Toothless was slowly relaxing. That was by no means a difficult thing to achieve, given he could not possibly get any more stressed, and therefore had nowhere to go but down. Astrid still chose to think of it as a minor victory.

Said victory had been achieved by not leaving him alone, as counterintuitive as that might have seemed, given their less than stellar history. She had walked around the entire island with him, sometimes in silence and sometimes making small talk. The dragons had all returned to the nest, and the ambient light around them was beginning to fade, but still they walked.

The one thing they had not done was talk about anything that was going to happen. Nothing of the future. And nothing of the past, either, though that was more because there was nothing more to say. All that was left were little things such as the inner workings of the nest, which Toothless was more than happy to explain for her. She was happy to listen, because she knew none of what he was telling her.

"Flares resent Coals," he remarked, bringing up something else she didn't know. "Coals are all pretty ugly in the eyes of everyone else, and spend absolutely no time making themselves look good. Flares, on the other hand, make it their life's work to look as good as possible, and everyone can appreciate it. So there is a tension there, but the Coals don't care, so it's just the Flares who are unhappy about it."

"You are saying Flares are mad that all Coals are ugly?" Astrid asked incredulously.

"No, they are mad because Coals do not care. You will never hear a Coal remarking on beauty, whereas Flares love to be complimented. I think, to the Flares, the Coals should be those most effusive in praising their looks."

"And how do the other kinds of dragon see the issue of appearances?" She was interested in learning where Zipplebacks stood on that, for instance.

"Flickers, Blasts, and Blazes just keep themselves clean and remove dead scales," he explained. "Same with us. They will comment on extraordinary beauty, but that's about it. Only Coals and Flares deviate from that middle ground, which is why I mentioned them specifically."

Only on extraordinary beauty... "What will Flares comment on?" she asked. "Do they compliment each other all the time? Because it sounds like that would be the only time they got any compliments."

"Flares complimenting each other?" Toothless scoffed dismissively. "The only time you will ever hear a Flare truly praising another dragon is if they are that Flare's offspring, or a potential mate the Flare wishes to woo."

"Odd." She wasn't going to mention that Stormfly often commented on her beauty. Aside from sounding conceited, she didn't think Stormfly counted as a normal Flare anyway. Even other dragons considered her odd.

"And that blue Flare who guards you is the exception," Toothless added, by chance following her line of thought. "I think she took a few too many hits to the head during captivity. Given who was hitting her in the head, you certainly can't complain about how she is now."

Astrid looked over at him incredulously.

He grinned back, his expression amused but tense. He wasn't sure how she was going to take that.

She decided to be herself, and slapped his side with her tail. "Not funny." Against her will, some of the amusement she couldn't help but feel about the idea of literally knocking Stormfly silly and then somehow ending up dealing with her as a result seeped into her voice.

He relaxed, shaking his head wildly as if to shake off the pain in his side. "You hit hard."

"I always hit hard." Mostly out of habit; Snotlout wouldn't let up on his smarmy stupidity unless his head was ringing or his arm was numb from the shoulder down, and he was the one she usually found herself needing to hit.

"What does it mean?" he asked.

"That you've annoyed me," she said neutrally.

"Is there any context involved, or is that all it can mean?" he asked curiously. "If you slapped a close friend like that, would it mean something different?"

"Not really, no," she said. "But I probably wouldn't hit a close friend as hard as anyone else."

"Probably?" he persisted.

"A lack of close friends means I never got to decide what I'd do if one annoyed me," she admitted. "I had other things to concentrate on." And a lack of friend material. Her generation was a tiny group of people, most of whom she disliked or disapproved of.

"Oh. Well, for us, everything depends on who is doing the gesture, who they are directing it at, and the relationship between the two," Toothless explained. "And it varies depending on the kinds of Flames involved."

"Mentor told me that. I still haven't gotten around to learning what everything means." And she didn't have time to do so now, either. It was almost dark, and she needed to be back at the nest by dawn. "I have to go do something. We will spend tomorrow together, starting right at dawn, so be at your rock."

