Hey everyone, sorry for the delay. Reason; looking for a new job. Already had 7 job interviews so far and it is starting to get really depressing. Mostly because I am looking for something where I can work with Symfony (it's a PHP (programming language) framework) and only end up finding places where they use something else. Well at least so far I haven't been invited just because I am a woman in the programming world...

So my dramatic life aside, a new chapter. The title is very much a give away. Also I got a couple of questions for you guys to help me decide on something. I got this story almost completely planned in my head... story line wise that is. But I need to decided on a few things. So here we go:
- Camicazi and Thuggery will get dragons, but I don't know which ones? ( You can use dragon species from the book series as well, I got the uncomplete book of dragons XP)
- Of course those dragons need names, any ideas?
- Shall I include Heather? (I have some ideas for it, just not completely worked out, like what her purpose in the story would be. Don't want it to be random, so far everyone has a purpose in the story and I like to keep it that way so if you got ideas, shoot)

On a side note; I read parts of my story back and noticed mistakes. I will probably fix those in the upcoming weeks, not sure of you will get emails of that, but it's just fixing mistakes. See one? Let me know

I will try to upload the next chapter by the end of June, but I'm not promising anything here. Getting a new job is important. Got bills to pay... and my ridiculous hobbies of collection pokemon cards, pony figures, games and gaming consoles...

Rogue Deity Master: Well I like a bit of chaos, it would be boring otherwise XP.

Tillerton: Oh don't you worry about that one. That is going to happen soon ). Also I hope you will like the fluff (and the reason it is sort of hold back) in this chapter. Believe me I am even frustrating myself here.

Vivi-ntvg: Peelers will have a role in this story actually 8D. Also Hiccup can walk, just not without pain (and he's stubborn about that so he pushes himself) or for long pariods of time. Standing is also a problem.

Oblivioux: I do that sometimes too. It's hard to stop reading when a story is good.

Carl Solo: I will think about it that is for sure.

Chapter 21: (some) Romance in the sky

Astrid gaped at him as if he had just slapped her in the face for some reason she didn't understand. Her flying Toothless? How did he get from learning more about dragons to her flying Toothless? Aside from that it sounded insane. She had seen that complicated contraption that was supposed to help Toothless fly and there was no way she would ever understand its workings.

"Have you lost your mind?" she eventually said.

He simply chuckled. Chuckled! She didn't think it was funny in any way.

"I thought I already had the day I decided to befriend Toothless," he grinned.

At this Astrid rolled her eyes without a comment. Yes, perhaps he had lost his mind that day.

"Astrid, please," he then suddenly pleaded fully standing himself again.

He walked over to her with a pair of begging eyes looking at her.

"I can't fly Toothless, but I really hate seeing him grounded this long because of me," he muttered as the pleading expression turned into one of guilt.

She looked over to Toothless who now was the one to roll his eyes. Apparently he was okay with being grounded as long as Hiccup would recover. It was still hard for her to comprehend how close those two were. Of course she knew they both cared a lot about each other, but she only just now realized that Toothless hadn't made a fuzz about the whole grounded part. It was just Hiccup who was making a fuzz about that, though she could understand why he felt guilty about it.

"Fine," she sighed after Hiccup kept looking at her with begging eyes.

It wasn't like she was going to learn how to work with that contraption in just one day. Besides, he looked rather cheerful when he brought it up so she would humor him. A grin appeared on his face once more and just when she was about to go get the tailfin and saddle, she suddenly got hugged. As suddenly as it had happened, as suddenly he let go. Face red, stumbling over his words as he said he was going to put his riding clothes on before running as quick as his left leg let him. Baffled Astrid stood there for a moment, letting the event sink in before quickly getting the two required items before Hiccup found out where she had hid them.

She waited with both Toothless and Stormfly and when Hiccup reappeared, he was wearing the same clothes he had been wearing when she shot him out of the air. What surprised her was Toothless giving him a glare. Followed by saying something she didn't understand, but apparently the two were having a disagreement. In the end Toothless huffed and Hiccup went into the barn to get a couple of ropes.

"What do we need that for?"

"You'll see," he just smiled and started walking towards the forest, "come on."

