Few things before you read this. One, I have read the story Ring of Fire by toothlessgolfer. This particular HTTYD cross with the LOTR is very deliberately set before Thorin and the others intrude on Bilbo's home to hire him as a burglar. I thought it would be fun to post a new story without giving any sneak peeks in the drabbles. With that in mind, enjoy!

Waking up with an immediate migraine was never pleasant. Coming to the horrifying realization you were completely alone and that you neither recognized your surroundings or knew where the Helheim you were made things worse, especially when you were already suffering from a migraine that felt like Thor was using your skull as an anvil.

So it was only natural when the worst of it dulled to a low throb that he would search for Toothless. Toothless, who always slept on a slab right next to him in his room and was never far from his side.

Hiccup headed to the first sign of civilization he could find, wondering where the hell his brother in all but blood was and why he had woken up in a strange place.

He had no idea that he was in for a great many shocks, and it would start with a forge.

Several hours later...

It was a very good thing this place accepted coin, because he didn't have any of the local currency. Fortunately gold was universal in any land, regardless of what was imprinted on it. Once it was revealed his coin was good, however odd looking, the innkeeper accepted him with good cheer.

A human showing up in slightly odd garb speaking 'dwarfish' was unusual, but there were several dwarfs who were happy to translate for a free pint in the village.

Hiccup didn't know what dwarfish was, only that it sounded like a heavily accented version of the language that was prevalent in the archipelago and it took him a bit to filter it through his mental translator.

At least he had something close enough to the local language to be understood.

Still, no one had heard anything of Berk or about dragons outside of some dirty looks from the dwarves...right up until he mentioned that his village had been fighting against the beasts for generations until they had recently driven them off.

Which was true to an extent, but it was pretty clear dragons were a lot more bloodthirsty and less likely to be tamed than the kind he was used to. Either way he was able to describe a monstrous nightmare well enough that the dwarves believed his claim of having encountered the beast before.

Hiccup could only hope this Thorin was a reasonable person.

Thorin's POV

Balin had given him a head's up about the odd human who spoke a variant of dwarvish that had fallen out of favor at least two hundred years ago.

He was rather curious as to why a human would know that dialect when there were very few dwarves who were still alive that knew how to speak it. Fortunately it was close enough to the current one that they understood what he was saying, but it was still very odd.

Hiccup entered the forge, and the first thing Thorin noticed...outside the King's bearing the young man had...was that he was a blacksmith.

It wasn't anything obvious, but any dwarf worth their salt could tell. This Hiccup looked at the smithy not as a customer, but as a blacksmith would entering another's workshop.

Thorin, against his better judgment and bitterness over the loss of his kingdom and the failure at Moria, liked the human a bit because of that. He didn't drop his guard though.

"They say you speak dwarvish fluently," he commented.

Hiccup's green eyes went straight to him. He could sense the young man recognized him as a fellow king, as his bearing shifted slightly.

He'd recognize the way Hiccup held himself anywhere. It was the same way he held himself when talking to his cousin.

"Are you Thorin?"

"I am."

"Someone by the name of Dwalin pointed me in this direction. I'm looking for information and I can pay you with either gold or if necessary work."

Thorin settled in to his small table, and gestured for Hiccup to sit down.

Apparently the young man woke up with the mother of all hangovers and had absolutely no idea where he was or how he got there. He would have suspected a prank, as there were members of his tribe who would have found it amusing, but he sincerely doubted it as not even the 'twins' as he called them would pull something like this.

Thorin had the feeling this Hiccup was holding something back, but kept his silence.

Much like he suspected, Hiccup was a blacksmith and was well used to working with metal. However he spent more of his time acting as the chief these days.

Thorin might have dismissed the idea of the human working in his forge...but then he caught sight of something that held his full interest.

The odd gait he had dismissed as a limp...likely from battle...was revealed to be due to the young man's leg being made of metal from the knee down.

Hiccup clearly had no issue walking with it, and if not for the fact he saw the hard iron himself he would never have believed it possible. He could easily think of a number of dwarves who served accidents from mining or forge work that were forced to make due with peg legs that were far less mobile.

"I believe, Master Hiccup, we can come to an arrangement."

It was a good thing he was used to weird things and working in a smithy, because it took a full two months before Thorin and the men who followed him to trust him even remotely.

During that time he found out the full story of what happened to their homeland, and the trouble they had with the dragon.

According to Balin, who was more than happy to teach Hiccup common-tongue since he was apparently using a very old variant of dwarvish that was almost forgotten, Thorin's grandfather became too greedy and selfish when it came to acquiring large amounts of gold and as a result, a dragon came calling.

Smaug took Erebor and the King's Jewel was lost in the ensuing scuffle within the mass of gold, and the dwarves were scattered. Thorin had done the best he could after they failed to claim Moria from the orcs, but he was still rather pissed about the whole thing. It was that battle where he earned the name "Oakenshield" as he had fought a pale orc by the name of Azog the Defiler and only had an oak branch to use as a shield.

All in all it cemented the idea that Thorin was a misplaced Great Chief in Hiccup's mind. A concept that, when explained to the dwarves, was met with great approval.

Hiccup was rather curious as to the rather scary amount of similarities the dwarves had to vikings. They were both stubborn, fierce warriors, were good at blacksmithing and their writing and language were so similar that it was easy to mistake one for the other.