"What do you plan on doing then?" That was a careful question, laden with nerves and a little guilt.

"The same thing we are doing now," she assured him. "Maybe without the walking, though. For the morning, at least."

"And after that?" He was looking out into the fog, avoiding her eyes.

"You will run a few laps around the island, and I will go flying." By that point, they'd have to burn off some nervous energy, and she was pretty sure sitting still was only going to make them restless, so that was necessary. "And then... we will go to the Flickers' place." Which reminded her that they still needed to be sure the Flickers would accommodate them. "I will meet you there."

"We will meet there," he repeated quietly. "And if I cannot do it, you will not..."

"I will not be mad, or drag you to Inferna immediately, or even be all that unhappy," she said firmly. "But we both know it's better if you can manage it, so I expect you to try."

"I know." He looked up at the fog, still avoiding her eyes. "Night, already. The day really flew by."

"Go get some rest," Astrid commanded gently. "I am going to do some flying." A lot of flying. A whole night of flying, broken by some writing.

"Flying... I wish I could fly," he murmured. "I miss flying."

There was nothing she could say to that. She watched him go, not expecting and not receiving so much as a farewell.

He would cope as he could, and so would she. First, she would ensure the likely scenario went as planned. That meant finding a Flicker.

Doing so might be hard, but she knew a few easily-found dragons to start with. She flew up to and into the volcano, intent on seeking out one of the dragons who had once been Flickers, to convey her message or find out how she could ask a Flicker directly.

Inferna was still awake, her tremendous snore unsettlingly absent. All activity in the mountain was hushed, slowed, quieted. Nobody wanted to be the one to rise above the crowd in noise and catch her attention.

Astrid immediately saw Stormfly, but not because she was already there. Astrid had turned to circle around the edge of the volcano's interior, and so she noticed Stormfly gliding in a few heartbeats after her.

That was far too coincidental. Stormfly had to have been watching her from afar, likely on Inferna's orders. Not listening; Astrid's senses were better than any Nadder, and she would have heard Stormfly were she to get close enough to listen.

Stormfly was not a friend of the Flickers, so far as Astrid knew. Instead of confronting her uncharacteristically silent shadow, Astrid ignored her and sought out the nearest Blaze, who happened to be the female who had once been a blind Flicker. She would have to be careful about what she said, or how loudly she said it. One of the two.

"Our condolences," the Blaze said sadly as Astrid neared. "The Blaze you often speak to probably does not know if you would rather be comforted or left alone, so if you wish to speak to him you must go to him yourself." She tilted her head and glanced over at one of the lower ledges Astrid couldn't quite see. "You will find him down there."

She did not want his sympathy; as it was, she was barely keeping her cool. She would rather be left alone. "Thank you for that advice. I must ask a favor." She lowered her voice to a near-whisper. "Can you speak to the Flickers for me?"

"You do not know how to find them without drawing attention," the Nightmare said quickly. "We will fix that later. Yes, I can. What do you want to tell them?"

"It's more of a request. I've seen their open cave section, the place they do experiments," Astrid explained. "The male Bolt can't fly, so our options as to where to go are limited. Could you have them let the two of us stay there tomorrow afternoon and night? Alone?"

"If you are there to do what you promised Inferna, I think they will grant you that," the Nightmare rumbled, "but you cannot hide from Inferna there. Those hidden places are only hidden because Inferna does not care to find out about them. You will not destroy that secrecy by giving her a reason to care."

"No hiding there," Astrid agreed. "I did not plan on it."

That was the likely future planned for. Now, to get to work on the unlikely future. The one she would not let herself hope for. The one that relied on Snotlout and involved Stormfly, as much as Astrid wished it didn't on both counts. She flew away from the Nightmare and quickly relocated Stormfly, still trailing her.

