Dragon Prince Ch.11
I own my imagination not HTTYD if I did the vikings wouldn't leave their teenagers alone with out proper adult supervision for a known amount of time.
"That sounded like a close one Hiccup, we'll have to be more careful." Toothless scolded as Hiccup led them to 'the perfect place to practice tail positions and such'. Toothless felt like he should doubt that claim, perfection was so hard to achieve.
"Do you really doubt that I know that?" Hiccup snapped, "If someone finds out about you, da da da we're dead."
"She started to follow you through the woods, if you can't lose her next time, she's going to find out." Toothless said as they reached their destination lecturing one last time before taking in his surroundings.
They were at an isolated cliff over-looking the ocean on the far side of Berk, and as Hiccup promised it was perfect. The wind that blew up from the sea was just strong enough to enable them to glide a few feet off the ground, their was a sturdy stump to secure them in place and the surrounding trees and other foliage blocked them from prying eyes.
"What if we told her?" Hiccup asked tentatively as he use a measured length of rope to tie the larger dragon to the stump.
"Why would we tell her? She's one of them, she'll get us busted." Toothless growled slightly at the thought of the humans coming to attack them.
"You just said she'd find out, so why not let her on our own terms? Besides I trust her." Hiccup gave the rope a good tug to make sure the knot was strong enough. Once satisfied he gave an approving nod to his work.
"Are you attracted to this female? You do know she is not of your kind, right?"
"What!? No! Why would I-ew! Bad dragon! What's wrong with you?" Hiccup spluttered and blushed as Toothless chuckled smugly. The young were so easily teased and side tracked. "So, can I tell her?"
Or maybe not.
"Only if you're absolutely sure it's the right thing to do." Toothless sighed. "So are you going to hop on me any time soon or can I take a nap?"
Hiccup grumbled about impatient salamanders mocking him under his breath, before her clamored onto the saddle. The practice was going quite smoothly for most of it, however, when an unusually strong gust of wind came out of no where it got caught in Toothless's massive wingspan as they were testing a tail position and blew them back.
"Is anything damaged?" Toothless groaned, rolling onto his belly, that hurt.
"Uhh..." Hiccup conducted a quick search, "No, surprisingly, unless you count my sore backside."
"Okay, then lets move on to something else." Toothless ignored Hiccups' protests about only have six positions marked down and picked him up by the back of his vest and trotted back to the cove, also ignoring the increase amount of complaints coming from the boy.
(Line)
"You can do this." Toothless encouraged watching the boy squirm.
"Are you sure?" Hiccup was unsure and looked just as nervous as he felt. He was wringing his hands together and chewing his bottom lip so much Toothless was surprised it hadn't fallen off.
"Yes. Now, focus and just do what I told you." Toothless rolled his eyes, Hiccup was acting like he had asked him to jump off a cliff and start flapping his arms to fly.
"W-what if I can't?" Hiccup asked fearfully, with wide eyes.
"You can. Trust me." A scaly nose rubbed against a freckled cheek, offering comfort, "You just need to try."
"Fine." Hiccup closed his eyes and toke a deep breath to calm his nerves and let his shoulders sag when he let the air out. Okay Hiccup, he thought to himself, it's go time.
Hiccup toke another deep breath, but this time he also tried to breath out. The human body isn't suppose to intake air and expel something from the mouth at the same time, it simply can't work like that successfully; and so Hiccup felt a strange pressure take over his upper body, like it was struggling with what he wanted it to do and what its' natural impulses were. Then, like what happens when a bubble pops, he tasted something odd before something shot out of his open mouth.
The odd flavor forgotten, Hiccup eyes snapped open and he jumped to his feet. His eyes lit up with excitement when he saw the smoldering patch of burnt grass a few feet away. "I did it. I did it! I can't believe I actually did that!"
Toothless watched as the boy hop from foot to foot with joy as he pointed at the blackened grass, he rolled his eyes at the seemingly endless energy hatchlings had. "Well, don't just dance there all day. Do it again, the more you practice the easier it gets."
"Really? Cool!"
(Line)
Toothless had to admit, if he knew teaching Hiccup to shoot a plasma blast would keep him so occupied, he would have done it ages ago. Hiccups' first shot had been around mid-day and the hatchling had been try to create different powered blasts until past sun down. Toothless tried to get him to take aim at something, but the child seem content with experimenting with power levels for the time being.
When the moon was up and lighting the forest in a pale blue glow the older dragon finally managed to convince Hiccup to go to his home. The boy was reluctant, and begged for an extra five minutes of practice which he got, six times.
