Chapter 9

Astrid knew by now that she was in trouble.

The realization had come gradually, back in the library, as she had flickered her fingers across the dragon manual pages and shot rapid-fire questions at Hiccup about the draconic world. This new understanding of the situation irked her. What she had prepared herself for upon breaching the tower's stronghold was danger because of her hair. Because of ruffians and thugs and all those other demonic persons. Because of the general selfishness of humanity.

But it was her mind that was betraying her.

The first betrayal had spawned so unexpectedly that she had only been able to bite her tongue halfway through its vocal machinations. Hiccup had been telling her the various medicinal uses of Deadly Nadder spikes, and she'd asked if he'd ever bothered partially grinding them down to form weapons. He'd admitted that he hadn't, but that they probably wouldn't function in any usable way. Out of her mouth - teasing, confident, imaginative - had come, "Well, I'll just have to see-" for myself. Hiccup hadn't caught it - as his mind whirled into action pondering new avenues of innovation, Astrid had been shaking her head.

See what, Astrid? You won't be designing weapons with Nadder spikes. You will be at home in your tower again starting tomorrow.

This she told herself resolutely. She had always had a plan.

The second time, Fishlegs had startled when she gave him a compliment on how quickly he'd found a scroll documenting wind patterns across the land.

Grinning affectionately, Hiccup had watched the mumbling Fishlegs scurry away. "He's not used to you."

The words "not yet" tried to race out of her, but her gritted teeth barred their path. This would be the last time she ever saw Fishlegs. There would be no time to make his acquaintance properly.

Astrid had lost herself again not too long after in Hiccup's tale of finding the dragon nesting island. The image of her leaping off a dragon's back onto the island, chasing baby Nadders and ducking from projectile eggshell remnants of dragon birth - it had captivated her so intensely. She had opened her mouth to tell Hiccup that she couldn't wait to see it someday.

It was at that moment Astrid realized she was in trouble.

That discomfort weighed on her as she leaped feet-first through the window after Hiccup, back into the alleyway where they had begun their castle escapades.

"Where to next?" Hiccup asked, and Astrid mentally grabbed tight hold of the plan she'd spent months perfecting. She had barely followed it thus far - inns, subterranean caves, hair braiding, a dragon, a library, and... Hiccup - but she was too stubborn to toss it aside entirely.

"Weaponry," she said, shoulders pulling back.

Hiccup shook his head, but it was friendly rather than denying. "Trying to make your frying pan jealous?"

Astrid raised her eyebrows at him and replied, "Just to look at."

"If you need to borrow money..." Hiccup began, then seemed to think better of it. By now, he had wisely begun to understand her self-sufficiency.

They left the alley behind for the flow of human traffic, even thicker and more rambunctious than earlier. The alcoholic odors Astrid had encountered in the Moldy Cabbage flowed through the air in abundance here.

Straining his voice above the cacophony of celebration, Hiccup leaned into her shoulder and said, "We'll head for the second-best blacksmith in town!"

Her eyes scanned the crowds as Astrid had to nearly yell back, "Why second-best?"

"Because the best blacksmith is Gobber, and he already makes fun of me enough when he's sober!" Hiccup called back. Astrid had to laugh at that, even as she rolled her eyes. Men and their names.

The briefly overwhelming swell in the crowd passed, surging further up the road toward the castle's main entrance. Hiccup paused, presumably to expand the distance between the ruckus and themselves, before taking off at his usual brisk, long strides in the same direction. Astrid, yet again deeply grateful that her newly braided hair was no longer a hindrance to her movement out in the world, jogged just a few steps behind him.

Hiccup looked over his shoulder to throw back what Astrid guessed was a question, but the crowd had slowed down. A tangle of strange noises, reminding Astrid in some ways of her own healing song, clogged the air. The crowd broke out into loud noises themselves, supposedly cheerful - at least more cheerful than anyone in the Moldy Cabbage had been, and that was her only other experience with crowds. Hiccup held out an arm, blocking Astrid from moving any further forward. People were backing up toward them. Astrid's shoulders tensed, and she bounced on her toes to scan the crowd. It wasn't much use, as most of the people were taller than her anyway. When she looked at Hiccup, a grimace had seized his face.

