Chapter Three.

Astrid didn't sleep that night. She lay awake, fingers flexing on the handle of her axe, waiting to hear the high pitch whir of a Night Fury and know that she had betrayed Berk. There wasn't even a heaviness in her eyelids to distract her- only a quiet panic that kept her torn between running to the cove and running to the chief.

She thought about Hiccup. Glaring up at her ceiling, she shifted beneath her blankets and wondered if his furs protected him from the cold. She rubbed her knotted stomach and wondered what he'd eaten. She wasn't sure how long he'd been stranded with that dragon in the cove, and she counted back the days since their last raid. Had there been a Night Fury that night?

Her wrist hurt. A bruise blossomed along the pale skin, exactly where the feral boy had grabbed it. When the thought made her angry, she thought about what he'd said-

"Doesn't that sound as silly as you and me?"

Easy to say, over a bruise and a cut on the cheek. But when she thought about the lives ruined and lost thanks to the dragons, it was hard to think of the vicious cycle as silly.

Assuming there was a cycle. That Hiccup's words were true, and that the dragons were being controlled by some larger, outside force. Thinking of Toothless, and those huge, expressive eyes, she sighed with frustration and tried to ascertain whether it was a tame monster or a deadly house pet. And which would be the lesser evil.

She ended up falling into a troubled sleep just a little before dawn. For the first time in a long time, she slept in. Skipped training. When her mother came in to rouse her, she was lost in a nightmare where Berk was burning and a man's graceful silhouette crawled through the shadows.

Astrid didn't go back to the cove. Instead, she stood outside the kill ring, leaning on the cage-like roof. A new generation of young Vikings was being prematurely entered into training, and she watched tight-lipped as Gobber led a handful of children through drills. Their people had been decimated with the lack of food, the violence, and the bitter winters. Berk was dying, and they were raising little ones to fight for it.

As the chief's right hand man pulled a switch to raise the gate of a Nadder's keeping, she knelt down to watch the kids below outrun sprays of hot magnesium-fire. Astrid had a small scar on the back of her arm from flames like that. Emotions battled in her chest, a dangerous hope and practical realism. Suspicion and instinct. She tried to picture the bright blue Nadder looking at her with the same kind of curiosity and calmness that Toothless had expressed. Her eyes narrowed as its snapping jaws just barely missed the back of one skinny girl.

"Oi!"

Astrid ripped her gaze from the children to see their teacher staring up at her. Gobber squinted against the gray morning sunlight and lifted his hammer-arm to shield his face. "Care to come down and show 'em how it's done?"

She stood wordlessly, unstrapping her axe from her back and making her way around the dome. The tunnel leading down had been shut off so that the dragon wouldn't escape, so she had to wait for Gobber to crank it open enough for her to duck under. At her entrance, the little class of pre-teens scurried to the closest wall and stared at her with wide eyes. She knew they watched her like that. All the children watched her, ever since she earned the honor of killing her first dragon at fourteen. It was part of what fueled her- the idea that there were others looking up to her.

And it was partly why Hiccup's words terrified her.

The Nadder tilted its head at her when she entered the ring, and she twirled the axe in her grip. Taking a smooth breath through pursed lips, Astrid tried to clear her mind of outside distractions. It was a necessity, she had learned, for survival. She couldn't think about other things when she stood to toe with a beast ten times her size. Emptying her thoughts made her capable of responding with speed and accuracy. But no matter how many slow breaths she tried, her brain wouldn't settle.

"Okay," she whispered to herself, widening her stance and bending her knees just slightly. "This is life or death. Don't show fear. Save the village."

With that, she sprang, making a charge for the dragon with her axe held high. The Nadder immediately belched a stream of white-hot fire, which she avoided with a graceful somersault. The heat of it warmed her left side, warning her of the pain that awaited if she stepped wrong. Reaching into her belt, she shot a throwing knife at one of the dragon's feet. It landed just above one talon-tipped toe, and the beast shrieked. Its wings beat wildly as it shook its foot, trying to dislodge the painful nuisance. When it finally kicked the blade free, the Nadder gave Astrid a vicious hiss and whipped a tail full of poisonous darts her way.

The blonde fell flat to the ground, the air smacking out of her lungs as she hit the stone floor. The spines whistled above her, and she heard Gobber yelp behind her just before the projectiles landed with sharp cracks. A laugh went up from one of the kids.

As quickly as she had thrown herself down, she was back up on her feet, sidestepping a circle around the bird-like dragon. It advanced first this time, but instead of running or avoiding the dragon, Astrid knew this was her time to run straight ahead. She dove beneath its blind spot and rolled under its large head. With a grunt of effort, she swung the axe across the Nadder's thin thighs. Blood spattered her arms. The creature made a terrible scream of pain and fell to the side.