If that was how she wanted to play it, fine. Astrid made her way back out of the volcano, away from Inferna's prying ears, and headed down into the foggy sea stack maze.

Then, the moment Stormfly might not be able to see her, she dropped onto the nearest sea stack and waited. The Nadder was following, but with no way to know where Astrid had gone.

A distinctly Nadder-shaped blur flew by in the same direction Astrid had been going moments ago. Astrid leaped up and circled around, getting behind Stormfly without being noticed. She glided through the fog on steady wings, coming up on Stormfly from above and behind.

"I don't like spies," Astrid announced loudly once she was close enough.

Stormfly shrieked and almost fell right out of the sky. "Don't do that!" she screeched. "You said you didn't want me around, so I am just… not around. But still here."

"I did not want you around in the volcano while I might be getting violated," Astrid clarified, groaning in frustration. "Come on. I have a trip I want to make, and you have to be with me. We will be back at the nest by morning."

"You promise? She'll kill me if you escape," Stormfly whined.

"I'm not leaving for good," Astrid hedged. "Not so long as I am a dragon." If Snotlout could change her back, she'd... well, she'd think of something. It wouldn't involve going back and mating with Toothless, that was for sure. But if she disappeared, Berk would be destroyed…

She'd figure it out if Snotlout achieved the impossible. There was no point in worrying about it before that.

"So... where are we going?" Stormfly asked curiously. "And how far is it?"

Hopefully, Stormfly could make it without stopping. Astrid knew she could, but the Nadder was a little bit less sure of a bet. "You will see."

~O~o~O~

"Are we here to kill another Flightless?" Stormfly asked skeptically, looking down on Berk. "That will be hard with just the two of us and no raid."

It would have been hard, were Astrid planning on doing such a thing. The moon was full, so there was absolutely no way Stormfly was sneaking around undetected. To make matters worse, Berk was blanketed in white snow. Astrid, as black as night, would be so easy to spot as to make sneaking worthless. Killing someone would be hard.

Abducting a Jorgenson would be even harder. But it had to be done.

First, though, Astrid had to defuse the hidden commands Stormfly might accidentally try to follow. "We are not here to kill him, though I wish we were. I hate him. But he might be able to tell me something I can use later, so I have to talk to him and keep him alive. We are here to ambush him, take him into the woods, and find out what he knows, without hurting him."

She was assuming Inferna had no rule about working with humans simply because it would never usually happen… and because Toothless had been capable of doing far more than she planned on doing here, even once he was back under Inferna's control. She was also assuming Inferna was not going to find out about this, though that seemed like a safe bet. So long as Astrid was where she was supposed to be by dawn, Inferna would have no reason to suspect anything had happened.

If she was wrong about any of that, Snotlout might die. She might die. Or there might be no consequence at all. But she'd never forgive herself if she didn't at least check Snotlout's progress now.

"So... how do we get him?" Stormfly asked nervously. "I don't want to be captured again."

"Neither do I." She wasn't going to let Berk kill her, not even as a Winter gift. There was far too much she might be able to accomplish, and she didn't want to die. "I know where he sleeps," she explained, leading Stormfly further down, flying low over the village.

"Somebody might see us," Stormfly hissed.

"They know you don't raid this time of year, and it's too dangerous for anyone to sail, so they are not expecting to be attacked at all." There would be no guards. Winter was a time of peace, marred only by the sometimes lethal weather. As long as they stayed out of the snow, it would all be fine. Even if they went into the snow and left tracks, it would still be fine for them. Berk, on the other hand, would experience a not-unwarranted bout of panic and then paranoia... or just blame the twins and get on with their lives.

The Jorgenson huts were near the docks, a cluster of sturdy buildings that held the extended Jorgenson clan. Snotlout, Astrid knew thanks to being forced to listen to him brag at various times throughout his life, lived in the largest one, in the basement.

