Toothless woke up to a tap between his eyes. He opened them groggily and saw in dismay that he was not flying in the homeland of his sweet dreams from a few drowsy moments before, for he was still curled up on his nest of hay and hen-feathers he had seared warm with his own throat-flames in Hiccup's room, which he had entered for a solitary winter nap when Hiccup had not been there at the time. Now, Hiccup occupied the room like a Witch had snapped her fingers and transported Hiccup from his whereabouts to sit in a chair before a desk and create faint scribbling noises with a writing tool that gently piqued Toothless' awakened, sensitive ears in miniscule movements.

The air in Hiccup's bedroom felt toasty to Toothless by the comfortable heat of Hiccup's fire, which had turned from embers on stones of coal to tall and lively orange flames since his master had returned. The room smelled like ashes and aged wood inside and the loud scent of ink carried from Hiccup's endless piles of blueprints and personal maps of places around Berk recorded on parchment that all competed for limited space on Hiccup's desk. The sight of the familiar items in Hiccup's room and the feel of the soft bedding his master had prepared for him every night was soothing to Toothless and drew his eyes to loll backwards into his eyelids until they slowly met together and his neck limped to sink deeper into the hay under his head in a hushed, crackling sizzle. The scritch of Hiccup's stickpen faded slowly from Toothless' ears until they flattened lifelessly on his head.

Toothless popped open his eyes. Another paper-light missile projected from somewhere in the room onto his head.

Vermin, Toothless mentally cursed to Hiccup in his dragon language. The boy had not grown out of his wiles to disturb him when he was trying to relax or escape the world through his dreams, or when he simply preferred to be left to himself. When they had first met, Hiccup would not let him be until he had fit his human contraption on his tail's broken wing that had been snared by Hiccup's own doing to dare to capture him by a projectile net of tough and heavy shiprope. Toothless had thought his wing would heal better in the hands of nature and time from Hiccup's clumsy assault , but Hiccup had been persistent to find him in his place he had landed in the forest, a prison of high rocks in a grassy atoll that he had fell into from the air because he was unsupported by his damaged tailfin. Toothless had been confident he could breach the barrier alone and return to his nest far away from the Vikings' settlement. Although Toothless could not even escape from Hiccup's antics to pester him then, he had unwillingly became fond of the Viking the more he was taunted by his own curiosity of the boy's peculiar inventions he had not seen from any other Viking in all of his dragon-years. He had seen other objects, sharp things and vicious-looking weapons, meant to murder him and his he-dragon and she-dragon cousins and friends simply because they lived. Hiccup had instead created a way for him to survive. It had not made sense to him at first why Hiccup had chosen to help him in that way, but, as their bond grew, Toothless understood that Hiccup was a human to be trusted, and even loved. Thoughts of his much younger Viking master cheered Toothless and soothed him to retreat into his memories and experience a different dream of he and a twelve-year-old Hiccup flying over the sea for miles.

In his dreams he and Hiccup were flying over the ocean with the Sun in their faces and the wind on their skin. Toothless skated beneath a large, arch-shaped rock bed that jutted from the ocean, and Hiccup balanced on his spine and then leaped over the top of the landform to sprint across it and land on Toothless's back. Toothless was encouraged by Hiccup's improving balance and agility, and he pumped his wings until they funneled in the clouds together. Hiccup made a happy sound and Toothless dived backwards as he knew Hiccup wished him to do. Hiccup shouted in high spirits. They accelerated to the rocking waves just before Toothless swiveled upright and speared forward above the water like a black jet. His wingtips created a white trail of ocean spray. Hiccup dipped his hand in the water and skidded the waves to sting Toothless's eye. Toothless growled and dived beneath the surface into the sea to drench Hiccup. When he arose, Hiccup was clutching him in a bearhug and was laughing, and Toothless made a light yet foreboding sound of amusement. Toothless sailed them at a comfortable height and flapped his wings that carried a whiff of the scent of salt from the sea they were soaked by. Hiccup rubbed him eagerly and asked for him to do it again. Toothless flew faster in time for Hiccup's cheer, and suddenly he woke up once more.

Three more light objects had pummeled on Toothless' nose and Toothless shook his head like he wanted to rid of the tingles he felt from it. He saw a crumpled ball of used parchment bounce from his nose to the wooden boards of Hiccup's floor that had some space between them to see the first floor of the boy's home. Toothless accepted an assumption that Hiccup was drawing again and then he lowered his flat head to the position it had curled in against his body. He let out a discontent warble and then relaxed his muscles and lifted his wings to cover him like a delicate shell over his black body. He was moments from drifting off again, for he usually slept quickly by Hiccup's fire on cold winter mornings, but just then Toothless felt another ball of parchment sting him between the eyes.

Toothless snarled that time. He leaped upright on his legs. He honked lowly and paced his bed to gauge if he wished to investigate what his Viking was working on with such ferocity, or to fight to return to sleep. Toothless looked vexed and wholly irritated as his green eyes narrowed and his round, black pupils became diamond.

Hiccup glanced over his shoulder when he heard Toothless' disgruntled voicings. He looked at an assortment of discarded drafts around his dragon and saw where all of his uncalculated tosses of frustration had gone. "Oh, sorry there, bud." Hiccup said, chuckling. He turned to his unmarked sheet and wrote on it busily with wet, oily symbols from his stylus.

Toothless knew then that the paper was not thrown in aggression. He relaxed enough to perch in his bedding and watch his master lazily.

