourished and weaker faster than a regular dragon. Earlier this day, during the morning, Hiccup had chased an unlucky (and tiny) fish in the shallow end of the lake. When the fish escaped into the deep end—which Hiccup is still afraid of—and he’d clambered out, he could barely catch his breath.

If we didn’t get ourselves something to eat soon, then Hiccup would be unable to leave the cove and we’d starve. Upon this realization, coupled with the near-constant worrying about a Viking raid, I decided that I needed to find out once and for all if I really could leave the cove. The last time I’d tried, I was slightly injured from being attacked by Hiccup and too pissed off to think straight. So maybe I could now.

Standing up from my comfortable spot on a stone and shaking my body, I sniffed the air, taking in the scents around me. It was midday and the sun was shining down in an unusually warm fashion. So, like any sane dragon, we’d taken a break from tag and put the summer weather to good use to sunbathe. Oh, it felt glorious! Shaking it off to do actual work was almost painful.

Hiccup stirred besides me and groaned. I butted him with my head. This would be the first time he’d woken up since that inspiring fish chase and I wasn’t going to try to leave without him knowing.

“Hiccup, I’m going to see if I can get out of here.”

“Again?” The hybrid mumbled, so quiet I had to strain my ears to hear him. “Mm’kay. Good luck.” His breathing evened out and his muscles relaxed, signaling that he’d fallen back asleep. I frowned worriedly. A couple days ago, he would have leaped to his feet to help or at least asked me why. The uncharacteristic lack of interest from him was unnerving.

I waited several seconds for him to do anything else. When I got nothing, I murmured a quick “Thanks”, sniffed, and hurried over to my lookout tree. My determination rose when I got to it, filling me with more hope than ever. It took me seconds to climb to the top and I faced the cliffwall parallel to the one I was closest to (the lowest one), opening my wings and tailfins in preparation. My eyes narrowed and I took in a long, deep breath.

You can do this, I encouraged myself, you’re stronger now. You and Hiccup both need it. I bunched up my muscles, double-checked my position and the direction of the wind, and launched.

I immediately went into the gliding position, flapping my wings to keep me level. Advancing over the lake was easy. The edge of the cliff became closer than I’d ever seen it before. I was going to make it! I was going to make it—

“Aaah!” Not again! The air under my left side suddenly grew unstable from the wind generated by my wings. I tipped to the side and desperately tried to maintain level, but it was no use! I was starting to flip over! All I could do was roar in disdain and turn so my shoulder hit the wall directly in the middle, sending rocks and mud tumbling to the ground!

“Oof!” I landed on a small jut of rock. It crumbled under my weight. “Damn it!” I knocked into a boulder and scrambled to grab onto it with my claws, but the rain from the previous night had made it slimy and wet. I slid off. “GREAT DRAGON OF THE SUN—!” The ground gave me a merciless hello, knocking the wind right out of me.

Well, that was successful.

I heaved a breath and lifted my tail and right wing off my chest, rolling to the right and examining my left wing. It ached terribly, but besides being sore, it was fine. I sighed in relief. A broken wing would surely kill me. Just to make sure, I flapped it a couple times.

After a few seconds, I slumped in defeat. I should have known better to try and escape the day after another thunderstorm; the walls of the grove may have stone in them, but a great portion of them were also mud, several slimy vines, and enormous tree roots! Of course I wouldn’t be able to climb my way up; it was too wet! There wasn’t anything to grab hold of! And to add insult to injury, the same exact failure had happened about a week and a half ago when I’d first tried to escape! I shouldn’t have forgotten.

Cursing my stupidity, I began to stomp my way over to where Hiccup was. He was sitting up straight, worry clear in his body language even from my distance from him. I didn’t care. I was mortified and covered. In. Mud. No amount of optimism and joking would make this moment okay. Ever. I made a mental note to try to find a dragon to rip the memory out—permanently—and then destroy its vessel into little tiny pieces. And then burn it. And then crush the ashes.

Now, where would I find a dragon to do that? They’re quite hard to find—oh! Wow, I got here fast.

Sitting down with a huff next to Hiccup, I got to work cleaning myself. The mud tasted disgusting and even had a few bugs in it. To make matters worse, Hiccup decided to watch me, obviously wanting to say something but too afraid to speak up. I pointedly ignored him.

A moment of consideration passed and I stood up, flustered, and walked over to a patch of long, thick grass. Then I proceeded to roll around in it.

Hiccup burst out into laughter. Embarrassment coursed through my body. I twisted and turned as quickly as I could, stood up, and rapidly shook my body, flinging bits of leaves, soil, and rocks everywhere. When I looked down, I was satisfied to see that the majority of the mud had come right off! Though there were a few spots that I would have to fix myself…eugh...

With as much dignity as I could, I stepped away from the flattened, dirty grass and got rid of the remaining filth on my body. My great friend was nearly howling with laughter. Yes, I would definitely have this memory removed. Permanently.

“You’re just jealous because I could get it off so fast,” I muttered.

Hiccup, having heard this, fell to the ground and onto his back, barely able to form words. “What are you, a dog? I have never seen that before! Hahahaha!”

I rolled my eyes and sat down, splaying my wings out. “No, I’m a Shadow-Blender! And at least I’m putting in an effort to stay clean, unlike a certain someone.” Hiccup stopped laughing abruptly and I smirked. “You flew yourself right into that one.”

The brown Shadow-Blender gave me a mocking glare. The look fell, however, and he frowned. Turning around and lying on his stomach, Hiccup asked, “Uh, and what exactly were you doing? Not that I didn’t enjoy waking up to you screaming colorful profanities.”

I suppressed an embarrassed smile. “I was trying to get out! I thought maybe I could hunt down some deer, or maybe a few mountain lions,” I mused. “I’d rather have fish, but keeping us fed is more important.” I sighed, hunching over slightly. “But I can’t get out. Not now.”

Hiccup nodded. “It did rain,” he murmured, looking at something behind me. More loudly, he added, “But you don’t need to worry about that stuff, Toothless. Astrid said she would come back, which probably means she’ll bring food. And if she doesn’t think of that, then Fishlegs will.” He smiled at me. I was unconvinced.

“It’s been a week, Hiccup,” I pointed out. “I think that by now, we’d have heard from them.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. I mean, they’d have to get the food from somewhere. And a basket of the stuff can’t just disappear in quick succession from the last one. They’re probably waiting for everything in Berk to cool down.” Then his innocent, hopeful smile returned. One I was quickly associating with the humans and Hiccup’s blind trust in them. It was infuriating.

“But how do you know—“

“Toothless!” Hiccup held up a paw at me, voice commanding but gentle. I hadn’t even realized that someone could speak in that way. ”Calm down. We’ll be fine.” He grinned up at me, eyes shining. “They promised.”

I sighed, shaking my head. It was impossible to talk sense into this dragon.

Hiccup continued as an afterthought, mostly talking to himself, “Besides, they’re probably busy with dragon training.”

My ears pricked. Dragon training?

I narrowed my eyes at him. “What’s that?” Part of me didn’t want to know. And Hiccup knew. He cringed slightly, dragging his eyes down to his feet and scratching into the dirt for a moment. I repeated the question impatiently, a stone sinking in my gut.

He chuckled sheepishly. “Well…um…I’m not sure about your people, but, uh, Vikings sometimes take…prisoners.” I sucked in a breath and he grimaced, tucking in his head and avoiding all eye contact. “And those dragons are caged in an arena, except when they’re let out, when they’re being used to…teach future warriors…uh, fighters…how to fight dragons.” The last part was nearly whispered.

It took me a very long time to comprehend that. It made no sense to me—what, did they just walk over and point out weak spots? Plus, no dragon would ever betray its brethren willingly—

I stood up, face wrinkled with rage. “So, you mean,” I hissed, “that innocent dragons are being used as training accessories?!” When Hiccup said nothing, risking a single, guilty glance up at me, I lost the tiny grip of restraint I had left. “So, what?! They’re just barely kept alive?! They’re trapped? And when they’re let out, they obviously want to defend themselves, and they’re just treated like playthings?!” I roared, pacing and slamming the ground with my paw.

I whipped around to face Hiccup, body tensed and tail whipping back and forth. “How long are they kept there? How are these coward warriors taught? Are they fed? Are their injuries tended to?!” Sudden realization dawned on me, and I froze, eyes widening. “Please tell me these trainees know what they’re doing before they let them in the arena. They don’t just randomly stab a dragon, right?”

Hiccup sighed, sitting up. “The guy who runs dragon training, Gobber, has been my mentor since I was little...well, littler. He never explains anything…so…no. His favorite phrase is ‘learn on the job!’” I gaped at him. “As for everything else…the dragons are kept there until they die. And I’m not sure how much food they’re given, but Gobber does mention that he has to get a medic for them, but that’s only when they’re physically unable to fight. But…” he sighed. “I…it’s just…I don’t really hear much of those dragons after they get sick.”

His green eyes rose to meet mine. He looked desperate. “Toothless…I’m sorry. But just to let you know, I was never a part of that…my Dad wouldn’t let me.”

I slowly shook my head. “Unbelievable.” The anger in my chest boiled, reaching its limits. A small part of me whispered to calm down and I ignored it. “UNBELIEVABLE!” I spun around and shot a blast of fire at an unfortunate boulder, letting loose a long string of curses. Hiccup recoiled, ears standing straight from my choice of words. His mouth moved up and down for several seconds before he finally found his voice.

“Toothless, please—“

I jerked my head towards him. “So these dragons—who can’t even help what they’re doing—are being held in cages and only let out when your Vikings want to let them out? To PLAY with them?! And they aren’t even given time to recuperate?! And none of your tribe-mates ever thought that, oh, it was wrong?! What is the matter with them?!” I spat.

Hiccup frowned. He weakly defended his former comrades, “They don’t know about the spell. All they see is the dragons raiding out of nowhere.”

“But we don’t take prisoners!” I cried. “We never bring in humans! Why should they think that they can take in our kind! What is your King thinking?” I stared at Hiccup for a long, tense, moment, and blurted, “What if they took you or me in?!”

The bond between us formed once more. My words had hit Hiccup like a tidal wave, despair bouldering over him for a brief second before he began to imagine the consequences.

I quickly turned away, too afraid to find what his imagination could come up with, and snarled, “I can’t even begin to try and understand that devil’s work.” I swiveled my head around to look back at Hiccup, causing him to stop in his approach towards me. “And another thing! You just want to sit around and do nothing while they’re being taught to kill us?! Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?! I would have started teaching you already!”

“T-teaching?” The Shadow-Blender stammered, rearing his head back.

“Yes!” I began to pace. “You have no idea how to defend yourself. And neither do those humans, but they’re being trained to kill us now!” I snarled wordlessly at the thought, sympathy for the poor dragons in this ‘arena’ welling up inside me. It was downright wrong. And it meant that Hiccup and I—especially Hiccup—were in even more danger. “If there were an attack, you’d be completely helpless. All your fighting techniques I’ve ever seen you do have been reckless and dangerous!” I turned to him, ears slightly pinned back, and puffed my chest up determinedly. “Let’s start.”

Hiccup shook his head, ears straight up and leaning back slightly. “What? No!”

I gritted my teeth. Now was not the time to be stubborn! We had a lot of catching up to do to make sure Hiccup at least matched the teenagers in skill. “Yes! We’re starting now!”

With a loud thump!, the hybrid was lying on the ground. He draped his wings over his body and the grass around him and rested his nose on his tailtip, using his tailfins to block his face from my view. “No! You can’t make me! I won’t do it!” His voice wasn’t whiney or annoyed like I’d expected, taking in his immaturity at this point. Oh, no. He sounded hurt and genuinely angry.

I paused for a split second. It’s for his own good, I reasoned. Even if he doesn’t like it, he needs to be able save himself.

Hiccup didn’t budge when I advanced. I stood directly over him and narrowed my eyes, trying my best to look intimidating. “Hiccup,” I started, “I’m going to make you if you don’t agree. You need to learn how to protect yourself.” While I was trying to keep from insulting him, I couldn’t honestly bring myself to care; I was more concerned with his inability to think about his own health. It was like he believed he couldn’t possibly get hurt!

When silence was my only answer, I got angry. “Hiccup, I’m warning you,” I growled. I wasn’t afraid to rough him up a bit; half-sheathed claws and teeth never hurt anybody. All I had to do was make him go on the defensive and then point out what to do and what not to while I ‘attacked’ him. Then I’d repeat the same moves until he figured out how to react to certain assaults.

What I couldn’t understand was why he was so reluctant!

Hiccup raised his head and gave me a good, long glare. “I’m not going to attack my own tribe! Those are my friends and family!” He pinned his ears and side-frills against his head, tailtip twitching.