The thing was, Viking basements were pretty haphazard and generally accessible from outside the hut in case of a total hut immolation during a raid. There would be a hatch somewhere outside in the snow. But it would be buried, because the basement could also be accessed from inside the house and Snotlout was too lazy to shovel off another entrance if he didn't need it.

Astrid decided to forget about what Berk might think of tracks and landed in the snow behind the largest Jorgenson hut. Stormfly followed, stepping daintily. "I like this stuff, but we never get it at the nest."

As Astrid had expected. Snow would be far too pleasant for that hellscape. "I guessed so," she said. "Here's what we need to do. Stomp around until you step on something that is not dirt, grass, or rock." Flaming the snow away would quickly exhaust their fire and make a scene – not to mention the possibility they'd set something on fire – so they'd do without.

Stormfly began tramping randomly through the snow, looking around nervously all the while. "There are sleeping Flightless in these things?" she asked, looking at the other huts, stark brown buildings topped with white. "They do not go anywhere warmer?"

"Make no noise, and do not flame," Astrid reminded her in a low voice, searching a little nearer to the Jorgenson hut, thinking the basement would not extend out very far. "We only need one, and there are not enough of us to fight them off if they raise the alarm."

"I would not attack them anyway," Stormfly huffed. "It is the cold-season. Inferna does not make us fight them in the cold-season, and I have no quarrel with them."

The entrance to the basement wasn't easily found, and Astrid found herself tramping through the snow at length. She was continually surprised by how much more durable this body was. The snow was almost pleasant, cold but not freezing her body. Her dull scales were trapping the cold, which was uncomfortable – another reason to be rid of them – but other than that, she was warm enough that she thought she could do this indefinitely.

Then her paw struck something wooden, something hollow. "I have it," she called out, keeping her voice down. It was deathly silent aside from the noises she and Stormfly were making, and while Vikings were heavy sleepers, some of them could wake in an instant if they heard a roar or growl or anything that reminded them of dragons. Her father had been one such conditionally light sleeper.

Stormfly fluttered over to Astrid, using her wings to take long hops through the snow. "Now what?"

"Help me quietly clear it off," Astrid requested.

Stormfly immediately set to work, kicking large clumps of snow away with her talons and strong legs, clearing the snow far more efficiently than Astrid could have managed. A large hatch with a metal ring as the handle was soon revealed.

Astrid was glad she had been forced to take Stormfly along. This was working out pretty well. "Stay here. You won't fit. I'm going to go get him." She slowly and silently pulled the hatch up with her muscular tail. A dark vertical shaft led downward, just large enough for her to fit into.

"Be careful, that looks cramped," Stormfly remarked. "I will watch for danger."

"You do that." Astrid crept straight down the hole, headfirst, and landed on her front paws at the bottom while her tail still stuck out the hatch. She really did barely fit in here.

But now that her head was down on the level of the corridor, she could see down it, and into the basement itself.

It was, in a word, Snotlout. Mildly unclean, musky-smelling, littered with overly large weapons of every kind, and generally disorganized. Snotlout was sprawled across a wooden cot in the corner, asleep. There was another rudimentary ladder up to what Astrid assumed was the Jorgenson hut behind him.

To get to Snotlout, she had to come down this awkward bend, the place where the vertical shaft terminated into the low, horizontal corridor. Astrid stretched out, pulling her backside in, and wriggled around the bend. She felt like a clog in the tap of a mead barrel, stuck in a tight corner.

Then she was through, though several of her dull scales had been scraped off in the process, left behind her in the corridor. Fine by her; a downpayment for Snotlout and a few less itchy, cold annoyances for her.

She crept through his room, holding her tail close to her body in order to avoid cutting it on any of the sharp objects he kept around. At least they were still sharp; that was a point in his favor. He didn't let any of his things get dull from disuse, even if she never saw him with anything but a sword. There was even a longbow in the far corner, though that was a nigh-dishonorable weapon in the eyes of most Vikings, only barely acceptable in drawn-out battles when one could not physically reach the enemy.

