Hope you enjoy!
I really don't know what i'm even doing, if that hasn't become clear enough from my other stories and just sdjfbalskdjfbsdjk...
I'm so sorry ya'll. I'm seriously just...?
If there's anything you're just not sure about or you're just not a fan of, let me know! (Nicely please. Because i'm a delicate flower. And I cry. Easily. A lot...)
But yeah...Oh lawd...I can't believe i'm doing this to myself again...

Quick suggestion! My writing seems 50% less crappy when you listen to the 2nd movie's soundtrack while you read.
Oh, and a happy Christmas to all of you lovely people!


"Come on, Skullcrusher! Keep on at that pace and we'll miss out on the match, boy!"

Eret, Son of Eret, former dragon trapper, now honorary rider and member of the stubborn, stoic village Berk, laughs as he vaults deftly over a fallen log, lands on his feet with a solid thud, and then continues dashing on downward through the moss and the brush and the forest towards the stadium, the beginning of Berk's brisk winter air stinging his cheeks as he goes.

It's been one year.
One whole terrifying, wonderful year since the last time he'd been up and down this mountain with only his dragon at his side. And the thing is, he'd been quite a...different man then.
He'd been a black sheep- soiled hands, stained name, with no earthly idea that he could or, indeed, would ever get to...here.

But, oh, the journey's been lovely.

And now?
Well, now...

"Just this last stretch!" Eret shouts jubilantly.
And the overwhelming sense of simple life in his lungs makes his entire body thrum with energy.

Come rain or shine, dragon and rider have been training every morning all this spring and summer.
And today's dragon race, it's got his entire life staked on it.

Well, that may be a bit dramatic, he supposes with a chuckle.
Most people wouldn't call a wager for a week's worth of stable cleaning duty a 'life-or-death' stake.
Then again, Eret thinks, just now recalling the sheer amount of Skullcrusher's waste alone, some might...
He grimaces at the very thought, but, just as suddenly, he cheers again, knowing for sure that the deplorable task will be going to some other unfortunate viking this time, and he will be the one to decide who.

After all, he is determined to win.

And with her as his former mentor, he knows that he can.
With her, he can do anything.
By gods, he'd fought tooth and nail to earn the right to say so.

And now, because of his persistence, because of her grace, here they are: just moments before he'll, once again, fight for even more of that favor so, weeks down the line, when he asks her a question, she'll grant him one more undeserved kindness...

One that is worth at least as much to him as her forgiveness had been, if not infinitely more.

And this time, he knows a clumsy, self-composed song won't be enough.
Oh, it would for her, he's sure. Because she is...she, and is used to giving so much. So now it's time for her to get- to get everything she deserves, even the things she hates to admit she wants.
Celebration. Festivity.
And just a touch of dramatic flair.

For Eret, however, that means that for the next fortnight or so, he'll need a distraction while he groups their friends together and pieces together some kind of plan.
And so, in the end, it all, very unfortunately, rides on making her clean up piles and piles of dragon dung.
He hopes she'll understand at least, when the reason comes to light...

Because the reason?...
Gods, the reason.

He can't even think it out in straight words, and at the mere, vague idea of what's to come, there's a lurch in his stomach.

But, Eret, oh, he loves it and feeling another surge of strength pulse through his blood with the nerves, he pushes on, shouting for a dragon that has fallen so far behind by now, it is completely absent from view.

"Skullcrusher!"

He spares a single glance behind him and from there, comes a dissatisfied snort.

The ground shakes as an enormous, horned beast, reflecting a hundred different shades of green and orange and red, comes tramping along, charging, breathing heavy as he tries to catch up with his rider.

Eret laughs once again and he's just about to feel sorry and call it all quits when suddenly, the enormous horned creature lunges for him and-

"Argh!"

Eret finds himself hoisted up and flung over the creature backwards with the help of one very sharp horn.

Wonderfully enough, this doesn't scare him anymore.

And instead, as solid ground grows further and further from his view, Eret merely shifts his body over and settles in the saddle proper with a grin.
"Alright, old boy. I s'pose we can skip a run just once." he says. "But don't think you're getting off tomorrow!"

They lift and push into the open, endless blue and Eret let's out a whoop at the top of his lungs and they fly.
Skullcrusher loops and he dives and he darts into the very sun and oh, it's a kind of freedom Eret can't believe he's ever had to live without...
The air is so sweet and the feelings are so real and it's-...
Why, it's bigger than life...

It's still only the second best feeling in the world.