Oh. This was his problem. And it was probably one of the most ridiculous things I’d ever heard. “Even if they attack first?” I asked sarcastically.

“Even then.” The dragon held his angry look while mine changed to one of horror.

“Hiccup!” I exploded, leaping back. “So you’d just stand still and let them kill you? Imprison you? That makes no sense! And,” I’d been pacing and stopped abruptly in front of him, “They’re not your tribe-mates anymore! They banished you! They’re rotten!”

Hiccup jumped to his feet. “They still are!” He cried, crouching low to the ground. “Astrid and the others proved it when they didn’t attack either of us!”

Shaking my head, I said, “They’re humans! Dragons never trust humans! It’s a fatal mistake, as is choosing to not learn how to defend yourself!” I added with a hiss. Even if he still was ‘one of them’, he needed to learn to save himself from other dragons! He had tunnel vision and refused to look in the right direction.

“I’m human!” Hiccup shot back just as fiercely.

“Were human,” I corrected. That was probably one of the more ridiculous things I’d heard him say. Yet he still looked just as upset as before, failing to see my reasoning. I sighed, suddenly realizing I may have gone too far. Again. Damn. “Why can’t you see that all I want is for you to be able to protect—“

Hiccup wasn’t done yet, though. He angrily shouted, “If I were human right now, would you trust me?!”

Immediately, I exclaimed, “Of course! Are you crazy?” Hiccup was different. He wasn’t like the others. He was kind and caring and understanding. While all humans and some dragons were blocked by mental barriers, he just waltzed right through them. He was a very special person. I would go as far as to say that I’d let him ride on my back if he’d magically returned to his previous form.

We both dropped into silence. The bond burst to life.

Hiccup was scared. He was terrified of rejection after having so much taken away from him, even before I changed him into a dragon. He didn’t want to think about attacking humans because he still wanted their acceptance. Especially his damn father’s, who, from what I could get, was the biggest idiot to grace the planet with his existence. But something worse lurked beneath the terror; he was afraid of something else. He felt like he, personally, had been challenged, but had been unable to understand himself. He didn’t truly know if they were his people anymore. This line of thought was suddenly cut off and blocked from me. It was like a mental slap, leaving me dazed.

It finally dawned on me that the question he’d asked—would you trust me?—had meant everything to him. He had wanted my acceptance as well. If I’d said ‘no’, our relationship would have shattered.

When I blinked out of my temporary mental paralyzation, Hiccup’s emotions had drifted between relief and happiness from my answer. The waves coming off of him switched to confusion when he sensed my earlier panic—ah, shit! Quick! Think of something else!

Forcing over a wave of apology towards him, I let my inner monologue from before sit at the front of my mind—yes, even the stupid ‘ride my back’ part—and couldn’t help but smile sheepishly when his jaw dropped. Most likely about the latter.

The climate of the situation eventually became awkward, with neither of us saying anything. I dropped the connection between us by looking at some colorful birds. Hiccup sat up and leaned back on his haunches, looking very pleased—probably that he’d gotten me to ‘understand’.

“All I want,” I said softly, assuming the same position, “is for you to know how to take care of yourself, and not just from humans. A rogue dragon may wander in tomorrow and decide to declare this area as his or her territory. And what if a strong predator comes in here? Don’t laugh, those disgusting fluffballs carry a lot of diseases.”

“It’s nice to know that you’re afraid of a little doggy or kitty,” Hiccup remarked with a chuckle. He tipped his head to the side and asked in a much more serious tone, “But…I’m not really comfortable with this. Fighting, I mean.”

Standing up and shaking my head, I reminded him, “I never said ‘fight’. Today, I’ll just teach you how to defend yourself. You’re too…too gentle to actually hurt something.” I rolled my eyes along with this. The smaller dragon scoffed dramatically and pretended to be offended.

“Alright,” I said, “let’s start.”

I promptly crouched, spread my wings out, and tackled Hiccup to the ground. He shrieked at the sudden assault. I couldn’t help but laugh at the priceless look on his face. “Lesson one,” I stated, making sure I made a point of trapping all four of his legs to the ground before stepping away, “never let yourself get pinned. That’s what happens right before the bottom of your throat gets ripped out.”

Grimacing, my trainee rolled onto his stomach and, as he considered this, brought up an arm to rub his cheek. “Thank yooou for that wonderful mental picture. I’ll cherish it for the rest of my life.”

I chortled. “I’m just saying what would happen. So, what do you think you should do if you’re about to be pinned?” I settled casually into a battle stance, taking notice of the way Hiccup’s right ear twitched in annoyance.

He hummed thoughtfully, his expression becoming vacant as he went into deep thought. He was deliberately silent for nearly a full minute, in which I shifted back and forth impatiently. “Well…when we fought that one time, I smacked you with my wings and you stopped…”

“That was from surprise,” I said. “Don’t expect it to work again. Also, that leaves you even more vulnerable. I’ll get back to that later.” Hiccup closed his mouth, the question he’d been about to ask fading away.

His face scrunched up in concentration, and the freckled Shadow-Blender pawed at the dirt absentmindedly. “Um…roll away?”

I nodded. “That could work, but only if you’re fast enough. Here.” I stalked towards him and wiggled my rump. “Pin me. I’ll show you.” When he showed hesitation, I encouraged, “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine! Just do what I just did.”

There was a beat, and then Hiccup stooped down with a resigned sigh. I smirked when he took in my (proper) position and adjusted to mimic it. Well, there goes one problem, I thought. And here comes another! I braced myself when the former Viking all-out sprinted, lowered himself below me, and jumped right onto me. He grabbed my shoulders in his claws and forced all of his body weight into them, knocking me up and back. As we moved midair, he spread his wings to their full extent and very low to the ground—and now we’ve got another lesson to cover. Sigh.—and moved his paws to my wrists.

We hit the ground hard. Hiccup had succeeded in disabling my front legs, which was far better than I expected. I smirked at his triumphant expression and proceeded to crush it.

While we were still skidding across the ground, I curled up, raising my abdomen into the air with my powerful back muscles in a backwards roll. I pressed my hind legs into Hiccup’s stomach as we tumbled and shoved as hard as I could, using the force of his own blow against him. Because I kept our movement going instead of letting us drag on the ground, he was thrown several meters behind me. I completed my fancy acrobatics, pushing off the earth with my shoulders and curling my front legs in. When I rolled to the point where I wasn’t upside-down, I flapped my wings to counteract my momentum and leaped to my feet.

I turned around, determined to be modest. Quite a shame that I failed so splendidly when I saw Hiccup lying on his back, groaning and moaning. Oh well, serves him right for laughing at me when I was covered in mud!

“That hurt, thanks for the concern,” he grumbled when I’d made my way over to him. “I didn’t know you were going to do that!”

I raised a brow. “What did you expect?”

He pushed himself to his feet with a grunt and shrugged. “I don’t know. Not that.” Hiccup frowned, looking lost in thought, and said, “So if I ever get thrown to the ground, use my hind legs to push them away when we land?”

I nodded. “Unless they’re also blocked. Then you twist midair and use your shoulder to free your front paws. Maybe add a little bit of fire, which we won’t be doing today.”

“How much exactly are you planning on teaching me?” Hiccup asked with wide eyes. He was completely relaxed, leaning back on his haunches with his tail wrapped neatly around his paws. I could still see past his exterior and knew that he felt a little intimidated.

I didn’t respond. Instead, I pretended to turn and walk away, only to suddenly spin around and slam my entire body into his chest. I grabbed for his hind legs with my own, pushing them together before he could kick me—which was his first reaction, thank the Dragon of the Sun—and simultaneously forced his front legs back. Holding my breath and position, I waited.

Hiccup’s wings snapped open and he struggled to get away from me. He managed to lower his left elbow enough to force my arm down, causing me to lean to the right and arch my back. When I purposely faltered, he gave me a swift uppercut to my neck with the blunt end of his wing and jabbed my upper arm with his bony shoulder. I let go and leaped away, landing neatly on the ground while my student toppled into a tree-colored heap.

All of this happened in seconds. A wingbeat.

“Good job!” I praised. “You remembered. Now do it again.”

“Auugh.”

“And make sure to keep your wings away from me at all times. Did you see the way I had mine opened, yet far away from your reach?” I asked.

The reluctant trainee nodded. “You said you were going to come back to that. Something about them being vulnerable?”

I nodded and said, “Well, yes. As you can see,” I brought my tail around and waved it at him, “our wing and tailfin membranes aren’t as strong as our scales. They’re the most important part of your body, and your weakest points. The Dragon of the Sun and the Dragoness of the Moon made us that way so we wouldn’t forget that they are our gifts. Anyways, a tear in your wing is not only agonizing—and they bleed like head wounds—but fatal in some cases, since the dragon can’t fly away. If they do, then the membrane just rips apart until there’s nothing left.” Smiling sadly, I continued, “And you already know what a disrupted tail does.”

A chilly wind whipped about, rustling the trees and making the spotted shadows we were standing in ruffle. Hiccup shuddered from nose to tailtip, squeezing his eyes shut and pulling his wings in for warmth. I grimaced as I took in his skinny frame. He’d lost a lot of weight in this past week.

The moment passed and my friend acted like nothing had happened. “Okay, that makes sense. I probably should have thought of that earlier.”

“Of course you should have.” I grinned and whacked Hiccup in the cheek with my tail. “Stupidhead.”

He yelped and shook his head madly to get rid of the stinging. “J-jerkface!” Hiccup whined and held his face with his paw, giving me a wide-eyed, ‘why would you do that?’ look that greatly resembled a kicked dragon hatchling. I almost broke under the pressure of the sheer cute.

Key word: almost. I am a very strong-willed dragon, after all. Ha-ha-ha!

Darting as fast as I could, I jumped to my feet and spun around Hiccup several times, using the tree as a jumping pedal to confuse him. When he was looking in the complete opposite direction, I grabbed his scruff, hauled him to his feet, and then threw him into the ground. Smiling rather sadistically, I pressed a paw onto the hybrid’s chest, strong enough to hold him down and keep him still.

Hiccup could only bring himself to gasp repeatedly, flabbergasted. I resisted the urge to laugh my spines off.

“Lesson numbers three and four!” I announced. “Always keep your eye on the enemy. And now it’s time to learn some defensive blocks.” Releasing him from my hold, I backed up until both of us were completely ready before squaring my feet and half-opening my wings besides me. Hiccup complained dramatically.

“Now, even though I told you that your wings are the most vulnerable part of your body,” I began, nodding in approval when Hiccup took on the same stance as I was, “they can be used to glance off blows. For example, a Two-Leg might try to swing their tail at you, which is considered very dangerous because of their poison spikes. But if you were to block it with your wing and keep moving it, then it’ll rebound on them. Like this.”

I faced an invisible enemy, pretending to dodge an attack by jumping to the side. Still keeping my right wing half-opened, I pushed it down so the elbow was parallel with the grass. Immediately afterwards I swung it up, opening it as I did, and skipped backwards. Hiccup watched with great interest, leaning forward and ears perked.

I relaxed back into my ‘ready’ stance. “Do you understand how that would work?” At Hiccup’s nod, I continued, “Your wings can also withstand fireblasts and some direct attacks. If a dragon or human is trying to claw at you, only protect yourself with your wings if you can do nothing else. There’s always the risk of them being powerful enough to break through.”

“So,” Hiccup piped up, “if I keep the attack moving, it’ll deal less damage because it’ll just skid past me? Like how you kept rolling during that tackle to avoid getting crushed?”

Beaming like the sun, I said, “Yes, exactly! The key is motion.” As I said this, I swayed back and forth, grinning widely. Hiccup valiantly suppressed laughing. “But be careful. If you stop or let them apply more pressure mid-block, it can still hurt you very badly.”

The hybrid made an acknowledging gesture with his paw. “So, can I do the same thing with my legs or tail?”

“Yes. But there’s better ways to do it. I was just about to get to that,” I explained. After an awkward silence, I continued, “Okay, guess I’ll explain it now...”

“You see, with your wings, you have to be careful. But dragon scales are very thick and can withstand blows that a human cannot. Don’t forget that and shy away from an attack thinking it’ll dig deep,” I told him seriously. His ears fell back and his side-frills twitched in embarrassment. “What I usually do is knock whatever’s coming towards me out of the way. Shadow-Blenders are some of the more flexible dragons. As you know, you can reach up to your head and very far out, while other dragons are limited by less flexible legs. Use it to your advantage. If you see a bite coming towards you, rear up and do this.”

