The snow didn't fall hard at first, but we all knew that by sunrise, there would be an inch stuck to the ground at least.
"Okay, whoever wants to can kill me now before Mother Nature does it." I said and brought out my dagger from its sheath.
Before Scruffnut reached for it, Bottonlout grabbed it out of my hand and growled, "Nobody's dying. Not tonight."
"Tell that to the snow." Salmonfoot said. "Freya's soaking wet, I'm skinnier than a stick, if anyone's going to die it's going to be either her or me."
Everyone just looked to him with an extremely annoyed look. We didn't have anything against him, but in any situation he went to the worst possible conclusion.
I just rolled my eyes at his thought. "We're almost fifteen, I'm sure we've all spent one winter night outside."
"We're sixteen." Buffnut pointed out. Once he said those words the only thing that could be heard was the crackle of the fire, and the steady wind, dropping in tenperature.
"Seriously?" Comet asked in disbeleif. "I mean, you guys always act like -"
"Like what?" Scruffnut urged him to go on.
"Uh, nevermind."
"Past that point, a dragon's flame pouch is in its stomach. If you just lay on it and it starts to get cold, their instinct is to warm themselves up, in turn keeping us warm." I explained with the help of Stormcloud who rolled over onto her stomach, inviting me to lay on it.
"Clever girl." Comet said.
"What? Did you think the daughter of the chief of the Isle of Dragons was an air head?" I said and crawled onto Stormcloud's stomach.
Everyone followed my actions and clung to their dragons. Nothing was said, we just nuzzled up to the warmth that emitted from our dragons. As the wind kicked up and stung against my face, Stormcloud wrapped her wings around me and tucked her face in the tunnel she created.
I couldn't see anything beyond her dark gray scales and her glowing lilac eyes. The wind outside began to grow vicious. It howled and whipped loud enough for Stormcloud to wrapped all four legs around my body. I could tell she was getting wary, because her eyes kept flicking outside and back.
"What's the matter, girl?" I asked in a sweet voice. All she gave me in reply was a low growl. It wasn't to me, but something outside. Suddenly, a roar, unlike ones I've heard, exploded in my ears.
Stormcloud's low growl turned into a sharp snarl. I tore through, the dragon's protective shield and burst into the open. The wind hit me like a whip and my face began to freeze. My breathing grew heavy as I made my way for the other dragons that had their wings around the riders.
"Comet! Bottonlout! Salmonfoot!Scruffnut, Buffnut! Scythe! Get your asses out here!" I called to each one of them and within seconds we were all standing in a circle.
"Any particular reason you called us out here?" Comet shouted at me over the high winds.
"I know I'm not the only one who heard that roar. " I shouted above wind.
"What roar?" Bottonlout asked.
For the second time, the roar pierced my ears.
"That one!" Everyone gave me a suspicious look. "You can't hear it can you?"
"Maybe the SeaShocker venom is still in her." Scruffnut said.
"Yeah, maybe she's going insane!" Buffnut added.
"I'm so jealous!"
"I'm not going insane!" I shouted at them. I desperately looked from some indication of my sanity. "Look at the dragons. They're terrified!"
Comet looked back to Tigerlilly who was crouched back, with a lashing tail and back to me. "She's got a point. I don't know why we can't hear what the dragons are, but better safe then sorry."
"But we can't travel through this blizzard, we'll die!" Scythe pointed out.
"We have no choice!" Bottonlout said and began walking off the shore.
Pretty soon we were all walking into the kneeling trees. They gave some cover from the trees, but even Zeus was shivering as I held him to my chest.
We walked, and on occasions I heard that roar I've never heard from another dragon kind. It was high pitched and threatened to burst my eardrums. We kept walking, until I fell.
My face stung as the snow clung to it when I dropped to my knees.
Comet was the first to my side and said in my ear, "We can't go on. We have to stop."
"We can't stop." I replied.
"We're tired and cold, we can." He argued.
"Look, what ever is following us it's either getting closer to us or we're getting closer to something." I said and used Comet as a tool to stand up.
"And how can you tell?" He asked me.
"My stomach is on fire." I replied and kept walking.
It grew darker around us and the blizzard raged on. The dragons were by their rider's sides, trying to shield them from the winds.
The longer we walked the hotter my stomach grew. I don't know why, either we were going to find something or something is going to find us. Either way, I'm pretty sure we're screwed.
Suddenly flapping filled my ears. I turned to the others who were looking up to the sky. I turned around and saw a Flightmare, glowing mystic blue in the moonlight.
Fear rushed through me as fierce as the blizzard. I looked to the others who were looking to the Flightmare. It hasn't even paralyzed us and we're already frozen stiff.
I suppose we have the storm to thank for that.
My question was, what was it doing all the way out here? Flightmare don't usually come out this far from the forest surrounding the Berk islands.
The Flightmare didn't roar or growl when it came into our presence and I know it saw us, because it looked stright into my eyes. There was nothing but urgency in its expression as it dove for us.
Just as I was about to duck down, I saw that the Flightmare wasn't looking at us, it was looking past us.