"What is this?" she yelled to him as the crowd began clapping in some sort of disorganized beat to the unfamiliar noises.

"Dancing," he shouted back.

She had no idea what that was, but she pressed on: "And the noises?"

His face crunched in confusion as he looked between her and the crowd. "What noises?"

"The..." she tried for a few nearly mortifying seconds to emulate the sounds but failed completely. Astrid's shoulders were cringing nearly up to her ears by the time the last failed sound faded through her teeth.

"Music?" Hiccup yelped in disbelief. "You've never heard-"

His voice dropped into a grunt as a new throng of people excitedly pushed forward from behind them, propelling Hiccup and Astrid into the clapping revelers. Within seconds, Astrid was pressed tightly in a pile of excited, foul-breathed people, even as some force behind her continued her trajectory closer and closer to the "music".

Finally, she was in the middle - sort of, she realized, finding herself balancing on the edge of a wide open circle in the middle of the crowd. A few people were bouncing, swinging, flailing, and hopping around. Astrid quickly deduced that their movements pulsed in a near-match to the music and the crowd's clapping. This must be dancing, then.

The music swelled in volume and drama before coming to an echoing stop. The rhythm of the clapping devolved into applause and whoops. Someone called out something repeatedly, though Astrid could make no distinction of what was said. The people flailing in the circle nodded and beamed at the crowd before melting back into the ranks. A few young men around Astrid's age slid into the circle instead, their eyes unhurriedly and conspicuously sweeping across the crowd.

"I'm guessing that if you don't recognize music, dancing is probably unfamiliar too, huh?" Hiccup was at her ear, still having to speak loudly over the music before them and cheers behind them. "Hey, it's not a question!" he protested at her frown.

"You're pushing it." Her accusation lacked any convicting venom.

"I'd feel self-centered if all I did was talk about myself," he pointed out. She huffed, conceding the point, and they watched the dancers continue their strange twirling. One scruffy-looking man spinning near them had locked forearms with his partner, and their gazes entwined as they spun around each other. Astrid's mind, apparently on a traitorous streak, provided her with a visualization of herself in the same dance... with Hiccup.

Get a grip, Astrid, please.

She shivered to chase the image out of her mind, or at least into some darkened corner of her brain where she could easily ignore it. Tilting her head ever so slightly, she caught Hiccup glancing at her. His lips, quirked up, dropped as he looked away and scratched at the back of his head. Astrid bit down so hard on her smile that she briefly expected the taste of blood.

The song paused, accepted cheers, and then shifted into something different. A high-pitched single melody trilled around them. Astrid could only compare it to the whistling of late-night wind pirouetting around her tower. Beside her, Hiccup hummed.

"What?" she asked, but her voice now seemed too loud for the single melody and the low grumbles of approval echoing through the crowd.

While his breath deepened, Hiccup's gaze was pinned on the dancers, whose paths had changed dramatically. The young women stood still, coy grins abounding and hands clasped together behind their backs, while the young men with lowered brows and slow gaits circled then. It took Astrid a moment to realize the young men were singing.

It took her another, longer moment to realize that Hiccup's softened voice was joining their song.

"I'll swim and sail on savage seas
With ne'er a fear of drowning
And gladly ride the waves of life
If you will marry me.
No scorching sun
Nor freezing cold
Will stop me on my journey
If you will promise me your heart..."

The young women grabbed control of the music, calling back, "And love me for eternity!" Immediately, the men grinned, shoved at nearby fellows, and stood still. Taking up the circling were the young women, though their gaits were light, low skips rather than slow strides. Astrid tore her eyes away to see Hiccup, face bright, mesmerized by the event. It didn't feel like a simple dance to her, the way the previous steps and music had been. And judging by the faces of the crowd, not aglow as brightly as Hiccup's but still warm and wide-eyed, this moment seemed a treasure unearthed.

Astrid pulled her focus back to the center, where a few more rhythmic noises joined the wind whistle's one, and the girls took up the song.