Astrid noticed the small limp he was having and really wanted to tell him to take it easy. Perhaps not walk at all. Maybe it was best to wait till tomorrow with this whole flying thing. Yet, seeing him a much more cheerful mood made her keep her mouth shut. If flying was what would make him happy, she would gladly give him that. Even if that meant she would probably have to carry him home tonight.

After a long walk Hiccup sat down against a tree, trying to hide how much his leg was actually hurting, but Astrid saw right through it. She gave a glare, but got an uncomfortable smirk back and before she could tell him off, he pointed to a wooden pole at the edge of de ledge the were on.

"Tie this rope around that pole and then on Toothless saddle once I put it on him," he instructed her as Stormfly lay down next to him and decided to take a nap.

He threw one of the ropes he had brought along at her and turned to Toothless. Tying the rope to the pole was then in a matter of seconds so she turned to Hiccup. He swiftly put the saddle on the dragon's back and in only a few minutes, Toothless was completely set for flying. The black dragon hopped over to Astrid with excitement who then tied the rope to the saddle.

"Alright, now sit on his back."

Astrid did as instructed and waited for Hiccup to tell her what to do next. What she hadn't expected was for him to tell Toothless to spread his wings and float. Shocked, she tightly got hold on the saddle, but quickly noticed they were just floating. The wind on this ledge was rather strong, she then thought, finally understanding what they were doing. This was a save way for her to learn how to control the paddles. Suddenly getting excited herself, she moved it around, getting an instant response from the dragon below her who was going to the left. She then operated it by moving it into the opposite direction, making Toothless turn right. Playing around with it, quickly earned her a chuckle from Hiccup. She threw him a glare, which he returned with a grin.

"Not that hard at all, right?" he smiled and signed Toothless to land.

To Astrid's disappointment Toothless did as told, but tried to hide this from Hiccup, who now came over telling her to look at the tailfin. For the next half hour he went on about the position of the tailfin and how the left and right could turn into sharper turns with a certain setting of the stirrup. He told her how often he had nearly killed himself by having those settings on default, so they now required a switch to be turned for safety reasons. When she tried it out, she was nearly flung of the saddle by the sharp turn Toothless then made. Hiccup snickered as she let herself slide of the saddle, glad to not have fallen.

"You're lucky the wind is not nearly as strong as it was when I tried this out," he sat as he scratched the black dragon under its chin, "the rope snapped and we were blown away a few feet. Got my safety rope jammed too."

"Safety rope?" Astrid repeated and studied the saddle for anything that would match that description, yet found no loose rope anywhere.

She then noticed he had fumbled around with his outfit and held up a piece of rope that had some metal at the end. At first she thought it looked like a hook, but then noticed it was more like a loop thing with no opening, though it was slightly thicker on one part. He rolled an apparently loose piece down and flicked part of it open. Now it did look like a hook… a bit at least. How in the world had he come up with that?

"By no means is this the original design of course. Let's say trial and error… painful error, got me to this," he explained looking somewhat uncomfortable as he admitted that mistakes were made, "same goes for the saddle and tailfin. I actually have one design of tailfin that allows Toothless to fly alone. Should have brought it with me when we flew to England."

"England?" Astrid said the moment he dropped that word, "where's that?"

Was it a town, a village? Where was it? She was clueless yet curious. Hiccup however didn't seem to be willing to share that. It was obvious he had heard her, he had winched ever so slightly when she had repeated the word. He however ignored her question and went on synchronization between dragon and rider. At first she was annoyed by him ignoring her question, but decided that she just had to be patient with him when it came to talking about his travels. Though her curiosity was starting to get hard to keep under control.

Five minutes later he instructed her to sit on Toothless back again and he started telling her which way to go. It was a good thing Toothless still had all four paws on the ground, or they would have gone all over the place with the way she was messing up as Hiccup called out to go left, right, up or down. As soon as she started to get the hang of it, which by all means took at least an hour, he started to go faster or shout left right after already having told her to go left. It confused her to no end and made her really want to punch him. Throwing him glares resulted only in her messing up more. He was sitting on the ground again, at points chuckling at her frustration when he told her what she had done was wrong. At long last she managed to not hear the word 'wrong' for quite some time, but when Hiccup told Toothless to go up she was startled and nearly fell of the dragon's back.

