Stone Circle Ties
By Uniasus
Number One of the Fated Universe
"Hiccup."
Hiccup sighed, pausing in opening the door to leave for the morning. "Yes Dad?"
"I have another task for you."
"Does it have to be done today?"
"Yes."
With a sigh, Hiccup shut the door and returned to the breakfast table. Toothless slumped along behind him, also not liking what Stoick had planned. Usually when the Chief of Berk gave you a task it was important and involved multiple elements leading to long nights so you can finish by the deadline. Being Stoick's child did not give Hiccup any leniency. Plus, in the three months since the defeat of the Green Death, Hiccup had become the village's go-to person. It seemed like every problem anyone had that needed fixing landed in his lap.
"I know you're working on saddles, but I think Gobber and Rancid can take care of that for awhile."
"Probably." Rancid was the village's head leather worker. While Hiccup still used his workroom in the forge to plan, he had taken to using a section of the leather shop to craft saddles. It was a whole lot easier to work where all the supplies were close at hand. And along the way, Rancid had learned how to make them too. Gobber was churning out stirrups fast enough that it took both Rancid and Hiccup sewing the leather to keep up with him.
"And with the fall snows around the corner, this is a bad time to start dragon training."
Hiccup bit his tongue about it always snowing on Berk, but his dad was right. It would be better to start teaching Vikings how to fly as the snows started melting and not as they started falling.
"You want me to help with the harvest this year?"
He hadn't been good at it in the past, and judging by Stoick's grimace he was remembering the harvester that Hiccup had unveiled last year. It seemed to throw up dirt instead of carrots like it was supposed to.
"No. I don't want that."
Hiccup sighed.
"But I think our maps are out of date, and maybe the harvest weeks would be a good time for you to leave Berk and redraw them."
Right, get the Viking who could make harvest worse off of the island now that he could fly away on a dragon. It was a thought both refreshing and not. Lately he had been treated as the town genius and while he liked getting respect it could be a little overwhelming. At least his dad's opinion of him hadn't changed completely. It was a nice piece of the normality he had lived with for years.
Still, he wasn't exactly pleased with the idea of leaving Berk. He was finally feeling important and after being surrounded by so many friendly faces the thought of being alone again made him nervous.
"When did you want me to leave?"
"Well, I was thinking a few days. You'd need time to get supplies and plan."
"Okay Dad." He got up and made his way to the forge.
"Toothless, how likely do you think you could catch food for the entire trip?"
The black dragon showed his teeth.
"I'll take that to mean 'I'm a fearsome dragon, why wouldn't I be able to catch meals?'. You just don't hunt much here because you're lazy, right?"
Toothless chuffed and closed his eyes, curling in tighter on himself. If he stayed in the corner in a dragon-ball, the Night Fury fit in the workspace for the most part. It's not like Hiccup moved around in the space, he pretty much just sat at the desk.
The dragon flipped his ears up but then lowered them quickly. Someone was coming, but no one of interest to Toothless. Hiccup guessed Astrid. She came to visit often enough that Toothless seemed to ignore her comings and goings.
"Hey," she said walking over.
"Hey yourself."
"What are you working on?"
She pulled Hiccup's sheet towards her to read the runes. "Are you planning a trip?"
"Yeah, my Dad's kicking me off the island for harvest. Can't say I blame him. Ow!"
He rubbed his shoulder where Astrid punched him. "Idiot. You've been complaining for weeks about the amount of work you have to do around the village. This here," she pointed to his calculations of food and water supplies, "is a vacation."
"A vacation? I'll be drawing maps non-stop!"
"Odin help me," Astrid said to the ceiling before turning to address Hiccup. "Did you Dad say how far you had to go?"
"No."
"There you go, you can decided. It'll just be you and Toothless on a flying adventure, how can you not see the vacation in that? I thought you were smart."
"I am! Just, not about vacations. I do better with dragons."
"So I can tell. Now, come on Mr. Vacation. Apparently a dance of Terrors got into a barrel of mead and decided to storm the Elder's house."
