Chapter 52: The Question Of Justice

The legal status of dragons has nearly always been that of a minor child legally beholden to and dependent on an adult human. While the fact that dragons are fully sentient and sapient individuals was very quickly apparent, even to the early dragon-riders, the fact also remains that, outside of a few exceptional individual dragons, a typical dragon's abstract reasoning skills and higher order thinking processes range around those of a five- or six-year-old human child. While dragons have their own language capable of communicating abstract concepts, much like those of corvids, prior to their integration with human society it was still extremely primitive, with even the most complex regional dialects only consisting of perhaps a thousand words. Simply put, dragons aren't quite intelligent enough to be humanity's full intellectual partners. Hence their legal status.

At present, dragon-riders essentially adopt the dragon in a civil bond away from the legal trusts of the Brooderies, who corporately act as the dragons' legal guardians until and unless they are bonded to a rider. With the bond between rider and dragon holding a legal status similar to that of a marriage or child adoption, dragon-riders are, presently, entirely responsible for the behavior of their dragon, and have obligations to the dragon in kind (food, housing, medical care, etc.).

Ideally, it is a partnership between near-equals, where the human gives their hands and brains, and the dragon gives their wings.

The Dragon Law: A Primer On Dragons And Jurisprudence, 1744, London

Chief's Hut, Isle of Berk, Alban Hebrides

February, AD 1042

Wulfhild lay in bed with Hiccup and Astrid, the three of them grinning and panting slightly.

After dragging Hiccup home from the mead hall, they'd cleaned him and themselves up from the rigors and mess of travel and then messed themselves right back up again; her own waist-length hair was currently gnarled into sweat-stuck ropes and yarns all over her body, Hiccup's hair was stuck up in amusing little spikes, and Astrid's shoulder-length hair was every bit as bad as her own.

"Well…" she drawled in a yawning voice, her body still shuddering a bit from the aftershocks of pleasure, "we asked for a command performance… and I think that you delivered."

Astrid smiled sleepily and Hiccup gave a tired and smug smile. "Thank you, thank you," he said in a happy, if tired, tone. "I mean, I think my hands are going to be cramped into claws for the next day, but…"

Wulfhild kissed him. "You are entirely too smug at the moment for your own good." She smirked and leaned in, propped up on one hand. "Even with those magic hands of yours."

"Humph," he said with a satisfied smirk that made Wulfhild grin in response. "Please. They're not magic. It's skill."

From his other side, Astrid chimed in, "It really is. Be glad that you managed to join in after he'd had a chance to train on me, Wulf." She gave a happy sounding sigh as Hiccup's smile turned sheepish. "Of course, all of that was more fun than not, especially once he got started…"

Wulfhild laughed, and she smiled at the two of them. "How long did you two…?"

Astrid, her head also propped up on her hand, looked over at her. "Well… last winter, we didn't have much to do aside from spend time together and work in the smithy… but that was just awkward fumbling at first."

Hiccup groaned at some memory and flopped back down onto the mattress. "Very awkward."

"Gloriously, hilariously awkward," Astrid confirmed with a smirk. "But we didn't have our first time in full until we got to Norway."

Wulfhild quirked an eyebrow and felt her cheeks heat. She said as lightly as she could manage, "And I was under the impression that you'd been lovers for months, from the way that you acted together."

"Define 'lovers'," Astrid said, her smirk deepening. "If you mean the sort of… things that would have required me to perjure myself when I wore my krasen circlet, then, no, we didn't until that first night in your brother's kingdom. For lips… and fingers… and tongues…" she licked her own lips and caressed Hiccup's hands, making him moan and Wulfhild gave a little heated giggle, "well, we started playing around with each other a little after last Thawfest."

Wulfhild felt her cheeks flush more; even though she was naked in bed with both of them, and having just enjoyed Hiccup's use of said body parts, there was still a frisson of embarrassment, and she envied Astrid for her frankness. Trying to emulate her friend, she laughed and looked at the two of them. "You managed to hold off from this for months?"

"Yep. Of course, well," Astrid gave a languid little wave to indicate the entirety of Berk, "this place is small, and people would have noticed and talked if we took the time for that."

Wulfhild nodded, her smile widening. "And, besides… you were having enough fun… exploring?"

Hiccup laughed. "Oh, yeah. The first time I…" he wriggled his fingers suggestively and Astrid moaned in memory, "well, it took me a few minutes to understand that, no, I wasn't hurting her."

"Far from it," his wife said with a satisfied smirk, and plunked her head down on his sweaty chest. "So… Hiccup, are you feeling better?"

It was apparently the wrong thing to ask; Wulfhild watched the light withdraw from his expression and turn inward, and he sighed.

"Astrid… no. Look, we killed people. People that didn't need to die."

Wulfhild scowled and poked him in the ribs. "So, you're saying that I should have let those guardsmen that were coming to kill you do that?"

"No, but…" he flailed his arms a bit. "Look. I… I was thinking about what Heather said. And while I still don't think I need to 'toughen up', I made a mistake there—in assuming that everything would be fine and he'd act just like all the other kings, even though I knew that his dad was the old High King—and Vedrarfjord's neighbor. I should have thought of that, and I didn't. And so all the people who died… that's on me."

She and Astrid shared a commiserating look, and then Wulfhild spoke up.

"So, Hiccup. I want to make sure I understand this completely. We walked in there to negotiate both peace and a mutually beneficial relationship with them, right?"

"Yes…"

"And we had gone in prepared to have to fight our way out if necessary, right?"

"Yes, but I didn't think—"

She put a finger over his lips. "And we had already talked with several other kings, right?"

"And that had all gone pretty well," Astrid interjected, an eyebrow raised sardonically. "We walked in, we talked, maybe you got some of what you wanted, and some of what you didn't."

Wulfhild nodded. "Now, a bunch of that was because they felt that you were threatening them—coming in with dragons and everything—but, still, at the end of it, we got attacked once. Over nine out of ten kings and chiefs that we went to were willing to listen. And you're blaming yourself for the fact that one of them wasn't?"

"I… no… yes…"

Wulfhild rolled her eyes and gave Astrid an exasperated look. Astrid shrugged, making a few of the furs slid off her shoulders, and she said to him, "Hiccup. Why are you blaming yourself?"

"Because…" he flailed his hands and shoulders passionately, "because… because if we hadn't… they'd be alive if we hadn't gone there!" he said in frustration.

Astrid looked a little taken aback, while Wulfhild just sighed and stroked his chest. "Hiccup. Do you also blame yourself for the deaths of those two traitors back in Nidaros?"

"Huh? What do they have to do with it?"

Wulfhild sighed again. "Everything. Look, your line of thinking goes like this as I understand it." She ran her nails up his chest and he shivered, and then she poked him lightly with one nail at his left shoulder. "Start at the beginning. Why were we there? Because we are doing a necessary task for the good of the… of our tribe. It was a lawful, needed task, ordered by the Chief, done in order to keep our reputation from being blackened unfairly."

