Vylma twisted the golden ring as she waited for the boat to reach Grimmel's harbor.
She never wore rings or this much jewelry she had on now. Rings in different sizes and colors adorned her fingers. Three golden necklace hanged around her neck and bracelets in different colors were around her wrists. The dress was in maroon red with small golden embroidery on the bottom and it's arms. A gold and brown belt with Barviks crest on it, made the dress puffy with all the layers under the dress skirt. To top it all off; her hair was black. The brown and red was gone for the moment as the coal made her hair black as a raven. On top of her head was also a golden crown. Maybe it was a lot of work and maybe excessive, because Grimmel had never seen her before, but Vylma wanted to be sure he couldn't draw any parallels to her dad. So she had found a dress that looked rich and had put on more jewelry she normally would. Her grandmother's necklace laid on her night table in Barvik and Brie was on Barvik.
Grimmel's harbour was not far from them and Vylma took a deep breath to calm her down. This would be over soon and all she has to do is talk to Grimmel about the war and probably listen to him talking about killing Toothless and dragons and Berk. She just needed to keep herself in check and not make him suspect that she didn't kill dragons or want to burn Berk down. If she just keep a poker face and not punch him in the face, it would be all good.
Ropes were thrown overboard to the two men standing on the dock and they tied the ropes tight around two poles. The plank was laid down and Vylma held her gaze to the backs of her guards that stood in front of her. She could feel Grimmel's eyes on her after she had seen him come walking towards her boat as soon it stood still.
Vylma had prepared for this ever since she had sent a letter back to him that she would help him and when she had gotten the letter back, preparations to go to his island have been in action and now they were here. On enemy territory, but Grimmel didn't know that.
Her guards moved forwards and so did she, taking each steps as gracefully as she could and tried to push her nervousness down from the surface.
"Queen Vylma Hadderson, it is a welcoming sight to see you on my side of the war." Vylma wanted to laugh at Grimmels words, but she gave him a smile and responded;
"I hope I am on the right side of the war," she still held her smile. "I think we can see about that when the night fury is dead, won't we?"
Vylma was going to play this all out. She had told herself to be seen as a dragon killer lover in Grimmel's eyes and let him believe she could bath in dragon blood if that what it took to win this war and keep Berk and Barvik as safe as she could. Grimmel couldn't become suspicious of her and put one and another together and make a link to Vylma and her father or Berk for that matter. He would never know the truth until the war really started.
Magnhild wished she had argued more with her parents to take Temple with her, but they had a point with Toothless and Stormfly being the fastest dragons and having three dragons would be easier to spot.
It's not that she didn't like sitting behind her mum on Stormfly, that wasn't the real problem. The problem was that she wanted to have her best friend with her and being able to fly on her own. Okay, it maybe was a problem that she didn't ride on her own dragon and feel the freedom of having control of what the dragon she sat on was doing. Magnhild had ridden on Stormfly many times in her life, but it wasn't the same as riding on a dragon she had trained herself and had a bond with.
She could feel Stormfly turn underneath her, but she was not as prepared for it as if she was in the front like her mother or knowing by instinct what the dragon was going to do, like her mother right now.
Astrid had asked Magnhild which way the hidden world was and she had guided them to the big ocean hole and told her mother, father and Toothless to dive in there. Magnhild saw the glance her parents had given each other before diving in.
Hiccup was slack-jawed when he saw the hidden world and it seemed like his eyes didn't know where to look. His head slowly moved to see everything before him and when the light fury who had touched Magnhild's hand the first time she was here, came flying towards them, Toothless halted in his flying, making Hiccup almost fly forward.
Magnhild smiled at the light fury as she flew straight to Magnhild, looking happy herself.
"Hi again." Magnhild giggled when the light fury's showed confusion and glanced at Magnhilds parents and the two dragons she had never seen before. Probably wondering where Temple was.
Astrid looked between her smiling daughter and the confused light fury and asked; "Is this the light fury you were talking about?"
