Chapter 4

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(A/N: Surprise :)! I dedicate this chapter to you, nlilystar, because you were the first one reading, voting and commenting it :) Thank you for that! It keeps me writing to see someone enjoying it! I hope you enjoy reading this chapter! ^^)

3rd Person POV

It rose from the ground, covered in dirt and leafs. Opened its eyes and looking to a redheaded girl behind his master and pal. “Toothless!” A joyful yelp came from the young man as he jumped up and down. Both couldn't believe their eyes. Merida, because she never saw a real dragon and Hiccup because Toothless has never ever looked so dirty. Toothless rushed towards him, ready to knock Hiccup over. He didn't mean to, he's just happy to see Hiccup feeling OK. “Whoa! Stop! Don't jump! Please Toothless don't knock me down, now. Just sit down.”, Hiccup advised him with his hands raised up high. He cocked his head and did as he was told. Finally Merida resolve from her rigidity and looked into Toothless's eyes. “What a wonderful green hue.”, she whispered, moving a step closer to him. 'She's not thinking I'm insane...', Hiccup hoped deep inside. Merida wanted to pet him, but he was covered with mud and branches. Hiccup smirked at the sight of Toothless, messy and not even caring about it. Lifting her dress, ready to rip more fabric, just to clean Toothless, made Hiccup laugh. “Please, don't ruin your dress even more.” She snickered and ignored him, ripping off a huge piece of cloth, which was basically like half of her petticoat and handing it Hiccup. “C'mon, don't make me rip it out for no reason. Take it and clean him!” He hesitated but took it after all. “It would be probably everything she had.”, he thought, which was wrong because she wasn't the 'lass living on a farm' like Hiccup thought. But of course she didn't told him yet. He wrapped the cloth over Toothless's head, which reminded Merida of a maid and she blew up laugh-snorting and fell on the ground, holding her stomach. She was actually kind of cute in Hiccup's eyes and Toothless's was, in Merida's, too. While Merida finished laughing, on the ground, Hiccup cleaned Toothless's head and face. If there only was some water nearby. He flung the dirty rag over his shoulder, flicking some mud to Merida. A streak of mud landed on her face, making a splashing sound, and, all of the sudden, she stopped laughing and looked to Hiccup. With the sound of the splash he turned around to see what it was about and couldn't hold back his urge to laugh. She wasn't mad or angry, she was surprised. Simply surprised. She started laughing and stood up moving towards Hiccup. “C'mon, pal. Let's go to the river to get him cleaned.” A slight side effect from all the laughing made her giggle while talking to him. “Well, and me too, since ye throw dirt at me. Let me just get Angus.” Hiccups face turned into something Merida interpreted as shocked, and he overreacted a bit by saying, 'he didn't meant to' and 'he's so sorry'. Seems like someone isn't into sarcasm. She patted his chest laughing. “Calm down, it was a joke. I'm not angry.” She turned with a flourish, making her skirt lifted and moved circles around her waist. It made Hiccup's blood run into his cheeks and he was happy that she won't see him blushing. It was kind of embarrassing, in his eyes, even though she was stunning. Merida made her way to her Scottish Clydesdale horse Angus to take him with her. As she got close to him, he sniffed on her quiver again. “Oh right!”, she realized and rummaged around in her quiver for an apple to give it Hiccup. Maybe he's hungry after all. But, what actually happened to him? Merida did not know. She moved backwards, away from Angus, to make sure he wouldn't pilfer the apple right away and turned to Hiccup with a smile. In the background, Toothless smiled his wide, toothless smile at the sight of the apple. She started to talk about how she put the apple in her quiver for later and how she thought about Hiccup being hungry, but before she even noticed, Toothless threw himself over Hiccup and piloted the apple in his mouth, using his long, sticky tongue, causing Hiccup to land in the mud. Again. But he was lucky enough not get his face in the mud. Hiccup struggled to escape under Toothless but failed and tried to relax somehow. Merida's facial expression was a mixture of disbelief, sympathy and curiosity. It was an apple, hard and steady, and Toothless had no teeth, as Merida finally saw. Which explains the name. Toothless. Anyways, he nibbled as much as he could until he gave up and gulp it as a whole. After that, he smiled. It seemed like he would give his best toothless smile for her, to impress her. She grinned and pressed her fingers on her lips, trying to control herself. “Toothless, please!”, Hiccup finally growled as Toothless moved away. Merida helped him up and giggled as she saw the amount of mud all over his clothes. “Now ye need to wash too!” He lifted his arms and playfully asked for a hug, to give her some of his mud. She started laugh-snorting and held her stomach and he shrugged with a grin. “No way! My Mother's probably gonna kill me! And it's my fave dress. I don't want to get it dirty.” after a few seconds of laughing she took a deep breath and went to Angus “So when it's your favorite dress, why did you torn up your petticoat so much?”, Hiccup asked cheeky. 