I pushed myself onto my hind legs at a vertical angle, using my tail and wings to balance, and ‘grabbed’ a Flame-Body’s cheek with both paws and swung it to the side. Then I leaped on its ‘neck’ and bit down on it.

“You can also do this.”

This time, the Flame-Body was coming from below, aiming for my underbelly. I jumped back and slammed my paws down on its head, pretending to crush it.

Hiccup spoke up again, “What if it comes from your direct left or right?” He tipped his head to the side. “Just smack it away?”

I shook my head frantically at this. “No! You’ll end up hitting the side of their mouth and lose a paw.” My heart skipped a beat at the thought. “You’d either jump away and let them go past you so you can get their neck, or use your forearm and smack their chin up.” I did a swift demonstration of both and finished, “I suggest the former. There’s still a chance of getting bit with the last option, and to be fair, it’s a little advanced for you. Better safe than sorry, right?”

Instead of answering, the newbie did a swift array of the five blocks he’d just learned, looking very much like he was having a seizure. I sat back and grinned as he danced around me, beginning to practice side dodges and back skips. He wasn’t perfect; he’d knock himself off-balance, trip over a stone or log, fall over his own feet, or just stumble over nothing. But he seemed much more interested in simple defense moves than offensive tactics, which was very encouraging!

We did this for quite a while. I would add in advice, like “always cover your neck” or “square your feet” when I saw fit. The one thing I focused on the most was the avoidance; when and where to leap away. There was no use in jumping out of harm’s way, only to fall flat on your face. I even charged at Hiccup a few times, spinning around him and snapping, making the two of us perform a strange, circular duo that had us treading in one spot for awhile.

After running away from imaginary bites, I moved to ‘attacking’ Hiccup by clawing, swinging, slicing, and anything else that I could imagine. Hiccup depended heavily on the ‘glancing blow’ tactic I used my wings for, using mostly his forearm to bat away the attack and send it upwards.

When we got to avoiding human weapons, the change in my friend was immediate; he stopped and glared at me. I continued on with the lesson until he cooperated, showing him how to push away a human’s sword by batting their elbow, stop an axe swing with a push to the chest, how to tell where a thrown weapon will go and how fast it will move, and many more.

When I finally felt comfortable with Hiccup’s blocking and evading skills a couple hours later, I decided to move on.

Hiccup halted when I said this. “Why?” He tone was quizzical. “I totally got the hang of it!” He panted heavily, wings drooping to the ground and legs shaking slightly. I worried for a second and then brushed it off as the aftereffects of his workout. He couldn’t have been drained that fast…right?

“Exactly.” I rolled my eyes, showing no signs of my discomfort. “We haven’t even gotten to your tail yet,” I said in amusement when all he did was stare at me like I’d sprouted fur.

Regarding me with an apprehensive look, Hiccup flatly said, “All you do is swat away blows, like with the wings, right? Only harder.”

I stopped. Aw, damn. He made it sound so much simpler than it was in my head. At my silence, he sniffed loudly and smirked, making me cringe inwards and flick my tail back and forth in embarrassment.

Well, that was the end of Lesson Four then. We’d done getting yourself out of being pinned, what not to do (wings edition), never get distracted (which wasn’t really considered a lesson and more of a tip), and how to block with your legs and tail. Hiccup had already figured out the dodging bit and greatly enjoyed performing them—at one point, he seemed to get distracted and started bolting back and forth, singing in a high-pitched voice, “I’m a pretty pony! I’m a pretty pony!”. Afterwards he told me that I looked a little too serious and he wanted to make me laugh. The former Viking especially liked twirling around trees and boulders with ease and bouncing off of them.

Lesson Five would be all about fighting aggressively. Lesson Six would cover stealth and staying light on your feet. Lesson Seven would mash it all together and test Hiccup’s abilities, adding on anything else I’d forgotten to tell him. Overall, we had a lot of work to do. Which meant lots of complaining! Huzzah!

I dove into Lesson Five headfirst. I knew it would be the hardest lesson of all of them—Hiccup hated confrontation—and would take the longest. So, instead of rushing him like I would any other hatchling, I started off with an explanation of how one should attack.

“…biting and clawing works very well, especially with fully extended teeth. Oftentimes, I’ll fold my wings and smack enemies with the wrist and outer edge of it. It’s a very uncommon move for a dragon to make and will definitely catch someone off-guard.” I constantly reminded myself to not use the word ‘human’. It was very hard; my speech had lasted a long time, since I’d just started off explaining complex battle moves that flew right over my student’s head. Eventually I decided to stick with basic attacks that I knew Hiccup would understand and remember. “If there’s something behind you, you’d better kick at it—like I said awhile ago, the hind legs are the strongest part of your body. Oh, and your tail can strike like a whip if you try hard enough. And don’t forget the common headbutt.” I paused, wondering if I’d missed anything. To be honest, I’d forgotten what exactly I’d said and what I hadn’t. What was I trying to get across, again…?

“Wow. That took forever.” Hiccup made a show of checking the sun’s position in the sky—afternoon. I stuck my tongue out at him. “So, you’re just explaining it, then? I don’t actually have to do it?” The lazy Shadow-Blender brightened up considerably, hope evident in his straightened ears, widened eyes, and upright back.

I smirked. “Mmmmm-nope. Now we start. And don’t expect me to treat you like some fragile egg!” Though I probably would anyways. Hiccup was very, ahem, delicate. Or he acted like it, at least.

The overdramatic lump dropped to the ground. “Why?” He wailed, curling up into a ball and covering his eyes and nose with his paws. “You just explained it all perfectly well! I don’t need a demonstration!”

I sighed. This lesson was going to take forever.

“Ow! Ow! Ow! I give, I give!”

“You are such a wimp.”

Hiccup squirmed out from under my front paws and glared at me. “Well, excuse me for not wanting my ribs cracked! That actually hurt, Toothless!”

I raised a brow. “Yeah, for a second. You seem fine now.” A huge smile spread across my face when the Shadow-Blender spluttered, attempting to come up with something clever. He didn’t seem to be able to do it, the poor thing.

Hiccup sat down, gasping for air. “Anyways,” he sucked in a deep breath to try to stop panting, “I think that we should rest for the day and continue tomorrow.”

I blinked and checked the sun’s position. It was dusk, painting everything in hues of rosy-red and purple, with only a little bit of yellow highlighting the tallest trees and cliffs. The entire cove was blanketed in blue shadows, and one could even see a few stars regaining visibility directly above.

Just as I had suspected, Hiccup hadn’t been all that great at fighting. I can’t believe I’m admitting it, since he was a Viking and is now a dragon, but he’s a pacifist! He was too uncomfortable with the simple concept of attacking something. It had taken nearly a half hour to convince him to even strike me, and when he did, it was as if he were playing with a baby bunny. While amusing at first, it left me more concerned.

 I’d spent several hours on different strikes and how-to’s, forcing him to repeat them on me, but it wasn’t real. After awhile, I’d just given up and moved to Lesson Six. To my surprise, Hiccup had been very good at sneaking around despite his clumsiness. So he had some hope.

Once Lesson Seven rolled around, though…

I took in my cove-mate’s exhausted posture. His eyes were dull and gray and he could barely stand. The way he heaved for each breath brought my attention to his chest, and, to my horror, I could see a faint outline of his ribs. Any doubts that I was imagining Hiccup’s malnutrition vanished. It was real. And here I was sapping away his strength with drills that he didn’t want to learn in the first place.

“You’re right,” I said, looking away guiltily. I forced myself to put on a cheerful expression and walked over to him. “Let’s go.”

Hiccup gave me a concerned look as I passed him, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he stumbled over to my side and tried to match my pace. He was concentrating more on the ground in front of him than anything else. I grimaced.

When we got to the tree that we usually slept under, I remained standing while my friend carefully lit a patch of coals on fire. He tipped his head to the side at me, half-lidded eyes reflecting the sky above him. “Is something wrong?”

“Hiccup.” I sighed and sat down. “I think you should get another fish basket tomorrow.”

His jaw dropped, outrage crossing his eyes for a split second before being replaced by disbelief. “What?! Why? I promised Astrid—“

I interrupted him in sudden anger, “Look at yourself, Hiccup.” He did just that, very confused. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying my best to quell the rage that had come out of nowhere. When I finally opened them, the oblivious fool was still giving me an expression that screamed ‘huh?’

“You barely had any energy today. And what little you had, it left you very quickly. At one point during Lesson Six, you looked like you couldn’t move!” I widened my eyes at this to make a point and spread my wings out. “It’s because you’re hungry! But with each day, you get tired faster and faster, and I can’t get out on my own.” Gritting my teeth in frustration, I pleaded, “Please, Hiccup. You’re starving yourself, and your human friends seem to have forgotten about you.” Realizing that this may sound harsh, I added, “or are overestimating you.”

The tree trunk-colored dragon fiddled with a piece of coal, suddenly looking a lot older and weaker than he really was. “I’m not stealing,” he deadpanned. “Not a basket of food or some chunk of meat, at least…” His eyes wandered around our home and settled on the lake.

Hiccup leaped to his feet, causing me to start and making my heart pound in my ears.

“That’s it!” He cried, grinning from ear to ear and tail swishing. “I know what to do!”

I blinked several times, relaxing from my surprised stance that I’d automatically assumed. “What?” I scrutinized him. Hiccup was dead-tired merely seconds ago; I couldn’t help but be wary.

He turned to me and exclaimed, “I’ll just borrow a fishing net!”

I raised a brow. A fishing net? What was that? And did he really expect some Viking to say, “Oh, you need this? Give it back to me by sundown.”?

Hiccup blabbered on, oblivious to my confusion, “See, if I take a fishing net, then you and I can use it together and get a bunch of fish out of the lake. That’ll hold us over until Astrid and the others come back. We could hold it in a corner of the lake and use fire to scare the fish into it, and then we’d just pull it up to get them all! And once we got them all out I’d just take it back before anyone noticed! It wouldn’t take too long! This is perfect! Yes!”

“…Huh?” So this ‘net’ was put in…corners? What? The lake is round!

The inspired Shadow-Blender finally acknowledged me. I expected an explanation, but he only deepened my confusion by butting his forehead with mine. He stood there grinning for a second, and then thudded back onto his coal bed, exhaustion overcoming his...erm…happiness-high? “I know how to get us food without causing a huge upset with the Vikings. If you hadn’t started this conversation, I would’ve never thought of it!” He purred. I stared with a blank face, not quite understanding what just happened. With a roll of his eyes, Hiccup explained, “A net is a bunch of ropes woven together that you put in the water and trap fish with. I’ll show you how to use it when I get it tomorrow.”

Well, if it gets us food…“Um…okay. Whatever you say…” I shook my head and stepped over the small dragon, letting my left wing spread on his back and resting my chin on my front paws. He scooted over to allow me room on the coal bed and we struggled, trying to fit two dragons on a Hiccup-sized object.

It was awkward.

“Just lay down, Hiccup.”

“No! I can’t sleep with my right side warm and my left side cold. Scoot over!”

“I’m hanging off the edge! You’re taking all the coals up!” In response, he pushed me over. I yelped and flipped off the coal bed.

“No I’m not! You’re the bigger one out of us!”             

I narrowed my eyes and forced my way back onto the warmth of the embers. “Oh, so you’re calling me fat now? Thanks.”

“Of course not! You know what—here. I’m going to be mature. See? Look! I’m adding on to it, your majesty. Since obviously I have to do all the work.” Fwiiish. Hisssss…

“…well you don’t have to be a smartass about it.”

Hiccup playfully pushed my head aside, curling up on the newly-heated patch of coals. He mumbled something about it being my fault that I was so fat and closed his eyes. It took less than a minute for his crashing body to relax into unconsciousness.

He’s so tired, I thought. I hope his ‘fishing net’ thing works.

A mighty rumble brought my attention to the sky. The warning did no good; it began to rain before I could even stand up. From the looks of it, thank the gods, it would probably just be a storm and nothing serious like last night.

I pushed myself over to Hiccup and spread my wing over him again. He shivered slightly and leaned into me, breathing deeply and evenly. He didn’t even twitch when more thunder boomed overhead. I pushed my head under my wing and on top of Hiccup’s neck.

I didn’t even realize how tired I was until I fell asleep.

Something nudged my shoulder. I squeezed my eyes shut. I hadn’t slept well in days! Whoever was bothering me would wait.

The poking persisted. I’ve slept through worse, I told myself. Just think of…sleeping…

“Toothless? Are you okay? Oh, and by the way, you’re being a total hypocrite right now. Just thought you should know for future reference.”

That sarcastic comment woke me up.

