Chapter 10: The First Shot
Author's Notes: The end of episode 1 has come! Soon we shall get to episode 2, and many questions shall be answered. Not all, but many.
Reviews:
The Story Of Your Life (Mar. 26, Chapter 9) – I always try to listen to music when I write. It helps me remain calm and not fly into a rage whenever I write a fight scene (by the way, I make faces when I'm writing dialogue, to get a feel for the emotions behind the words XD). And thank you. I rather liked their names, myself. I chose them because they have white scales and their different breath weapons, but they once had these really weird names that I can't remember.
The battle with Darksoul will be fun, but it's not happening until episode 15. I know, it's a long way in coming, but now you have something to look forward to! :P
mc arno (Mar. 31, Chapter 9) – Thanks! I like what I'm doing with this story, and I'm glad others do, too.
Disclaimer: HTTYD is not mine.
Key:
0*0*0 – scene change
Horizontal line – perspective change
Hiccup bent forward in the saddle as Toothless, Snow, and Ash flew over the palace quickly. If he looked to his left, he could see Cog holding onto her dragon tightly, half of her armor missing and a few scratches on her arms, but otherwise intact. He sighed inwardly and looked down at the city below, the twinkling lights of the houses and other buildings like a field of stars. A part of him was upset because he had gotten his friend hurt, but the rest of him replied with a curt remark that Cog could take care of herself.
Speaking of stars, how come he could see them, but no moon? It was late enough that it should have risen.
'Come to think of it, I didn't see one last night, either,' he thought concernedly. Maybe it was just time for the new moon. Well, it didn't matter right then. What mattered was getting out of here with their lives.
"Hey, Hiccup, we have to go down to the city! I need to grab something!" Cog shouted over the rushing air. He shot her a bemused look, even as they dove to the cobbled streets in a flash of black and white.
The few people that were still out watched them with shock as Cog jumped off of her dragon and started running down the street, glancing down some streets and alleys as she went. Hiccup followed her on Toothless, prepared to make a quick getaway if they needed to, and Snow and Ash weren't far behind. Finally, Cog stopped at the entrance to one street. Toothless barely managed to stop in time to avoid hitting her. He opened his mouth to say something sarcastic, but the look on her face stopped him. Whatever she was looking at, it was serious business.
"Hiccup, follow Nuts. He'll show you to the place we need to meet up," she said grimly. Hiccup craned his neck to see some guards racing towards them from the street she was looking at. Yeah, definitely serious business. His mouth twisted in concern.
"Will you be okay?" he asked worriedly. She grinned widely and gave him a thumbs-up.
"Of course I will be. I've got all sorts of knowledge about this city! I know this city like the back of my hand," Cog replied confidently, holding up her left hand for emphasis. Toothless warbled with just as much worry as Hiccup was feeling, but Ash growled firmly, and he grunted in understanding. That was when the tiny black and brown dragon flew out of her armor and started hovering in front of them with rapid beats of his enormous (compared to the rest of him) wings.
"Now go! I'll handle these guys," Cog shouted, pointing at the street beside them. Nuts chirped for them to follow him and flew down the stony pathway, and Hiccup glanced at Toothless.
"Well, bud, she did say she could handle them. I think she can," he murmured to reassure his dragon partner. He growled uncertainly, but started bounding down the street in the wake of Nuts. Snow and Ash remained behind with Cog to face down the guards.
I watched the armored men and women approaching us with dread. Okay, on the outside, I put on this confident, cheerful front, but these guys wanted to kill us! That would make anyone feel terrified. And while I knew how to fight, I didn't want to hurt any bystanders, even if they were just staring at me in shock and dismay.
Snow growled behind me (I knew it was her because her sounds are a lot more emotional than Ash's, and it came from the right, not the left) and I tensed up. If necessary, my Skellurdreki partner would hurt these people to protect me. I didn't want that to happen at all. Not while there was still a chance that this was just a big misunderstanding on their parts.
"Hey, there! Did you know that I'm actually not Markless?" I called to the guards. They slowed down a bit, weapons at the ready, and really looked at Snow and Ash. I silently sighed and waved in greeting.
"Yeah, so... it turns out the Jarl lied when he said I was Markless after I turned five. Who would have thought he could miss something like that?" I continued casually. They blinked their eyes and scrunched up their faces in thought, and a part of me hoped I was getting through to them. One man, though, shook his head and glared at me.
