Chapter 11
Hiccup woke up tired. Again. It was almost like back when she was trying to keep Toothless a secret on Berk. Actually, it was exactly like when she was trying to keep Toothless a secret on Berk. The only difference in this situation was that she was in Dunbrough. Hiccup sighed.
She knew from experience that the feeling of being exhausted was going to become natural to her soon enough. All Hiccup could do was not let anyone know just how tired really she was. If she let it slip, then they would wonder why. And then they would find out about her nightly trips into the woods. Obviously, they would get curious about where she was going, and then it would only be a matter of time until they found out about Toothless. And that couldn't happen. The Dunbroughs were nowhere near ready to accept Toothless. Hiccup still had her work cut out for her. For now, she would just have to go through her days like normal.
If Hiccup was like anyone else in Dunbrough, she would have shivered when she climbed out of her bed. But, Hiccup was still very much a Viking. She embraced the cold as she left the warmth of the covers, but groaned when she started walking. She and Toothless had done a lot of hard flying last night, and Hiccup's body was still slightly sore.
Hiccup started walking slugglishly to the stables, and was surprised to find Maraud already there. He didn't seem like the type to wake up early, and it certainly was early. Hiccup had always been an early riser, even by Viking standards. Right then, not even half of the store owners were even starting to walk to their shops.
Maraud was holding Angus's saddle in his arms, and muttering angrily. As Hiccup walked closer, she realized why. The leather was scratched up, and a couple of the strings were chewed up, or missing. Maraud was pursing his lips together, trying to figure out what could have possibly happened, but Hiccup had a feeling she knew.
Hiccup had thought Toothless was acting a little strange during their flight. He almost seemed angry. But whenever Hiccup had asked him about it, Toothless had shaken off her concern, or her hand. When Hiccup finally convinced Toothless to let her down because it was too late, he had had a strange glint in his eyes.
At the time, Hiccup hadn't understood. But now she did. Toothless had been jealous. And the odd look in his eyes? He had been planning on destroying the saddle since the very beginning. Hiccup wondered how he managed to get in and out of the plaza without anyone noticing him. Then, Hiccup mentally face-palmed. She had said it herself. He was a Night Fury. If there was any dragon who could pull off such a low key mission, it would be him.
"Hey, Maraud," Hiccup said as she stood next to him. She tried acting like nothing was wrong, but she felt so incredibly guilty about his saddle. If only Dunbrough had a smithy…
"Hmm? Oh, good morning, Pri- Hiccup," Maraud mumbled absentmindedly. Even though Hiccup hadn't asked anything, Maraud theorized, "I'm not exactly sure what happened, but if I were to bet, I'd say this was the doing of those da-" Maraud snuck a look at Hiccup and cleared his throat, "Those same teens that damaged your ship,"
Hiccup pursed her lips, and scrunched them to the side. She gently pulled the saddle from Maraud's hands and examined it. The leather was torn, yes, but the basic mold and frame was untouched. Hiccup let out a small smile. At the end of the day, Toothless was a gentle dragon, who never really wanted to destroy or break anything.
Hiccup ran an analytical eye over the saddle. She remembered the days when she had to constantly fix her and Toothless's saddle, back before she added a harness to keep her on the saddle. She had become quite the expert with working with leather. If she was right, then the repairs for the saddle would only take about an hour, if they even took that long.
"Does Dunbrough have a smithy?" she asked Maraud. He looked at her for a second before asking,
"A blacksmiths, you mean?" Hiccup nodded, and Maraud said, "Of course we do! We're not just a run-down kingdom in the middle of nowhere, you know!"
Maraud tried his hardest not to get too annoyed. Really, he did. He knew that Pr- Hiccup didn't mean to be rude or disrespectful. He just wanted her to know that of course his home had a 'smithy' as she called it. Dunbrough was quite advanced, if he did say so himself. It just irked him whenever anyone underestimated his home.
He led her to the smithy, insisting on holding the saddle. Hiccup had tried to argue, saying that she was fine, but Maraud just took it from her instead of arguing. He didn't know why, but he had a sense that she was just as stubborn as he was.
"This is it," Maraud said, placing the mangled saddle on a table in the middle of the blacksmiths. He would get McFeely to fix it for him later. Right then, Maraud was only interested on the look of joy on Hiccup's face.
The second she had walked into the threshold of the blacksmith's, her face had lit up, and her fingers had started twitching. Maraud leaned against the table behind him and looked at the pretty girl in front of him.
"So," he asked, "What do you think?"
Hiccup turned to him and smiled.
"I think it's great!"
She then started walking through the shop like she had been born and raised in it. Maraud turned to watch her. He wasn't exactly sure what she was doing, and if she was about to do something dangerous, he wanted to make sure that she was safe. Maraud mentally shivered at the thought of what his mum's reaction would be if she learned that Hiccup got hurt, and Maraud was there and didn't help her at all.
Hiccup walked to the opposite wall and slipped on a thick apron, tying the strings behind her like it was second nature. Her hair was already in an untidy bun, but she decided that it wasn't good enough. She looked at Maraud for a second, blushing, before quickly letting her hair down.
Maraud's breath caught in his throat. He already knew Hiccup was a beautiful girl, but she looked down-right goddess-like with her hair down, framing her face perfectly.
She quickly pulled it back up again, tighter, and refused to look at Maraud for a couple of minutes. She went to a room in the back that Maraud hadn't even noticed before, and came out with a box of leather, a spool of thick thread, a thick needle, and a pair of scissors.
Hiccup put the box down on a small stool, and went to stand in front of Maraud. He stared at her, and she blushed lightly before saying with a small smile on her face,
"Maraud? The saddle is behind you,"
"Hmm?" he hummed stupidly. Hiccup laughed a little.
"Can you hand it to me?"
"Oh! Of course!" He turned around before she could see the blush on his face. "Here ye are,"
"Thanks," Hiccup smiled up sweetly at him, and Maraud pursed his lips. He watched as Hiccup went back to the box of leather and tools, and started working. The smile was wiped from her face as she started to concentrate, and Maraud found that he couldn't keep his eyes off of her.
She moved with practiced ease, like she had fixed a saddle thousands of times before. She quickly cut off the unsalvageable bits of leather and threw them into a different box she had dragged over. Then, she started sewing the loose strands back onto the frame of the saddle. And for all the bare patches of saddle, she pulled out new pieces of leather, measuring them out precisely before cutting them in the exact size and shape she needed. She sewed them on quickly, but accurately, and before Maraud knew it, Hiccup was holding the saddle out to him. He took it from her, and took a second to admire the craftsmanship.
If he hadn't known that the saddle wasn't meant to look like that, there was no way he could have figured it out. Hiccup sewed the patches of leather on so that they covered the base, but so that they made a design, and also would give him more traction when riding. It was a beautiful saddle, and Maraud couldn't figure out how a princess would know how to do that.
Maraud found that Hiccup actually did that a lot- surprising him. And, he was starting to think that he liked it. A lot.
So, there's some more Mericup fluff! I felt really happy while writing it, and hashed it out in like, twenty minutes. There's not going to be a lot of straight up fluff like this in the story as a whole, so enjoy it while you can get it! Like I said earlier, this is going to be a long fic, so it'll be a while until Toothless is 'introduced' to the Dunbroughs. I think I said this before, but things really start to spice up around chapter 15. Interpret that as you will. You really won't find out until I get there. I might need to change this story to T soon. If you have anything against that, PM or review, and tell me, and I'll see what I can do, but I think in the next day or so I'll do that, if no one had any major objections. Thanks for following and reviewing! It's awesome that people like this story, and I can't wait until the next update :)