"Can't I get a break here?!" she complained as she clung to the saddle, "I know you want to get Toothless back in the air but I'm getting exhausted!"

Hiccup mumbled to Toothless to land again and thankful Astrid slid of the saddle. Once standing she immediately sunk through her legs, now realizing just how exhausting she actually was. Toothless looked alarmed, so she gave the dragon a smile before letting herself fall back in the grass. Soon enough Hiccup looked down with a worried and apologetic expression. He seemed to have crawled over to her on hand and knees as this was the position he was still in. She wondered if it wasn't painful, because of his injured leg.

"Sorry, I'm used to it, forgot you're not," he mumbled as he sat back down, "you okay?"

Astrid sat up and hit his arm, hard... well, not too hard, she didn't want to injure him, but hard enough for him to feel some pain. Sure enough he gritted his teeth and rubbed the sore spot as he looked somewhat confused and annoyed at her.

"What did you do that for?" he asked, but Astrid turned her back to him.

She got to her feet and started stretching herself. After sitting on the back of a dragon that long, being told to do certain movements with the stirrup she had grown stiff. Mostly because she wasn't exactly relaxed when trying her best to do the positions Hiccup told her to do with quick speed.

"It's a good thing I told you not to use it with that leg of yours, damn mine hurts," she said, looking at him.

Hiccup simply rolled his eyes and fell back in the grass, closing his eyes. She watched him for a while, he seemed rather relaxed like this.

"How is your leg doing anyway?"

"It's fine," came as a quick reply with little thought to it.

"Hiccup, I'm serious. You were limping earlier-" she started but was quickly interrupted by him.

"I know what I'm capable of!"

"Do you also know your limits?" she spat back.

They were glaring at each other, until Hiccup looked away by rolling to his side. He kept quiet and didn't even respond to Toothless. Astrid sighed and sat back down in the grass.

"I'm not trying to hold you back, I just want to be sure you're able to walk tomorrow as well… without too much pain."

She got no response, which really frustrated her. Whenever she got to close he would clam up and refuse to talk. Shutting her out. And he was pretty damn good in it as well. After ten minutes of waiting for any kind of response or anything she got fed up with it and kicked his behind that was turned towards her. Before he could roll around and glare at her, she had walked over to Toothless who seemed to enjoy what had just done to his rider. After climbing on the black dragon's back again and going over the working of the stirrup, she soon heard Hiccup telling Toothless to go up. As if nothing happened he returned to commanding her what direction to go, though sounded slightly annoyed. It took him a while before the annoyance was completely gone, but Astrid didn't care too much about it. She was just glad that she was doing well with whatever command he was throwing her way and that seemed to please him too.

Hiccups watched how Astrid followed his instructions. When she hadn't messed up for half an hour straight, he got to his feet as Toothless landed.

"Let's give it a try in the air, no twist and turns or whatever kind of stunts, got that Toothless," he said as he gave his scaled friend a look.

"Pff, boring… but fine," he huffed.

"Wait, you mean we're actually going up in the air… as in right now?"

"Unless you want to rest first," Hiccup shrugged as he untied the ropes, "though you won't have to change the stirrup as often as you did so far. Just in the beginning to get up in the air, after that it's mostly gliding."

He watched her pondering what to do and hoped his behavior from earlier wasn't going to backfire on him. He didn't even understand himself why he acted like that. No, that wasn't true. He did, he just didn't want to admit to it. He didn't want her too close. In fact she already was way too close. Whenever she would show she actually cared about him, as in really cared about him, he wanted to run for the hills and hug her tightly at the same time. Instead of doing either of those things he would end up shouting and shutting her out as much as possible. It had many reasons why he acted the way he did, simply because he was confused and absolutely terrified of a repeat of events or being betrayed in the end. At the same time he was drawn to her in such a way that it was hard to resist and it was that that confused and terrified him the most. Sure he had a crush on her in the past and banned her out of his thoughts as much as possible when he left Berk, which hadn't been much of a success actually. He had found love during his travels, lost it too in a most cruel way. Yet this… this was entirely different he realized now. Different from the crush he used to have, watching her from a distance, not even daring to really say much to her. Different from the one he had once loved and lost after leaving Berk. He didn't want it though, no matter how much his mind would wander and imagine things, no matter how nice she would be, not even if she were to kiss him right here right now. He didn't want it. He didn't want to loose someone he cared deeply about again, so all he could think of was shutting her out, not matter how hard it might be. He would leave Berk and with that he would leave her. She wasn't going to follow him, he was sure of that, she was too loyal to her friends and family.

