RAGNAROK IS COMING

— Fool Me Once —

"This plan is idiocy, Avrid." she whispered as they walked through the front gate of a- well a castle.

Liogoo had only seen wooden houses in this realm, things straight out of the Vanir's history books, but whoever Drago was, he had more means than the rest of the Vikings. It was damn huge, bigger than some of the Asylums built for the Kohuru and stunning in detail. Great spirals and sculptured statues, windows the size of walls and decorated in roses and peonies. It looked like a damn Queen's manor.

"Perhaps, but we are very low on options. Unless you have a better idea?" Avrid deadpanned, raising a brow.

Liogoo rolled her eyes. No, she didn't, but anything had to be better than this. There was no way they'd fall for this because they were literally going to walk through the front door and demand the people of Berk go free.

Avrid rolled his shoulders as Peaton pulled him along, walking forward with Avrid in tow. Chains clasped the hands of all seven of them with Peaton leading the way, looking about as comfortable as a deer caught in the mouth of a lion. They were cold and uncomfortable but Liogoo had been in worse. That ridiculous cousin of Avrid's though- Liogoo was one more grunt away from turning and strangling the human with his own chains.

She looked over slowly, clenching her jaw as he shook his hands again, making the rest of them feel its reverberations through the links that connected them. The human looked up, caught Liogoo's glare and gently put his hands together.

Liogoo sighed. "We are going to die."

A gardener- or at least a nimble human poking at roots- looked up at Liogoo and frowned.

"Die, Avrid."

"Liogoo." He warned and she blew out a breath.

Die. In Midgard of all places.

Paeton nodded to one of the guards at the castle's double doors and they frowned at their Captain, looking at the line of prisoners and the one man holding them all.

"They overpowered us at the docks, locked my men in their boat and tried to blackmail their way into the island." Paeton explained. "Inform Drago that I have Hiccup Haddock in chains. "

One of the guards flickered a look between Paeton and Avrid, Liogoo and Tannis but Paeton gave him a nod. With a final check, the guard dipped and ran into the castle, aiming straight for the throne room and coincidently giving away the entire layout of the castle.

"Now." Avrid said and they all shook out of the chains and split, each going where the Captain had instructed. Paeton and Avrid took out the guards at the front of the doors, knocking them out efficiently and quietly. That gardener wisely scattered, leaving the front of the place empty.

Liogoo grasped Avrid's arm before running to the back end of the castle. "Die, Avrid."

He huffed at her and commanded her off, rolling his eyes at her fading grumbles.

"She's right, you know, I don't think this is going to work." Peaton gruffed, laying the head of one of his men down gently.

Avrid slid out Forseti, tapping her on the marble floors as a call to life. She glimmered in response, purred almost.

"I am glad to inspire such confidence in you all."

The Captain shook his head slightly, watching the strange weapon out of the corner of his eyes. "I will run to the Immunes but you have less than ten minutes before the next shift of guards will discover this."

Avrid waved his hand, ten minutes was almost too long. Paeton sent him a stare and then ran off. It was a risk, to trust the Captain but one he was prepared for.

Avrid rolled his neck and strolled into the castle's throne room, swinging double doors back hard enough they bounced off the wall, shaking the courtesans into a panic

Avrid caught the deep gaze of Drago instantly and smiled at him. "I apologise for the entrance, but I saw double doors and thought: what the Hel."

Drago had aged and not well. Avrid knew him as strong and built, handsome, perhaps, but the years of grief and anger had morphed the man. Scared him and crouched him into something as hideous on the outside as he was- undoubtedly- the inside.

Avrid caught the doors as they bounced into his hands and walked backwards, closing them.

"Did you miss me?"

"You." Drago hissed, storming over and sliding an axe from his back. "You took everything from me."

Avrid held up his hand. "I wouldn't come near if I was you."

And it was only because Drago's eyes snagged on the onyx blade in his hand that he did stop, stop and looked between Avrid and the weapon. Avrid frowned, unsure of the man's interest.

"So it is true then?" Drago trailed, his focus entirely on the dark blade.

Avrid rolled his shoulder. "What?"

But Drago only grinned, his crooked lips pulling up and snagging. He nodded to the women and men in opulent suits and elegant gowns and they eagerly disappeared behind the curtain at Drago's ostentatious throne. The thing was practically a podium, an altar.