"My dearest one, my darling dear
Your mighty words astound me
But I've no need of mighty deeds when I feel your arms around me!"

The dancers all held up their right arms, fists clenched, and locked forearms together, and the words pulled back to the young men as more wordless songs entwined together around them. Hiccup, enraptured into total stillness next to Astrid, joined their voices.

"But I would bring you rings of gold -"

The crowd whooped, laughter bubbling through their tones. The dancers stopped to cross their hands together and click heels together beneath their grasps.

"-I'd even sing you poetry-"

"Ugh!" the crowd chorused, resting the backs of their palms on their foreheads in mirthful exasperation. In the center, the young men kneeled, their fingers still entwined with the young women's as the girls twirled around their partners, leaping over their legs and giggling.

"Yes, I would keep you from all harm if you would stay beside me," the young men finished. As the young women took deep breaths to respond, and their partners began to twirl and spin with them, the crowd began a slow, nearly synchronous clap to the beat.

"I have no need for rings of gold.
I care not for your poetry.
I only want your hand to hold-"

"I only want you near me!" the men and Hiccup yelled.

Then the entire crowd, clapping faster, joined in, enthusiasm overpowering any perfect tone:

"To love and kiss
To sweetly hold
For the dancing and the dreaming
Through all life's sorrows and delights
I'll keep your love inside me.
I'll swim and sail on savage seas
With ne'er a fear of drowning
And gladly ride the waves of life-"

"If you will marry me!" Astrid yelled along with the crowd, catching on to the repetition of lyrics just in time. The young men grabbed the women at the waists and swung them up high in the air where their breathless laughter reverberated. Astrid's peripherals caught a number of older men in the crowd swinging up their wives, who squealed, giggled, and playfully slapped at their husbands' shoulders. The entire crowd was cheering and whooping and applauding, and Hiccup was no exception. His eyes were wide, shoulders stretched out to their fullness, hair somewhat ruffled from his own enthusiastic motions and clapping.

Astrid let herself enjoy the view.

Somewhere behind her, a rough voice howled, "Skol!" The masses joined in, many fists raising filled mugs in the air above their heads. Hiccup repeated the call as well, and Astrid looked at him in confusion.

"It's like a cheer," he explained, shrugging lightheartedly. "A call for good health. We sort of just say it whenever something good happens."

She allowed a grin. "That was something good," she said, nodding toward the dancing circle.

Hiccup's eyes tilted upwards as if beholding a memory floating across the clouds. "Yeah," he said. Before her eyes the happiness made him taller, warmer, more confident.

The flush in his cheeks spread to his ears as he seemed to drop back down to earth. "Sorry, I'm sure you're ready to see those weapons." His voice was as soft as it could be in the crowd while still being audible. Astrid watched his shoulders drop and back slump back down to to normal, and she couldn't help but wonder why the air felt one degree cooler.

He slipped through the gaps in the crowd, Astrid on his heels. They wove through the masses and onto the street veering off slightly to the left. Behind them, new music hummed into existence, and the crowd greeted its rebirth with glee.

Astrid matched Hiccup's pace, chasing that single degree of warmth. "What was that song?" she asked, voice dropping to a normal volume, gaze cataloging every angle and corner and plane of Hiccup's face as he ruminated on her question.

"'For the Dancing and the Dreaming'," he said after a moment. "Our ancestors brought it here from their ancestors." A small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth as he gazed absentmindedly at the sun-dappled cobblestones beneath his footsteps. "It's a crowd favorite."

"No kidding," Astrid replied. "And you... you seemed to really like it."

That tiny smile on Hiccup's face widened, and Astrid felt her stomach celebrate the victory. He sighed, face bright again from memories. "It was my dad and mom's favorite song," he explained. "Probably - definitely - still my dad's." Hiccup's recollections flowed openly in the sunlight illuminating his face. "It was their song- it was their first dance, and it was one of their favorite things to do together, just for that song. My dad used to tell me all the time, they'd drop whatever they were doing when they heard that flute tune starting it up. Didn't matter-" and his gaze was far away now "-what they were doing. They always danced to that song."

