Disclaimer: I don't own HTTYD

A/N: I'm back! From Croatia, as a matter of fact. It was very nice, thank you for asking. Have a new story, yay! This one turned out to be more of an exposition-dump, I'm afraid. Sorry about that. Also, just so there's no confusion later, I went back and made it so Harald's imprisoned crew – and Savage – escape Berserker Island and break Adulfr out of prison.

Secrets and Lies

Chapter One

The word spread almost straightaway. Gossip and rumour and hearsay trickling down from the barbarian north, muttered about in taverns and whispered in alleyways. The men who had been there were constantly pressed for details, and they were more than happy to tell the story over and over, adding their own embellishments as they saw fit. Eventually, the only part their rambling tales had in common was that the so-called Dragon Whisperer, Hiccup Haddock, was dead.

Of course, the reaction of most people when they heard the news was "Who's dead?" A lot of people had heard of the Dragon Whisperer, but most of them thought the man was a myth. It didn't help that all of the bounty hunters who had seen him die claimed that they had been the one to kill him, usually by fighting their way past an army of dragons singlehandedly. Nobody believed Amos when he said he'd killed the Dragon Whisperer, much to his chagrin.

Even those who knew who the Dragon Whisperer was weren't sure whether to believe the tale. How could a man who commanded dragons have been killed? Then again, seven years ago they would have said the same about Drago Bludvist, and look what happened to him.

Of the ones who did believe the rumours, most of them wondered how they could take advantage of the man's death. There were all those islands full of dragons to be captured and slain or sold; the Dragon Whisperers followers couldn't keep an eye on all of their archipelago. Maybe they could even take over his home island, Nerk or whatever it was called, if enough of them banded together. That guy who had tried to invade the archipelago a few years before had disappeared from prison, so maybe they could get with him.

Hiccup's allies found out too. The chieftains of neighbouring tribes had been let in on the ruse, if only so Hiccup wouldn't have to be left out of the Althing's held on Berk. Everyone else, though, thought the man was dead, and sent Astrid their condolences. Further afield, word reached Iceland. When Isak heard the news, he was shocked…and more than a little suspicious. He didn't believe for a moment that Hiccup would have been defeated as easily as it appeared. People were so gullible, these days.

As for Mik and his friends, they were outraged. Mik protested that they had to do something, avenge Hiccup somehow. Ragnar sternly insisted there was nothing they could do…and then did his best to comfort his son when Mik complained that it wasn't fair, they'd liked Hiccup. I can't tell him the truth the chieftain thought sadly, as his son grieved. He had told Ormar, his trusted right-hand man, but if anyone else found out, the ruse to protect Hiccup and his people would fail.

When Johann overheard the rumours, he honestly couldn't believe his ears. Hiccup, dead? He fervently hoped that it was just some tall tale – it wasn't as if he was unfamiliar with those. Johann decided not to tell Klaus the bad news, if it were even true; there was no sense in worrying the poor boy sleepless over the possible death of a man he had just recently begun to admire.

Faking his own death had seemed like such a good idea at the time. That was a lie; he'd known even then that the plan had drawbacks. Still, it had been the only foolproof plan he'd been able to think of. Hiccup had been 'killed' late that spring; now, it was nearly autumn, and he had to face the truth – that pretending to be dead wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

It was too early to tell if phase two of the plan – the part where people stopped trying to capture and/or kill him – was working or not. Sure, there hadn't been any attempts since his 'murder', but then maybe people just weren't stupid enough to try and sail this far north when it was nearing winter.

The worst part had to be that he was still looking over his shoulder. Gunnhild had sent word that Adulfr had escaped his imprisonment, which meant that he might come back to Berk and try to take it over, now that his enemy was supposedly dead. Toothless had already decided that if Adulfr did show his face, the Night Fury would kill him.

"You do realise that's how we got into this mess, right?" Hiccup had snarked at him when Toothless first told him of his intentions.

*I won't risk our pack – I won't risk you – by letting that monster live. Hiccup, you know as well as I do that Adulfr has to go. Don't you remember what your dad says? Men who kill without* -

"Reason cannot be reasoned with" Hiccup finished off, "I know, but everyone has a reason for what they do. It's just that people like Drago, Adulfr and Harald have really terrible reasons for doing what they do."

