Chapter II: All Hiccup's Fault
Hey guys, so for the wait. It's a short chapter unfortunately.
"Are we there yet?"
Astrid's grip on the handles of the saddle tightened, turning her knuckles a blinding white. Her annoyance had reached a peak where she was practically drowning in it. After reading the invitation Hiccup, unknowingly, left behind, during his hectic get away; Astrid immediately ordered the others to prepare for a journey. She made Fishlegs search for the location of this 'Ebony' Isle, in a map book Hiccup created. Apparently, it was in an area that only Hiccup had explored.
Astrid huffed angrily. This was the fifth time Tuffnut asked that stupid question. "No, Tuffnut," she grounded. "We're not there, yet.
"When will we get there? I'm bored, and there's nothing for Barf and Belch to blow up!" He exclaimed as he leaned back to rest his head on Belch's neck, while his sister, Ruffnut snored away on her dragons head.
Astrid, grounded her teeth together in frustration and turned to yell, "WE'LL GET THERE WHEN WE GET THERE! NOW SHUT YOUR MOUTH! OTHERWISE, THE LAST THING YOU'LL EVER SEE IS ME, HURLING MY AXE AT YOU!"
That immediately got Tuffnut to shut up. Astrid huffed out an angry breath, and turned back to face the vast nothingness that surrounded them.
Valka was standing on the back of her dragon, Cloudjumper; guiding him with the movements of her feet and the trust between them. She gotten increasingly worried about Astrid. The situation had flared up the young shield-maidens temper to the point where it boiled over. Valka understood Astrid's behaviour towards Hiccup's secretive actions over the past few months, but she also knew that this wasn't the best way to deal with it.
Flying at the back of the group, Valka looked to her husband with a concerned expression. Stoick the Vast -Chief of the Hairy Hooligan tribe- rode beside his wife on his Rumblehorn, Skullcrusher. Having left his previous dragon, Thornado, to take care of three orphaned baby Thunderdrums -Which Tuffnut named Bing, Bam and Boom- Hiccup had introduced his father to the Rumblehorn; seeing that, both the dragon and Viking had a similar traits and were hard-headed.
Stoick felt the gaze of his wife on him and turned his head to meet Valka's worried face.
"Valka, what's wrong?" he asked
His wife sighed. "I'm concerned Stoick," she confessed. "All this mystery that surrounds Hiccup, has me fearing that it could tear our son and his friends apart; especially Astrid."
"Valka, i'm sure Hiccup has a very reasonable explanation for his recent behaviour." Stoick stated. "Besides, you should be focusing your concerns towards Astrid. With the way she's handling this, she's about ready to start Ragnarök herself." he said, as he nudged his head in the direction of Astrid at the front of the group.
"Yes, that is true" she agreed with a small chuckle.
The next few hours where uneventful. Having made only one stop at an island, they were still surrounded by the never-ending ocean. Fishlegs continuously looked up from the map, and back down to it. The edges of the paper crinkled by his firm grasp and sweaty palms, and the strong winds threatening to blow the sheet of paper away was not helping one bit. He was now starting to regret not the bring the map book with him. Thinking it was going to be too fiddly to read in the sky, and having too little time to copy the map, he merely ripped out the page they needed. He felt incredibly guilty since Hiccup put a lot of hard work into the book, he promised to somehow reattach the page. But, now he was kicking himself for not bringing the whole book.
"Fishlegs! Are we near that island yet?" Astrid called against the wind.
Taking a quick scan at the sheet he held, he tried to pin their location. But, the map was as blank as the seas around. He knew when he first saw the map they were going to have a difficult time navigating. A huge area on the map was completely empty; meaning that there was absolutely noting but ocean in that area, and if his calculations were correct, they were in the middle of it .With Hiccup the only one to have explored this vast region of emptiness they had the disadvantage. With the nearest island at least a few hours away, he begrudgingly admitted, they were lost.
"How can we be lost?!" Snotlout shouted.
"It is very difficult to navigate," he shouted back. "through such a huge area of ocean, Snotlout! Especially, when we haven't been here before!"
"You have the map! You are the one we count on to guide to different locations!"
"Well, it's not my fault i didn't have time to study the maps better to make navigation easier." Fishlegs argued back.
"Oh, so it's my fault then?" Astrid joined in.
Fishlegs accusingly pointed at her. "Well, you were the one who rushed us to try and follow Hiccup, barely giving us time to properly prepare for a very unexpected trip. Into an unfamiliar area, i might add!"
"I was trying to find out what's gotten into Hiccup lately!"
