Maour limped into the tavern on Mahelmetan, looked around, and upon not seeing the man he meant to meet, claimed a familiar spot to wait. He knew this tavern; he'd met the Ingermans here, and the twins' mother. The former were still on the island, having moved in. He would have to mention that.
'Isn't the funeral beginning soon?' Toothless asked. He was stuck on the Isle of Night until the gouges on his back healed, and he was camping in Maour's senses to escape the pain and boredom. 'I want to at least see that, and don't forget we have to talk to Togi.'
"I know," Maour murmured, seemingly to himself. The bartender looked up at the noise, saw nobody demanding his attention, and looked back down at the mug he was polishing. "We've got time, though we might miss the start if he's any later."
"Oy," a rough voice exclaimed from right behind him "I'm right on time! I said sunset, sun's still up." Gobber circled around the table and slid into the seat on the other side.
"You might be confusing the moon and the sun," Maour joked. "Planning on being late to the big funeral, too?"
"I'm not goin'," Gobber said seriously. "Too many good men lost, and I didn' really do enough to save 'em."
"You did more than most," Maour retorted. He was still fuzzy on the details of what, exactly, Gobber had done. By the time he and Toothless had limped into the central cavern, all they saw was Gobber's knife prosthetic in Astrid's cold, dead body, and Skarpur purring smugly. In the ensuing rush to get them to Eldurhjarta, Maour hadn't even been able to ask where Gobber had gone afterward.
"Doesn't feel like it," Gobber muttered. One of the barmaids passed by, but he waved his hook dismissively and declined anything to drink. "Sure, I got 'er, but I took too long about it. Gainin' 'er trust, gettin' into the Berserkers… I coulda cut 'er in half back on Berk, and Snotlout woulda thanked me. No need to go to all this trouble."
"But you helped with the war, too. You gave us advanced warning when they were coming for the Isle…" Maour leaned in. "By the way, how did Astrid know?"
"Way she told it, she overheard Heather talkin' to one o' the dragons before she attacked," Gobber explained. "You'd know better than me where and when that might o' happened."
'Heather is not going to take that well,' Toothless murmured. 'And it isn't even the only bad news you have to give her.'
Maour winced, thinking of what Camicazi had told him earlier that day. "Yeah, she's not going to be happy," he said, thinking of both pieces of news.
"Eh, things happen," Gobber offered. "Anyway, if that was my only contribution, I'd be downright ashamed, but it ain't. I also ordered that last suicide charge on the beach."
"That was you?" Maour smiled, though it was probably a cold smile, given what they were talking about. It was hard to feel good about death and destruction, even in retrospect. "We did wonder whether she had lost her mind… even more."
"Nah, I did that, and she followed along. What were you lot goin' to do if we did the sensible thing?" he asked.
"Wing it," Maour said. "Lure them into the woods, hunt them down… Something like that." Skarpur hadn't been clear about the details of her plans for the final confrontation on the Isle past explaining the general concepts. Luckily, Gobber had handed them something much more simple.
"Huntin'," Gobber snorted. "Some hunt. Ye know, she didn't kill a single Night Fury. Ever."
"While Dagur got two," Maour said darkly. "It is ironic." Sad, painfully pointless death, but ironic if one could look past that.
"Aye," Gobber murmured. They both fell silent for a long moment.
"How did things go down once we left you in front of the cave?" Maour asked. "That's the only thing I'm still not clear on."
"Yer dragon friend didn't tell you?"
"It's been a hectic week." Between sending their allies away, dealing with all the flotsam washing up on the shore, the multitude of injuries, trivial and serious, and Fora and Vern on top of everything else, he hadn't had any time to think in the last week, let alone follow up hanging threads. He'd barely had time to cobble together usable crutches for himself, and he needed them to walk.
"Well, I sat around for a bit, then the grey-eyed one landed right by me and made to rip me limb from limb," Gobber recounted, absently running the tip of his hook along the table's grooves. "I yelled somethin' about you and my name, and Astrid bein' in the caves, and it decided to take me along to check another entrance. I don' know if it understood what was goin' on or not, really."
"She definitely did," Maour assured him. Of course, Skarpur would have entered the caves from a different angle to try and trap Astrid, and of course she would have brought the questionable but probably safe Viking along, to ensure he didn't try anything sneaky. "And?"
"We went in, I banged my helmet on three different walls, and then Astrid stumbled into a big open space," Gobber said. "The dragon lured 'er in with its eyes, and I snuck around the back and finished what she started." He sighed heavily. "That's one down, at least. Don't know if the other's worth the trouble."
"Snotlout?" Maour asked.
'I say he is worth the trouble,' Toothless offered. 'Also, will it be bad if you and Von miss the funeral ceremony entirely?'
"It's not a huge deal, they don't care if we're there at all," Maour muttered to Toothless.
"Eh?" Gobber asked, leaning forward.
"Snotlout's not a big deal," Maour offered, saying what he thought about Gobber's original question. "Astrid led, he followed. If you want to go after him, sure, but I wouldn't." He hadn't even wanted vengeance against Astrid, not for Stoick. All of that was behind him.
"Maybe," Gobber said doubtfully. "I don' really want to go back to Berk, not with it like it is now, and it'd be hard to manage… I got Astrid, maybe that's enough."