*Do you seriously think you can talk him down? Hiccup, he raised an army to destroy everything we care about because we wronged him by killing one person, who tried to kill us, without even knowing Adulfr existed! This human is not sane, Hiccup. I can't believe you'd even think about showing him mercy* Toothless growled, claws kneading furrows into the dirt.

Hiccup felt his frustration rising, and realised in the nick of time that they were in danger of falling into a vicious circle. He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths, counting them. When he got to twenty, he was losing count and a lot calmer. "I'm sorry, bud" he sighed, sitting down on a rock. "I know you mean well, but even if you kill him, people will still blame me…besides, like Dagur says, it's a slippery slope. I don't want to be the sort of man who kills my enemies just because. I know Adulfr is too dangerous, and he probably can't be reasoned with…but I still…I need killing him to be a last resort, not the first one."

Toothless crooned apology and nuzzled him. *If you think you can talk him down, you should try, but if not…I don't care what anyone else thinks. I have to protect you, to protect all of us. If it helps, you can pretend to try and stop me so witnesses think I was acting out of your control* he suggested.

Hiccup chuckled a bit. "I think they're gonna be mad no matter what we do" he sighed, stroking Toothless' head. "C'mon – I need to fly!"

*Happy to oblige!* Toothless warbled joyfully, tossing Hiccup onto his back and launching into the air.

None of this was to say he was unhappy. He and Toothless could spend more time with Helena and Ebony, for one thing. Hiccup was teaching his daughter to read, and he'd even taught Toothless a little bit as well. They had begun to teach their daughters to swim in the cove lake, warming the water with plenty of dragonfire just enough to not be too cold or too hot. Hiccup was also spending time with Skulder, talking about all the places he'd been.

Berk's new resident cryptid expert; well, okay, its only cryptid expert; eventually caught on that Hiccup's 'way' with dragons was more than it seemed. Seeing Hiccup pay attention when dragons came to him and Toothless, nodding and even replying to their gestures and cries. Overhearing villagers ask him to tell them what their dragon was saying, or scold the dragon for some wrongdoing because they just wouldn't listen to anyone else.

At first, Skulder thought Hiccup must have figured out the dragon's language, but he couldn't recall Hiccup ever speaking in anything but Norse. His curiosity finally got the better of him, and he worked up the courage to ask Hiccup about it directly. After swearing Skulder to secrecy, Hiccup told him some of the truth; that dragons were telepathic, and he could understand them. When Skulder learned of his strange gift for translating, he wrote a few words in a different language. That was how they learned that the 'magic translator' did not work for written words. "Well, I'd be happy to teach you to read them sometime. Might come in handy" Skulder had generously offered.

Skulder had been given a job at the Academy, teaching dragon anatomy. He taught alongside his old friend and former shipmate Heyral, who taught classes on the care of baby dragons. The fierce warrior had once been known as 'Heyral the Bloodthirsty, scourge of dragons', but all that changed when Skulder convinced him to come exploring, five years before the war ended.

Skulder and his friends had made camp on an unfamiliar island in the south-east of the archipelago. Whilst he hunted for boar, Heyral was attacked by a Deadly Nadder. He fought the dragon and killed it, like he'd always done, only to hear a strange rustling and cheeping from the undergrowth. His curiosity got the better of him, and when he looked closer, he discovered a hollow in the rock with three baby Nadders huddled inside.

It was then that Heyral realised that the dragon he'd just slain had only been trying to defend her nest, and now her hatchlings were orphaned. Ashamed by what he'd done, Heyral vowed to defend the baby Nadders until they were big enough to fend for themselves, to earn back his honour as a Viking. That time gave him invaluable knowledge of the care of baby dragons, knowledge he now passed on to both the older and younger generation of Berk.

After eighteen years of exploring and studying cryptids, Skulder had books chock full of notes and sketches of dragon species from across the world. No-one on Berk had taken such a close interest in dragon anatomy, either before or after the end of the war. Skulder proved that dragon wings were adapted forelegs, with a shoulder, elbow, wrist and elongated 'fingers', the spars that supported the membrane. Hiccup took a particular interest in the wings, his mind immediately filling with ideas on how to design a new and improved flight suit. Not that he mentioned this to anyone at first…

"See, what fascinates me about dragons, more than any other cryptid, is that they're all so diverse and unique on the outside, and yet on the inside, they're really not that different from each other – or from us, in a lot of ways. Of course, they're also nothing like us at all – for one thing, they breathe fire."

