Note: Feel free to skip the note to my guest reviewer below.

Dear Guest Reviewer, you know who you are,

Holy crap. I am so freaking sorry for hurting you this way. I'm actually pretty grateful that you told me what you hate about this story. I've been deeply wounded by stories that do this kind of thing as well. They hurt my heart and I go around miserable for weeks. I'm sorry. I know how it feels.

I don't know what to do to fix it for you. Obviously **I** think it can be forgiven (and be warned, I have a lot more abuse in mind before that happens) just as Hiccup forgave murder in HTTYD2 because it was under an outside influence. But tell me what you want for fix-it fic and I will do you an alternate ending – and seriously, you might want to quit reading this one because I'm not done with the abuse, and it IS horrible. I do plan to have sixteen hundred metric tons of love and healing after, but that will probably not do anything for you in the short run.

But I just want you to know, destroying that pair's relationship? NEVER. They're my babies. I would never. Seeing how much they love each other makes me feel alive. I'm just as invested in them as you are. The only reason I wrote this was to do something like HTTYD2 with Hiccup as the one who does something the other person would never forgive and be forgiven anyway.

And honestly, I never meant to hurt you with this fic, I know how it feels. I won't delete this fic, which is selfish of me, I freely admit, but give me a fix-it prompt and it's yours.

One Day Earlier

"I wish you could stay longer," says Djamilah, the Berserkers' Moorish healer, to Gothi. "I enjoyed your company so much in this village of meinfretr."

Gothi grins just short of a scandalized giggle, scratching Mutual in the dirt.

"Hey!" says the chief's sister, but she's used to the village healer calling her a stinkfart. "Just because you're the healer doesn't mean you can insult us!"

Insult is healer's privilege, Gothi writes. Also whacking in head with staff.

"We need more dragon-healing experience," Djamilah goes on, more seriously. She reaches out to stroke Cloudjumper. "May I?" Cloudjumper nods and flutters his scales as she runs a dark hand over them. He likes the Berserkers' healer. She reminds him of Valka. "Simple things like allergies will often leave us up shit creek."

"We owe you a debt of gratitude." Heather says formally to Gothi.

Yes we do, Windshear chirrs, nodding her polished head. The Razorwhip, and the island's dragons, are now completely cured of a reaction to an obscure plant that even Dagur hadn't recognized, but Gothi identified by scent without too much effort. Gothi smiles up at the grateful Razorwhip, who nuzzles the healer with her metallic hide.

"I'd say we owe Berk, but it'll have to be you personally. We couldn't owe Berk any more than we already do."

The young chief of the village comes in for a landing on his Triple Stryke, hovering on big wingbeats before landing. Hi, Windshear, Sleuther nods. Then he bows to Cloudjumper. Greetings, Alpha-Dam's Consort.

Greetings. No need to be so formal, Sleuther. Cloudjumper tilts his head pleasantly. Nice island you have here.

Sleuther offers the formal draconic response, You are welcome to stay always. Then he shifts to a friendlier register. How are things on Berk?

Good, good. We had some dragon-hating humans, but they're gone now. Still getting stragglers in from the last of the Ice Nest. Trying to get them settled in the Whispering Death tunnels below the human-nest before winter hits. As you can imagine, there's a lot of squabbling, and…

"Heather…" Dagur greets the healers before resuming, "I'll only interrupt this a minute, but there's a Rapscallion ship in the east."

Those would be the dragon-haters, Cloudjumper says. Sleuther tosses his bright head.

"Oh, that's on its way back from Berk," says Djamilah. "Gothi was just telling me they left her village two days ago."

Heather frowns. "Why?"

Peace treaty, Gothi writes.

Heather shakes her head.

"What's wrong, sister?" asks Dagur.

"Probably nothing," says Heather. "But there's been a lot of talk among the other chiefs that they're plotting something against Berk." Cloudjumper bristles, and the other dragons raise their heads. Heather turns to Gothi. "Was everything okay when you left?"

