This is where I belong ||httyd fanfic||

42. The cornation of the new cheif

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She had been deafened to the audience's applause and endless rounds of cheers, but before long they finally came back to her ear. Her senses were finally returned to her as she noticed people picking up and leaving, parents leading their children away. Even most of the dragons were going back to their pens beside the houses or going into the barn to take a well-deserved nap. The parade was over, it seemed, and people were packing up to go back to their houses and resume their normal activities.

Or so it seemed; upon closer inspection it looked as though they were passing by their homes, the crowd just moving on in one single line, not a single person going into a house. They all headed towards the Great Hall, pulling themselves up the stairs to get inside. There was something else going on, some big event that required everyone there; judging by the fact that children were allowed, it obviously wasn't business or war-related.

Astrid seemed lost for a moment, wondering what to do next. By now the others were probably wondering where she was and setting out to find her themselves. She felt she should go back and ease their troubled minds and not leave them panicking over needing to find two missing people. Her priority was Hiccup, to find the boy and bring him home, and currently there was no sign he was here...

But curiosity had gotten the better of her, this island of dragon riders and the Dragon Conqueror plaguing her every thought. There was something else going on here, something she was missing, and she needed to know what.

She hid herself among the throngs of Vikings and made way for the Great Hall herself, ducking her head down so no one else would take notice of her. She looked to the sky once more, and found that the Dragon Conqueror was now gone, as if he was never there.

'Who is that guy?' she wondered.

Astrid hunched down and kept her hood pulled down over her head, grasping the fur lined sides tightly and threatening to rip it over her head in an effort to remain unseen. She walked closely among the multiple villagers to hide amongst them like a leaf in the forest, one of the crowd, completely unseen. Despite what she had told the woman during the parade, she was a trespasser, and she had her doubts that the woman she spoke to during the parade really believed her. In such small enclosed communities where everyone knew everyone on islands surrounded by miles of open sea, it was far too easy to tell who was an outsider and who wasn't. She only hoped she could get to the bottom of whether these people were hostile or not quickly so she could get out of there without anyone noticing her.

From underneath her hood, she could see all the dragons returning to their wooden dens next to the houses, or going inside the large barns to nestle in the hay and take their nap. Some were going off to large structures all over town to get a meal or to weird stations where they rolled around blissfully in warm coals or got their backs scratched by the metal spikes. This place seemed to perfectly accommodate dragons of all kinds and cater to their every need; Fishlegs would most certainly find this place interesting if he ever saw it. But to Astrid it seemed this place was almost meant more for dragons than humans. The Dragon Conqueror had most likely planned it so: gaining the people's trust so they would have no problem while the beasts overran their village and he'd have a big enough place to house all his pets. That jerk probably had this whole village wrapped around his little finger, giving them a good show and offering protection so they would do whatever he said. He had taken control and they hadn't even known it; it seemed he fully lived up to his name as 'Conqueror.'