Magnhild had told her parents everything about the light fury that she had stopped from hurting Brant and said that the light fury had come to her afterwards. Magnhild thought the light fury wouldn't remember her, but it seems like she had.
"Yes and it seems like she remember me after these years." she couldn't stop smiling. Knowing that a light fury had remembered her from that day two years ago, felt amazing. She felt special. Now she really wished she had argued to have Temple with her. What if they could become friends? Magnhild flying on Temple while the light fury flew alongside with them?
Stormfly and Toothless were friends, so why couldn't Temple and this light fury also become friends?
Vylma wanted to throw Grimmel off the cliff they were standing on as they watched over the dragons that were locked in cages that stood below them. She didn't know how many there were down there, being captive, afraid and probably being tortured and giving no food or water for how long they had been caged. She didn't want to know and she felt her fingers twitch by the thought of just running down there and free as many dragons as she could, but that would leave in disaster for her, Barvik and Berk and she couldn't afford that.
"I've always wondered," Grimmel began and caught Vylma's attention. "Where do you come from? I believe it's not from Barvik."
This is something she had thought of on the way here. How she would fool him that she was from another island and not from Berk.
"Outcast island," Grimmels eyebrow went up in surprise with that information. "I wasn't born there, but my father settle down there after my mother died one cold winter. My family were poor and in that cold winter, my father stole firewood from the neighbour and he got caught. Because my mother died that night, the village chief thought it was perfect to outcast my father. I could stay with another family, but father didn't want to let me go so he sailed to outcast island. He never told me the village name we're from and when Alvin the Treacherous died 3 years ago, we left. We sailed wherever the sea took us, we had a good year with just him and me, but life isn't supposed to be happy. My father laid dead when I came back from the northermarket one day. I don't know who killed him, but I knew he hadn't killed himself." Vylma looked down and let a tear come down her cheek, a tear that was meant to her grandmother. "Heartbroken I sailed on my own until I saw Barvik and at the right time I saved them from a dragon. A monstrous nightmare was roaming the village, setting fire at everything he saw and I knew that something had to be done. Long story short; I slayed the beast and became queen."
Vylma held her face in a sad expression as she held her breath and prayed to the gods that Grimmel would buy her fake story. He held his hands behind his back and nodded at her.
"I'm sorry for the lost of your parents," she let out a silent breath when he turned his eyes away from her. "And at such a young age to have your father killed and sailing alone on the sea. I'm happy for you to have found Barvik and became their queen at the same time."
Vylma started twisting her golden ring without noticing. She tried to stay calm and keep her face natural, because she could feel her muscles wanting to move and her jawline wanted to her to open her mouth and say something rash. Her feet wanted to kick something and her hands wanted to punch something, or rather someone.
"Nervous?" Vylma jerked her head fast when Grimmel spoke. She could feel her eyes widened and she turned her attention to the caged dragons.
"Bored." she simply said and let her arms fall down to her sides and shifted her weight to her left leg.
Grimmel fully turned his body to her, "Have you ever seen a night fury before?"
I grew up with the one you are chasing after. "No." she said and shook her head.
"Than maybe I can show you one."
That got her attention to the fullest. Did her parents and Magnhild not make it to the hidden world and was captured? Was Toothless here? Was her parents and sister prisoners? How did he captured them? Was the plan already destroyed?
"You have a night fury? Here?" she asked and raised her eyebrows.
"Come." he said and began walking away from the caged dragons and Vylma had to remind herself to get out of her shock and confusion and walk after him.
Hiccup hadn't wrapped his mind over the hidden world after being there for almost two hours. It was a wonderful, amazing place to him and the sight of so many light furys at once, felt unrealistic. Especially seeing Toothless trying to flirt to one of the light furys he had taking a liking to. Hiccup couldn't stop smiling at the two. Toothless being a goof and the light fury at first being confused at the night fury, but now they played together and a part of Hiccup didn't want to seperate them. Another pair he didn't really want to seperate was Magnhild and the light fury she had befriended.
"You think we'll ever get out of here with Magnhild?" Astrid asked who had her eyes on her daughter and the light fury playing.