Arvid walked closer, circling Drago. "I spared you last time, Drago. I will not make the same mistake."

"No, Avrid. You won't."

Avrid grinned. "Well done, have you learned a few things? Are there wasps in my father's hive?"

Drago raised a heavy brow. "Avrid Guigrain. Elder, King- Hiccup Haddock. I didn't think it was true."

Avrid shuffled Forseti in his grip.

"I thought the Trickster made it up to manipulate me, I see now I should have asked more, of how the pathetic little boy I saved from drowning ended up in such a high esteem."

His blood went ice cold.

"Trickster?" Avrid dared breathe- dared believe.

Drago's slow smile was enough of a confirmation. "Oh yes, the great Loki Laufeyson. He did tell me the most interesting things of your past."

Avrid raised Foresti. "Is that you, hiding beneath another man's mask?"

Drago chuckled. "No Avrid, but I have a proposition."

…oOo…

They were running, past the side of a stronghold that was eerily quiet and darting between the trimmed trees there. Tannis sounded like a child walking on dried leaves.

"I swear to-"

"Shush, there it is." Tannis muttered, ducking low behind an oval hedge. Liogoo tucked her back into the prickly leaves and lifted her dagger, shimmying it to catch the reflection of the guards blocking the back entrance.

It had been the Captain of the guards to sit the seven of them deep into the caves at the dock and instruct the best way to infiltrate. Tight, well thought plans and timings that had been in motion before they had set foot in the island. She didn't trust the Captain, not in the slightest, but if Avrid did then Liogoo really had no choice. She'd had to hang at the side of that damp cave and listen to him giving each of them a station, somewhere to go and debilitate the island's defences, leaving Drago alone in the hall with Avrid.

It was a solid plan and they might even pull it off but the idiocy lay in trusting that Captain. It all depended on him, on whatever story he had with Avrid. They were banking on some sort of promise or history to keep them alive and Liogoo didn't trust it one bit.

"This might go all well and good, but what will you be doing, Captain?" she'd asked, sliding up to him.

"I have people in there, that will help overthrow him. They are only waiting for the word."

Paeton had bristled a little when she raised her brows, disbelief written all over her face. Wary of Liogoo as he should have been, Peaton reached up, grabbed and pulled down the collar of his shirt.

"This was a promise I made, to my family." He confessed and pointed to a fading tattoo of runes. "I am the reason they perished and I have been paying for it every day since. I want Drago dead long before any of you even heard of him."

Liogoo glared. "And we are to believe this?"

"Liogoo." Avrid warned. "I trust that he tells the truth, step down,"

She'd snarled but faced the map. "Then what's my job?"

Tannis pointed to the reflection of the guards. "Four, not even a struggle."

Liogoo nodded and reached back to knot her hair. "There could be more inside though so we distract and slip in. 'Not even a struggle', is imperative."

Tannis reached into his pocket and pulled out a flat silver coin, branded with the trident of the Royal Watery Barricade. Her mother's coins.

Liogoo shoved down the tightness in her chest as he flicked it to the bushes further in the growth, catching the guard's attention instantly. They sent one to check and Tannis slid into action. Slid behind the bushes and pulled the legs of the man, cutting his airway in the same move and alerting not even a cricket.

As the guards watched the area the other had gone, not yet aware he was dead, Liogoo stumbled from the bush.

"Oh dear, dear." She squeaked, pretending to catch sight of the guards. "I didn't- oh goodness. I am meant to be in the kitchens. Have I led myself astray?"

They shared a look, the remaining three guards and one called for their missing counterpart, just in time for Tannis to come stumbling out of the bushes. "Where did you- oh, Maria. I have been looking everywhere."

One of the remaining three split, checking on their missing and Tannis took one, Liogoo the other. Smothering the two guards before they had a chance to gasp.

Liogoo let the head of the human fall to the stony path. "This is too easy."

"Only you would say that." Tannis said, rolling his eyes. Liogoo glared and flung her blade to the side, catching the neck of the guard and dropping him to his knees.

"Suspicion often keeps people alive."

Tannis ignored her and walked into the arch, unsheathing an axe and Liogoo pulled out one of the swords the hobbled, sandy man had given her. It was too long and weighed strange in the hand, but when Liogoo had inspected the blade and handle- it reminded her of Avrid's flawless work.