'Did he just sassed me?', were Merida's thoughts as she giggled and guided Hiccup, Angus and Toothless to the river nearby. Hiccup was impressed by everything she would do for him. He is a complete stranger and she just ruins half of her petticoat for him. “It's just a petticoat. I'll get a new one.”, she explained while moving trough the trees. Hiccup stretched his arms while walking. “I guess I owe you something for your help.”, Hiccup chuckled while scratching his neck. He knew he owe her something, but he wasn't sure what to do, yet. I thought rushed into Merida's head as all of then could already hear the splash water and see the clearing trough some trees. Merida's lips formed a small grin as she thought about something he could do, and turned red like a tomato by just imagine the way she would have asked. If she would have been brave enough right now, she would have turned around, she would have made a big step towards him, would have pressed her hands against his chest and she would have whispered “Let's go on an adventure.”, leaning close to his face. But she wasn't. You could see her fighting the strongest man in DunBroch, but not doing, what she just imagined. 'Maybe later. If I know him better.', she mumbled quit for no one to hear, trying to hake the blush in her face disappear as fast as it rushed. She softly hit her cheeks a few times, mumbling something, to get back to reality again, out of her thoughts. Good thing Hiccup was behind her, he didn't even noticed a single, damn thing. Lucky Merida. She hurried through the trees into the blinding sun, getting her face touched, with a warm and pleasant breeze by the wind. Surprised by her sudden hurry, Hiccup and Toothless followed her and glared amazed to the clearing in the forest, listening to the river. What a beautiful place. Grassland with flowers and river, stones, sizes from pebble to rocks, everything was there. Merida heard an impressed 'wow' behind her and turned to Hiccup. “Hurry! Get Toothless into the water. The mud will dry, in the sun.”, she informed him sheepishly and at that time, when she saw the full of him, she noticed his missing foot and that 'thing', he has now. She hoped not to sound like her mother. Giving orders and stupid advices, duh. Hiccup, still astonished by the beauty of the nature, rounded by Merida, gave her a light smile and did as she pleased. But as soon as Toothless saw the river, he ran towards it and caused a big wave of water to crash into Merida's face. At least the mud in her face was gone. She pushed her wet hair out of her face and looked to Toothless who seemed to have great fun in the river. He rolled on his back like a happy puppy or something. Hiccup felt ashamed of what happened to Merida and went to her with a face which practically said “I'm sorry” just by looking into it. “I'm sorry! I didn't know he would do that... I guess I owe you twice.”, he stuttered, blushing red and scratching his neck. What was this feeling? Merida felt like jumping in his arms, resting her hands in his neck and forgive him everything was the only right thing to do. She sensed a tingling feeling in her belly but she had to control, she felt the blood rushing in her cheeks. His face was touched by the sun and his hair blew slightly in the wind. “Ah.. uhm its OK. I guess the shock was bigger than everythin' else. I mean, its just water, it won't hurt. Well, only if ye drown, but the river is not deep enough to drown in.. anyways... uhm.”, she gabbled on. This was awkward, but Hiccup didn't even realized it. He's not to judge, he has no experience with girls like Merida. “I will just lay into the grass and dry... ye go wash yer self and Toothless!”, she said eagerly to make this moment less embarrassing and turned around to search for a sunny spot. Hiccup snickered soft and shrugged as she turned around. He couldn't help it. Did he had a choice? Not really, duh. 