Astrid didn't know what to do with herself. That was a recurring problem since Inferna's death, but this particular day made the lack of anything to distract herself with all the more obvious. Today was the day the dragons began their ceremonies, the ones meant for pairing off, mating, and by extension for everything she was not going to be doing. She didn't even know specifically what was going to happen; nobody had ever explained the ceremonies to her. They could be innocent, or they could be something she would rather not see. Or, as was most likely, somewhere between those two.
Astrid flew another circuit around the island, knowing she was only doing so to get a good, long look at the rock she was no longer really welcome at. Toothless was there, asleep. He slept too much nowadays. It had been a whole week since Inferna's death, and all he did was sleep and try to convince her to leave.
He was awkward around her now, their every interaction stilted and underlaid with tension. He wanted her gone for her own safety, but also probably for his peace of mind. She had no doubt that were he able to fly away, he would have done so days ago. She even understood, though she thought he was massively overestimating the danger his father posed to her while the other dragons were around.
She understood, but it still bothered her. She had somehow grown to like his simple, neutral interactions with her. Not having them anymore was painful, especially when the change was so abrupt and unpleasant.
If things were different between them, she would have asked him to tell her about the ceremonies. He was the only one she could ask. Stormfly would be embroiled in all that went on. The same went for Mentor and his mate; from what little Astrid could gather, this was a big day for all mated pairs, old and new. She did not feel she knew any of the Terrors well enough to ask for advice. The intelligent Zippleback who had admitted to not being good with females was nowhere to be found, and she didn't really know him anyway.
Everybody else she knew would be busy. Toothless, meanwhile, was experienced at not participating in the ceremony. He would be able to tell her whether any of it was going to be worth watching, and he had a good idea of what she wouldn't want to see.
She still could ask him to help her out. He would have no reasonable objection to telling her about the ceremony, it was not as if she'd be asking to do anything with him. His only objections would be the same tired old worries he'd verbally shoved at her every time she tried to talk to him since Inferna's death.
She passed over his rock and continued her circuit around the island; whatever she decided to do, it was not even dawn yet. She had woken early, not wanting to be caught up in anything. Few dragons were up right now. It was dark and cold, very cold.
So cold that she had shivered half the night, despite sleeping in a volcano. The drafts let in by the tunnels and open top were more than enough to counter the heat rising from below, and said heat seemed to be fading of its own accord. Sleeping alone was becoming tiring, ironically enough, simply because she could not get good sleep.
The thought of sneaking out to sleep in the sea stack maze was tempting, until an icy breeze gusted over her and reminded her that there was no natural warmth at all out there. It was the volcano or nothing, so long as she slept alone. The volcano that, for all she knew, might be hosting a dragon orgy for the next week.
She had to ask someone about the ceremony. That someone might as well be Toothless.
She doubled back and descended, diving down to the shore near his rock. She had decided. Not just to go to him for advice now, either. She wanted to get their simple, casual friendship back. Today was a day for relationships, and she would repurpose it into correcting their far more innocent one. She had let him mope for a week, hoping he'd snap out of it, but no more.
He was still asleep, so she wasn't forced to deal with his one-track objections immediately. First, she grabbed the shell and set out to refill it. That was over and done with in moments. It felt like moments, anyway. She was focused, and that was just a distraction, if a necessary one.
Next, she set the filled shell down and considered her target. He was sleeping in a tight circle, head tucked beneath his tailfins, shivering ever so slightly.
There was an easy solution to that. Astrid hopped up on silent paws and settled down right by his back.
Now, to wait. She would rather not venture back into the volcano before she knew what she'd be flying into.
~O~o~O~
Astrid ended up waiting longer than she had expected. Dawn came and went a while before Toothless so much as stirred. He did not wake up quickly, either; first came the shifting in his sleep, and then the slow stretching, and a tired groan that betrayed just how little rest he had actually gotten.
Then his tail flicked around and bounced off of her side. She looked down at it, waiting for him to look over.