Astrid tried to imagine a couple sharing a concoction of Hiccup's own features twirling around in the music. She could understand his expression as she murmured, "It must have been amazing to watch." That kind of love was weakness to her mother. It was weakness, after all, Astrid pledged to herself. Weakness.

She let the visualization twirl in her mind anyway.

But something shades Hiccup's eyes - a sad, dim hue rather than an angry darkness. "Yeah, it must have."

"You... never saw it?"

The smile morphed into something sadder, with a mild grimace. "She was taken when I was a baby."

Astrid felt her jaw drop. "I- what? Taken?"

Hiccup nodded, leaving his head lowered. "It was during a raid," he said, hesitated, then explained, "By a dragon."

The resulting shock felt like freezing water was trilling through her veins. She stared openly at this boy, this dragon rider who had lost his mother to his secrets.

"Are you serious?" she gasped, then immediately blocked off any possible answer by blurting out, "Your dad must really, really hate dragons."

Hiccup's shoulders tense and rise before drooping. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"Hiccup-"

"They took the love of his life, Astrid. Of course he hates them." Hiccup had never once portrayed any trace of anger, Astrid realized, not even now, when he could have been so, so angry. When perhaps he should be. "And before you ask, I tried to figure out why it took her as soon as I could ride Toothless. Because it's not like dragons to take people- they never take people."

"Except when it was your mom."

Astrid recognized the mystery in his face as nothing more complicated nor staggering than simple longing. "Except when it was my mom," he repeated softly.

The urge to reach out and comfort him spiked and dropped back and forth within her, and she swallowed back the words clogged in her throat. Anything Astrid could say seemed like it would be more comforting for her to say than for him to hear. She shivered, trying to chase away the guilt that reared its head along with the sympathy. No matter how old he was now, or funny, or smart, or worldly-wise, he wanted his mom - and here Astrid was, running from hers.

But I'm going back tomorrow, Astrid told herself, and she tried to convince herself that made up for the deception that would take up residence with them in that tower.

"...It was a beautiful song, Hiccup."

They both grabbed a fierce hold on that, on his father's happy memories. "It is," Hiccup agreed. "It's my favorite too."

Hiccup had spent his younger years gazing across the ocean, living alongside it, suffering its anger, recovering from its rage. He'd spent his teenage years dragged across it for one function or another, and he'd spent his few years as a young adult speeding across it astride Toothless. Any awe that his tiny self had felt upon interacting with the ocean had long faded away into viewing it as simply part of life.

Astrid, standing frozen, fists loosened, eyes wide enough for Hiccup to see that the color of her eyes matched the depths before them, was aglow with that long-forgotten wonder. Prying his own eyes from her, Hiccup looped his thumbs around his belt and followed her gaze. He dug back into his memories to find that old delight reserved for the seemingly unending expanses of cerulean and teal frothed at the edges in bubbling white.

"This... is the ocean," he said, rolling his eyes at his own redundancy.

"Yeah," Astrid breathed. Hiccup pressed down on a smile that would definitely send her into another self-defensive, embarrassed spiral if he let it surface.

Leaning into her, he extended his pointer finger into the far left, toward the land that stretched out for a mile or so and curled to the right to form Berk's bay. "You can't see the wild-lands from down here, but on Toothless' back you can see their peaks. It's mostly ice and caves. I haven't gone near it too often - the dragons living there don't seem too fond of human visitors."

Astrid's mouth quirked in a now-familiar indication of curiosity. "I wonder why."

He shrugged and guessed, "Might be a nesting ground, an even bigger one than the one I discovered." The aged wood of the docks creaked beneath their feet, and Hiccup glanced at the small beach to their right. "Do you want to get closer?"

"Huh?" Hiccup turned to see her staring at him, wide-eyed and pale. He looked around for whatever weird thing was causing her to freak out, but he only saw villagers traipsing about and the glow seeping from Berk's houses as the sun sank behind the mountains.