I snapped my eyes open and raised my head, slapping the ground with my paws and looking back and forth. “What?! Huh? How long was I…” I trailed off when I got a good, long look at my surroundings. Hiccup was sitting smugly in front of me. Oh, and the cove was abnormally bright. It took me a few seconds to realize that it wasn’t morning anymore.

Leaping to my feet, I cried, “You let me sleep in?!” I sprinted out from under the tree and turned around. There were birds twirling midair, the normally-still lake was rolling furiously, and the trees and grass swayed with a pleasant breeze. Even though He was blocked out by the branches and leaves of my lookout tree, I could still see the Dragon of the Sun was at the highest point in the sky. Worst of all, everything was wet. And I mean everything; you name it, and it’s soaked. I wouldn’t be getting out of here anytime soon.

Hiccup trotted up to me. “Good morning to you, too!” He rolled his eyes and nudged me with his wing. “Seriously, though, don’t get too upset. You’re always waking up before me. I figured you’d get tired after awhile.” Yeah, and I bet he sure enjoyed sleeping in as well.

Shrugging at my deadpan expression, Hiccup turned and walked over to the lake, wings folded neatly and ears slanted. “It’s funny how it’s moving like that,” he commented.

“Must be the wind,” I said, sniffing the air. My side-frills twitched rapidly against magnetic currents coming off of…something. Must be the storm that passed over us earlier. How odd; I would have woken up if it was that wicked.

Nodding, Hiccup turned back to me just as a huge torrent ravenously thrashed inside our entire home. We braced ourselves as the foliage around us creaked and moaned. Branches and leaves began flying everywhere. Some water from the lake sprayed out and dropped back in, leaving behind several ripples that made it look like there were tiny islands in it.

When it was over, the two of us looked at each other in surprise. The link burst to life, sending an agreed, Well, that was unexpected— and creepy…

An explosion went off!

I managed to turn just in time to see the source of the noise: a huge tree branch had snapped clean off of its trunk. It spiraled through the air before smashing dead-center in the lake, sending a geyser of water several feet high. A small cliff coming off of one of the surrounding walls gave in, crumbled, and plummeted to the ground, where the stones crashed and shattered. I scrambled over to Hiccup, who had frozen and was staring in the lake at our reflections, warped beyond recognition.

As quick as it came, the spell ended. The chirping of birds resumed and the trees and grass continued to dance in slow-motion. The only thing that was different was the lake, which was still recoiling from the shock of the tree branch and blotting out anything mirrored in it.

I frowned. I wasn’t superstitious, but this was getting ridiculous. “Hiccup? Are you sure about your fish net thing? I don’t think it’s—“

“No!” He shook his head wildly, green eyes lighting with an energy that seemed to have left him days ago. “The stones fell because they were unstable from all the rain and hail. And that tree branch was just really old—they’re not omens. I’ll fly over the forest, okay? The only thing that’s wrong here is that you’re worrying even more than usual.” He grinned at this. I was unfazed.

Hiccup’s smile fell and his eyebrows lowered. “Hey, Toothless, I was only joking.”

“I know. But I don’t—“ I stopped when he bumped his head against mine, holding it there.

His eyes stared into mine, bringing forth the connection between us again. “I promise I’ll be careful.”

 All I could do was nod and look away, hoping that the bond didn’t carry over any of my fears. All I’d gotten from Hiccup was his excitement to be able to help the both of us. After a moment, I looked up and smiled. “Be very careful. I don’t want to have to climb out of here because you get stuck under a tree branch or something. Worst rescue ever!” I attempted to lighten our moods.

Another gust of wind, not as big as the previous two (but still of considerable strength) swept through, blowing my ears, tail, wings, and side-frills sideways. Ugh, it was going to be one of those days. The same happened to Hiccup, who squeezed his eyes shut and shivered. I hooted in laughter when he took in a deep breath and sneezed several times.

“Ugh! Ew!” The apparently-allergic Shadow-Blender shook his head. He laughed when I continued to make fun of him, sitting down and pointing at him with a paw. “Haha, very funny,” he smiled, “but I should probably get going.”

I calmed down immediately. Glancing at the sky for any signs of another storm and sniffing the air—it only smelled like rain—I gave a resigned sigh. “Don’t wait like last time.” I began to look away—and stopped.

Two wolves were standing on the edge of the cove nearest to the human nest. Both of them were deep, rusty-red in fur color; one I’d never seen on any non-dragon animal but humans before. A chill went down my spine when I took in their eyes—deep, deep brown, so deep that they appeared to have black holes inside their heads. They stood empathetically, tails limp and feet spaced close.

I stood up, staring at them. Neither moved. Not even in the wind. More unnerving was that when the wind happened to swoop towards us, it brought no scent of wolves with it. That was—that was unnatural, that shouldn’t happen—!

“Hiccup,” I turned towards him to make sure he saw the same thing. His brows were furrowed, puzzlement clear on his face. He glanced at me for a brief second to confirm that I wasn’t hallucinating out of worry.

When I looked back, the wolves were gone. I still couldn’t smell them.

I gave Hiccup a pointed look. “You still sure about this?”

Even though it was a rhetorical question, he answered me anyways. “Yes! I am! Or would you rather us wait here and have me get ‘weaker day by day’?” He, once again, attempted to imitate me, his voice cracking slightly when he did.

Aw, shit! The little runt learned the ‘use one’s own words against them’ tactic from me. I grappled for an excuse for him not to go.

“Well—“

Hiccup’s expression hardened. “I’m going.”

At my defeated, anxious silence, he gave me a comforting smile. “They’re probably just passing by to see why we’re still here, or something,” he said, leaning down and spreading his wings and tailfins out. “I’m gonna get going before the weather gets any worse. I’ll see you in a bit!” With that, he flapped his wings and pushed off the ground, springing into the air a little slower than usual. “And I’ll be fine!”

“Be careful!” I reminded him for the umpteenth time. Hiccup circled once, shouted another reassurance, and disappeared behind the cliff wall and the trees. I perked my ears, listening to his wingbeats, worrying that he just wouldn’t have enough energy to make the trip home.

I should have stopped him! I panicked. He’s too weak to carry something back. He got off far too slow, and he’s going to wear himself out! I haven’t taught him how to pace his flying!

I considered calling out to him, but I knew it would be pointless. I could no longer hear the pumping of his wings, which meant that he would never hear me no matter how hard I screamed. Settling on pacing, I walked briskly along the side of the cove, looking up into the sky every few seconds. I knew that Hiccup couldn’t possibly be back—he just left, for the Dragon of the Sun’s sake!—but I couldn’t help myself. I hated the feeling of utter helplessness.

Calming down enough to lie down was impossible. Pacing wasted enough time but got old when I started to tread a tiny trench into the ground. So I did the next-best thing: I climbed my lookout tree and turned, watching the cliff wall that was right next to it. Hiccup had taken off quite close to my watch post; only a couple meters away, actually. From where I was situated, I was just over halfway up the wall. It didn’t help at all, but it made me felt like I was doing something.

I was so focused on listening for Hiccup that I didn’t even notice that something was entering the cove until it was too late.

I spun around sharply, turning to look at the source of the sounds. I could hear footsteps—several footsteps—and stones being kicked into the cove. I jumped, glided across the lake, and landed neatly on one of the rocks that had fallen earlier this morning. Sliding down so I could see just barely around it, I glared at the tiny entrance. It was several meters away from me and barely out of reach. I was situated directly to its left.

Voices began to drift into the cove. I relaxed slightly (I recognized them as the defenseless teenagers’) but didn’t budge. For all I knew, these hatchlings were leading in an entire raid. It hit me hard how lucky it was that Hiccup had left—that meant that he was in no danger.

‘Astrid’ jumped down, easily absorbing the short six-foot drop in her almost dragon-like knees, gripping her double-bladed axe in her hands, and began circling around apprehensively. The female look-alike stumbled after her, yelping and sprinting to keep her balance. She turned and shrieked at the male look-alike, who had his paws on his hips and was laughing hysterically. ‘Snotlout’ shouldered past him and joined ‘Astrid’ without a word, looking very suspicious and wielding the claw-like weapon Hiccup had informed me was a sword. It reflected the sun’s light.

‘Fishlegs’ was last, struggling to fit himself through the crag. I tipped my head to the side in slight curiosity; he’d been able to fit through easily the last time we’d seen him. It wasn’t until he jerked his body out, tripped, and fell off the ledge did I realize that he was carrying…a basket?

The humans all spun in tiny circles, each of them falling silent. It was almost as if the Dragoness of the Moon Herself loomed over them. They packed together like frightened sheep, holding weapons or hovering their hands over them. The male look-alike covered his mouth with his paws and boldly called out Hiccup’s name, his voice echoing ominously.

I clawed my way up over the rock and narrowed my eyes at them. None of them noticed, hilariously. Well, easy fix. I rumbled deeply in my throat to gain their attention.

‘Fishlegs’ took notice of me first, giving a short, high-pitched scream and holding a paw over his center. The others jumped and faced me while I sat on top of the rock, puffing out my chest and staring down my nose at them. You are not welcome here, I was trying to say. This is my place.

‘Snoutlout’ braced himself as if I were charging him this very instant.  ‘Astrid’ took a calmer approach, holding her axe towards the ground but keeping it slightly raised, coolly maintaining eye contact with me. ‘Fishlegs’, for some reason, tapped his paws together. The two look-alikes stood close together, bodies relaxed but faces tense. I knew they all wanted to ask the same question: where was Hiccup?

I sniffed the air and swiveled my ears back and forth. There was nobody else nearby. This revelation put an involuntary, relieved grin on my face. Only a temporary relief, though.

My eyes settled on ‘Fishlegs’. What was in that basket? Why did he have it?

The realization hit me at the same exact time that a blast of wind nearly slammed me off my boulder and a wild dog let out a frenzy of barks, barely audible. I heaved a deep breath, eyes widening. The happiness I’d felt earlier about Hiccup leaving washed away like a stone caught in the tide.

“Night Fury…where’s Hiccup?” ‘Astrid’ spoke to me. She stopped her fruitless scan of the cove and narrowed her brilliantly blue (gods, why were they that color? That was reserved for the sky only!) eyes at me.

Instead of answering, I jumped to the ground and stopped about three meters away from them. Fighting down the panic, I wracked my brain for some way to stall them—or at least keep them from figuring out that Hiccup had left to steal. Which I had convinced him to do. What have I done? I cried internally. They’d lose all trust in him, and it was all my fault! Even if they were disgusting, cowardly warriors, they were still very important to him!

“She’s talking to you! We know you understand us!” ‘Snotlout’ snapped, glaring at me and leaning forward. I turned onto him and snarled fiercely. That put him in his place fast; he jerked and swayed back, doubt glimmering in his eyes for a split second. Just because he fought captives, didn’t mean that I couldn’t encroach a heart-stopping fear into him.

I snorted at him and then nodded towards the cliff. No use in hiding the fact that Hiccup wasn’t here; they’d already figured that part out. But I could be vague about it. Very vague.

Dragon of the Sun, please, help us! I prayed. Dragoness of the Moon, watch over Hiccup! I looked uselessly around for a distraction and came up short.

“He left?” ‘Fishlegs’ gasped. He dropped the basket to the ground and it snapped open, dumping out some of the fish-filled contents. “But we brought food!”

“Well, this sucks,” the female look-alike commented dryly. “So we came here for nothing?”

“Looks like,” her male counterpart answered. He raised a brow at me. “You aren’t going to eat it all, right?” I bared my teeth at him. How dare he assume I would do that! And what nerve, treating me like I was some old friend!

‘Snotlout’ scoffed. “Whatever. If Hiccup isn’t here, let’s leave.”

It made me uncomfortable to agree with him, but I did. Yes, leave! I growled at the entire group in general, gesturing with my head towards the entryway. Get out of here before Hiccup comes back!

‘Astrid’ shook her head fiercely, crushing my hopes. “No. We’re waiting for him. I want to know what he’s doing and why.”

My heart plummeted. Hiccup was going to come back with that fishing net and ‘Snotlout’ and ‘Astrid’ will accuse him of breaking their deal. I just knew that ‘Fishlegs’ wouldn’t be able to convince them that he wasn’t a ‘menace to their society’ again. But if I tried to force them out, they’d most likely attack! I had no problem in defending myself, but once Hiccup found out that I’d willingly hurt his so-called friends, he’d never forgive me. They couldn’t just stay here, though!

What was I going to do?!

My heart hammered in my ears and my breath was hard to catch. It didn’t matter to me; the thrill of flying always cheered me up and made me feel completely at peace. I felt so free when I was darting through the air, seeing everything from a new perspective. The view was stunning.

