Author's Note: A nice, less frantic chapter to balance things out. Don't worry everyone, things are coming to a head soon…

You may also want to pay specific attention to small details, this chapter is a turning point of sorts.

Spark's face was the picture of sorrow conflicting with hope. He only had eyes for Hiccup, not even seeming to see Beryl. The world seemed to stop for a moment, emphasizing the stillness of the moment. Three Night Furies standing on a forgotten island, staring at each other. No one moved in that moment.

Hiccup recalled that he was still Ember. Right here, in front of his hatchling, who had apparently been so hurt by his death. Parenting instincts took over, and he pushed whatever reasons Spark had for past actions aside. That could be dealt with later. Right now...

Hiccup stepped forward, resting his chin on Spark's scrawny shoulder. He sighed as Spark broke down, head bowed as his body was wracked by sobs. A glance over his shoulder at Beryl conveyed Hiccup's intent. First, they would console him. Past grievances could be addressed afterward.

Spark sobbed uncontrollably, now frantically pushing his head against Hiccup's chest, as if to be sure he was real. Spark might have been trying to say something, but nothing came across except the understandably strong mix of belated grief and shock he was experiencing. This lasted for some time, while Hiccup offered what reassurance he could silently, knowing Spark wasn't coherent enough to understand anything more complex than a comforting purr.

Beryl watched with a mixture of empathy, apprehension, and sorrow. After a few minutes, he put a wing over Spark, easily reaching over his smaller brother.

That was something odd. Spark had not grown nearly as much as Beryl had. He was small, somewhere near two-thirds of Beryl's size, and not very muscular at all. While he might be the older brother, he was in no way the bigger of the two.

There was a moment in which Hiccup couldn't help but compare Spark to himself. Small, scrawny, no muscle.

Eventually, Spark's breathing slowed a bit, and the odd noise that for Furies passed as sobbing subsided, though it didn't stop entirely. He stepped closer, eyes closed and head still pressed against Hiccup's chest.

Spark's voice was broken and almost stretched, an odd tone that Hiccup only vaguely recognized as a stressed and aged version of the hatchling he knew. "This is too good to be true. Please do not let me wake up from this dream."

Hiccup's heart broke a little. "This is not a dream. You are awake."

Spark was clearly still skeptical. "That is what you and Dam say in my dreams too." He whined. "And then I wake up, and there is no one."

Beryl grumbled half-heartedly. "I could thrash you. That would make you believe."

Spark looked over, his eyes clouding with... was it sorrow, pain? "A nightmare, then. I have those too."

"Spark, we are both here... in one way or another." Hiccup winced as he recalled exactly how complex that explanation would be once Spark was coherent enough to ask the obvious question.

"I..."

"It's fine. You'll believe eventually." Hiccup sat down where he was, realizing they would be there a while. "We won't leave."

"We do have other things to do, you know." Beryl nodded at the horizon. "She got away, but the hunt isn't over yet."

"We lost her." Hiccup sighed. "I have no idea how to find her again. So it's not like we're wasting time."

"Fine." Beryl snorted, leaping into the air. "He's really messed up. I'll bring food."

That was an understatement. Hiccup watched Spark as his offspring slowly circled him, apparently making sure he was real from all angles, having not even responded to Beryl's comment. Once Spark had made a complete circle, Hiccup addressed him. "What?" There was an odd look in Spark's eyes, next to the pain and inexplicable guilt.

"You are hurt. That is new." Spark shook his head. "And where is Dam?"

Hiccup moaned. "Gone. Dead. This is not a perfect dream, but imperfect reality." He drew Spark's attention to his wounds. "These are as real as I am."

"But..." Spark whined, sitting down. "Beryl said you were both killed, but I thought you both escaped. What happened?"

"That is a very long story. " Hiccup debated inwardly for a moment on what to tell Spark, but he couldn't lie to him. A bit of the truth would suffice. "We did both die. But I am here now, alive and... mostly well."

