Dark Despair (Book 2: Together Forever)

Lessons and Setbacks

This time when I tried getting up it only took me two tries and I leaned against my mom for support. Okay, okay, you got this. One paw at a time. I lifted my left foot up again and this time, putting my weight against my mom, I stayed up. Okay, next paw. I did it again and again, each time putting less and less weight against her.

I fell down a couple more times and got better at getting up. By the end of the lesson my legs were shaking, "How-w do you doos this every day?"

"Practice, lots and lots of practice. I've been doing this walking thing for 20 years now. You'll get the hang of it." 

"Hows I shift back?"

"You think of what it is to be a dragon. Like this." My mom shifted back to a dragon and I fell on top of her.

I imagined my wings spreading out and the rush of air on my face and blending into the shadows and night sky. When I opened my eyes I found that I was a dragon again. 

I spread my wings and flopped onto my mom's back.

10 days later

Astrid's POV

Heather's plan had been going along nicely. We took out a couple of ships every few days and the fleet was down to about 20 ships. We'd also freed all of the captive dragons who had all decided to fly away.

We were on our sixth attack run when we realized that all of the ships had stopped and circled around the ones we were attacking.

Shoot! They've figured out our strategy. 

"Retreat!" I roared as loud as I could.

We started circling in the clouds.

"I got a new plan!" Windshear said. "Astrid, Heather, and Rowan ride Mist and Eclipse who fly just under the sightline of the ships. Then Mist and Eclipse pull up beside a window and Astrid, Heather and Rowan destroy the ship from the inside, while Stormfly, Forestflame and I distract them."

"Okay! I like it! We'll take a few days break, regroup, gain back some energy then attack again." I said.

We landed on a particularly big sea stack and rested while we still could.

5 days later

We started our attack runs. 

Rowan and Heather had entered the previous two ships while entered this one. 

I immediately started freeing the dragons. I was down to the last cage when I heard, "I can smell you human-girl." Why is that voice so familiar?

"Good for you."

"Come closer and you'll see what my might can do," I swear I've heard it before.

"I'm sure you can do that with all your chains on."

"I can still kill you." That's when I realized who it was.

"You'd kill your own fiancée, dragon? Or should I say... Hiccup."

???'s POV

I was sleeping when I started hearing growls come from outside my cage. There were blasts and chaos. "Can't a dragon get any sleep?"

A few minutes later I heard footsteps approaching and I growled at the girl, likely one of the ones who had me trapped here.

It shocked me slightly when she said, "Good for you."

I just growled back at her, she didn't know what breed of dragon she was dealing with.

And she sassed me.

"I can still kill you," I told her.

"You'd kill your own fiancée, dragon? Or should I say... Hiccup." She said as she rounded the corner. I watched as she took off her helmet, tears flowing down her face. "What have they done to you?"

I yanked on my chains trying to get to her, my mate, my Astrid.

"Astrid." I purred as she started taking the chains after me. "Look out!" I roared as Viggo entered and blew a dart at us and I whacked it out of the way with my tail.

She immediately drew her sword, but at the same moment I felt metal press up against my scales.

"Move and he dies," Viggo said. Astrid looked between us and made a huge dragon roar, the loudest I've ever heard. "Still doing that?"

"It's useful." She said and dropped her sword.

"All of your weapons," Viggo said. She frowned and removed a second sword, her axe, a knife from her arm and the blow darts she kept at her side.

Viggo looked at her and said, "Throw her in a cell, limited food and water."

They gave her the cell across from me and put my chains back on, idiots. 

They left me and Astrid alone, "So how did you survive?" And thus began our conversation.