"And now our reputation will get worse when they find out that we killed a bunch of them!" Hiccup said, scowling.

"Will it? You did everything you could to save their lives," Wulfhild said. "And the survivors will know it. But do you agree at least that we had every reason to be there?"

He nodded curtly. "I suppose."

"Good. And, on a larger scale, I would also point out that, how did you put it, Astrid? That staying in and having little to do over the winter just isn't an option any longer." She shook her head. "Not if we're going to be carrying mail. We can't be the mysterious tribe of riders—especially not when we're only a day or two's flight from them. Or less. We'll just look like a threat."

Hiccup made a face, but nodded. "Point."

Wulfhild smiled, took a deep breath, and then said carefully, "Good. So we start from there."

"Meaning?" Hiccup asked.

"We, meaning you, as herald, and the rest of us, as retinue, have to go out to meet the neighbors." She tapped him pointedly on the shoulder. "If you had refused to go, what would have happened?"

Astrid interjected sarcastically, "Well, I think Stoick would have been rightfully pissed off. And then you," she poked her husband in the side, "would have had another moping episode. I mean, it's not like, oh, last spring, I had to duel Snotlout for the right to do exactly that."

Wulfhild nodded. "Exactly. And you're someone who's already had some success in getting to know your neighbors," she said with a smirk. "I mean, Norway's practically right next door by dragon."

Astrid glanced at her with a mixed amused and sardonic expression. "If you're 'the girl next door', what does that make me?"

"His wife, lover and partner… and a violently accomplished shieldmaiden who can and has knocked me around the training room with great skill," Wulfhild said earnestly to her friend—who snorted—before turning back to Hiccup. "So far you've had nothing but success there. I mean, looking back to when we set out, would you have had any reason to doubt that things would work out?"

He opened his mouth to protest, and Astrid said first, "Be honest, Hiccup. Would you? Really? Would you really have said to yourself, 'no, this is a mistake, I shouldn't do it?'"

He moaned and rolled over, putting his face into his pillow, and Wulfhild took the moment to appreciate the view. All of that time in the forge and riding Toothless was giving his back muscles fine definition, and she shared a smirk with Astrid, who rolled on top of Hiccup and started to rub his back.

"Nope, not that easy, babe. Answer the question," she said, straddling his lower back and massaging the neck and shoulders. Wulfhild just started to play with his hair, running her nails across his scalp.

He moaned into the pillow and said, muffled, "Yes, you're right. I would have gone. But that—hey, ow!"

Wulfhild released the tuft of hair she'd tugged. "Good. So, you would have gone regardless. Was it your fault for things working out poorly with that one king?"

Astrid balled her fists and started kneading up and down his back, and he moaned in pleasure. "This isn't fair… you two… ooooah…. Right there… no fair…"

Wulfhild smiled sweetly at him and reached out and played with his ear as Astrid massaged his back. "If you think this isn't fair, I have some ideas on how to make it worse."

"Uh oh," he mumbled. "But, no, seriously, stop. I am trying to think, and… ooh. That's… distracting."

Astrid shrugged and rolled off of him, as Wulfhild chuckled. "For the moment, I'm still working through your thinking here. So, we were doing something that made perfect sense for us to be doing, something that would be helping both our people and theirs. And one of them attacked us, despite the fact that you were a herald and showed up with a small retinue. Right?"

Astrid leaned over and said, "So, somehow, the fact that we, outnumbered and under a flag of heraldry, managed to fight off four times our number, is somehow our fault…"

He sighed into his pillow again, and said, muffled, "They said that they'd take us prisoner and wouldn't hurt us."

Astrid gave Wulfhild an irritated look and motioned to her with a can you believe this? expression.

Wulfhild rolled her eyes. "Hiccup. The king was already showing that he was willing to ignore the conventions of diplomacy and war. Ignore the threat to your life. God knows that you risk that far too easily for me or Astrid to be happy." She looked at Astrid, eyes set, and motioned with her chin. Nodding, Astrid slid her arms across Hiccup's body and pulled him upwards to face Wulfhild. She asked, "Ignoring that risk to yourself… would you really be willing to risk the two of us in the dungeons of a man who called you a devil worshiper and attacked a herald?"

Before he could respond, Astrid followed up with, "And whose head guardsman was clearly looking forward to hurting us all?"

He gaped at the two of them, head darting back and forth between Wulfhild and Astrid.

Astrid, after a few moments of this, poked him in the stomach and asked, "So… love… is our safety less important to you than their lives when they risked them like that?"

He groaned, and then moaned, "No…"

"Good. I mean, you took the right action in the moment, and I'm not blaming you for feeling guilty now. It shows that you're a good person," Astrid said.

Wulfhild nodded emphatically. "The fact that you're not writing off their deaths as acceptable losses or even as 'good kills' just shows that you're a wonderful person, Hiccup." She patted his flank… which turned into a sensual stroke after a moment. "But you can mourn their deaths without blaming yourself for them. Blame the king that panicked and attacked us. Blame the men who didn't have the sense to hold back from attacking people with dragons. Maybe blame yourself a bit for agreeing to leave the dragons outside as they demanded. But you don't get to hog all of the blame. Sorry. They died because their king attacked a herald whose retinue acted in self-defense." She shrugged. "Really, if anything, you're letting the man actually responsible off too easily. Who would you blame if he'd ordered the attack on untamed dragon instead? Him, or the dragon?"

Astrid beamed at her, and Wulfhild smiled back in response. Hiccup just closed his eyes and sighed.

Lying behind him, Astrid gave Wulfhild a wink and mouthed the words, oh, good, he's finally thinking.

Wulfhild gave her a grin and a tiny nod in response, and then mouthed finally.

After a good solid minute, Hiccup slumped and said, "Yes… you're right. Both of you. I'm sorry."

"Hiccup, there's nothing to be sorry about. None of us got hurt, your creations kept us from getting hurt, and you're listening to us instead of saying that what we have to say is pointless," Astrid said bluntly. "From my perspective, that makes you a great person. You just needed a kick in the ass," and Hiccup gave a little cry of surprise and his hips jerked towards Wulfhild as Astrid pinched the mentioned body part, "to remove your head from it."

Wulfhild snickered and, taking her eyes off of the very enjoyable parts of his body that had just moved towards her, she looked him in the face and said, softly, "Hiccup. There's enough blame in the world for enough bad things that you don't need to be greedy and start grabbing for more."

He glanced at her, and said, "Was that what I was doing?"

"Yes. You were," Astrid said.

"I'm sorry."

"We know you are. But be sorry for the right things, babe," she said.

"I'm… okay."

Wulfhild leaned in and molded herself against him. "I think that we can promise you that if you take too much or too little blame for something, we'll call you on it."

"Not that there's much chance of you taking too little," Astrid said sarcastically. "But if you start doing either of those, we'll call you on it. Okay, partner?"