"The Jarl never lies. He always tells the truth," he growled in reply. Somehow, I got the slimy feeling on my back when he spoke, but it was... faded somehow, as if it was diluted. Like someone had taken the Jarl's or his sons' speech and mixed it with water before letting this guy use it. Like someone was using Myst Magic through him.
Like it was Myst Magic that could infect people, but weakened with every person.
That must have been one of the Jarl's Myst Magics, I realized with a shudder. Somehow, his every word was believed when he used it, and it had even affected me for a little while. But why wasn't it working now?
Ash growled warningly just over my head, and it hit me. My bond with Snow and Ash had been strengthened when I found them again. That must have been a Myst Magic I got from them. I could resist the effects of other people's Magics, though it had been weakened while we were separated.
"Listen, buddy, everyone lies at some point in their life! It's a part of being human. No one is perfect, not even the Jarl."
That was the wrong thing to say.
As soon as I mentioned Darksoul, they all shot daggers at me with their eyes and began advancing again. I backed away a bit and looked at the two heads of my dragon.
"Okay... I suggest fleeing," I said calmly. Ash gave me the coolest look ever (and I'm talking temperature-wise, not awesomeness-wise), Snow growled impatiently, and I climbed up onto them just in time to avoid being hit by a pike. It quivered where it was driven into the mortar of the street, and that stuff is pretty hard when it's dried. The fact that the blade was buried a few inches into the gray goo was proof that the woman who threw it was strong. Now imagine what that would have done to me.
Cog-kabobs, anyone?
My Skellurdreki did a quick about-face and started running back through the streets, letting me lead them to the place I needed to go. There were important things there, and I was not going to leave them behind.
0*0*0
When I reunited with Hiccup, Toothless, and Nuts, we were at the edge of the city, near the Garden of the Sylphs. I could see them by the light of the sleeping Pixies and other small monsters that slept in the trees, flowers, and shrubberies (there had been a great fuss when the Sylphs who lived there had demanded the shrubberies in return for their help with controlling the winds. To this day, I can still hear them shrilly insist, "We want a shrubbery!"). My Claptrap partner flew over and started chirping happily, nuzzling my face as he gripped the sides of my head with his wings.
"Hey, Nuts. I'm glad to see you, too. Did everything go okay getting out of the city?" I asked Hiccup, looking past the membranes of Nuts' wings. He nodded and saw the bag on my back, carefully placed over the weapons I still carried.
"Yeah, though Nuts nearly led us into an ambush. What's that?" he replied curiously, pointing at the brown cloth bag. I managed to get Nuts onto my shoulder and shrugged.
"Just some important things we might need. I always kept them... just in case I got the chance to leave the city. Now I have to go," I replied resignedly. Hiccup's face fell. His mouth opened to say something, but that was when we heard someone hiss at us.
"PSST!"
We both jumped, but when a guy with unkempt black hair and shining green eyes jumped down from the tree nearest us and held his hands up to show he wasn't a threat, we both relaxed.
"Are you the reason the city is in an uproar?" he whispered. Hiccup and I shared a wry look and shrugged.
"I guess so. The Jarl apparently doesn't take kindly to my taking back what is rightfully mine," I replied, pointing back at Snow and Ash. They growled warily, but that was when a green Seraph stepped out of a grove of trees nearby and barked quietly. They immediately stopped and dipped their heads in respect.
The young man smirked and folded his arms across his chest. He had on some sort of dark tunic and leggings, but they were finely made. This guy was definitely not your run-of-the-mill man in a tree.
Now that I think about it, are there run-of-the-mill men in trees?
"Then that makes you an ally. I am Levi Wolfram, rightful ruler of the Land of the Faded, and anyone who opposes that usurper's reign is a friend to me," he introduced himself, bowing slightly.
We both just stood there silently, staring at him like he had an extra head or two noses. This guy was the real leader of this land? How was that possible? Wasn't Darksoul the Jarl?
"Uh... Levi, isn't that Darksoul guy the ruler?" Hiccup asked, voicing one of the questions in my head. Levi scowled and spat on the ground.
"A traitor. He murdered my father with his twisted words and almost killed me. If not for Dhole, I would be with my father," he said bitterly, putting a hand on the head of the Seraph. That monster was the same as the one on the tapestry behind the throne, only green instead of gold.
"The Wolfram family... that's why the Land of the Faded has a Seraph on its coat of arms!" I exclaimed, stunned by this realization. He nodded once and turned away from us.