Dragons had a fuel sac, a thick-membraned cavity between the stomach and lungs, just below the breastbone. As the dragon breathed, the fuel sac (so-called because it was filled with the fuel for the dragons fire) would be squeezed between the lungs, heart and ribs over and over, keeping up the pressure and thus the heat. This was the 'heart fire' warmth that made leaning back against your dragons chest so pleasant in the chilly winters. A third tube in the neck beside the windpipe and gullet, dubbed the 'fire-pipe', let the dragon breathe it out, igniting the fuel either from sucking in air, as Toothless did, or from a spark made in the back of the throat.

The one thing Skulder hadn't been able to figure out was where they got the fuel from. When pressed on the matter, he had shrugged helplessly and suggested, "Their food, perhaps? Or…magic?"

Whereas Bork and the other Vikings of Berk had grouped dragons based on similar abilities to form the seven dragon classes, Skulder took what he called a 'top down' approach and grouped dragons by their physical similarities. He grouped them first by the number of limbs they possessed (wings counted too), then by neck length (short or long), wing shape, and in the case of westerns, whether they had raised or lowered forelegs.

The idea was that the more traits the dragons in each group had in common, and the more traits each group had in common, the more closely related they were likely to be. Of course, it wasn't a perfect system, possibly because of various species going extinct or not being seen before they could be classified.

The largest and most diverse of the first four groups were the 'westerns', dragons with six limbs. This group included everything from Night Furies and Gronckles to Zipplebacks and Stormcutters. "I will admit, the dragons with more than one head did throw me for a while. I even considered putting them in their own group, the 'hydrans' – actually, I found evidence there were once hydras in Greece, before they were hunted to extinction by 'conquering heroes'. Still, there aren't really enough multi-headed dragons for it to be worth their having a separate group to themselves."

Then there were the two legged, two winged 'wyverns', like Nadders, Monstrous Nightmares, Skrills and Whispering Deaths. "They're called Spine-Twisters now, and they only have two wings" Hiccup explained/protested. Skulder had grinned and shown him a sketch of a Whispering Death skeleton, with a shrunken thigh bone and femur about where its hip would be. Clearly long ago its ancestors had been wyverns, so into that group it went.

The rarest group was the 'many-legged' group, the dragons with more than six limbs, from the eight limbed Singetail to the twelve limbed Firewyrm. The fourth group was the one that fascinated Hiccup the most – the easterns. Skulder had not travelled far in the East, but he had seen enough to know that the dragons there were unlike any that Hiccup and the riders had ever seen.

"The dragons of the East are worshipped by the people there. Beautiful, majestic creatures – I never had the privilege of seeing one with my own eyes, but their imagery is everywhere. I'd almost think them an entirely different kind of cryptid, but the culture insists they are dragons, so who am I to argue?"

He showed them a picture once, but a mere painting couldn't really do it justice, no matter how detailed. It depicted a sinuous creature with scales like fish, not lizards, and feet with talons like the largest hawk. A pair of antlers sprouted from its head, its wings were covered by what Skulder confirmed were feathers, and its long tail ended in a white plume of fur.

As if that wasn't enough, Skulder told them that the eastern dragons (or so he'd heard) did not breathe fire, but water. They presided over lakes and rivers, and were considered omens of good luck. "I wish I could have seen one in the flesh. I wouldn't even have wanted to study them, just to see one would have been…it's a shame you can't see them either, Hiccup."

"…Oh, well, you never know. Maybe one day I will."

When Hiccup asked about his own dragon, Skulder explained that Toothless was a 'short-necked bat-winged prowling western' – or to be more exact, part of the group characterised by having short necks (duh), wing membranes that reached from the shoulder to the hip, and all four forelegs on the ground. Night Furies most closely resembled Sand Wraiths and Woolly Howls, but they also had traits in common with dragons such as Stormcutters and Thunderdrums. "Aww, you hear that, bud? You, Thornado and Cloud Jumper are really distant cousins!"

