Toothless went absolutely mad as soon as soon as they grabbed hold of me. He unleashed fire, hit one straight in the chest, knocking him to the floor, and singed another with a glancing blow. They took my arms and hauled me further along the hall to what looked like a room purpose built for interrogation. They throw me onto the floor. My scales scrape across the rock, my back aches.
The leader dismisses his bodyguards with a wave of the hand; He either believes I won't hurt him, or I won't be able too. But he's left me unrestrained, the only mark of my imprisonment the locked door behind me. The room is empty besides two chairs sitting facing each other, walls made of the same black stone ever present everywhere else in this place, rough and foreboding. It's just me, and the man who has been trying to hunt down my dragon.
He makes no move to be friendly, but steps towards me.
:I've heard of ones like you. My father spoke of those that would brave the dragon's territories to befriend them, thinking to gain themselves more power by allying with such powerful beasts. Outcasts, or particularly foolish adventurers. Occasionally, very brave souls who needed the dragons power would find one that accepted their offer:.
I can't speak, either in his tongue or mine. Some part of me has blocked the knowledge of how to speak, and overwritten it with fury, and darkness.
:So I wonder, how did you? They say you and this Night Fury defeated this dragon queen, and of course I am very grateful. Such a feat is very impressive...:.
Something catches my eye. The barred door to this room is open and a scarred, bruised wolf limps in. He scowls at me, catches my gaze and holds it. I can't help but feel anger at what he has done. He tried to tear me from my dragon, and I can't forgive. I growl a challenge, and he growls back. I see the leader try to hold the wolf back from me, and for a clear moment I want to talk, to ask about motives and what it is they desire.
Then, a primal feeling overcomes my very being, and I ROAR and thrash and drop to the ground. My head pounds and my vision spins, but I feel myself grow and revel in the knowing of power. So I open my maw again and scream out at the injustice of being caged and kept from my mate, and a torrent of flame rushes up my throat and fires in a concentrated burst at the wolf facing me.
It hits him, and he hits the wall with a yelp and a thud. He lies there, whimpering. The other one has left. I pad over to the bars of the door and try to peer through, but my wide spade shaped head is too large to fit between the bars.
I can see the guards have left as well, and outside this room lies a bare hallway. Further down must be Toothless and the other strange dragon we encountered. Out of the shadow steps a figure. Hooded, like a daemon. However this one holds something. A key. He holds it up and smiles at me, as if he recognizes me. It's Lith. It's hard for me to think, but I know that the daemon must have done something to distract the others and obtain this key.
:Dragon Boy. That's you, isn't it? You've grown into a Night Fury:. He seems amazed. I snort at him, give a questioning look at whether he will actually let me out.
:I've sent those troops to the entrance to cause a distraction, and stolen the master's skeleton key. We don't have much time before they come back:.
He unlocks the door. We waste no time in finding Toothless, and I jump at my best friend, wrestle him too the ground and lick and nip his ear plates. It feels too good to reunite. He escapes my grasp and swipes me with his tail, but I swing myself around and wrap his tail with mine. The excitement and sensation of new feelings is overwhelming, infectious. I can't help snickering a dragon laugh and running my tongue over the ridges of my mate's neck. He warbles contently at the affection and relaxes from his tensed stature. We lose ourselves in the comfort and enjoyment of each other, until a loud, resonating growl pierces every corner of the room and shatters the comfort of the moment.
:Stop:.
We pry ourselves from each others grasp and look at the mirror-scaled dragon standing before us, nonplussed and stoic.
He paces a little bit closer, and the whole room shimmers with the light he reflects. He looks at us, then to the door.
:Come:.
Obediently, we follow. We step through the halls of this hostile, alien place, feeling no fear and muffling no sound. I look to this new dragon not as the strange beast of curiosity I did before, but as a friend and leader. I do not know what brings this feeling or why, but I no longer care. At least I still know my purpose here: To put an end to the evil of this place, in whatever way.
I walk beside Toothless through the main entrance and back into the main chamber, following our new guardian. As I watch the mirrored dragon survey the cave a fear overtakes me.
:Don't hurt them; I plead. But I can't speak, even through telepathy, so I nudge his shoulder and look at him through Night Fury eyes, the same way Toothless does whenever he really wants something from me.
He grunts. I don't know what power he has, what he knows or can even do to these creatures. But I know they are not completely the monsters they are claimed to be. One of them proved this to me.
He signals with a wave of his head; his silver eyes point to a group of humanoid daemons near he entrance of the volcanic chamber. He lifts off, and beckons us to follow. Toothless croons at me;
:Watch me, follow:.
He pushes off the ground and pushes down with his wings. He keeps his fins straight and stable as he lifts off, and maintains this as he gains altitude.
I concentrate, push off the ground and push down as he did. I take to the air and watch him as he angles himself to follow 'Mirrors' in a gentle glide. It's a simple name for an imposing dragon, but I feel Mirrors could be as gentle and cute as Toothless if he wanted to, so it fits as well.