"Where will you go now, assuming Snotlout avoids your wrath?" Maour asked. "You know, the Ingermans live here, on Mahelmetan." He would offer a place on the Isle, but he had no idea how that would work, and assumed Gobber would rather live somewhere with other humans, somewhere closer to the normal he knew.
"Here?" Gobber looked around the unusually empty tavern. "Between you and me, I don' really like the attitude around here. I wanna go somewhere my smithin's needed, not something else ta sell."
"The Rockbreakers, maybe?" Maour offered. "They do all sorts of stuff with blacksmithing, you might like living there." They had also betrayed his people, but Gobber wouldn't get involved in their politics, he would be going to live on their island, and that treachery was the act of one man, not the entire tribe.
"Maybe…" Gobber shook his head. "I don' know enough about 'em. I'd have to find one tonight."
"And I've got to go attend a funeral, so it sounds like we both need to leave," Maour offered. Gobber's need was the more urgent one; the allied fleet was putting out to sea tomorrow morning.
"That's it, then," Gobber said in a low voice, shoving his chair back and standing. "See you around?"
"Send me a message through Johann when you get wherever you end up." Maour offered a hand to shake, and Gobber pulled him into a rough hug.
"Aye, wherever that is," Gobber agreed. "But if ye fight any more wars, count me out. I think I'm done wit' all of that."
"Hopefully I am too," Maour agreed. He didn't really believe it, but he could hope.
Heather was entirely certain the Bog Burglars, Meatheads, Waxears, and Rockbreakers had long overstayed their welcome on Mahelmetan.
She empathized with the Mahelmetans, to a degree. Their home had been coopted as a staging ground for a war not their own, their island had been attacked, their village had almost been raided despite the pledges to defend it…
But now the war was over, and of the five tribes Mahelmetans had been forced to host, four would be leaving in the morning.
That did, of course, bring its own problems.
"I paid for it, e's tryin' to cheat me," the woman yelled, pointing an accusing finger at a shop owner who was holding a dead chicken in one hand and a butcher's knife in the other.
"She paid for a wing, Thor knows why she wanted one, and then tried to take the whole thing," the shop owner retorted, looking at Heather. "They're leavin' tomorrow, just make her pay for the whole thing. I know ye lot won yer war, there's no need to be skimping now. Make with the plunder and stop wastin' my time."
"It wasn't that kind of war, and I'm more concerned with what actually happened here, not making it all go away," Heather said. She was lying about her motives, she would very much like this to just go away, but if she sided with him-
"This'll go away when I get what I paid for, no less," the woman yelled back. "I'm a Bog Burglar, if I'd wanted to steal it, you'd not have caught me!"
"Yer just gettin' sloppy, that's all," the man sneered. "Maybe I'll spread the word. The Bog Burglars have lost their touch!"
"You'll wake up to find you've been stolen out of house and home and left naked in the street," the Bog Burglar woman threatened. "Nobody trash talks us. You'd have the whole tribe after you."
"Yer leavin'," he sneered.
"But we're in town one more night," she shot back.
"Both of you, stop it," Heather said in her most no-nonsense voice, acutely aware of the size difference between her and them.
The Bog Burglar stepped back, and the shop owner lowered his knife.
Luckily, size wasn't quite as big a deal when there was a Night Fury lurking on a nearby rooftop, adding weight to her words with an appropriate noise whenever she spoke. In this case, a snarl that had everyone else on the street quickly finding other places to be.
"I don't know which of you is in the wrong, and I don't really care," Heather said evenly. "How about you give her back what she did pay, she takes none of the chicken, and she can go find someone else to sell her what she wants?" She could bring this fight to their respective chieftains, but she was tired of mediating and had somewhere far more important to be. If she hadn't literally stumbled across this brawl on her way through the village, she wouldn't have gotten involved.
Both of them seemed to find that agreeable; the exchange was made with no complaints, and scarcely another word spoken. Heather half expected the Bog Burglar to raise a stink about getting back exactly what she had paid, but that didn't happen, and the two scurried away like rats once they were done.
'Is it me,' Einfari asked from the rooftop, 'or have we gained their respect since the battle?'
"Our allies have been telling war stories for a week, probably in every tavern on the island, and they saw what you guys can do when things aren't stacked against you," Heather murmured as she continued on her way toward the docks. "That covers both sides, so yes, I bet they have." So much of the war up to that point had been a lesson on how many ways Night Furies could be disadvantaged under the right circumstances, so it made sense that such an increase in respect would only come now, after the flip side of that had been seen.
'Maybe, but I feel like we should have been getting this respect from the beginning,' Einfari huffed. 'We might be late. Do you still want to walk?'
"Yes, I do." She hadn't expected to be stalled by a random argument, but she had time to spare, and the way things were going, trips into civilization, even just Mahelmetan, were going to be rare after today. She wanted to get the full experience of walking through the village one last time, pick up the general mood.
Said mood was a mixture of apprehension and relief, regardless of whether one was talking about the native Mahelmetans, or those who were only visiting. A huge armada had been destroyed, all was well at the moment…
But then other news had spread. There was an island of Night Furies not three days sailing away. An island that had fought a war to protect itself. Mahelmetan, being their closest neighbors, had a reason to be worried about that. It was probably like waking up one day to see a man standing over one's bed with a huge sword in his hands, smiling kindly. Hugely unnerving and scary, even if that man professed to be peaceful unless provoked.