"Wha–?" he barked, looking back at her for the first time, and rolled right off the rock, landing on his back on the ground beside it.
Astrid waited until he had regained his feet to speak and did not so much as blink, not looking directly at him so much as past him. "Calm down."
"I am calm," he muttered rebelliously. "But you... you should not be here. It's not safe."
"I know you think I should leave," she agreed, hoping to head off his objections at the pass. "But no matter what you say, I'm not going to do so today. Today, I want a guide."
"A guide?" He tilted his head, as if trying to understand. "To what?"
She flicked her tail at the volcano behind them. "That. The ceremonies. I don't want to be blindsided by something I'd rather not see, but I do want to watch the rest." She was curious as to the actual ceremonies involved. The only one she had ever seen apart from what would be going on today was the one for vengeance, with the female Gronckle. That had taught her dragon ceremonies could be elaborate, so she was pretty sure there would be something worth seeing.
"There's nothing to see," he grumbled.
"So I am safe flying in there and watching all the nothing?" she asked. "That would be nice."
"No, some of it you will not want to see," he corrected, probably imagining her reaction if she acted on his downplayed assessment. "Only some, though. It is not… too bad."
"So you'd be willing to go up there with me and point out what I should avoid?" she pushed.
"No, you should not stay here at all," he huffed, pawing restlessly at the ground. "And I would not take you up there anyway, not today. Flames would make assumptions."
"We both know there is nothing between us, and I will loudly remind anyone who asks." She walked right up to him and batted at his nose, making him flinch and reflexively close his eyes. "You're being obnoxiously rude, you know. At least look me in the eye when you make excuses to get me to go away."
"I'm not being rude, I'm just saying," he objected, pawing at his nose and backing away.
"Just being sullen and trying to drive me away," she corrected. "Look. I'm not leaving. You're not making me, and you know it. So you have no excuse to act like this."
"I know, it is just... I don't know," he groaned. "I am being stupid. I know that. You want a guide? Let's go." He drained the shell she had left for him, and began walking towards the nearest slope up to the volcano at a quick trot.
"Slow down, you look like you're running from me," she barked, falling into place beside him. This had gotten him moving, but the awkwardness was still there. "And tell me what happens today."
"Fine." He took a deep breath. "Today is the cold-season ceremony. We do it all at once to get it over with, and to make sure everyone lays eggs at the right times."
"The right times?" It seemed the answer might have been as simple as getting him to start talking, but they were not solving the larger problem. There was none of the easygoing attitude she knew. He was sullen and nervous, and there was no reason for the latter. None but her.
"Close enough together that all the new young will be ready to fly at roughly the same time, but not all at once so that there will be no competition for territory on the laying island," he said. "Eggs always take the same amount of time to grow, so the only thing we can control is when they are started."
"So..." and she would not be embarrassed, because there was nothing between them, and she was asking merely to understand the custom, "they do try to make eggs today?"
"Today and for the next ten days." he admitted sourly. "After that, they take off for the hatching island. Then, two moon-cycles later, they come back, new hatchlings in tow."
"Is there anything else to see besides that?" Astrid asked unhappily. This was definitely leaning on the side of 'hide in the sea stack maze for a week' so far.
"Plenty, this is a time of celebration too." He cast her a cautious look. "And by the way, the safest place to avoid seeing what you and I might want to be private is probably the shore. Cold, open, and littered with sharp objects."
"Then I am camping out on the shore," Astrid decided. "I'll pick out a rock of my own, don't worry." She would prefer to share his, for the sake of both of them, but if he was so uncomfortable with her she'd settle for some distance.
"Good idea." They were up at the tunnel now. He stopped her with his wing. "I don't know exactly what you don't want to see. Right now, the only thing going on is probably the new mated pairs all parading around, showing each other off to the nest. But I can't promise there won't be anything going on. Avoid looking at the sleeping alcoves, that's where it would be."
