18. Saddle up

Storm sent the gang to get fish and told them to come back to the academy with enough to feed the dragons. They were going to take a big step in their training – actually getting on their dragons. They all meet back at the academy and Hiccup told them that they were going into the woods, to a clearing that was near enough to the village and far enough from their camp that the pair decided to keep the gang's dragons there.

After a bit of skepticism from the gang and having Snotlout go and tell someone where they were going -after all they didn't entirely trust the 'dragon demons'- they followed the pair. When they reached the clearing and as the dragons came into few they relaxed. The dragons perked up when they saw the humans and they started happily approaching them when they smelled the fish that the trainees brought. The gang became completely engrossed with their dragons while Hiccup and Storm overlooked the group from the edge of the clearing, having pulled up their helmets and being cautious as to not repeat the arena incident.

The dragons were more trusting in the woods, and happily bonded with the future riders. None of them noticed the saddles that were pilled near one of the trees. The saddles were old versions that were changed out for better ones by the people who lived with the on their hideout or the pair themselves had used. The old saddles would be good for the first week or so of flying, then they would need to be swapped with new ones.

The pair let the group have some more time with playing with their dragons, both quietly wishing that they had more time like this with their own dragons. But with training the Berkians in dragon riding, deciding to patrol the island every evening on their own accord for everyone's safety, getting food and doing their best not to stray from their own training schedules left very little time to actually enjoy their time with their best friends. While technically Storm could have Shadow with her, she knew that would make Hiccup sad, as he couldn't have Toothless with him, and without Shadow Toothless would be lonely.

"Okay, before you get on your dragons, they need a name," stated Hiccup. "When you give your dragon a name you are furthering your bond, you're giving them a place in your life, you're giving them a place in your friend group"

"You will no longer say 'I'm going to feed the dragon' or-" Storm gestured to Astrid and her Nadder. "- 'I'm going flying on my Nadder', you're going to say 'I'm going to play with..." She trailed off, gesturing to Fishlegs to finish the sentence.

"…Meatlug…" He said hesitantly, eyeing his dragon carefully and when the Gronckle happily nuzzled up to him, he smiled. "Yeah, he seems to like the name!"

"That's great, Meatlug's a girl by the way" Storm smirked at the embarrassed look that crossed his face.

"Your turn," Hiccup pointed to the rest of the group.

While the group went about naming their dragons Hiccup shared a small smile with Storm, the sight in front of them reminding both the riders of the first days with their own dragons.

Snotlout went with the name Hookfang, his dragon not accepting the boy's desperate attempts at naming him something like 'Deathclaw' or 'Death-bringer' or any variation with the word 'death' in it. The twins quickly figured out that their dragon liked the names Barf and Belch. Eret gave the name Skullcrusher to his Rumblehorn, much to Snotlout's apparent annoyance as he kept mumbling something about 'Dragons not accepting cool names'.

"She liked the name Stormfly," Astrid said, then she continued confusion clear on her face. "I wanted to go just with 'Storm', but she wasn't liking it, but she had no problem with the name Stormfly."

"Some dragons are just like that, they just take to some names more than others," Hiccup said sharing an amused look with his sister, much to the confusion of the others. The pair knew that Stormfly, having spent time with them, knew that the name 'Storm' belong to the female of the pair and the Nadder didn't want there to be confusion between the humans, even though the gang had no idea of her name.

"You'll get saddles that we'll be helping put on your dragons," Storm explained while handing each saddle to the respective rider. "These saddles will need to be replaced with ones that suit both you and your friend best, but these will do for starting out."

The pair helped the new riders to put on the saddles one by one, strategically leaving the twins and Snotlout for last, as they were the ones most likely to try flying off without any real knowledge, just their old memory of how. The twins would do so for the shear want to cause chaos, even with Ruffnut having some more respect for Storm, they wouldn't miss a chance at destruction, and Snotlout, well, he had been quieter that day, but that didn't mean that he suddenly found respect for the pair, as he looked like he was planning something. Storm wasn't worried, Snotlout wasn't the smartest of the group by a long shot, he thought they were bald for Thor's sake! And Storm knew for a fact that their helmets didn't cover all of their heads and you could see the back of their heads and know their hair colour after one meeting.

Then came the slightly difficult part. Neither of them had their dragons with them and usually they did this part from the back if their own dragons, but this was going to be different. Storm was the one that shot down the idea of bringing Shadow with them on the basis that if they saw one of their dragons that keeping the other one, in this case Toothless, away would be very suspicious. Their trainees would definitely pester them until they saw the Night Fury and Hiccup wasn't ready for that. They both decided that the sensible thing would be taking a demonstrative flight with them one at a time, but one of them had to be on the ground with the rest of the group, because they didn't want any of them to get overeager and try on their own, doing too much too fast, potentially injuring themselves or the dragons.

The gang were all excited by the fact that soon they'll be in the air, only Eret was showing some obvious caution as he had never been on the back of a dragon for flying.

"Think we should start with Eret?" Hiccup whispered to Storm, when she nodded he gently pushed her forward, making it clear that she would be the one helping the ex-dragon trapper. She glared at him, whoever next that'll say that Hiccup was too innocent or nice to do something so cunning will get a punch in the face from her. The little shit knew that she would rather stay away from the man, yet he still made her do this. Storm gave Hiccup a sly smile knowing full well that she will make him ride with Astrid when the time came.

She schooled her features and confidently walked up to Eret and Skullcrusher, she had a dragon rider to make and she would not let her emotions come in the way of success.

[Just to let you know, this story is complete and updates will be every day or so. Chapters that have been writen as separate parts will updated together and the other updates will happen every day (unless I forget). This was a double update because the last chapter had been a bit short.]