At least she was on the side of the scary ones, not those being intimidated. It was easier to be okay with such an arrangement when she had a hand in ensuring nothing came of it.
The docks came into view as she turned a corner. The warships were all loaded with fairly-purchased supplies, ready to go in the morning, and their sailors stood on the decks. Most were docked, but a few were out in the water beyond the island, and in the midst of those few sailed a large Meathead warship piled high with weapons and armor broken beyond repair.
The docks were occupied in their entirety, every open space filled with a Bog Burglar, Meathead, Waxear, or the occasional Rockbreaker.
Einfari leaped down into the street and leaned over. 'No walking through that,' she said solemnly. 'Everyone is on a roof over there.'
Heather clambered into the saddle, her body already sore from the long ride to get to Mahelmetan, and spotted the cluster of rooftops that held the Isle of Night's representatives. Maour was there with Von, who had brought him to Mahelmetan in Toothless' stead since Maour's foot and Toothless' back were both injured. On the roof next to them, two Furies were laying side by side, Skarpur and Togi.
Heather felt a smile break out entirely of its own accord as she considered where Togi was. He couldn't have flown there, he wasn't cleared to fly yet, but that he had managed to climb up spoke well of his health. She hadn't seen him since before the final battle, and neither had Einfari. This would be a reunion once the ceremony was over.
Or, she realized as Einfari set down right next to her parents, a reunion right that moment.
'Just in time,' Togi purred, nuzzling Einfari as she sat next to him. 'I think. They are not doing anything now, and they have not yet, but the humans down there are getting antsy, so it must be soon.'
'Or so we have reasoned,' Skarpur laughed. Her tail was wrapped around Togi's.
'Where's Nóttreiði?' Einfari asked.
'The fields,' Skarpur answered. 'Heather, he wanted to see you there once this was over, for some reason. I didn't ask, but he seemed relaxed, so it cannot be anything too serious.'
"Thanks for carrying the message." She was confused as to what Nóttreiði would want with her here and now; they shared a small cave system. She saw him every night.
'Speaking of messages,' Togi said with a low growl, 'I have another for you, one I just got today from a small, obnoxious human thief."
"I got that message too, maybe save that one for after," Maour called out from the other rooftop. He and Von were sitting comfortably, staring out at the ships. "We have to look like we're being respectful."
'Especially since we do respect them,' Skarpur agreed. 'Look, there is a fire out there.'
Heather turned her attention to the distant ships. The one in the middle would be the mass funeral ship, and the pile of armor a representation of the many men and women who fell in the battles against the Berserkers. There had been individual funerals throughout the war, but this one was meant to cover everybody who had fallen in the conflict.
Or, every human. She didn't know if the Chieftains had thought of the two Night Furies who died, but she assumed they hadn't. They would have gone through her if they wanted to acquire some material possession to burn in their honor, and she had received no such requests. As far as she knew, nobody had.
That was fine, though. Night Furies had their own ceremonies, far less grand but no less important. She hadn't been invited to attend either funeral on the Isle, as they were family affairs, but she knew they had occurred. They were being mourned, they hadn't been forgotten, and since the Isle had only lost two people, it was impossible that they would forget anyone, unlike this mass ceremony for the uncounted dead humans.
The laden warship drifted away from the others, and arrows of fire peppered it. The docks below were almost silent, the occasional cough or mutter the only thing preventing it from being perfect, a virtual inevitability with that many people in the same place.
The ship lit, having been doused in oil beforehand, and slowly sank. It seemed to both take no time at all, and far too long. The flaming ship lit up the night, being the only source of light out on the water.
Then it was over. There was nothing after that; the moment the last flames sputtered and died as the ship dipped below the waves, the funeral was over. The reality of several allied fleets leaving in the morning immediately reasserted itself down on the docks as several hundred overconfident Vikings all tried to get to wherever they felt they needed to be.
"So, the news," Maour began, raising his voice to be heard over the clamor.
'How bad is it?' Einfari asked. 'Because it sounds like it's bad.'
'Not bad, just… Surprising.' Von shook her head. 'I don't know how to feel about it.'
"Camicazi had a message for me right when we arrived," Maour explained. "Turns out, one of the Meathead ships was pulling up Berserker survivors after the battle, as they always do. You know, to ransom them back to their tribe."
Heather had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. "Tell me they didn't," she requested.
"Pull Dagur up, down an arm and nearly dead of blood loss even once he started breathing again?" Maour replied. "They definitely did. But they're not going to ransom him back to his tribe."
'I don't trust that,' Skarpur snarled.
'There's more,' Von said.
"The plan, at least from what she told me, is to use him as leverage," Maour explained. "The new Berserker Chieftain, whoever that will be, is going to want him dead to make sure that he doesn't show up and take over again. Mogadon is going to keep him as insurance against the Berserkers. So long as he has Dagur, he has leverage over their current leader."
"We need to get to him and make sure he dies," Heather said coldly. They weren't going through all of this again.
'Not necessarily,' Togi rumbled. 'I think we can afford to leave him there. He is missing an arm, right?'
