Heels. Why was I thinking about my heels? Oh, they were the only thing that I could think about. Every few seconds I could feel some sort of sensation on my heels. I couldn't will my eyes open or my limbs to move but I could feel my heels. I dedicated all of my brain power to the sensation on my heels. Were was I if I was feeling this on my feet? Am I on a beach and the waves are reaching my heels? No the movement is too random for waves. Then it hit me. I'm being dragged by someone. The rider? Most likely. To where? I needed to wake up. You can do this Freya. Just open your eyes. Come on, open your eyes. OPEN YOUR ... . My eyes opened a crack. It was dark out and I was in some forrest. Ok what else. I'm being dragged by the rider. The clanking sound means he still has his armor on. He has his hands under my armpits and my hands are bound behind my back. What kind of binds? Cloth. Can I move the rest of my body? I quickly tensed the rest of my mussels to affirm that they are working. What was hitting my head? Something hard and not belonging to his armor. A hilt! It must be a dagger hilt. Ok patience, you are going to have to wait for the perfect time to do this. We started heading down a decline. I pushed with my feet and we both fell backwards. The hill wasn't large enough for us to tumble, in fact it wasn't a hill it was more of a pit. I fell on top of him and wormed my way up so that my hands were on the hilt. I grabbed the dagger and rolled over and started to cut the binds.

"Well this should be interesting." I heard the rider say from behind me. "It's going to take you ten seconds to cut through those binds so what were you ..." I heard him say and then the binds broke and he corrected "I was wrong, five seconds.". I stumbled to my feet, my muscles aching from a combination of exhaustion, bruising, and probably the venom.

"I'm curious, what's next in your plan?" questioned the rider who was now on his feet. I looked around my environment with wide eyes trying to find anything that could help me. "Was it to run? You could run and try to find your ally's here. However, how do you know if you are even on the same island as before?" he planned for me and cocked his head to one side. "Then again you would be abandoning your friends if you ran. I don't think you will do that seeing as you just jumped onto the back of a hostile dragon to save your friends earlier." he continued to mock. I couldn't reject his logic and fought the urge to run. I hated that in some way he was still controlling my actions after I had gotten free. I pointed the dagger at him and held my ground.

"Or you could fight me. I have to admit you had me on the run there when you were in your prime, with a sword and shield, after you had relinquished your fear of death. You should do much better now that your exhausted, tired, partially drugged, and only armed with a dagger." The rider mocked and I just listened with a blank face, without the energy to show emotion. "If you actually managed to wound or kill me then you would have to take into account what my dragon would do to you once he realized that I had fallen. It wouldn't be pretty or quick I could tell you that right now." he said as he sat down on a log as if to mock me. I could attack him now. He is sitting down and has no weapons drawn. As I moved one aching leg his logic wormed it's way into my head. I am in no condition to fight and he has full plate armor against my dagger. I lowered my dagger and looked around again.

"Seeing as you won't run without your friends and can't fight the only logical move for you is to try to find them and escape together." the rider reasoned leaning back on his log. "The only problem is you don't know where they are. You could try calling out to them but they could still be unconscious and who is to say I didn't gag them. As it happens I know exactly were they are." the rider continued.

I raised the knife to threaten him and said in a raspy voice "Show me.".

At this point he drew one of his swords and said "I might if I had some kind of inclination to do such a thing. How about a deal, you give me that dagger back and I will show you where they are.".

"This dagger is my only leverage. There is no way I'm giving it to you." I said.

He stood up and drew his other sword and said "And yet it is just a dagger. Do you really feel like that dagger gives you enough leverage to make this much of a fuss over?". I looked over my opponent with both of his swords at the ready. With a sigh I grabbed the blade of the knife and through it at his feet, purposely aiming away from his foot.

"Which way?" I asked as he sheathed his swords and the dagger. He gave a slight pause and then pointed in a direction. I started moving in that direction very slowly as the day had taken it's toll on my muscles.

"Do you mind hurrying up? It is getting later by the second." the rider asked, walking behind me.

"Oh ya let me do all I can to accommodate you. You know, I was liking unconsciousness better than dealing with you." I replied.

"Do you want to get shot again?" the rider asked.

"Why not?" I semi-sarcastically replied.

"Because it is easier to manipulate you with words than it is to drag you through the forrest." he stated.

"Oh I see how it is? Your dragon dose all the heavy lifting and you are ... what ... just the herald. Big talk and no ..." I scolded but I was cut off.

"I think your forgetting who fell down because they were tired on ..." he gloated but I cut him off this time.

"... On top of your dragon where you used your bond with it to influence the battle ground to your liking. Yes I'm greatly impressed that you were able to beat my last ditch effort to help my friends with your, how many years of experience riding that dragon." I mocked.

"Nice try but remember who is in charge now. The reason you and your friends are still alive is because you are going to give me information, not the other way around." he stated, refusing to answer my question of how long he had been riding his dragon.

"Oh I thought we were still alive because of your merciful qualities." I said sarcastically.

"Am I not merciful? I really only need one person to interrogate and yet all three of you are alive." He replied.

"No thanks too you. The only reason any of us were alive on the ground was because we were looking out for each other. There was no attack you gave that wasn't intended to kill us." I scolded thinking I had made my point.