"The ocean," he clarified slowly, his face crunching in confusion. "Do you want to see it up close?"

"Yes," Astrid said forcefully, shivering at some chill that apparently only she could feel and squaring her shoulders.

As he swung his arm out toward the beach, Hiccup attempted to nonchalantly scan the skies. Toothless occasionally liked to soar above the city around this time of day if he knew Hiccup was inside - though, thankfully, the dragon knew to soar high enough that he had only been spotted by villagers twice. The resulting panics in the streets were some of Hiccup's least favorite things.

Astrid was already striding purposefully toward the beach, so Hiccup broke into a jog to catch up. Making their way across the docks, they dodged around fish carts and cages. Hiccup wrinkled his nose at the less-than-delightful odors of gutted fish that permeated every splinter of the docks. After all the fish he'd been forced to wrangle for an injured Toothless at the beginning of their friendship, and after the scent wafting across the castle on a windy day for most of his life, his nose should have adjusted to the smell. Hiccup suspected all his travels to the archipelago's less fishy areas in the past few years had ridden him of his tolerance.

Jumping down off the docks onto the beach, Hiccup walked right up to the water before realizing Astrid hadn't made it much farther than the wooden beams planted in the sand.

Sidestepping the flowing tides, Hiccup smirked at her. "Afraid of a little water, Astrid?

Yup, that worked. As expected, Astrid glowered at him and marched toward the water. She was lucky the sand was cold and wet, Hiccup thought. At a more powdery consistency, Astrid's march would have ended very quickly. All the same, her eyes widened as the sand sunk in through her toes and inched up her heels. Nearing the water, her gait slowed to a trepidatious tiptoeing. A few paces from the water, she stopped again.

He had seen Astrid afraid already, back in the Moldy Cabbage. Her mother's heavily dramatized crime reports were to blame for that. "What did your mother tell you about the ocean?" Hiccup asked, finding his voice gentler than expected.

Astrid stared at the waters courting the edge of the horizon. A slight tremor shook her stiff arms. He could barely hear her over the gentle waves as she answered, "She said it was an endless pit filled with monsters, and people get lost in there all the time and are never found."

"All true," Hiccup admitted. Her lips pressed even more tightly together and paled, the only indication that she had heard him. "But..." He stepped toward her. "She's been right about a lot of things so far. And you still faced all of them." He pressed his luck and reached out a hand.

Astrid took a deep breath. Hiccup swallowed his disappointment as she stepped past his hand, gathered her skirts in her whitened fingers, squeezed her eyes shut, and sunk her toes into the water. A tiny gasp broke from her.

"It's cold, isn't it?" he asked, stepping beside her.

"So cold," she breathed, and then she laughed: a sharp, short burst of amazement. He tried to swallow his laughter as she leaped back, eyes open again, and danced on the sand. "Cold, cold, cold!" she yelped, and Hiccup gave up on muffling his laughter. "A-are you laughing at me?" she hissed, still jumping around while her teeth clicked from the cold.

"Yeah, because you were crazy enough to dip your toes into it!" he said as he shook his head at her. She smiled, for once not offended at his teasing. "Well," Hiccup said, crossing his arms, "now we know you'll never forget it."

Her eyebrows knit together, and she stared at him in confusion, though still padding back and forth on her bare feet. "I was never going to forget any of this."

In nothing short of a small miracle, he was able to hold her gaze for a few seconds as he replied, "Good."

Finally, Astrid stopped hopping around. She stood, futilely scratching the palm of her foot on her ankle to try to shave off the layer of sand. Holding out her arms in a remarkable display of balance, she gazed out at the water, now laced with golden sunlight. "It's getting late. Are the lanterns soon?"

Hiccup swung his arms at his sides. "We have a little while. You already saw all the weapons you want-" he grimaced at the newly minted memory of Astrid swinging around an ax with far, far too much enthusiasm and glint-eyed resolve for his taste "-so now I guess we just grab dinner and then go see the lanterns."

Astrid nodded and began moving toward the docks. She took two tentative steps balancing on her toes before giving up on whatever plan she had for keeping her feet free of sand. In a few large strides, she and Hiccup stood back on the docks. Hiccup took the lead as they headed back into the heart of Berk.