Astrid leaped out of the way just before it crashed down on her. Then she lifted her axe above her head and slammed her boot down on the dragon's neck so its teeth couldn't snap at her. Then every nerve in her arms went numb.

The girl stood there with her killing blow held between her fingers, her breaths heavy and her face contorted with a murderous rage. But as time seemed to still, she found herself wondering at the hate surging through her. She thought of the way Hiccup had snarled at her when she mentioned killing dragons, and a flash of uneasiness stirred in her gut. The dragon went limp beneath her foot, seemingly accepting its fate. Astrid grit her teeth.

Then she let her arms fall. The weapon hung uselessly at her side.

She closed her eyes. Took another long, slow breath. Then she opened her eyes and glared at the Nadder.

"Go!" she shouted in its face, pointing the axe toward the man-made cave the beast had emerged from. When it only lifted its head and blinked in confusion, she bared her teeth and growled the way she'd seen the wild boy do. "Get in your cage! Go! Go!"

The creature responded with terror in its eyes, trying to struggle onto its feet, but it screeched in pain and flopped over. Astrid's expression twisted with horror as she watched the pathetic, bleeding thing use its wings to flap and pull itself to its cage. Her stomach lurched. She had to turn her back on Gobber and the children so they wouldn't recognize the disturbed gape, the urge to cover her mouth with her hand. As it floundered and yelped back into the cage, Astrid's eyes followed the smeared trail of bright red leading right back to her feet.

She could hear the Nadder's whimpering even after Gobber closed the gate. A silence went up from the humans, and she swallowed. They watched her. They were always watching her.

She should have slept that night. The weight of her heart, of her head, of her body- it was all unbearable and crushing, and all she wanted was to close her eyes and not see Hiccup's face or the Nadder's bleeding thighs for five minutes. Long enough for the conflict in her veins to settle and for sleep to claim her, but Astrid wasn't granted that mercy. She hadn't even undressed before throwing herself on her bed and resting her arm over her face. She was glad for that now- it meant she could slip outside the Hofferson house without having to restyle her hair or change clothes.

The cold night air in her lungs cleared her thoughts a little. She leaned back against the closed front door and slid down until she was sitting. Stretching out her legs in front of her, she stared ahead at her neighbor's sheep pen and tried to think about nothing. There was a heavy humidity to the atmosphere, like it might rain or sleet at any moment, and the wet thickness grounded her a little. Her limbs felt so tired. Her mouth tasted so terrible.

Just as she was about to let her eyelids fall, a blur of motion in her peripheral made her heart stutter and speed. She sat up and squinted into the dark, but nothing looked amiss. Still- a little part of her already knew what was darting through the shadows, and that small voice urged her back to her feet. She stood, hands curling into fists, and with a muttered swear, she jogged in the direction of the movement. All the lights in the village were off, except for a dim glow coming from the Great Hall and Stoick the Vast's house. Her boots on gravel sounded like explosions against the quiet.

Astrid slowed, looking to her left and right. She saw nothing. No flickers or flashes or hints of a wild thing stalking through the night. She spent a few minutes wandering through the village, checking behind houses and around bushes. A frown crossed her lips as her search turned up nothing, and she began to wonder if she'd just seen a bat or a squirrel. Or maybe nothing- maybe she was so exhausted that she was beginning to hallucinate.

She was just starting to convince herself of the latter when she heard the sound of something shifting above her. Her head snapped up just in time to see a black shadow overtaking her, and then she was tackled to the ground.

Though she started to scream, she forced her mouth shut with a snap and rolled with Hiccup. He wrestled her to the hard earth, and though she'd been able to overtake him in the woods, he had caught her off guard. And, it would seem, he had a flexibility and strength that he hadn't revealed to her the day before. Astrid growled and writhed, trying to escape his grasp as he locked her legs in place and twisted her arms above her head. She arched her back and bucked her hips against him, but she was only answered by a playful chuckle and the weight of him pressing down on her chest. It was then that she realized how his body was flush against hers.

"I swear to Thor, I will tear you limb from limb," she hissed, keeping her voice quiet for reasons not completely clear to herself. "I told you to stay away from the village and Odin can strike me dead if I don't kill you and your dragon both!"

"You didn't come," he told her, his breath hot on her face. She could just barely make out a glint of a reflection from his eyes in the dark. "I needed to talk to you."

Astrid fixed him with a glare, though she wasn't sure how much of it was wasted in the shadows. "Get. Off. Now."

"Will you attack me if I do?"

"Probably," she snapped.

There was a sharp exhale of warmth on her cheeks then, and she noticed a humor in his expression. "Well that's not much of an incentive for me, is it?"

"Hiccup, I will gut you!"

He laughed then, and the noise had a strange effect on her nerves. It both grated against them and eased them in the same heartbeat. Giving a last jerk in an effort to dislodge him, she found herself slammed back against the ground. She sighed with irate exasperation.