"Wait, is there anything worth going in there for?" She didn't really think going in there to see dragons flying about as normal would be worth the risk.
"The Flickers will be out in force," he replied. "The Blazes are going to have a competition to see who can burn the longest. The Flares are probably going to have the Blaze you call Mentor judge among them and announce which is the most beautiful. There will be fish everywhere. I saw the ones in charge of that come back last night. They hid it, but this morning they'll bring it out."
Astrid judged her level of hunger. In general, a total feeding, going from empty to full, took a good part of the day, requiring dozens of fish. She liked not having to eat often, so she went four or five days between feedings... and this was the fourth day. She could use some food, and not having to spend any time fishing would be nice.
"We'll go in, fill up on fish, take a brief look around, and then leave," she decided. "When do I want to be out for good?"
"Noon," was the immediate reply. "That's when things really kick off. The idea is that by seeing who's with who, nobody will question whether or not some female might be having second thoughts, or some male looking around even though he has a mate. It prevents a lot of stupid arguments and fights."
"That's disgusting." She shuddered. Different ways, they didn't care for privacy, but still.
"It kind of is, but it is not as if anyone is looking," he said sheepishly. "Maybe a few yearlings curious about what they will get to do in a few cold-seasons, but aside from them, everybody just kind of concentrates on their own… interests."
"You just said the whole point was for people to look and know who was with who." She was not at all comfortable with the subject matter, but they were falling back into their old dynamic as he got involved in defending his kind and stopped thinking about who he was defending them from.
"I... yes, but that's just for those who would otherwise wonder," he explained. "The jealous males, that kind of thing. To be seen looking is actually to all but admit you're insecure or greedy. Nobody can lie about who they were with if someone who didn't look asks later, because odds are somebody will be able to call them out on it. The alternative is a lot more lying and conflict."
"If you say so." She couldn't really argue about whether or not that would work, because she didn't know dragons, and if he said it worked, then it obviously did. "We only have so much time. I want to be out of there long before noon."
"After you," he offered, looking around anxiously. "I am going to hang back, by the exit. I don't want to be asked–"
"I'll roar at the first one who does," she interrupted. "Now come on!" She smacked his side with her tail and stepped back, herding him into the tunnel ahead of her. He glanced back at her as they walked, but said nothing about her less than subtle means of prodding him forward whenever he slowed down.
She didn't like 'reluctant and irrationally nervous' Toothless any better than 'sullen and obnoxious' Toothless, but at least the former was progress of a sort.
She did let him stop when they reached the outlet of the tunnel. "All clear," he announced after a long look out into the volcano. "The sleeping alcoves cannot even be seen from here, and the Blaze is already judging the Flares. We missed the fire-holding contest."
Astrid followed him out into the open and checked for herself. He was right, things looked mostly normal at the moment. Everybody but the Coals looked a little more clean and shiny than normal, and the Flares in particular were almost reflective, they were so polished. Mentor was indeed looking over five different Flares, appearing as though he would rather be doing anything else. His mate was with him, laughing and occasionally pointing something out.
"Fish," Toothless remarked, grabbing a slimy and slightly ripe-smelling shape from the top of a truly massive pile. "Eat fast. I think they might start a bit before noon. It's more of a guess, given nobody can see the sun."
Astrid needed no more encouragement to be quick. She began tossing fish back, swallowing as quickly as she could be sure was safe. Eating like this was fast, too. Usually, the time it took to eat a full meal as a dragon came from procuring the food, not from consuming it, and her stomach was very, very quickly full.
While she ate, Mentor declared a victor. The winner was a pale pink Nadder who squawked and gloated, though the other Nadders took it in stride. Stormfly, who had not even made the final running, seemed to be congratulating the winner, causing quite a bit of confusion.
"That blue Flare is not right in the head," Toothless remarked. "She's better for it, but still."
"I think she'd be totally intolerable if she was like most Flares," Astrid admitted. "As it is, she is at least kind and supportive, if talkative and airheaded."