"What do you feel like eating?" he asked, mentally listing every culinary option in the city.

"What are my choices?" she huffed, out of breath as she tried to keep pace with him.

He slowed his walk with an embarrassed guffaw. "Uh... fish or... chicken."

"That was fish you got us earlier, right?"

"Yup, and you had chicken last night, so you've already experienced the full range of cuisine Berk has to offer."

Astrid laughed. "Let's circle back around to chicken, then."

"A fine choice, milady." Hiccup stopped briefly to offer her a teasing bow. She rolled her eyes at him, and he reveled in how long this bout of good will toward him had lasted. This entire journey, in terms of Astrid's moods, resembled trying to fly Toothless in a thunder storm.

"Are we going to one of those stick carts again?" she asked, and he scrambled in his mind for a moment before realizing Astrid was remembering the fish skewer stand.

He shook his head, replying, "I thought we could stop by Heather's place, actually. You remember Heather? She was around when you were getting your hair braided?"

Her mouth twisting in an odd line, she said in a very artificially light tone, "Dagur's sister, right?" When Hiccup nodded, she asked, "So we're going to her house?"

"No- sorry- Heather's a bartender too. We're going to the tavern where she works, Mulchbucket's."

Astrid pulled her head back and frowned, confused. "Mulchbucket's?"

"Mulch and Bucket are the owners," he explained. "They're very creative."

Her tongue stumbled around for a response, finally settling on "Why does Mulch get his name first?"

Hiccup shook his head fondly. "Bucket's a nice guy."

"Okay."

"Also extremely gullible."

She laughed. "I look forward to meeting them, then." Casting her eyes to the sunbeams shooting off the tops of Berk's mountains, she asked, "Where are we staying tonight? Your room?"

Hiccup's brain screeched to a halt. He said a lot of noises without actually saying anything for a few seconds before sputtering out, "Prob-probably going to get another room at an inn, yeah, an inn, yup." Astrid stared at him quizzically, and he struggled to find an explanation for his ridiculous stuttering. His brain provided the worst possible one and sent it shooting straight out of his mouth: "There's only one bed in my room?"

Roses bloomed and fluffed their petals across Astrid's cheeks and ears. "Yeah! Of course! Right!" she said, and punctuated her own outburst with a punch to Hiccup's arm. For whatever reason, the fact that she was just as mortified as him by this accidental miniature catastrophe brought Hiccup some strange comfort. Astrid reached for her braid and frowned as her habitual finger combing was halted by the thick braid and flowers. "An inn sounds good," she murmured.

"How-how about this - we get you some food, I'll get us a room while you eat. Heather will look after you, and if we wait to go to the inn, there might not be anything left tonight." He hated that it sounded deeper and more meaningful than it actually was.

"Look after me?"

Hiccup sensed the annoyance rearing its head even before it fully surfaced in Astrid's voice. "She'll watch your back, I mean. Honestly she'd probably be a better guard and guide than I am."

Astrid shook her head. "You have your... your friend, though." Hiccup huffed in relief that Astrid had wisely chosen - as they tunneled through a thick, drunken crowd - to obscure Toothless's identity.

"Yeah. But my friend can't exactly show up wherever he wants to. As for Heather, she might give even you some trouble with her fighting abilities."

"I'm not trained in combat, Hiccup." Her cheeks flushed again, embarrassment of a different nature surfacing.

"Could have fooled me." She shone a genuine thankful smile his way. "Anyway," Hiccup said, lifting his head up to the gradually approaching twilight. "I have to check on Toothless at some point, and I don't want you to miss out on anything."

"I appreciate that."

The crowds continued to grow in congestion, noise, and alcoholism - at their peak when Hiccup and Astrid shoved their way to the worn burgundy front door of Mulchbucket's. The tavern was housed by a wooden building clearly from the pre-Viking era, though Hiccup held no pretense of architectural expertise. Its walls had survived several conflicting paint jobs of teal, green, orange, and mustard - all of which currently coexisting in an overall welcoming appearance.