No matter his decision, he was still stuck with her on a daily basis. Well more like twenty-four seven really, since he slept in the same room with her. It was hard to deal with, annoying at points, because he had moments where his body seemed to make its own decisions. Though at the same time it felt nice to actually have someone to talk to… aside from a dragon that was. On top of that he really needed her, right now mostly because he was graving to go up in the air. It wasn't just for Toothless' sake, he too was missing the wind blowing though his hair as they soared through the clouds.

"I guess if that is the case we can leave now," Astrid finally said.

Hiccup couldn't help but smile at that, at long last he was going to be up in the air again, even if he wasn't the one in control this time, he couldn't wait. He quickly woke up Stormfly, since Astrid wasn't sure about how safe it was to wake a sleeping dragon. After strapping Astrid in the safety mechanism, he climbed on Toothless, right behind her. He let that dawn on him for a moment. It wasn't often he sat behind someone on the back of the dragon, especially not behind someone he had love interest in. Why did he suggest this again? Right he wanted to go up in the air. He want Toothless to stretch his wings again. After an inner monologue with himself to convince him he wasn't going to mess up… badly, he wrapped his arms around the girl.

"Ready?" he asked trying to act as normal as possible, while being nervous as hell.

"Yes, so what do I do."

He instructed her on what the settings of the stirrup had to be and when she was done told her to hold on tight before giving Toothless the green light to go up in the air. The familiar feeling in the pit of his stomach made him grin like an idiot as they left the ground behind them. Stormfly following them. They kept on going up in a nearly vertical angle, which made Astrid repeat 'oh Thor' over and over as she clung to the saddle. He instructed her to move the peddles, but she seemed to be too focused on the steep ascent they were making.

"Astrid, if you want to go into smooth gliding you have to change the stirrup," he practically shouted to get her attention.

She finally complied and soon enough, though probably not soon enough to Astrid, they were gliding smoothly.

"You could have warned me about that," Astrid breathed still trying to calm down.

Hiccup chuckled as he finally loosened his grip on her. He could tell she was completely freaked out by it, her heartbeat told him that much. He noticed her knuckles were white from her hold on the saddle.

"Sorry, won't happen again," he said as he leaned backwards, looking down.

He really missed this. He might not be flying Toothless himself, but this was still amazing. After enjoying the view from up high and the wind blowing through his hair for a while he looked over to Astrid. She seemed focused on the stirrup and what was directly in front of her. With a grin he shook his head, thinking it was very typical to her not to enjoy the trip in itself. It made him think about her flying Stormfly, he in fact hadn't seen her fly said dragon.

"Would you loosen up a little and just enjoy?" he said as he sat against her again.

His arms stretched over to her hand, making her let go of the saddle and spread her arms into the wind.

"Hiccup!" she protested.

"Relax, you're on the safety rope."

She really didn't seem comfortable, pulled her arms loose and got hold of the saddle again. Somewhat disappointed he wrapped his arms around her.

"Didn't you say you jumped of Stormfly's back to catch me? Why so nervous about not holding on to the saddle?"

"I actually also fell of Stormfly when we were flying through a storm," Astrid mumbled uneasy, "she caught me, but… well Toothless can't fly when no-one is on his back because of the prostatic tailfin."

She had a point there, after all he had fallen of Toothless back plenty of times, which had nearly killed them both. Though he hadn't expected that she had actually fallen of dragons back as well.

"She caught you, didn't she?"

He got a reply in the form of a lot and once again laid his hands on hers, though this time not to force her to let go. Instead he gave her instructions to change the stirrup. Confused she responded to his command and they slowly climbed this time. As the got close to the clouds, Hiccup softly pinched in her right hand.