He smiled softly. "Okay."

Astrid grinned and nudged him forward. "Wulf… you're the one that did most of the head-ass plucking this time. You get the kiss."

"Now there's an image," Wulfhild said with a grin as she pulled Hiccup into an embrace and a kiss.

###

Vedrarfjord, Eire

Hákon looked out over the milling crowd in the courtyard of the fort and shook his head.

Next to him, Gunvor snickered. "Are you really surprised?"

"I'm not," he said, watching his brothers fill in the little slips of old parchment with the names of the hopefuls and put them in the big barrel for the drawing. "But, well, when we announced that we'd be starting to send people over to Berk, I wasn't expecting to have to draw lots to determine who would be going!"

Gunvor shrugged. "Between the wages offered, and being eager to learn about our people… and the chance to potentially train a dragon, is it really a surprise?"

"No… I guess it isn't. I just wonder how many of them are there for a dragon of their own or greed or actually wanting to know what it means to be one of us?"

"You can't know the hearts of men—or women, for that matter, husband dearest," Gunvor said. "But I can say this much: it needs to be done. And not just because Berk needs more hands to help, and we need to train people in how our home works."

"What do you mean?" Hákon asked, as his brother Cinaed and his wife Dingleberry broke up an argument between two men trying to cut in line.

Gunvor sighed. "Haven't you noticed that everyone here... gods, how do I put this? Everyone here that isn't from Berk is looking up to us?"

Hákon nodded. "Aye…" he said slowly.

"Right now, we have a lot of support. Between the freed thralls practically worshiping the ground that Hiccup walked on, and the loans for jobs and the stipends for the Bed Rights and Food Rights, and how we aren't playing the same sorts of games that Alvin did, even those people who don't like the fact that we aren't noble or Christian or Eirish grudgingly support us… out of their own greed, if nothing else. But those are a minority." She chuckled and elbowed him lightly in the side. "Many of them support us strongly. I've been told that at least a few people are starting to refer to you as either Hákon the Wise or Hákon the Good."

"What!?" Hákon blurted, loudly enough that a good tithe of the crowd looked up at him in surprise.

Gunvor waved to them and smiled. "Just talking! Don't worry about it!" The upturned heads in the crowd bobbled in nods and got back to their business, and she looked back to him. "Yes. Right now, as one person told me, we're seen as lords like none other—which is why Njord is now running Veisafjord for us."

Hákon nodded; he'd given his immediately younger brother—younger by only ten and a half months—stewardship of the nearby city.

Gunvor continued. "So as far as the general feeling is concerned, we can do no wrong. But we need more dragon riders here—to help with the construction and other work, plus transportation between the cities. And we need more Hooligans to help bring people in to… you know, how we do things."

"Aye. That's why we're sending people there, to help them become Hooligans, even though we're short on hands as well," Hákon nodded, wondering where she was going with this.

"And I realized something the other night," she said. "Another good reason to do this." She waved to indicate the crowd. Hákon looked out at them; nearly a thousand strong, a good quarter of the city and hinterlands' population was crowded in and around the fort. It was almost a festival—to the point that at least one of the food sellers had their children walking around with baskets and pushcarts, selling warm food and drink. They were doing quite the neat bit of business, it looked like. "Right now, they're all looking up to us. But what would happen if we didn't try to include them? If we," she stepped in front of him and looked him seriously in the eyes, "acted like the lords they're used to, and kept the power—the swords, the money, the dragons—to ourselves… what would happen?"

He blinked. "I don't know."

She nodded seriously. "So, yes, I'd say most of them down there are here, at least in part, for the hope of a dragon of their own." She leaned in. "And we need to let them have that hope. They need to have dragons of their own."

"Why? I'm not disagreeing with you… but why is it so important?" he asked.

She reached up and poked him in the chest… specifically on his mother's amulet. "Because, if we don't… then in ten years, or a generation… what this was made from won't be what marks someone as a thrall. It'll be the absence of a dragon."

Hákon stared at her, stunned. He couldn't have been more breathless if she'd struck him. "Oh…"

"Aye. Already, look at how things are going here. We're making this city dependent on dragons—for protection, for labor, for any number of things."

He nodded, but before they could continue on the topic, there was a call from below, as one of his brothers called up to him.

"Hoy, Hákon, it's time!"

He nodded, and as he and Gunvor went down the stairs, her words were bouncing around in his head. It would be a sick jest of the Norns if the very dragons that had brought freedom to his ancestors were the thing that forged new jarls and thralls here.

As he entered the courtyard with Gunvor at his side, the crowd applauded, and they waved.

He approached the barrel, which currently had one of his nephews—Stigir Finnsson—clowning around on top of it. The lad had the barrel on its side and was walking it through the crowd so that the parchment lots inside would be well mixed.

As he watched Stigir do his acrobatics, Hákon looked out over the eager and cheering crowd, pondering what they were doing today in a new light. Out of the hundreds of hopefuls, only fifty would be selected today to be sent over to Berk, because that was all that Berk could safely house and feed at the moment. When he'd first made the announcement, he'd been anticipating a few hundred at most would be interested in leaving the city and moving to Berk, even with the promise of work there. It wasn't as if Vedrarfjord itself—and now Veisafjord—didn't need every hand they had.

Instead, a full quarter of his new subjects had been interested, to the point that he'd thrown up his hands and instituted the lottery as a fair way of handling the selection.

Stigir eventually, and after much laughter from his antics, walked the barrel over to him and Gunvor.

Hoisting the barrel up on a table, he pulled off the cover and motioned to Gunvor to begin.

She smiled, stepped forward and put her hand in the barrel. Plucking out a single strip of parchment the size of her finger, she read out the name.

"Caolán mac Fionn!"

A hoarse shout of exultation came from the middle of the crowd, and a young man with a scarred face stepped forward, practically bouncing in glee.

Hákon smiled at him, and then it was his turn to select whose life was about to change.

A young Eirish woman, a laundress judging by the redness of her hands, was next.

Shortly, all fifty had been selected and were lined up by the doors to the fort, chatting excitedly. Hákon moved past them and climbed the stairs back to the balcony.

Taking a deep breath at the top stair, he shook his head in bitter amusement. What had Lord Freyr been thinking, making him a jarl? Six months ago, the biggest worries in his life had been ensuring an even grind from his millstones and his daughter's happiness. And he'd managed to severely damage the latter—out of good intentions, no less!

Now…

He stepped over to the doors to the balcony and opened them.

A roaring crowd greeted him, chanting his name.

He managed to keep the incredulous laughter from escaping his throat, and waved once. "Thank you, everyone! Now, just to remind you all, they're not vanishing permanently—although," he looked down, "how many of you lot are unmarried?"

About two-thirds raised their hands.

Hákon shrugged exaggeratedly. "All right. I make no promises that they'll end up coming back. We like weddings over on Berk."