Liogoo followed Tannis into the alcove, immediately cast in a darkness. Whatever these humans were guarding, they were thorough about it.

Tannis whistled and Liogoo felt tempted to do the same. They stood on the crescent of a cave, a dark, winding cave that went vertically down far enough she could only see a void. There were no lights, no bottom but the Captain had described such a place. He had said it reached far enough it would take at least twenty minutes to walk there and back, meaning they needed to run if they were to make it up and down in time. At the end would be a dungeon and guards and then the labs. Simple enough.

Still, Liogoo looked to Tannis. "This must be a trap."

Tannis blew a breath and looked to the side and the opening in the ground: a tunnel. A tunnel that stretched the length of this cave and knocked into the side like a passageway. It was rough and from here, Liogoo could see far down enough with the staggered torches attached to the wall.

"Secret tunnel. I hate secret tunnels" Liogoo declared and started into a jog.

They had minutes to free the people of Berk inside one of the smaller sections of the cave because as she ran down, Liogoo realised it took more of a catacombs structure. Little branches in the side of the walls that never seemed to depict anything other than more empty, fire flickering tunnels. There was a high chance these Berkains would be unable to walk and so Liogoo and Tannis were only here to dismantle the guards focused on this area; if there was a chance some of the prisoners could fight then they were to come with.

Tannis kept up well and they were making time, falling into a rhythm, his boot occasionally knocking stones to echo through the passage. Liogoo would glare at him but they couldn't speak to ensure the guards wouldn't hear them coming. Paeton had told them to go straight and when they met a fork then left, Liogoo did and nearly ran into a guard.

The stealth approach went out the window and Liogoo cursed, falling into a different rhythm. The humans were almost too easy to cut down. They fought like savages, without calculation or finesse. Liogoo swung and ducked, slashed and sliced until they were all dead. She turned to find Tannis pulling his daggers from the body of a thick male, both of them watching it slump to the floor.

She wiped blood from her brow and pointed behind Tannis with the tip of her crimson sword. "Dungeons."

He looked behind him. "By Odin's beard- there is no way we could find anyone in here."

Liogoo looked out and though she hated having to fail, he was right. The tunnel had opened in an arch and beyond was a line of black iron dungeons. A line that had to reach at least half a mile.

Liogoo walked past the first one and gasped. There were hundreds of them. Cages stacked on top of eachother like jars, line after line of prisoners- a entire Archipelago of humans. Se had thought the line solid but it opened and closed like the shelves of a library. Running sections of humans. She crouched, looking into the nearest cage but, but there was no one in it. Liogoo frowned and looked into the one above it and still nothing. Tannis came over then, torch in hand and jogged down the first section, his face getting paler the further he went.

"Nothing." He called, the word echoing and shattering across the empty space.

Nothing. Meaning they either hadn't filled the dungeons or whoever had been in them were dead.

"Hold on." Tannis called and he turned a corner at the end of the section, disappearing. Liogoo called his name and when there was no answer, she cursed and snatched a torch off the wall. She jogged down on her tiptoes, silent as a cat.

"Tannis?" Liogoo dared whisper.

"Liogoo it's-"

She curved the corner and met with another open room cut from stone. A room that smelled of rotting corpses and something that burned her nose. Tannis stood in front of a bench of sorts, one that ran the length of the room. There were buckets and chairs and all kinds of strange objects splayed about the place- thrown about, as if someone had ransacked the room.

"It's some sort of experiment room." Tannis said, flipping the page of a small leather bound book. Liogoo walked to his side and leaned over. "With Freabole."

"I spent four years with the priests in Vanir, give." Liogoo explained before peeling it off him.

She flipped open the first few pages, running her fingers over the rough scroll. "Whoever this Alchemist is, he was trying to create-"

Liogoo flipped through the pages, her heart sinking with every diagnosis and experiment and abstract she read. There were dark black spots on the ends of the pages, as if the author had left his feather on the page often, zooming back and forward between the book and his patients.

Liogoo played with a lock of her dark hair. "He was taking apart the Freabole, trying it will a myriad of different chemicals to see if they could give him what he was looking for but I can't find-"

"Soldiers."

She pivoted, looking behind her at Tannis. He stood over a trapdoor.

"Damned secret tunnels," Liogoo groaned.

"Soldiers," Tannis repeated, looking down. "He was creating soldiers."