"Never wondered about touching the clouds?" he whispered in her ear and saw Toothless look over to her as well.

With her right hand she let go of the saddle and let him bring up her hand to the white formations of clouds above them. As they kept on flying their hands went through the clouds. Astrid looked around surprised when she touched it, pulled her hand back and looked at it.

"It's wet, it's just water," she muttered.

"So that's what it was, I could never figure it out," Hiccup grinned at her, earning a soft hit on his arm before held up her arm to touch the clouds again.

Soon she let go of the saddle with her other hand as well.

"This is awesome. I never flew this high," she beamed as she pulled her arms back down.

"I have never seen you flying Stormfly, not since my amnesia is gone and I… moved in," he muttered those last words knowing he started blushing as he thought about actually living with Astrid in the same house. Heck they shared a room! It was wrong on so many levels yet exciting so much more.

She dropped her arms and held on the saddle once more.

"I only flew with her to find you and then once after that, okay," she answered, keeping her eyes in front of her as if they were to fly into a tree or something that high up in the sky.

"Why?"

"Why is this so important to you all of a sudden?"

"I'm curious to know what side you are on."

"Side?" she repeated and looked over her shoulder to him.

"Yes, side. Are you on the side of dragons or them?"

"Them? There's a them? Hiccup, them are my family, my friends… your family. If I really need to choose a side it's that of what is the right thing to do."

"And would that be?" Hiccup asked.

It was what he had thought for a long time, but really stopped believing in that way of living. He had ended up nearly dead multiple times because of it, not to forget about the horrible feeling that sometimes came after doing what you thought was right.

Astrid remained silent for a while and he thought that he had asked the wrong question. Now they were going to have to sit there in silence the rest of the flight. However, she let out a sigh and started speaking again.

"I haven't figured it out yet. I know killing dragons isn't the answer. They are forced to do what they do, I know that now. But I also believe that forcing others to just believe one on their word that dragons are harmless is wrong too. Everyone on Berk has seen the dangers, has seen death, has lost people because of this… war between humans and dragons. I guess…. I guess the only way I see right now would be giving people time to… adjust…"

"I guess that answers the side question, but what about flying Stormfly? You seem to enjoy yourself an awful lot up here in the sky and from what you told me, you made some interesting moves in order to knock me of Toothless. I mean jumping of a dragon after actually falling off one, you sound as crazy as me," he chuckled and heard her let out a snort yet came with no answer.

He placed his head on her shoulder and since he was holding her so tightly he could feel she was surprised by his move.

"Astrid… what are you afraid of?"

"I'm not afraid!" she was quick to response.

Hiccup wasn't convinced. He had felt her stiffen slightly, saw her clenching the saddle ever so slightly when she replied.

"Then why aren't you flying with Stormfly more often?"

"I'm… not afraid of her or flying with her…" she said in a mutter after a while, "I… just don't want to deal with… you know."

He knew. He knew very well. It had been his daily life for a long time.

"It's already bad enough as it is, I don't want to provoke anything. I mean… when I escaped from being exiled over 'siding with dragons' as your father put it, people were angry. Sure I flew on Stormfly's back again soon after. Then she started helping out my dad with the fishing, because of all the raids that had happened that was more important than me flying with her. So I was fine with that."

She let out a sigh and glanced over to her blue scaled friend flying beside them.

"I never cared about the opinion of people. Ignored their shouting, their glares. But you saw what they are doing now, they are even attacking me! Years I have been protecting them and this is what I am getting back…"

"It starts getting to you after a while, doesn't it," Hiccup muttered, thinking about his own experiences.

She simply nodded as he leaned back, enjoying the wind blowing through his hair. She looked over her shoulder to him, giving him a guilty look though he was clueless as to why.

"At least I'm not alone in this, like you were."

Ah, that was it. He shrugged, "Ya well, what can you do about it."

"I'm serious Hiccup, you have been through this for years, it changed you, made you think you were a good for nothing walking disaster."

He stared at her with a frown. Those words were too specific. Too close to thoughts he used to have. She noticed his look of distrust and turned to stare at the clouds in front of her again whilst talking.