"You are here." Spark tentatively purred, the sound almost foreign coming from him. "That in itself is too good to be real." It seemed the fact that Hiccup had admitted to dying had gone straight over his head. Maybe it would sink in later.

"It is," Hiccup responded. "Though the method is unusual. I will speak of that later." He recalled his promise to Beryl. "I need to ask you something."

"Anything." Spark's ears were perked, and his entire body betrayed his euphoria.

"What happened to separate you and Beryl?" He had heard Beryl's side. Now to hear how Spark saw it.

Spark flinched at the question, though he seemed willing to answer it. "We were searching for you and Dam. Beryl did not think you were alive, but I did, and we argued constantly. We ran into a group of dragons, carrying prey through the air over the sea. They saw us and flew towards us. Beryl flew at them." Spark whined piercingly, his ears flat against his head. "He was yelling at me, telling me to go away. He abandoned me. I thought he would come and find me once he was done hanging out with those other dragons, but he never came back, and I had to keep searching."

Hiccup put the two conflicting stories together. It made some sense, though Spark had clearly been messed up in the weeks immediately following the attack of Vithvarandi. Not very observant, not thinking clearly, in denial... understandable, all in all.

Such a misunderstanding. "He didn't abandon you. He was protecting you from them."

Spark shook his head. "Then why did he never come and get me?"

"They captured him, and he could not escape for many years." Hiccup met Spark's eyes. "He thought you abandoned him there. It was a massive misunderstanding."

"Really?" Spark's voice was dubious. "Are you sure?"

"He's very sure." Beryl landed behind them, bearing fish, his expression soft.

Hiccup wondered how long Beryl had been listening, unobserved. The fish was almost entirely dry, which implied a few minutes at least. As did the fact that Beryl looked so calm, instead of furious at Spark for 'abandoning' him. He must have heard what Spark thought had happened.

Beryl cautiously approached and dropped the fish in front of Spark. "We both misinterpreted the situation. I thought I could just fly away after they had captured me. I didn't know about the Queen."

"The Queen?" Spark seemed to be beginning to believe. His voice was quiet and he seemed overwhelmed. "Who is that?"

Beryl purred smugly. "Who was that, you mean. She's gone now." He faltered, looking over at Hiccup.

Considering Spark's fragile state, Hiccup felt it best not to overwhelm him any more. "That story can wait."

O-O-O-O-O

They spent the rest of the day together, mostly in silence. Spark seemed to be aware that they didn't want to overwhelm him, and refrained from asking questions. Hiccup would have begun explaining, but the wearied appearance of Spark, along with the wounds he himself and Beryl bore both sapped his strength and made him wary.

That was what eventually broke the silence. Hiccup was too bothered by Spark's almost neglected appearance to hold his tongue. "Spark?"

Spark looked up. "Yes?"

"What are you doing now? You don't look so good. Is the hunting bad?" The lack of muscle was worrying, but Hiccup was beginning to think he could see faint impressions of ribs beneath those pale yellow scales. In addition, the odd structure of the scales around Spark's eyes was entirely unexplainable. Something was off.

Spark shrugged his wings. "The hunting is fine. I just do not eat very much."

"Why not?"

That was met with a squirm, Spark not meeting Hiccup's eyes. "I usually do not feel like it."

"And the scales around your eyes?"

That question seemed to confuse Spark. "What about them?"

Hiccup tried to put what he could see into words. "They are strange. Almost as if they were half-grown, but that makes no sense." He was searching his mind for what could cause that, but nothing fit the symptoms he could see.

Spark frowned. "I do not know anything about that." He lapsed into silence, staring out into the distance.

That night Spark slept in the dirt cave, while Hiccup and Beryl stayed outside, giving him some space. Hiccup took the first watch, unable to be completely at ease even here.

O-O-O-O-O

About an hour into the first watch Hiccup heard something odd. It defied description, a strangled moan coming from...