"We could've questioned him when he got back!" Snotlout recoiled.
"Yeah! And allow him to return to his weird, distant self again! We finally have a glance into Hiccup's past, and i'm not passing that down. We deserve some answers!"
The argument carried on for another ten minutes.
Valka and Stoick kept their peace by keeping silent, fearing their interruptions might make it worse; but, they also wanted to see if they could resolve the issue and come to an agreement. However, the twins stared at the three bickering dragon riders in amusement. While they weren't part of it, this was the first piece of fun they had in hours.
"Can we all agree that this all Hiccup's fault?!" Snotlout asked.
Astrid and Fishlegs looked at it each other, contemplating. They were out here in the middle of nowhere because of Hiccup. Their concerns for him was because of his strange behaviour. And, they were relying on a piece of paper that revealed where he would be, because Hiccup dropped it.
They both looked back at Snotlout and nodded their heads.
"Hey guys!" Ruffnut called. "I see something on the horizon!"
Everyone immediately snapped their gazes to the speck Ruffnut was pointing at. Astrid dug through her travel bag, and pulled put a spyglass. Bringing it to her right eye she squinted through the glass lenses as the magnified image of a ship came through. And wasn't just any ship.
"Its Johann!" she exclaimed.
"What?!" everyone yelled.
"I-I-It can't be." Fishlegs stuttered. "He's trading route doesn't come out this far"
Astrid pulled the spyglass away from her eye. "Well, whatever the reason, i'm sure it's because of Hiccup."
Shortly after the demise of the Red Death, Johann had pulled into Berk's port. Stoick had become suspicious of Johann, when he didn't express surprise of seeing Hiccup alive, but rather seemed relieved. They then found out that Johann had known Hiccup was alive all this time, along with Gothi. Which resulted in a heated argument between father and son.
"Well then," Stoick announced. "Lets see what Johann has to say. Lead the way, Astrid."
With a firm nod, Astrid leaded the group of dragon riders towards Johann's ship. It didn't take long to reach him; and to say Johann was startled was an understatement.
Landing the dragons on the ship, leaving the twins and Snotlout hovering above, they advanced on Johann.
"What a surprise!" Johann enthused. "I'm surprised to see the great Chief Stoick the Vast all the way out here. What brings you here?"
"We could ask the same thing, Johann. You're way off your trading route." Stoick replied.
The trader began to sweat. "Well, i-i-i'm taking a holiday, you see. A-And i heard about this place from a-a-a friend! Yes, a friend!"
The Vikings all shared a look.
"So, you wouldn't happen to know anything about where Hiccup could be going to?" Astrid questioned suspiciously, as she pulled her axe off from her back and began to finger the blade.
"Why of course not!" Johann gulped loudly. "How would i know anything about the Wedding?"
"We never said he was going to a wedding." Valka stated.
Before Johann could blink, Astrid had tackled the trader to the deck of the ship and pinned him there with her foot, and pointed her axe to threateningly to his neck.
"Tell us what you know!" she demanded.
"Alright, alright, i'll tell you!" He put his hands up in surrender. "Hiccup asked me to come here so he'd be able to collect an item."
"What was it?" Fishlegs asked.
"They were rings," Johann answered as Astrid let him up. "He gave them to me for safekeeping. He didn't want me to come to Berk or the sanctuary as he was busy with something else."
"Do you know what he was busy with?"
"I'm sorry Master Fishlegs, I'm afraid I do not know. All I know is that he needed to collect rings off me to bring to a wedding he is attending. Apparently, these people are very important to him."
"Have you met them" Valka asked.
"Once or twice ; I visit them when my schedule allows it, which isn't very often , but they are lovely people, and they treat Hiccup like family."
Astrid held her axe at Johann's throat again. "So you know where the island is then?"
"Yes, I do," he chuckles nervously. "Continue heading Northeast, you should reach it within the hour."
Strapping her axe back on her back, Astrid mounted Stormfly "Thank you Johann, you've been a really big help."
"Don't mention it. Please." he pleaded.
Astrid gave no answer. Stormfly took off in the air, followed by the other dragons, and lead the group Northeast.
True to his word, the riders had reached an island within the hour. And they could see why it was called 'Ebony Isle'. The island was large and in a rough circular shape, there were no mountains but a beach circled the island, but not with sand; ebony black pebbles encompassed the outside of the island before it met with white sand. Tropical trees covered the island, giving shade to village in the middle.
Landing on the beach and entering through the trees, Astrid began to think of ways they could approach this. Too focused on getting answers to Hiccup's weird behaviour, she forgot that just waltzing in there and questioning Hiccup upfront would seem hostile to these people. They didn't know the people of this island and there was the high possibility of them having a different culture to Berk. Before long they were at a gate built into a high wooden wall that was circling the village.