"When you had amnesia I tried anything I could think of for you to get your memory back. Which wasn't easy, because I didn't know you well. One of my attempts let us to your dad's place, basically your room where you managed to find an old journal of yours."

"You read that?!" Hiccup immediately accused her, knowing exactly what she was talking about.

"You told me to after reading it yourself, saying you didn't want to remember any of it."

She read it. Crap. Crap. Crap! How much had she read, he wondered as he felt his privacy had been violated. Granted he didn't know even half of what he had written in it of the years. He could guess; beaten up by Snotlout and the gang, accused of things he hadn't done, messing up something, his dad being a jerk, take your pick it was sure to be in there. Multiple times. But what he was certain of was also in there was his most inner thoughts about his feelings for Astrid.

"So you read it?" he asked monotone, "I didn't remember a thing so you thought it was fine to read it?"

She looked over her shoulder again with a much more guiltier look he had seen on her face so far.

"Hiccup, I'm sorry. I didn't want to, but I had to somehow figure out what to do to make you remember who you were."

"And you thought that telling me on the back of Toothless, high up in the air was a good moment to mention that?"

She slowly shook her head as he pulled himself backwards, away from the girl as he gave her a scowl. Before she could say another word, he let himself fall of Toothless.

Astrid gaped when she saw him fall down. Her heart stopped for a moment as she freaked out over the fact that apparently Hiccup was suicidal. Why had she been so stupid to mention the journal?! She noticed Stormfly diving for him, but before her nadder friend could grab him, the boy himself seemed to have suddenly sprouted wings and was just easily floating on the wind. Hearing Toothless grumble something she tried to calm herself. Not suicidal… just mad. Okay, him being mad at her wasn't good either, but much better than him willing to die.

Her heart was still beating fast and that bastard was just acting like a flying human was the most normal thing ever. Damn him, she thought as she stared at him. After a while he landed on Stormfly's back and guided the nadder to a nearby island. Apparently they were going to land. Land, that single word repeated through her mind a few times before a second wave of panic started. How was she going to land, he never told her what the settings for landings were!

"Uh, Toothless…?" she started, who roared something she couldn't understand, but he too seemed to understand the mess they were suddenly in.

She remembered the settings for down and quickly changed the stirrup, messed up, making them go up instead. After a slap of one of Toothless ears, she quickly changed again, this time the correct setting, and they went down, much faster than she had intended for them to go. In her panic she basically went over every setting, making them zigzag and go up and down multiple times, before plummeting in a the bushes on the island. Toothless was quickly back to his feet and marched over to his rider, however Astrid was still stuck to said dragon with the safety rope and was just dragged along. Her attempts to get herself free were in vain. Toothless ended up knocking Hiccup down whilst what seemed like cursing at him. Then the dragon dropped himself on top of his rider in such a quick movement, Astrid was brought down as well and fell flat in the sand. Face first.

"Enough!" she shouted as she pushed herself up, catching the attention of the two, "at least let me undo this whole safety rope thing!"

Hiccup watched her and then started laughing and as he did so unhooked her. Relieved to be freed she sat down in the sand and dusted the dirt of her face and out of her hair.

"Those things were private, Astrid," she heard Hiccup say eventually as he was pushing Toothless snout away.

His expression was solemn, betrayed even. She couldn't blame him. He knew what he had written down and she had read his most secret feelings.

"I know, I'm sorry."

He grumbled, went with his hands through his hair and then gave her an angry look.

"I'm sorry isn't going to undo anything. Would you like it if I read anything you wrote down in private?"

"I don't keep a journal," she muttered, which only seemed to piss him off more.

He turned his attention to Toothless instead and started talking to him in dragonese. Astrid sighed as she tried thinking of something to fix this mess. As she had told him she didn't keep a journal, so that wasn't something she could give him to read. Beside she didn't have any secrets, well not as big as everything that was in that journal of his. She looked back over to him and found him lying in the sand, giving the sky a glare as if it had wronged him. She let out a sigh as the paragraphs she had read swirled in her mind.

"How much of it did you read?" he suddenly asked, stirring her from her thoughts.

