It had been days and I was weak. They fed me, yes, and they gave me water to quench my unending thirst, but I was still weak.
The ache in my arm declined to a dull throb. My ankle hurt, but I could walk at least. I sat by the door, desperate for a way to at least get out and get to a Terrible Terror and get some of its venom.
I touched my face, feeling for my mask. I expected my hand to contact with the smooth surface. No, I touched skin.
They had removed my mask.
No wonder I felt so bare.
I couldn't help but lit out a pitiful whimper. They had taken away my one hideaway from the world. I had one source of disguise, and now they knew my face. I could be tracked. My silver tear of the moon was gone. I felt so…mortal.
When I was on the back of Darkmoon with my raven feather cloak flying out behind me and my hair woven with the feathers of night and mask shrouding my face, I could do anything. I could fly anywhere. I could be anyone.
No, I was normal. Boring.
Shaking my head, I cleared my thoughts. For Thor's sake, think! Focus on getting out of here and protecting Darkmoon, not pitying your own losses. I scolded myself, leaning up to see through the cracks in the door where sunlight could stream through.
A dragon snoozed on the opposite corner of the training arena. It was the Nightmare that I had seen with the boy, Snotlout. He was a prideful boy with a dragon to match his temper, but I knew the secrets of these flaming beasts.
I peered through the bars on the door, pursing my lips and whistling softly. The dragon snoozed on.
What had he called that dragon? I heard him mention the dragon's name, but what was it? Grumble? No, no, it had to be something else. Spitfire? No, that was not it.
"Hookfang!" I called in revelation. The dragon's amber eyes widened in recognition of its own name. His head lifted off the ground lazily, blinking in my direction. His eyes were intelligent and curious.
"Come here, Hookfang. Come on, I have something to show you." I bid. The dragon's eyes widened in curiosity. If there's one natural weakness to all intelligent creatures, it would be curiosity.
The dragon rumbled to life, taking a few tentative steps towards me little cell as I stretched on hand out towards it. He looked around, waiting for his master to come out of hiding and command him something that the dragon was likely to ignore.
His head leaned right against the cell, looking into my own enclosure, waiting for more. I grinned. I think I had him. "Hookfang, I know you like to set things on fire, right?" I asked. The dragon was intrigued, I could tell it now. I continued on, hoisting myself up to stand. "You only have a shot limit of ten, but I can make that expand." I whispered. The dragon's pupils rounded in surprise. I could tell that the Nightmare was anxious to hear more.
I bit my tongue, waiting to see what he would do. The dragon chuffed quietly.
"But first you have to let me out of here." I whispered. The dragon paused, taken back. "Come on, use those long claws of yours to pick the lock. They're nimble and thin enough to do it." I shook my head. The dragon contemplated the choices.
It took a long while, but his head ducked down and the door popped open. I pushed on it with my shoulder, favoring my injured wrist. As soon as I was out, I looked around the arena. It was nightfall, just past moonrise. The last rays of sunlight were quickly fading.
The dragon nudged my side, anxious to hear what I had to say. I held up my head and he touched the tip of his snout to my palm, an act of trust. I wouldn't betray it for that would mean certain doom.
His eyes pleaded to know what was going on. I looked at him curiously. "I'll show you, but I have to relieve the pain in my wrist first. I need some of those little Terrible Terrors, then we need a grindstone." I whispered urgently. The dragon's tail shook like a dog, anxious to get to the good part. I climbed upon the back of the dragon, the saddle smooth and worn from constant use. The dragon grumbled but subjected to the new rider.
"Okay, Hookfang. We just need one Terrible Terror for a few minutes." I whispered to him. The dragon slowly turned to the wall, grasping at the chains and taking off through the hole up top. Soon enough, we were soaring.
The dragon was clever. He stayed low enough not to be detected, by high enough not to startle the sheep grazing in nearby pastures. The village was all dark with not a person in sight.
We flew over the village, quietly gliding across midnight skies to where there was a small house up high on the cliffs, solo and looking out across the sea with tumbling waves and playful winds. The dragon set down just on the grass, flattening himself against the ground to keep out of sight. He looked at me urgently as I climbed off.
I saw a Terror sitting in one of the flower bushes. It opened a glassy eye and stared at me, making a tiny little croaking noise as I approached. I settled down, crawling on all fours towards it. The dragon cocked its head to the side in curiosity.
I froze as the dragon rose from its sleeping position and crawled towards me, clicking its teeth all the way. It made another croaking noise as I chuckled. I held out my hand as it sniffed. Cradling the injured wrist against my chest, the dragon twisted its head and moved to sniff my injured appendage.
"Creeeeak." The dragon crackled. I laughed stroked its scaly neck. It closed its eyes and purred like a feline. I reached the base of the largest spine on its back and scratched. It cried out in pleasure and collapsed on the ground, panting from joy. I laughed and gently moved its lip up, scratching at it's tooth. The substance that came off on my fingers collected into a tiny little glob.
I looked to Hookfang, gesture to come nearer. I moved to his claw, gently applying pressure and he lifted it up. "Just nick my wrist, gently please." I whispered. Grimacing all the while, I bit my lip as the dragon did as I asked. The pain was incredible. Moving some of the venom over the wound, I held it onto my wrist, tears of agony leaking out.
After a moment, the venom started to work and the ache was dulling down. I had learned from Freya, my mother, that Terrible Terror venom was lethal in high doses, but in small batches, it can relieve pain for a couple days or so.