Something Balin had commented on more than once, as the dwarves found it odd that a human was speaking an older dialect and could read and write in their language so fluently. Most humans didn't learn to read at all, and those that did were usually nobility.

It wasn't until Hiccup was dragged in yet another night of drinking with the dwarves that he gained clues to part of that particular mystery.

Fili and Kili reminded him of the twins Roughnut and Toughnut, though considerably less stupid and far less prone to doing things wrong. Don't get him wrong, he tolerated the twins to an extent, but they were complete idiots.

Even that braggart Snoutlout was smarter than them, and that was saying something!

Kili was cheerfully supporting a slightly drunk Hiccup when the pendant his father had given him the day Gothi named him Chief of the Tribe (thus freeing Stoick from the job) partially feel out of his shirt. It was old and no one in the tribe really remembered where it came from. All that was known was that only the most direct line of the first chief were allowed to have it.

Hiccup went to put it back in his shirt, but Fili caught a glimpse of the metal and it caught their interest.

The expression on their faces was rather...interesting...to say the least.

"Where did you get that?" asked Kili, his tone odd.

Hiccup blinked, then saw what the dwarf was looking at.

"It's something passed from chief to chief of my tribe."

Hiccup waited until they were at his small home a little outside the village before he showed it to them properly. He wondered why the twins were acting so odd about it.

It was the next morning when Balin and Thorin came...at a decent hour considering he would have had a nasty hangover if he had drank any more of that mead...and were invited in.

Hiccup had a sneaking suspicion this had something to do with the Chieftain's amulet.

"So what's this all about?"

"What do you know of the emblem on that pendant?" asked Balin.

"The pendant is a remnant of the tribe that the mother of my ancestor came from, and was a symbol of their status before their disagreement caused them to settle in a new land. She was the one who taught the tribe language, writing, blacksmithing and how to survive on the island we settled on, and was considered one of the greatest women in our history. Of course shortly after she died, the dragons showed up and we'd been fighting them ever since until I put an end to it."

"Put an end to it?" repeated Thorin.

"You have to understand, the dragons where I come from are far smaller than what you described Smaug as. While there are beasts of that size, most of them are not nearly as intelligent and are more interested in food than gold," said Hiccup quickly. "They also prefer isolation from others, save for one subspecies I know of that tend to create sanctuaries and rule over the other breeds. We've come to call those who can control the others Alphas."

Thorin looked a bit disappointed hearing that.

"What's this about anyway?"

"The pendant has remarkable similarities to the ones we give to the line of Durin, of which Thorin is a member," explained Balin. "It's curious thing for a human to have it when to our knowledge none save our oldest bloodlines should have one. There's also the fact that you arrived speaking a much older dialect of dwarvish that has been almost forgotten."

"Durin?" said Hiccup, sitting up. "I know that name. Some of our very oldest records call the Haddock line the 'children of Durin', but since it belonged to the mother it's not really spoken of. And most of the records are so old they are rather hard to translate."

Balin looked satisfied hearing that. Ever since Hiccup arrived in their village Balin had been investigating their archives. He had found something of note in the records that were taken from Erebor, though they were incomplete.

According to what little he could find, there was a young dwarf maiden from the line of Durin...a many-times great ancestor of Thorin...who got into a major argument with her father the king and had eloped with a young blacksmith of great renown from Dale.

It was unclear what happened to her, as those parts of the records were missing, but some he found of a later date said that she disappeared and was never heard from again after investigating an odd gate.

Most records believed she had been killed by orcs or some other misfortune with her husband and son. However Balin was starting to believe that they had settled and founded a new kingdom, though they were cut off.

It would neatly explain Hiccup's dialect and the recent revelation of that pendant.

Hiccup was more than happy to let the older dwarves examine the pendant, so long as he was present. He found it easy to get along with dwarves, just like they found him much more tolerable than most humans.

The older dwarves confirmed Balin's suspicions. The pendant was almost identical to the older ones used by Thorin's line. However since Hiccup wasn't a full dwarf he was still considered an outsider and was ineligible to rule anything.

Hiccup was fine with that. If he was part dwarf like they said, then a lot of odd things made far more sense. He had already noticed a remarkable amount of similarities between vikings and dwarves.

Six months. That was how long he had been there, and he had made the beginnings of a possible life here. He still had a great deal of wanderlust, but there was no point in traveling when he had no destination and no idea where Toothless was.

However today was different. Today traders were coming into town and they had stories of odd people who spoke dwarvish, but were fierce warriors. Considering his own experiences, Hiccup knew they were talking about his people, and he also knew his duties as a chief demanded he find them and bring them to a new home.

He had already come to the unpleasant conclusion Berk was lost, until they found the pathway Balin had mentioned briefly.

The dwarves knew immediately when they saw Hiccup's expression...especially Thorin. He knew all too well the pain of his people being scattered and the headache of having to track them down to insure they were safe.

Especially when there were monsters like orcs, goblins and wargs out in the wilds who would kill the ones missing without hesitation.

To that end, the dwarves helped Hiccup pack for his long journey and agreed to watch his home until his return. After all, he was kin as far as they could tell. And even if he wasn't, he had made quite a few friends with them.