Eventually, Hiccup did stop asking for more time, but only because he couldn't speak past all his yawns. The trek through the woods was peaceful, and if it wasn't for the cool crisp air, Hiccup could honestly see himself falling asleep on his feet. However he did make it back to his hut in good time despite all the stumbling he id between his many yawns. He opened his front door with plans of going straight upstairs and falling asleep on his bed.
"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" Hiccups eyes widened comically huge when he noticed Astrid siting by the fire, eerily similar to the way his father was the night he shot Toothless down, she had been sharpening her ax. "I followed you in the woods today, I wanted to talk to you. But I lost you, so I came back here to wait until you return thinking you'd only be an hour or so, three hours later I was searching the forest trails, the beaches, the farms, every building in town and the caves, another six hours and I was back here waiting for you again. I was starting to think some dragon had carried you off somewhere and you just come back now? Do you have any idea what time it is? Well, what do you have to say for yourself?"
"I-I uh... Lost track o-of," Hiccup tried to stutter out a response but Astrid was so scary when she got worked up.
"You lost track of time?" Astrid, if possible seemed to get even angrier, "What were you doing the was so important that it made you lose time, Hiccup? Was it the same thing that keeps you in the forge all night? Or was it the thing that made so good in dragon training?" Her eyes widened when she saw him flinch ever so slightly, "It was, wasn't it? Are you training with someone? Why didn't you ask me? Tell me!" Hiccup wasn't sure how Astrid could look hurt while still look furious, but she did. He looked away from her, she shouldn't look like that, it wasn't right.
"I want to tell you." The child said in a small voice, he wasn't able to left his eyes off the floor. He didn't think he would have to tell her now, he wasn't ready. What could he say? What if she hated him for what he was doing?
Astrid, sensing his fear, stepped forward and placed her hands gently on his chin and made look her in the eyes, "Hiccup, tell me." she said again, softly enough not to scare him anymore than she already had.
"It'd be better to show you." His voice was no longer as small, but it was still feeble at best.
"When?" Astrid move her hand to his shoulder and dipping slightly to look him straight in the eyes when she noticed she no longer needed to hold his face up.
"Tomorrow." Hiccup really didn't want to give himself to much time to back out.
"Okay. Go to bed, it's to late for either of us to be awake right now." Astrid wasn't going to go home, she was to tired and it was late. After Hiccup disappeared up the stairs she laid down in front of the fire and let its' hypnotic orange glow and warmth coax her into slumber.
(Line)
When Hiccup awoke the next morning tired, that was expected considering his late night but, what he did not expect Astrid to have his morning meal already on the table waiting for him. Astrid, had always been able to cook a decent meal, as long as she didn't use her own recipes otherwise it would be pure tongue torture to eat what she made. She didn't cook often, which depending on the situation was a good thing, she actually tended to avoid 'women's work', as Tuffnut once put it before his sister beat him up. So to see her siting at his table with a perfectly ordinary, common arrangement of food was a pleasant surprise.
"Morning." Astrid said as she began to eat her food. How she managed to get a better rest then Hiccup sleeping on the floor was beyond him, but the blonde look a lot better than he felt. Hiccup mumbled something close to a proper greeting, before he let a huge yawn occupy his mouth for the time being as he sat down across from her.
Astrid stopped eating and rested her chin on her hand and watched the young boy try to rub the sleep out of his eyes with his fist, "Sleepy?"
"Mmhmm." Hiccup nodded and began the task of putting the required sustenance into his body.
"Well, that's what you get for staying out so late." Astrid sang before she resumed consuming her meal, missing the relieved look Hiccup gave her when he realized her anger had calmed enough for her to tease him. He didn't speak though, neither did after that, they were both lost in thought about the previous night.
The meal passed at a lazy pace with a sort of awkward tension that only comes after fight in the between stages of anger and forgiveness. The only sounds to break the silence were the scraping of utensil against plate, the chewing of food and the occasional yawn, any outside noise was too subdued to penetrate the stillness of the Chiefs' hut. The after meal clean up was just as quiet, the two youths had shared many meals together over the years and, while their parents were away, they had developed a system that equally divided the work. One work gather the dirty dishes while the other put away the leftover food, one would wash the dishes while the other cleaned and put away. It was so systematic for them that even if they reversed their roles their synchronization would not falter.
Finally Astrid broke their silence, "So, are you going to show me what you couldn't tell me?"
"Yeah, but leave your weapon here." Astrid had picked up her axe from where it was leaning against the wall and gave the burnet a curious glance. "Please, it's not like you'll need it and your deadly enough without your axe so what's the point?"