'She is gorgeous, even when her hair is wet.' was the thought running trough his mind while moving towards Toothless. He was so excited and waited for Hiccup to come to lick his face but Hiccup slipped and found himself on his butt, sitting in the river. Merida observed his action and laughed before she made herself comfortable and sat down in the grass, trying to doze while the sun's warmth dried her. The flow washed the dirt off Hiccups clothes and Toothless tried to catch something in the river with his mouth. “You are hungry, aren't you?”, Hiccup asked, standing up slowly. “Com on, you just ate an apple.” But, as if Toothless wasn't listening, his mouth was filled with some water and several fish. Hiccup couldn't do better than laugh and pet his head. “Let's get you clean.” Toothless peeked to Merida before swallowing the fish and water, and smile his toothless-smile to Hiccup. He enjoyed Hiccup cleaning him and listened as he mumbled something. About Merida maybe. Toothless got curios and moved his head against Hiccups, signaling, that he should talk to him. “What? You didn't listened to my mumbling, did you?”, Hiccup ask confused and got confirmed by a nod from Toothless. Hiccup sighed and turned to Merida, who doze in the sun, waiting to dry. Should he tell him? Toothless can't talk, so he wouldn't tell her anything, but was it worth? He wasn't even sure, they are strangers, but nice strangers, to each other, why would she like him? Toothless cocked his head and looked at him expectantly. “If you could talk, you would probably say something like 'Tell me! I wanna know! Do you like her? I like her! She's nice! But, tell me what you mumbled. PLEASE!' Am I right?”, Hiccup chuckled and Toothless frowned. Well, it looked like frowning. Hiccup made sure she wouldn't hear him, or at least assumed she wouldn't. He got Toothless out of the river and sat down on a sunny spot, far away from Merida. He noticed how big the clearing was, at that moment. Toothless sat behind him and started rolling around a bit until Hiccup frowned and Toothless stopped. His wide green eyes looked curios to Hiccup. Hiccup sighed again and started to whisper: “Look... I was just talking about, how this could actual happen. I mean, look at her and look at me! I'm... well, me and she is gorgeous, beautiful, kind, a bit sassy and she is just lovely! This must be a dream, it's too good to be true, that I meet a nice girl, and she helps me and she sacrifices her petticoat for me and you to get clean. And we don't even know each other.” He stopped and looked to the ground. His face formed into a sad expression. Did he even noticed this himself? That he is sad? “But I think, we should go back to Berk as soon as possible.” Toothless made a loud, glum twirping sounds and rose his head to the sky, waking Merida out of her doze and made her sit up. Hiccup frowned at him but he kinda felt the same. He wanted to know her better but how should he? And he owes her something for her help. Merida looked around for the noise and saw Toothless and Hiccup sitting near the river but far away from her. Was he afraid of her? She stretched her arms up high and gave a joyful moan into the air. Hiccup turned around, nervous if she heard him. Her dress was dry, for the most part, her hair was shaggy and fuzzy but still wet at the ends. It was fuzzy before, but not that fuzzy. He didn't thought it looked bad, he just thought it was worth mentioning. She made her way to Angus and went to Hiccup and Toothless after this. She was getting hungry and asked Hiccup, with her Scottish accent, if he would like to come to her place and get something to eat. His face lighted as he thought about food. He was pretty hungry too. “But...”, she started, “ye can't take Toothless. He has to hide here in the woods. Sorry... but the people around here aren't used to... dragons.” She looked to Toothless and apologized. He didn't even know why. Hiccup frowned but he was so hungry. Should he leave Toothless here? A place he doesn't even know? “Oh! My home might not be, like you probably imagine. And on the way, I would like to hear the story about ye. Like, how ye came here, or somethin'.”, she added sheepishly and blushed a bit. How could he say no to this face? “Alright. Sorry buddy, but promise me, to stay at this clearing. We will be back... uh I.. I will be back.”,she said and the last sentence made Merida giggle a bit before she added “No, no 'we' is fine.” Toothless nodded and sat down to show, he understood and won't move. Hiccup petted his head and turned to Merida. She waved goodbye to Toothless as she entered the forest to guide Hiccup and Angus to her castle. And something in Hiccups face made him think a little thought, making him nervous, very nervous. “Wait, did she just asked me for a date, by inviting me for dinner?”

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