Astrid was brought out of thinking when she was suddenly pulled back by Fishlegs. Turning around to shout at him, a loud 'thwack' noise caused her to look back at where she was standing two seconds ago. A long staff, bound in tight strips of black leather, with a large jagged blade on both ends was sticking out of the tree, she was just standing next to.
"What is your business, here?"
All heads turned to the owner of the voice.
A tall and lean woman stood ten metres. She had dark caramel skin with dark brown curly hair that reached down to her hips. She wore a dark turquoise dress that split at on the sides, brown tights and knee-high black leather boots. A grey fur collar was attached to the back and sides of the neckline of the dress and her metal armguards wear sharp and threatening.
Stoick took the moment to answer.
"I'm Stoick the Vast, Chief of the Hairy Hooligan Tribe. we came here to look for my son, Hiccup?"
"Why?" the woman bluntly asked.
"We need to ask him some questions." Astrid answered.
"Why?" The woman shot back.
"The reason doesn't concern you"
"It does concern me," The woman walked to the tree and took the staff out of the tree with one mighty pull. "Hiccup is a very important to this village, we owe a lot. Besides, how do I now you're not lying? For all I know, you could be spy's, working for warlords."
She twirled the staff expertly in her right hand, her piercing chocolate brown eyes glaring thoughtfully at them. Astrid met her sharp gaze, fingering twitching, yearning to grip the handle of her axe.
"Listen," Astrid barked. "I don't know who you think you are, but, I'm not going to let you get in the way of seeing my boyfriend!"
The woman pointed the bladed staff at Astrid. "Are you challenging me?"
Astrid snatched her axe from her back. "You bet i am"
Stoick and the others moved back. They all knew not to get in Astrid's way when she was fighting in a duel, and they did not want to be collateral damage.
The woman advanced first. Swing her double-bladed staff at Astrid. The latter dodged by jumping back. Astrid hefted her axe and swung from underneath. The other woman blocked the swing, and stabbed one of the ends of her staff into the ground and propelled herself over Astrid. As she landed, Astrid turned to face her opponent, but was met with a kick to the stomach, sending her back two metres.
Astrid back-flipped, she up-righted herself, swaying a bit on unsteady legs. She regained her balance and rushed at the woman, jumping up into the air with her axe held over her head. The woman lowered herself to the ground, with one leg bent underneath her and the other outstretched; the woman gripped her staff with both hands and held it out in from of her and blocked the blow from Astrid's axe.
The woman pushed Astrid's axe off and spun counter-clockwise, running her outstretched leg across the ground and into Astrid's leg, effectively tripping her. The young shield-maiden laid on her back, dazed. Astrid was met with a blade to her throat.
"Had enough?" the woman mocked.
Astrid growled and was about to show the woman a piece of her mind, when a voice called out-
"Enough!"
Everyone, including the woman turned to see Hiccup, casually, standing at the gate, with his hands clasped behind his back.
"Hiccup!" the riders exclaimed.
Hiccup gently smiled before walking up to them. "I expected you guys to be here sooner. I'm pretty sure i left enough breadcrumbs for you to follow." he said calmly.
"Well, after you left," Snotlout retorted. "You lead us into unfamiliar territory, causing us to get lost by Fishface here. All the while, dealing with the twins complaining, and Astrid's obsessions in finding you."
Hiccup chuckled. "I can't believe you guys actually went through that, just to find me."
"Hiccup, we should get inside." the woman stated. "The ceremony's about to start"
"Of course," Hiccup agreed. "Come on guys, we should get ready."
"Oh no!" Astrid yelled. "You're telling us whats going on right now! What's this island? Who is she? And, what in the name of Helheim is happening?!"
Hiccup sighed. HE shared a look with the woman, who nodded her head lightly. "Well, to answer those questions, Astrid. We're on Ebony Island, a sheltered refuge for a tribe who only wishes to live in peace." He used his hands to gesture to the woman. "This is Celestia. She is a very good friend of mine and one of the best warriors this world has ever seen.
"And to answer your final question, Milady. We are attending a wedding."
Hello Readers,
HAPPY SNOGGLETOG!
Sorry this took long to get out. I finished high school and went on a holiday to Papua new Guinea (Which was AWESOME!). Anyway, I haven't been in the writing mood and had trouble figuring out the plot for this chapter.
I wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy new year!
Hope you enjoyed the chapter.
Please review
Till Next time =D