Toothless had just looked bored at that. *We'd be like cousins even if they looked nothing like me, they're family. It's what's on the inside that matters, not the outside* he declared rather profoundly…before spoiling the mood by hacking up some half-eaten fish for Ebony to slurp up.

There were also the 'bat-winged stalking westerns', like Chin-Spikes and Snafflefangs; the 'bird-winged prowling westerns', like Rock-Tails and Chargers; the 'bird-winged stalking westerns, like Sail-Backs and Lava-Eaters ; the 'short-necked wyverns' like Spike-Tails and Lightning-Fangs; and the 'long-necked wyverns' like Fire-Scales and Armorwings. "It's the many limbed dragons that are the hardest to figure out. Not only are they not like the other groups of dragons, they don't even have much in common with each other, except that they all have more than six limbs!" Skulder had said in exasperation.

Hanging out with Skulder, talking about dragons and cryptids and all the places the older man had been, was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing, because it helped take Hiccup's mind off things like Adulfr's escape, and a curse because of his natural curiosity and eagerness to explore. Hiccup knew that he had plenty of time, he could spend decades on Berk and still have time to explore so much of the world…but when he saw Skulder's maps and heard about different cultures, different dragons, the urge would creep in to fly out and see it all for himself. There was just so much interesting stuff out there!

Of course, he wouldn't go anywhere without Toothless, and his other half had no plans to fly anywhere beyond their territory anytime soon. This pleased Astrid, who got rather annoyed with Hiccup whenever she caught him poring over Skulder's maps. "You need to stop looking at those" she chastised him, "You're gonna drive yourself mad – well, madder – when you know damn well you can't visit anywhere on that map, at least not yet."

Hiccup sighed. "I know….maybe I'm just getting nostalgic, remembering when it was us exploring the archipelago, discovering new dragons…y'know, the good old days" he remarked.

Astrid gave him an incredulous stare. "The good old-? Hiccup, you have a beautiful wife and daughter, the respect of your entire tribe, and dragons literally bow at your feet. These are your 'good old days'. These are the days you're supposed to get nostalgic over – and you're not even thirty, how can you be getting nostalgic over anything?"

"I don't think nostalgia has an age limit, Astrid. And I was kidding."

"Could've fooled me. I'm serious, Hiccup; you have everything here on Berk. What more do you want? Whatever it is you're looking for, it isn't out there, it's right" –

"Here?" he asked, catching her hand and holding it to his heart. Then he pressed a quick kiss to her knuckles. "I'm sorry, Astrid. I don't mean to…you're right, my life is wonderful, and I wouldn't give up you or Helena or any of this for the world. I promise." He sighed and confessed, "I guess I just can't help myself sometimes. You know what I'm like."

"Yeah, well, you're stuck here with us for now, so get used to it. If you want something to take your mind off your insatiable wanderlust, it's our anniversary soon" Astrid remarked.

"Oh…I knew that." She gave him a look. "Okay, no I didn't. But I do now! So, uh…do you want flowers, or something?"

Astrid rolled her eyes, muttered "why not?" and went to attend to her duties as chief, which basically consisted of walking into the village and waiting for people to come to her with problems. After she'd left, Hiccup turned to Toothless and asked confusedly, "What did I say?"

One of the downsides of pretending to be dead was that, unless they were in on the secret, Hiccup couldn't really have any visitors. Not that he'd been getting many visitors he didn't already know…He'd been hoping that someone, anyone, would work up the courage to visit Berk and talk to him and learn what dragons were really like, but it didn't look like that would happen anytime soon.

Still, it was really for the best if people believed he was dead. Then perhaps they wouldn't think he'd come after them all with an army of dragons, or worse, decide to get rid of the threat of him before he could do anything to them. Not that he had or would do anything, of course, but people did dangerous things when they were afraid; and people were afraid of dragons, and of him.

Hiccup really, really tried not to take it personally. In his head, he knew that centuries of prejudice, fear and hatred towards dragons couldn't be so easily undone on such a large scale in just a few years. In his heart, he saw the creatures – the people – who had accepted him into their midst so easily being rejected, and destroyed, through no fault of their own.

The good news was, things were getting better, slowly. As Eret and his crew travelled around the north, they helped villages find ways to deter dragons that were safer for everyone. Things like planting peppermint around the borders of sheep paddocks (1) – dragons found the scent overpowering and nauseating – or putting a few common eels in with fish catches did wonders at keeping hungry dragons at bay without them getting hurt.