For a moment she frowned as she thought of her answer. She decided that being honest was the best way to go in this situation, even if that meant he would be angrier at her afterwards.

"Front to back… thanks for praising my abilities, worked hard on that," she added to hopefully ease the atmosphere.

She gave him a sideway look, finding him blushing but heard him let out a snort as well. He sat up straight, but avoided looking at her.

"Well I know why you were working so hard…"

She stared at him in disbelieve. How would he know why she was always training, trying to the best at her age group? It didn't make any sense for him to know, they weren't close. They had rarely talked in the past.

"Fin Hofferson," he then nearly whispered with a soft smile.

Her eyes grew wide as her uncle's name was spoken. No-one ever uttered his name with her nearby, so it shocked her. What shocked her even more were the following words that left Hiccup's mouth.

"After what happened with the flightmare you changed. You put full focus on bringing back honor to the Hofferson clan. Training day and night. You should know that your uncle didn't freeze in fear in the heat of the fight, like people had said. He was literally frozen for a moment by an attack of the flightmare."

She tried to make sense of what was happening and what Hiccup just told. How did they get from her having read his journal and him being mad because of that to her uncle? As she kept on staring at him not sure about what to even say or do, he told her everything he knew about the flightmare. Soon enough she too had to agree a dragon like that couldn't have killed her uncle, as she heard it barely having any teeth and eating glowing algae. It froze people so it could run and apparently it followed its food source which just happened to run right through Berk.

"I have to tell dad when we're back home," she mumbled at the end of his tale and looked over to the ocean, seeing the sun setting already.

It made her jump up as she realized what time it was. Soon her mother would serve supper.

"We have to go back," she urged and gave Hiccup some sort of panicked look for she didn't want to be late for food.

He chuckled and shook his head. No?! Oh hell no. They were leaving. Now. Astrid stepped to him grabbed his hand and tried getting him to his feet, yet instead was pulled down in his embrace. Too surprised about this, she did nothing.

"We will never be back in time for dinner, just relax. We'll eat something here before going back. You can put the blame on me if your parents ask why you weren't home in time."

He pushed her back a bit, so she was just sitting on his lab as she tried to keep up with what was going on. He actually willingly, not being driven by a fevered mind, hugged her!

"Also, now you don't have to help your mother with peeling potatoes," he snickered.

Feeling slightly insulted she punched him in the stomach, before pinning him down as he chuckled.

He stared at the beauty that was glaring at him whilst sitting on top. Her glare soon softened as he tried very hard to keep himself from doing things that were entering his mind. If this continued, he would soon end up losing control over himself. She might be sitting on top of him, that didn't mean she had the upper hand. After a minute or so she let go of him, though remained seated.

"Are you still mad?" she asked, "I really only read it to understand you and find a way to make you get your memories back."

Was he mad? Actually that was a very good question. He wasn't entirely sure if he was. Part of him perhaps, his privacy had been invaded. Yet he somehow felt better, knowing she knew everything about him now. Even if she knew about him having a crush on her. She didn't know he still thought of her that way. He would have been mad if anyone else had read it probably… except for perhaps his grandfather of Gobber. But Astrid?

He sat up, realizing how close her nose was to his and tried to come to terms with his feelings. Eventually he let out a sigh as he looked away from her.

"I don't know… partly, yes, but… at least you're being honest about it," he mumbled.

Then he felt her arms wrapped around him as he was caught in a tight embrace. Sure he had hugged moments earlier, simply because one it had been easy and two he couldn't keep himself under control at that moment. Right now, being hugged by her, it took all of his willpower not to kiss her. Thor he wanted to, but he had no plans of staying in Berk and doing something like that to her before leaving, he wouldn't do that to her. Nor himself, it would haunt him the rest of his life if he did. So he complied to hugging her back, taking in her scent and when they let go of each other he made sure to remember the feeling of her arms wrapped around him. There was absolutely no way she would ever hug him again.