Magnhild and the light fury had been glued by their hips ever since they came here and it made Hiccup glad his daughter had found a friend. He only hoped she knew the light fury couldn't come home to Berk with them. Grimmel didn't need more dragons to hunt down and kill.
Hiccup moved his left arm across Astrids back and laid a hand on her waist. They sat on the ground on a cliff, with the view of dragons flying around and sometimes they could see Toothless and his girlfriend (as Astrid called the light fury) flying by. Magnhild and her new friend was a few meters to Hiccup and Astrid's left "Let's hope we don't have to disappoint her by saying that the light fury needs to stay. I don't want Grimmel to go after more dragons."
Astrid's body dropped and turned her head to Hiccup. "Maybe we should head home. We don't know how long Vylma will keep Grimmel occupied."
Hiccup sighed. "You're probably right, even if I want Vylma away from that madman as soon as possible, we need to leave as long she's there." He let go off Astrid and stood up, Astrid followed him. "You wanna tell our daughter she needs to say goodbye to her new friend while I tell Toothless he needs to say goodbye to his girlfriend?"
"Okay, good luck." she responded and they walked their separate ways.
Grimmel lead Vylma to a longhouse that was two stories high. No windows and with a simple wooden door and it was well hidden under trees, bushes and the roof was made of grass. Vylma knew a night fury couldn't be hold in there, if it wasn't tamed but that seemed unlikely when it came to Grimmel. Either the night fury (or furys?) was in cages and had their mouth muffled or it was a house full of dead night furys.
The door opened and Vylma only saw the floor a few meters in front of her as the sun shined inside. The rest of the room was dark and she had a bad feeling in her gut of what she would see when the light touched the rest of the room.
Grimmel lighted the torch that was hanging on the wall close to the door and with that fire torch; he lighted up the rest of the room as the fire went around the room against the wall. Like a long fireplace around the room. Revealing what the house held.
Vylma took a step back when she saw what was before her.
"Peaceful, isn't it?" Grimmel said.
Nausea and anger came over her. This wasn't peaceful! This was madness, outraged and completely wrong on every level! How can he think this was peaceful? How did he think when he thought this idea was good? It was anything but good! How did he even come up with this? When did he come up with this?
Vylma was glad Grimmel didn't look her way so he couldn't see her alarming face. But she knew he was waiting for an answer or a reaction and she needed to play along. "Impressive is more like it." she cursed herself when she heard her voice sounding strained, but Grimmel didn't seem to notice.
He put the torch on the wall again and walked forward, Vylma forced her legs to go after him. Into the house of the dead night fury's resting place, or whatever he called it.
Because that was it was. The room was surrounded by night furys. Dead night fury's that stood like statues in different positions. Vylma knew they were real. She had for god's sake lived with one for her first 15 years. All of them had black scales like Toothless, but there were few who had more like a dark grey scales, maybe they were really old or did their skin become that when they had been dead for long? There were night furys with green and blue eyes and Vylma stopped in her tracks when she saw a purple eyed night fury.
"That's a rare on." Vylma jumped when Grimmel spoke. "Found him flying over our ships when were sailing away from here almost 40 years ago. Only took an poison arrow to get him down and now he's standing here, like the rest of his kind."
"He has been here for 40 years?" she asked.
"Yes."
"But you haven't been here since your father died!" she exclaimed and turned to him.
Grimmel looked surprised that she knew about that. "Yes, but I don't travel around with them. It would take up way to much space on the ships. And I'm surprised you even knew about my father."
Vylma stood tall, clenched her jaw and pushed her nausea down. "I did some researchers about you when I got your first letter, so I know about your backstory." she said quickly to change topic and hopefully would get out of here. "Maybe we should talk more about how we're going to take down a night fury who's guarded by a whole village. I guess you've never taking down a night fury guarded by humans before?"
He nodded slowly. "We should and no, I've never taking down a night fury guarded by humans before, that what's make him special and a fun challenge to take down. But I wanna show you something before we go and discuss how we'll win this war." he started walking out of the house, but he stopped by a green eyed night fury, standing on all four and growled silently as it was dead.