The only problem was that I couldn’t move as fast as I wanted to. It really annoyed me how I tired out only a few minutes into my flight. But hey, that didn’t matter. I’d catch some fish with Toothless and then I would be fine. As if agreeing with my thoughts, my stomach contracted, sending a sharp jolt of pain through my body. I smiled grimly; I’d felt like this for days. Somehow, I’d managed to keep it from Toothless, thank Odin. He would have gone insane if he knew.

I made sure to skim over the treetops when the village came into sight. There was my house on its lonely little hill and very few buildings around it. I quickly looked away, fighting off the immediate sadness and guilt that accompanied thinking about it.

The road leading from my house to the village lasted a long time, only interrupted by the storage shed at the base of a gigantic hill that looked more like a baby mountain than anything else. I hated walking up the thing. It took so… long…

A memory, something insignificant from several months ago, resurfaced unexpectedly. I had been walking up that same hill—more like struggling to climb it without resorting to trodding up on all fours—while Snotlout, Ruffnut, and Tuffnut were busy carrying packages to the storage shed. I’d greeted them briskly, nervously. When Astrid wasn’t around to be a good role model, those three would get very—ehem—rough with me. I had brought my arm up to cover a bruise from a last encounter, knowing that they would think I was weak if a ‘friendly punch’ had left such an ugly, green-and-yellow mark.

“Oh, look, it’s Hiccup the Useless,” Snotlout had joked. Ruffnut and Tuffnut, always the followers, had laughed while I blushed in anger and looked away. I remember stumbling and falling flat on my face under the pressure of their gazes, bringing out ‘clumsy as a Gronckle’ jokes. Ironically, one of them had laughed that I’d be better off a dragon that day. “What’s wrong, did that small wind knock you over? Haha—woah!”

Almost immediately after Snotlout had finished his sentence, he’d misplaced his foot and caught a more unstable spot in the dirt road. The package must have clattered to the ground and burst open, since it had been badly splintered later, but all I could remember was lunging forward to catch my cousin from falling headfirst down the hill. Somehow, I had known that he would be badly hurt if I’d let him past. So I grabbed his shoulders and caught a glimpse of his wide, frightened bluish-green eyes before my own feet collapsed. I remember sliding on my belly but holding fast, and about five terrifying seconds later, Snotlout and I had fallen about halfway down. I also remember grimacing at the scrapes that my legs and stomach had acquired, hating the pain.

Of course, the twins were nearly suffocating with laughter. They’d actually had the good grace to fall to their backs and roll on the ground. In response to this Snoutlout had scrambled back to his feet, wiping the mud off his body with a humiliated, red-faced look.

As hard as I tried, I couldn’t get myself to my feet that day. It must have been the nerves. But, for some reason, Snotlout seemed to have actually cared. I vividly remembered him roughly grabbing my arm and hauling me to my feet. It was no use—I couldn’t find purchase, and nearly fell over again. But he caught me. And for just a second, with him clutching my arm and keeping me from sliding down the hill, his expression softened into one of thankfulness and—dare I say—kindness.

Tuffnut had made a comment, and the regular ‘mean’ Snotlout had returned. Even so, he’d pushed me forward and stayed behind me, catching me when I fell for the third time and saying nothing to the twins’ whining on how he was wasting time carrying Hiccup the Useless up the stupid hill.

SNAP!

My paw brushed across a branch, causing it to crack and startling me out of my memories. The treetops below had either grown taller in the past minutes or I’d flown lower.

Well, nothing like your daily tree-slap to get your brain working, I guess.

Oh, way to go, Hiccup, I berated myself. With a sigh, I decided, I guess I’ll just land here then, since I’m so close.

I tilted my body up, slowing down, and then arced. Gravity did the rest of the work and pulled me down into the forest. I swooped past two or three trees and opened my wings again, flapping them madly before settling on the ground with a soft thud. A few rabbits and a fox darted away in surprise, the latter letting loose a series of growls and yowls. The canine sized me up, reconsidering its size-to-me ratio. It turned and ran. I laughed.

Rolling my eyes, I began to meander through the forest, putting Toothless’ stealth training to good use. Make yourself light on your feet, he’d said. Walk on your toes, stay low, and don’t flail your tail about. I concentrated, sneaking through the forest with my wings, ears, and side-frills pressed tight against my body. The only sounds I could hear were the birds, summer bugs, and my own soft footfalls. I could tell the wind was blowing from the trees swishing above me, but it was more or less canceled out on the forest floor by the trunks.

Make sure to pause every few seconds to get a good bearing on your surroundings, Toothless’ voice echoed in my head. If you see anything, don’t just turn and run, or they’ll know you’re there. Back up slowly and hide behind something. Then run.

Even though I was walking at a careful, slow pace, and my wings hurt from the overexertion, I made it to the forest edge surprisingly fast. My heart kicked up into double-time, but unlike earlier, it wasn’t from being tired. I swallowed heavily, looking back and forth several times. I couldn’t hear anyone. My nose told me that nobody was around, or hadn’t been for awhile.

Still, I made sure to stay under cover for several minutes. There was no movement from my house or the hill. I heard what sounded like thunder in the distance. The wind blew harshly.

I warily stepped out from my cover, crouching low to the ground and wings half-extended. My tail swished involuntarily with every other step and my ears twisted in every direction they could. I found myself spinning my head back and forth in an attempt to watch both my house and the hill at the same time. Closing my eyes, I sucked in a deep breath. Calm down, Hiccup.

I briskly stalked over to the storage shed, sniffing at the doorknob. There was a key-locked bolt on it. Great.

I grabbed the doorknob anyways and gently pulled at it. Hey, why not give it a try, right? Just my luck—the gods really do hate me sometimes—it didn’t move more than an inch. Hanging my head in defeat, I focused my attention on the lock this time. Gripping it with fully-extended teeth, I yanked my head back.

Shhhhiiiiiing! CRACK!

“Oh, come on!” I cringed when the lock, doorknob, and an impressive portion of the wood from the door ripped clean off and skidded along the ground next to me. “Not again!” I had only meant to rip the doorknob out!

The door swung open and creaked, slamming against the wall and pushing itself back. I held out a paw to stop it from closing and rushed in. The sound of the wood ripping had felt louder than any amount of thunder I’d heard in the past few days. I had to hurry!

“Okay, fishing net, fishing net,” I told myself, looking back and forth. I ignored the fish baskets in the front, even though the smell of them made me swoon. There wasn’t really any rhyme or reason to where things were placed. A lot of freshly-killed food was held in the front and several weapons were stored off to the right, but that was it. My heart began to flutter. What if I couldn’t find any? “Fishing net, fishing net…”

Something shiny caught my eye, right in the back. It was a familiar, two-horned helmet, one horn with a tip chipped off, sitting on top of a pile of crates. It was silver, and even though it had dust on it, it still gleamed in the sunlight being let in. I stared at it for a second, looked away, and then did a double-take.

The fishing nets were right behind the helmet!

“Oh, thank the gods!” I breathed. I pressed my wings in tight and leaped over a fish basket and onto some sorry piece of furniture. Jumping down, I crept under a wooden beam that had fallen sometime in the past due to termites and then pushed myself through two giant, vacant weapon racks. Now at the very back of the shed, I began to climb the stack of crates, using them like a giant staircase.

The fishing nets were being held on a hook near the ceiling by a little metal circle tied into one of their corners. I hunched over onto my hind legs, reached up with my paw, and gripped one of the metal hooks in my claws. Very carefully, I plucked the net into the air, allowed it to fall over my paw, and then clumsily folded it on the crate. Stooping down and picking the net up in my mouth, I began to cheerily make my way back out of the shed.

I squeezed past the weapon racks and, instead of going under the beam, I just jumped over it. Big mistaaake!

“Aaaugh!” I cried out when I jumped straight through an enormous spiderweb (I even felt the spider bounce off my cheek!) and landed in a heap in the entryway. A few baskets fell over when I knocked into them. I was a little busy trying to get the web out of my face to notice.

Groaning, I rubbed my nose, mouth, and eyes as hard as I could. My body felt like I had ants crawling all over it. Shuddering, I reached blindly for the fishing net with my paw and knelt down to pick it up in my mouth. I opened my eyes, blinking several times to clear them up, and turned to walk out of the shed. Never again. Ugh.

There was a person standing in the doorway.

My heart stopped.

Dropping the fishing net, I backed up and curled in on myself, trying to make myself a smaller target. I knew my eyes were as wide as dinner plates. My body shook in complete and utter fear and I fought the instinct to just trample them over and fly as far away as fast as I could.

“Dad,” I croaked.

His shadow encased my body, not moving a single inch. He just stood there. Watching me. Dad didn’t look surprised; he looked furious. Completely and utterly enraged. He stared at me like I’d just gone in and told him that one of our rival tribes had taken over all the others and were heading for ours at this very second.

I swallowed. My throat felt dry all of the sudden. “Dad,” I repeated, grasping the net in one hand and leaning away from him. My mind went haywire; should I run? Should I stay? How can I escape if he’s just standing there? Would I have to blast a hole in the wall? Where would I go? How would I tell Toothless without putting him in danger? A million instances ran through my brain in a moment’s noticed, as disassembled as the shack we were standing in.

Dad took a deep breath. Looked at his hands. I realized that he was holding his sword—the same sword he’d attacked me with when he banished me. I began to feel dizzy and take in short, frantic breaths.

“So, you were the one who stole.” Dad looked up at me with narrowed eyes. I shrunk under the gaze. He was staring at me in the same way he’d looked at the Monstrous Nightmare that had attacked me. There was something else, though. He was looking at me like I betrayed him. Guilt shoved me to the ground and ripped at me.

I nodded without thinking, looking down at the fishing net. And here I am doing it again.

Dad gasped and took a small step back. I looked up him with wide, watery eyes. His mouth was open in shock and his knuckles were white. He looked as pale as fresh-fallen snow.

We stared at each other in silence: me in terror, and Dad in disbelief. I found myself longing for a link that wasn’t there. For Toothless.

It suddenly occurred to me that I needed to be doing something. I raised my paw and looked around for anything I could write on; I couldn’t just scratch the wood. It was too beaten up to be able to see any words I put down in it. So that meant I needed to find…there! There was an ink jar resting on a shelf over to my right. Maybe there was some left—

“You can understand me?”

I looked up at Dad and glanced back at the jar. “Yes,” I said, nodding my head rapidly and making direct eye contact. My body tensed when I did and I looked away quickly, feeling nauseous. Squeezing my eyes shut for a second, I struggled with myself; I couldn’t get a handle on my emotions!

Wordlessly, I pointed at the jar of ink with my free paw. I can use that to explain everything, I wanted to say. My mouth felt frozen, and the words died on my lips. I could barely move. It felt like I’d been glued to the spot!

My father looked briefly over in the general direction of where I pointed and then back to me, uncomprehending. “Why? Why did you steal? Why are you—“ he cut off, closing his eyes and sucking in a breath. When he opened his eyes, eyes that looked so much like mine, they were full of pain. “Why are you stealing again? Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

This hurt more than anything else. I reared my head back. “Dad…I-I…” I looked down at the net and held it up for him to see. “I wasn’t stealing any food,” I weakly explained, even though I knew he couldn’t understand me. Dropping it, I pointed at the jar of ink again. “I can explain—“

Dad’s eyes hardened and he glared at me with more wrath than I’d ever seen before. “Get out.”

I stopped, my leg slowly lowering back to the ground. “What?” I whispered, feeling my ears stick up. I must’ve misheard him. I had to have. I had to.

His eyes became narrow and his face turned bright red. “Get out!” He screamed, raising his sword. I spooked, my claws tangling up in the fishing net and letting out a wordless cry. “Get out right now!”

My legs stayed put after their short spasm. I was frozen to the spot like a deer when it sees a hunter. Not even my tail or wings moved. All I could do was stare in horror, feeling like I was reliving the entire first night again.

Slowly, I shook my head, feeling my pain—both emotional and physical—build up and well me over. “No,” I chocked. “I’m not just a dragon!” I turned and sprinted over to the ink jar as fast as I could, turning around and knocking it over with my tail. I didn’t know what was scarier; the fact that Dad just walked over to me, taking his time and knowing I wouldn’t fight back, or how his face had become stony and unresponsive. I needed to convince him!

The fishing net was still clinging to my left claws. I shook it out and slung it over my shoulder, finally able to focus on the ink jar. My eyes lit with hope; ink was spilling out of it!

Trying my best to ignore my father’s advance, I dipped my claw into the ink and began to scratch the word ‘Dad’ onto the floor, upside-down so he could read it. It stood stark against the bright, white light filtering in from the door. The door that I’d broken. I curled in even further, nearly lying on the ground.

Dad stopped abruptly. His eyes widened. I leaned low to the ground, shaking from nose to tailtip. That sword was so close!