"That is why I have come back. I wish to challenge Darksoul, but now that I know he has control over all in the city but you two, I have a different plan. Will you help me overthrow him?" he asked seriously. I looked at Hiccup, he looked at me, and we both glanced back at Levi.
"Well, seeing as Darksoul is trying to kill us, I think we're in. What's your plan, Levi?" I asked, noting the growing din in the background. The guards were getting closer to us. If we didn't hurry, we would all be captured or killed.
"We need to get some help, and I think I know where. The Library," he explained briefly. My eyes widened in shock. No one went to the Library anymore, not if they could help it. They said it was haunted, cursed, that only fools went there without some form of protection.
"Are you insane? We can't go there! We'd need, like, a bazillion protective charms just to survive!" I hissed back. Hiccup shot me a confused glance, and I gestured that I would explain later. Apparently, Berk was both really far away and really out of the way, if he had never heard of the Library. Even people from the Land of the Sorrowful, far in the direction of the rising sun, past the Sands of Stolen Time, knew about the Library. But I digress.
Levi shrugged noncommittally and looked over us at the entrance to the Garden. By now, the light from the anolite torches the guards held was starting to bleed towards us, and I realized our time was running out.
"I may be insane, but right now, I'm the only person in this country who will help you. Do you want to take your chances with Darksoul's mercy, or the potential horrors of the Library?" he gave us an ultimatum. Sky gods, I hate it when people do that!
Hiccup glanced at Cog. She was biting her lip, sneaking peeks over her shoulder at the coming guards, and finally she made up her mind with a resigned sigh.
"Fine, we're going to the Library. Maybe I can look up stuff on the Winterstorms and Skellurdrekis there. I want to know more about Snow and Ash, and common Myst Magics their partners have," she grumbled hopefully. Levi raised an eyebrow, then grinned.
"I thought something was strange about you. You're Cog Winterstorm, aren't you? You look just like the portraits in the Hall of Ancestors," he said appraisingly. She flushed a bit and rubbed her arm.
"Um, yeah. Thank you. I didn't know I was famous to lost princes," she said quietly. Levi did some sort of shrug/wave motion with his arms that was kind of funny to see, but apparently Cog didn't think it was humorous. Instead, she blushed even harder.
"Well, Winterstorm dye is pretty popular. That Kaupmaður Strut guy is the reason I was able to get in here today, and he's the one who sells it to all the other lands. It's hard to find something so well made nowadays," he replied appreciatively. Cog would have said something to refute that (at least, that's what Hiccup thought she would have said), but that was when their time ran out.
"There they are! But who's that man with them?" a guard shouted, the light from his anolite torch bleeding across the ground to the group of humans and monsters.
"I don't think now is a good time to talk about the quality of Cog's goods," Hiccup said sardonically. The other two nodded and jumped onto their monsters, Hiccup leaped into the saddle on Toothless, and they took off into the sky just as a particularly lethal-looking morning star embedded itself in the ground where they had stood. The giant of a man who wielded it glared at them as they escaped, meeting his eye with a dark challenge. This definitely wasn't over between them.
As Hiccup, Cog, and their new ally, Levi, fled Faded Dreams, a swath of pale dust and rocks began to rise over the horizon, providing a sense of ominous portent to what they would find in the cursed Library.
Darksoul looked at his three generals with undisguised, icy wrath. Dýrð, Sigur, Heiður, even they had failed to stop Winterstorm and her friends from escaping. But Heimska had a new mission for them, one of redemption.
"My generals, I have news. I am reassigning you all," he began coldly. They all flinched, but as he continued with his new plan, their looks of dismay changed to expressions of delight. This was far greater than capturing some brat.
This mission was the beginning of a battle that would encompass all in the Fractured Lands.
Author's Notes: And with that, we come to the end of episode 1! *Cue epic ending music!* I had a lot of fun writing this one, especially that bit at the end of the Hiccup POV with the dust and the rocks. Have fun guessing what that is.
The episode count is up to 20, now, and that's where it will stay. I have basic outlines of the episodes written up, so I know where I'm going with this story. Just in case you were worried.
And feel free to review for this chapter, because I'll be answering any questions or replying to any comments in the first chapter of Strays, Episode 2: Last of the Winterstorms. Go ahead and ask whatever you want! No, really! You can even ask me something totally random, like what Cog's favorite color is, or what Nuts' least favorite food is. Type away!
Wild Cat 214, out!