"Past the elbow, so pretty much the whole thing is gone," Maour confirmed. Von looked worried upon hearing that, though from the way she looked back at Maour, Heather guessed she was more concerned about her brother than the enemy. Luckily, Maour's foot would recover, unlike Dagur's arm.
'So he is physically weak, a captive, and will be killed by his own tribe should he escape,' Togi summarized. 'He is no longer a threat, and we would be striking at an ally if we assassinated him.'
"Only if they knew it was us," Heather objected, calming down. It was true that Dagur had no power now, even if he broke out somehow. 'Do we know for a fact that his people wouldn't welcome him back, regardless of what their new leader thinks?"
'He led them into war against Night Furies and got an entire armada slaughtered,' Togi said gravely. 'All the fighters went with him, and they left their families behind. Almost none of them will be going home. Nobody would want him back when he led so many to die for nothing.'
"It's not like Astrid's around to take over, either," Maour added. "Whoever leads the Berserkers next will have no military might to speak of, and hopefully no desire to go conquering again any time soon."
"Not to mention some of the other tribes will be sure to kick them while they're down," Heather reasoned. It certainly didn't sound like the Berserkers were going to rebound from this easily, if at all. She wouldn't be surprised to hear that someone like the Outcasts were planning to wipe them off the map entirely.
'So it is just unnerving, letting him live,' Einfari summarized. 'Not actually dangerous. We are not making a mistake?'
'I don't think one human is going to make such a difference going forward,' Togi rumbled, looking directly at Heather. 'Are you okay with leaving Dagur to rot in captivity, or should we consider other options?'
"I'm okay with it," Heather decided. It kind of played into the last thing she had said to him, too. She wouldn't kill him, because that was what he would want, insane and bloodthirsty as he was. She was no sister to him, and if it was safe to let him rot in the least honorable way possible, she was more than happy to do that.
'That is the smart decision,' Togi praised. 'Now, can someone help me down off this rooftop? I believe I could just jump-'
'But Eldurhjarta flew all the way out here to check on you, and said not to do that, so you will accept help,' Skarpur said primly, entirely overriding him. Togi's sly purring implied he didn't mind that.
'How can we help?' Einfari asked.
'I only need your mother's assistance, so you and the others can go stand in front of the building and ensure nobody is watching,' Togi said. He grunted in exertion as he crept toward the back of the roof.
'On it!' Einfari deposited the both of them on the mostly empty street in front of the building, which seemed to be a storehouse of some sort. Von and Maour landed beside them.
'Well,' Von hummed, 'it looks like we are drawing attention, not the secret operation going on in the alleyway.'
"That's Aldir," Maour added, looking at the man who was approaching. "Chief, what can we help you with?" he called out.
"Why does he assume Aldir needs help?" Heather muttered to Einfari. She felt she was missing something.
'No clue,' Einfari hissed back.
"We're heading out tomorrow," Aldir responded as he walked into easy speaking range. "I'm glad I caught you here. Have you given any thought to my request?"
"Something to combat Skrill?" Maour responded. "No, honestly. I'll look into it, but no promises."
"It would be a great help… Though maybe just sending some of your most powerful dragons to my island for a while would do it," Aldur mused. "I could have sworn I saw one vastly exceed the shot limit we know of."
"What?" Heather asked, playing dumb. Toothless' glow hadn't been pronounced at all, not like Togi's, so she had thought nobody noticed. It wasn't like the Furies were distinct from a distance, and who would be counting shots in the middle of a battle?
"I'm not sure what you mean," Maour said diplomatically, "but like I said, I'll think about it. It's a long way to send anyone, especially now with the injuries we sustained in the fighting, but if I come up with something I'll probably bring it myself."
"We would be greatly in your debt," Aldir said formally. "Farewell until we next meet, riders and dragons."
"Farewell," Maour said just as formally, replying in kind. None of them said anything until Aldir had turned and was walking away.
"Sounds to me like you just committed to something," Heather whispered to Maour.
"Eh, it's a project," he said casually. "I might come up with something, I might not, no harm done in thinking about it. I'm not sending them anything that could be mass produced and used against other kinds of dragons, which makes it much harder."
'That is good caution,' Skarpur remarked, emerging from the alleyway. Togi walked behind her, moving slowly but steadily, and with no visible pain. 'But what if sending anything of yours improves their knowledge of creating things in general?'
"If only it worked like that," Maour said with a smile. "Actually, that's an idea. I could just make it so hideously complicated that anyone who could figure it out and reproduce it would be smart enough to make better weapons on their own anyway."
'Sounds hard to do,' Von remarked.
"I've got plenty of time to think," Maour reminded her, pointing to his foot. Heather couldn't see any difference between his boots, but he held it gingerly and put as little weight on it as possible. There were two oddly shaped wooden crutches on the back of Von's saddle, ready to be used if he needed to walk somewhere. "Not much else to do while I heal."
'I understand your struggle,' Togi said gravely. 'If I listen to the Eldurs, I will be here for a while yet, simply because they do not trust my stamina to make it all the way back to the Isle.' He continued walking once he reached their group, and Einfari followed along. Heather considered dismounting, but decided against it once she saw that Maour wasn't getting down to walk. He might feel singled out if he was the only one riding, even if he was doing so for a legitimate reason.