"Why didn't you come back?" he asked. His head cocked in a way that reminded her of the Nadder.

"I don't know," she growled between clenched teeth. "But if you care about whether or not people find out about that Night Fury, you'll want to remove yourself before I start screaming."

The amusement disappeared from his body language, but he did as she demanded. In one smooth movement, he untangled his legs from hers and pounced to the side. He crawled around her as she pushed herself up and brushed at her clothes. "I have questions."

"Yeah, I have a few myself." Her eyes cut to her surroundings, checking to see if anyone had lit a candle or thrown open their shutters because of their scuffle. It didn't seem so, but just in case, she rose to her feet and beckoned him forward. "Not here. Come on."

He followed her on hands and feet, and she glanced at him sideways as they walked in silence. It was still bizarre to her, the way he moved and behaved, but it lent a credence to his story of being raised with dragons. In a way, it was a bit of the reason that she was inclined to believe him. Shaking her head and sighing, she looked ahead and led him away from the villagers, over the bridge to the kill ring.

They ducked inside the entrance tunnel, but she didn't take him inside.

"Okay," she began, folding her arms over her chest. "What do you want?"

He seemed distracted, his eyes scanning every inch of his surroundings. His fingers were walking over the crank used to raise and lower the gate, examining the craftsmanship with fascination. It seemed that he hardly cared about her question. But then he replied, "I told you. I want to stop the war."

She sneered, but didn't argue. "You said you had questions."

Hiccup nodded, and looked back at her with curious eyes. The moonlight was a little brighter where they were, and she could see him better. "Why can't I come into the village?"

Her gaze was flat. "Besides the obvious?" she asked, holding a hand out to indicate the way he was crouched on all fours. "I don't trust you to not hurt my people."

Lifting a brow at her, he rose up on two feet. It seemed awkward on him, like he couldn't resist hunching over slightly, but it was an improvement. "If I wanted to harm the humans, why would I have waited this long? Why would I bother trying to earn your trust?"

Astrid pursed her lips in a scowl. The way he said "the humans," as if he wasn't one- it was weird.

"Trying to get inside information? Trying to learn when and where to cause the most damage? Waiting for your dragon buddies to come back you up? Waiting for-"

"Okay, okay." He rolled his eyes in a very teenage boy way. It took her aback for a moment, made her anger soften a little. "How can I prove I won't hurt them? I just want to watch. See." His expression dropped a little with earnest. "My- my dad might be one of you."

She tried not to sigh as heavily as she wanted to. For a moment, she'd almost forgotten what he'd said about his parents once being part of Berk. "For now you just have to... lay low." Shaking her head, Astrid remembered that the village came first. She had people to protect, and for the time being, that meant keeping the outsiders out. "Where's your Night Fury?"

"Toothless? I told you." He nodded his head vaguely toward the direction of the forest and its hidden cove. "He can't fly. He's stuck down there. We've tried to get him out, but the walls are too tall."

"So how do you expect to stop this war with just you and a toothless, flightless dragon?" He'd yet to unveil some grand master plan to her.

His nose crinkled as his eyes cut to the distance. "I don't have it all figured out yet. For now, I'm just trying to keep Toothless safe. Then I figured I could wait until the next raid." He looked back at her. "I can get one of them to listen to me, give me a ride. It'll take me to where the queen is, and then I can figure out how to defeat it."

"Ride it?" It was like how he'd called his home a day's flight from Berk. "Like on its back?"

"Or neck," he replied with a shrug. "Depending on the dragon."

Astrid shook her head but didn't stop staring in disbelief. "You just get stranger and stranger."

His lips spread into a smile. "It's only strange to you because you've never done it." When he took a step inside her personal space, she could tell that he was trying hard not to lean over onto his hands. "Give me one chance. One flight to prove you wrong. About everything."

Her nostrils flared as she pulled back, annoyed by his constant habit of getting too close. "Me? You want me to fly on a dragon?"

Hiccup nodded with obvious enthusiasm, grinning. "Just one flight. And then you can turn me in if you want."

She didn't miss how he didn't say me and Toothless.

"And just what do you expect me to fly on?" she bluffed with a scoff. "Your dragon's injured, remember?" For a breath, she thought about the Night Fury trapped in that cove. The supply of fish in the lake there had to be getting low, if both he and Hiccup had been feeding from it. "What... what's wrong with him?"

The feral young man's face turned grim. "His tailfin," he explained, his smile gone. "The left one was torn off when he and I collided. It throws off his balance. Keeps him from staying in the air."

What about a prosthetic? She wanted to ask, but for some reason, she stayed quiet. Until she knew more about that Night Fury, Astrid didn't want to give it any more killing power than it already had. Still, she sympathized with it. It made her think.