Astird had been right, Hiccup thought on the second day of their map mission. Flying in the skies, just him and Toothless, really was a vacation. Already he felt relaxed and thoughts of saddles and preparing for the colder months were gone from his mind. It was just the wind in his hair, the stunning views, and the random dives into the water Toothless was fond of doing. Thankfully, the Night Fury limited those to shortly before they landed so Hiccup would have the chance to dry out by sun or fire. Cold and wet were not his favorite things and after awhile his stump would cramp something fierce and throw off their flying.
They had taken to visiting the big unknown islands they came across, one or two a day as they flew. Hiccup figured that just knowing what an island looked like wasn't enough, it was also important to know what resources it had and whether it was inhabited. And by whom. They had passed many smaller islands that weren't worth exploring by land and saw dances of different species of dragons. It made sense, the nest had been huge and not even half of the dragons on that volcanic island had moved to Berk.
Hiccup had been secretly hoping to come across a new dragon species, either one not in the Book of Dragons or one that was that he hadn't seen yet, but no luck. Oh well, he was still enjoying himself.
"How about this one buddy?" Hiccup asked, pointing towards a good sized island that had a small dirt beach.
Toothless chuffed in agreement, and then spiraled into a dive to go fishing. Hiccup always had to hold his breath and close his eyes before they went underwater. He would have liked to see what was going on, but the salt stung too much. Maybe he should make some type of goggles when they got back to Berk.
They dove a few times, and on the last Toothlees held the fish in his mouth instead of swallowing it. That was the Night Fury, always looking out for Hiccup. Fresh fish for dinner, with a bit of the bread he had packed. Hiccup had packed everything in water resistant bags in case of rain, but they seemed to hold up well during sea dives as well.
The dirt beach was more muddy that it had seemed from above, but there was a cave in some small cliffs on the other side that Toothless found which worked well. While Hiccup sat in the rocky space and rubbed a salve into his stump, the Night Fury scrambled to the island's thin forest and brought back a decent sized sapling to make a fire.
Hiccup laughed as he watched the dragon try to enter the cave, but couldn't because the tree was taller than the entrance was wide.
"Silly dragon. Turn it around Toothless. Roots first."
For some stubborn dragon reason Hiccup couldn't understand, Toothless refused to follow his directions and eventually forced his way in the cave. Of course, the majority of the tree had snapped off at the edges of the cave and Toothless had to slink down to the shore to retrieve them.
They spent all of the third day on the island. It didn't take that long to explore it and Toothless was not willing to spend time with the Nightmares living on it more than he had to. Instead most of their time had been spent relaxing.
While Hiccup had been getting better on Berk with using his leg, nothing prepared him for two straight days of flying, keeping his muscles tense the whole time. Toothless had noticed his pain in the morning and had prohibited Hiccup from getting up till lunch time by keeping him pinned with a front leg across his belly. Not that the viking minded. Toothless was warm and comfy to sleep against and he enjoyed the time to sketch the birds that flew by the cave's opening.
For all the good their day of rest did they left early morning on the fourth day, flying had too much of a strong call.
The seventh morning was beautiful, the sky and ocean were the same color and when he looked ahead Hiccup could imagine the world went on for ever and once again wondered about what it would be like too keep his eyes open as Toothless flew through the water.
The seventh afternoon was anything but beautiful. They had seen the dark clouds approaching from the side, but Toothless had indicated he thought they would find a good place to ride it out before it actually hit. Instead, the clouds had moved quicker than either of them had expected.
"I can't see a thing!" Hiccup yelled into Toothless's ear, head buried into the dragon's neck. "What about you?"
The dragon whined, a 'no' if Hiccup had ever heard one.
But whether Toothless was relying on some other sense or just pure instinct, the dragon was giving non-verbal cues of how he wanted to fly and Hiccup did his best to adjust the petal with his left leg. It got harder the longer the storm went on, his bones and muscles were slow to respond as quickly as Toothless wanted and it didn't help that the wind would suddenly change directions. His entire world narrowed: the feel of the saddle against his chest and clenched in his fingers, Toothless's scales on his checks as Hiccup did his best to hold on and respond to Toothless's flight directions. There were several times he was glad of the safety line.