Leaving the village took no time at all, even with Togi's slow gait. The village was surrounded by fields, so one was never very far away, and Nóttreiði, as it turned out, was waiting in the closest one.
'Brother,' Einfari called out as they split off from the group to approach, flying the last stretch, 'what do you have to say that cannot be said in front of everyone?'
'You count as part of everyone,' Nóttreiði rumbled irritably. He had flattened a large patch of grass, presumably out of boredom, and stood in the center, pushing down a patch of tall weeds with his tail. 'I'd like it if you left her here and rejoined our parents. We will come to you once we're done.'
'Will you?' Einfari hummed. 'You know what, sure… Be nice.' She leaned to the side, a clear signal, and Heather took it, dismounting to land on a mass of crushed wildflowers.
'That was easy,' Nóttreiði remarked, watching as his sister quickly departed. 'I wonder what she thinks I have to say.'
"I'm wondering what you have to say," Heather said honestly. She had seen Nóttreiði at least four times in the last two nights, and surely if it was something simple, he would have taken her aside then.
'Nothing momentous,' he assured her. 'I just wanted to say that I don't mind you.'
"Really?" She had been on good terms with him for a while now; that really wasn't a big deal at all.
'Really,' he confirmed. 'But I had something to ask.' He slapped his tail down on the weeds, totally flattening them. 'What do you think of me?'
"Of you?" she asked, stalling for time to arrange her thoughts.
He nodded. Outwardly, he appeared to not care all that much either way, but he wasn't meeting her eyes, even when she stared at him for a long moment.
"You're solemn and confusing," she said, choosing her words carefully. "You were always angry and rude, but Einfari kept saying that was not really you. I don't think I have gotten much of a chance to see the real you."
'After I stopped hating you?' he asked in a low voice.
"Awkwardness, instead," she explained. "I don't think that was you either." He didn't know how to treat her, and that meant he was guarded around her.
'But all of that will cast a bad light on whatever else I am,' he said in an odd tone that was almost a question, but not quite, like he wanted to ask but had phrased it as a pessimistic certainty. He was still avoiding her gaze.
"I don't plan to let it," she said honestly. "So I don't think anything of you yet. Do you plan to disappoint me?"
'I am disappointingly boring compared to Einfari, or anyone else in my family,' he said quietly. 'I barely know myself, but I know that much.'
"Boring doesn't bother me. Or you could find ways to be interesting." She refrained from going closer, or making any other overtures; something told her he wasn't looking for that sort of reassurance.
'I can do that.' He looked up, finally meeting her eyes. 'Sorry. For everything. You proved true through it all, and I was not even considered safe to bring to the fight.'
"Apology accepted," she said softly. "You did something worth doing, though. You helped protect the people who needed it most of all." It was not as if he had sat around and done nothing; he had been guarding Joy, and by extension the ship containing three hatchlings. There was no shame in that.
'Thank you.' He growled, shook his head, and rose to his paws, striding forward to close the distance between them. 'I feel like my life was picked up by some all-powerful Myrkur, shaken about, and then dropped out of boredom with no explanation.'
"That's life." She refrained to comment on how he attributed all things insane and maddening to the Myrkurs as a family, more interested in how he was still approaching. She still had the feeling that he didn't want to be touched, not now-
'Let's go find out what our family is guessing about us,' he said quietly, passing her at a slow walk that she would have no trouble keeping up with.
"Lets," she agreed, feeling an unexpected glow of happiness. It was awkward and stilted, but she couldn't deny that his attempt to include her felt great. Late in coming, or maybe early, it was hard to say, but great nonetheless.
That was the last one. The Nótts all accepted her, they all liked her, and their home was safe. For the first time in years, she had a home, a family, and nothing on the horizon threatening anyone or anything she cared about.
She wasn't about to drop the attitudes she had adopted on the run, though. That was just how a Nótt thought, and she'd need every bit of cunning she could muster to keep up with the deceptive family she had found herself a part of.
'That was perhaps the most stilted attempt at an apology and "can we be friends" that I have ever heard, bar none,' Einfari muttered to her mother. They stood apart from Maour, Von, and her father, because those three had something else private to talk about, and she felt no shame in filling her mother in on what Heather and her brother were talking about. Especially as Heather hadn't told her off. It wasn't eavesdropping if one was allowed to listen.
'Give him credit,' Skarpur said seriously. 'He is finding his paws. That's not easy for him, and I think he is allowed to be confused and moody.'
'You make him sound like a younger adult,' Einfari grumbled. 'In fact, I think you told me that a long while back, when Joy was a hatchling. He is older than me, you know.'
'And finally getting around to the growing up he has been putting off,' Skarpur retorted. 'Besides, females mature more quickly than males, that is just a fact of life.'
'Is it a fact the Eldurs would back up with evidence?' Einfari asked.
'Not that kind of fact,' Skarpur laughed.
'What are you having the Eldurs confirm?' Nóttreiði asked as he arrived. Einfari took notice of how close he and Heather were walking, and the subtle grin on Heather's face, and surmised that her friend had easily caught Nóttreiði's intended meaning, no matter how badly he had fumbled explaining himself.
'Something about growing speeds,' Skarpur purred casually.
'Okay…' Nóttreiði looked at Einfari, and she stared steadily back at him until he blinked. 'If you are going to ask, all I am going to say is that I do not mind her, and she doesn't mind me.'