"I believe this is the father of Berk's night fury," Vylma's eyes widened, "not only do they look alike, but he was protecting a egg we never found again after a week of fighting and that was 40 years ago not far from Berk."
Vylma had to agree with Grimmel with this night fury looked like Toothless. The color of its scales, eyes and it was like looking at Toothless, but this night fury had its tailfin whole and he looked a little bigger than Toothless.
Vylma shaked her thoughts away to come back to reality, when Grimmel started walking out of the house and told two men to put out the fire in the house and lock the door after them.
She moved fast to catch up with Grimmel who had started walking towards the cliff again.
Grimmel's island was big. It held houses here and there and in the middle of it, was a longhouse that was his. It wasn't as big as the house which held dead night furys, that house seemed like one of the biggest houses the island held. A large part of the island held dragons in cages and a big arena was on the other side of the island. Vylma didn't want to know what Grimmel was doing in that arena to the dragons or people. Vylma had heard that Ingrid was underground when she was here, so he must have the dungeons and some rooms underground.
"Where are we going?" Vylma asked.
"Just follow me." Grimmel simply said and lead her down the cliff down stairs that was carved from the stone wall down to the trapped dragons. Vylma had missed these steps when they stood on the cliff before, and she knew way; the stairs were perfect made to blend into the stone wall.
They had to walk past three cages and Vylma forced her eyes to look forward, she didn't want to see dragons in pain. It was enough she could hear their whimpers and whines. If she could, she would free them, but she couldn't, not now anyway.
Vylma didn't know where Grimmel was taking her to show her something, but when he turned and walked into a cave that was 5 meters deep and had double doors in front of her and Grimmel, she knew this was the underground place Ingrid held as prisoner and where Kyria got brutally killed.
The room behind the doors reminded her of Berks stables, but it wasn't as cozy, full of life or colorful. This… stable held dragons who was screaming or whimpering in pain and Vylma held her hands in front of her so they wouldn't block her ears from the horrible sounds that echoed between the stone walls. It smelled of dragons spillings and dragon blood. The room was also lit in a creepy way. Shadows casted on the wall and floor as a evil and unwelcome patterns.
Nausea came to Vylma again and she had to swallow and keep her mouth close so nothing from her stomach came up. She glanced at Grimmel and wasn't surprised he didn't even flinch at the stank and the view the room held. Why would she? This was his doing after all.
Luckily they only walked through the room and went to another, that only held one stable. Or a stable with iron bars from floor to ceiling and the floor with one door leading inside and the ceiling was iron as well. And Vylma froze when she saw what the prison held.
"I wonder what Berk would do if they knew about this." Grimmel said and held his eyes on the night fury. "A female night fury. Probably the last one in the world."
A night fury who was alive, Vylma didn't know how much longer with all the scars and way the dragon was laying; her eyes close and her breathing uneven, she even sounded she was struggling to breathe. But a living night fury, that wasn't Toothless. This was something her father dreamed about. Sure, light fury's existed and he probably was with one right now, but this was a night fury. A night fury who didn't seemed to have much left of her life if she didn't get help immediately.
"She's in so much pain she can't even shot fire or fly," Grimmel pulled a lever and the wall the night fury slept against opened to a sandy arena. "But she can walk."
The night fury's eyes opened and Vylma could only stare at the blue eye. Her breath got caught in her throat when she saw the night fury's left eye was red and white. Blind. Grimmel had made her blind in her left eye.
The night fury turned to Grimmel and started to growl, but she still didn't stand up from where she layed. Vylma felt a flicker of pride in her chest when she saw the strength the night fury held even in her condition, but that died quickly.
"WALK!" Grimmeld yelled and the night fury lowered her head and eyes and stood up and started walked into the sandy arena.
Grimmel gestured to Vylma to come with him inside the arena as he open the cage door. Vylma swallowed before she followed him in slowly steps and felt that something bad was going to happen.
"No need to fear," Grimmel said when he saw the terrifying face of Vylma. "She can't attack you, I've made her too weak to even run."