He quickly walked into the small dirt cave, seeing something he had half expected. Spark was twitching in his sleep, moaning and turning. His back was to Hiccup, but it was clear. The nightmares he had mentioned were plaguing him once more.

Hiccup was about to wake Spark when said dragon rolled over, abruptly revealing what had been hidden by his back. Hiccup jerked back.

Spark's paws were just below his eyes, claws unsheathed and pulling at his face, narrowly missing his eyes. There were trickles of blood coming from where the scales had been pulled askew, cuts in the skin under them bleeding.

Suddenly the odd scales around Spark's eyes made a horrifying amount of sense. Hiccup barked sharply, a command to wake and be alert rolled into a single sound, one he had taught Spark and Beryl specifically for emergencies so long ago.

The effect was immediate. Spark bolted up, claws sheathing even as his eyes opened, wide and startled. Hiccup could hear Beryl moving towards the cave, having also been alerted.

Spark stared at him. "Wha-" He shook his head. "Thank you." A short whine escaped him. "How did you know?"

Hiccup spoke sadly. "I understand now what happened to your scales." He still wasn't sure if Spark fully understood what was happening. His offspring seemed unaware of the trickles of blood on his face.

Spark proved him wrong by grimacing. "I did not want to worry you. I do not do it intentionally, but sometimes I just wake up like this." He awkwardly pressed his face into the dirt wall, blotting most of the blood. "I cannot stop it."

Hiccup padded over and after a moment of indecision licked the remaining blood and dirt off carefully. "You can't. Scoot over." He gestured for Beryl to come in, crowding the small cave. "Now someone will notice as soon as the nightmares return. Sleep. We're here."

Spark purred tiredly, wordlessly thanking Hiccup. He curled up and went back to sleep almost immediately.

Hiccup spoke briefly to Beryl. "He is very troubled."

"Yes, he is. What are we going-"

"We're going to help him, of course." Hiccup glanced over at Spark. "He's your brother."

"I wasn't suggesting we leave him!" Beryl shook his head wildly, dismissing the idea. "That would probably kill him."

Hiccup agreed with that assessment. His heart was breaking, thinking of what Spark had gone through, to so powerfully haunt him even now. Losing his parents, and then his brother. Living with the traumatized memories, thinking he had been abandoned and left behind by family. Quite similar to what Beryl had gone through. Thinking back...

"You two are more alike than you think." Hiccup voiced the connection he had made. "Both traumatized by being abandoned."

"But I had an enemy to blame," Beryl growled. "And a friend to help me fix things."

"While Spark only had himself to blame." A thought ran through Hiccup's mind, a crazy plan. "Beryl, would you say revenge helped you cope?"

"Not really. You did more for that."

"So we do the same for Spark. Support him, help him out of this..." It was depression, from what Hiccup could tell. Not eating, sadness, refusing to fully believe things were getting better. Terrible nightmares. It all fit the bill. "It's not like I know how to follow Vithvarandi anyway."

"She'll come back someday if we don't kill her." Beryl shifted uneasily, facing the exit of the small dirt cave. "We can't let her get away."

"I promise bud, as soon as we know where to go I'll be the first to keep chasing. But right now we're stuck." That was the reality of their situation. No matter how much it frustrated him.

O-O-O-O-O

The night passed slowly. Hiccup ended up waking Spark four times over the remainder of the night, far more often than Beryl had thought would be necessary. No one got much sleep.

That didn't seem to matter to Spark, who rose with the sun, tired but... enthusiastic. About everything.

Beryl groaned, a tugging on his ear pulling him from light sleep only recently obtained. One eye sluggishly opened to see a scrawny yellow Night Fury motioning towards the coast.

"Come on!" Spark seemed happy, but there was a pitiful pleading undertone to his voice that didn't seem to go away as time passed. "We can go hunting before Sire wakes up."

Before Hiccup woke up. Beryl nodded slowly, not wanting to say no to his brother now, of all times, when they had just found him. He did, however, question one part of that plan. "Why not wait until he wakes and all go together?"