Hiccup couldn't really tell what was going in, he kept his eyes closed and with how the wind was batting them around it was hard to tell directions. But he could feel Toothless fighting a loosing battle and dropping altitude. There had been several sudden dropped before the Night Fury got his wings under control. Hiccup found himself praying to Loki, Tyr, Odin, Freyr and any other god whose name popped into his mind. He wasn't ready to go either of the afterworlds yet!
Something hit them and Toothless dropped again, longer than before that made Hiccup think what ever had hit them had injured the dragon. Eventually they righted, only to be hit from the other side and Hiccup was highly suspicious it was a tree. They went spinning out of control, and Hiccup felt his back collide with something so hard it had to be stone. As he blacked out, he last thoughts were at least they found land and he hoped it wasn't a long drop.
Hiccup woke up to the feeling of a soft hand on his check and the rumbling of Toothless's growl. The one that said 'I'm only trusting you because I have to and give me one good reason to bite your head off'.
The soft hand on his check couldn't be Astrid then and when he finally opened his eyes he saw a lot of red.
"Oh good, you're awake." It was a girl's voice, softer than Astrid's usually was in tone but the accent stood out to his ears. Similar to those of the vikings on Berk, but not close enough to be mistaken for it.
Hiccup groaned and closed his eyes. The light hurt.
Toothless took that as a cure to flex his wing and push the girl away before settling the appendage over Hiccup protectively.
"You beast! Just because he's awake doesn't mean he's okay! Let me get a look at him!"
Toothless's answer was a negative, but Hiccup pushed at wing weakly with a foot and the dragon uncovered him, continuing the growl he had been making before. The Night Fury's protectiveness was normally something he appreciated, but this girl seemed to have some knowledge of medicine and Hiccup had a feeling he needed it.
"Now, open your eyes."
He did and found the red head crouching over him. And he thought his father's beard needed taming, her hair was even wilder.
"Can you talk?"
Hiccup wanted to say of course he could, but when he opened his mouth nothing intelligent came out.
"Well, that will get in the way. Your worm can understand me, so I'm assuming you can too. Can you show me what hurts?"
It took a lot more strength to lift his arm than he expected, but he indicated his head, back, and the remains of his left leg.
The girl took his head in her hands, turning it this way and that and gently prodding under his hair. Hiccup winced when she pressed a spot on the back of his head. She bent him over so she could look at the wound better.
"You got a nasty cut there, bleed quite a bit, but it seems to have stopped." The girl pushed him upright till he was leaning on Toothless's side again. "Dad always says head wounds bleed a lot. He also says they can cause damage to the mind."
At that, Toothless interrupted his growl to whine.
"I'm sure he's fine. Well, the not talking bit worries me, but he understands and that's a good sign." She turned from the dragon to Hiccup. "How many fingers?"
Hiccup blinked at fist she held up. Was this a joke? She wasn't holding any up. He tried to tell her, but the pain got to him again and chocked out his words. Instead, he clenched both his fists into imitation of hers.
The girl eyed his fists curiously, most likely not sure what caused him to make them. "What about now?" She brought up her second hand, but instead of it just being a fist she had stuck out two fingers. Hiccup mirrored it, extending two fingers on his left hand.
"Another good sign!" The red head grinned, and was even bold enough to pat the dragon at Hiccup's back. "See that worm, he's gonna be fine."
Hiccup wasn't entirely sure about that. Did she just call Toothless a worm? Did he hear that right? And he was having a really hard time remembering just how he got here. Where ever here was.
"Now," the girl continued, "we need to get him back to town. I'm afraid you can't come in worm, your kind doesn't have a good reputation here. But hopefully I can fix that, convince them all that you're friendly. You are friendly, right?"
