━━ chapter five
a bond from trust
✿✼:*ﾟ:༅｡.｡༅:*･ﾟﾟ･⭑
━━Valkyrie's words stayed with Hiccup for longer than he'd like to admit. Maybe it was because she never lost her temper like that. The only time Hiccup could ever account for something like that happening was when she pushed him off the docks and into the water. (That had been because of him, too━sounds like a reoccurring pattern). He trailed through the woods, a fish in one hand, and his shield (well, a new shield) in the other. Birds whistled, animals rustled the leaves and bushes, and his boots crunched the twigs underfoot. But none was louder than his own thoughts, a flood of guilt because of what she had said. Grow up, pick a side, and be a Viking!
Hiccup had never been a Viking. At least, not the Viking the people wanted him to be. He was a disappointment, a runt of the litter, a nuisance like a pesty bug on the dining table, needed to be crushed under the foot of a much larger creature. Hiccup felt like that bug, and the foot was his dad, or Valkyrie, or just every other Viking in Berk.
And now ... if they knew what he had done━or what he couldn't do━, what would they think of him? Grow up, pick a side, and be a Viking!
He reached the break in the boulders, leading into a small and open dwelling. A small pond sat in the middle, dazzling in the daylight. It was quite tranquil, with a few trees bristling in the cool air, a bird here or there, the sound of the water hitting the shore and drawing back, the wind making the grass bristle ... but it wasn't tranquil. There was a creature hiding amongst the beauty━a beast, they all said. But ... but Hiccup found himself arguing otherwise. He looked into the eyes of that Night Fury he was meant to kill ... and couldn't bring the knife down. He didn't know why ... but just like he chose to not kill the dragon that day, the creature decided not to kill him. They said: a dragon always goes in for the kill, but this one didn't. The most dangerous of all dragons, had left Hiccup alive.
It intruiged him━just as much as the look in the dragon's eyes as he stood over him two days ago. There was something in the beast's eyes he couldn't explain, something that made him feel like he was looking into a mirror of himself.
(Maybe that was why he was so intrigued after all).
Grow up, pick a side, and be a Viking!
Hiccup had no idea what side to pick. That Nadder would have killed him today in the ring, but this Night Fury had given him a second chance at life.
Shuffling closer to the break in the boulders, Hiccup hid behind his shield. With a thud, it scraped across the moss-covered rock, and he couldn't shuffle any further. With a racing heart, his green eyes peered over the iron brim, and couldn't see the dragon anywhere. With his free hand, he held the fish up, trying not to grimace at the slimy touch━or the smell, because there was that, too. As quick as he could, he chucked the fish over the brim, and it landed a few feet away on the grass.
He waited there for a second to see if the Night Fury would show itself. But it didn't. Hiccup peeked out again, and gritted his teeth. Forgetting about the situation of his shield, he went to move further, only to get stuck. Hiccup frowned, great. He tried again; no avail. Just great.
Realising he was just going to have to go for it, Hiccup took a great big gulp of air, like he was going underwater and crawled underneath the shield and into the opening. Trying to pull the shield free from the otherside, he sighed. Why does all the bad things happen to you, Hiccup? You had one job, and look what you did━No wonder Valkyrie got angry with you!
Spinning on his feet, he checked whether the Night Fury was anywhere close. It made his stomach squirm to not know where it was. "Oh, Thor save me..." he muttered before quickly reaching down and picking back up the fish by its gills. Gross.
He stepped out, looking back and forth, around ... This dragon was pitch black, how was he not seeing it?! The fish was slipping from his fingers, and he fixed it up with a turn-up of his nose, not realising the Night Fury watching him from above the boulder. He heard the scrape of its claws on the stone, and Hiccup spun around, his gasp getting stuck in the back of his throat.
The Night Fury reminded him of a black cat━it peered at him, moved, prowled up towards him in the same way. Its head shape was that of a diamond, except flattened with piercing cat-like, intelligent eyes. Up it's back, it had what Hiccup could describe as fins almost, leading all the way down his tail where only one flap of the creature's tail was still intact. It's wingspan was not as large as other dragons Hiccup has encountered, but they definitely worked━for a Night Fury was said to be one of the fastest dragon's alive, if not the fastest.
It landed on the grass ground, head tilted to sniff the fish Hiccup held in his hand. He felt as though his heart would crawl right up his throat, but Hiccup held his ground, and extended his arm out towards the dragon, the fish dangling from his fingers.