The first is what comes now:
When Skullcrusher finally touches down just in front of the keep beneath the arena.
When Eret dismounts, cheeks flushed, still breathless and high on adrenaline.
When standing there waiting, with her back turned towards him, is the familiar figure of her.

Even from behind, he recognizes the dark hair, the fur hood, the relaxed stance...And there's the dragon, too, of course.
The beautiful black Nightfury, the one that senses his presence before its rider does and begins hopping and rolling about excitedly in the dirt beside her.

At the commotion, she starts to turn too, but Eret grins and with a confident swagger in his steps, he catches her waist before she can for the one thing he does loves most- a simple kiss.

He tugs her flush against him, feels her blush, the romantic music swells and then-...

"Gah!"
He topples over backward in the grass.

That...That isn't her face.

"Eret." she rasps in greeting.

And that isn't her voice.

Something is wrong.
Very, very wrong, but this stranger only smiles at him serenely, and that is bad but even worse is when the unfamiliar face in front of him begins to shift and change and morph from one unknown into another and it's beefy and stubbly and black-haired and then thin and long and then blonde and then dark and scarred with cold eyes and then it's all of those things and then none of them and then-

At once, it stops changing altogether.

Slowly, a thin body, a new face, a combination of all the ones he knows, rises into being before it hunches over and sticks itself right into his personal space. And...

"Eret! Hello?" a terrifying harmony of five voices shout.

He shrinks, cowered on the ground.

But the stranger frowns, eyes glinting mad and only goes in closer.

"Eret?"

"..."

"Eret."

"..."

"Eret! Can you get a grip and WAKE UP ALREADY!"

Smack!

Eret, Son of Eret, jolts awake with a violent gasp, a cold sweat running down the defined muscles of his bare back.
But, when he finally gains enough sense and he squints around and sees the familiar interior of Althea's home, he realizes it was all only a dream and sighs.

Well that was terrifying.

Absently, his hand passes over the empty sheets beside him, still warm to the touch from another person's presence.
And then, he finally starts to smile.

It was terrifying, but not real.

He laughs for getting so worked up.

And then, now that his morning scare has passed and he's gotten in a few good chuckles, he's groggy and tired and dazed once again and he falls back in bed with a soft groan, rubbing at his mysteriously smarting forehead.

...

Smarting forehead?

...

Oh no...
A morning call as rude as this one can only mean one thing. But right now, he'd rather just sleep in and so, perhaps a little distastefully, his eyes peek open again and flicker to the bedside and-

"Aghhh!"

He hurriedly lurches back, and sure enough, five very familiar faces crowd his vision, each of them grinning cheekily and tittering amongst themselves as if they're in on some big secret.
Immediately, Eret grabs for the quilt and yanks it up to his neck. And not just because he's basically naked.
(Goodness knows they've barged in on him enough over the months and they've seen all this before.)

It's just, this time, there are a few...rather telling red marks on his neck and shoulder that he'd prefer they not know about.
He's just beginning to redden at the thought of them, but thankfully, they don't notice.

They're all much too excited about something else, in fact. And right as if on cue, Astrid Hofferson herself pushes between a snickering Tuffnut and Ruffnut, plants her hands on her hips, and chimes with a grin, "Today's a special day, Eret!"

His dream- really, just a memory of the week before (well, minus the chilling end, at least) comes back to him full force just then, and a breathtaking spark lights in his chest when he remembers.

Still, Eret tries to seem perfectly calm when he jokes,
"Special enough to disturb an innocent man's rest?"

"Uh. Special enough for us not to mention the garden that's blooming love bites all over your man chest." Ruffnut mutters, snickering under-her-breath.
Tuffnut mimes vomiting and Fishlegs giggles behind a dainty hand and Snotlout only waggles his eyebrows and flashes Eret a thumbs-up.

So they'd seen after all.
Eret blushes. All the way from his ears down to his bare bottom down to toes.
But ignoring all of that, Astrid only sighs testily,
"Special enough," she says pointedly. "to motivate us to take time out of our busy schedules to help you. So come on, get dressed already!"
She gives him a spirited laugh and tosses him his shirt, which had somehow last night, ended up on the floor clear across the room.

Gods, Eret thinks in embarrassment. The room is littered with evidence.

Still, he hopes that Astrid, at least, won't comment on it, and he almost thinks he'll get his wish, too, as she waves the rest over to wait with her in the living room calling, "We've got a lot to do, Eret!" over her shoulder.