"That's all you need to say," Heather agreed.
'Well, then, I guess now is the time,' Skarpur purred cryptically. 'Heather, if you want, we could adopt you like the Svarturs did Maour. It changes nearly nothing, but it's a nice gesture and Kló would tear me to pieces if I did not offer. It would be something entirely for your sake. Togi and I will not treat you any differently either way.'
"If it's all the same to you, then..." Heather said hesitantly.
Einfari purred supportively and nodded. She didn't know whether Heather wanted this or not, and were it her she would have waited to ask, but she would be happy either way.
"I'd rather not change my name or anything," Heather finished. "If we don't have to do that, then sure."
'That is fine,' Skarpur agreed. 'Your name is yours, I understand not wanting another. You would not be the first of mine to stick with one name and never change it.' She glanced at Nóttreiði.
'I am still waiting to hear a short name I like for myself,' Nóttreiði rumbled. 'Come up with one, and I will happily take to using it.'
'We've been trying for years,' Einfari groaned dramatically. She shared a conspiratorial glance with Heather, certain they had the same thought. It would certainly help things along between Heather and Nóttreiði if she came up with a good name for him, one he liked… And Einfari could be sure to propose all of their ideas, and then credit the successful one to Heather whether it was hers or not.
Or maybe Heather wasn't thinking along those exact lines. It didn't matter; they'd figure it out.
The sun was just rising as Von set out for home. Her wings beat steadily against the warm air, and she found herself in danger of falling asleep out of mingled tiredness and boredom. Maour was motionless, probably lost in thought, and Heather was lying across her saddle, maybe asleep but definitely not providing any distraction.
'I envy you,' she called across to Einfari, the only person aside from herself who couldn't afford to fall asleep. 'You get to go home to a clean, quiet cave and just sleep.' She loved Fora and Vern, she really did, but they made life hard.
'Is there anything I can do?' Einfari asked helpfully. 'You know, you could sleep out in the forest.'
'I know,' Von sighed. 'But I have to be close by in case someone needs something.' Maour had trouble walking, Toothless was stuck on his stomach until the gashes along his side closed up, and her mother had taken two arrows to the stomach, rendering her just as immobile as Toothless while she healed. Von and her father were the only able-bodied Svarturs left, and they had two hatchlings to handle alongside everything else. It was temporary, everyone was slowly getting better, but the next few weeks promised to be exhausting.
'So?' Einfari pressed, flicking her head. 'Help? I could bring fish to your cave at dusk, if that saves you a trip.'
'Sure, that would be nice,' Von agreed. She didn't know whether her parents would be entirely happy to accept charity from another family, but there was no harm in finding out. It would remove one small task from her long list of nightly responsibilities.
'No problem,' Einfari purred. 'I took one little arrow, mom got out without a scratch, and the rest of my family wasn't fighting. We can afford to help everyone else while they recover.'
'Not to mention it's the nice thing to do,' Von teased.
'Well, of course, that goes without saying,' Einfari huffed. 'It is just that nice is good, but nice and easy is very good. Nice, easy, and putting a friend in my debt is better still.'
'It's not a favor if you plan on making me return it later,' Von laughed.
'Sure it is, I can do favors while having ulterior motives.' Einfari leaned to the side and flew closer. 'Maour, are you asleep?'
There was no answer. Von flexed her back, arching midair and shaking the saddle a little, and Maour slumped forward. She wasn't surprised; he wasn't any less overworked, helping out however he could, and the pain from having a huge hole put through his foot certainly did not help him rest when he could get sleep. So long as he was secured to the saddle, which he was, she was content to let him rest all the way back to the Isle.
'Heather is definitely asleep, I can tell,' Einfari purred. 'So, we can talk freely. I want you to return my favor by helping me plot.'
'Plot?' Von repeated, feeling her remaining lethargy replaced by interest and mild apprehension. She wasn't clever, not like Einfari or her family, but if Einfari wanted her help she'd give it.
'I figure I'll need someone in your family, and Toothless is okay, but he's not the first person I would pick,' Einfari explained helpfully, completely avoiding the actual explanation Von wanted. 'He would probably give the game away and tell Maour.'
'I might too, if you do not tell me what the game is,' Von threatened. Sometimes, Einfari needed a hint about when she was beating around the bush too much.
'Think about it,' Einfari said, drifting closer. 'You know the other humans on the Isle. Tuffnut, Ruffnut, and Fishlegs. Does Maour spend a lot of time with Ruffnut, or for that matter any of them?"
'No, not really,' Von murmured. She kind of saw where Einfari was going, but wanted her friend to explain it all, just in case there was something she wasn't anticipating.
'Exactly. And I'm sure nobody pushes him to. But he's going to want a mate eventually, and I know who it should be.' She waggled her tail suggestively and tilted her head back, eyeing Heather.
'You think they could be mates?' Von asked.
'I think that they would work better together than any other pairing that could be made, and I know making a pairing with another new human would be both dangerous and frustrating,' Einfari said firmly. 'So, help me out. Let's make sure they see each other regularly for any excuse we can come up with. I bet they'll do the rest for us.'