The Night Fury hunched up it's back━so very much like a cat. Hesitantly, it padded it's way closer, flaps at the tip of its head shivering in curiosity. As it came closer, Hiccup had a moment of realisation ... it was a boy. This dragon was a boy, just like him. It was nervous, just like him. Scared, just like him. His shoulders slumped, and Hiccup couldn't help but peer into the dragon's eyes as he opened up his gummy mouth━
His eyes narrowed back into slits, and Hiccup gasped, shuffling back as the Dragon reared again, eyeing the point of the dagger at Hiccup's hip. He frowned, and glanced down at it. Stepping further away, Hiccup carefully grasped the hilt of his dagger so the Night Fury could see. As soon as his fingers touched the hilt, the dragon snarled. Hiccup's heart pounded even faster (as if could pound faster!).
Just do it, He told himself. And so, with a wide space between him and the dragon, Hiccup quickly picked up his dagger, held it up in the air so the dragon could see and dropped it to the ground. The Night Fury narrowed it's gaze further in suspicion. Hiccup gritted his teeth, and with a hitched breath, hooked the dagger up with his foot, hopped on the spot for a second to gain his balance, and chucked the knife as far as he could into the water.
It was like someone had flipped a switch on the Night Fury. As soon as he heard the plop! of the dagger hitting the water, he sat back down on his hind legs, lowered his wings and the dragon's eyes grew so wide, staring at Hiccup it almost reminded him of a child. The flaps at the top of his head flickered, waiting patiently for Hiccup to hold out the fish again.
For a second, all Hiccup could do was stare at the creature in amazement. This deadly beast that all intelligent Vikings feared, was watching him like a dog begging for a scratch behind the ear. Hiccup let out a small chuckle of disbelief and held out the fish again. The Night Fury was back to shuffling closer, his neck extended out and jaw opened wide to take the fish. Hiccup frowned, staring at the gummy insides of his mouth. "Huh," he mused. "Toothless. I could have sworn you had━? Gah!"
Like the sound of an animal trap, the Night Fury's teeth reappeared from his gums and snatched the fish from Hiccup's hand. Throwing his head back, the dragon swallowed the carp whole.
Hiccup kept his hands close to his chest, watching the dragon gaze at him with a quiet, "... Teeth..."
Eyes narrowed back into slits, the Dragon approached Hiccup earnestly, and he gasped, staggering back, "Uh━uh━" the creature made a noise in the back of his throat, a gutteral sound; almost an intrigued purr in search of more food. "No━no━" Hiccup fell back onto the grass, and shuffled away as far as he could until his spine hit the rock. "No, no, no..." The Night Fury was so close, he leered over Hiccup and the son of the chief could see the detail in his scales, the two holes for his nostrils that huffed out hot air, and the bony brow line above his eyes that shaped down towards his nose and mouth. "I━I don't have any more!"
Hiccup thought the dragon might eat him like he did the fish, except he just threw his head back again. A frown etched on the Viking's face, watching the dragon━was he about to vomit? (Great, Hiccup was going to get vomited on by a dragon, just his luck...).
But it wasn't vomit that landed in Hiccup's lap. Oh no, he would have much preferred the vomit. Instead, the dragon had gagged up half of his lunch and handed it over to Hiccup━half a fish, all slimy, and gross, and slimy...
The dragon sat back on his hind legs and watched Hiccup. It took him a second to realise he wanted him to eat the other half of the fish. Hiccup gaped at the Night Fury, incredulous. "You don't━you can't seriously mean...?" he sighed. Great. I would have liked the vomit over this, thank you, you toothless reptile━
Toothless.
Hiccup didn't know why, but he liked the sound of that.
The dragon glanced down at the fish in his lap, egging him on to eat it, and Hiccup grimaced. But with a brave breath, he picked up the fish. Rising it close to his mouth, he took a lasting bite into the raw flesh. Oh, gross, gross, gross, gross━don't vomit, don't━
The Night Fury tilted his head, ears and flaps flickering. Hiccup nodded, trying to tell him that it tasted great when it was completely the opposite. However, the dragon wasn't finished. It swallowed━gulping, and Hiccup's shoulders slumped. Is he serious?!
Oh, Odin... Hiccup closed his eyes and swallowed. He nearly retched it up, but refused to let it escape, and swallowed it again━all of it. He shuddered. Oh, gross. The Night Fury licked his lips, as if asking Hiccup how it tasted, and so, weakly, Hiccup gave the dragon a strained smile.
The Night Fury frowned back at him, and then ... he did the last thing Hiccup would ever expect. His gums twitched, lifted ... and the dragon seemed to smile. Hiccup's breath was taken away. This dangerous creature, with his diamond shaped head and cat-like eyes, was smiling at him ... intelligent, beautiful ... Hiccup looked into his eyes, and it was like he looked into the reflection of water to see himself.
Toothless.
Pick a side, Valkyrie had said ... Hiccup had picked a side, looking at the dragon in front of him; happy and ears twitching. He picked a side, just not the side everyone wanted. He was never a Viking, at least, not the Viking everyone wanted him to be. But that was okay ... because that allowed him to sit right here, and stare back at this magnificent creature. Hiccup found himself━before he could hesitate━reaching out his palm to touch the Night Fury, and when he thought the dragon would let him, it's eyes narrowed back into slits, and he dashed away.