Toothless snapped his teeth, every inch a wild animal, but the girl just laughed. "Fine. You're friendly when you want to be. And you'll be friendly if you want to stay with your rider."
It sorta sounded like this girl was threatening Toothless, Hiccup thought as he closed his eyes again. That took courage, even Astrid was wary about setting off a dragon. Everyone on Berk was well aware of the power dragons had. Either this girl wasn't aware of them, or in the brief time she'd gotten to know Toothless she had learned to understand him to some extent. He wanted to ask her questions, but he sunk back into sleep to the sound of her voice explaining something to the Night Fury.
Hiccup woke up briefly later, noting he was lying on Toothless's saddle while the dragon stepped delicately. The girl rode a thick limbed horse beside them. He blacked out again.
The next time Hiccup woke, it was dawn the next day. There was a chair next to his bed, and in it was the red headed girl from the day before. She was sleeping, and loudly at that. Head thrown back over the chair and snoring.
Hesitantly, Hiccup pushed himself against the headboard to take stock of his body. There were bandages around his head, more around his torso, and his stump was wrapped in something that smelled awful. But he had to admit, he was surprised at how good his left leg was feeling. It didn't ache at all. Just his back did, and now that he was more coherent he could tell his right side hurt too. Hiccup guessed bruised ribs.
A particularly loud snort had the red head waking herself up and as she looked around frantically she noticed Hiccup was awake. "Good morning!"
"G-good morning."
"Glad to see you got your words back."
"Thank you?"
She leaned forward in her chair, turning it so it faced him better. "I was told to ask you a couple of questions when you woke up."
"Okay. What are they?"
"What's your name?"
"Hiccup. What's yours?"
"Merida."
"Well, that's pretty."
To his surprise, Merida blushed.
"Right, question two. What's the last thing you remember?"
"You mean, before I woke up in pain or the last thing I remember before passing out?"
"Before you got hurt."
"Umm...trying to stop a dance of Terrors from climbing on me while I was trying to get to sleep. Toothless was no help, he fell asleep before me."
She frowned. "You don't remember how you got to the stone circle?"
"Stone circle? Is that where you found me?"
She nodded.
"Nope. Not a clue." Well, there went all his signs of a healthy brain.
Merida collapsed back in her chair. "The healer said you might not. Apparently its common for people who have head injuries to not remember a day or two. But I bet it is was an adventure."
"Probably. I have a lot of those."
"Really?"
"Yea, Toothless and I have them all the time."
"Toothless?"
"My dragon."
"Your what?"
Before Hiccup could answer, there was a knock on the door and Merida went to answer it. In stepped a guy as skinny as he was, but a good deal taller. Between his hands he carried a tray that smelled delicious. Hiccup's stomach growled at the idea of breakfast.
The newcomer smiled at the noise. "An appetite. That's a good sign. Merida, I'll take care of our guest. Your mother is insisting you have a morning bath."
The red head scrunched up her nose, but stood up anyway. "I'll be back later Hiccup."
"Okay."
Merida came back at lunch, carrying a tray of food. Hiccup looked away from the window. He had been trying to spot Toothless, knowing the dragon was out there somewhere and probably staring into his room but the viking hadn't caught sight of him.
"Looking for your worm?"
"My what?"
"The beast you ride."
"Toothless? He's a dragon."
"Is that what you call him?" She set the tray on the side of Hiccup's bed and he saw there was enough food there for two. "Here, his type is called a worm."
"Not entirely sure how he would like being called that."
"We can find out after you eat. My mum told me I don't have to go to lessons this afternoon."
"You have a good mom. My dad is always telling me what to do." He rolled his eyes before taking the bread and spread Merida handed him.
"Dad is usually off doing something or another, but Mum has complete control over him." She giggled, releasing a small snort, and Hiccup found himself fascinated with the sound. Astrid wasn't a laughing person, usually a situation that made other people smile had her rolling her eyes in frustration. Hiccup decided he liked Merida's mom.
"What about your mother?" Merida asked before popping a hard-boiled egg in her mouth.