That didn't help Vylma at all!
The night fury stopped in the middle of the arena and turned so she laid as she had laid in the cage. It reminded Vylma of Toothless when he laid behind her father and he used the dragon as a backrest, but this female night fury laid in pain and in agony and not nearly as comfortable as Toothless.
"Now I wonder," Grimmel stopped a few meters from the night fury and Vylma stood beside him. "What would you do for your people?"
Vylma took her eyes away from the dragon to the stone wall that surrounded the arena. "Anything." which was the truth. Barvik may have made her queen against her will (did she really have a choice?) at a young age, but they had helped her to go through the role as queen in the best way they could and they had welcomed Brie as their friend. They listen to her and trusted her to be their queen. To lead them and keep them alive through every weather and bad growing seasons. She owned them to keep them safe.
Grimmel nodded and pulled a dagger from his belt. "Good. Than you would cut out this beats heart and have my trust."
Vylma head turned her head so fast to Grimmel that she could feel her neck crack. "What?" her stomach dropped and panic washed over her.
"You said you've slayed a monstrous nightmare to save Barvik and back then you didn't even know you would become their queen by doing so." he handed out the dagger to her, "Cut the night fury's heart out and you'll have my fullest trust and Barvik will forever have my support, if you don't go against me that is."
Vylma narrowed her eyes at him. "Is this how you get people's trust? Making people cut out dragons heart?"
Grimmel shrugged. "I only support does who's willing to kill dragons. Aren't you a dragon slayer?"
Vylma glared at him and was ready to say something when a man came walking into the arena.
"My lord, you have a urgent message from-"
Grimmel put his hand up and stopped the man. "I'll see to it immediately."
"I hope you do what's best for you and your people, queen Vylma." he told her, still holding out the dagger to her.
Vylma looked at the dagger and back to Grimmel before taking it. She watching him walk out of the arena and telling the man to stay and watch over her as he disappeared.
What would she do? She needed Grimmels trust to keep Barvik and Berk safe until the war really began. Backing down now was a bad idea and something she had to remind herself the whole time she had been on this horrible island with this sick man by her side. Barvik would be on his hate list together with Berk and the plan was not to have a war on both island. No, the plan was to have a upper hand and kick Grimmels ass and free the dragons that was captured on this island.
But could she really kill a dragon? Even if the dragon was in agony and would be better dead than in pain it was in? Vylma couldn't take her to Berk and try to heal her. Her guards had stayed in the harbour because she knew Grimmel couldn't hurt her without having Barvik (and Berk, but Grimmel didn't know that) after his head for killing their queen, so she couldn't ask them what to do. And she knew she couldn't, was to do nothing. Barvik and Berk counted on her to make sure they won the war and that means she needed do anything, even killing a innocent dragon.
Vylmas hands was shaking, her heart beat fast, she felt sick and she started to sweat. What choice did she have? Either killing one creature or getting her own people killed, together with her family and every dragon.
She let her hands work and shut down her brain so she hopefully wouldn't remember the feeling when the night fury's body jerked when the dagger stabbed right through the skin, nerves and muscles and the warm blood coming on her hands, face and dress. The way the night fury's organs felt against her hands and the smell of blood.
The thing that would haunt Vylma forever was the sound of the night fury when it got stabbed and the way it went limp under her hands.
"I see you have slayed the beast."
Vylma didn't react when Grimmel came walking into the arena. The arena that held a lake made of blood and a statue of a queen.
Blood was covered Vylma's dress, hands, hair and face. The times she had automatically wiped away tears streaming down her face with her bloody hands was why too many and she had to remind herself to stop. She didn't need more dragon blood on her body than she already had. Her face was stone and her hands had stopped shaking, the nausea hadn't stopped threating to come full force.
"And the heart?" Grimmel asked.
Vylma quickly stood up and let the heart slide down the dagger into his hand. "I believe we have a war to discuss." she said with no emotions and marched out of the arena away from the night fury she had just killed and finally she would do what she was here to do.