'That does sound like a good idea…' Maour was great, but she could imagine him just ignoring Heather in favor of other things. The two might well never even consider each other if they never saw each other. That seemed like a waste of potential…
But while she felt she knew Maour well, she didn't know much about Heather. 'Would it be a good match?' she asked. 'I mean, you and Toothless would not be.'
'That's different,' Einfari retorted. 'Heather is like me, but less pushy, and Maour is more pushy than Toothless when he gets an idea into his head. It would work for them. Besides, if it obviously does not work, we can just stop.'
'Okay, I'm in,' Von decided.
They flew in silence for a few moments. Something occurred to Von.
'You have never done this with me, have you?' she asked suspiciously. That seemed like something Einfari would do.
'Never,' Einfari promised. 'Did you want me to?'
Von shook her head. 'No.' She didn't have any prospects; she knew every available male in the pack, and none attracted her in the slightest. 'None of them interest me, and that has not changed.'
'A few of them are changing,' Einfari murmured. 'But that's going to take a while.'
Von considered asking who she was talking about, but she knew odds were that Einfari wouldn't give her a straight answer if it involved anyone in her family.
'This is boring,' Einfari sighed after a moment. 'I can't wait for everything to be back to normal.'
'Is normal possible?' Von asked, voicing a concern she had after walking through a human village without being attacked. 'Everything is changing.'
'Normal, to me, is everyone in my family safe and sound, and something interesting going on in the background,' was the reply. 'We can have normal no matter what else has changed. It just means safety and happiness.'
'I want that too, then,' Von murmured. Thankfully, it seemed they were going to get it.
Toothless lay on his stomach, concentrating hard. He remembered Maour in danger, the need to do something, the inability to act, and tried to feel as he had then.
Nothing.
'No to that too,' he reported.
"Not a flicker," Maour agreed from his spot seated on a dune a short distance away. His charcoal pencil slashed out another little box on his parchment. "Now try that while preparing to fire."
Again, the memories he would rather forget, the attempt to replicate the feeling though everyone was safe and sound now, and in addition slowly building up a shot.
He coughed out the weak blast and snorted as it splashed into the ocean. 'No.'
"I didn't think that would work," Maour admitted. "But Togi was thorough, and I wanted to test everything he mentioned."
'Leaving no stone unturned,' Toothless agreed. He shifted his paws, feeling the warm sand under them. It was good to get out of the cave, and even better that he had a real reason to go. He couldn't be guilty about not watching the hatchlings if they were doing something so important in the meantime. Enjoying the noon sun was just a side benefit of slipping away when everyone else was asleep.
"Okay, last one," Maour said. "Then we can relax. This time, think of the same things, and access every aspect of our link at the same time."
Toothless was more than tired of remembering the desperate battle of a week ago by now, but it was important, so he immersed himself in the memories again and reached out for Maour's senses. Sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell, all were accessed to the fullest.
The sensations were similar but different from what they were trying to replicate, and when he attempted to move Maour's good leg, to kick at the sand, nothing happened. He was observing, not controlling.
In a sense, it was a failure, but he couldn't help feeling that it was success. He didn't want to manage it again, he was glad the glow had gone away and could not be recovered. It might be useful, he might need it again, but having it available upon a whim felt like far too much for him to handle, even if it did not come with such troubling abilities.
After a long try, just so that Maour would not ask him to try again, he pulled back and flexed his wing shoulders, feeling the gash along his side weakly protest. 'Nothing at all.'
"Got it." Maour marked the parchment, and then after a moment crumpled it up into a ball. "So, nothing. At least it's consistent with Togi's experiences."
'I am glad,' Toothless murmured, digging his paws deeper into the sand. It was a weight off his back, to be sure there was no trick, no way to call up the power at will. He didn't feel like he was ignoring something important, it wasn't available to him and that was that.
"Glad to tell Togi that we couldn't get anything to happen?" Maour asked. "You know, he really does not seem to mind that both of you have used whatever we're calling it."
'He does not, I do,' Toothless shot back. 'And so long as you do not call it "alpha glow" I don't care.' He felt awkward at the sight of Togi, no matter how pleasant the other dragon was, even when looking through Maour's eyes. Like he was posturing in front of Shadow, but worse, because Shadow, being his father, had his trust in a way that Togi never would.
Of course, that awkwardness might not be him, like his certainty about how much fire he had was not really him. It wasn't intentional, it wasn't reasoned, and that seemed to point to it having the same cause, the same power they had both used.
"That reminds me, the Eldurs dropped by with some more name suggestions," Maour remarked, pulling another parchment out of a compartment on his armor. "Let's go through them."
'Toss me that ball,' Toothless demanded, 'and we can talk about names. But only until it's gone.' He was glad Maour had intercepted that particular emissary; the Eldurs were far too enthusiastic about his newfound ability. He would rather forget about it.
"Blárleiðtogi," Maour said as he threw the crumpled parchment. It bounced off Toothless' nose and landed in front of him. "Wow, your reflexes are getting rusty."
'Blue leader?' Toothless huffed, deciphering the name as he poked a claw into the ball. 'Way too on the nose.' It also sounded far too much like Togi's full name for his liking.
"Blárljómi, then?"
'Too direct.' Blue glow sounded like a drink the Thorstons would make and then regret making, like they had in the past with fermented fish water and Night Fury spit. Even the memory of that particular experiment made him feel like gagging. He bit down on the parchment ball in an attempt to rid his mouth of the remembered taste.