Astrid scoffed and rolled her eyes as she leaned it back up against the wall and let Hiccup lead her to whatever he wanted to show her. Of course she didn't need it, that didn't mean she would just leave lying around, it was her most prized possession. Hiccup himself gave it to her for her eleventh birthday after her previous one broke irreparably from overuse. She had asked him where he got it, worried only slightly that Stoick had first gifted it to Hiccup before the boy gave it to her, and he replied, shyly, that he had made it for her and told her that it was so plain in design because it was the first thing he crafted all by himself. It hadn't been out of her sight much since then and she toke very good care of it.
Astrid blinked suddenly when she realize Hiccup had led he off the trails and into the wilder part of the woods, "Where are taking me?"
"You'll see."
Hiccup led further into the forest until they came upon the stone entrance of a cove she never knew existed before. The scenery around it gave an odd natural illusion that made it nearly impossible to spot unless you knew what you were looking for.
"Incredible." Astrid breathed as she toke in the tranquil beauty of the hidden paradise, "I can see why you spend so much time here."
"It's not so much the view I come for, as to who's inside here." Hiccup said leading her into the cove.
"Who?" Astrid raised a dark eyebrow.
"Yes, who. I'll call him in a moment, but first you have to promise you'll stay calm and not attack."
Toothless knew the hatchling brought the female before they even stepped into the cove, he could smell them in the wind. He had decided to hide and at the right moment give the human a little... personality test.
He waited until the blonde viking made the promise before he pounced. The female reacted impressively, knocking Hiccup down with a gasp when she saw the Night Fury and hiding him quickly behind a boulder while snatching up a decent sized rock and taking a defensive position in front of Hiccup.
"RUN HICCUP!" Astrid shouted at the boy.
"No! Astrid you promised!" Hiccup jumped up and tried to get between the two or at least snatch the rock away but the blonde just kept him safely sheltered behind her. Well, as safe as one could get when there was a snarling dragon in the area.
"I promised not to get offensive, this is defensive." As soon as the words left her mouth all forms of regression seem to leave the dragon, leaving it looking cute and almost harmless.
"Ooh! I like her!" Toothless cooed, "Can we keep her?"
"Hiccup, what's going on?" Astrid asked the boy who seemed to have been relieved at the sounds the dragon was making.
"Uuh... Astrid this is Toothless, Toothless this is Astrid." Hiccup made the most awkward introduction in viking history to the two being he was closest to.
"Toothless has teeth." Astrid stated numbly.
The black dragon gave her a gummy smile, "Are you sure?"
"What's going on?" Astrid finally registered that Hiccup didn't answer he earlier question.
Hiccup sighed, Astrid was in shock, "You might want to sit down it's a long story." Hiccup really didn't think it was fair of him to tell her everything while she was in shock, but it was the only way he could tell everything without her freaking out halfway through and so he led her to rock big enough for both of them to sit on and started talking.
It toke most of the morning for him to explain as carefully as he could the events that led them to the situation they were in now and the whole time Astrid seemed slightly dazed and so he refrained from going into details. When he came to the subject of his heritage he was particularly careful with his words, he weighed each option and got some advice from Toothless before he said each sentence. After asking her if she wanted it, Hiccup even gave her proof of him being a dragon by shooting a small blast at the ground.
After all that was needed to be said was said, Hiccup cleared his throat to get Astrids' attention and asked her if she was okay. Even though she looked like she was ready to faint the blue-eyed girl nodded.
"Maybe you should take her back to the village, I think we broke her."
"She just needs rest Toothless, she'll be fine. I hope."
(Line)
Once Hiccup finally got Astrid back to the Hofferson home and into her bed, Hiccup was completely worried. The whole way back Astrid had this dreamy look and she just kept giggling randomly, maybe she was broken. Hopefully sleep would help her.
Astrid giggled again as Hiccup was leaving her room, "What's so funny, Astrid?" finally giving into the curiosity that had been eating at him.
"Toothless has teeth."
So, this chapter showed Astrids' slight bipolar tendencies. Also I spent time to touch up some of my chapters. Sad news that happened in my area, it shocked everyone, one of my buds' grandma walked outside while her husband was out working and froze to death early in the morning, they said her medication confused her. He had to go to her funeral the last day before the break. I think he went dressed in our house colors, green, white and purple, because it was on the same day as our school compete in different events to see which house is the annual 'Fun Day Champions'. He's really dedicated. Enough sadness, it's a new year (something I slept through cause I forgot) and that means we've got to get used to writing 2014 (that'll take only ten months) and start counting down the days until June arrives. Thanks for all the favs,follows and reviews.
Pepsi out.