She crawled out of the water, dragging her limbs like they were dead weight throught the wet sand leaving a trail of blood from her thigh running down back to the sea. She couldnt pull herself up anymore and she stopped trying too. She had given up but weirdly was still moving off the wet sand, onto dry, until she released she was being dragged by someione eles.
" come on astrid, we just jumped off a fucking boat, dont give up on me now okay" dragging her to dry land. He pulled her up, watching as her leg bleeds out in front of him, she started to cough up water that had been caught in her lungs.
" you okay?"
" no, no im not. Get it out, pull it out, just get it out!" she screamed at her bloodly leg. He kneeled down beside her leg, ripping a piece of fabric off his shirt wrapping it above her leg to try and stop the blood flow. " okay im going to pull it out on 3 okay"
" dont fuck with me eret, just pull it out" she said as he placed his hand on the piece of wood.
"1-"
" eret!"
"2-" and he pulled it out making astrid screech into the night, he moved the fabric wrapped around her leg down to cover the wound and made sure it covered the entire wound.
Once she stopped screeching she looked down at eret " you said you were going to pull it out on 3"
" you said not to fuck with you" leaning back on his legs.
" that sounded so wrong, just shut up" and they both sat their together watching as the boat burnt in the sea. After a while the silence stopped with astrid bursting out with laughter.
" what?" he smiled watching her as she giggled.
" i-im free" she giggled, and soon so did eret.
xx
Hiccup arrived at 8:50 at the camp, many groups had already arrived, heather and 5 of her group had arrived, dagur and 2 of his had arrived one of them was mulch and the other snot, along with tuff who had ruff and 5 others of his group, gobbers group and erets wasnt back yet, but for now as chief he had to talk to those who had just arrived.
He walked up to them, heather, dagur and tuff coming forward first. Heather spoke first.
" three of mine dead, we all got split up and only five got back." next was tuff.
" only one of mine, he got caught in the cross fire" and finally dagur.
" well four of mine are lost, supposed dead, since they didnt trust the guide who was a former ememy"
He was thinking of an answer before he spoke. " okay inform the families if they are here, if not remember their names and tell their families when we get home. Is gobbers and erets groups not here yet?"
They all shook their heads.
" okay, go i'll talk to the others, you guys inform the families." the three walked off and hiccup walked up to the group of ex prisoners, who were standing around looking inscure, and feeling exposed. Snotlout and ruffnut came forward when they saw hiccup.
" snot. Ruff. Hey" he huged them both then went to adress the others.
" hi mulch, buckets here, he will want to see you" he shook his hand before speeking to the other.
He took a breath before speaking, he had to say this right, one wrong turn and he could affend everyone. " okay. I understand you feel exposed and alone, you have been alone for so long and we have all missed you. But there are families here, your families and they miss you but they will also understand if you want space. And i know i keep saying i understand, but im pretty sure none of us know what you have been through, so use eachother as support, use you family as support. We will be staying at this camp for the rest of tonight, all tomorrow, and leave the day after, so you can have a chance to heal, mental and phyical. We have healers so please if you are injured at all please let them take a look at you."
" yes chief" and they all went off.
xx
" ouch ouch ouch. Eret, would you give me a bit more support on my right side. Please!" eret held her right arm over his shoulder, trying to support her.
" im trying"
" obviously not trying hard enough" they were taking small steps towards the camp, east.
" well do you want me to carry you"
She shot him a glare through her eyes " does it look like i want you to carry me?"
Her eyes felt like they were daggers cutting through him, and he has never been so scared in his life. Apart from heather. "no"
" right, good. Distract me, tell me something about you." she said through the pain.
" err, trainings good, im dating heather, skullcrusher is doing great and-"
" wait-" she butted in. " you and heather. Oh do tell."
" err yeah its great, she is great, no, she's amazing and the sex is-"
"OH!" she butted in again. " first im the chiefs wife, and its illegal to have sex before marriage, so i dont need to know and second i just dont need to know" her eyes wide, not even looking at him, she didnt want too. Her friends sex life is her friends sex life, she didnt need to know.
" okay, so something eles?"
" yes, definitly something eles. Hiccup, tell me about hiccup" her breath became quicker as it became harder to bare weight on the leg.