The chattering of the bell above the door when they slid through was nearly inaudible over the din of the tavern. While the Moldy Cabbage had a booming population of cultural, societal, and ethical miscreants, Mulchbucket's pulsed with golden lanterns gleaming over a cheery, boisterous clientele. Sailors spilled over a table in one corner, loudly daring each other to wild feats even as their eyes repeatedly returned to the smirking, confident shield maidens cloistered in the opposite corner, performedly oblivious to the sailors' bids for attention. Street urchins surrounded wizened warriors telling of great feats and legendary battles. Irate villagers yanked their good-for-nothing spouses off bar-stools and back home by the ear. Even in a building not built by Vikings, the signature Viking decor choices of shields and animal heads tacked haphazardly to the wall reigned and just added to the chaos.

In the midst of it all waltzed Heather, laughing, poking fun, rolling her eyes, flirting meaninglessly for a drunk's extra coin, and serving drinks. Hiccup watched as one sailor, clearly new to the scene, reached for Heather's backside - and a short, fully-bearded barrel of a man from another table grabbed the sailor's wrist so tightly Hiccup fancied he could hear a crackle. Heather, not turning to face the sailor, grinned at the barrel-man and tipped her pitcher into his empty cup. He nodded respectfully and turned back to his band of brothers.

Hiccup slid up behind Heather, righting a mug on her tray nearly tipped over by a patron's wayward elbow.

Heather looked over her shoulder and grinned up at him. "Long time no see."

He shrugged. "You're welcome. Can we get a table?"

Heather swung her whole body around and caught sight of Astrid. Instantly, Hiccup decided coming here had been a bad idea. Astrid's face closed into stone. Heather's face opened into unbridled glee.

"You both certainly can!" she crowed. Turning toward the bar, her already low voice dropped a few more decibels as she howled, "Bucket!"

A loud crash sounded from behind the worn old curtain, and Bucket came sauntering out a second later. His face, rimmed in long golden hair with a beard and mustache to match, was bewildered as always - and was topped by his signature bucket. The tall, burly man scanned the room, eyes like those of an old, tired, perplexed hound. When he spotted Heather, his path quickly cleared as he bumbled along.

"Yes, Heather?" His voice was soft and mild but still discernible above the din.

Heather jerked her head toward the offending sailor and his band of cronies. "They were getting handsy with me. Billio stopped it, but I think they've had enough of our service."

"Right-o," Bucket chirped. He turned to the oblivious table of young men, and his face immediately twisted from a summer meadow into a storm-shaken ocean. "Out!" he thundered. The men leaped to their feet and scampered toward the door, even as Bucket's meaty hands grabbed some of their elbows and jackets and threw them in that direction.

Heather's smirk never left her face as she ignored Bucket's enforcement - clearly preferring to study Astrid. Astrid hadn't looked away either. "You're in luck. A table just opened up," Heather said, only meeting Astrid's gaze.

"Delightful," said Hiccup, feeling anything but, and he slid onto the newly vacated bench. Astrid, after a moment of pause, joined him on the opposing side of the table. He watched her slide her frying pan back out of her satchel. Heather watched too, grinning even wider now.

Hiccup drummed his long fingers on the warped wood of the table. "O-okay. Heather, what's on the menu?"

And still Heather did not look away from Astrid, even as she said to him, "You."

Resisting the mind-bending urge to slam his forehead down onto the table, Hiccup gritted out, "Very funny, Heather. The actual menu."

"Chicken legs, chicken-and-potato stew, tomato stew, porridge." Heather turned to refill a nearby patron's mug with ale, but her eyes immediately returned to Astrid, who looked nearly murderous.

"Why are you looking at me?" Astrid said, a snarl curling the corners of her words.

"I could ask you the same question," Heather replied, actively nonchalant.

"Can we get the chicken stew, please?" Hiccup begged, wondering why the room was so annoyingly warm.

Heather finally swung her gaze back to him, and Hiccup instantly wish she hadn't done so, mainly due to how infuriatingly smug she looked. "To share?" she asked with an air of innocence.