Great titters of laughter came from the crowd.

"But we'll see them again regardless! There are plans for regular flights back and forth, carrying cargo and mail and passengers! So for the married ones, you'll undoubtedly be able to join your spouses soon! And I'm hoping that more of my tribe might want to come here!" He clasped his hands behind his back to keep from swinging them anxiously. "We will be one people, not distant lords on a faraway island and peasants in the cities! We've always taken people in and mixed with them!" Unclasping his hands and taking his right out from behind his back, he reached into his shirt and pulled out his mother's amulet. "As my mother did! As the Chief's mother did! Some of our greatest, like my wife's great-grandfather, came from outside!" He looked down at the fifty. "As for you, I'm covering the costs for your trip over! Because that's how we operate as a tribe! I help you get a leg up, and then you give a hand to me! Or to someone else! Because together, we are stronger!"

The crowd cheered, and Hákon had to swallow incredulous laughter again. They were applauding what he saw as obvious, from a lifetime of experience.

He raised his hand, and the crowd quieted. "Now, tomorrow morning, you leave for my old home," he said, addressing the group they were sending. "I hope that you treat it like I have been treating this place!"

One of the men in the group stepped forward, bowed, and said, "Sir! We will!"

"Then pack your bags, and get ready to try Magnhild's beef stew up in the mead hall for dinner tomorrow!"

They all cheered and laughed.

Gunvor came and joined him as goodbyes were made below, and leaned up against him. "Very smooth," she said softly into his ear. "I could barely tell that you were panicking the whole time."

"I've been practicing," he said just as quietly. They clasped hands as the crowd dispersed and his brothers gave the future residents of Berk the rucksacks to carry what they could take with them.

Hákon wished them the best of luck.

###

Dubh Linn, Eire

Alvin hit the floor as the two guardsmen shoved him forward. Hooded and with his hands bound behind him, he landed awkwardly and hard, jarring his shoulder. He hadn't recovered from that before more hands gripped him, pulling him upright, and his head was cruelly hauled upwards.

As the hood was plucked off his head, he deadpanned, "Thank you. Have you considered washing those?"

"Well, you've got quite the smart mouth, don't you?" came a nearby voice.

Alvin shrugged and looked at the man sitting in the throne. He'd seen Ímar mac Arailt before, in his preparations to assume Adalwin's identity as one of the Uí Ímair. Ímar was older than Alvin by a decade or so, but they were both tall and dark-haired Norsemen, which had been the point that let him get away with his charade. Of course, Ímar was sitting on a throne and dressed in a fine outfit while Alvin was on his knees, hands bound behind his back, wearing a roughspun tunic.

"Well, it's gotten me this far," he responded. "So, I take it that you have a job for me?"

Ímar blinked and then scowled. "That's a fine presumption, Alvin. Perhaps I wanted to see the man so brash that he thought he could impersonate one of my kinsmen before I handed you off to my torturer."

Alvin shrugged as best he could. "If that was your intent, I'd already be strapped down and getting worked over. But instead, I'm here, in a private audience—" he nodded his head around to the mostly empty room, "—while you're dressed to impress, and my identity was kept secret with the hood. Which really needs to be washed, by the way. Was it made from an old horse blanket or something?"

Ímar scowled at him. "You are an impertinent little…"

"Look, if you're going to kill me, can you get it over with?" Alvin said, giving another nonchalant shrug… and finally the small knife he kept strapped to his forearm dropped into his hand. Carefully, he started to cut the rope around his wrists. "Otherwise, I'm curious as to what it is that you want me to do."

Ímar leaned forward and a cruel smirk crossed his face. "Now, why would I kill you?" He snapped his fingers, and another guard came in with a struggling hooded figure—and Alvin's heart dropped into his stomach.

The other figure was placed next to him and the hood on her head was plucked free, although the gag on her mouth kept her from saying anything.

Ímar expansively waved his hands at them. "We caught her coming into the city yesterday. I knew who she was, and figured it was time for us to have this talk."

Alvin tore his gaze back to Ímar and said flatly, "What is it that you want us to do?"

"Why do you say 'us'? She'll be staying here, as my insurance."

Alvin shook his head. "We work together. You want insurance? You know who we are. All it takes is a single word from you to exposure our cover, and my identity as Adalwin is gone."

"True…" Ímar mused. "Well, what I want you to do is what you were going to do anyway. You're going to make pilgrimage to Rome… full of the tales of the horrors of what the dragon-riders are doing. And you'll get the Church to send aid on my behalf. And if you do well enough, I'll give you back Vedrarfjord… if you're willing to take oath and serve me."

Alvin pondered for a moment. He had his knife… but the king had a sword and three guards.

And besides… he was being offered the chance to do what he'd already planned on doing. And if the king thought that he'd defanged Alvin… well, he'd learn.

Briefly.

He nodded his head. "I accept your terms."

"Good. Since the Hero has already come sniffing around, looking for more vassals, I don't know how much time you'll have… but don't dally." He motioned to his guards, and back on went the hoods.

A short while later, they were unceremoniously deposited back into the small inn where Alvin had been staying. The guards gave Alvin a sour look when he handed them back the cut rope with a smile, but left without another word.

Turning, he said in Latin, "Hullo, love."

"Hello yourself, you idiot," she replied in the same tongue.

"You say the sweetest things."

"You're the one that got outsmarted by a girl young enough to be your own daughter," she said, scowling. "And then captured by one of our enemies."

"True, true. And I look forward to getting some of our own back from them. But you know as well as I do, dearest, that these sorts of setbacks are common in our profession."

She snorted. "I still can't believe she had it in her." She pounded a fist into her other palm. "I thought we had her completely cowed."

"Aye, we did. And I'll admit that I played right into her hands by revealing where her parents were. It was my mistake, no question. Ah, well. If nothing else, that just confirms that her parents are excellent tongs with which to manipulate her."

"Oh, yes. But I found a better one."

"A better one? Oh, please, do tell."

"She's found herself a lover. The big burly boy, Fishlegs clan Ingerman. The one that we gave her to. According to the gossip I picked up, they've been bedding each other since last autumn." The woman snorted. "Apparently, not all of what I taught her about pleasing men went to waste."

"I know that that was a concern of your, dearest."

She snorted again. "Aye. And I remember our bet. You won."

Alvin shrugged. "Two young people thrown together like that? I'm honestly shocked that it took that long. But you're the one who took the bet of him being honorable in the first place."

She gave him a scowl and nodded. "Aye. I suppose I did. So much for the decency of men."

"If more men acted in the way that they claimed to hold as ideal, and treated virtue as anything other than a suggestion to be winked at, we'd be paupers, love."

"And we aren't now?"

He mutely walked over to the room's thin bedframe, reached under it, and pulled out a small leather purse, from which the clink of gold coins issued. Putting it back, he smiled.

She huffed. "Fine. Your point is taken. So, dearest, what are we going to do?"

