The Dragon Master Part I: Rewritten (A Httyd fanfiction)

Chapter 38: Thick tension

"Your dragon's been on good behaviour for some reason. I was expecting him to be thrashin' about and all...but no." Alvin spoke.

"That's because he that beast is smarter than he appears." Both Astrid and Hiccup cringed inwardly at hearing that arrogant voice. Even Alvin sighed in annoyance, turning his head away from them to avoid looking at the mad Berserker Chief walking right in between the two with Cutthroat and Enobaria close.

"Hope you had a nice sleep, beautiful." He winked at her. Astrid simply smirked before elbowing him in the face, prompting his guards to advance on them, Enobaria drew her sword

"Stop!" Alvin yelled, and his men soon unsheathed their weapons and placed themselves between the young couple and Dagur's men. It also didn't help that Toothless began thrashing around in his cage, baring his teeth and snarling menacingly.

"What do you mean stop? She elbowed me in the face!" Dagur yelled, pointing at Astrid while holding his nose that began was bleeding slightly.

"And she had good reason to after you threatened to rape her! So as far as I'm concerned, she's settled the score. Now, calm your men down Dagur." Alvin commanded. Dagur didn't like his passive attitude towards the prisoners. It was as if he was favoring them over this alliance.

"Do as he says, cousin. We're on his ship. We have to follow his rules." Cutthroat spoke, placing a hand on Dagur's shoulder. Dagur turned to him, and saw that his cousin was serious. "Stand down." He called out, and his men obediently lowered their weapons, while the Outcasts stayed at the ready. Hiccup, who had placed himself in front of Astrid when things got dicey, turned back to look at her. She knew what would have happened if she did that. But she wanted oh so badly to hit him and make him pay for the portion of the torture he had caused her. She wasn't sure if Hiccup was mad at her, but was silently surprised when he smiled at her, and she couldn't help but return the smile.

"You're going to pay later for that" Dagur shot her a glare. Enobaria punched Dagur's arm with a warning glare. "Let me watch over her alright? Just stop acting like a child." Dagur growled but nodded.

"Best you listen to her Dagur...Hiccup, please get to work. Enobaria watch over her." Alvin said, moving close to the female Berserker while gesturing him to the dragon.

"Go on. I'll be fine. I'm not restrained unlike last time." Astrid gave him a reassuring smile, bumping her shoulder with his. He nodded in reply, before walking to his friend who was caged up, little did the enemy know was that Hiccup and Toothless's bond allowed them to speak telepathically to one another.

"Have they been treating you well enough?" Hiccup thought.

::Sort of... as best as they can treat a dragon anyway. The same can't be said for you::

"Yeah well... I've had worse. Aside from that, we need to go to Dragon Island and get this over with."

::I know. I kept hearing their guards talk about finding it by threatening to harm your mate::

"So you can see why we have to do this." Hiccup said. "If we don't help them find the Red Death, they'll kill her."

::But that's the thing, Hiccup, I don't sense her." he replied. Hiccup's facial expression took one of surprise and curiosity::

"What do you mean you don't sense her? I thought she could communicate with all dragons?"

::She can, but for some reason I can't sense her. There are two possibilities: either she's dead, which is highly likely, since she lost a lot of blood from our fight with her days ago, and the other is that she left the Archipelago, which is very unlikely since she would never leave her home like that without good reason. The only reason I can think of is that a bigger dragon showed up, and even that is nearly impossible::