" hiccup, well first he has been so determinded to get you back, he was so pissed when the boat kept moving which meant you kept moving. He had been planning this for months. And he is an amazing farther to stoick, i mean those two are like two peas in a pod-" astrids whole body stiffened when her sons name was metioned.
" do- do you want to talk about stoick?" she had a delayed answer but finally opened her mouth.
" err no, if anyone is going to tell me about my son, its going to be my husband." they came up to a swamp it was now about 5 maybe 6 miles from the camp.
" okay we can do this. We can do this right?" eret asked astrid nervously. " yeah we can" and then they started to walk.
xx
Gobbers group just came in with valka and 3 others, hiccup ran straight to gobber. " give me an update"
" we lots two, but your mother is here, so thats the good thing" gobber patted hiccup on the shoulder.
" okay you go and inform the families im going to see my mom" and he ran off to see his mother.
" mom!" he shouted when he saw a familiar figure. Once she turned around at the sound of hiccups voice, and he saw it was actually her he ran towards her and hugged her.
" oh my baby boy"
" mom, you okay" he pulled back and looked at her, making sure she wasnt hurt.
" im fine, im fine. Hows my grandson? Is he here?" she asked.
" no, he is at home. But he is amazing mom, just amazing, you will love him. He is so like me, he loves dragons and drawing and he is so like astrid he cant wait to pick up his first axe and he loves play fights. Talking about astrid where is she?" Valkas smiling face from hearing of her grandson turned to worried and confused. " no idea. Why is she not here?" hiccup shook his head.
" none of erets group is here" her face relax at the sound of this. " well thats okay, erets group was last i heard. So maybe they are on their way, so dont worry son she is a strong girl, who has grown stronger over the last two years. Now come, im so hungery could you show me to where you food tent is i havent had proper food in forever." he gave her a warm smile and took her to the food tent to get some hot soup brothel.
xx
" how long is it?" astrid asked wobbling on her own with eret in front of her. They were still in the swamp, knee deep in smelly swamp water making both their eyes water.
" its about 2 miles, are you sure you dont want help?" he asked turning around.
" nope im fine, you called me dead weight, so i will hobble on my own thank you." she hobbled past him gainig the lead.
" your going the wrong way!" he shouted from behind.
She stopped in her tracks turning around to see him pointing east when she was going south east " well why dont you take the lead" and he started walking toward the camp with her trailing behind. While walking eret could hear her walking behind him as the splashing noises got louder as her leg got harder to walk on, they were nearly out of the swamp land when astrid felt as if something was following her, she could hear it in the water behind her so she turned around slowly then screemed.
xx
It was about 10:00 now and erets group still hadnt arrived and hiccup only way of coping is pacing around in his tent and not eating any food his friends or mother brought him.
" oh now please hiccup, just eat something" valka said while siting on a chair watching as her son over thinks and paces all around the tent. But he was too deep in thought to be listening, he couldnt think straight all he could think of is that " what if something happened? What if?"
" hiccup please" she asked again.
" mom please, i cant eat. I cant eat untill ive heard of something, because not knowing anything is like torture, cause your mind plays tricks on you." he sat down beside her elbows resting on legs and head resting in hands, just trying yo get a peace of mind. Wht if? What if?
However his mind was disturbed by snolout and fishlegs barging in "CHIEF!" they shouted.
His head shot from his hands and he looked at the two " what?" he replied with no hope in his voice. Fishlegs spoke first.
" the guards said that they see a figure coming" but hiccup could understand why they had to include him. But snotlout already answered him.
" you might want to come and see this" hiccup looked at the two and then his mother, he got up from where he sat and head out of his tent. Not far from his tent, near the hill drop a bunch of people were gathered, he walked up to see what or who was making such a gathering. As he got closed he could see that it was all the people from berk gathered together and in the middle was heather, she was hugging eret.
He was pleased to see his friend, but he was hoping it was someone eles. Which made him think where was his wife. He walkd up to eret and shook his hand, he would have love to asked how he was, if he was okay, but someting different came out.
" where is she" eret didnt answer, he just looked to the ground and then back up at hiccup but as his head raised he had a smirk on his face. Making hiccup more confused.
" she is a stubborn one" he said as he walked back through the crowd towards the hill drop and shouted down " are you still coming or do you need me to come and get you" it was silence for a second and then an answer.