"There is something you can do," she began quietly, tearing his gaze away to look at the ground. "In the meantime."

"For Toothless?" His voice sounded so hopeful that she almost mentioned the idea of a prosthesis again.

"No. Um." Turning her head to the kill ring, she nodded into the arena. Shame burned her cheeks, and she prayed the moonlight wouldn't give it away. "A Nadder. It's hurt. Do you... do you want to look at it?"

The hope dashed from Hiccup's face, but a determination took its place. "Yes."

Astrid started to lead him inside, but then she pulled up short, whirling on him. "If you use anything I show you now against me in the future, I swear on my life I won't hesitate to tell everyone exactly where Toothless is. I'll lead the hunt myself." Her tone was fierce, and this time she entered his personal space. If acting like an animal was the only way to communicate to him her sincerity, so be it.

"I won't," he assured her. "I just want to stop the killing."

She searched his face, wishing she could spot a glimpse of dishonesty or ulterior motives. It would make things so much easier if he was the villain mastermind she wanted to think of him as. When she found none there, she tore away and stalked into the training ring. Once they were both inside, she cranked the gate closed and prayed the noise wouldn't wake anyone. In the moonlight, the shadows cast by the metal, netted dome appeared sinister, and they flickered over her pale skin like spidery black fingers.

Approaching the Nadder's cage, Astrid chewed at her lower lip. She wasn't sure how the dragon would behave or even, if she was honest, whether or not it was alive. But if the beasts were what Hiccup claimed they were, hopefully he'd be able to treat it. Preferably without losing any of his or her body parts. She hadn't brought a weapon. It made her nervous.

"It's in here," she murmured, walking over to the lever. He dropped back to all fours, and she watched him nervously as she took a deep breath and shoved the heavy metal bar as far down as she could.

The dragon didn't burst from its cage like it had with the young Vikings. Astrid noticed that much right away. She couldn't see into the little cave for all the darkness and shadow, but that didn't seem to bother Hiccup. He crawled forward slowly. And then, to her immense surprise, he began making a series of clicks and purrs with his mouth.

There was motion from inside. The darkness shifted, and the blood froze in Astrid's veins as Hiccup disappeared into the black. Her pulse raced, her breathing heavy, but she told herself that as long as she could hear his bizarre little noises, he wasn't being eaten alive.

The feral boy scampered back out, making a gesture at the dragon inside with his head. He lowered himself down on his forearms and cooed.

After a long, painful moment, the shadows melted. She heard the scrape of talons against stone, and then she was holding her breath as the Nadder she'd nearly killed came limping out of its prison. The nighttime made it difficult to see, but the creature made little pathetic chirps with each shuffling step, and Astrid could make out the blood crusted and oozing from the deep slashes on its upper legs.

Hiccup made more clicking noises, drawing the dragon further and further out of the alcove. When it was fully out, its head turned and tilted at her. She froze with panic but didn't let the lever to the cage go. Its eyes were bright in the dim light, and though its pupils spent a moment narrowing and widening at her, the dragon eventually looked away. It limped toward Hiccup, until the feral man crawled forward and stretched up. He rubbed his face against the Nadder's chest. Then he slid his hands up its throat until he reached its jaw. He gave a little scratch, and just like Toothless had done the day before, the Nadder purred and rolled onto its back with a slump.

"What happened to her?" he asked once the dragon was resting, his expression broken as he crawled over to inspect her wounds. His voice was tight, and she suspected a little angry.

"A fight," she answered with a thick tongue. She'd never been a good liar, but she hoped that Hiccup's exile from humans would keep him from noticing her uncomfortable tone and torn gaze. It made her question why she thought she needed to lie to him.

The way he exhaled sharply through his nose revealed his irritation. She could just barely make out the clench of his jaw. "It won't kill her," he said flatly, and Astrid got the impression that he was upset with her. Even though he probably didn't know it was her axe's slice in the creature's thighs. "I can heal her, but it'll take several days. I'll need to make a poultice. I need some things."

Guilt wouldn't stop wracking her, even as her own moral compass spun wild and confused. Dragons were evil. Had swarmed and attacked her village forever. But staring at that pitiful Nadder, Astrid couldn't help but swallow down the roughness in her throat. "I'll get you what you need."

"When was the last time she ate?"

"I don't know."

He was quiet for a long moment. She could sense a tension, an unhappiness rolling off of him in waves.

"Don't forget," she whispered. "They've done as much to us too. And worse."

Hiccup gave a humorless laugh. "And yet I still want to save you from yourselves." He shook his head. It wasn't easy to tell whether he meant the Vikings, the dragons, or both of them. "Will you be able to take care of her while I'm not here?"

And there he went, putting yet another life in her hands. Hiccup, Toothless, and now this Nadder that she'd injured. She had to wonder, even as she nodded, if her grasp was as steady as he believed.

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