And before she could warn him it was a bad idea to jump through an unknown hole in the ground, Tannis stepped off, his feet shuffling as she heard his landing. With another groan, Liogoo crouched onto her rear, hanging her legs through the hole and sighed a prayer to Freya before falling through.

She was met with a gust of wind cold enough to cast her bones into a constant shiver but then Tannis had his arms around her waist, catching her falling form and placing her gently on her feet.

Liogoo shook out of his arms. "You idiot.

Tannis only pointed behind her. "Soldiers."

She turned and almost had a heart attack because right as her head twisted, she was met with a face millimetres from her own. A cold, lifeless face staring straight through her. Liogoo cursed and shuffled back, almost dropping the book in her hands.

Liogoo spun around and threw the back of the book against Tannis' chest. "Warn me better next time, for Gods' sake."

He caught the book, frowning at her but began reading through it, searching for whatever the Alchemist had done.

"This is madness." Liogoo breathed and her words turned to whispering clouds bouncing against the walls. It was supposed to be an army of dragons- not humans.

The trapdoor had been another room, another chiselled out section in this cave but instead of caged, the humans were very much free. They stood almost impossibly straight, each one unblinking and unseeing. Liogoo hated it, but she reached up to the nearest one. A pale female with a long face and a twin, by the looks of it. A twin standing beside her that Liogoo checked the pulse of.

Their hearts beat- slow, but alive and when she put her finger under their nose there was the slightest breeze. Like they were asleep but standing and- awake. Liogoo scrunched her nose and walked between them.

"Does it say what he did?" She called to Tannis, inspecting each face for the one Avrid had drawn flawlessly on a piece of paper. Liogoo pulled out that paper but bit her lip when there was none even markably close.

Tannis flipped a page. "No but he does have a paragraph here at the end, hold on."

Liogoo poked a red-haired female as Tannis read, "'The Fishlegs boy discovered the key this afternoon. I thought his mind was rather interesting and I was right, he is incredibly smart but I do not know how long I can stand the stammering. He discovered a flaw with the process'- and then he describes something about how he changed the Freabole…"

Tannis flipped the page. "Ah, here. Says, 'The latest dose is perfect. Causes a reaction that debilitates their nervous system from their brain, causing it to work on instinct and with the Freabole changes they are now instincts I can shape. Mindless, the Fish boy calls them and I like the name. The Mindless follows my command and I have managed to set a few in place. Yellow makes them lift their heads. Orange has them blinking. Green-"

"Tannis." Liogoo called.

"Hold on there's more. 'Green sends them into fi…" Tannis realised his mistake before he looked up.

"Tannis! You motherfucker!" Liogoo yelled, ducking a fist flying towards her and falling on her ass. Fortunately at the fringe of the crowd, Liogoo scrambled away, looking up at the hundreds of Mindless now waking up.

Tannis shut the book. "Shit."

…o0o…

Paeton dipped his pounding head to the three familiar guards stationed outside of the door at the very end of the corridor. It was hard, to keep the shaking out of his voice when he faced the men he had trained with since he was a boy. To face them and know in a few minutes he would have to fight against and not with.

"They are all in there?" Paeton asked and clenched his fists.

Morbid, a soldier with more heart than any man he had ever trained, nodded with a humoured grin. "Yea but I'd be careful, Yrsa's losing and she's in a foul mood."

Paeton didn't smile back. "Stick to your stations men." Morbid tried to hide his hurt with a sharp nod and a fix to his posture.

Paeton bit his lip and opened the door to Yrsa's quarters, already hearing the evidence of her anger.

"You cheater Bjorn!" She screeched, her white eyes wide in disbelief.

"Come now, Yrsa. You don't think I'd try to trick the crippled?"

Yrsa's slap to the back of Bjorn's head echoed in the lavish room. Paeton turned the corner and spotted them in their dining room, all three gathered around the table. Frode was trying his best to hide his grin but Paeton caught the card he slipped off the table and let fall to the floor.

As he saw Paeton he grinned. "Ah, Captain. How did it go, was there anything interesting at the docks?"

Bjorn's marvellous eyes snagged on Paeton and they lit up, his mouth pulling into a melting smile. Paeton looked away.

"I kept your pot, Captain, safe from the oaf's thieving hands." Yrsa greeted, throwing out a card on the table.