"Well, once we get out of here, we do exactly as the king here ordered us to. We make our way to the nearest mainland bishop with our tale of woe, you, the escaped noble lady who witnessed and can describe the depravity and depredations of the deplorable degenerates…"

She gave a deep, long-suffering sigh at his alliterative articulations.

Continuing on gamely, he said, "…will bear witness alongside myself, the deposed but still legitimate King Adalwin of Vedrarfjord, to the terrors currently being inflicted onto my loyal subjects. This despite you and I having not a drop of noble blood in our veins, but we have something better—a piece of parchment that says we do."

She snorted again. "And what is our end goal, oh king? Last time you said it was High Kingship of Eire, and I would be your queen, and not just your secret asset." She shrugged. "Even if training the girls was enjoyable in itself."

"Well, we still have the girl at Berk if what you heard is correct, plus our other assets in the other courts, milady. And this time, the script does not have you playing the part of my brutalized and broken demonstration toy, but that of a wide-eyed noblewoman ingenue, come to tell the sophisticated leaders of Christendom what horrors you've witnessed."

She scowled, and then pouted affectedly. "I almost prefer the old role. I hate playing the airhead whose only knowledge of bedroom sports comes from naughty whispers with the chambermaids and attempts at seduction by lustful noblemen."

"Ah, but think of how much fun you'll have teasing and stringing along the priests," Alvin said with a smirk. "And I'll still be available for scratching any itches you may have, so long as we're discreet."

"I suppose that's acceptable," she allowed. "You know how I like to play, at least."

"That I do," Alvin said with a leer. Smoothing it back down to a knowing smile, he continued, "Besides, you can always entrap a few of the priests who want to seduce you for our later use."

"That does sound tempting," she admitted with a smile. "I haven't corrupted a priest in ages."

"Where we're going, uncorrupted priests will be rare as hens' teeth, love. You'll have to settled for the pre-corrupted ones." He snorted. "I'm still debating on which method to use when we get to Rome. On the one hand, we can act exactly as we present ourselves to be, and 'let' them take advantage of us, with proper steering. On the other hand, finding some sympathetic soul who is already properly positioned, and letting down the mask slightly that we're not the overawed provincials that they think we are in order to speak terms more frankly, is also decidedly tempting."

"We'll just have to play it by ear, you old fool, as always. You're the one that just reminded me of the dangers of committing too deeply to a plan in our line of work."

"True, true. So, how was Vedrarfjord after their takeover?"

She snorted. "Interesting. I managed to accumulate some significant funds before I left the city; while Arailt's guards took what I had on me, the bulk of it is buried outside the city. I could go retrieve it with little issue."

"Good idea. How did you get the funds?"

"My usual ways, helped by those tenderhearted Vikings—and, yes, that is a phrase I never expected to say—pouring in funds for their takeover. I take it you've heard who succeeded you, yes?"

"The Hero's in-laws, yes."

"Aye, and they're apparently spending their daughter's bride price-cùm-Harthacnut's ransom like water in order to 'help the city.' It's certainly been very helpful for them in locking down their support with the people. Classic carrot and stick for pacification. I have no idea how long it will last, but coin was flowing through the city, and they were growing in population, instead of losing it."

Alvin pursed his lips and nodded. "That might make things difficult for retaking the city in the future. Do we have any loyalists left?"

"Some… but your cover being blown there didn't help matters." She crossed her arms and snorted. "Or here, come to think of it," she added pointedly, and poked him in the chest. "Why did you respond to that jackass Fritjof?!"

Alvin sighed. "Surprise and panic, honestly. I messed up and I'll own up to it."

She turned away from him and gave a huff. "Good. Because you cost us so much in that moment."

"Ah, dearest Delilah," Alvin said to his wife, "where would I be without you?"

"Dead in a ditch in Saxony, or dead at the bottom of the North Sea being nibbled at by fish, or dead in a sewer in Paris, or dead…"

He laughed. "Aye, and you'd be in some bordello with a collar around your neck or a pauper's grave without me, dearest, so let's stop with the accounting there."

She sniffed overdramatically. "Why? It's fun." Turning back to her husband, she said, "Regardless, conditions in the city are improving compared to your reign, at least at the moment. I'm certain that we can meddle with things to our advantage when the time comes, but, for the moment," she scowled, "they're buying the loyalty of the populace with coin and bread, and already over a hundred thralls from across all of Eire have fled there to be freed. They're fanatically loyal, and they've made oath of their own free will to the Hero."

"Seriously? Of their own free will?"

"I was there in the crowd. The few who knew me at all thought that I was just another freed thrall, thanks to my prior role. So the day that they took over Veisafjord—"

"Argh. That was a mess. I barely got out of the city in time."

"Well, he, his wife, and his concubine, as well as the girl and her lover, and Fritjof," she hissed the name, "overnighted with her parents that day. The freedmen found out and practically stormed the place to get a look at the Hero. He came out, waved at them, talked a bit. And it wasn't being managed at all; I checked. Completely spontaneous. One of the freedmen in the crowd—named Fintan, couldn't find out anything of significance about him—offered his oath and knelt, and everyone followed suit. And it seems to have been his idea, as far as I could tell." She scowled. "I had to take a knee or stand out."

Alvin laughed. "Well, you're used to going to your knees to men!" He sobered. "Could we use that?"

"I considered it, but the girl knows what I look like, and while I could probably spin some tale of woe and tribulations at your hands that would buy me access, I didn't see any long-term advantage to it. Certainly I could probably have killed one or more of them in a moment of weakness or incaution on their part, but I would have gotten killed for sure."

"Aye. Well, we can move on from here. Besides," he pulled her to his side and gave her a kiss on the temple, "I'm pleased to have you with me for this."

"I suppose that I can say the same," she said in a mock-grudging tone and leaned up against him. "But we have weeks before we can leave to find that helpful bishop you mentioned. In the meantime…"

"Aye?"

"We have this nice private room, all to ourselves." She grabbed the front of his tunic and pulled his face down to her eye-level. "I say we make use of it."

"Sounds like a plan to me," Alvin said with a smirk.

###

The Broodery, Isle of Berk, Alban Hebrides

Fishlegs, his hands and hair covered in muddy rock dust, smiled at the trio of Eirishmen he'd just hired to help stoke the fires for the Broodery. "Oh, and one last thing," he said, and walked over to the spigot that they'd set into the wall; it was made of metal, not wood, and there was a cup attached to it by a chain. "We've had problems with people passing out from the heat down here." All three of them nodded; they'd stripped to their waists and were speckled with sweat already. "So Hiccup put this in."

He held up the cup, and twisted the spigot, making a stream of water fill the cup, and then shut the valve. "It flows from the cistern, so it's cold. Drink as often as you need to, and then drink some more." He shrugged with a smile. "Trust me when I say that it sneaks up on you." He drank and the three fellows grinned indulgently. They'd be trading off shifts, but for the moment he was giving them orientation before handing them off to his kinsman Boarguts, who had been the chief—and occasionally onlystoker for the fires since autumn.