Before I had a chance to do anything about it, an ivory spike was shot into its wings.
The dragon crashed into the ground like a meteor with a horrendous cry. Snow blasted in my face when it passed me in its crash, and I instantly looked to Spike and Bottonlout. Spike's tail was now a weapon instead of an accessory. Ivory spines were shaking with fury and in front of Bottonlout.
I turned my attention to the crashed dragon, but what surprised me was that there was no glow.
Disregarding the others shouts of disapproval, I followed the trail of shoveled snow, where finally, I saw a little black dragon. It looked almost like a Skrill, but with less of an armored hide.
"Oh my gods..." I gasped.
"Freya!" Comet ran up to me and pulled me back by my arm. "Those things are crazy territorial!"
I didn't break my eyes with the dragon's as it looked straight at me. "Not this one."
Comet let go of my arm. "What?"
"Look at it, it's lost its glow."
"Meaning...?"
"Meaning it doesn't have a food source. Their food is so rare, that they have to be overly protective of it. Without it, they're just wild dragons." I explained to him.
At this point Salmonfoot had come up beside us and looked at the Flightmare and said, "This one seems scared. Strange, they're usually very aggressive creatures."
"I would be scared too, if I was just shot by a Deadly Nadder. That thing's not moving for a while." A sudden gust of a sharp wind reminded me that we were in the middle of a snow storm. "And neither should we. We have to find some shelter before we freeze"
We all looked desperately around, trying to search for something that would serve some cover, and eventually the Buffnut cried out, "There's a cave over there!"
I was almost upset that they were the ones to find a cave, but I geuss I can't not share the glory.
As the others ran to the cave, I couldn't bring myself to run away from the dragon that called out in pain behind me. I looked over my shoulder to see its pure black eyes looking into mine.
Zeus clawed himself out of my arms and up to the Flightmare. The little Terror was nearly blown off his feet in the strong winds, so he practically crawled on his belly.
The Flightmare didn't seem to know how to react. He mirrored the look in Zeus's eyes with his own.
My brain shut down for a second when I began to realize something. I struggled to walk up to the dragon, but as I did, I clenched my fists and gave it a harsh stare. I'm return it let out a warning growl and then a snarl as I got closer.
I stopped halfway.
The other half I walked smoothly as I could in a storm with a soft smile. I continued to look into its eyes as I did this, and it purred at me.
"Oh my gods," I gasped when I realized, "you don't have eyes."
"Freya!" A voice caught on the wind called to me. I looked in the distance and saw a flame in the distance.
I looked back to the dragon. "Do you have enough energy to move? The Nadder didn't give you that much poison, did he?" I asked sweetly.
The dragon struggled to get to its feet, but I put my hand on its head and it turned to me. I smiled and the dragon continued to walk on toward the cave. Zeus crawled up my leg and clung to my neck with his entire body.
When all three of us got to the cave, the other immediately reacted.
"Freya, you brought a freaking Flightmare in the cave!" Bottonlout shouted.
The dragon reacted with a sharp growl and opened its mouth. I saw blue mist beginning to seep out from the corners of its mouth and I turned it's head to me.
"Easy, girl. It's okay." I said as I looked into its eyes.
Everyone watched on in amazment until Buffnut piped up. "She tamed a Flightmare." He said bluntly. "What next? Is Thor going to come down as well!?"
"But ... how?" Salmonfoot asked in pure awe.
"Well, I learned that a Flightmare doesn't have eyes. It has mirrors instead. Like how the nurse's dragon can change moods, a Flightmare sees expressions and interprets them as it's own." I explained.
"So it doesn't have its own?" Bottonlout asked.
"I'm sure it does, but I geuss it's a survival tactic." I responded before Salmonfoot gasped.
"Of course!" He said. "If the other dragons feels hostile then it'll get just as angry as that dragon and if it sees a helpless dragon than it'll feel as if it's trapped as well and help."
"Something like that. It's only a geuss." I admitted before I felt my stomach heat up. "Something's in here."
"How can you tell?" Comet asked. "Stomach warm?"
"Yup. It wasn't the Flightmare, but whatever's in this cave." I said and stared at the darkness that was beyond the light of Spike's fire that balanced on his tongue.
"Well we can't really leave your new friend here at the mouth of the cave while we go explore, for gods knows how long. Could get hurt, or freeze and it can't move." Scythe pointed out as he watched the Flightmare collapse on the stone floor.
"Fine. We should stay here and wait for the Flightmare to move again. If not I'm blaming Bottonlout." I said and went to go curl up on Stormcloud.
"What? Why me?" He argued.
"You're the one who shot it!" Comet retorted.
"I was Spike's idea, but I aporoved." Bottonlout said and let his dragon curl around him, like a mother cat with her kits.
"Okay! Let's just all sleep. I'm tired as is." I said as Stormcloud enclosed her wings around me.
I don't remember anything that happened in that night while I was safely enclosed in Stormcloud's wings, but I did know my stomach was getting hotter and we were getting closer to something.