"I..." Spark glanced over at the sleeping orange Fury. "I want to thank him. For last night." He purred sheepishly. "You too, but hunting on my own takes too long."

Beryl rose to his feet, stretching his wings as they trotted towards the woods. "A good idea. We can talk as we go." He and Hiccup hadn't discussed how to explain the situation, but Beryl had a pretty good idea as to how to start. "I was grounded, for a while."

Spark stumbled and face-planted in the dirt. He slowly recovered, spitting dirt and staring wide-eyed at Beryl.

"For a while, I said. It was worth it." Beryl rumbled happily, taking the lead in searching for tracks or scents, speaking as he did. "I hate to imagine what would have happened if he had missed that night. I'd either be dead or still a slave. The war would continue."

His tone grew speculative, where before it had been confident. "Really, Ember wouldn't be around either. Vithvarandi would be..."

Well, no, she'd still be doing exactly what she ended up doing. Searching for a candidate for her twisted gifts, failing miserably every time. Killing to prolong her own worthless existence. "Never mind her. That part isn't my story to tell."

Spark jumped over a fallen log, trailing after Beryl eagerly. "What do you mean, shot down? By a fireball?"

"No, by a No-scaled-not-prey device." Beryl purred, despite the pain inherent in that memory. "He got a lucky shot. Lucky for both of us."

"Please stop speaking in riddles." Spark pleaded. "I do not think I can get any more confused."

"If you wish," Beryl spoke plainly as they hunted. He told of the time spent as a slave to the Queen, being shot down, the despair of not being able to fly, being trapped. By the time they had picked up a trail to follow, Beryl was speaking of the small human that he had tentatively trusted, and what followed. The finale of the hunt happened to correspond to the killing of the Queen, Beryl only pausing briefly to put the deer out of its misery.

Spark insisted on dragging the carcass back to the cave himself, listening intently as Beryl spoke at length about how the human place had changed after the death of the Queen. The many questions he had were forestalled by the carcass in his mouth.

Beryl stopped after speaking of convincing his human companion to carry weapons. "He thought one sharp metal claw was enough. I showed him otherwise." Beryl snickered. "He still doesn't know I was messing with him. But it did make me feel better, especially when he figured out how to carry all of them secretly."

Spark dropped the carcass a few feet away from the cave. His mouth freed, he immediately started with the questions. "He is really your best friend? The..."

"They call themselves humans." Beryl made an approximation of the word in growls. "Yes. You are my brother, and so is he, in a way."

"Then where is he now?" Spark winced at the question even as he spoke. "Is he still around?"

"That is a question with a very long answer." Beryl nodded at the cave. "Sire will answer it later."

"Okay..." Spark tried to change focus. "You let him ride you?"

"If I wanted to fly, yes. But it wasn't a burden or a chore. He enjoyed the flight as much as I did, and possessed no wings to take him up on his own. So I took him." Beryl frowned, speaking seriously. "I always thought he was a dragon in heart if not body." That was immensely ironic now, all things considered.

"Strange." Spark tilted his head, eyes narrowing slightly. "And you are not telling the whole story."

"No, I am not." Beryl walked over to the cave and barked loudly. He was answered by a deep grumble.

"We have food out here." Beryl paused and then grinned. "Move it or we'll only leave the head and guts for you."

Ember shot out of the cave, tackling Beryl as he exited. "Not happening." He announced smugly, before disengaging and taking a share of the food.

"Why not?" Spark took one of the aforementioned pieces and swallowed casually. "They are the best parts."

Hiccup, or as Spark saw him, Ember, shuddered. "Maybe to you. I'd rather my food not stare at me as I eat it."

They finished off the deer in companionable silence. Ember finished first. "Thank you both for hunting for all of us. I would have helped, you know."

"Which is why I did not want to wake you." Spark replied. "I wanted to thank you."

After a moment, Hiccup looked around almost uncomfortably. He seemed to be building up the courage to say something.