"So, sir…" said one—Caolán, if Fishlegs remembered right, who had to be twice Fishlegs' own age—pointing around the room for emphasis as he listed off each point, "Wood from the Broodery pile, keep the fire stoked, drink as we need to, and the pay is six pennyweights of dragon scales per day?"

Fishlegs nodded. "Yep. I'm sorry that the pay is on the low side but—"

"Low!? Sir, that's more—three times more—what I'd get back in Vedrafjord for farm work!"

"Yes, but here, we don't have enough hands already, and a lot of scales and silver to go around." Fishlegs shrugged apologetically. "I mean… I'll understand if in a month or two, you three tell me that you found better jobs."

Caolán smiled. "Didn't you tell me that we're helping keep the baby dragons warm in their eggs?"

Fishlegs nodded slowly, and said, "Yes…" a bit hesitantly.

Caolán shared a grin with the other two men. "Then I'm here until they hatch, for sure!" The other two nodded in agreement.

Fishlegs grinned at their enthusiasm. "Well, I need to get going. If there are any problems, tell me?"

They nodded, and set to work, chatting happily among themselves as Fishlegs made for the exit. They'd cut in a fresh horizontal hole into the rock to meet up with the exterior ramp that led down to the Scauldron cove, and it gave access to the Broodery's fire chamber. Walking up the ramp, he shivered; the difference in warmth between in there and out here was stark.

He was pleased that his three new workers had committed to staying with him. The fifty people that Astrid's parents had sent over had been pretty much immediately snapped up into Berk's labor pool. His men were getting six pennyweights of dragon scales a day, while the tannery was offering twelve

Of course, if his and Hiccup's plans worked out—and it looked like they would—they'd be able to partner with the baths and laundry soon enough, which would help free up some more hands.

Arriving at the Chief's hut, he knocked.

"Enter!" he heard Stoick's voice call out.

Opening the door, he stepped in and paused, as his great-aunt Bladewit was there; she was standing nearby, as Stoick was looking over a sheaf of parchment with dense, neat handwriting on it. Bladewit glanced in his direction and gave him an inscrutable look before turning back to the Chief.

"Yes, Fishlegs?" Stoick asked.

"I, uh, I have those numbers you wanted, for, for the upcoming hatchings."

"Good. Wait a moment? Maybe get yourself something to drink?"

Fishlegs nodded and walked over to the barrel. Pouring himself an ale, he tried not to let his grand-aunt's anger get to him. She was not happy about him and Heather, and had made that distinctly clear. As a member of the Ingerman clan now—even through Fishlegs' concubinage—Heather should have had access rights to the clan library, but she'd been preemptively banned.

The worst part was that Heather was just sitting back and taking it. She'd told Fishlegs that Bladewit just needed some time to warm up to her, and in a year or two, the ban would probably be rescinded.

After he'd drunk half of his cup of ale, Stoick looked up from the sheaf of parchment. "So far, it looks good. Thank you, Bladewit. I'll finish reviewing it later, and we'll bring it before a Thing for voting to adopt it."

She bowed. "Thank you, Chief. I'll see myself out?"

"Aye. And thank you again."

After Bladewit left, Fishlegs stepped over to the table, and Stoick looked up at him. "So? How bad is it going to be?"

"Well… we can't candle the dragon eggs like we would a chicken egg, so we have no idea which of them are viable or not. But we still have over sixteen thousand eggs… and given the problems we had last year with just a hundred and fifty hatchlings…" He gave a slightly terrified laugh. "Sir… we're going to have somewhere around a hundred times more hatchlings this year. I don't think keeping them in that little nursery we put together in the Broodery is going to cut it."

Stoick sighed and nodded. "All right. Talk it over with Hiccup. I want you two to put your heads together and come up with some solutions."

"Yes sir," Fishlegs said. "I'll go find him."

Stoick held up a hand as he turned to leave. "Lad, before you go?"

"Yes?"

Stoick held up the sheaf of parchment. "Could you do me a favor and look this over? Your eyes are younger, and you're more used to reading than I am."

Fishlegs nodded. "I can do that. What is it?"

"Bladewit and Clodgall's proposed additions to the tribal laws, specifically for the dragons."

"Oooh. Uh…"

"Fishlegs. I'm not saying that I need a line-by-line critique. But you can read it faster than I can," Stoick said reasonably. "Please?"

Fishlegs swallowed and nodded. Taking a seat, he took the sheaf of parchments and started to read.

It was fairly basic, as far as the laws were concerned. Clearly modeled on the existing laws for Bed Rights and Food Rights, it spelled out that the dragons would be supplied with a warm and dry place to sleep—or wet, in the case of those dragons who slept in water—and with the appropriate minimums for food. Legally, a dragon bond would be like a child adoption—the rider would be responsible for the dragon's behavior and upkeep—and, interestingly, his grand-aunt and Clodgall had solved the issue of breeding and eggs by stating that eggs and hatchlings would legally belong to the Haddock clan, to be hatched and raised as part of the wild flock (even if some dragons helped with nurturing the young). It was a neat and elegant solution to that issue, especially when it came to tracking whose eggs belonged to who… but still, that was surrendering a lot of power to the Haddocks…

Then he looked at the next clause and felt his blood run cold.

Adoption of dragons from the Haddock Wild Flock, as the Wild Flock is legally a part of the Haddock clan, can only be done by those who are members of allied clans by blood, marriage, or adoption. Such adoption will not require a mundr…

He must have gasped or something, because Stoick asked, "What's wrong?"

Speechless, he just passed the parchment over and pointed to the specific clause.

Stoick read it over, blinked, and then read it again. "Lad. I'm reading this wrong. Tell me that her proposal here doesn't make it impossible for anyone from Vedrarfjord to get a dragon?"

Fishlegs said, his voice slightly strangled, "I could, but I'd be lying. Those clans there are vassals to you. Not allied. Only the four clans here are your allied clans. And the clanless…"

"Aye. I follow." Stoick ran his hands through his hair, looking upset. "I need to talk to her, because this is an official draft." He pointed to the signatures on the last page, with Bladewit and Clodgall's endorsements. "But first, let's see if there are any other surprises in here."

Fishlegs nodded and bent his head back over the parchments.

###

Constantinople, Roman Empire

"Oh, the looks on their faces!" Gudmund cheered, the words a bit slurred.

Snotlout hoisted his own cup, filled with strong, unwatered wine—the stuff was definitely growing on him. "Oh, it was great! Did you see that one pirate who saw us coming and just jumped overboard!?" They were sitting in the barracks, drinking, having returned from their first mission as dragon riders the day before.