"Two out of four isn't bad," he agreed. He scanned the volcano again, his head swiveling on his stocky neck to take everything in. "Don't look to our far left. Two Blasts have decided to get an early start."
"Maybe you should stop staring at that, then?" Astrid suggested, already beginning to move for the exit. "I thought you actually liked privacy." Maybe all males shared some traits, regardless of species.
"I like it for myself," he clarified shamelessly. "They chose to do things in public, so I can look. It is not like I find it interesting, anyway." He followed her out, swallowing one last fish as he stepped into the tunnel.
"Does that ever happen?" she asked. She remembered Mentor telling her otherwise, but maybe Mentor had only meant it as a general rule, with possible exceptions.
"Does what ever happen?" Toothless asked with a confused warble.
"Do flames of different kinds ever show interest in each other? I know it is not normal, but are there exceptions?" she clarified. To her, it did not seem so very improbable. She had heard dogs of different kinds could interbreed. While it might be a bit demeaning to compare dragons to dogs, they shared the same setup of multiple breeds under the same overall category.
"No. It just does not happen," he assured her. "What might have been love is just good friendship in that case. Sometimes, it would have been friendship either way. There is a difference, if one looks."
"I'm sure there is," she agreed. "Back on the subject of the ceremony, is there anything else I should know to avoid?" She didn't want to stumble across some love nest out among the sea stack maze, for instance.
"No. You know enough to avoid them." He began to walk quicker, putting distance between them both. "But this would not be a problem if you left."
She let him go, troubled. Not by dragon culture; she was just going to have to tread carefully for the next week. By him.
There was something more to this than her actions. His sporadic rudeness, occasional nervousness, and constant pushing for her to leave… She was missing something. Even when he was distracted, there was a dark finality to him that, while not new, was more troubling now. Inferna's death should have lightened him up, but for some reason it had done exactly the opposite.
She took to the air, resolving to ponder the problem for a while. She did her best thinking when her body was occupied with something strenuous.
~O~o~O~
Up above the clouds, under the sun, things did not seem so bad, but she forced herself to think, gliding idly. Something was wrong with Toothless. Probably more than one thing, if she was being honest.
The obvious problem was his father, who he was sure would come looking for him now that Inferna was dead and unable to add him to her collection of slaves. Astrid wasn't entirely convinced he would come looking, if it were her she'd long since have moved on, but she wasn't a misogynistic, abusive waste of life, so she wasn't likely to think like him in any case.
Complicating this was her existence and presence at the first place said abusive father would come looking. Of course, Toothless didn't like that. Never mind that she was perfectly capable of flying away or fighting back if need be, he still wanted her to leave and be safe. He probably wanted her to leave for more reasons than just that one, too; the nest wasn't a pleasant place to spend a Winter if she didn't have to, and Mentor's suggestion that they all stay was just that, a suggestion. A few dragons had left, though none she knew or cared about.
Toothless was worried about her, for sure, but also nervous. Maybe he was guilty. He had made her what she was, and directly put her in danger from Inferna and now his father. And whatever complications her literally wearing the body of his imaginary Night Fury fantasy savior brought, and only narrowly escaping being forced to mate with her…
She didn't envy him that tangled pile of feelings. Looking at it like that, his erratic and inconsistent behavior made some amount of sense, in that it didn't make sense, not even to him. Her leaving would neatly cut the Gordian knot.
The problem with that was she didn't want to leave. Certainly not now, right as Winter was starting. She didn't have anywhere to go. The nest, cold and foggy as it might be, was at least somewhere to live with other people. The only danger here was the same one he wanted her to leave to avoid, but out there she'd be vulnerable to the weather, Vikings, possibly dangerous dragons from outside Inferna's territory, and who knew what else.
Also, leaving felt like giving up, and she didn't want to give up their friendship just so he could have an easy way out of figuring himself out. She had been forced to deal with all of the personal contradictions his actions had caused, he ought to do the same.
