"Ugh, I've told you a million times, the beard thing? Looks stupid."

"It does not."

"Okay, uh, you have looked in a mirror, right?"

"You're just jealous because you'll never be as manly as I am."

"I'm a girl, and you'll never be as manly as you think you are."

The Twins were sitting down next to each other with their identical trays of food and a tankard each of drink. Tuffnut had tied his long hair into an ugly, braided, fake beard around his chin and made a point of keeping it away from his food to protect it. It did not work, and he accidentally sloshed his drinks into it almost constantly, and had to pick out bits of food he had dropped before Barf or Belch could take the fake beard off.

"Stop begging!" he snapped in his way, shoving Belch's head away as the dragon nuzzled him for the crumbs. The dragon released a series of electric sparks, pouting.

"Hey! You two," Astrid called from behind them, coming closer. "I need you to do something."

"Finally," Ruffnut turned around backwards on the bench as their shared Zippleback moved out of Astrid's way.

"Yeah, maybe something to do will get my stupid sister off my back."

"Well, that's where your HAIR is supposed to be." She shoved him and he shoved her in retaliation.

"Oookay," Astrid said, suddenly reconsidering her request and half-hoping they'd dig their heels in and tell her no. "Well, since Fishlegs, Snotlout, and Eret are all standing guard at the Nest island while we get defenses built up there, I need you two to keep an eye on the Warlords and their army."

"You need us to do what."

"You want us to SPY on them? On a bunch of crazy Warlords?"

"The ones who want to lick Grimmel's boots?"

"Yeah, and their army?"

The two of them looked at each other and rolled their eyes in opposite directions. Tuffnut leaned back casually on the dining table.

"Yeah, fine."

"When do we leave?"

They rode out a few hours later with a pack of provisions and supplies, with strict instructions not to be seen. Valka, Cloudjumper and Astrid watched as the Twins steered the Zippleback's heads closer to each other so that they could squabble in the air. Cloudjumper huffed with amusement.

"It's not too late, you know," Valka said dryly, sharing her affectionate judgement with Astrid. "Cloudjumper and I could still go."

Astrid shook her head. "I'd rather you be here." She sounded like she was going to go on, but she just let out a sigh, her breath making fog in the cold air. Valka looked at her kindly.

"Hiccup will come back," she said. "He's with a Night Fury and a Light Fury, and he's smart. We only have to hold out till then."

"Yeah," Astrid said. "He is smart. But he's not a killer."

"Grimmel is." Valka nodded and looked away.

"He's not gonna stop going after them until they're all dead, and at some point he's gonna catch up with them and Hiccup's gonna have to be smart enough realize he can't fix everything with peace-talk."

"Have a little faith in him," Valka said. "My son found the last Night Fury in the world. He changed the minds of Vikings on Berk, for the gods' sake. He found me, after twenty years. He will find a way for this to end happily."

"I hope so," Astrid hugged herself and Valka put a hand on her shoulder. "I really hope so."

—

The Twins, averse to the idea of using maps, had the general idea of where the Warlords had last been seen. Unfortunately, the ships had moved since Astrid had been there. They had moved much closer, around the land mass they'd once been on the other side of.

"Oh, there they are," Tuffnut remarked casually.

"Whose symbol is that," Ruffnut asked, pointing to one that seemed familiar.

Mutually, they forgot to fly lower to see more, lucky that it was dark and none of the warriors manning the ships thought much of a lone Zippleback flying over them, and that they were far enough above the war-boats that their commentary could not be heard over the creaking of the ships themselves.

They landed, eventually and after much debate, on a grassy cliff just behind the Warlords' army, a hundred feet up from where they had made contact with the beach. By boat, Berk was maybe a two days sail away. When Barf and Belch leaned their heads down to let them off, the Twins stepped as close as they could get to the edge and looked down, each keeping a hand on one of their dragon's horns.

The firelights from the Warlords' men's torches and lanterns glowed and traveled around as they took to unknown business.

"What do you think they're doing down there?" Tuffnut asked, not really interested.

"Ugh. Stupid stuff," his sister responded. "Planning to take over the world."

"Gross. What's so great about the world, anyway?"

"Yeah, and why would you wanna be in charge of so many stupid people?"

Barf and Belch clicked and chattered, tilting their heads to look down.

Ruffnut agreed. "They are jealous of you."

—

Hiccup had no idea where they were. He had lost track, his mental map blurred by many days of excitement. And now, he was pretty sure they were flying in a new direction than the one they had been flying in before.

Now that the Light Fury had shown them what she wanted to show them, he wasn't sure where they were headed next; where this mysterious hole in the ground would be. But she was still insisting that they follow, even if Toothless didn't like it. They just had to keep Grimmel away from Astrid, and away from Berk.

They were under the cover of an open-mouthed cave, with a little campfire for his benefit. Moon was curled up some distance away, no longer daring to be too familiar with Toothless. Hiccup worried Toothless had driven a wedge between himself and the Light Fury by attacking her. But, he had attacked Hookfang once, too, to protect Hiccup, and the two dragons were still fine. So maybe they just needed time to recover.

The new wedding spoon was in his hand, and with this thought he wilted, unable to continue carving it. Toothless glanced at him as the whittling knife nearly touched the wood and then dropped to the ground. Hiccup sat back and sighed.

"This is…" Hiccup showed the spoon to Toothless unnecessarily. The dragon had already seen him work on the previous ones, too. "It's supposed to be a symbol of our partnership. Our togetherness. She said the 'buddy system.' And look at us, we're out here trying to stay as far away from her as we can for as long as possible."

Toothless nudged his arm with his wide face and got what he wanted, a pat on the nose, as Hiccup tried to reason with himself.

"But it's for others, too. If we're distracting Grimmel, he's not trapping and killing other dragons. And without him, I doubt the Warlords are very good at it. Divide and conquer. I guess. It's not forever."