"She died when dragons attacked our village."
Merida frowned. "But you're riding a worm, I thought you must live in peace with them."
"We do! But it's a recent thing. Only about since three months ago."
"That sounds like a story. Tell me about it, it'll be a good memory check."
It took all lunch for Hiccup to share his story about finding Toothless, his dad capturing the dragon, taking down the Green Death, and how Berk was getting use to living with dragons.
Merida said that the healer had given him permission to go out as long as he didn't do anything strenuous, and so the red head took Hiccup into the woods telling him her story. About how her parents had decided it was time she married, and in an effort to change her fate had changed her mom into a bear.
Hiccup was sure that at the time worrying about her mother had Merida tense and scared, he had felt the same way several times this past year, but she managed to tell it with humor. Hiccup couldn't help laughing when she talked about her mom trying set up a proper breakfast and failing due to a lack of survival skills. It caused his ribs to hurt, but is was a good ache.
A crash through the trees had Hiccup looking right and then there was Toothless, bounding towards them with a goofy gummy grin.
"Toothless!"
Hiccup spread his arms open, expecting a tackle hug, but the Night Fury skidded to a stop right before him and instead rubbed his head up and down Hiccup's body while purring. The dragon had probably noticed his limp, if not the bandage around his head.
Merida laughed at the action, and Toothless glared at her, but he didn't seem to be warning the red head to not come any closer. And some point, the dragon had deemed her okay.
"You're a smart worm aren't you? You're very aware of what Hiccup needs."
Toothless seemed to take affront to being called a worm, just as Hiccup thought he would, but allowed it to pass as he sniffed Hiccup as if assessing damages.
"I'm okay, just a little banged up." Surprisingly, Toothless turned to Merida in order to confirm this.
She nodded. "Nothing broken," she said as the dragon gently nudged his ribs and when Toothless snuffed at Hiccup's head she added "He can't remember anything from the day you got here, but I think it's a good bet to say you guys were caught in that bad storm two days ago."
Toothless wuffed a yes and Hiccup scratched the top of his head, looking along the dragon's body for injuries but he didn't see anything other than cuts and scrapes.
"I take it dragon's aren't very welcome here?" It would explain why Toothless was in the woods and not the stable.
Merida shook her head. "They have a reputation for carrying off maidens and burning villages."
"Well, I can see the burning part. But maidens?"
"Maybe we taste good."
Toothless gagged. That was a no.
"Maybe the dragons here are lonely. You said they tend to stay in groups, but all the ones around here live alone."
"It's possible," Hiccup answered, thinking quickly. "I mean, the dragons on Berk took to people pretty quickly. It's almost like they were waiting for us humans to come to our senses."
"Well, if Caledonia worms are anything like Berk worms, I'm sure they're secretly sweet like Toothless." Merida stepped forward to scratch the Night Fury and within moments she had found the sweet spot that sent the dragon to the ground. She jumped backwards in surprise.
"Nah, don't worry. They all do that. It's actually good to know when they are acting up that dragons have an off switch."
Caledonia was part of a huge island. Hiccup didn't have to map it, Merida had lots of maps in the castle library and she had given some to the viking, but he still had the desire to explore it. It was slow going, Toothless was being extra careful with him and actually refused to fly for the first three days. Instead, they explored the area on foot, Merida and Hiccup riding on Toothless's saddle.
Merida was a great guide, taking them to see the stone circle they had crashed into and a tall waterfall that never dried up. Hiccup had only seen waterfalls before after a rain or a particularly fast snow melt, the water rushing over the cliffs of Berk. But this one seemed to be more of a planned event than water simply flinging itself off rocks.
"It's beautiful." Hiccup said, staring up at it.
Merida poked him in the back. "You should come back to visit, minus the crash, so we can climb it."
"You climb that?!"
She laughed, and Hiccup felt his lips turn up in a smile.
"Of course! Once a year on my birthday. It's the one day of the year where I can do what ever I want. No lessons of any kind. Then again, now that my mom and I are on good terms, I probably could find the time on other days too."