"How about Eldurengill?"
The taste of parchment and charcoal wasn't exactly pleasant, but it at least took Toothless' mind off of the Thorstons. He crushed the ball against the top of his mouth with his tongue. 'They just wanted to put their name on it with that one.' It wasn't even a good name. "Fire Anger" was ridiculously vague.
"Yeah, I thought so too. Konungdæmið?"
The parchment was turning to mush, so Toothless spit it out again. 'What?' he asked, unsure as to what that meant.
"Let me see, Fishlegs gave me translations but they aren't in line…" Maour ran his hand down the parchment. "Monarchy."
'Like the Queen,' Toothless spat. He hocked up a tiny blast and obliterated the parchment ball. 'No. I don't like any of them.' That hit a little too close to home. It might be accurate, what he did was a lot like what the Queen did, but he didn't care about that. He wasn't going to be anything like her, and having what he did named to refer to her would just make him dislike it even more.
"I don't know, it kind of works." Maour frowned. "Hey… Usurper?" He had dropped the light, joking tone he used for the other names.
Toothless considered it. The name poked at something at the back of his mind, a memory buried. The name kind of worked, playing with the idea that this was related to the Queen in some way, but making it sound like he was not akin to her so much as in opposition, turning the power to his own ends, which he liked… But it felt like he had been called as much before-
'Isn't that what the Skrill call us?' he rumbled, catching the reference.
"Yeah, that's where I got it," Maour agreed, sounding troubled. "I wonder if there's a connection."
'There could be.' The Eldurs had already said they didn't know anything useful about the Skrill and their reasons for hating Night Furies to the extent that they instantly went for the kill, and that extended to not knowing why the title of usurper applied. It could be a coincidence, or it could be connected.
'But,' he added, 'that sounds like something for the Eldurs to figure out. You can't ask a Skrill for answers.' Hopefully, Maour wouldn't get that idea back into his head.
"No, I can't, but I can give Aldir something to capture them with," Maour said. "If his tribe had one totally secured, I could ask."
'And get no answer,' Toothless snorted.
"We'll see if it happens. Anyway, about names…" Maour folded Fishlegs' parchment in half. "There are more here, but they're all like the ones I already told you."
'Crumple it up and give it to me,' Toothless requested. 'Let's just not name it, or call it something short and simple like "glow" or "blue".'
"I'm good with calling it 'the glow'," Maour agreed. "Just that, no fancy name, no putting it in your own language?"
'None of that.' Toothless lurched to his paws and walked over, taking the flat parchment from Maour and walking away with it.
"Hey!" Maour protested, picking up his crutches and getting to his feet. "No fair, I can't walk right!"
'I'm injured too!' Toothless called back. 'It's fair!' He circled back around to find that Maour's crutches had both instantly sank in the sand, leaving him sprawling and helpless. 'But it looks like I still win.'
"Laugh it up." Maour swiped at the parchment, but Toothless held it high out of reach. "I'm going to get that back."
'You can try,' Toothless taunted. This was much better than pondering things he would much rather leave in the past and forget about. It might all be important later, but for now, they were busy. Busy healing, busy with the hatchlings, busy having fun. Unless it all came crashing down on their shores, he was going to do his best to ignore the lingering questions and whatever their answers might be. At least for now.
Author's Note: So ends this particular story. Let me say, for the record, that I hope I never have to rewrite a story while posting it again. Expanding, fine, correcting plot elements, fine, writing from scratch if I must, but totally redoing a very flawed plot while simultaneously posting is really not fun. I would even say it's worse than just writing a story from scratch while posting regularly; at least with that I can assume I'm not being screwed over by my lazy past self too badly.
But I think I managed it.
Anyway, on to more positive things. This series certainly isn't anywhere near over, and there's more to come in this story. Next week, you'll get a stereotypical teaser chapter here, which will seem to tell you what's coming in the next story while in reality telling you nearly nothing and hiding all the real twists and turns firmly behind its back, as all real teasers should.
The week after that, you'll get the first of several 'deleted scenes' chapters. I have an ungodly amount of those, even after pruning the boring ones not worth showing, and I consider them proof of just how much crap my past self left for me to handle.
But what about the next story? Well, as it turns out, the next story has a completed rough draft, but that rough draft was written by the same lazy idiot who wrote the rough draft for this one, aka me of about two years ago (fun fact, the first two and a half books were all written in the same summer, one after another). As I just said, I'm not going to rewrite on the fly again, so it'll be a while before Living Freely begins posting in earnest. (Thankfully, that same lazy idiot did not begin writing the story after Living Freely, just plotting it, so I won't have to deal with him in the future after this.)
However, to ensure nobody thinks I'm abandoning this series (and to give myself a semi-solid deadline), I will say this. Living Freely will begin posting in early September, 2020, regardless of how much headway I've made on rewriting it between now and then. I might have rewritten the whole thing, or I might have a solid plot revision and the first five chapters, or anything in between, but whatever I have, it's beginning then. The posting frequency will be determined then based on how much I have ready.
So, for now, rest easy knowing that a teaser epilogue and five chapters of deleted scenes are coming (the last of the latter will be posted on the same day as Living Freely, so as to ensure everyone gets a reminder when that begins). I'll see you when the next story begins!