She went out with Stormfly to hunt for fish for their meal and Hiccup could see how much she actually enjoyed to be on a dragon's back. He got up and gathered some would so to roast the fish, though he kind of dreaded having to eat fish now. Sure enough Astrid noticed that the moment she offered him a fish that was done by pretty much slapping it in his face after he teased her a bit over he she apparently was able to at least cook fish. He had quickly pushed the fish away and refused it the moment she offered it the normal way.

"Hiccup, you need to eat more than just apples, bread and light chicken broth."

He simply frowned at the fish, cursing at himself for not bringing food with them. Whenever it came to flying he tend to forget everything else. It's how he ended up at the nest and now being forced to eat fish.

"I could pre chew it for you, hatchling," Toothless joked.

"Stop making things worse," Hiccup snapped back at the dragon as he tried to get the image and taste, for he had once had it after all, out of his mind.

With a deep sigh he finally took the fish and took a small bite, mostly because he was hungry.

"I really don't understand why you're so afraid of eating," he heard Astrid mutter after which she took a bite of her fish.

"If you want me to stop eating altogether right now, please continue on that topic," he told her and with that it was dropped, to which Hiccup was very thankful.

After their meal it was time to leave.

"No jumping off again," Astrid warned him as he sat down behind her.

Rolling his eyes he promised he wouldn't and they took off into the night sky. Hiccup looked down to the sea and noticed ice forming as he kept himself in place by holding on to the sides of the saddle. Apparently winter had finally arrived. He turned his attention back in front of him when he felt Toothless level out.

"What are you doing?" he asked Astrid who seemed confused by his question, "higher. I want to show you something."

"What could possibly be so high up sky to show me, aside from clouds," Astrid sighed, yet let Toothless climb once more.

"Well something I am pretty sure you never bothered to look at," he chuckled, "seeing as you always focus on your goal. You miss a lot whilst traveling if you don't stop for a moment and just look around you. "

Astrid looked over her shoulder, probably trying to make sense of his words. They would soon make sense, he knew.

They entered the clouds, but soon left them behind. Hiccup looked up to the many stars lighting the night sky. Know how to use them to navigate to wherever he wished to go. Astrid however seemed focused on the fact that she now was wet from the clouds and gave the water formations below a scowl. Chuckling a little, for he had predicted she wouldn't look, he leaned fully against her.

"Would you just look up already," he said as he gently pushed her chin up.

"Stars?" she muttered confused, "Hiccup I have seen stars before."

"Just wait, you'll see it soon," he replied leaning backwards again, whilst realizing that trying to keep her on a distance was getting really hard, especially when on Toothless' back up in the air.

So to keep his hands to himself, he got hold on the sides of the saddle again.

The nightfury let himself glide on the wind with Stormfly beside him. For a few minutes they flew in silence, then the sky broke into colors and Astrid gasped as the colors danced around. Not knowing where to look she turned form left to right, trying to take it all in.

"What is this?" she asked giving Hiccup a questioning look.

"The northern lights, beautiful isn't it," Hiccup smiled at her before looking up at the sky, "they are something you can only see here in the north. Kinda missed them. Vid would love to see them."

"Who's Vid?"

Ah, he said too much. There was no need for her to know who Vid was. He shrugged it off with saying it was someone he had met during his travels. She gave him a suspicious and curious look but let it slide. Turning her eyes full of mesmerize back to the dancing lights.

"How did you know about this?" she asked as she leaned back against him.

A tad surprised he took a moment to collect himself so not to start making a stuttering fool of himself. He wondered if she did it on purpose, in the hopes he would loosen up or spill things.

"Grandpa showed me, a few weeks before he left. Went looking at them plenty of times alone," he finally said as he dared to wrap his arms around her.

Looking back up at the sky he hoped she wouldn't feel nor hear his heartbeat that was going ridiculously fast by now. He cursed at himself for being foolish, yet couldn't help himself from enjoying this. Yet the thought of him leaving as soon as he could, made sure he wouldn't go further.

Not much later Hiccup told her to go down again and when they broke through the clouds, snow was falling out of them. Not bothered by it at all Hiccup let Astrid look down and once again let her gasp in surprise. Bellow them was Berk, lit by small fires. They slowly made their way back to it.

"Now understand what you've been missing?" he whispered in her ear as they circled around in slow decent. She could only nod.