AN:- ONly real plot bunny I've had going for a while.
For Everything Else
Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III was dying.
To his people it was inconceivable; to his friends it was a tragedy. The dragons responded by flying around the village spewing fire and wailing in a way that none of the residents of Berk had ever heard. The town threw themselves into mourning for three straight days, a marked change from their usual activities. His closest advisors began the arduous process of trying to find his successor while his sons and daughters all tried to get out of the duty.
In the entire village, only one person did not throw themselves into misery and wailing. Astrid Haddock simply accepted that he would no longer be able to leave his bed, and so set up a large chair right next to him and stayed there night after night. She sponged his brow when he was hot, massaged his stump when it ached, and spoke to him when he was awake.
It wasn't fair, she decided as she watched his chest rise and fall irregularly. It was all thanks to Hiccup that the Vikings were even able to live to a ripe old age, and now he was suffering the effects of it. He wasn't the first Viking to die of old age, thank the gods, but that didn't make it any easier to watch. She wiped droplets of sweat from his brow and sighed, wishing he at least looked peaceful in sleep, but it was clear he was having nightmares.
She leaned back into the chair, groaning as her back protested the movement. She wasn't young herself, and she felt it more every day. She had always thought that she would go first, probably gloriously in battle, but the years had dragged on, and slowly she had found it harder and harder to get out onto the battle field. Eventually she had realised that it was time for her eldest daughter to take over, a responsibility Fel had accepted with no small amount of glee.
Toothless was outside the house, looking increasingly forlorn. He had led the dragons in their first circle of the village before returning and folding himself into a little ball at the entrance to the house Astrid and Hiccup had shared for nearly fifty years. It had once been the blacksmith's, Astrid remembered suddenly, back when Stoik had still been the leader of their tribe, and Hiccup had wanted to have somewhere to share with his new bride.
She had been such a girl back then, and he such a young boy. She so certain of herself, and he so uncertain. In the years that followed they had almost reversed their roles, as Hiccup began to know himself more and more, where Astrid found herself increasingly at sea. At first it had been simple things, finding that she wasn't the greatest dragon expert in the village, then trying to make her own mark after she had become 'the girlfriend of the son of the chief.'
When they had been married it became even worse. Suddenly she was faced with the duty of preparing to become the wife of the chief. It would be her duty now to produce children, enough to guarantee a long and healthy line of Haddocks. She still wanted to be leading their troops into battle alongside Hiccup and Toothless, not confined to the village while the old women nagged her about how to bring up children right.
Meanwhile, Hiccup had gone from strength to strength, in more ways than one. He had finally grown into his body, his lanky arms and legs growing to fit his hands and foot, finally getting rid of his gangly uncoordinated charm. She almost didn't recognise him some days, when he came in after a successful flight and swung himself off Toothless, stomping across the village with a confidence she had never known him to possess. His arms had filled out, he had finally been able to learn a weapon, and when they went into battle he wielded his hammer like Thor himself.
When Stoik had passed on to Valhalla he had carried himself like a true Viking, and assumed leadership without complaint. He had told Astrid later that night that he only had two things he wanted to achieve. He wanted to turn Berk into a real town, with proper trading and a fine array of artisans, not just warriors. The second thing, and this he had only confided in her in a whisper and after rather too much mead, was that he would never treat any of his children the way his father had treated him.
No matter that he had managed to reconcile with his father, no matter that they had shared many happy times since then, he still wanted to be better to his own children than his father had been to him. She had never known that about him, despite five years of marriage at that point. That was how it always was with Hiccup. He revealed things about himself slowly, and usually only when drunk. The day he had offered, completely without prompting, that he loved Fel more than life itself was the day that Astrid knew she would never love anything as much as she loved her husband.
She watched his chest rise and fall, wishing she could stop the horrible sound of his breath rattling low in his chest. He didn't get sick; it just wasn't how he did things. She had never known him to falter, and it had been over thirty years since she had even heard him complain about anything. Ever since the day he had lost his foot he had clammed up almost immediately, and not once complained about his problems out loud.
She brushed a hand over his forehead and was shocked when his eyes fluttered open and fixed on her face. "Wow, you're really beautiful."
She smiled, but he must have seen something in her eyes because he reached a hand up and laid it over hers, "Y'know, you really shouldn't smile when you're not happy. What's wrong Astrid?"
She shrugged, "You're causing a lot of moaning in the town again," She told him.
He smiled weakly, "Yeah, I've had a lot of practice at it."
"No Hiccup," She found she was suddenly determined to make him realise just how much he had meant to the dragons, to the tribe, to her. "You've made us happy, happier than we would have been. Happier than any Viking has ever been. All it took was," She gestured vaguely, "Some of this."
"You just gestured to all of me," He grinned, and for a single beautiful moment the years drifted away and he was smiling that goofy smile while his eyes sparkled with hope.
"Well I'm your wife; I'm in charge of all of you."
The smile faltered as he winced at some new pain and they were right back in the old bedroom, Hiccup old and ill on the bed in front of her. "How's Toothless?"
"The grandchildren are looking after him. No one knows what he's going to do if you don't get out of that bed soon."
"Well I think you'll probably find out soon enough." He winced again, and she was shocked at how blunt he was being. "Tell him thanks will you?"
"Tell him yourself."
His breaths came shallow in his chest and he was staring at her face like he wanted it to be the one thing he took with him to the halls of the gods. "Sorry Astrid, I didn't want to leave you alone."
She leaned in close and thumped him, very softly, on the forehead, "That's for leaving me," She whispered, trying to hold back the powerful sobs that were starting to wrack through her body. She moved down and kissed him.
She had kissed him a lot, and in so many different ways. She had kissed him like a wife, in front of the village as they married. She had kissed him like a chief, when he had achieved glorious victory, and so many times she had kissed him as a lover, when they had been alone together with the fading light of the forge and Toothless mysteriously deciding he needed to be on the other side of the mountain all of a sudden.
But not this time. She was no longer the chief's wife, she was no longer the dignified elder woman who would soon go out and announce that the chief had joined his fathers. She wasn't even the great love he had known since he was a boy. She kissed him sweetly and innocently, barely more than a peck but carrying behind it all the years they had had, and all the years more that they should have had. She kissed him and for the final time they were children.
By the time she pulled away his chest no longer moved and his eyes had closed, his fingers limp in her own. She managed to hold herself together long enough to say one final thank you to him.
"And that's for everything else."
AN:- Have you ever had something that you thought was a really good idea, but then when you tried to actually write it it turns out really badly? This story was like this for me. I had the idea right after watching HTTYD for about the hundredth time and starting writing immediately. BY the time I got about halfway through I realised I really didn't have the skill to give this anywhere near the emotion it needed.
Ah well, I hope you enjoyed it despite my lack of skill.