Most people weren't ready to live alongside dragons, let alone ride them, but some people were slowly but surely getting on board with the idea that if dragons could be befriended, they didn't deserve to be killed. At the very least, they were worth more alive than dead, even if Hiccup didn't like thinking of them that way, as just means to a profit.

"I still can't believe I used to think like that about them" Eret admitted when Hiccup brought it up one time. "Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and punch myself. Yet, it makes sense, when you think about it. Y'know how I said I was already trapping dragons when Drago 'hired' me? There's a reason I went into trapping and not hunting – there was more money in it, long term. See, business can be boiled down to supply and demand. What kind of brilliant business strategy involves literally killing off your supply? D'you think dragon hunters ever realise that if they keep hunting dragons to extinction, they're gonna put themselves out of a flipping job?!"

It appeared that the hunters had finally gotten the message. The Crashing Tide crew first got wind of it when Aksel was in a market and came across someone selling "Dragon friendly claws and spikes! Get your dragon claw and dragon spike accessories here!"

Some careful questioning had revealed where the merchant had gotten these 'dragon friendly' severed claws and spikes. When the crew investigated, they discovered that dragons were being captured alive and 'harvested' – which meant having their claws, spikes, sometimes even a few of their fangs sawn off. The good news was that it would eventually grow back, but the poor dragons were left shaken and made vulnerable by the ordeal.

Eret and his crew shut down that enterprise, but it was only the first of many. Some might say that at least those dragons hadn't been killed, but Hiccup would say that a choice between being murdered and being mutilated wasn't really a choice at all. There was nothing 'dragon friendly' about this barbaric practice; dragons were still being treated like objects. It was all very well mocking dragon hunters, but the supply was only half the battle. They also needed to stop the demand for dead dragons, and that was having unintended consequences.

Hiccup could live with people not liking dragons. He could understand them fearing dragons. He just wanted humans and dragons to not hurt each other. Was that really too much to ask? He wished he could prove to everyone that there was so much more to dragons than they thought. Sure, they breathed fire, but fire didn't have to just destroy, it defended and cooked and warmed. Dragons could fly – if people could just get a taste of that, that indescribable feeling that came with seeing the world from above, how could they fear dragons then? If they could only experience the loyalty a dragon partner would show, how could they see them as deserving of cruelty and death?

"I wish I could let all humans hear thought-speak, let them see how you guys aren't so different from us. Maybe we should take over the world, bud. At least then we could make everyone play nice."

*I feel like that would end badly.*

One day after lunch, Astrid brought up another issue they'd thus far been avoiding. "I just keep thinking; we all joke that life and death situations are an occupational hazard for a Viking, but we can't control what happens…there's no guarantee that either of us will, y'know…and we both have a lot of responsibility. I just think we need a back-up in case the worst should happen" she explained to Hiccup, and by extension their parents.

There was a pause, and then Fredrick announced, "Well, that was a downer."

Agatha swatted him around the head. "Honestly, Fredrick! Our daughter is trying to talk to us about something very important here. Show a bit of respect!" she scolded. Then she turned to Astrid and implored her, "Don't listen to your father. He's an idiot."

"No, he's right. It isn't fun to think about this, but we need to. Hiccup, you and I both need second-in-commands to take over if either of us were to be incapacitated or killed" Astrid insisted, before rubbing her hands over her hair and complaining, "but I have no idea who that could be!"

Hiccup replied "I always thought, if the worst should happen, I'd take over as acting Chief in your absence. Isn't that what we agreed?"

"Yeah, but what about you and Toothless? What happens if you two…and even if nothing happens to you, you're not going to be here forever" she pointed out.

"Well, Cloud and Skull already do a good job as our second-in-commands, so I guess they'd take over if we weren't around" Hiccup shrugged. "I would ask Urchin, but the pack is kind of leery about the idea of him taking over as Alpha."

*With good reason* Toothless grunted. He knew that Urchin had been forced to be a tyrant, that the fault ultimately lay with Drago, but he still couldn't blame their pack – especially those who had been Urchin's former subjects – for being wary of the Sea-Giant.