Then she reached his slumbering body and had to decide how best to wake him. He was snoring loudly, and thankfully dressed already. It was too cold to sleep in anything less than a full tunic and maybe gloves, but still. She was dealing with enough as a dragon. Being haunted by seeing Snotlout undressed would just be too much to stand.

She settled for poking his side with her paw, claws sheathed, until he stirred. Now she just had to cross her fingers that he wouldn't scream or attack once he saw her looming cobalt eyes.

What actually happened was that he rolled over, locked eyes with her, and clearly said; "I'm not into dragons, go away," before closing his eyes and falling back asleep.

She poked him again. This was not a time for him to brush her off thinking it a dream.

"Stop it, I know I'm the hottest guy on Berk, but I told you..." he trailed off, seeming to understand that she was really there. He sat up, still staring.

She made a writing motion with her paw, and then beckoned for him to come with her.

"How the Hel did you even get in here?" he asked quietly, grabbing for a heavy coat and his boots. "And why is it just my luck that Astrid Hofferson snuck into my basement in the middle of the night, but as a dragon? What did I do to make you mad, Loki?"

She ignored him. As long as he was still dealing with this practically, he could complain all he wanted. She was finding dealing with Snotlout still far easier when he was not in the least interested in her current form. It took a lot of the tension out of her side of things.

"Least you're better than Ruffnut," he muttered disagreeably as he shrugged his coat on. "Crazy idiot snuck in here last week and painted everything pink." With that, he was ready to go.

Astrid awkwardly turned around, narrowly avoiding knocking over a precariously placed spear, and made her way back up the corridor and shaft, losing a few more scales in the process.

Snotlout followed after her, eyeing the scales covetously as he passed them. "I'm keeping those," he announced.

She was fine with that. As soon as he was out in the open, she grabbed him and leaped into the air, out of the quiet, ominous danger of the village. That was the hard part done.

Stormfly rose up beneath her, eyeing Snotlout curiously. "You know, he looks kind of like the one you killed last time."

"Similar people," Astrid lied. "I don't like this one either, but–"

"Hey, it's the Flightless from the arena!" Stormfly crowed. "You really don't like him! But why do you need him?"

"I want to find out what he knows," she said truthfully.

"So," Snotlout called up, his voice higher-pitched than normal, "who's the other dragon?"

She set down in the middle of the forest, picking nowhere in particular. There was still a long flight ahead of her before morning, so she didn't need to waste time carrying Snotlout further from the village. There was no raid going on anyway. Everyone was asleep.

"Keep watch," Astrid requested, gesturing to the trees around them. "There shouldn't be anything around here, but better safe than sorry."

"Okay." Stormfly hopped off into the woods, apparently making a game of jumping from snowdrift to snowdrift.

Astrid and Snotlout watched her go.

Then Snotlout spoke. "You know, I think that's the Nadder from the arena."

She could finally respond, through writing in the snow. 'She is. She is also quite stupid and chatty.'

"Could have guessed that," he said honestly. "So it really was dragons who broke them out? Not the twins?"

The twins? She had planned that breakout to specifically implicate dragons, not frame the twins! But maybe it was too much to expect a Viking tribe to see circumstantial evidence and immediately leap to assumption-shattering conclusions when the island had a known pair of troublemakers.

'Yes,' she scrawled in the snow. 'It was dragons. Time is short. Have you found anything?'

Snotlout spread his arms dramatically. "Was waiting for you to ask. You are looking at your savior. Snotlout Jorgenson, slayer of beasts and now practitioner of magic dark and dangerous, all to save his beloved."

'Skip the dramatics.' She still wasn't letting herself get excited about this.

"Fine, but we're going to say I was awesome and dramatic when we tell the village about all of this," he asserted. "I looked through all of Fishlegs' stupid books and got everybody older than me to tell every story about magic they knew. You owe me big-time for that. There was a lot of time wasted listening to Gobber. He talks about yak-dung like Hammerhead Yaks and Whales and all sorts of stupid dragons that don't exist."

