Key:

Normal speech

Thoughts/emphasis

Dragonese

Telepathic communication

Chapter One: Never Hide Anything from Astrid

Welcome to Berk – again. By now, you should know most of what needs to be known about this place. You know, Meridian of Misery; North of Hopeless; South of Freezing-to-Death...all that jazz. Prone to dragons, like me, Berk is one of the liveliest islands in the Archipelago. Oh, I'm Toothless, by the way. Berk is also one of the toughest places to live, seeing as the food is tough and tasteless and the weather is not particularly ideal. Then again, we're talking Vikings here – it's an occupational hazard. Oh, speaking of hazards...

THUNK!

"OI! Watch it, will you?"

"How 'bout you come over here and try to deal with a dragon's toothache?!" Gobber the Belch yelled at a passing Viking who'd nearly been hit on the head by a flying tooth from the Deadly Nadder he'd been tending to. Gobber had been Dragon Dentist for about a year now but he was still prone to causing accidents he refused to admit responsibility for – this tooth incident was the fifth one this month.

"Gobber, it might be better if you took things a little more gently," Stoick the Vast sighed as he was passing by. Gobber let the purple Deadly Nadder go, now toothache free, and rolled his eyes.

"We're Vikings, Stoick," he reminded the chief. "I'm not entirely sure if 'gently' is even in our vocabulary." Stoick chuckled – his old friend could really be comically sarcastic at times. "Anyhow, I've been waiting for Hiccup for over an hour now – where's he got to?"

"He's been as jumpy as a rabbit in the springtime recently," Stoick explained. "I honestly don't know what's gotten into that boy..."

"OW!"

Stoick and Gobber winced as Mulch passed the Chief's House by the Great Hall only to have an old sword hilt land on his head as it came flying out of the top floor window. The sword hilt wasn't the only thing to be thrown out – moments later a helmet, the Book of Dragons and even some tunics came falling to the ground. Stoick shook his head – just like he'd been saying seconds ago. He walked back over to the house to hear a familiar nasal voice repeating the same phrase over and over again.

"Where is it? Where is it? Where is it?" the voice mumbled.

"Uh, Hiccup?" Stoick called. Inside, a gangly teenager with dark auburn-brown hair, forest green eyes and a spring-loaded prosthetic left leg glanced up from looking through the chest in his room at the sound of his father's voice.

"Huh...DOUCH!" Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III yelped as he dropped the lid on his head and stumbled around his room for a bit before tripping down the stairs and landing in the fish basket...again. Stoick winced and headed indoors to help his son out.

"Hiccup, are you alright?" Stoick frowned, helping his son to his feet. Hiccup recovered from his brief concussion and headed outdoors.

"Yeah, yeah – I'm fine, Dad," he replied. "Whatever it is, I'll be right with you. There're just a few things I need to do first: the dragons' food needs to be changed, sheep at the back of the barn need to be rotated...oh, and then I need to head out with Toothless to make sure Mildew's not planning something else with the Outcasts to get the dragons off Berk and therefore leaving us vulnerable to attack. Okay...okay..." he recited at top speed, heading in the direction of the dragons' stables. Stoick noticed his son wringing his hands – their relationship may not have been the best over the years but Stoick never missed a thing when his son was nervous. Not to mention he'd done his spot of spying on the Outcasts and Mildew merely the previous week!

"Son, you still haven't found that ring yet, have you?" he sighed.

"NO!" Hiccup cried, exasperated. "And I've got to make the proposal official today – I can't find it anywhere!" Since randomly letting slip his true feelings for Astrid Hofferson in the middle of a battle with the Outcasts six months ago, Hiccup and his then-girlfriend-now-fiancée had been hand-fasted to marry when they turned sixteen. Hiccup had spent the last six months working on Astrid's engagement ring himself (as well as his own). He'd taken so much care into it that it had been reshaped countless times to make sure that it was the perfect fit for Astrid except now he'd mislaid it somewhere and had no clue as to where on Berk it was.

"Don't worry, Hiccup," Stoick comforted, placing a hand on his son's shoulder. "Very soon, the entire village will be celebrating the engagement of their future chief. It will be a momentous occasion for everyone." At this, Hiccup cast a cynical glare at his father.