Beryl knew what it was. "Ember," he said carefully, "I brought Spark up to speed a little bit as we hunted."

Hiccup flinched. "Exactly how up to speed is he?"

"The last I told him was of arming my human friend so that he could protect himself," Beryl replied slyly.

"So basically, you left me the hard part." Hiccup smirked. "And I'm sure you left out the more embarrassing details of that time."

"I don't know what you're-"

Hiccup snorted, laughing at the affronted expression on Beryl's face. "Need I remind you of the eel incident, or the time you and," he faltered for a moment, "your human friend were accidentally stuck together, and had to sneak into the human nest to break apart?"

"No, those are not important," Beryl growled in embarrassment. "Anyway, you're up."

"That I am." Hiccup moved over to look Spark in the eyes, entirely serious. His son was fragile even now, and explaining this in the wrong way could break him. That was quite apparent.

Spark met his gaze steadily, eyes shining with that now slightly repressed euphoria tinged with lingering fear and disbelief. All caused by Ember's presence. It was like a building held up by a tangle of supports, some rotting and some entirely ineffective where they sat. To mess with them was to court disaster, but it had to be done.

"Spark, look carefully." Hiccup began. "And know this. I am here, now. Keep that in mind, no matter what I tell you happened in the past, or the circumstances behind how I am here."

Spark nodded fearfully, but his voice cracked. "If it is so bad, I do not want to know." He didn't seem at all ashamed to admit that. "Let me live in blissful ignorance."

Hiccup shook his head sadly. "Ignorance is never bliss for long. In this case, ignorance is very dangerous." Vithvarandi was a monster, one whose greatest strength was anonymity. Knowing she existed was mandatory, especially for Spark. And his own story was inextricably tied to her, so the two came together. No matter how hard the knowledge hit.

"So..?" Spark kept his head up, waiting.

"So, you saw your Dam and I die, that day on the beach." Regardless of what his son had chosen to believe at the time.

"I did. But-"

"You saw what happened. That dragon killed us both." Hiccup leaned forward, his nose just barely touching Spark's shoulder. "Remember, I am here now."

Spark inhaled deeply. "I know."

"So, you know that much. Beryl and his friend encountered someone they did not know, recently. Someone who promised to return the friend's leg."

Spark blinked. "No-scaled-not-prey can do that?"

Hiccup shook his head deliberately. "No. They can't. That is what made her so strange. The friend made a bad decision, and he and Beryl went to where she said, descending into a nightmarish tangle of tunnels and old things, eventually finding the same strange one in the center. She did something to the friend, promising him the ability to live forever if he'd just do a few things."

Spark flinched. "What did he have to do?" His voice conveyed how nervous the story was already making him.

Hiccup held eye contact. "Two things. First, she wanted him to be her immortal mate. Second, and much worse, she wanted him to kill Beryl. The power she gave him was the same she had." He inhaled. "The ability to take the body and memories of someone at the same time as taking their life."

Spark took a step backward, his eyes wide and wild. "And if he refused?" He glanced over at Beryl. "Clearly, he did."

"He would die without taking a life in the next few hours."

That information made Spark droop like a dying plant, his ears falling and eyelids dropping in sadness. Before anyone could speak, he whined quietly. "And so he died, which explains where he is now."

Beryl snorted. "He isn't that easy to kill." He motioned to Ember. "Keep listening."

Ember purred comfortingly. "The strange one was not happy when the friend said he'd die rather than kill Beryl. She attacked Beryl herself, to take his body. But the stolen body she used was one that Beryl didn't want to fight. Mine." He forged ahead, needing to get to the dubiously not-horrible resolution quickly. "She, it appears, had been that dragon so many years ago. Eventually, the friend by pure chance killed her while in my form."

Spark was eyeing him suspiciously now, seeing where this story was leading.