Hiccup channeled his confusion and frustration and embarrassment into a warning glare. "Heather."

"Two bowls of chicken-and-potato stew." She twirled off, skirts swaying in a menacing way that only Heather could fully pull off.

Hiccup sunk his head between his hands as his elbows bore down on the table. Running his fingers through his hair, he groaned out, "Sorry about her. I don't know what her problem is."

After clearing her throat, Astrid shot one final glare in Heather's direction and replied, "It's fine."

"I mean-" oh no, the rambling, here it comes "-I come in here all the time. I've had literally everything on the menu and a few things off the menu, and it's not like Heather and Dagur know everything about my life, you probably know more about me than they do at this point, and, yeah, sure, Heather's known me for years, but she can't act all shocked that I brought a girl in with me today-" His hand paused in its frantic combing through his locks to slap his skull, because he did truly need to shut up.

"Sounds like she's jealous," Astrid spat out. Hiccup looked up to see her leaning over the table, resting on crossed arms, brooding - an emotion he'd had yet to see cross her face.

He laughed very loudly and very dramatically, drawing the attention of a few barely amused and slightly curious heads. "Who, Heather? Nah, no way, I'm not her type. Or, well, I guess I kind of am? But it's not like that."

Hiccup had received less accusatory looks from his father, and that in of itself was impressive. "Oh, you're her type, huh?"

He had absolutely no idea how to get out of this situation in any kind of graceful way or how to answer that question. He leaped to his feet with an excuse: "Well, Heather will get you anything you need. Just tell her I'll be back, and tell her to put everything on my tab, and I'll pay for it. I'm... I'm going to stop by an inn and check in on... uh, my friend. I'll be back soon. Yeah. Definitely in time for the lanterns. For sure. Yup. So... uh... see ya!"

Even as he turned away as quickly as he could, his eyes and mind still picked up on another new emotion taking residence on Astrid's face. He couldn't decipher it, and he was honestly afraid to, so he walked even faster, even as he vowed to yell at Heather later.

The pilgrimage into the city had taken up significantly more time when Astrid was taking in the vistas for the first time, so, after nabbing a two-bed room at a nearby inn, Hiccup made quick work of traversing across the city, back through the hole in the wall, and past the surrounding farms.

He had lied - just a little - to Astrid about Toothless, but he had his reasons. Toothless didn't require constant checks to the extent where Hiccup technically needed to duck out all the time and look after him. Last winter, when Hiccup was dragged on a royal diplomatic trip he'd rather pluck his toenails off than go on, Hiccup had designed a solo-flight tail-fin for Toothless. Though his best friend had initially rejected the fin, preferring to rely on Hiccup for their flights - unashamedly one of the best moments of Hiccup's life - Hiccup had eventually convinced Toothless of its usefulness. The dragon still preferred flying close to his rider, but the contraption brought them both some independence and peace of mind.

With a couple whistles and clicks of his tongue that Hiccup knew Toothless recognized, the dragon unfurled himself from deep grass in a small clearing. Hiccup let himself be shoved over into the grass and plastered with dragon kisses. "Hey, Toothless," he said, feeling himself relax. No guesswork was involved with Toothless. Their rhythms had synchronized long ago.

Pushing up to balance on his elbows, Hiccup smiled at his dragon and set his plan in motion. "How do you feel about going on our first tandem ride tonight, bud?"

Author's Note:

I know I already said this, but this was actually my favorite chapter to write. "For the Dancing and the Dreaming" - you know I had to! I was going to put in a little piece where Astrid got asked to dance, but sadly my laptop ate it. Oh well. Still a fun scene!

I won't be updating next weekend. Unlike those writers who post through weddings, surgeries, and other wild life events, I'm going to be crazy busy next Monday because (triumphant trumpet noises) my little brother is graduating from college that day! I also planned on taking a posting hiatus during the holidays, so I guess I'll see you all in January!

Have a lovely Christmas! If you celebrate Kwanzaa or Chanukah, may those days be lovely to you as well!