I’m so dead, I snarked to myself. What a great way for me to die. Killed by my own father because he can’t understand me.

“No…no, you’re not…” Dad shook his head fiercely. “Stop it!” He shrieked, jerking towards me and raising his sword high above me. My eyes widened impossibly further. No. No! “Stop acting like him! Stop pretending to be someone you’re not!”

What happened next played out in slow-motion.

I dipped my claw in ink and began to frantically write. Dad kicked my palm away, causing me to yelp, and grabbed my scruff. He brought a well-aimed punch right to my cheek and flung me aside, causing me to topple into an old bookshelf. It collapsed on top of me, crushing me to the floor!

Groaning, I clawed my way out from under it. The net was still attached to my shoulder. Dad was standing where he’d just been, fists clenched (one around his sword) and panting heavily. My shoulders and wings were screaming in pain from having such a heavy piece of furniture fall on top of them!

I stopped short and realized, with horror, that I was growling and baring my teeth at him.

Oh, gods, no! Not again!

“Listen, you…you devil,” Dad spat. “You’re not my son. Take the damn net and leave. If you ever come back—no, if I even hear that you’re alive on my island, I will! Kill you!” He screamed. “Do you hear me?!” His face scrunched up in what looked like pain and he took in a deep breath. His face was red all over. “Do you hear me?! GET! OUT!”

It felt like that speech sent my entire world crashing down. It was like I wasn’t in my body, as if I were just floating outside it, watching everything but helpless to do anything. Dad raised his sword and rushed at me, screaming a battle cry, no trace of the father I loved in him.

Heaving, I turned and sprinted out of the shed. My tail hit something that had fallen to the floor and it went shooting off, out the door, out of sight.

The sword swooped just over my right wing and hit my thigh, thin and shallow, but still piercing. I screamed. The act of him actually hurting me was worse than the actual pain. It was a reckless swing, even I knew, and yet it meant so much more. The hatred was nearly tangible in that weapon, a second voice demanding that I leave for ever and never come back.

NO!

A group of Vikings had just begun to form, confused and concerned. All of them gasped at seeing me, some of them saying “Night Fury!” while others rushed inside to see if Dad was okay. Even thinking that word made me choke up.

I blundered past them all, not even caring that they probably saw me crying. My feet carried me straight for the forest. My back and wings hurt far too much to fly, the fishing net rubbed against my shoulders uncomfortably, my stomach was sending agonizing waves throughout my body, my legs were tired, and that strike hurt—oh, gods, it hurt!

I jumped over a fallen log and swerved to the right, coming to an abrupt stop when a hallowed-out tree suddenly came into view. That helmet from before, the one with the broken horn on it, was sitting directly inside the massive trunk.

I stood there for a moment, body shaking like an earthquake had hit it. My legs were stiff and unwilling to bend as I approached the helmet. I could easily see my reflection in the polished medal. A dragon. A Night Fury. The unholy offspring of lightning and death itself. Slitted pupils, so tiny they looked like more like cuts on my eyes. Bared teeth. Wounded.

My head swam, I swayed—I was on the ground, curled around the helmet, cradling it in my arms. Everything was foggy, like it was a dream—Thor, I wished it was a dream—that was never-ending. I squeezed my eyes shut, hugging the helmet against my forehead, chest heaving and Thor how I wished this was a dream! Why couldn’t it be a dream!

I could hear my Dad talking to someone in the distance.

Oh, gods—

He was never going to believe me.

My father was never going to love me again.

The realization sent a bolt of lightning through my body. He was never going to try to understand. He was never going to acknowledge me as me again. He will never see me as anything other than a monster, a beast, a devil! I screamed and sobbed and cursed and begged and wailed and writhed, anything, anything for forgiveness, for understanding, for just the slightest bit of compassion! My heart felt like it was being ripped out by the very sword Dad had been wielding, mercilessly leaving me to bleed out and die.

And it was all because of an insignificant fishing net!

I didn’t understand! Why would he reject me?! I’d proven to him in every way that I was me! Yet he still attacked me!

Why? Why?!

Why did I everything I do turn out wrong!

I buried my face into the soaked, mud-stained helmet that no longer showed any reflections. I didn’t care anymore! I just wanted to go home! And I didn’t even know what that was anymore! I thought that once I proved myself, something could be worked out. I thought that maybe Toothless and I could come to some agreement with the others. I thought Dad would be more understanding as one of the ‘legendary’ leaders of Berk. I thought Dad loved me…

I whimpered. My tears had long since gone dry.

I wished that I had never gone into that damn shed!

“He went this way!”

“No, he went this way! Follow me!”

…What?

“I saw it run in that direction.” This was Dad’s voice.

He saw it. Not him.

I was an it now?

Wait, what did he just say?

My heart dropped to my stomach at the betrayal. No matter how small it was. He said he would let me go!

The helmet was dull and lifeless now. When I released it, it tipped over, dead. My throat felt constricted, like some invisible hand was squeezing it shut. In a panic I shakily rose to my feet, grabbed the fishing net in my mouth, and crept out from inside the tree. Looking in both directions, I couldn’t see anyone. I could hear them getting closer.

I needed to get out of here right now. If only to be away from him. And the storage shed. And my house, next to the hill where Snotlout was almost my friend.

Crawling away was ironically easy, especially with the water-filled mud swallowing my tracks. Like it wanted to erase me from Viking society as much as my father and that hunting party did.

Swaying dangerously, I clawed over a large tree trunk and checked my immediate surroundings for any Vikings. When I saw none, I opened my wings, clenching my teeth together from the pain. I needed to get out of here right now!

I leaped into the air. Pain shot through my wings and shoulders, causing me to falter and nearly fall out of the sky. I gasped around the fishing net and squeezed my eyes shut. Pawing uselessly at the air, I pulled in my legs and narrowed my wings and tailfins. I had to back to Toothless! We had to hide! If I didn’t make it, we’d die…and it would be all my fault…

I shot over a sudden drop in the landscape, catching alarmed shouts before zipping out of earshot. Making a sharp right, I frantically circled my way around to the cove. It was northeast of the shed, dead-center in the forest, and I’d been moving north. Hopefully the drops, ravines, and island-hop would deter the posse; almost all but one of them didn’t have a bridge, the only way to cross over being a fallen tree or well-aimed jump. The island-hop was the only exception, with a rickety bridge built long ago that was the most treacherous thing to cross than anything else in Berk. Except for my father.

Damnit, Hiccup, don’t think about that!

Pumping my aching wings as fast as they could go—which wasn’t fast at all, really, just another thing I couldn’t do right today—I swept over a meadow, a large creek, a huge crack in the ground, and many other detours. I tried to push the whole shed incident out of my head to concentrate on just getting back, but it was too hard. It replayed cruelly inside my head, blinding me from what was right in front of me.

I neared the cove and felt relief for the first time in what felt like a lifetime. With one final flap of my wings, I went into ‘gliding mode’, straightening all of my muscles out and letting the wind carry my tired body into the open. I could have sworn I saw two dogs staring wistfully at me, but it must have been a trick of my devastated, awful imagination.

I’d never been happier to see Toothless. A small part of my mind informed me that Astrid and the others were here. There would be a time for that later. I cried out my best and only real friend’s name, dropping the net on the ground in the process, and reached out to him. He reared up on his hind legs, concern written across his face, just barely beginning a “what’s wrong?” I pummeled right into him.

The two of us rolled in a Night-Furian ball for a couple seconds before Toothless stopped us. He sat up on his haunches, confused and uncomfortable, and lightly pushed me off of him. Even though all I wanted was a hug, I stood back, ears pinned against my head, eyebrows lowered, body still shaking.

“Hiccup?” Toothless glanced over at the others for a second. “What’s wrong? What happened?” He added, fear freezing his face when I failed to respond, quietly beginning to snivel again

Letting out a wordless cry, I launched myself at him, wrapping my arms around his chest and gripping his shoulders with my claws. I bawled, desperately holding onto him like he was the only thing keeping me alive! The dragon took a sharp intake of air and stilled for a second. Then he awkwardly wrapped his paws around my neck and the back of my head, spreading his wings out for balance. I could hear shouting in the distance but it didn’t quite register. I felt like I’d shut down.

“Just a fishing net,” I whispered.

“H-Hiccup,” Toothless stuttered. I looked up at him, willing—hoping—for the bond to come into life. He paused for a second, taking it all in. Toothless’ brows lowered and he hugged me tighter, leaning his head down close to mine. “Oh, Hiccup.”

I breathed heavily and forced myself to stop crying. I needed to stop—I needed to explain what was going on to him! We were in very real danger! It didn’t really matter to me if Astrid or the others saw me like this. I needed help. I couldn’t deal with this all by myself!

A low growl ripped from Toothless’ throat. I tensed and curled in on myself. He wasn’t looking at me, but at something behind me, all of his teeth bared and ears pressed tightly against his head. I hadn’t realized it, but as we’d both returned to all fours (when did that happen?), he’d brought his right wing around me as if to protect me against anything that might harm me.

Looking over my shoulder, I could see that a very wary Fishlegs and Astrid had approached, the other three lagging behind. Letting Toothless release me, I wiped away my tears with my arm and felt myself choke a little. For a second, my legs shook. I collapsed, too exhausted to stand anymore. Toothless stooped low besides me, tail swishing and glaring at the two teenagers. I just looked at them. Why were they here?

Fishlegs looked very confused, frightened even. He crept closer despite Toothless’ snarls and Astrid’s warning. Disregarding him, I looked behind him at the others—especially Snotlout. The twins had equal looks of worry and alarm on their faces, while my cousin seemed to be very bewildered, like he wasn’t sure what to think. There was a hint of unease on his face. I couldn’t tell if it was for me or him, though.

Astrid cleared her throat, bringing my eyes over to her. She was kneeling next to a seated Fishlegs, one hand in her lap and the other holding her axe to the ground. “Hiccup, what happened? Can you write it out?” Her voice barely sounded concerned, mostly puzzled.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I grabbed my forehead, shaking my head wildly.

“Are you sure?” Astrid pressed. “What was that thing you dropped—Ruffnut, can you go see what he dropped?”

Toothless spoke—no, he snapped. “Yes, he’s sure! He’s traumatized!”

Traumatized? I repeated to myself.

It took me several moments, but I eventually came to realize how much of a wreck I was. I mean, I knew that I felt miserable and was acting like it, but it never really registered. My mind had felt like it’d flickered and died off when Dad had rejected me, leaving me to act on random impulses and instincts. I hadn’t meant to cry so hard or shatter under the stress. It had just…happened, as if I had no control over it. Like the wind from earlier.

I didn’t want to go through this. Not again. Once was enough for a lifetime. I tried to tell this to Toothless, to have them stop asking questions, but my voice had fled.

While Ruffnut jogged around the lake (I’d dropped the fishing net pretty far away) and gathered the attention of the other teens, Toothless leaned in close to my ears. “Are you okay?” He whispered. “I can chase them off if you want.” Pausing, he continued, “I couldn’t get them to leave earlier, but I knew you wouldn’t want me to attack them…”

It took me a second to respond. Shaking my head, I whimpered, “The h-hunting party is on its way here. They’re in trouble, too.” A surge of sudden rage towards myself overcame me. Everyone here was in danger. The five would be considered traitors if they were caught and could very possibly be sent to their deaths. Toothless would be killed on sight. Instead of warning them, though, I’d sat there and wasted our time crying in hysterics.

I was allowed to be distraught. I was allowed to be traumatized, as Toothless put it. I was not allowed to wallow in self-pity and risk the lives of everyone here! I had to push it aside for now, bottle it up, let it hit me later when we were safe. Although I couldn’t hold it in forever—or for long—it would only end up hurting my friends.

Toothless repeated the ‘hunting party’ bit in alarm, standing up straight and sniffing the air. His eyes darted to and fro. Apparently he hadn’t gotten that part from our temporary bond.

I narrowed my eyes in concentration and began to stand up, grunting with the effort. My body felt like it was on a rocking ship caught in the middle of a hurricane. Thank the gods Toothless understood how physically exhausted I was; he stood up as well and allowed me to lean on him. “Yes,” I shakily answered, “there’s a hunting party. Which is why we need to hide and get them out now!”

The Night Fury let out a low growl. He was frustrated. Even though it wasn’t directed at me, I still felt guilty and cringed, staring at my feet. This day could possibly be worse than when I’d been transformed!

Ruffnut finally returned, wearing an anxious look and holding the net in one arm while sprinting over to the four of us. Snotlout and Tuffnut rushed to meet up with her, eager to see what was going on as well. I braced myself for the explosion that would result from their findings

Sure enough, it happened.