"You remember I wanted this to be a private thing, Dad?" he reminded him. Given all the attention he already had as a hero nowadays, the last thing Hiccup really wanted was an engagement party. Unfortunately for him, pretty much everyone else in the village disagreed, especially his older sister, Valkyra.

"Yes, right," Stoick nodded, not really listening. "Of course. HAS ANYONE FOUND THE RING?!" he bellowed, nearly deafening his son again. Hiccup swore to the gods that he was the only Viking on Berk who didn't have hearing problems and he wanted it to stay that way. Most of the village knew of Hiccup's crisis, save Astrid who had actually been kept in the dark about the whole thing (miraculously, given some of the Vikings' tendency for letting important information slip). Almost every villager was searching a different part of Berk.

"It's your turn to search in there!" Tuffnut Thorston snapped by the barn, shoving his twin sister, Ruffnut, towards the entrance. However, she did a rather fancy move where she grabbed her brother and managed to shove him inside the barn instead. To be honest, Hiccup could see why no one had volunteered to search there – it had been by his dad's request and the fact that Ruffnut and Tuffnut had been causing trouble with the livestock again that had landed them that job.

"I searched in there the last time!" Ruffnut snapped back as her brother fell into a water trough.

"Well, I'm going by the ladies first procedure!"

"And I'm saying I've already been!"

Hiccup rolled his eyes and facepalmed – seriously, give the twins a task that doesn't involve blowing something up with their Hideous Zippleback, Barf-Belch, and there was no way they would get it done even if you gave them a whole year...which Hiccup didn't exactly have right now. Fishlegs Ingerman flew over on his Gronkle, Meatlug, seconds later.

"Sorry, I couldn't find it at Thor's Beach," he shrugged apologetically. "But there we go, keep looking." Hiccup had highly doubted that the ring would be too far from the village anyway but it had been worth a shot. A black dragon covered in silver-white markings with a sparking forked tail landed close by, mounted by a girl who looked a lot like Hiccup with the exception of her having two feet and a golden-green left eye that looked a lot like a dragon's. This was Valkyra Horrendous Haddock II, Hiccup's elder sister and also the Dragon Shifter – the human incarnation of the Goddess of Dragons. To everyone who knew her, she was known simply as Kyra.

"Well, it's not at the Rookery," she explained, dismounting the Star Backed Night Fury. "Windwalker and I checked everywhere." Again, it had been worth a go – Hiccup had gone to the dragons' Rookery multiple times for some peace and quiet whilst making the ring. Hiccup's cousin, Snotlout Jorgenson, arrived shortly afterwards.

"Found it!" he crowed after exiting the Great Hall. Hiccup ran over excitedly.

"You found the ring?" he grinned. Unfortunately it turned out that Snotlout hadn't been looking for the ring and had instead found his dad's old hatchet – why it had been in the Great Hall and no one had noticed it before now was anyone's guess. Hiccup groaned and went back to search the forge. "Great – this is just great. This whole engagement's now gonna be totally screwed and all because I can't find that stupid ring!" he cried, folding his arms in frustration and not noticing his sister walk up behind him.

"Hiccup, look under your foot," she suggested, indicating her younger brother's prosthetic. Hiccup turned around and glared at the girl in the eye. Initially he hadn't even been able to keep eye contact with her after Alvin the Treacherous had shot her in the eye six months ago and her forest green left eye had been replaced by a golden-green Night Fury one but these days he was used to it. It was when both eyes went dragon-like that people had to worry about her.

"Don't be stupid, Kyra!" he growled. "The ring is not under my foot!"

"Would you just look?" Kyra insisted. Hiccup groaned and obliged – it was times like this that he missed being an only child.

"See? No ring," he pointed out, keeping his balance by leaning on the workbench. "Just a spring-loaded prosthetic."

"Exactly," Kyra nodded. "And that's the only thing Astrid needs to know who she's engaged to, with or without that ring." Hiccup sighed – his sister was right.

"I'm sorry, Kyra," he sighed. "It's just...you know it's not been easy. This is the one time I've been able to show confidence of some kind...OW!" he exclaimed as Kyra clapped a hand over his head.

"Two words for you: useless romantic," she joked, running back out of the forge into the village.