But then, she stops short.
And the viking side-eyes him and can't help but seem to crack a grin as she adds, "Although, I think you might have done enough already."

At that, the surreptitious giggles erupt into full-on peals and snorts of laughter and as the five of his friends roll around and slap each other and guffaw out loud, Eret can only sit there and try to fight the blush in his cheeks.

But when the laughing doesn't let up...

"Alright, alright." he says over them. "I think we've delved into my private life quite enough for one day, thank you very much. And- and anyway, it isn't what you think."

"Sure. Whatever you say, Eret."
Astrid shoots a wink as she leaves.

"You might wanna put on some clothes next time?"
Tuffnut snorts as he goes.

"Or don't. 'Don't' works just fine for me."
Ruffnut grins. She blows him a kiss.

"Wha- But, babe, I lift yak for you." Snotlout whines, trailing after. He flexes. "Bam. Oh, yeah. See that? All muscle."

"Yeah? Well, I got you that new saddle you wanted." Fishlegs boasts, body-checking Snotlout out of his way. "It'll add plus one to speed! And, with tons of convenient pockets for storage, you..."

Once they're gone and the door is shut behind them, Eret groans.

"Gods take me now..." he mutters aloud, burying his face in his hands.

But then, he begins to laugh instead.

Because he had, in fact, won the dragon race of sometime past.
And for forcing his friends for awhile to think and talk of nothing but today? A little teasing isn't unbearable punishment.
As a dragon trapper, he'd certainly endured worse.

A lot worse...

As he pulls his old woolen vest over his head, Eret pauses to run a finger over that fading brand, his last reminder of the man he used to be, burned into his chest so long ago.

And there are still times when he is uncertain; times when, in the middle of the night, she must help to convince him of it.
But that life- with its loneliness, its cruelty, its fear, it is all over now.
And in its place is...

He glances down at the scar again. Or, more specifically, at the very corner of it, where he remembers the press of her lips, the nip of her teeth, the heat of her breath...

Wait. Stop.
No.

With a firm shake of his head, Eret catches himself just as he's beginning to grin like a fool, and he resolves to blush about all that later.

Because for now...

It's a very special day.

And he's got very special plans for a very special someone on this very special day.

With one deep breath and another glance at his reflection in the looking glass, he rushes out the bedroom door, only pausing to grab for a pouch he's kept hidden carefully between the mattress for months and months on end. And when he reaches the living room, he looks around at the faces of his friends, straightens his back, and grins, eager for his very brand new adventure.

"Are the lot of you all ready?" he asks.

Five faces grin back.
And then, they rise one-by-one and march purposefully out into the village to start their new day together.

That's become a normal thing for him, somehow- 'together'.
As in, 'he' and somebody, anybody, else.

Whether that means he and Hiccup or he and Skullcrusher or he and Snotlout or he and Ruffnut, Tuffnut, and Fishlegs or the entire village or all of the above at once.
And to Eret, finally, this kind of not loneliness...Well, it's quite a nice thing after all.
He thinks she would agree.

Speaking of which...

"So. What is it that Gobber's got Althea doing, anyway?..." Eret wonders.


Althea Cross: a partner, now, in both childish showdowns between village friends, and in mischievous, eccentric antics at home alike, with hair longer, eyes softer, and skin newer, breathes in the biggest lungful of fresh air that she can as she stands and watches over the village that she's somehow come to love so much.

The view is ten times as beautiful as it was a year ago.
And even though she'd broken the habit of leaving the way she always used to through pure force of willpower, now, there are, every day, new reasons that she feels she'd rather stay.

Starting with her sheep.
Instead of ten, they number thirteen now and although the newer members of the flock are just as stubborn and gluttonous as the others, Althea's come to appreciate their antics, even in times like these.

Tired as she is from last night's fun, Althea laughs as Mili's little one, plump just like her mother, plods over and bleats at her pointedly, eyes half-lidded in a reproachful stare.

"We're not traveling all the way there today, Ono." Althea chides gently. "The grass here will have to do. I've got to get you back and help Gobber train a few brutes just as defiant and impossible as you in half an hour."

The sheep huffs, but just as its about to enter stage 2 of rebellion, there's an unexpected flapping of heavy, leathery wings and a woosh! and a low growl and Ona shuffles away, wide-eyed, to join Ana and Una again.

Althea begins to smile then.
Because that growl?

It, of course, has come from yet another reason she finds herself here more than gone. Although she may have mixed feelings about reason number 2 going off and spending so much time with someone who isn't her, even if that someone is Toothless.