We land in front of the daemon leader, his guards and lieutenants. Mirrors unleashes a powerful roar at the daemon leader, overbearing the smaller creature with a dragon's sheer size and force. It's clear that he is furious at being held against his will, held from his freedom. It's a familiar feeling. I have shared dreams with Toothless about his years chained to the Queen's demands, felt the anger, the injustice of it.
Under the crisscrossing aqueducts and beside pools of molten lava, we face each other. The daemons fear to provoke us, yet Mirrors is too caged my his anger to speak.
:Surface dwellers; their leader scowls, :So impudent. What entitles you to the surface? Tell me? What is so great about you that you can have it all whilst I suffer my days without sunlight?:
I try to speak, but my voice emerges as a smooth growl. So I growl at him, and pace forward once to push as gently as I can at his chest and nudge him backwards, towards the exit.
Mirrors and Toothless realize what I intend, and although they scoff, Toothless warbles at the larger dragon and he concedes to my plan.
:Come. Experience; He demands of the daemon.
Stepping out into blazing sunlight, we breathe the fresh air of the viking archipelagos and listen to the distant call of gulls. Waves crash against the small resilient volcanic island. Cold wind batters.
I nudge the daemon towards Mirrors. I know what can make someone appreciate the world.
Mirrors frowns at me. He gently lowers his belly to the ground and allows the apprehensive daemon to mount his back.
We take off and start flying. I follow Toothless' lead, and he gladly patterns his wingbeats so they are easy to follow and predict. He leads the group north, and we fly under his direction for many leagues until we reach a vista of shimmering rainbow lights and land upon an icy plateau.
We watch the colors shape and shift and bend. We marvel at the beauty and impossibility of the spectrum wave.
:One day me and Hiccup will find where these colors come from; Toothless remarks.
I growl at him to be quiet, that was only an idea. Perhaps the colors come from the same place the moon and stars do, and are unreachable.
On the flight back, Toothless loops around me and barks to the moon about us. He croons, and does so as a melody of dragonflight and colors, and the masterful constructions of the daemon underworld. Mirrors and I join in, and after a while the daemon smiles.
We land back on the volcano. Mirrors growls at the daemon and shakes his head at us.
:I am the last of my kind; The amazing dragon says. His mood is dark again.
:I will not leave this world to YOU:.
Mirrors is looming over the daemon as if to smite him right there and then, at the end of a cold overcast day on a forgotten island at the end of the world. His prey speaks back.
:I won't have it:.
What he says next is blocked out by a piercing screech in my head. It grows from a din to an all-encompassing roar. My vision blacks out, and all my feelings numb.
The next thing I see is a loving dark scaled face looking down at me, but his eyes are closed.
:It scares me what I've done to you Hiccup. I'm sorry. Please, just come back to me and I promise I'll try to make it so you can be a normal human again. I don't know how. I just don't know what I've done:.
I look at my hand. It's small, and pale. Scales run up to my wrist. I smack Toothless over the jaw. He opens his eyes, and smiles. He's ecstatic to see me, like he always is. His eyes glisten in the starlight and his paws rset on either side of me. Cold stone lies beneath me. The waves crash and the gulls call.
I get myself up, over so I'm on my hands.
I lay my hands on his paws.
:Being a Night Fury is amazing:.
I look as deep as I can into the green of his big eyes.
:I want to be as much as I can with you, and as much as I can like you:.
He humms, gently.
:We may just go where no ones been:.
It's what Toothless said to me long ago, shortly after we left Berk.
:I might just do what noones done; I say, and smile at him. I lay my lips on his.
We walk along the coast. The sea spray washes over us, and runs off our scales.
:I need some new clothes:. It's stating the obvious, but walking in the nude as a human-dragon hybrid was starting to wear thin at this point and I worried for how I looked to others.
:You look good:.
:Thanks:.
We flew back to the mainland and Toothless told me of all that transpired between the daemon and Mirrors. The pact they formed, so all daemons could see the world, live in peace.
I worried, as I do for dragons and humans, that peace could never be truly attained.
We landed at the shore near where we left. I praised Toothless' sense of direction. After scouting the area, we came across a small hut. I pilfered a set of pants, and left a dragon scale as a kind of payment.
As we landed at the castle and greeted Greisha, I tried to be optimistic. I told her of what we achieved and was proud. We infiltrated a stronghold and captured an enemy leader. A good day's work.
She welcomed us with welcome arms and a good supply of fish. We attended a banquet, and I sat beside Toothless at a long table. We feasted. I threw fish at Toothless and he caught them in he mouth. I threw them in the air and he blasted them with fire to roast them. We drank and sang.
We said goodbye as the sun set. We followed the moon, and chased the night. Toothless swoops down to a pile of rocks in the middle of the ocean, and we lost ourselves in each other.