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━━She thought about apologising to Hiccup, which was a new and strange concept for Valkyrie to understand. But as she sat with the others, in the warmth and light of the open fire, turning her chicken around on her stick, she'd glance over to where the boy sat by himself, staring into the flames and think ... had she'd been too harsh? They had nearly died━that Nadder could of killed them. If it weren't for Valkyrie, they could have died. She was angry at Hiccup because he made everything hard, and was nothing but a liability to the rest of them ... but did that give her the right to have shouted at him like she did? He wasn't like them, he was lanky, he was sheltered━Stoick, his father, the chief, never let him be given the chance to kill a dragon. While the rest of them were given clubs as teething toys as babe's, Hiccup had been given a drawing stick. Of course, he didn't know what he was doing.
It made him a liability, yes. It made Valkyrie's job harder, yes. It angered her, yes. But did that also make her want to apologise? Yes, it did, and that worried her. That was out of character. So very not Valkyrie the Vicious. She was given that title for a reason, and it wasn't because she apologised.
Picking at her chicken wing to see whether it was tender enough, Valkyrie listened back into Gobber's infamous story of how he lost his arm and leg ... again. She's heard it like ... what? Five thousand times, at the very least?
"And with one twist," he was saying, "he took my hand and swallowed it whole!" Gobber gestured the chicken menacingly at the teenagers. Valkyrie arched a brow, sharing a quick look with Astrid. "And I saw the look on his face ... I was delicious. He must have passed the word, because it wasn't a month before another one of them took my leg."
There was an echo of breaths of awe from the other young Vikings. Valkyrie just picked at her chicken, and managed to snag off some of the wing and chew on it. As she did, her gaze returned to Hiccup who supported a fish instead, still glumly staring at the fire. He didn't seem to be listening at all.
(Surely her words hadn't upset him that much, had they? Maybe he was more of a chicken than she had originally thought).
Fishlegs eagerly tapped his two chicken legs together, "Isn't it weird to think your hand was inside a dragon?" Astrid leaned away from his moving chicken legs, shuffling closer to Valkyrie with an dubious frown upon her face. She wasn't the only one. Tuffnut stared at Fishlegs, a brow arched. "Like if your mind was still in control of it, you could have killed the dragon from the inside by crushing his heart ... or something."
Snotlout pointed his chicken angrily at Gobber, "I swear, I'm so angry━I'll avenge your beautiful hand and your beautiful foot. I'll chop off the legs of every dragon I fight, with my face."
Astrid pinched the bridge of her nose, and Valkyrie flicked her arm to stop her from kicking embers into Snotlout's face.
Gobber shook his head and snagged the wing off his chicken. "Oh, no━it's the wings and tails you really want. If it can't fly, it can't get away. A downed dragon is a dead dragon."
Valkyrie saw Hiccup frown, which caused for her to frown. So he had been listening this entire time? She narrowed her eyes at him, studying the twich of his nose ... there was something up with him ... something weird━well, weirder than usual, and it can't have been her words to him earlier today ... right?
(Right?).
Her determination to examine Hiccup and figure out all of his secrets was interrupted by Gobber, who moved suddenly and let out a loud yawn. "All right," he announced, "I'm off to bed. You should be, too━" he pointed his chicken at each of them. "Tomorrow, we get to the big boys." Valkyrie's posture straightened at those words, allowing her heart to flicker at the thought of facing one of the larger dragons. Time to prove herself. "Slowly, but surely, making our way up to the Monstrous Nightmare. But who'll win the honour of killing it?"
Valkyrie's gaze flickered back Hiccup's way, only to fall short. He was gone. He was━Oh, for the love of Odin━she looked away for what? A second and now he's gone? She blinked. What? She glanced at everyone else to see whether they had noticed, but everyone was far too busy looking at Tuffnut's 'tattoo', which if anyone had a brain could see it was just wet charcoal. Val looked back at Hiccup's empty seat, gaze fixed on the steaming, uneaten fish. She narrowed her eyes into the night, and quickly stood up. While the others were distracted, she stepped out into the night, hovering by the wooden stairs down back to the docks and caught a glimpse of a green tunic and brown hair.
She thought about going after him, wondering what on Berk Hiccup could be doing━or would be doing━if he needed to just run off like that ... she had wanted to apologise to him. Valkyrie still had time. She could catch up to him. But she didn't ... she just walked back to the fire, forgetting about the whole ordeal. Hiccup was weird. It was normal. (Yes, it was normal).
*
a/n: my updating choices are sporadic. like I just update whatever I want at this point. I'm feeling extreme httyd obsession, so I is updating this a lot ahahahah
hope y'all enjoyed this chapter.