"Yes, but what about you, Hiccup? If you and Toothless get killed, who's going to be the next Dragon Ambassador?" Astrid pressed the issue. It was a good thing that Selena had taken Helena and Ebony to play outside, or she couldn't be so upfront about this.

"Uh…" Hiccup hesitated, but his eyes slid towards – "I kinda figured mom would…I mean, she's as good with dragons as I am, if not more so."

"Well, sure, but your mom's old. Older! Than you, I mean – sorry, Valka, I didn't mean it like – Well I did, but" – Astrid floundered.

"Oh, don't worry about it Astrid. The four of us know we're not long for this world" Valka mock-sighed. She, Stoick, Fredrick and Agatha all chuckled; their son and daughter just blushed.

Astrid cleared her throat and explained, "What I mean is, it would probably be better if your…" she didn't want to say 'replacement'. "If your successor was younger than you."

"Well, hey, you can understand thought-speak and you're really good with dragons…how about, we can be each other's second-in-commands?"

His wife gave him a long-suffering look. "That's a nice idea, Hiccup, but we both know why that wouldn't work. What if we both got killed?"

Hiccup dropped his chin into his hands. "Well, so much for being optimistic" he said sarcastically.

"Elbows off the table" Valka chided, before adding "What about the Academy?"

"The Academy?"

"Well, you could train an apprentice from there, couldn't you? One of the students" she explained.

"Yeah…that could work. Oh, except it would need to be someone from Berk, obviously, but I don't want students from the other tribes to feel like I'm leaving them out."

"You'd have to leave all but one of them out anyway. You can't train them all to be your apprentices!"

"Yeah, I know…"

"Do you have ta pick just one?" Stoick questioned, "Why not train one from each tribe? If things carry on the way they are, damn near every tribe in the archipelago could do with their own 'dragon whisperer' soon enough."

"Huh. That's actually a really good idea, dad."

"I do have them sometimes, you know."

"Glad we got that settled!" Fredrick remarked cheerfully, "So I guess this only leaves your second in command, right, Astrid?"

"Who did you have in mind?" Stoick wondered. He felt pretty safe in assuming it wasn't him, after that 'too old' comment.

Astrid sighed heavily and confessed, "Honestly, Stoick, I have no idea."

To her surprise, it was Hiccup who suggested, "What about Snotlout?"

Incredulous, she repeated "Snotlout. Really? I think you're just trying to foist being acting Chief off on him."

"Do you really think I'd have such ulterior motives? And even if I did, he'd love being acting Chief."

"That's what worries me."

"Astrid, I'm serious. I know Snotlout and I haven't been on the best of terms since…since his father passed away, but this could be good for him. It'd be a way for him to honour his dad. Spitelout always wanted him to be Chief, this'd be the next best thing."

"You know, I can't believe I'm surprised you're saying this. Okay…so you train new dragon ambassadors, and I'll let Snotlout be acting chief. This is going to be interesting" Astrid remarked wryly.

"Just one question – what happens if Snotlout gets killed?"

"….Gustav takes over?"

"Can we please stop talking about any of us getting killed?" Agatha insisted, exasperated. "Come and help clear the dishes."

Meanwhile, half a world away in the Med, people of good intent and ill went about their business without any thought to dead Dragon Whisperers. Crops were grown, livestock raised, slaves worked, prayers recited in mosques. There was a thriving dragon trade throughout the Mediterranean; there were so many habitats surrounding the inland sea, from swamplands to deserts, and various dragons to be captured and sold to everyone from the Visigoths of Spain to the Byzantine Romans of Turkey.

There were many dragon trappers and hunters in the Med, all of whom were competing with each other. Trappers were no strangers to alliances for business, but they tended to be between crews in different parts of the world. That was how Ryker had gotten a Triple Stryke, a dragon native to the deserts of Northern Africa, from there to the far north of the Nordic Ocean.

Of all the dragon trappers in the Med, one of the most successful and most feared had to be the crew of the Tempest, captained by the notorious Spanish pirate and dragon trapper extraordinaire Nicole Stormheart. She was beautiful and dangerous in equal measure, with tanned skin and dark brown hair in thick braids, shoulder guards made from the scales of a Razorwhip and arm guards made from Triple Stryke hide. Around her neck she wore a triangular pendant, set with a single sapphire and decorated with her personal crest, a trio of azure blue lightning bolts.