“Is that—is that a fishing net?!” Astrid shrieked. I’d never heard her yell so loud in my life. Fear assaulted my heart, knowing that she wouldn’t even bother to understand why I’d gotten it. The teenager was hard-headed, stubborn, and stuck to her beliefs. I’d been on shaky ground with her before, and now I may as well have picked her up and thrown her off a cliff. Even I couldn’t explain everything in time.

Snotlout took one glance at the stolen good and sent me a look that could freeze oceans. I hung my head, taking in short and shaky breaths. He probably would never trust me again. Brilliant. In his rage, my cousin let out a long string of curses that would put Toothless’ wide vocabulary to shame. Spinning on his heel, he pointed at me and screamed, “You stole! Again! After you promised!” His best friend, Tuffnut, had to hold him back from charging at me. Toothless snarled. My head spun.

Tuffnut, struggling to hold back the much bigger Snotlout, looked over his shoulder at the others for help. He seemed more confused than anything. After thinking about it, I’d figured out that Tuffnut really was a lot more thoughtful than I’d originally given him credit for. He treated me like I was normal because of that day when he’d fallen off the cliff and I’d prepared to catch him. The problem was that he was afraid of going against Snotlout, the second-in-command of their group, so he said nothing. He didn’t do anything either, though. I was just thankful that one person in the group wasn’t automatically overcome with anger at me.

Fishlegs and Ruffnut said nothing. All the obese Viking did was let his out-of-breath companion lean on him, staring at me with disappointment. This, more than screaming, bothered me. I couldn’t bear to look at him—the only person out of all five of them that I could really call a friend—and let my weight fall on Toothless’ tense shoulder, staring at the dirt.

“Hiccup,” the dragon growled, “I think you better start writing before they attack us.”

Of course! I realized, eyes widening. Why wasn’t I already doing that?! Stupid! Stupid!

Lifting a claw, I tuned out Snotlout’s screaming and Tuffnut’s shouts at my cousin to quit trying to attack us, that Night Fury looked really mad and holy shit that hurt. Fretfully and faster than ever before, I scribbled down my message. It was nearly impossible; my nerves were fried, causing me to flinch at every loud sound, my heart thudded in my ears, and my leg shook from hunger and fear.

So pretty much, I was still a mess even after I tried to force myself to calm down. Superb, as always.

Eventually, I got the writing down: We were starving. I was going to borrow it to fish in that lake and then bring it back.

Lifting my eyes and straightening my back, I got ready to point out the message to everyone else—and was scared out of my wits when I saw Fishlegs right in front of me! I yelped and jumped back, hiding slightly behind Toothless. Fishlegs sent me a nervous, tiny smile and read over the passage, slouching a little when he’d finished.

Out of all five of the Vikings, he had been the only one to notice that I’d started to do something. Tuffnut was still holding a raging Snotlout back. Astrid and Ruffnut were examining the fishing net and shooting malevolent looks my way, especially Astrid. She looked humiliated and was seething, just barely keeping herself calm enough to assess the situation. I cringed and forced aside a wave of emotion. We were going to die! I had to do something to keep us alive!

“You traitor! You’re a liar and a fraud! You will never be one of us or part of our family ever again! I’ll kill you! I’ll KILL you! I’ll rip your heart out and shred it to pieces!” Snotlout was howling. I pressed my ears and side-frills (which were vibrating from all the noise) against my head and felt my tail drop to the ground. I felt an intense, sudden urge to crawl away into a cave and hide there forever. My throat felt like there was something in it and I swallowed harshly, unable to look Snotlout in the eye and muscles tensing up. A quiet, defensive growl rose up in my throat, one that I couldn’t muffle.

Toothless stepped in front of me, eyes dead-set on Snotlout. He barked at him wordlessly, clearly trying to get him to shut up and pay attention. When nothing happened, his face wrinkled, he squared his feet, and he roared. The Night Fury bellowed for what felt like ages, the terrifying noise stopping everything in its tracks. Even the lake, which had been crashing around like the ocean, seemed to slow down as if worried it might interrupt.

Fishlegs let out a shriek and backed up, misinterpreting the cacophony and thinking it was aimed at him. I uselessly called out for him, even though I knew he wouldn’t understand me.

My friend cut himself off with a low growl, pawing at the ground. To my surprise, he lifting a paw and patted at the ground in front of the writing several times. It would be the first time he’d even attempted to communicate with them, and of course he was looking as pissed as ever while he did. Even so, it caught the attention of Astrid, the twins, and Snotlout, and they all cautiously (in the last three’s case) made their way over.

Astrid placed her hands on her hips and glared at me, her upper lip curling. “Really. And how should we trust you? See that basket over there?” She turned and pointed to a very large basket. My heart dropped to my stomach. Oh, no. “We stuck our necks out for you and got you that. But you stole anyways! I don’t care how hungry you were, I told you we were coming back!”

“Traitor,” Snotlout hissed. Fishlegs had wrestled his sword from him in the time it took him to get over here, and now he was standing with his fist raised. “You betrayed us after we gave you a chance! You deserve to die!”

As soon as he said this, Toothless forced the two of us to back up. I didn’t protest this time. I was feeling a little too uncomfortable with Snotlout that close and that mad.

Shaking my head, I wrote again, We were starving. I nearly collapsed and the Night Fury begged me to get something. He almost made his way out because he was so worried. I swear to all the gods that I was just borrowing it.

Unfortunately, Fishlegs read this aloud. At the ‘collapsed’ part, Toothless’ head snapped back and he sent me a horrified look—a look that didn’t go unnoticed by Astrid or Fishlegs. I averted my gaze guiltily.

“I didn’t want you to worry any more than usual,” I mumbled. Well, aren’t I an asshole. Lying to everyone now.

Toothless shook his head, eyebrows bent down. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he said just as quietly. “I would have tried harder to get out. I wouldn’t have been mad—I’m not mad at you, Hiccup.” He repeated with conviction when I stared at my feet. I just nodded and gave him a grateful smile, so glad he didn’t get upset.

“So,” Tuffnut spoke up, brows furrowed and nose wrinkled. “You left, like, just now, pretty much?” At my nod, he fell silent. I’d given up on him continuing when he suddenly piped up, “Wait. If you were borrowing it, that meant you were planning on bringing it back, right?”

“Yes, stupid,” Toothless deadpanned. I suppressed an unexpected smile and nodded seriously again.

“That doesn’t cut it.” Astrid glared at the twin and turned to me. “No matter what angle you look at it, you still stole. We had a deal!”

Snotlout turned to Tuffnut, who’d moved in front of him. “See? Even Astrid agrees with me! Now lemme go!”

Tuffnut stood his ground, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and continued to block my cousin from attacking me. “Uh, I think you’re forgetting about the Night Fury. Duh.”

“Looks to me like he let the Night Fury tell him what to do,” Ruffnut spoke up. I began to shake my head at her to tell her that it wasn’t Toothless’ fault, but he stopped me with a swift, unharmful jab to the foot. I jumped and hissed.

My eyes widened in confusion and fear of what I was suspecting. “What are you doing?!”

He gave me a strained smile despite his battle-ready position. “It is my fault. And they’ll trust you if they think I made you do it.”

I was in the beginnings of a worried, angry rejection when Fishlegs spoke up, “Woah! Why did it do that?!” We both turned our attention on him, and he looked between the two of us with a calculating eye. “Hiccup,” he began slowly, “did the Night Fury make you? Could you explain yourself better, please?” Hope rose up in his eyes. He really didn’t want me to be a traitor. And I was going to make sure he knew I wasn’t.

I gave Toothless a short glare and shook my head. In the ground, I wrote: No, he begged me. And if I hadn’t, he would have gotten out and taken the first thing in sight. I didn’t want to steal at all. And technically, I didn’t break the deal because I borrowed the net and was going to bring it back before I even ate! We were going to die!

Reading it along with the others, I couldn’t help but feel guilty. I’d let my anger get ahold of me and had ‘snapped’ at them in the only way I could. My only hope would be that my progressively-worsening handwriting would make it too hard to read.

Astrid shook her head, eyes narrowed. Snotlout let out an ‘ugh!’ noise, threw his arms into the air, and then crossed them, giving me a harsh look. Fishlegs’ eyebrows raised high into his forehead and he frowned. Tuffnut looked wary and Ruffnut shifted.

I started to get nervous when nobody said anything. They all just looked at me.

Astrid spoke up first. “Hiccup,” she held her forehead in her hand for a second, getting frustrated and throwing it back. “You really shouldn’t have stolen or ‘borrowed’ it!” She snarled, pointing an accusing finger at me.

I narrowed my eyes. We didn’t know when you were coming back.

“We had to wait so there wouldn’t be another commotion,” Fishlegs piped up, trying to keep the peace. “We took the food from our families, but if we did it all at once, they’d think that someone stole from them.”

I understand, but waiting over a week? I questioned.

“I think it’s too quick,” Astrid said. She flicked a piece of hair from her eyes. “And like I’ve said, we told you we were coming back. That was part of the deal. Why didn’t you just get over being hungry?”

Something about this made me beyond angry. Have you ever been over a week without food?! I can barely stand right now! I scratched into the dirt, face wrinkled and tail whipping back and forth. Toothless coughed behind me and I looked over my shoulder at him. It suddenly clicked that we were at the same height; I’d gone into an aggressive stance without even realizing it! I straightened out immediately and backed up a pace.

Now look at what’s happening! I thought furiously. Gods, why can’t they just listen? The hunting party will be here soon! I gave a furtive glance up towards the edge of the cliff. I couldn’t hear or see anything out of the ordinary, but it wouldn’t take long for the Vikings to find this place once they’d realized that I was still on the island and responsible for both thefts.

Astrid’s angry expression didn’t falter. She gave me a scrutinizing look. The same couldn’t be said for Snotlout; he just looked even angrier. Once I relaxed, though, he lowered his fists for just a second as he processed what I’d written. Clearly, they hadn’t thought that I’d actually get hurt from having too little food. I even thought I saw concern flash across my cousin’s face, but probably imagined it. He’d already made it quite clear that he hated me.

“But you still stole!” Snotlout protested. He glared at me. “How do you justify that?”

Fishlegs turned towards him. “He said he was borrowing it.”

Scoffing, the bigger of the two growled, “What, and you trust him? You always believe him!”

“Yes, because he’s always had reasons! The first time, he was hungry and couldn’t do anything else. And…apparently, you thought we abandoned you?” Fishlegs looked over his shoulder, a hurt expression set on his face. I began to rush an ‘it’s not like that’ explanation, but he just shrugged it off. “Anyways, the plan seemed to be to fish and take the net back before anyone noticed, right?” At my nod, he smiled. “See? It is justified.”

“No, it’s not—!“

Ruffnut casually leaned back, latching her hands together behind her neck and sticking her elbows in the air. “Whatever,” she said easily. “I get it. I’d probably do something similar if I thought I was abandoned, too.” She raised an eyebrow, and queried, “So that Night Fury begged you? To get food for yourself?”

I smiled weakly. Toothless rolled his eyes.

“I never beg,” he told me. I just made a noise of acknowledgement and pushed myself off of his shoulder. This wasn’t the time for jokes and games.

“How can you guys just accept all of this?! Astrid!” Snotlout gasped. I found myself wondering the same thing. The twins and Fishlegs weren’t the most reluctant people to trust, but this was getting a little too easy. Something was wrong.

But I just didn’t have time to ponder on it.

Taking a deep breath to stabilize myself, I began to scratch in the dirt a very short message. I knew the second I was done, I would feel awful again. If I was lucky, then they’d leave immediately and hide back at the village. If not, then they’d shoot questions at me again and I’d break down. Already I was having trouble controlling my emotions. I prayed to the gods that they wouldn’t stay.

Dad saw me.

Astrid gasped and recoiled from the writing like it was evil. Understanding lit up on her face for the first time. “That’s why you were crying.”

I winced and looked away, desperately trying to block the terribly fresh memories from resurfacing. Admitting what had happened to myself—and, essentially, to everyone else—was a lot harder than I’d expected. The first person I saw was Snotlout.

He frowned, biting his lower lip and rubbing the back of his neck. Once he noticed I was looking at him, he crumpled his nose and narrowed his eyes. “You got what was coming.”

Ouch.

Why would he say that? Of all of them, I thought he would understand! He’s my cousin, not an acquaintance!

I blinked several times in pain and shied away, using Toothless as a cover. Said dragon bared all of his teeth at Snotlout and let loose a long, steady hiss, tail whipping back and forth.

“Wait!” Tuffnut cried. “Is he coming after you?!” He spun in a circle, taking in his surroundings as best as he could.

