Short chapter, I've been kinda busy, but this chapter was fun. As a heads up, I'm not going to explain how Caillte can turn into a dragon because he's an OC from a different story. If you'd like to find out please visit my FictionPress account and read my story "Caillte" or visit my deviantART account "E-Kathryn" Gallery-THE SHADOWS-Ice Dragon Antics for more of Caillte's backstory. If all you care about is Hiccup and the gang, just go watch DW:Dragons and HTTYD2! ;)
The blue dragon zipped through the clouds as fast as Stormfly, able to keep up with Toothless and very nimble from its size. Caillte gave a loud roar from behind Toothless as he flapped his wings frantically, giving it his all to keep up with Toothless. Hiccup laughed seeing Caillte's tongue hanging out of his mouth as with the exhilaration he was more fun than ever in his life.
"Let see what you got!" he shouted loudly back at the blue Smokerod dragon, as Toothless let out a plasma blast which struck the side of a cliff. Caillte watched as the rubble from the explosion fell into the sea and he took another pass over the cliff face and as he flew at the rocks much like a Night Fury folding his wings as he dove, smoke poured from his mouth like a zippleback's gas only blue and suddenly and concussive blue flame burst from Caillte's teeth and like Toothless he struck the rocks, doing just a bit less damage than Toothless had.
"Yeah!" Hiccup shouted excitedly just as Toothless soared upward followed by Caillte who landed at the top of the cliff and sat down, watching Hiccup and Toothless intently as Astrid and Stormfly landed behind him. Caillte looked to Stormfly and gave a warbling growl causing the Deadly Nadder to playfully come at him nuzzling his softer scaly armor with her beak.
Astrid jumped off to watch Caillte and Stormfly play, communicating with each other through growls and little bird-like screeches. This was until the young Smokerod came into play and shot into Caillte like a kamikaze bomber. Súile-Ciel climbed all over Caillte, nibbling on his wing tips and the soft parts on his arms.
Fishlegs stood aside watching the two and really starting to see the parental relationship Caillte had over Súile-Ciel. It truly fascinated him how Caillte interacted with the baby dragon, Fishlegs was also able to observe that Caillte and Súile-Ciel did not have very thick scales and they were surprisingly frail for dragons. Fishlegs dared not get between a dragon and their young from his experience with Changewings, but he had to ask, "Can Súile-Ciel turn into a person too?"
Caillte perked up, staring deeply at Fishlegs with his big green eyes, suddenly he seemed to sneeze and shake his head in denial. Fishlegs fondled a notebook he was scribbling into, "ah, got it," he muttered as he wrote down all the stats for the Smokerod species. Its class was mystery, its fire type was a concussive blue fire with a lot of smoke, and its size was medium-small.
Again Fishlegs got up to ask a question, "What's your preferred habitat?"
Caillte was too busy wrangling his little dragon hatchling to the ground as it nipped at his ear. Astrid laughed a little at how Caillte wasn't paying any attention to Fishlegs, and they had to wait a while for Súile-Ciel to take off flying after Caillte roared at him playfully. Caillte shook off his amusement laying down on the ground comfortable before he transformed back into himself reaching immediately for his staff.
He looked to Fishlegs with a broad smile on his face, something they had not seen much of since they met him, "I've lived with River and other Stormcutter's all my life, they live in high altitude mountainous areas, and being sharp-class they made nests out of wood. Before River and I started flying north we had a very elaborate shelter almost like a hut with a roof, a fire pit and everything!" he described gleefully.
Fishlegs awed, writing all of it down, "are the other two Smokerod hatchlings different colors other than blue?" he asked.
Caillte nodded, "Yes, they are white like River, a boy and a girl."
At this, Fishlegs' curiosity was sparked, "what colors of Stormcutters have you seen?" he wondered eagerly.
Caillte laughed a little startled by the question, "Well… my three hatchlings are blue like me, brownish-red—I've seen one other Stormcutter with that coloring, and the second oldest, Darmisu is black all over like Toothless. I've also met one Stormcutter who was purple, but she was hostile towards us and I only got a look at her."
As he said this, Hiccup landed with Toothless up on the cliff with the others. Caillte met eyes with him and suddenly frowned, "Stormcutters are extremely overprotective and I admit it has been a risk for me every day to stay with river. If they feel a connection with anyone or anything they'll snatch it up and carry it away to their nest, that's what happened to me at least. They are caring, but River can be overbearing at times…"
Hiccup took this in silently, imagining what it must have been like for Caillte to be taken away from all that he knew by the white dragon. "What about your family?" he wondered his voice a bit worried for the boy.