An urgent message had arrived a few days before from some of the Roman Navy patrolling in the Aegean Sea; a group of pirates was preying on ships, and they had requested Varangian backup. To Sigurd's surprise, it had turned out that the Varangians also worked with the Navy, hunting pirates in light ships called ousiai. Being mostly Norsemen, their skills with light craft were greater than that of the Romans, which made complete sense, but he'd never considered it before.

But rather than dispatch a fleet of ousiai, the Emperor had sent Sigurd and the small contingent of dragon riders that he'd managed to train—specifically, his core group of friends, who had been the first to get dragons of their own after the Emperor's personal bodyguards. They had flown out, along with a dozen other Varangians riding second-saddle, with Jorn riding behind Sigurd being officially in command as the senior officer, and reported in to the shocked Navy commander later that day.

Then, yesterday, they'd found the hapless pirates.

Benjamin snorted and leaned up against Pelagia, who molded herself against him. "I missed it! Tell, tell!" he said.

Snotlout waved with his cup. "I saw the whole thing! This guy was walking about on deck, and then the lookout screamed that we were coming! And he freezes, looks up, sees us, and I swear I could see the look of 'I didn't sign up for this!' run across his face, and he dropped his bow, ran and dove into the water!"

The group burst out laughing. They were getting rather drunk at this point. After the surviving pirates had surrendered, faced with Gudmund and Thorred's Campes, which, like Nadders, could throw spines, it had turned out that the pirate ship had had a hold full of loot, including pots of wine—and they'd gotten to keep nearly all of it for themselves, after Jorn had paid the hundred marks per ship captured to the Empire. A twenty-two-way split had given each of them a tidy fortune.

At the moment, they were in the barracks, one of the pots of wine opened for the riders to enjoy, another three having been given to the rest of the Varangians to share.

Snotlout drank his cup of wine with a grin. Thorred had tried to compose some verse to commemorate the victory, but he'd stopped his composition in favor of wine, thank the gods. Instead, they had turned to a Norse drinking song that they all knew, which had a seemingly inexhaustible number of verses, most of them obscene. Set to a good beat, it was even better than a drummer for rowing!

Benjamin leaned forward a bit. "So… uh… Gudmund… been meaning to ask… you're Norse, right?"

"Aye. I'm Swede, born and, hic, raised," Gudmund said with a drunken smile. "Lemme guess. You're going to ask how, 'cause I look like an Ethiopian?"

Benjamin shifted a bit uncomfortably. "Aye."

"M' father was a V'rangian, with Emperor Basil. Came back home w' loot and three concur—conbu—concubines." He saluted with his cup. "A Greek, an Arab and an Ethiopian—m' mother." His face split in a grin to reveal white teeth. "Been twenty years, and they all still complain about th' cold, but their beds 're warm enough." Gudmund took a deep drink and, with his grin turning feral, slammed the empty mug down on the table as punctuation. "Between a Swede wife an' those three, I got lots o' siblings."

Thorred asked, curious, "How many?"

"I'm third o' fourteen," Gudmund said proudly. "What 'bout you, Ben? You and Pelagia are looking pretty… friendly."

Ben grinned. "Younger son, not much chance to inherit, came down here for loot and pay. Found a lovely lady," he said, and took Pelagia's hand and kissed the back of it. She grinned and pulled him closer.

Sigurd toasted the pair of them, shoving Snotlout's jealousy to the back of his mind with an effort of will. "Well, you two look pretty happy!"

"What about you, Sig?" Thorred asked eagerly.

Sigurd looked at the wannabe skald with a deadpan expression. "Not telling."

"Why not?"

"Because Sigurd has realized, Thorred, that, for all of your many and varied strong qualities," Gunnar said, his words somehow even more formal than normal despite having drunk more wine than anybody else, "not only did you get the wrong sip of the Poet's Mead, your meter is terrible, your rhymes forced, and while you can carry a tune in a bucket, it had best have a lid on the top to keep the poor song from escaping its torment."

"Annnd," drawled Hrafn, "you seem to have appointed yourself as Sigurd's personal skald."

"But if I don't set it to verse, in order to let Sigurd's tale disperse, and let others hear it and converse, things for Sigurd could get more adverse!" Thorred said earnestly, seemingly unoffended by Gunnar's critique.

Hrafn's jaw dropped open, and Ketilbjorn, who had mostly been quietly drinking, coughed, sputtered and choked.

Gunnar reached over and shut Hrafn's dangling jaw with a click, before turning to Thorred. "How much of that perverse rhyme did you rehearse?"

Gudmund whimpered and said, "Oh no… he's corrupted Gunnar!"

"What? No! Oh dear…" Gunnar said as Thorred cackled.

They all laughed and clinked cups together, and then there was a knock at the door.

Turning, Sigurd looked, to see Jorn and Kristoffer standing there, looking serious.

They all stood and saluted the senior officers. "Sir?" Sigurd said.

"At ease, all of you," Jorn said.

They relaxed, but there was still an air of tension.

"That was well done with the pirates," Jorn said. "But you need to realize that this was a test."

"A test? Sir?" Gunnar asked.

"To see what you could do. Now that you've passed…" Jorn sighed. "The assignments will get more dangerous. And while the Emperor still needs Sigurd to tame and train dragons, as he hasn't found anybody to do the job for him yet, he hasn't forgiven you for standing up to him."

"Sir?" Sigurd asked, trying to clear his mind of the fog that the drink had given him. "What are you saying?"

Kristoffer said softly, "We're saying that your fate is probably going to be a glorious death on the battlefield against impossible odds or an arrest like Harald's, as soon as he finds someone else to train dragons for him—assuming that he just doesn't order you killed in a fit of temper."

The mood in the room dropped. "What can we do, sir?"

"Well, for the moment, keep training more riders. You'll need them. You just became the point of the Emperor's sword. Keep yourselves sharp."

"And in the long run…?" Gudmund asked.

Kristoffer shifted uncomfortably. "You've all started your terms of service less than a year ago, except for Axelsson there. It's… going to be difficult. Already the Varangians are seen as the Emperor's strong sword arm by the Army. You've made that status that much stronger. So there will be enormous pressure to deploy you for the most dangerous tasks… and the Emperor has no reason to hold you back."

###

Mead Hall Council Chamber, Isle Of Berk, Alban Hebrides

As the clanheads entered the small council chamber, Stoick braced himself. This was going to be a fight.

"Thank you all for coming," he said politely. "Please, be seated."

"What's this about, Stoick?" Rikard asked.

Stoick looked to Bladewit and Clodgall. "This afternoon, Clanhead Bladewit gave me hers and Clanhead Clodgall's official proposal for amending the laws to account for dragons. Overall… it is a good proposal. However, there is a problem."

Clodgall cocked his head quizzically. "What sort of problem, Stoick?"

Stoick resisted the urge to glare at Clodgall, and instead took out the specific piece of parchment, and placed it in the middle of the table. He tapped the offending lines. "This sort." He leaned back and said, "If we were to adopt this into law, it places excessive limitations on who can adopt dragons." Rikard and Hardnut leaned in to look.

