Hiccup couldn't hold back her tears any longer. Her father was finally proud of her! He was proud of someone she could never actually be.

Hiccup was sitting in the woods. She wasn't at the cove, she couldn't make herself to go there. The helmet her father had given her was resting in her hands, her head full of thoughts about… everything. She was a fraud and a cheat, yet her father was finally proud.

Tears ran down her cheeks uncontrollably as she sobbed. She dropped the helmet on the ground and let her head hang. It was going to hurt when she lost training, it was going to hurt to see the disappointed look on her father's face, but she wouldn't lie anymore.

"All those years of the worst Viking Berk has ever seen! Odin, it was rough! I almost gave up on you!"

Her father had said those words with a laugh, like it was funny to tell her that. Like it was funny for her to hear that she was a large enough burden to her father that he almost gave up on her.

"Now you have a chance to beat Arne! No one will question if you become heir now!"

Those words sparked anger inside her. Her father loved the boy more than he loved his own. Arne, the golden child. Arne, the one her father wanted her to marry so she would have a status in the tribe when she grew up. Arne, the one she had a crush on but couldn't do anything about it, because she didn't want to give her father the satisfaction and because Arne didn't even look at her twice.

Arne, who was walking towards her right now.

Hiccup quickly wiped away her tears and did her best to ignore the boy. From the corner of her eye she saw him sit down next to her. She continued staring at the ground in silence, Hiccup didn't understand what he was doing here this late, but she didn't dare to speak.

"How are you?"

Hiccup couldn't help but look up at his question. She hadn't expected him to talk to her, especially in a friendly tone. She had seen that her success in training made him mad, and by Ruffnut's insistence, jealous. Hiccup was lost for a moment before she answered.

"I'm fine."

She didn't say anything else, because one lie was enough. She was angry, sad and just overall miserable. Hiccup was far from 'fine'. The girl didn't voice any of these thoughts. How could she? As far as she knew, Arne had an alternative motive for even being near her. Hiccup wasn't stupid, she knew her father talked to the boy and his family in regards to setting up a marriage when they were older if both sides wanted to. If Arne really wanted to be the future Chief all he had to do was say yes and play nice with her for a while, enough for her to get comfortable and let down her guard.

That was the main reason she hated having a crush on the boy. After all, her reluctance was the only thing stopping her father from going ahead with the marriage plan. At least her father listened to something when it came to her.

"Are you really?"

At this question she raised her eyes and looked at him. She knew it was obvious she had been crying, but she hoped her angry glare made up for that.

"Why do you care?" she hissed.

"I've always cared," he shrugged, "I guess I never made it clear."

Hiccup snorted when she heard his answer. 'Always cared' he said and she didn't believe him. Arne was someone who looked at himself before he looked at others. He stepped over people to prove he was the best, and sometimes, Hiccup thought he didn't even notice it.

"Why are you here?" came her whispered question.

He tilted his head and a small smile lit up his face. He wasn't amused, he looked content. She started at him for a moment before she understood what she was doing and quickly turned her eyes to the ground.

"I came looking for you, actually," he chuckled, the sound bringing and unwanted smile to Hiccup's face, "Your father came to talk to me."

"What did he want?" she groaned and placed her head in her hands, all the things her father could've said running through her mind.

"He asked me that I help you train if you beat me in training," Arne said, keeping any emotion out of his voice.

Hiccup didn't know what to say to that. Her father had went behind her back and asked someone to train her, even after she had taken first place. She didn't know if the anger she felt was warranted, after all she didn't know how to fight dragons for real, she only knew the tricks she had learned from Toothless.

"I don't need your help," she finally told him, her gaze fell on the helmet she had dropped, "My father had no reason to go to you."

"Didn't he?" Arne channeled, "Ruffnut said you go training every day, but I haven't seen you do any fighting."

"Training doesn't equal fighting, Arne," she told him as she stood up and picked up the helmet from the ground.

She didn't put the helmet on, she couldn't make herself do that. It would feel like she had betrayed her mother is she did. Hiccup's mother who had been taken by dragons would not want her daughter to be friends with dragons.

"Against a dragon it does," he argued, "You're first in training, you should know that."

"Does anyone on this island care about anything else?" she demanded, her eyebrows pinched in anger, "All everyone talks about is dragon training."

"I would think you like dragon training. You excel at it, everyone loves you now," Arne said with confusion.

Hiccup looked at him with disbelief before she let out a humorless laugh. She felt tears gather in her eyes again, but she didn't care.

"Now," she repeated and turned to look up at the sky so the boy wouldn't see when the tears ran down her face, "Everyone loves me now."

"Yes, they do," he said slowly, confused at her reaction.

"I haven't changed, Arne. I'm still the same person as I was before, but suddenly, when they think I can kill dragons, they love me," Hiccup bit her bottom lip to stop a sob from escaping, "I'm still the same mess up I was before."

"Hiccup – "

"If I die because I don't have enough 'training' – " she turned to the boy, tears were running down her checks but she didn't care, " – so be it."

Hiccup didn't wait for a response, if one was even coming. She turned and walked away, she didn't need light to know where she was going, her years spent wandering around the woods helping her to know where she was going.

Even when she reached home, Arne's shocked face hadn't left her mind. Truth does that to a person she guessed, because what she said was the truth. She didn't care if she died in training. Toothless would be okay with Ruff and Tuff knowing about him and they could take care of the dragon when he couldn't take care of himself.

Her father was already asleep so she didn't get a chance to talk to him, she wanted to tell him to stop going behind her back when things concerned her. Hiccup didn't believe that additional training was all Stoick had talked about with Arne.

The girl placed the helmet on her workbench and went to sit on her bed. The day had started off so good. She had finally felt free, like herself. And now, now she felt like the biggest failure and fraud. The helmet was like a sign of her lies. Her father was proud of her because of things she didn't really achieve.

She needed to fail dragon training while she still had the chance, because if she didn't… she didn't know what she would do, but killing the Nightmare was never going to be an option.