"I'll come back. It would be fun to climb. Or at least, attempt too." He lifted his metal leg into the air and waggled it. "Might have to make a new one made for climbing first. But if not, well, Toothless can fly me up there and we'll watch."
"It's a plan." And she wrapped her arms around him.
The fourth day the bandages came off and while Hiccup wasn't feeling 100% Toothless deemed him well enough to fly.
Up, up they went, Merida shrieking with laughter in time with Toothless's wing thrusts and Hiccup felt himself laugh with her. While he had always enjoyed flying, her joy was making him relive the feelings of his very first flights on Toothless. Disbelief that it was actually happening and sheer awesomeness.
Once they leveled out, Merida let go of Hiccup's waist and spread her arms out. He had a thought that if she had stirrups, she'd be standing up in them.
"I'm a bird!" she shouted to the wind, moving her arms up and down.
Toothless snorted, but Hiccup laughed and spread his arms too. "If you're a bird, I'm a dragon!" He reached behind him for a handful of Merida's hair, she fell into his back, and used the locks as imitation fire as he opened his mouth to roar.
Merida laughed, not minding the hair abuse, and Toothless decided to show off. There was a whine-bark and the dragon breathed out a fireball before flying through it.
Merida's hair caught on fire, and Hiccup and her hurriedly put it out. She was laughing the entire time, not minding the singed hair and instead used a finger tip to run over the skin above Hiccup's left eye. "Your poor eyebrow, it's gone!"
Blushing at the contact, Hiccup mummered something about it growing back and then turned around to face front again.
"Hey Toothless, how about we show her a few moves?"
Hiccup felt the dragon body beneath him sift in indication of a dive. "Hold on tight, Merida!" he called over his shoulder as he adjusted the foot pedal. She wrapped her arms around him, fingers interlacing over his heart, and put her chin on his shoulder so she could get a front seat view.
"I think you should show Toothless to the town," Merida said as they landed.
Hiccup paused in undoing the saddle. "Won't that cause mass panic?"
"Maybe. But he's such a good little worm." She rubbed her nose against Toothless's and the dragon snorted into her face. Merida laughed at the hot air. "Plus, you said you wanted to show other people besides the vikings on Berk that worms, dragons, aren't something to be afraid of. What's the worse that can happen, they make you leave? You were going to leave tomorrow morning any way."
"No, they can forbid me from coming back." Which, Hiccup thought, truly was terrible because he had grown increasingly fond of Merida, with her laughter and willingness to break the rules. He was already planning in his head when would be a good time to leave Berk and come back to see her.
Merida deflated at the thought, even her bushy hair seemed to lose a bit of it's volume. But then she straightened. "Then I'll come see you!"
"No offense, but it would take weeks by boat and to be honest I'm not even sure where Berk is from here. I doubt your parents would let you leave home for that long."
"Than, you'll just have to come and visit without telling my parents."
Hiccup looked at her. She was serious, she really wanted to see him again. "Thanks," he whispered.
Merida looked confused as to why she was being thanked, but then understood. "Well, I really like you."
Merida had suggested that Toothless look his best when they walked into the castle, so while she polished the saddle Hiccup did his best to give the dragon a bath in the river. Toothless kept side-stepping him to either catch fish, avoid the soap, or get in position to splash Hiccup with his tail. Hiccup on the other had was just getting frustrated, and walking around in a river current without the sturdiest of legs resulted in a lot of falls. Not to mention the small rapids.
He lunged for Toothless with the soap for a fourth time, but the dragon skidded away and Hiccup landed face first in the water. For the twelfth time. "Stupid reptile!" He threw the soap at Toothless's head.
The Night Fury caught it in his mouth, understanding that the game was no longer any fun for Hiccup and lied down next to him, upstream to block the current.
"Thank you Toothless," he said, bracing himself against the dragon's side as he stood. "Soap please." The bar hit him in the shoulder, and Hiccup glared at the dragon, but Toothless's chuff of laughter had him shaking his head in forgiveness.