That was a short-term consideration, though. When everyone left for good in the Spring, she'd probably go with them, or strike out on her own. When that happened, Toothless would be back to drinking dirty, polluted water. Even if she enlisted one of the other dragons to continue her self-appointed task, they would leave come Spring. He would be alone here.
Forever.
That was another problem, a big one. No matter what happened, he was stuck here. Even the largest of the Nightmares wasn't bulky enough to carry him anywhere, and he couldn't swim, so there was no way for him to leave the nest. He would die here.
Of course he was dark and withdrawn, and trying to get her to leave. This wasn't totally about her, or even mostly. It was also about the fact that he was doomed. Unless she stayed, but that wasn't really an option.
If she stayed, it would mean a life of boredom. A life of bringing the same dragon water half a dozen times a day for years on end, a life of solitude with a dragon who was both attracted to her and not at the same time. That did not sound at all appealing. They could work out their differences and issues, maybe, with time, but even then... Two casual friends whiling away the years on a crummy, constantly-foggy piece of rock because one could not leave and the other had nothing else to do with her life? That was just sad.
Another problem, but one without a solution. He wasn't going to figure that out if she left him to it.
Astrid was pulled from her increasingly morose thoughts by the sound of flapping wings below and behind her. Her hearing was good, so she had heard the two dragons coming up behind her long before they reached her. Then again, they were making no effort to be quiet in their flight. She wheeled around and caught sight of a pair of Nightmares, flying wingtip to wingtip. Two of the dragons who had once been Terrors, the mated pair.
"Female Bolt," the male Nightmare called out. "Today is a day for celebration! What are you doing up here?"
Astrid pulled around and descended to their height, flying parallel to them. "Some of your celebrations are things Flightless would never do in sight of others."
"Are they?" The female Nightmare laughed heartily. "Well, I suppose you'll be up here a lot in the coming days. This is one of the few places we can't do that."
"Though actual Flickers can, so be wary of that," the male added seriously. "They generally stick lower to the ground, but you might see a few thrill-seekers up here."
"Well, there goes my last safe place," Astrid griped. "Why are you up here?"
"We are going for a sunny flight, and taking in the sights," the male answered happily. "Clouds... more clouds... even more clouds."
"We do this every cold season, it's left over from what we did as Flickers," the female explained more seriously. "We might have been one of the few pairs you'd see up here, seasons past. Nowadays we just fly."
"Wait, I thought you– Astrid cut herself off when she realized she didn't know what she had thought. "How did this happen, again?" She gestured to the both of them.
"We were a mated pair of Flickers," the male explained. "Then my mate was injured in a raid."
"Hit hard on the head. Among other things, I was blinded," the female continued neutrally. "I couldn't do anything, and once Inferna found out, I would be eaten. So I went to an old Blaze who sympathized with our kind, and asked him to change me, so that I could see and fly again."
"And I was left behind," the male added. "Fine by me. I knew that I was going to change to follow her, so that we could be together again, but I waited until she could change me herself."
"How did you know how long to wait?" Astrid would be worried, were she in the female's position, that she'd mess it up, accidentally change him into another Flicker or something.
"We just knew," they both answered. They exchanged a knowing look.
"So we are some of the only flames in the nest who can claim to have–" the male began, only to be silenced by the female snapping at him. "What?"
"Aside from it being rude to brag to an unmated flame, she has already told us she is up here precisely to get away from that kind of thing," the female huffed. "Think before you speak!"
"My apologies, then," he rumbled. "But on another note, would it be rude to ask what you intend to do, come the end of the cold season?"
"We do not understand what is between you and the other Bolt," the female explained. "Or if there is anything. To make it worse, you cannot simply leave him and come back later."
"Because he won't be alive to return to," Astrid sighed. "Yes, I know. But I don't feel anything for him, and if I stay here just to keep him alive, it will just make it harder for me to leave later. I'd be stuck here." If she took up that duty, she wouldn't abandon it.