Bjorn faked hurt. "The Captain knows I'd never steal from him." and he threw a card on top of Yrsa's.

She screeched again and yanked Bjorn's cards off him. "You have to be cheating!"

"The sun's setting." Paeton whispered and all three of them stopped breathing. Stopped and looked over to the Captain. It was only then Bjorn noticed the sweat on the man's forehead and he stood, his chair scratching against the floor.

"Are you sure?" He asked, taking a step closer. Paeton only dipped his head and they all sprung into action. Frode was gone, disappearing behind a corner and Yrsa stood, a dip in her brow.

"Why? Why now?"

"There is no time to explain but- we have help." Paeton said but then Bjorn was towering in front of him, tall and more stern than Paeton had ever seen the joker of a man.

"You haven't been compromised, my dear?" he asked, tilting his head.

Paeton had to hide how deep that hit him. "No."

With a nod, Bjorn pressed his lips together but Peaton could see the relief in him. "And the plans?"

Paeton shook his head. Changed, he mouthed and jerked his head to the door. Frode reappeared then and threw a golden sword to Bjorn. He caught it in one hand and placed his other on Paeton's shoulder, patting it and moving to the door.

"Whatever it is, we must find Astrid first." Frode interjected and finished strapping something to the inside of his sleeve. "I haven't seen her in days but she must be locked somewhere in Drago's rooms."

Paeton swallowed the lump in his throat. "Astrid is gone."

Frode's shoulders sagged.

"She was wilting before his eyes so he sent her to the Alchemist." Paeton tensed. "She never came back up."

"The girl is better for it. Sometimes there is no coming back from that." Yrsa said, folding her arms.

"We leave no one behind." Bjorn concluded. "We go down and see for ourselves."

Paeton turned to him. "We don't have time, H- we need to be in the throne room two minutes ago."

"We leave no one behind." Frode repeated and slid a blade into the contraption on his forearm.

And then the horn blew.

"Shit." Paeton mumbled. "Fine, Bjorn and I will go down, you and Yrsa need to run to the hall now. Don't ask me what, you'll know what to do when you get there."

Something shoved against the door and only for the foot Bjorn had in front of it, the wood only shuddered. Bjorn's eyes went wide and he put his other foot in front.

Yrsa shook her head. "If this is it then I need to find Heather, Drago will not spare her when we flee."

Paeton pinched the bridge of his nose, the three of them never did what they were told. "Fine, we don't have time to argue. Someone-"

"I will go to the hall, Paeton." Frode said, and walked over to the door to hold it when the guards outside all heaved against it. "The rest of you do what you need to do, but even if she's barely alive, Paeton, you bring her body."

The Captain nodded, promising Frode and then with a collective breath, the two men stepped away from the door in time for the guards to come crashing through. Bjorn snapped into action first, lifting his trunk of a leg and splitting the screaming guard's head in two with his heel. Paeton swallowed the bile in his mouth and stood back.

Call him a coward, but when Yrsa snarled, her white eyes flickering like her own personal storm and slid into a duel with feline grace, Paeton did not help. He only watched the closest thing he had to family shred his men apart, their years of anger finally settling.

Bjorn was a tsunami, a wave knocking and suffocating and decimating anything in his way. Frode was a gentle killer, slipping his blade between shoulder blades and under necks and Yrsa became an arrow. Splitting men and making it look like a finessed dance. With the warning horn, more guards had swallowed the hall but it took the Immunes minutes to cut them all down.

And Paeton watched. His sword frozen and dead in his hand. Yrsa and Frode had disappeared out the door, killing the last of them but Bjorn caught the ice in the Captain's eyes.

"Come, dear. Let's go get Astrid." He said, smirking at Paeton when he got a glare.

How many times had Paeton told him that 'dear' made him feel like a three year old child? Still, he silently thanked the oaf and followed his lead through the castle, stepping over the trail of bodies Yrsa and Frode left.

The Alchemist's quarters weren't far, a design implemented by Drago so the Immunes could be called by him and checked on often. Bjorn and Paeton sped through, ignoring the wave of soldiers where they could and lying when they had to. They didn't know yet, that Paeton had betrayed them all and an uncountable number of his men had stopped their Captain, asking where to go. He'd sent them to the docks, trying to spare as many lives as possible.

He sighed, relieved to see that old rickety door for the first time.