Astrid idly wondered whether Gobber had actually seen all of the things he spoke of. She had never believed him before, but she had never really believed any of the stories. Now, as a Night Fury who might be about to return to her real body thanks to Snotlout of all people, she was reevaluating what she was willing to believe.

"But I did find something," Snotlout finished. "It's really, really easy. You just have to burn a circle around yourself, sit like a human would, and want to change back."

Astrid felt her heart fall, though she had tried not to get her hopes up. 'That is all?' It was way too simple.

But maybe he meant she needed to burn a circle around herself with Solar fire. She wasn't sure if she wanted to waste her Solar fire on that. She still needed it to take down Inferna, somehow.

'A special kind of fire?' Astrid wrote out skeptically.

"What? No, the story I got it from used a torch, but we can't do that." Snotlout kicked at the knee-high snow. "Your fire will do. The story was about a guy who was cursed to live as a dragon until he changed his ways and embraced Viking honor once more. The fire circle was how he changed back. Of course, he originally changed into one because he did exactly the same thing in reverse, hoping the gods would bless him, but whatever."

In other words, even if it worked for that person, it didn't apply to her and thus wouldn't help. She burned – or melted, given how deep the snow was – a circle around herself anyway, using her normal fire, and sat on her hind legs. Best to just demonstrate how stupid this was by trying it.

Fire, sitting like a human… All that was left was to want to change back, if Snotlout was to be believed.

She envisioned herself, and found to her shock that her Night Fury form came to mind. She banished that, and pulled up her memories of her old body. Light blue eyes, blond hair, fair skin, no scales...

No wings, no tail, no fire, stuck on the ground, weak, bad eyesight, vulnerable to the elements.

No, she needed to want to change back. She focused on what she could do as a human. She could...

She could...

Not be forced to mate with the Night Fury. Assuming Inferna didn't immediately destroy Berk and kill her, she could live and eventually die fighting against the raids, killed by somebody she probably had talked to at some point. Until then, she would be stuck fighting and killing people she knew were not able to stop themselves. Unable to end Inferna, because the only weapon she could possibly use needed her to be a dragon to use it.

Leaving Toothless to suffer and die of sickness at the nest, abandoned by the only person who stood by him, even if she was in just as bad a position as he was.

She wanted to escape what was going to happen tomorrow night, and she wanted a better life… but there was much to like about being a dragon, and little to hate that was not Inferna's doing and thus not inherent to being a dragon.

It was never going to work, anyway. Astrid held herself still and kept her eyes closed for a while longer, just to make it look like she was really trying. Then she slumped forward and shook her head.

'Not working,' she wrote. 'I did not think it would. Do you know what it took to change me?'

"You never told me," Snotlout griped. "How would I?"

'I was burned alive,' she wrote blandly. 'The fire was magic. It has rules, limitations. I checked. The dragons could not change me back if they wanted to.'

"Burned alive... you're sure they can't fix you?" he asked slowly. "I mean, I'm not giving up, but this is going to be hard. I'll have to wait for traders, buy up their books, and ask for them to look into–"

'No.' Astrid knew it wasn't going to work. And she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to change back in any case. Maybe not even after Inferna was dead. There was nothing anchoring her to humanity, and she had dragons she cared about now.

"Why not?" Snotlout glared defiantly at her. "I'm not giving up."

'It cannot be done.' She could not be sure of such a thing nowadays, she did not know what was or was not impossible. But Snotlout's ridiculous plan had forced her to realize that she would not go back if she could. There were things she missed, but they were balanced and overridden by other things she would miss more... and the fact that she could never get back a lot of what she missed about being human. Her parents. Her simple worldview. Her future as a dragon killer.

For her, with all that had happened, staying a Night Fury was better than changing back into a human.

"You're Astrid, you don't give up either," Snotlout pleaded. "Come on, we only tried one thing. Come back... well, after Spring. Then I'll have more things to try."