"You might not feel anything now," the female said brightly. "it took us several cold-seasons to truly become mates in these bodies, and we were already in love before." She craned her long neck to look back at herself. "That kind of feeling did not come into effect until about three cold-seasons after. It takes time to adjust, just like it takes time to adjust to walking and talking and flying in a new body."
"So what you're saying is I should stay in case, a few cold-seasons down the line, I start feeling differently?" Astrid asked skeptically. She hadn't meant to imply she was seriously considering taking any mate, but the Nightmare had run with the assumption that it was only a lack of attraction stopping her from doing so. She wasn't sure how to disabuse her of that notion without making things more awkward than she was willing to tolerate.
"No, we are not telling you what to do." The male shook his head wildly, denying that idea. "You make your own choices, we cannot make them for you. My mate is just giving you something to consider. Bolts are rare, and you do not want to pass one up if you might regret it later. Even if you do still have your Solar fire."
"I'm not using it for that." She did not growl; these dragons knew far better than most why she felt that way. "And I would assume Bolts are only rare here because Inferna didn't get many to start with, and the rest stayed away."
"No, everywhere," the male said with a regretful toss of his head. "The few unlucky flames brought in because they got caught inside her territory tell us so. Your kind is dying, though it is not quite yet dead."
So not only was she a dragon, she was an endangered one. That was… typical, really. It felt like these dragons and the world itself were conspiring to stick her with the Night Fury, just like Inferna had wanted.
But Inferna was gone, and she could do what she wanted. If, someday...
What would she have done back on Berk, if there were no more wars to be fought? If she had to find something else she would probably take up a trade, but that would not fill all of the empty days. Maybe, after a while, she might start looking at finding a husband. It was what was done; there would be no reason not to. She had wanted to be a warrior to defend Berk and gain honor, not specifically to avoid marriage.
But even considering the possibility made her predicament just as complicated as the Nightmares had assumed it already was. Maybe she'd be open to a relationship in a few years, or maybe not. Maybe she'd want Toothless, or maybe not, but she couldn't know and would have to make a decision about it now because whatever she decided would define where her life went. Either she'd leave him to grow sick and die, or she'd be forced to stay here with him. He was stuck here, and all the magic in the world could not fix that, it seemed. He was too big to change into another kind of dragon...
"I have a question," she blurted out. "You were injured, right? That is why you were changed?"
"My head was somewhat caved in, and my eyes did not work," the female replied amiably. "It was a miracle I survived the injury at all. Why?"
"You were a Flicker. What would have happened if your mate had used his Solar fire on you, and turned you into yourself?" This was not a solution for Toothless; he was too big to be changed into anything. It was a good question nonetheless.
The female looked over at the male. He stared back with wide eyes.
"We did not think of it," she eventually growled. "That would have worked."
"Flickers never think of using our own Solar fire," the male said thoughtfully. "But it would work on each other. There are a few injuries among the current pack, bad legs or entirely missing limbs. Why do we not spend our Solar fire on remaking those Flickers? We just do not think to do so."
"That is something," the female murmured. "To have remained a Flicker..."
"My mate... do not tell anyone," the male murmured, "but I think I prefer how we ended up. Even to that."
"I do too, but the fact that we did not see the choice is painful all the same." The female nodded gratefully to Astrid. "We are going now. We want a few eggs this cold-season. You should go talk to the one who studies Solar flame. He might be able to explain why that would not work, if there is a flaw we three do not see in the idea."
"I'll do that," Astrid agreed. "But where is he?"
"Check the sea stack maze, near the outer edge," the male advised. "He tries to avoid the bulk of the celebration." The two Nightmares descended from the heights, leaving Astrid alone.
Not for long. She dove soon after, intent on looking into the simplest mystery of the growing horde dogging her steps. Maybe Toothless wasn't the only one whose problems had been in some ways exacerbated by Inferna's death...