Bjorn shouldered the door open with one shove, crashing through and startling the blonde boy sitting at a desk hard enough he yelled and fell to the floor.

Bjorn had a sword to his throat before he could move. "Where is the Alchemist?"

Paeton had seen the boy- Fishlogs or something the other- before. Seen him fiddling around with the same tools and liquids the Alchemist did. He was the Alchemist's accomplice. Some sort of assistant, betraying his own village for his life. Paeton had been there the day he'd been shoved into a cage shaking with what he had thought was rage but he was nothing but a coward.

His shaking hands went still and the boy looked at Bjorn. "Kill me for it. I don't care, I don't regret what I did."

Bjorn frowned but Paeton lowered his sword. "He's begging for forgiveness, for betraying his own people. We will kill you, after you tell us of Astrid's end."

It was the boy's turn to frown. "You don't care that I killed him?"

"Killed who?" Bjorn demanded, his usually warm voice frozen and stiff.

"The Alchemist."

Paeton crouched down. "Say that again."

"The Alchemist, he- well I only wanted to keep him out of the way so I could-" Fishlogs looked about the room but confessed, "I only wanted to help so I locked him in that room and then he tried to escape so I knocked him out- well I thought I knocked him out but he hasn't moved in a day and I think he's dead so I've been writing up all his fake reports and sending them out but then the horn blew and I thought-"

"And Astrid?"

Fishlogs pointed to a door in the corner, one Paeton had never noticed in all the times he'd been down here.

"She's in there but I haven't had a chance to check her with all the people coming in and out all day but I checked on her last night and she was fine- well still alive."

Bjorn tapped the end of his sword against the boy's chin. "You talk a lot, shush or keep it short."

Paeton turned to the other door. It must have been an inventory room because he'd never even seen the Alchemist near it.

"What room did you put the Alchemist in?" Bjorn asked and the boy pointed in the opposite direction.

Paeton gave Bjorn a look before he opened the door to Astrid. That Alchemist had taken a lot from the Immunes but Bjorn always had a certain fury with the old man. He'd never explained and Paeton had never asked. But the burly man only nodded at Paeton and the Captain left it at that, letting Bjorn do as he wished and pulling open the storage room.

Fishlogs came rushing up, and shoved through. "She's in bad shape."

Paeton found it hard not to care for the girl. For her brazen will and foul tongue and as she lay there, shoved in a wooden box like a forgotten doll, Paeton found himself livid at the boy. He elbowed him aside and pulled Astrid's skeleton of a body out, settling her in his arms softly.

"It was the only way I could make sure she'd stay hidden." Fishlogs murmured quietly.

Paeton ignored him and checked the side of her neck, waiting without breathing until he felt the tiniest of flickers. He rolled her dead weight into the crook of his arm and pressed her head into his neck.

"Can you fight?" Paeton turned to the boy.

Fishlogs reached behind a box and lifted a small axe. "I'm a Viking, I've slept with this in my hand since I was a babe."

Paeton shuffled Astrid up and walked out to the main room. They waited a minute before Bjorn stepped out of that room, closing it gently, He turned and Paeton had to look away from the splatter of blood running from his temple to his jaw. There was a coldness in his normally starry eyes, a sternness in his lips and dip in his posture. Paeton tried to catch his gaze but when Bjorn didn't so much as lift his head, the Captain felt a stone sliding into his heart.

Clearing his throat, Paeton jerked his head. "Okay, you two take the front, to the throne room."

Bjorn nodded, raising his sword and stomping out into the corridor. Fishlogs looked between the two for a second before following, lifting that small axe in the air.

The castle was in chaos.

Paeton had been the one to train his men, having been brought up with his Captain of a father, being able to hold his life was the only thing that kept him alive as they sailed the seas. At ten he had faced a full grown man and came out with no more than a broken leg. At fifteen he had garnered his father's position and held responsibility of building a guard from the ground up.

It was Paeton then, to instill the passing rituals for his men to become recognised as part of that guard. They were given several tasks and in one, they were locked in a chamber of smooth marble with only a slit in the side. He would have maids and the other guards scream through that slit. The kitchens always got in on initiation day and came bounding with pots and pans in hand, clapping them together. Children would run around the chamber, kicking and bashing the thing until the echoes inside could have driven a man mad.

The goal was to pick through the sounds and discern when Paeton blew the war horn. Most of his men would prepare for the day their whole lives.

