Fire and Ice
The people of Berk might have discovered Hiccup's powers over winter and deemed them harmless, but it seems that the boy's troubles are far from over. An unseasonable and unpredictable heat wave hits Berk suddenly, and Hiccup is forced to wonder whether he isn't the only one out there with unexplained abilities.
Chapter 1: Alone Time
A/N: Well, for one, I decided to write a sequel to Gift or Curse. Obviously. This idea occurred to me as I was actually planning out my HTTYD2 fic, 'Shudder'. That one is quite angsty, and this one shall be no different, I promise. I promise the next chapter will be more eventful. Please read and review!
Hiccup Horrendous Haddock awoke with a start in his darkened, freezing cold bedroom, soaked in sweat, his blanket discarded upon the floor. There was a very good reason as to why the room would have been so cold to anyone other than himself; ice coated the floor, walls, and door, surely sticking the side of the wooden door to its frame. A feeling of shame stole over him as he glanced around the wintry room, realizing what he must have done. It was not uncommon for him to have nightmares; he had them nearly every night, in fact, but this was the first one that had been so terrifying that he had unwittingly used his powers and it was also the first one in which his father had appeared.
He sat upright in bed as he thought of it, pulling the blanket back up onto the wooden frame with him. His father. The man who had never lost an opportunity to beat him, to berate him, had constantly reminded him to "conceal, don't feel". As the familiar phrase floated back to him, Hiccup glanced down at his hands, seeing the tinge of bright blue only now beginning to fade from his palms. He had iced the room very recently, then.
Knowing he was going to get no more sleep when thinking of the one man who had never failed to terrify him, Hiccup kicked the covers off, thawed the room as easily as if he had been doing it for years, and made his way downstairs carefully, as it was dark and he didn't want to light a candle. The ice, it appeared, had not only covered his entire room, but it had trailed out a bit through the crack between the bottom of the door and the wooden floor, because winter remnants lay in glittering trails all along the landing, a bit of snow on the stairs. Hiccup removed this as well before continuing on, putting one hand on the wall to keep himself going in the dark. Daybreak must have been near, the sky was a bit lighter than it would have been had it still been the dead of night, and there was no reason for him to give sleep another fruitless try. He was not getting much sleep these days; the constant barrage of endless nighttime terrors made it rather difficult to relax.
The worst part was that, every night, they were different, so he never quite knew what was going to happen that night when he lay down to sleep. He yawned, wiping at his tired eyes and reaching the tiny kitchen of his lonely, empty house and collapsing heavily in one of the chairs, resting an elbow on the table as he peered out at the dark blue sky.
Though he was loathe to admit it, Hiccup not only detested the nighttime, he loved the daytime, specifically the days in which he had company. Though his father was gone, his habits of isolating himself were proving difficult to break, and he was rarely ever the first to strike up a conversation with somebody. He lived for those times when he heard an unexpected knock on the door and found it was Astrid, or Gobber, or simply one of the villagers coming to call. With summer officially gone, autumn upon them and winter fast approaching, many people were already beseeching him to either give them a nice, cold winter or "for Thor's sake, don't freeze anybody!"
Hiccup rather thought that Mrs. Hofferson should have remembered that her daughter had unfrozen in the end, but he bit his tongue; it was, after all, his fault that she had frozen solid last summer, and he deserved whatever people threw at him for that.
The deep blue changed to a light purple, growing paler and paler the longer he sat there, until at last, he stood from his chair and once again regretting his loss of sleep, he walked into the living room and reached the front door.
Although his father had been gone for a few months, he still found it hard every morning to walk out, to remind himself that he wasn't forced to stay in here anymore. He glanced down at the fur gloves his father had once tried to convince him to wear, and shuddered, checking surreptitiously over his shoulder to convince himself that the man wasn't anywhere near. Although he knew that the ex-chieftain of his island was long gone, and that he was very close to inheriting the island himself, once his uncle, Spitelout, felt that he was ready, the nightmares always made the boy feel on edge and jumpy. Fumbling with the door, he at last managed to pull it open, walking out into the weak dawn light, as the sun had not yet risen.
As Hiccup had expected, nobody was out much yet; a light breeze was stirring the air, but not much else was happening. He opened his hands, inspecting his palms again, still with the odd blue tint, though it was much less noticeable now that it had been quite a bit since he had last used his powers. He looked up at the sky once before heading into the forest, where he knew the trees would block it out. This was his reason for getting up so early, and getting out before anyone else was even awake: the alone time. If Hiccup didn't get up at such an hour, he would never have had so much as a second on his own. He was constantly getting hassled by Spitelout, who seemed to think that every hour of the day should be devoted to learning how to be a chief – not to mention the highly unusual factor of his uncle teaching him, instead of his father, the way it should have been. And, when he wasn't working with Spitelout, little kids were swarming him, begging to see his powers, to give them just a little bit of snow so they could have a snowball fight, or make a snowman. Hiccup found he never had the heart to refuse, and often ended up playing with them, at least until Spitelout caught them again.
He reached the first few trees of the forest, quickening his pace now, jumping over tree roots and cracking twigs, taking a path that he knew well. The path to the private little cove he had once loved to visit, before his father insisted on keeping him shut up all the time. Before the chieftain had told him he was dangerous, a monster. Hiccup's serene smile faded when he remembered that, but he pushed it away. He had thought too much of the bad things this morning, and now it was time to focus on the good. Squeezing in between two enormous boulders, he emerged into the clearing and, without waiting for anything, without pausing to appreciate the beauty that he had admired a million times before, he raised his hands, flexed his fingers, and brought forth his power.
The glittering snow fell obediently, coating the fresh green grass in pure white powder. He slid down a bit farther, giving the rocks a covering of frost. But the best part was the one he saved for the very last. This was his favorite time of day, the time when he felt truly free to use his power, without fear of hurting anyone or being beaten for it. He ran to the edge of the lake, took a deep breath, summoned the power and ran out onto the water, effortlessly supporting himself with ice sheets in the shape of snowflakes. Hiccup ran around the length of the murky green lake in this manner, freezing the water and turning it the same pure, sparkling white of the snow and frost. The ice cascaded down, below the first covering, freezing almost all the water within. If he fell, there would be another layer of ice to catch him, thicker and stronger than the top.
Hiccup went skidding across the shiny white surface before he managed to catch himself, sit down on the frozen, snow-covered grass, and manifest himself a pair of skates, made entirely of the ice he would be skating on, which would assure him extra balance when he stood. Pushing slowly forward with first one skate, and then the other, Hiccup found it to be easier than the last two times he had tried this, both of which he had promptly fallen over. It was easier to stay upright this time, and by the time the sun had risen for real, he had only fallen down once. He picked himself up off the ice, dusted himself off and skated over to the other edge of the bank, vanishing the skates and replacing them with the boots he had fashioned for himself just that summer.
Breathing deeply through nose and mouth, he once again climbed to the top of the rock formation, squeezed in between the boulders and started back towards the village, the sky brightening steadily above him.