He scrubbed the dragon's scales, using a vine to tie the soap to a leafy branch to reach the high places and in between Toothless's claws. The dragon seemed to like the attention, and when he stepped out of the river Toothless preened looking at his reflection before turning in a circle in front of Merida to show off.
"Very handsome," the red head giggled. "Saddle's all ready, should we go?"
"Might as well get it over with. Plus, I would love to get back so I can sit next to a fire." Hiccup gestured to his wet clothes and Toothless looked almost sorry.
Merida started putting the saddle on and Hiccup helped her. He hopped on and pulled the girl up behind him.
Without a word, Toothless took off.
It was hard to say who was more nervous as they approached the town and castle, Hiccup or Merida. Toothless was just his normal dragon self, able to take things in stride, but both teens were hoping for a positive reception. It would make things a lot easier.
As soon as they were in sight of the castle, Hiccup heard shots and there was movement on the upper banisters. Toothless took them for a lazy loop around the stone structure, back towards it, and Hiccup and Merida waved to the archers who just stared dumbfounded back. One of them even dropped his bow.
Merida snickered. "The wee lamb, can't even hold his bow."
"Well, we do make an impressive sight."
"You managed to hold on to your weapon when you first saw Toothless, a trained archer should do the same."
"He was tied up!"
"Still."
Toothless landed just inside the town's gate, drawing a crowd that gave them lots of space.
"Merida!" The queen yelled, pushing her way through towards her daughter. "Get away from that beast!"
"No! This is Toothless, and he's a good worm. He's not going to eat me."
Merida's father made his way towards them. "By the river, were you flying that worm? Well done Merida!"
Hiccup just gaped like a fish. He figured Fergus would have been harder to convince that Toothless was not animal to hunted and stuffed.
Merida slipped off of Toothless's back, Hiccup behind her. As she stalked forward to talk to her parents, Hiccup went to the dragon's head and started stroking his crest.
"You told us you found Hiccup in a boat wreck!"
"He flew here actually. On the worm."
"Fergus get it out of here!"
"No! Mum, Toothless is nice. I've spent every afternoon with him and Hiccup. He wouldn't hurt me. Or any of you."
Hiccup was actually impressed with how Merida worked her parents. Logic and reasoning, taking the time to address their fears. She listened to learn what was bothering them, and knew just what to say and do to soothe their protests. Astrid had said something similar once about how Hiccup dealt with the dragons, that it was a wonder to watch. And he had to agree, he liked watching Merida convince her parents.
Eventually, they both came over. Fergus at a slight jog while his wife followed at a sedate pace.
Toothless stretched out his neck and blew hot air at the pair of them, sending their hair over their shoulders.
"Can I go for a ride?" the king asked.
"Sure," Hiccup shrugged, getting back in the saddle. The king hopped up without assistance and Toothless took off. Hiccup looked down below, Elinor was looking at them with fear in her eyes but Merida was talking to her the entire time and Hiccup just knew that while it might take time for the castle's occupants to be fully comfortable with Toothless they would with time.
"Why are you wet?" Fergus asked.
Hiccup just shook his head. "It's Toothless's fault." Fergus seemed to understand.
"So, how are you going to get home?"
Hiccup paused in double checking the straps of his packs to look at Merida.
"Well, I may not remember how we got here, but Toothless does. I trust his instincts."
She nodded and as if Hiccup was a deer she didn't want to startle walked closer. "I made you something."
"It's not a berry tart you had a witch help you with, is it?"
Merida laughed. "No. It's something that will last longer."
From behind her back she pulled out a rolled piece of cloth and handed it to Hiccup. He unrolled it.
The stitching was crude, but that was okay because being able to catch a rabbit was more important than tapestry work. It was her and him, riding on Toothless's back through the forest like they had for most of his time in Caledonia.
It was the first time he had gotten a gift from a girl.
He looked up from it to thank her, only to find Merida was in his face. Her nose was just a hair from his and the longer he stared into her eyes the more he blushed. But he wasn't the only one, Merida was blushing too.