It was safe to say then, that the call of that horn drew out every single guard on the island. He didn't doubt any men he'd sent to the docks weren't already on their way back to the castle.

The three of them stood on the balcony overlooking the entryway to the foyer and the battlefield it had turned into. Beyond that foyer, the doors had been shouldered open and wave after wave of clambering soldiers were shuffling through, pressing their shields together until they formed a wall in front of the doors- an impenetrable wall.

"What now?" Fishlogs whispered, leaning over the railing.

"They're supposed to be here, guarding the doors." Paeton trailed off because without that hall secured they had already failed.

Then the Siren's had failed in saving the prisoners who had been used like lab rats.

The Berkians had failed in securing enough numbers to give them even a sight chance at winning.

Paeton had failed in a plan he'd spent every waking moment devising since he put a blade through his father's heart.

Avrid had failed to kill Drago.

"Perhaps they-" but Bjorn went silent as the hall did. As the last of the guards filtered through and shielded the throne room's entrance. He went silent as the entire island did, nothing but the quiet shuffle of boots in that shield wall.

And then a war cry broke through the world.

A war cry and five vikings, axes and maces and hook raised.

A whistle and two daggers went flying through the air, killing instantly.

Paeton grinned as he watched Yrsa and Frode and Heather, Chief Stoick, Gobber, Spitelout, Snotlout and- running full speed through the gardens, bloody and worn- those otherworldly creatures.

The sight of them all- it was a chance. A chance that they could still win.

Paeton turned to the boy. "Take Astrid and hide her up here. If we are lost then you run to the docks, leave the rest of us and save yourselves at least." The boy nodded, nothing if not a follower and slid Astrid into his arms.

Then he turned to Bjorn. "Shall we?"

Cold and stark, Bjorn only nodded before raising to his feet and joining the battle that broke out. Paeton took a breath before doing the same, snatching out a second dagger from his waist.

The shield wall collapsed the minute those two Sirens came thundering through. Paeton hadn't really had time to process it- the existence of such a creature and chalked it up to some sort of genetic mishap. Something that had those creatures eerily graceful and sharp. Sharp talons that filleted men in a single swipe and sharp teeth that tore through necks to leave a necklace of dry and wet blood around her neck. Round eyes and impossibly angled faces but wherever they came from, it was their hands and mouths to change the tide in this battle. Their warning hisses that sent men running.

Paeton was not faring so well.

He was a damn good teacher and the guards fought with the same strategies and tactics as he did. Knew how to anticipate his every move. His men seemed to be artists at defeating him and yet he could barely remember one face from the next, thinking Joust always favoured his left leg but then that had been his brother and Paeton nearly lost his head. It was Bjorn, sticking close to paeton that kept him alive.

The foyer had split into three. The Sirens made a path through the guards and worked like a poison within, distracting and decimating it from the inside out. The Berkians were- well they seemed to just find a man and destroy. No real tactic beyond crush, smash and kill but they fought well; Paeton supposed living in a war against dragons makes for quite the champion indeed.

Yrsa was death on the wind. It had been her gift since the day Drago had sent her down to the Alchemist, to be something there and not there. To become a phantom of skill, to see things no one else could and yet she could not see what they could. Blind and yet sharp as a hawk. Paeton couldn't keep track of Frode but he was as good a fighter as any of them.

The Captain ducked and then swung his sword, aiming for the knees and sending the soldier down. When he yelled he reached for the next and found none. And behind him, nothing but felled soldiers.

Paeton scanned the crowd until he saw Bjorn retracting his sword from the belly of Joust's brother. He scanned it until he saw Yrsa panting with a hand to her thigh but nodding back at him, Frode's thin back arched as he stood and cleaned his knives. He looked to the rest of them and found the Berkians alive- injured and exhausted but alive. The Sirens were laughing, making some sort of joke before kicking the head of a guard to get to the hall doors.

This all meant nothing if Drago was still alive though and so Paeton called for them to wait. Wait for who could still fight and so they lined up, One behind the other for an entirety of thirty seconds before Liogoo huffed and pushed open the doors.

"Avrid?"

At the back of the pack, Paeton could only hear the confusion in Liogoo's voice. The confusion and hurt. And when he finally walked through, something bitter and heavy knocked him in the chest. Betrayal, and the Captain hated that Avrid had now fooled him twice.