One day, when her ships were docked at their home port of Barcelona, Nicole did something rather mundane; she went for a drink. At least from the outside it would be mundane, but this tavern was frequented by trappers, bounty hunters and other undesirable sorts, and she wasn't there just to get an drink or two. Nicole made it a point to keep in touch with her contacts not only in the Mediterranean, but all the way throughout the black market.

The Dragon Skull Inn was crowded, but everyone fell silent when Nicole strode inside. This was normal, and she paid her fellow patrons no attention as she ordered two glasses of wine and took them to her usual corner table. The twin Toledo swords crossed at her back sent a clear message to anyone foolish enough to think of disturbing her.

Naturally, and fortunately, the exception was the person she'd come there to meet. Cateline slipped into the chair opposite Nicole, and wasted no time with idle pleasantries. "Forkbeard is dead" she announced bluntly, before knocking back a gulp of wine as if she had just come from the deserts of Egypt and not drank for several days. Draining the glass, she quickly poured another.

Nicole took a more delicate sip from her own glass and replied, "Harald Forkbeard, I assume. If it's someone else, I'm not interested."

"No, I am talking about your old friend. It's rather old news, I'm afraid; he was killed last autumn. The good news for you is, his killer was killed just this summer" Cateline said casually, but there was a sinister smirk playing on her lips. Nicole raised an eyebrow over her glass.

"I fail to see the connection.

There was a rustle of fabric and then parchment as Cateline took out a yellowed scroll and unfurled it. The writing was Norse runes, a language neither woman understood, but Nicole knew a bounty poster when she saw one. There were a few on her, and she'd been happy to show them why that had been a very foolish idea. The man on this poster looked to be about in his early twenties, with a scruffy beard and a hard, glaring expression.

"Hmm. Kind of cute, if he weren't scowling, but he's not really my type."

"A distinction he shares with damn near every man in existence, then."

"That's not true. Is it wrong of me to have such high standards?"

"More like you're so high maintenance" Cateline retorted, smirking at Nicole.

"I can still have you removed, you know. Piss me off enough and I might just kill you myself" Nicole warned her, before gesturing to the bounty poster and saying, "So I presume this is Harald's killer, since it's obviously not Harald and you wouldn't waste my time showing me some random Norseman. Now either hurry up and tell me what this good news is, or leave, and I'll have your wine."

"So impatient. I always liked that about you" Cateline smiled. "Okay, here it is. My contact in his crew got in touch and told me that last year, they went after the bounty on this man. Apparently his name is Hiccup Haddock - don't ask – and he's become rather famous up in the north. Do you know what he's famous for?" she asked tantalisingly.

Nicole gave her a flat look and said, "You know I can't stand that game. Just get to the point, please, before you end up on the points of my swords."

"Have more wine, dear, you get tetchy when you're sober. Fine!" Cateline huffed when Nicole glared at her, "Folks up there call him the Dragon Whisperer. He has an affinity for the beasts. It's said that when he was a young teen, he ended a war between his tribe and the local dragon nest by somehow destroying a Queen dragon that was compelling the beasts to raid. They've been at peace with dragons ever since."

Nicole raised an eyebrow. "Alright, I'm starting to be impressed…but he's dead, you say, and you still haven't explained why this benefits me."

"Yeah, he's dead, but his dragon isn't, and there's two of them. They might even be a mated pair. You know how it is; in our line of work, the rarer the better, and how do you get any rarer…" Here she leaned across the table to whisper in Nicole's ear, "than a Night Fury?"

Ah! At last, Nicole was intrigued. "There's a breeding pair of Night Furies up there with the barbarians? Why didn't you say that in the first place?"

"It gets better" Cateline grinned, "Harald and his men captured this Haddock guy – for all of a few hours – and they also captured one of his allies, the chief of another tribe, who just so happened to ride a Triple Stryke."

"You don't say?" Nicole murmured, draining the rest of her wine. "Well then…it looks like my crew and I are taking a little trip up north."

(1) Metal poles in the ground, covered in leather to insulate them, topped with a bowl filled with soil and wild mint. Raising the plants makes it less likely the dragon will simply dive down to snatch a sheep, and ensures the sheep can't accidentally graze the protective plants.