Then again, Althea winces, thinking of her reason number 3 for staying, she supposes it's fair.

Nevertheless...
"You don't need to scare them quite that badly, you know." Althea says in greeting, turning to face her first and best friend in the world, who is just getting back from a morning flight with their aforementioned beau.

Bloodbiter tilts her head at the disapproval. Then, opens her jaws, and makes a show of-
schlk!
-retracting her teeth back into her gums.
She flashes a charming smile when she's done and Althea laughs.

"Well aren't you the accommodating one today?" she says. "Meeting with Toothless went well, I take it?"

Bloodbiter's scaly, flat head bobs up and down once and, after, she lets out a chirrup, as if to inquire back about her.

Althea blushes at that.
"Oh...Er. Last night was...fine..." she stammers, squirming. Then, to cover up her embarrassment, she quickly adds, "Except for dinner. Gods, Eret's cooking is still terrible. Don't tell him I said that though."

The dragon, however, isn't falling for the distraction, and Bloodbiter only throws her head back and gives a mischievous, garbling laugh.

"Oh, hush, you." Althea shushes.

But when the dragon's head pops up, affronted, the rider laughs again and with a sigh, she finds a spot in the grass beside the scaly warmth of Bloodbiter's side.

"Alright, fine. It was...nice..." she confesses. "Eret's been acting strangely all week so i'm glad he's okay..."
Then, Althea turns to her dragon.
She smiles at her in a gentle way the rider never would have let herself before, and
"We still missed you and Skullcrusher though." she says.

And the dragon knows that her rider means it.
So even though she's hardly pleased by the lack of real details regarding the conclusion to the great mystery of Eret's suspicious behavior, Bloodbiter lets it all go.
She's content with this for now.

Because the dragon knows that even these small glimpses of belonging are things the rider never once thought she could have.
Welling with a sudden affection, the dragon can't help but watch her rider as she smiles and takes in the view laid out before them. But when Althea catches her, orbs of green unblinking, her cheeks pink in embarrassment at having been caught so unguarded.

Bloodbiter chirps in amusement.

Their old life might be over, but there are still some things that remain the same.

"Come on. Let's get moving." Althea laughs. She pulls to her feet and gives her dragon one last pat on the head.

They walk on.


Not one, but two.
Two bodies, lying side by side, being pushed out to sea.

Not two, but one.
One boat, one arrow, one fire, shrinking against the horizon.

Everyone mourns.

But they weren't theirs.
They were hers.

Her parents, her family, her everything.

The entire village starts a beautiful, familiar song.
Their voices carry, even through tears of mourning.
But Althea's too terrified to join in.

Because she's heard the village tales and she knows how the story goes.

Her parents were heroes.
They died to save her.
Does that mean that she is the villain?
Or the dragons are?...

The little child Althea, with a blotchy tear-streaked face and a rumpled dress, thinks about that all day long as she stands at Chief Stoic's side with the rest of Berk behind her, watching until the funeral pyre is gone and the skies are black.
And she keeps thinking as she's led back to the great hall where well-wisher after well-wisher passes by with a condolence full of words too big for her to understand.

The night stretches on.
Time spent wrestling with her thoughts is long.

But it isn't until this that she finally gets her answer:
When the official service is done and all the village warriors are milling about, recounting memories and nursing mugs of ale, and she is sitting in the corner, withering.
Because after each and every one of the numerous great deeds are retold (and Althea is just now beginning to understand just how great those deeds really were, how untouchable her parents had once been), everyone's eyes rest just for a second on her.
And with each sip of drink, those eyes get a little more bloodshot and a little more angry and a little more cruel.

Little Althea looks all around the room for someone bigger, stronger, kinder to help shield her from the piercing stares, but what does it mean when all the faces she sees are unfriendly ones?...

It means it's her.

The villain is her...

But no...
If she lets herself believe it then there'll never be a single soul on Berk to take her side, and the only thing she has left in the world is herself.
She understands that full well now...

And so, much, much later, when most heads are passed out drunk on tables and the few that are still drinking are too inebriated to notice, Althea feels too suffocated to stay and so, she braves the terror and tiptoes past the eerily still, corpse-like bodies, swallowing her urge to scream.

She makes it to the door, escapes into the night, breathes...

And then, she runs home.
She locks herself in- doesn't come out.

Not tomorrow or the next day or the next.


I'm so sorry that this was so...djkxfnbjdn...
It's pretty slow, I know, but it'll pick up speed later so please try and bear with it for now!