"Apparently, the first kill one makes with that power is... different," Ember spoke clearly, making sure Spark remembered this part if nothing else. "The memories merge, coexist. As if the one had lived the entire life of the other. Their personalities also merge, I think. The friend and Beryl escaped, and the stranger followed. She killed many in her misguided attempt to gain the acceptance of the friend."

Spark barked, interrupting the narrative before Ember could continue. "So, are you my Sire?" His voice was heartbroken but angry. "Or just a No-scaled-not-prey playing with his body?!"

Ember glared at him. "Did you not hear me? It is as accurate to say I, Ember, am playing with his body, were I to take that form. We," he emphasized, "are a single being now, somehow. Not just Ember, and not just Hiccup. Both. It took a while to find balance, but I am Ember. I am also Hiccup. We are not two minds fighting for control, or one using the other. We are one." It was quite hard to put into words, especially as he had only relatively recently found that balance. To be fair, explaining the strange, gradual process of merging two sets of memories and instincts wasn't something he really had experience doing.

Spark visibly wavered, eyeing Ember as if he'd suddenly sprout human hands or something similarly ridiculous. "I was right. I did not want to know." He rumbled sadly. "Now I cannot even look at you without suspicion. How can I take your word about which of you is in control, or, as you say, both of you together?"

Ember held eye contact even now, and moved closer again, forcing Spark to look him in the eye up close. "Look at me and tell me I am not your Sire. Listen to me speak, remember the last day. At any point did I seem like another person?"

After a moment Spark shook his head angrily. "No! But-"

"Then why do you care?" Ember asked softly. "The alternative is that I remain dead. This is as close as anyone has ever gotten to a second chance, in my knowledge. And unlike the strange one's victims, my other half is fine with this. I am fine with this. The strange one took my life, but Beryl's friend gave it back, gave me a second chance. We are similar, and we share the same priorities. I do not regret this merging." Speaking of his nebulous state of existence as two people merged into one was giving him a headache. At some point in the conversation he'd switched from thinking of himself as Hiccup to Ember, but that didn't mean anything now. They were at equilibrium, truly inseparable now. Both names referred to the merged being. But explaining that was nigh on impossible to do coherently, it seemed.

"I guess..." Spark sighed. "Beryl, does he speak the truth?" He looked over at his brother.

Beryl grinned. "That's the best explanation he's ever given, and the most accurate. I was there for everything and saw the progression. He's right."

"Then... I will accept that." Spark's eyes flashed with amusement. "Sire?"

"Yes?" Ember rumbled curiously.

"Can you show me the other form you have? Just so I know what it looks like." Spark backed up. "I feel like I should know."

Ember sighed dramatically, secretly amazed and relieved that Spark hadn't broken at some point in the explanation, and had accepted his odd state of existence.

Actually, recalling Spark's euphoria, maybe it wasn't so strange that he had blindly accepted with very little objection. Ember suspected that if he had told his son he had gone to the moon and held the sun between his paws Spark would have done his best to believe. Whatever explanation allowed Ember to be real and present, Spark would have clung to. That he was only now asking for proof, after visibly accepting Ember's story as the truth, spoke of a need to believe.

"If I must." Ember triggered the change, closing his eyes as the blue flames covered them.

Spark gasped as the flames receded to reveal the human body Ember also saw as his own, the still scrawny human boy with one less leg and green eyes. Spark nudged him carefully, wordlessly inquiring.

Ember laughed. "Still me. And I can still understand you."

The next few minutes were spent with Spark investigating the first No-scaled-not-prey he'd ever seen up close. Ember cooperated, showing Spark everything from his prosthetic leg to the knives he kept on him.

Beryl participated a bit, but as the minutes passed he abruptly grew quiet, humming to himself, deep in thought.

Ember looked over at Beryl after a bit. "What are you doing?"

"Thinking," Beryl responded absently, staring into space. "Something is nagging at the back of my mind, but I cannot-" His eyes widened, and he barked triumphantly. "That was it!"

"What was?"

Beryl winced at something. "I know how to track Vithvarandi, I think... but you might not like it."