Yes. Gothi raises her head from the runes to look up at the chief and his second-in-command, then scratches out, What should I look for?

Djamilah narrows her eyes, looking at her chief. "You don't think they'd try that again, do you?"

"Surely not," says Dagur. "None of the tribes has used it since the ban. Hel, even Drago Bludvist never went that far." He shudders.

Gothi's gaze is absent. She strokes her chin. They were very insistent, she writes. I'll keep an eye open for any occurrences of that kind.

Cloudjumper rumbles to Gothi. If someone doesn't tell me what is going on very soon, I will be upset. You do not want me upset, trust me on this.

Heather's head turns from one to the other. "Is this something I missed when I was out looking for our father?"

"Well…" Dagur is a little hesitant. "It's probably nothing."

Heather folds her arms and narrows her eyes. "Which is a good way to get me to make you tell me everything."

"Well, sister… um…"

Djamilah waves the chief's hesitation aside. "Grudgeweed."

Dagur winces. "Djamilah, I'm not sure—"

"Shut up, brother." Heather faces the healer, arms akimbo. "Tell me what this stuff is, what it does."

Djamilah's voice goes dark. "We are not sure of its origins. It has been outlawed in the Archipelago for generations now, but some use it, and all remember it."

Dagur steeples his fingers and tries for a grin. "Heather, are you sure you want to—"

His sister's roar is only slightly less loud than Cloudjumper's. Both say, "TELL ME!"

Djamilah gestures down to where Gothi is scratching runes in the dirt.

Grudgeweed is a killer that turns love to hate. It takes your dearest one and twists them into an enemy in your mind.

Cloudjumper shudders. Valka has taught him to read, pictures that speak in a tiny voice. And these pictures terrify him. It turns friend against friend, parent against child, lover against lover. The stronger the love, the more the herb feeds on it. The more you care for someone, the more creative it seems to get with twisting that caring into a desire to cause them pain.

"That doesn't make sense," Heather protests. "You can resist it, right?"

Djamilah's face is sad. "There is no resisting it."

The finality in the healer's tone rubs Heather the wrong way. "If you really care for someone—My brother and I have a history of hating each other," they meet each other's eyes with matching rueful smiles, "and you know what, so have half the families in the Archipelago. But a mother and her child?"

Cloudjumper's eyes widen and he whispers, Valka…

Djamilah looks soberly at Heather. "That is the bare minimum of love required to activate Grudgeweed. Historically, it has been used most often to drive a wedge between a chief and his heir. That is why it has never been used to break up tribal alliances – although in a handful of cases, it's been used in inter-tribe marriages to start a blood feud. As a general rule, it will only start to work with those for whom you would die willingly." Her face softens. "Lovingly. Like a mother and her child."

Heather can't stop shaking her head. "If it feeds on love, why's it called Grudgeweed?"

"That's its weapon of choice," says Djamilah. "Grudges. But I'm not talking big ones."

Gothi is writing as she speaks. The smallest slight, the most ridiculous altercation, becomes in your mind a justification for torture and murder.

"Murder?" Heather whispers.

It is recorded that under Grudgeweed, one chief of the Outcasts burned his son alive for breaking his favorite bowl. The stick scratches in the dirt, relentless. A clan matriarch on the outskirts of the Archipelago tortured her daughter to death because she borrowed her mace and was late bringing it back.

Heather shakes her head, reading the runes over and over until Gothi covers them over with fresh smooth dirt. "What's the antidote?"

Gothi looks at the young Berserker sadly, then turns to her writing. There is no antidote. Grudgeweed's spell is only broken with the beloved's death.

"Yeah, it's not pretty." The Berserker healer folds her arms and pushes back the hood of her cloak. "Ask your brother," Djamilah adds, "how that shit's been used in Berserker history. You Vikings aren't short of horrible methods of torture."

Dagur laughs nervously. "I'm sure nothing's wrong," he smiles at his sister, already scrambling onto her dragon, "but just in case, I think we ought to pay them a visit on Berk."