I sucked in a deep breath and nodded once, staring at the ground. Damn it, Hiccup, don’t cry! I seethed to myself. You have to keep it together!

Still, my memories swamped me. For some reason, I could only think of the time when I was twelve and Dad taught me how to fish. He’d been so proud of me when I’d caught one all by myself. Now look—I’ve gone and become such a terrible son that he’s sent a hunting party after me! I’m dead to him, he hates what’s ‘left’ of me, and there’s imminent demise marching right up to my doorstep, but all I can think of is that one day where he actually seemed to love me—

Out of nowhere, a huge black wing draped around me and pulled me in. I looked up at Toothless, who wore a grim smile and then looked at something in front of me. Embarrassment washed over me. Get it together! Stop it!

Nudging Toothless aside, I shakily stepped away from him, ears and wings still drooping. The twins had gotten into an argument on which of the two was stupider, Fishlegs was rapidly tapping his fingers together, Snotlout had a horrified expression on his face, and Astrid was staring at me.

“What do we do?!” My cousin cried. “If they see us in this forest, we’re through! Dead! We need to get out of here!” As he said this, his eyes met mine. I perked up a little when I didn’t get an instant, wonderful dirty look.  All Snotlout did was look away, brows low over his eyes and his mouth a thin line.

“What about Hiccup?” Fishlegs looked over at me with wide eyes. “You need to hide! Or get out of here, too! This isn’t safe!”

Ruffnut and Tuffnut abruptly stopped fighting and stared at each other. In complete unison, they swiveled their heads around to watch everyone else, each wearing identical looks of fear and stepping closer to each other. Like I used my sarcasm, they’d fought as a coping mechanism. Apparently it had failed.

Astrid was the only one who didn’t panic.

“Hiccup.” She walked forward, as cool as a cucumber, and slouched in front of me. The others stopped what they were doing and watched. I leaned down to her eye level in a vain attempt to show that I really was trying. I wanted her to understand like nothing else, especially since I wasn’t sure if she would tell the hunters where this place was or not.

Astrid glared at me and growled, “You’ve lost my trust. Consider yourself lucky we now have bigger things to worry about.” She turned, hesitated, whipped around…and chopped me right in the forehead. It didn’t hurt at all—it barely felt like a tap—but that didn’t stop me from yelping and Toothless from screaming at the top of his lungs at her and almost lunging for her throat. “That’s for breaking the deal. And we’re taking the fishing net back with us.”

I nodded numbly, extending a wing to hold Toothless back. The Night Fury snorted angrily, easing into a defensive position. If looks could kill, then Astrid would be nothing more than a smoldering pile of ash. I felt like I’d just pulled a blank.

The beautiful blonde gave me one last angry, unnerved look before spinning and jogging her way over to the cove’s entrance. The others followed her, Ruffnut once again stuck holding the net. I could smell the fear of being caught radiating off of all of them—even Astrid. I didn’t blame them; if my Dad found them, especially now, with the fishing net in their possession, then they’d be as good as dead.

Ruffnut paused before leaving and cheerfully called out, “Don’t die!” She grinned widely at us and then disappeared behind the stone column, leaving the two of us alone. It was meant as a light-hearted joke, probably an attempt to make me feel better (she seemed to like me as much as Tuffnut did, but you never really know when it comes to Ruffnut.), but I grimaced at what the twin had said.

Sitting down, I let my eyes wander over to the fish basket. I knew we needed to hide, but what if Vikings went down into the cove? We’d be sitting ducks, backed up into a corner. But Toothless couldn’t fly out, so what else could we do? Even if the smooth cave that was blown into the cliffside was very high up, it would be easy for the well-trained Vikings to figure out a way to get in if they knew that both Night Furies were in there.

No matter how hard I wracked my mind for answers, it felt like it’d been beaten senseless. All I could do was stare blankly at what was directly in front of me, knowing I should move but being unable to. I’d never felt anything like it before.

Total paralyzation.

Toothless walked up behind me and gently nudged me in the side. “Hiccup,” he said gently, “we need to get going. I’m going to put the fish back in that basket and then we’ve got to go…somehow.”

I nodded. The Night Fury watched me anxiously, waiting for another reaction. I just felt too emotionally spent. I wanted to rest. One heartbreak was enough for one day, but Snotlout had to go and tell me I deserved Dad’s betrayal. Astrid was just icing on the demented, Hel-spawned cake.

Suddenly I didn’t want to be alone. I ran over to Toothless, who was nudging fish into the large basket, and sat down next to him, leaning my face into his chest. The dragon stopped and, after a moment’s consideration, placed his head on top of mine. He still felt very awkward about this whole ‘comfort’ thing.

“I’m sorry,” I managed, looking down at the food. “I know I’m being selfish. You’re right, we need to go. But…how?” I wrestled with my mind again, searching frantically for a way to save us.

“Don’t be mad at yourself,” Toothless spoke firmly. “Like you said awhile ago, it’s perfectly okay to be upset.” He finished pushing the fish into the basket and stared at it. After a moment, he gave the lid a confused, wary nudge, as if expecting it to snap like a bear trap. Very quickly, he pushed the lid over the top, and said in a satisfied tone, “There! Now let’s get going.”

I allowed a tiny smile to cross my face. All he’d done was put the lid over it, but he hadn’t flipped the latch. The fish would fall out the second he picked it up. “Wait,” I interrupted the Night Fury. “You forgot to do this…” I leaned down and fiddled with the metal latch, eventually falling back on my haunches and using both badly-developed hands to get the ring over the ridge. I’d never been happier to hear the click! of the lock pulling into place.

Toothless nudged me in the side. “Showoff,” he teased, plastering on a fake, strained smile.

Once more, I was reminded of how immature I was acting. I’d specifically told myself not to fall into a bout of self-pity, but then I’d let Snotlout go and push all of my buttons. Now Toothless was burdened with planning a nearly-impossible escape and keeping me from falling into what I just knew he perceived as a depression, all at the same time. Frowning, I stood up and shook myself real hard in an attempt to refresh my thinking.

I need to stop acting like this! It isn’t the end of the world! I thought furiously. I’m still alive, and I have Toothless, and we have food, and Astrid is still giving me a chance if she isn’t telling anyone. Dad just reacted like any Viking…he doesn’t really know that it was me. So of course he attacked me…a lot… I shook my head and stood up. No. Stop! I’ll just convince him when I can, I decided weakly.

Sometime during my internal rambling, Toothless had wandered away. He was standing a few dragon-lengths ahead of me, basket straps held firmly in his mouth, head tilted up in an attempt to find an easy way out. I trotted over to him.

“I can’t think of a way out!” He groaned. “You saw how badly I failed earlier yesterday. That mud is still there.”

“Maybe…” I trailed off, an idea lighting in my head. “Maybe we can—“

Voices began to drift down into the valley! Toothless and I whipped around to look in the general direction—the southern end of the cove with the collapsed wall—and exchanged a look of true terror. The Vikings had begun to make their way over! We were out of time!

“Quick!” I cried, leaping to my feet and extending my wings. “Get up on that tree and fly straight up towards the northern edge!” I began to run towards said cliff. Toothless did not hesitate to follow me.

He gave me a wide-eyed, fearful look. “Are you crazy?! That’s the tallest wall in the cove! And that group is huge—“

I halted and opened my wings and tailfins. “Just go with it! I’ve got an idea!”

Toothless’ ears and side-frills twitched spasmodically like mine were. There was no doubt that he was afraid for our safety, but he still nodded and began to climb the tree I’d pointed out. It was tall, not nearly the tallest, but it was very close to the cliff edge. I would have suggested the one he’d launched himself off of yesterday, but it was on the opposite end of the lake and was just too far away.

My companion raced up the bark in record time. Once he got to the top, I pushed myself off the ground with as much effort as I could, adrenaline-fueled wings pumping faster than they should have. I felt a strange, nearly painful heat run beneath my muscles but ignored it, brushing it off as my body trying to keep up with all the work I was pushing it forcing on it. Toothless spared one look over his shoulder and launched into the air as well.

I got to him at the exact moment that his missing tailfin threw him off balance and he hit the wall. Stalling midair, I wrapped my front paws around his midsection and flapped my wings furiously under the sudden weight. Gods, he was heavy! It didn’t help that he gave a start the second I’d grabbed him!

Had I come up with the wrong plan?! What the Hel was I thinking? We were staying in the air, but in the same spot! Nothing was happening!

Toothless suddenly found purchase in a tree root and shot up it until it ended, launching himself at a deep crevice. His claws failed to grip it enough, and he began to fall—but I wouldn’t let him! I reached for him with teeth and claws, just barely dragging him up the wall until he could find something else that wasn’t wet and covered in mud to hold onto. The voices were getting closer.

While I struggled to keep the two of us stabilized in the air, Toothless cried out to just hold on, we were almost there. I gratefully obliged. He pushed his wings up as far as he could without hitting me and flung them down, far stronger than I could ever dream and sending him onto a small cliff. It began to shatter under his weight. He jumped desperately into the air for anything to help him, and I swooped down to him, holding him up once more. He managed to climb onto another root and we moved up again. And again. And again.

My wings and arms were screaming in pain by the time we reached the edge. Toothless flapped his wings one last time and scaled it, hauling himself over it with ease and scrambling away from the crumbling cliff. I dropped to the ground with a pained shout, struggled to get to my feet, and ran over to him. All I could do was crumple to the earth. “That…was…too close,” I moaned, grimacing in pain from my muscles and stomach.

Toothless’ ears perked and he stared behind me with wide eyes. Dropping the basket, he anxiously breathed, “It still is! We’re visible and they’re about to come into sight! Get up!” He grabbed me by my scruff and hauled me to my feet. I hissed in pain, feeling more than a little resentful when I was ignored in favor of picking up the basket. The worried dragon looked over at me once and dashed off into the forest.

I chased after him, but before leaving completely, I stopped just behind of a fallen tree trunk that was a little bit taller than myself. Looking over my shoulder at my former home one last time, I saw a couple Vikings storming over to the cliffside. At their front was Dad, wielding his sword(!) and face bright red.

I turned and followed Toothless into the forest’s depths.

We ran.

We ran through the cool, damp forest, fear clutching our hearts, breath coming in and out harshly. I led the group and made sure to look over my shoulder every couple minutes to make sure everyone was still there. Once or twice, we had to stop to let someone catch up, but besides that we were almost constantly on the move. I was fine with it, but the others weren’t as physically trained as I was. The mud was hard to get your footing on, vines and branches wrapped around you or slapped you, you had to be a skilled jumper to move quickly. All in all, a very hard escape.

Back when we had first fled, we’d nearly pummeled straight into the hunting party. I’d skidded to a stop and bolted in the opposite direction as quietly as I could, cursing Hiccup for never telling us just how big the group was. I’d been under the impression that it was just Chief Stoick and a few other stragglers.

I burst through a bush and stumbled to a halt. Ruffnut stopped at my side, panting and sweaty. Her brother, Snotlout, and Fishlegs all preferred to stay behind me. We were standing on the cliff where we’d decided to confront Hiccup. I could just barely see the village and some smoke trails from here.

“What now?” Tuffnut barely got out. “You can’t be thinking that we’re putting that net back. I’m definitely not.”

I nodded in agreement. I wasn’t exactly sure why I’d taken the net. It was more out of spite than anything. I’d been so angry, but as that damned Night Fury demonstrated, any harm to Hiccup wouldn’t go unpunished. Those two had grown dangerously close in the past week. It worried me. I’d never seen a dragon act so protective over anything before. This added onto what I’d suspected, but hadn’t wanted to say anything about.

Hiccup didn’t seem to have noticed, but he acted very much like a dragon in our meeting. He pawed and stomped on the ground, went into defensive positions, and moved the weird things coming out of his face in several imitations of the Night Fury, to name a few. When he realized what he was doing, he’d stopped.

But the last thing I expected to see was Hiccup crying, or cowering away from Snotlout when he’d said what could be perceived as hurtful things. The thick-skulled teenager meant them as insults and nothing else; he was just too shallow to realize the depth of his words. Strangely, though, his position on Hiccup changed from day to day, and when the seven of us all met together, he usually went back into “I hate Hiccup” mode. Fishlegs had confronted Snotlout on it, but all he’d gotten was an earful of irrelevant ranting.

Slowly, unwillingly, I realized that I may have to consider that Hiccup really had switched sides. I didn’t believe the “I borrowed it” story. At all. For all I knew, Hiccup had taken it and several other things, but only got away with the net when his father got to him. On the opposite end, though, he could be telling the truth. It all boiled down to who he was now. Hiccup isn’t the same person as before. Is he more Viking or dragon now?