"Kyra!" Hiccup cried after her. "Not helping!" A roar sounded from the skies and a pink and yellow Monstrous Nightmare descended to the village from the direction of the forest. Mounted on the Nightmare's neck was a girl around Hiccup's age with black hair woven into a side plait and pale green eyes. It was Heather, a close friend of the teens and an honorary member of the Riders of Berk ever since they helped her free her parents from the Outcasts. Kyra had been introduced to the girl merely a few weeks ago and was already fast friends with her.

"Hey, guys!" Heather called as her dragon, who she'd named Newtsbreath, landed. "Guys! Guys! Okay...well, I've got some good news and I've got some bad news."

"What news?" Ruffnut called from the stables, now having her brother in a headlock. Kyra was actually mildly impressed at the twins' multitasking skills – heck, even she couldn't hold someone in a lock of any kind and still be able to hold conversation with someone else. Heather dismounted Newtsbreath and ran over to Hiccup, fishing something out of her pocket.

"Good news is I found that ring you were looking for, Hiccup," she smiled. Hiccup's face lit up.

"Heather! Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!" he grinned, tucking the gold band into his pocket. "Where did you find it?"

"That would be the bad news," Heather grimaced, indicating the forest. She gave Hiccup a small frown. "She's waiting in the Cove." Hiccup froze.

"Damn..." he muttered. He turned to Kyra. "If I don't come back out in half an hour, send Toothless in," he pleaded. Kyra rolled her eyes. This was only to have been expected. Even so she nodded her agreement.

Hiccup slowly made his way through the trees towards the Cove. He'd really hoped that he would be able to avoid this but, knowing who he was dealing with, he should have guessed that his chances of keeping the whole thing a surprise were slim at best. Reaching the Cove, he braced himself for the beating he knew he was about to get and headed down into the Cove to see a Nordic Blonde with storm blue eyes and holding a double-bladed axe glaring at him so hard that if looks could kill, Hiccup would be six feet under three times already.

"Hey..." he mumbled. Astrid Hofferson didn't say anything and continued to glare at him. "I...uh...wasn't expecting to see you here..."

"How long did you think you could keep it from me?" Astrid growled. Hiccup avoided eye contact. "Did you think I wouldn't notice?"

"Uh...well, I...what are you...I don't know what you..." Hiccup stammered. Astrid's glare deepened if that was even remotely possible so Hiccup gave up the pretence. "Okay, I hoped you wouldn't."

"Considering that you've barely spoken to me in the past six months and the entire village has avoided me for at least three weeks I think I'd know something was up," Astrid pointed out. Hiccup sagged. "Even Heather knew! Admit it – you knew I'd find out sooner or later."

"Yeah, well, I'd hoped it would be later," Hiccup groaned, bracing himself for a punch.

"Spell it out," Astrid demanded. "What have you been hiding?" Hiccup's hand unconsciously drifted to his pocket. "Thought so. You were pretty set on hiding that thing from me." Hiccup's green eyes widened.

"What? You knew?!" he spluttered. Astrid gave him one of her knowing smirks. "How am I supposed to make anything a surprise if you keep being five steps ahead of me?!"

"Because then I don't have any fun watching you panic," Astrid replied smartly. Hiccup's jaw dropped.

"You hid the ring?!" he exclaimed. Astrid raised an eyebrow. "Man...!" He didn't get a chance to say anything else as Astrid socked his arm. "OW!"

"That's for keeping me in the dark," the Nordic Blonde smirked as Hiccup rubbed his arm.

"Am I always going to have to put up with this?" he asked, exasperated. "Because you know, Astrid, I really..." His sentence was cut off as Astrid kissed him. "Never get used to that..." he finished sheepishly. Astrid smiled warmly.

"Kyra's right, you know," she grinned, turning to leave the Cove and head back to the village. "You really are a hopeless romantic."

"Why do people keep saying that?!" Hiccup cried, raising his gaze to the heavens.

It's finally here! Sorry it's taken so long for me to get this out - this story is going through a re-write (I found the original to be fairly poor, personally. Main plot's staying the same) but I hope it's been worth the wait.

By the way, you may want to read the prequel to this story: How to Speak Dragonese before reading this one, namely because of the backstory for my OC, Kyra, and also explain the lead up to this story. I'm not going to give a summary of the story for spoiler reasons but I would highly recommend reading How to Speak Dragonese before this story.