Hiccup continued to scribble with the same utensil Toothless saw in his hand all of the time. Toothless had seen Hiccup with the black charcoal stylus so much that he believed it was a charm of some sort, possibly for Hiccup's good luck. The stick had never hurt him, but Toothless was slightly afraid of it's importance to Hiccup. Only weapons were carried around every day by the Vikingmen. From what Toothless knew, Hiccup's wand could make mystical swirls and lines and pictographs that resembled many dragons he knew from growing up in the wild. Toothless wondered why Hiccup didn't draw the thousand other species that he knew of since he was a foal. There were even dragons in other realms that Hiccup had failed to draw. Hiccup interrupted his thoughts and Toothless angled his ears to face him.

" Listen to this," Hiccup announced, "and lemme know what you think."

Toothless moved his front paw forward a centimeter when Hiccup pushed from his squeaky, wooden chair and stood in front of him. Hiccup cleared his throat and spoke. Toothless heard Hiccup speak as if he were reciting an important message, but Toothless quickly lost interest in the mumbled jargon of his human language because his voice didn't rouse him to attention like other Vikings on the island. Toothless make quick business of licking and gnawing at an itchy spot on his scaleskin. He quivered his head and body to settle the sensation.

Hiccup, interrupted by the sound of his dragon's wagging earfolds, looked to Toothless. When he saw that Toothless was paying him no real attention, Hiccup smirked righteously. "Aah- -who cares what you think?" He said with a dismissive flap of his hand, feeling slightly offended yet unbothered.

Hiccup approached Toothless looking playful. Toothless felt the change in his master's energy and lashed his reptilian tail left and right in a faster pace as Hiccup came closer.

Toothless felt his Viking's hand scratch his mandible and Toothless cooed into the feeling. He licked his lips as most dragons did when there was pleasant stimulus. Hiccup's ministrations ended too soon and Toothless released a snuff from his nose for Hiccup to continue. Instead, the Viking sat on his bed and Toothless moved to be near his legs where his snout muzzled Hiccup's feet. He roofed his taloned paw onto the knee of Hiccup's strong leg, the one that had not grown a metal foot, and he heard Hiccup give him a light yet sharp command, "down!"

Toothless's eyes veered. He reluctantly obeyed Hiccup with a hiss because he was a dragon species that certainly did not like being told what to do, even by a rider he trusted with his life.

"You have to be really careful with this, it's drying." Hiccup added. He reshuffled his papers and inspected them for smudges from Toothless' forepaws that could have splashed in mud last night for all he knew.

Hiccup's freckled face lightened in the room's firelight and his cheek hiked upward at Toothless. "You know what this is, bud?"

Toothless nosed Hiccup's palm to scratch him again, and he heard an inviting chuckle before Hiccup's fingers hooked where they once were. Toothless closed his eyes and pressured his head in Hiccup's warm palm.

"It's my speech for Snoggletog today."

Toothless pivoted his neck to another area for Hiccup's fingers to scratch and he growled in contentment.

"Yeah, I know. Another one. I think this one is the best one yet." Hiccup spoke his thoughts out loud to Toothless because he had done so as he grew up and Toothless was a better listener than anyone Hiccup knew, especially Astrid.

"I didn't know there were this many speeches to make in a year. There's one maybe every equinox." Hiccup muttered to Toothless in puzzlement, "Or, is it every half-moon? Hm. I forgot."

Toothless brightened when Hiccup allowed him to come onto his bed for closer company. Toothless' bayed excitedly as Hiccup coddled him while he got comfortable on his tweed covers. Hiccup's scent hadn't changed much but it became iced by the winter and was very faint on the quilt. Toothless rested there and felt Hiccup's fingers preen his wings and head. Toothless shivered. He made himself comfortable on the human bed under Hiccup's touch.

Hiccup thought he should have paid more attention to his teachings of the basic rituals of his position when he had been initiated into chiefhood by his village's only eldress, Gothi, but he had been too distracted with having thrilling adventures with his dragonrider friends at Dragon's Edge. Being a chief wasn't easy on him because he was now distanced from the day-to-day lives of his friends and he felt that he wasn't allowed to see them as regularly as he used to a few years before. He looked forward to Snoggletog so that he could spend time with them and feel a little more normal as if his life hadn't completely changed overnight. Hiccup also worried constantly about the state of Dragon's Edge since he no longer had time to head the group and manage it in the way he thought was best for everyone there. There had been no plans from Ruffnut, Fishlegs, his cousin Snoutlout, or Astrid or Tuffnut on who should take over as the rightful leader of the camp. He worried that they had lost interest in the cause to ward off dragon trappers and unlock the secrets of riding, keeping, and training dragons as a group. He feared more that he was the only one of them that truly cared the most for the group's mission all along. he had no motivation to bring up his concerns when he would see the group later in the day. He wanted their experience at the festival to be like old times and carefree of the new burdens of adulthood.

It didn't aid Hiccup's disquiet about his life's future that he had lost Astrid as a trusted confidant. He only had himself to blame for it. He hadn't meant to erase Astrid from his life, but he had been overwhelmed with her excitement to become his chieftess, and he had not ever wanted to lose his connection to the world of dragons by filling his father's large shoes on the island. Eventually, tradition had compelled him to become his role though he had lost the girl that would make him believe that he was capable of becoming the descendant of luminary kings he was born to be. He missed her, deeply.

Hiccup derided his thoughts with a rough tut of his tongue. He was longing for a girl who had chosen his own friend over him after a pointless argument that she took too far. "Who needs Astrid?!" He said loudly and suddenly to Toothless who he assumed had read his thoughts. He wasn't going to be even more embarrassed after his battle with Tuffnut by showing up to Snoggletog without a date. "I'll bring someone that'll make Astrid wish she had never left me."

Hiccup's speech sounded angry to Toothless, who watched Hiccup leave and felt his hands slip from his jaws to get dressed for the morning. Toothless mewled a grunt of apprehension.

Words: 2423