"Mercy is a quality that has no merit during a battle. If you try to wound your enemy when he is trying to kill you, you will die. It only has it's advantages when the battle is won." He stated concretely sure of his answer. Without warning he grabbed my right shoulder as we walked into a clearing with one side open to a cliff.

"Our deal is complete here are your friends." He said using the hand not clasping my shoulder to point to a tree where a gagged Astrid, who was still unconscious, had her hands tied above her head, secured on a branch. Hiccup was laying on the ground, unconscious, near two tree stumps closer to the edge of the cliff and not gagged. His hands were bound behind his back like mine used to be. The rider took me to a third stump farther away from the edge of the cliff and pushed me down onto it.

As I glared at him he said "Don't look at me like that. You knew that I wasn't going to show you your friends and then let you go free.". He rebound my hands behind my back and secured them to a root that was partially out of the ground but had gone back into it. He looked over to Astrid and Hiccup seeing them still unconscious.

"So how about we get started. Let start with your name." the rider said crouching in front of me.

A large smile grew on my face as I answered "Wow is it unlucky for you that I am the first one to regain consciousness. The name and title I was given in Berk is Freya the Forgetful and let me tell you that name was earned.". "Now I want to watch your face as you ponder for a moment about how much vital information you are going to get from me with a name like that." I continued and my smile was growing with every word I spoke.

The rider looked unfazed by my attitude and said "Now I'm going to ask you a few questions. You are going to look me in the eyes when you answer each one. I now know what you look like when your telling the truth so if you are lying I will know.".

I nodded and he asked "How did the citizens of Berk start to ride dragons?".

"I don't know. When I had my first encounter with a dragon they had already been ridden for a long time.". I said truthfully. My smile grew larger when I saw the confused look on his face as he saw that I was truthful.

"What is Berks stance towards the empire?" the rider asked.

"There is an empire? How come nobody told me?" I replied to the best of my knowledge.

His look of bewilderment increased. I could almost see the thoughts racing behind his eyes. 'How can she not know about the empire' wherever this empire was. I could see he was thinking of a way to change his approach.

"What is your role in the town of Berk?" he asked.

"Oh well I just got a promotion. We are still working on the rank but I think it will be something like dragon researcher. I help out in the forge from time to time and ... as you already know I'm one of the riders who helps defend the town." I answered patiently waiting when this approach would come to a halt.

The rider pulled out the dagger and I thought he was going to threaten me but he asked "That's good, you work in the forge. Take a look at your friends dagger. How did Berk produce this quality of metal?" he asked.

"That's Astrid's dagger? Man is she going to be mad when she wakes up. Anyways, I have no idea how to make that metal and I haven't seen Berk's blacksmith produce any for as far back as I can remember." I said. For the first time since I was rescued off of that crate, I was thoroughly enjoying my amnesia.

I saw him get slightly frustrated and I said "Do you want to take a break or something? I mean the last thing you would want to do is misread me and accept a lie as truth.".

He stared into my eyes again with new determination in his eyes and asked "What were the events or circumstances which allowed Berk to become aligned with that island we were fighting above.".

"I don't know." I said plainly. He stared deeper into my eyes but didn't get frustrated when he saw that I was telling the truth.

"What are your parent's names?" he asked trying to get another 'truthful' answer to compare against.

"I don't know" I replied.

He paused and looked slightly frightened by my answer but then asked "Who are you?".

I smiled and said softly "If you find out could you let me know.".

I could see that he was disturbed by my answer and I set a new goal for myself right then. He needed to keep a cool temperament to check for lies so now I wanted to see if I could frustrate, annoy, or disturb him enough so that he lost his temperament.

"You look pale. Did I make you doubt your abilities to detect a lie?" I mocked. He got up from his crouch and started walking away from me. "Oh I forgot to ask you, how are your dragons wings?" I mocked again. I obviously struck a nerve because he immediately turned back around and headed back to me.

"Now I don't know what barbarian trick you used just now but it has become apparent to me that you can say nothing that will benefit me." he said, anger bubbling in his voice. He grabbed another piece of cloth and put it in my mouth and tied it around my head.

"If you want to know how his wings are take a look for yourself." the rider yelled at me. I was confused for a second before a large figure appeared over the cliff. It switched from its camouflaging darkness against the night sky to shining light and it's body became instantly visible. I could see there were square dark patches where the holes should be in it's wings and I realized that the rider must have patched up the holes with cloth so that his dragon could still fly while it's wings healed. I couldn't help but show fear as the massive head hovered over the clearing. I felt fear and shame as it's eyes looked me over. I could see the pain and hurt I had caused it and now I was at it's mercy. I was cringing and retreating as far away from its angry and judgmental eyes when I heard a sound. The dragon heard it to as it stopped it's terrifying glare and looked towards it's rider. Hiccup had woken up.

Authors Note: Now there is some reference to an 'Empire' in this chapter. As I am well aware that the roman empire dose make appearance in the books I will never be referring to it as Rome. The reason being is that this is a fantasy world filled with dragons and because of that there would be no benefit to associating this 'Empire' with rome. The presence of dragons in the world would have affected everything from mythology to battle tactics of the roman empire. There are so many things that would have been changed that it is pointless to refer to anything as 'roman' as their culture would be completely different.