The Terror was still asleep as I moved away from it, bending down to pat its head one more time. Hookfang nudged my side, anxious to learn how to make his firepower more potent. Was I teaching him something dangerous? Yes. Did I care? Not really. This was one more step to getting out of here, so it was well worth it.
We flew back to the village, landing just outside of it. I spotted the forge and a grindstone. Unfortunately, I hadn't taken in to account that it would be so noise to grind down a Nightmare's talons.
As we approached the grindstone, I sighed. How was I supposed to do this? I turned to the Nightmare who was staring at me curiously, wondering why I was hesitating. I sighed and patted his nose.
"We have to hurry. I'm going to grind down your talons just a little bit so that they're flatter. Once we're done, we have to get out of here quickly and escape to the mountains, just so that I can show you what you'll do." I whispered. The dragon's eyes went wide as I mentioned filing down his talons. I held up my hands.
"It's to create sparks, you'll see." I whispered. The dragon subjected as I turned to the grindstone and started the pedal, making it spin faster and faster until it was a decent speed. I had discovered this little Nightmare trick back a few summers ago.
The Nightmare struggled to fit under the small roof of the forge, but he managed to splay his two sets of deadly claws. Taking a deep breath, it was now or never.
I took one claw, heaving it up so that it barely touched the grindstone. A shower of sparks and a dull rumble filled the area. I took the claw down, seeing how it went. It was about six inches shorter and instead of it being needle thin and sharp on the end, it was about an inch across and flat. Perfect.
I snagged a helmet with glass to see out of, a forge's hood. Putting it on, I worked quickly. There was a noise and a light on at the opposite end of the village. Someone was coming out.
"Hurry!" I hissed. We finished with three of the four claws on the ends of his wings when I saw a figure appear. Dang. It was that pesky boy, Hiccup! Alexander was right next to him.
The Nightmare perked up, looking between him and me, a conflict coming to his eyes. I forced the last claw on the grindstone, sharpening it down before pushing the dragon out.
"Let's go! We don't have much time!" I whispered anxiously. Hiccup was calling out now and Alex, no, Toothless was growling.
I could tell the Nightmare was at a conflict. He could either pin me down and wait for Hiccup to come, or learn my secrets and take off with me.
He chose the latter.
I jumped on his back just as he started to take off. The dragon dove over the edges of the cliffs, rolling between the bridges and swooping low over the seas. I turned around. Hiccup and Toothless were hot on our tail. Unfortunately, the red of a Monstrous Nightmare didn't exactly blend in well with nighttime.
I looked towards the mountains anxiously. I tugged on one of the Nightmare's horns, pulling him left.
"Roll into the woods, settle down and lay low." I commanded. The dragon anxiously did as I asked, diving into the woods just at the base of the mountains. As soon as he touched down, I hopped off and scurried up a tree. The dragon lay low in the long grass.
I watched as Toothless/Alex and Hiccup flew slowly overhead, but didn't dive towards us. As soon as they were gone, I started walking off towards a mountain face in the distance. I could see a cluster of rocks and dirt that would be perfect for practicing on. The dragon followed me without another sound.
When we reached the dirty circle of earth, probably the aftermath of a Timberjack hatchling playing around and scorching the earth, I turned to Hookfang. The beast sat back on his haunches, waiting for further instruction.
"Okay, here's the trick. When you run out of shots, you can always get more firepower from your talons. I know it's cool and all to have super long and curves and sharp talons, but what you really want is talons about this long," I gestured to the length I had shortened them to. "and they need to be flat for the most part. Yes, they'll still kill prey and do damage, they're just not as long." I explained. The dragon inspected the hooks at the end of the wings that he used to walk around on.
"Fire comes from spark. In your maw, you create sparks that light up and cause your flame. You can light your whole body on fire from the heat you produce." I took a look around, searching out just the rock to use. I found one that I recognize and took it in my hand, scrapping it against the flat rock face against the mountain.
"This is similar to what your talons are made out of, only yours are about ten times stronger and produce hotter sparks. By scraping the flat tips of your talons against the rocks, you'll create a shower of sparks which will catch flammable objects on fire. Try." I instructed. The dragon did as I said and went up to the rock face, leaning up to scratch the tips of his wings on the surface. I ducked out of the way as a shower of sparks rained down on the dirt. The dragon was clearly impressed and softly vocalized it.
"Okay, now that you have that down, you need to learn how to control it. Now that you have the sparks part down, all you have to do is get the gas with it. When you breathe fire, that's a mixture of your self-generated heat, sparks created in your maw, and a bit of gas. If you get it right, you can create a small explosion around yourself by creating the sparks with your talons and breathing on it, since your breath is naturally part gas that ignites your inferno. Normal sparks don't catch on fire when you breathe on them because they aren't hot enough to be self-sustaining. However, you're able to generate sparks hot enough to last to ignition, so just by breathing on them with create a short lived burst of flames wherever the sparks land." I explained while the dragon watched with bored eyes. Clearly, he was just hear for the boom.
I sighed and shook my head. "Breathe on them and it'll work." I said and ran off as the scaled creature turned back to the rock face. I made sure to get a good distance away as Hookfang scratched his talons on the rock again, emitting a squeal as a shower of orange fell off. He quickly sent a little puff onto the shower which burst into flames around him.
Needless to say, the dragon looked pleased.
He played around for another half hour before coming back to my side, warm from the fire. I laughed as the dragon seemed to grin. I climbed back on his back as we flew towards the training arena. I looked longingly at the sea, wanting to escape.
But no, I had time still. I had to see Alex. I had to get him back. I had to get revenge.
I couldn't leave yet.