" i cant believe you made me clime this hill my self"
" well your stubborn ass wanted to" he placed a hand down and a female had excepted it.
" should have never trusted you" and he pulled up an alive astrid. Sure she was blood stained and bruied and scared, but she was alive and right now hiccup couldnt believe it. He had spent 2 years trying to find the mother of his child, his wife, and now she was here in his sight he couldnt see if it was real or not.
Her eyes landed on his immedietly, this was the first time she had seen her husband since the birth of their son. She let go of erets arm and walked to him slowly, still putting light pressure on her right leg. When he saw her limping towards him, he decided to meet her half way, since as soon as they were in touching distance their Arms were around eachother and they were on the floor. Hiccup was sat down with astrid on top her face in her neck and her arms around his shoulders. Hiccups arms lay around her waist, head on her shoulder. He opened his eyes to still find eret behind them he mouthed a " thank you" to him before he went off with heather, in fact everyone walked away leaving the two to have their reunion in private.
xx
He took her into his tent and lay her on the bed, her leg was still bleeding, but he said over the years he had learnt to stitch up open cuts and gashes. She sat down and wait for him to get the healers kit. He came back holding a box and sat beside her slowly staring to peel off the material that covered her leg. She hissed as he finally pulled it off her leg showing her exposed through and through wound.
" Sorry" he said placing the rag on the floor and grabbing something out of the box.
" It's okay" she replied as she watched him pull out a tub of paste and started to rub it on her leg.
" What is that?" She hissed as he slowly started to rub it in, as soon as it hit the open wound it started to burn.
" Just some paste gothi made over a year ago" still rubbing it in on the front and back.
" Why does it burn?" He looked as her face shown discomfort, and slowed down.
" because it's used to stop infections, is that better?" He had slowed down completely and her discomfort faded.
" yeah thank you"
He finished with the paste and started to stitch it up both sides, they didn't talk much while he was stitiching her up, just a few " sorry" thrown in there when he pinched her skin a few times. Once he had finished sewing her up he wrapped a clean bandage around it and told her to keep it rested. He sat looking at her, he had not seen his wife for two years and he now had the chance to admire her beauty he had missed.
" what?" she asked confused and pulling the covers over her legs.
He smirked at her before answering " your so beautiful, and ive missed you so much." she blushed, but sorta had an inscure posture about her. But that didnt stop her from moving over and patting on the bed next to her for hiccup to join her. He took off his armor so that he was just left with his pants, tunic and peg leg, he sat next to her leaning back against the head board like astrid. She grabbed one of his arms and threw it over her shoulder so she could lay her head on his chest.
" ive missed you too, ive missed your smell, and your touch and voice, i never forgot your voice." she said as he hugged her close and kissed the top of her head.
" do you want to hear about our son?" he said watching as she shot up and looked him in they eye.
" yes, yes i do. Tell me everything, every detail, every bit. I want to know my son." he smiled and got up, to look through some bags. Astrid sat up to see what he was looking for, then he pulled out a book and came back to sit with her. He pulled the covers over their legs and opened the book, inside was images draw of stoick every month. Astrid flicked through the page watching infront of her eyes her son grow up.
She got to the final page and looked at last photo for a while, her son had grown so big from when she last saw him but looking at the drawing he look quite small for a two year old. Probably just like hiccup, a little haddock. She giggled as she kepted her eyes on the picture, rubbing her finger along the drawing.
" he looks so happy in this picture"
" yeah i drew it when her was playing with his dragon toys, he loves them." she closed the book and placed it on the table beside the bed.
" where is he now?" she asked.
" at home with gothi, i sent him yesterday morning, promising him a birthday party and his mother when i get back-" he said as her head raised at the sound of mother. "- he misses you, so much. I tell him about you everyday, He wanted a story every night about you" she loved knowing her son wanted to know her as much as she wanted to know him.
" i wish he could of stayed but i needed to know he was safe so i could focus on you and the others today" he said apologetically.
" no its fine, i get it. Im actually glad you did, best him be safe than around here." a yawn escaped her mouth after she spoke.
" well i was going to say do you want some food, but it looks like you exhausted, why do we get some sleep?" rubbing her back.
" sleep sounds great."