'I don't want to go back.' He was unarmed. There was no danger here, aside from the danger of making a single Viking enemy.

"What?" He sat down in the snow, totally uncaring of how cold and wet that had to be. "I'm not reading this."

'I have too much to do. And when I am done, I will never be able to get back what I used to be. Being human will just make things worse.' She should change the subject. 'So help me do something else.'

"Why should I?" he asked petulantly.

'Stop the raids.' She could not change back, but she could get somebody's input on her other dilemma. The one she could tell no dragon of. 'Kill Inferna. I have a weapon, but I do not have a plan.'

"Inferna... the one with the magic barrier?" He crossed his arms, and there was a disapproving glower aimed her way, but he was still listening.

'Yes. I have a weapon, magic fire, but I can only use it once. And I do not have enough. But I am the only one who can attack her.'

"Why can't the other dragons attack her?" Snotlout stood, brushing the snow off of himself.

'She has commanded them not to. Only she can remove that command, unless she dies.' And in that case, they wouldn't need the command removed, because she would be dead.

"Sounds like there's no answer," he said sullenly. "Have fun being a dragon, I guess. I'm not going to tell the village."

'Why not?' She had expected him to. Now that he knew she could not come back, he would not be on her side.

"You're Astrid. Even like that. I won't betray you." He glared at her. "Even if you don't want to go back to normal. That makes you a traitor, you know."

'Maybe it does.' She couldn't deny that. 'Thank you for keeping your silence.'

"It's not for you, it's for your parents," he muttered. "They'll be dishonored if their only daughter turns out to be a traitor, and they're already dead, so they can't disown you. I'm not going to drag the Hofferson name through the mud for nothing."

That was very noble of him. She was once again surprised.

"And I'm not getting the body of a Night Fury either," he guessed. "I didn't keep my end of the deal, anyway."

She couldn't argue that. Toothless didn't deserve to die just to pay Snotlout. But... she did feel really, really bad about how this had worked out. Snotlout had tried, and she was stopping him from continuing to try. He wasn't getting anything out of this except some guilt about keeping things from his tribe. She didn't even have anything majorly important to pass on, no knowledge that Snotlout could use to make himself famous or protect the village.

She moved close to him, looking him in the eye, and licked him across the face. That was the closest she could get to holding her end of the deal in some small way. It wasn't even that gross, because she was a dragon. There was and could be absolutely nothing between them; not that she would ever want anything anyway. Even if he was far less horrible and stupid than she had thought all these years.

He put a hand to his face, looking sad. "So this is it. You'll fly away, and I'll forget you're not dead."

'We may see each other again someday, but yes, this is it.' She shook her head, feeling the same sadness. 'If the raids stop one day, and never start again, I won. I killed Inferna. That is my life's work, now.'

"And if they stop, we should stop killing the dragons on sight?" he guessed. "I'll try to get that to happen. Maybe we can focus on the Outcasts instead, if that day ever comes."

'Or maybe not,' Astrid wrote sheepishly. 'I killed Alvin the Treacherous. They will not be so bad without him.'

"I'm not even surprised," he muttered. "Leave me some enemies to take on, would you? I'm going to be Chief some day, and we don't do well with peace."

'I make no promises.' Astrid closed her eyes briefly to listen to the silence of the woods... and the distant cackling of an amused Nadder. "Blue Flare, we are going now."

Stormfly showed up a few moments later, looking pleased. "Did you get what you wanted?"

"No, and I still hate him," Astrid said woodenly, making sure Stormfly's hidden command wouldn't trigger. "We're going back to the nest now. Leave him, he can get home on his own."

"Okay." Stormfly leaped up into the air and flew away, knowing Astrid could easily catch up.

"Goodbye, Astrid," Snotlout said solemnly, before turning his back on her and beginning the long, cold walk back to the village.

Astrid leaped into the air, mentally letting go of one last hope. She was not changing back. Because she couldn't, and because she didn't want to.