"Tha-" he started to say but was cut off when Merida planted a kiss on his check.
She pulled back quickly, looking at the ground. Hiccup caught her wrist and did something he'd never done before. Kiss a girl.
Astird was the one who always started their kisses, as infrequent and sudden as they were. And he was okay with that. Astrid was a female viking who very often scared him and he was going to stay on her good side and let her take control of the relationship.
But Merida was different and while he was appreciative of the kisses Astird gave him he had never really wanted to return them. He kissed her on the lips, quick, but enough to make his lips tingle.
When he pulled away, she was looking at him with surprise and happiness, he felt like kissing her again, but someone clearing their throat caused Hiccup to release Merida's wrist and they jumped back from each other.
It was Elinor and the queen was smiling a secret smile that Hiccup wasn't entirely sure bode well for him in the future. But with it, he got the feeling that her acceptance of him and Toothless just sky rocketed.
"Have a good trip."
"I, um, I will."
Toothless fell to his belly and Hiccup mounted. He looked down at Merdia and smiled. "I'll be back. Don't know when, but I will be."
"Good."
Toothless took a few running leaps and then they were air born.
They weren't that far from Berk when a shout had Hiccup look to his left and there was Astrid astride Stormfly, waving enthusiastically. He returned it and Astird steered her dragon to a few feet below Toothless's belly. It was as close as they could get to each other while flying without the risk of getting hit by a wing.
"How was your vacation?"
"It was awesome. Found some really cool spots and met some interesting people."
She nodded. "Wanna do a few runs through the stone spires before we run out of daylight?"
"Sure!"
They sat side by side at a fire tower that night. It had changed jobs, from a look out for dragon raids to a lookout for storms and returning ships. Not that either were easy to spot at night.
The rest of their dragon training class had been up there earlier, eating and listening to Hiccup describe some of that he saw. While he mentioned Caledonia, he kept his injury and Merida out of his retelling. He was healed with no permanent damage and Merida was a person he was still trying to sort out in his head. A person he figured it would be a good idea to not tell Astrid about.
After the others had left, Astird had talked about what Berk had been up to while he was gone. Rancid and Gobber had done well with saddles, but they wanted him to look over them. And the harvest was almost all in. He could have stayed away an extra few days.
Suddenly it hit him that this was the longest amount of time he had spent with Astrid. First flying in the early evening, and now sitting at the bonefire for a few hours. It was strange. Usually they were busy doing tasks around the village and they never had the chance to be in each other's company for more than an hour or so. It showed. The conversation had dropped off awhile ago.
Hiccup tried not to think of Merida, whose company he had kept for hours and it never had this slightly awkward silence.
"I should probably get to bed. I'm so tired from all that flying."
"Oh, right."
They climbed down the tower and Hiccup walked Astird to her door. Once there, the blonde girl placed a kiss on his cheek. "I missed you," she said and slid into her house before Hiccup got the chance to reply.
Which was probably for the better.
Because the kiss Astrid gave him was nothing compared to the one Merida gave him. And because he hadn't missed her in return.
A/N: I have no regular Internet, but I do have this lovely PDF called Encyclopedia of Celtic Mythology and Folklore I downloaded for free during one of my weekly, hour-long wi-fi. Got it for a novel I'm working on, but it's also great for writing in the Brave universe.
'Worm' is actually the Norse and Anglo-Saxon word for dragon, so technically it's one Hiccup should be using. However, Celtic cultures learned the work from the Vikings, so it made sense for Merida to use 'worm'. I wanted to show a differences in the two culture, but that they can still mesh. The Celtic culture actually has quite a history of that.
Caledonia is currently used to poetically mean Scotland, but was originally a tribal territory in north Britain named for the people who occupied the area, the Cadedonii.
I'm also say I have no idea where in the world Berk is, or potentially could be, as I wrote this with only the movies for reference. Hopefully a week to get there, with lazy flying, is plausible for you guys.