Caillte's eyes fell to the grass unable to preserve the pleasant smile he had worn before, "I honestly don't know…" he whispered, "I…" he hesitated, "I never knew them…" he admitted with effort. However he quickly readopted his happiness, "but my family is with River now."
Smiling in return, Hiccup came over to the boy and laid a hand on his shoulder. Suddenly, Fishlegs burst forth with another question, "So when do we get to meet River?"
Again Caillte frowned a bit nervously, "I don't know how safe it would be to just bring you all to her, like hey, these Vikings had Súile-Ciel the whole time," he explained like it was actually a danger then suggested, "it might be safer to just bring one of you, then if she's reasonable I can bring her to meet the rest of you."
Hiccup curled his fingers under his chin contemplating this and he nodded, "that sounds like a good idea,"
Caillte sat down on the grass again, laying his staff across his lap, "Hiccup, you seem to have a great understanding of dragons, would you be the first to come?" he requested, garnering Fishlegs' immediate disappointment, "sorry Fishlegs, I have nothing against you, I just don't want River to get scared for any reason." Hesitating, Caillte cringed and looked to Toothless, "and by one of you I do me one, not a dragon and his rider, sorry Toothless…" he muttered.
Hiccup didn't like the sound of that at all and patted Toothless' head worriedly, "but Toothless is a dragon like River, why can't he come?"
Caillte gripped his staff turning his knuckles white, "Because he's going to be as afraid of him as I was when we first met, but she's bigger than Toothless, so she probably won't wait to fight him off."
Hiccup frowned but nodded and looked to Toothless, giving his chin a little scratch, "Sorry bud," he despaired, "looks like you're going to have to wait this one out…" Toothless warbled a tone of despair as well in agreement.
Abruptly, Caillte chuckled and Toothless gave him and odd look. "What?" Hiccup remarked, startled by Caillte's humor.
Desperately, Caillte tried to hide it, covering his mouth as he stifled his laughed, "Nothing… it's just his nickname for you… it's quite unusual!"
Hiccup deadpanned, and waved him off, "I don't even want to know…" he muttered whilst Toothless followed him, nudging him jeeringly. He wasn't sure he really wanted to know what Toothless had to say about him amongst dragons, but part of him really did.
Seeing he wouldn't get through to him, Toothless playfully ran back to Caillte nuzzling his side and throwing Caillte's balance some. Caillte listened intently to the sounds emanating from Toothless' strange draconic voice which Hiccup had come to love, "He says, you're 'Hapless', and without him, you'd have lost more than your toes."
Hiccup chuckled, eyeing Toothless, "I did lose more than my toes, you big useless reptile!" he joked sauntering over to his dragon.
Caillte looked to Toothless as he growled at Hiccup some incoherent phrase in Dragonese then Caillte looked to Hiccup, "he says you're hapless and clumsy, by dragons' standards that would mean accident-prone and unlucky."
Hiccup crossed his arms, "Gee thanks, bud," he muttered sarcastically.
Caillte chuckled, "He just doesn't want you to go alone, and you won't, I'll take care of him, Toothless," he assured, fingering over Toothless' dorsal spikes. There was just something about Caillte that Hiccup admired, Caillte had a totally different world riding on his shoulders, living among dragons and truly being one of them, yet still retaining his humanity. Hiccup doubted in that situation he would have been able to do the same.
Suddenly a malevolent roar rained down from the sky and all eyes turned to a cloud which turned orange with fire from inside it. Caillte tensed and suddenly Súile-Ciel flew down to his side, hiding under him as he stood up, drawing his brows in fear as he stared up at the clouds.
"What was that?" Fishlegs fretted.
Caillte's voice growled in what appeared to Hiccup as anger, "It's her!" he yelled furious. The Stormcutter's four wings disrupted the clouds batting a firm gust of wind down at them as again it roared, glaring down at them. "Hiccup!" Caillte shouted.
"Yeah?" Hiccup muttered nervously.
Caillte put down his staff, "You train dragons to trust you, right?" he confirmed, getting down on his knees to transform.
"Um yeah…"
Suddenly Caillte's eyes sparked, lightning green as he shouted just before he transformed, "ride me!" and his voice changed to a roar. Súile-Ciel pounced up onto Caillte's back and looked to Hiccup expectantly as the young dragon knew as well as any what Caillte was demanding. Hiccup glanced to Toothless for a brief moment before swallowing his guts and jumping onto Caillte's back.
Finally some action!