Bladewit quirked a gray-haired eyebrow as the two men read the lines. "Excessive? How so?"

Stoick gave her a flat look. "Under this law as written, no one from Vedrarfjord or Veisafjord, and no freedman here on Berk can get a dragon, as they do not belong to an 'allied clan.' That is a problem."

Bladewit pursed her lips and said, "I do not see how that is a problem. We did that intentionally when we wrote it."

Stoick blinked as Rikard and Hardnut looked up. "Intentionally? Why would you—"

Bladewit fixed him with a steely-eyed gaze. "Stoick. Consider this. Right now, those dragons are our tribe's greatest asset, and we've already seen that handing them out to those that are untrustworthy is a poor idea." She scowled. "My grand-nephew's choice of partners shows that."

"Heather is loyal!" Stoick protested. Off to the side, he saw that Rikard and Hardnut seemed slightly skeptical of his statement.

"She's infatuated, not loyal!" Bladewit snapped back. "I don't trust her! She's sixteen, and betrayed her parents on the basis of an adolescent attraction! It is only due to luck and your willingness to risk on her behalf that they are not dead! So what happens when the infatuation fades? Or when someone else finds a lever to hold on her?" Bladewit stood and looked Stoick firmly in the eye. "The fact of the matter is, whether she is loyal or not, trustworthy now or not, we made a mistake in trusting her too fast back then!"

Stoick scowled. "So your solution is to prevent all freedmen and all of the residents of Vedrarfjord and Veisafjord from gaining dragons of their own?"

"Yes," Bladewit said flatly. "But it is not prevention. There is a way for them to gain access to dragons under this law! Two, in fact—they can marry in or be adopted, much as how we have always brought freedmen into the clans."

"Like your own husband," Stoick said pointedly.

"Aye. And this was Frode's own suggestion!" Bladewit said, and Clodgall nodded in agreement.

Hardnut shook his head. "This would also prevent us from trading any more dragons to Norway!"

"And that is good as well! With dragons, Berk stands equal to Norway! With them having dragons of their own, we are again reduced to little more than a small village to be dominated, like how Echmarcach mac Ragnaill extracted such punishing tribute from us for all of those years!" Clodgall said emphatically.

Rikard spoke up. "I can see the logic behind it. This way, there is a period where they can grow to understand our ways and also, if they are adopted or married in, they have trustworthy members of the tribe standing surety for them, vouching for them?"

"Exactly!" Bladewit said enthusiastically. "So you agree?"

"No, I don't," Rikard said flatly. "All this does is send the message to those we have promised to bring into the tribe that we don't trust them. Not truly, and that they are not truly part of the tribe!"

Bladewit shook her head. "I'm not suggesting revoking Bed Rights and Food Rights for them! No! What do you take me for!? All I am saying is that we need some way to guarantee their allegiance, rather than just give them a valuable asset like a dragon and hope for the best!"

Hardnut grimaced, but nodded. "That's a valid point."

"Thank you!" Bladewit said, exasperated. "And don't forget that the Old Tribe is outnumbered, what, five to one by those in the Eirish cities!? We need some surety that our ways won't be swamped and dragged under by their sheer numbers! That they learn what it is to be Hooligans!"

"It's too restrictive!" Stoick protested.

"Is it!?" Bladewit replied. "What was your comment only three months ago? 'Half of them want to kiss my arse, and the other half want to take a bite out of it'!?" She leaned forward and scowled up at him. "Does that sound like the sort of people we should be trusting with dragons!?"

"And what about the clanless here?" Stoick countered.

Bladewit shrugged. "They already have dragons of their own if they wanted them. The law isn't retroactive—we wouldn't be taking their dragons away from them." She pointed a finger at Stoick. "But the ones that just arrived and have no idea how to be a Hooligan? No, they need to wait and learn."

Stoick scowled. "I hear your points, and I agree that there's truth to them. But could you relent at least somewhat and amend it so that we can give some of those who have proven their trustworthiness access, as determined by my clan's judgment?"

Bladewit shook her head. "No. With this, we are giving your clan, as Chief, an incredible amount of power. We trust you and Hiccup with it, but there have to be some safeguards." She nodded towards the parchment on the table. "That is our best effort to create a measure that will allow us to bring in new riders and yet preserve our ways at the same time. And it still has to be voted on by the Tribe Thing." She made a wry face. "And who knows? Perhaps our suggestion will not be to their taste. But if you want a different one, you will have to scribe it yourself, and put it to the same vote."

Stoick scowled again. "There is no way to change your mind?"

She shook her head. "No. I've put much thought into this over the last month." She gave a small chuckle. "How is it that Hiccup describes us? We have stubbornness in our bones, and, for the good of our people and our way of life, I have to choose this path."

Stoick nodded curtly and said, "Clodgall, you stand with her?"

"Aye, that I do."

"Hardnut?"

"I need to think on this, but I am unsure. There is no way that Norway will not take this as an insult."

Rikard spoke up. "Same with the Norse-Gaels in the cities under my grandson's watch. This is a slap in the face to them. I stand against it."

Stoick nodded. "And I stand against it as well. It is too harsh."

"Well then, bring it before the Thing for the vote!" Bladewit said.

"I shall… but not yet," Stoick said. "You told me to scribe my own proposal? Then I shall."

Bladewit bowed slightly. "I can respect that, even if I disagree with it. But!" she held up a hand with one accusatory finger raised, "until we have this resolved one way or the other, then I must request that there be a stop on training any and all new riders!"


A/N: So, there's that. I'm expecting a lot of hate aimed at Bladewit and Clodgall for this, but the thing is, they have a point. They might not be going about it in the best manner, but there is no question that letting Heather have access to a dragon, to give one example, was premature, and that the system, such as it was up to this point, was primed for abuse. It's very much "locking the barn door after the horse is gone" sort of mentality, combined with a overreaction out of fear, but it's not wholly baseless xenophobia. Just a "Can we get to know them first before we give them that sort of power?" reactionary attitude, combined with a unimaginative approach to problem solving along the lines of "This method is how we used to bring people in fully, so let's just go with that." Is it too restrictive? Hell yes. Does that make Clodgall and Bladewit evil? Nope. Just flawed, and their solution isn't anywhere near ideal...

Next, I have a bit of housekeeping and some good news.

Housekeeping first; A reminder that I will be going on posting hiatus for the month of July; over the course of June, I will be posting through to chapter 55 on the 24th, and then resuming posting on August 5th with chapter 56.

For the good news, I passed my German A1 exam and have my certification, so I will be able to get my permanent residency and work permits as soon as I can get the paperwork filled out.

As a final note, yes, I have seen the poster for HTTYD 3 and the character designs. For those interested in my opinion on them, I have this to say: I do not yet have enough information to be able to give an answer.

Thank you all for reading and see you next week!