~hey guys! thanks so much for all of your great reviews and comments! I've recently drawn a new cover photo for this story, let me know what you think and also check out hiccupandtoothless22 on deviantart for cool inspired pictures of Hadrian and his gang of Doppelgangers! Love you guys and keep on reading! :D Xxx~
By the time Hiccup had reached the front yard, his foot had gone completely numb. So much so that he could only feel the downy softness of the snow itself along with the frozen grass blades as they crunched beneath his heel.
Stoick stepped back when he reached the threshold of the front yard. He gawked at Hiccup, holding the storm door open to allow him room to enter. His eyes grew even wider as he stepped inside.
Against the warm inside air, his skin flared fire hot. His feet prickled, the numbness slipping quickly away, replaced by the sensation that the splinter wood he stood on had been transformed into a bed of burning coals.
"Did you go out there without your shoe?" Stoick asked. "Have you gone mad son?"
Hiccup didn't answer.
Stoick watched him with wary uncertainty, as though he couldn't be sure he was eve listening. "Did something happen?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
Hiccup pushed past his father and made a beeline for the stairs.
"Hiccup," he called.
He paused, but only for a moment. Then Hiccup did what he thought would be easiest for the both of them.
Drifting up the stairs like a ghost, he vanished into his room.
That night, no matter how hard he tried, Hiccup could not fall asleep.
He rolled back and forth on his bed, flipping from one side to the other, unable to make up his mind whether it was better to face his skylight or to have his back to it.
Neither felt comfortable. Or safe.
Nothing did anymore.
Darkness bathed the house, quietness filling every corner. Finally he settled on lying flat on his back and staring up at his vaulted ceiling. He shut his eyes. As he lay there, exhausted and yet firmly wired into wakefulness, Hiccup thought he was beginning to understand Hadrian had once told him in the moments before he came face-to-face with Jolene, or Lilith.
By degrees, Hiccup was growing weary of the night, to fear what the veil of sleep would allow to worm through his slumbering mind, what holes its images could burrow through his heart. And the seeds of doubts it could plant in his soul. Hiccup rolled onto his side again, facing his closet. Huddling into himself, he clutched his blankets tightly. What he'd seen in the dreamworld, with Hadrian in his room, couldn't have been real. It had been a fabrication meant o to confuse and detour Hiccup something Hadrian had concocted to distract him and cause him to lose hope he would give up.
Sitting up, Hiccup wrapped his arms around his knees, hugging himself into a tight ball, and lifted his eyes to the skylight.
Despite everything that's happened, and with this new feeling of abandonment germinating in his system, Hiccup felt a small candlelight of, something, flicker in his chest. Could it be, friendship? Understanding? Tracking back to his warning of Jolene, Hiccup had no other choice but to take Hadrian's word for it.
And even in reality, he was all Hiccups had.
Hiccup sat up on the corner of his bed closest to his skylight. He watched the clouds from an angle that did not show the moon, only that of the sky itself. From here, he could see the dark branches of the trees. Hiccup struck a match and lit the small candle next to his bed.
The darkness seemed to press in around him, as though waiting for him to make a move or dare to step beyond the spherical pool of light.
But Hiccup wasn't afraid.
His eyes remained steady on the ledge of the skylight as he spoke.
"I don't know if you can hear me," he said. "I can't tell if you're listening. I'm not even sure how this works . . . if it works . . . but I know that you've seen me. And . . . and I know what you saw today." Glancing down, he took in a breath, then let it out in along sigh before continuing. "You have to be listening somewhere. Look . . . I'm sorry I wasn't listening before, but I'm listening now. Please. I don't know what's happening to me. I have no one. This might not even come close to how you felt, but I at least understand."
The words were out. He lifted his head, his eyes returning to the skylight. He waited for something to happen, for him to appear on the ledge in a flurry of violet wisps.
"Hadrian!" he whispered, evoking his name. "Speak to me. Tell me how to fix this. Show me how to fix, everything; because right now, I don't even know if what I'm doing is right anymore."
Pushing off from his bed, Hiccup went to stand in front of the skylight. Not liking the way the dim light exaggerated the shadows on his face, Hiccup glanced at the night sky. The stars were diminishing, surrendering to the early morning dawn slowly bleeding across the sky. Time continued to crawl by, yet Hiccup stayed in front of his skylight, hoping that any moment he would see Hadrian's face appear, that he might step up behind him, or that he would hear him say something. Anything.
Hiccup dropped his head and swallowed back a choked sob that threatened to breach his lips. Fresh tears stung his eyes and blurred his vision. He fisted his hands and forced himself to look away and trek back to bed. Sitting at the edge, he braced his head between his hands, gritting his teeth in frustration.
Just as he was about to except that be might be completely alone, a soft breeze chilled the back of his neck.
Followed by an acidic toned voice. "The elder was rise to run."
Hiccup's eyes shot open, he swirled around towered the skylight. "Hadrian?!" his voice scrape raw at the back of his throat.
But when his eyes landed on the ledge, he halted. He pulled back and, with careful steps, drew to peer at the shadow perched on his ledge. He sat slumped against eh far corner, half of him lost in shadow. Another demon? He looked up, his dark gaze focusing on Hiccup. "I wouldn't cross the line," he said grinning. "if I were you."
He was different from Hadrian. This Hiccup noticed right away. Instead of black, his hair was deep black to blue-violet. As he lifted his head, his hair spiked up from his skull like the feathered crest of a bird. His teeth, pointed like the tips of countless sharpened pencils, gleamed an unsettling indigo. Though his face was whole, he was missing nearly half of himself on one side, including an arm from the shoulder down, part of his abdomen, and his leg from the knee.
He wore no shirt or jacket, which was what revealed the most unusual thing about him.
Scrolling designs covered much of his exposed skin. His chest, sculpted and smooth like a polished statue, depicted minutely detailed tattoos of sailing ships, tossing waves, and foam. A long-haired mermaid graced his existing shoulder, her scaly tail sweeping the length of his arm. An entire portion of the sea epic vanished into the pit of his missing side, and though the pictures themselves might have been beautiful, Hiccup was too distracted by the fact that they had been chiseled into his skin like carvings. That thought, combined with his demonic grin, the garish white of him, and the jagged gaps in his body, made them somehow vulgar.
"Who are you?" Hiccup asked.
"Not who"- he wagged a blue-clawed finger at him – "what."
"Fine," Hiccup obliged, "what?"
"Baffled," he replied, "at how you, fetching though you are, could possibly compete with the rest of us."
Hiccup stepped closer, eyeing him warily.
"If I had known about your, ability," he continued. "I would've kept my mouth shut."
Shut? What did he say? Still distracted by his engravings, Hiccup could only ask, "What's your name?"
"My name, isn't it obvious?" he questioned. "Scrimshaw." He drew out his name, the voice low and grating.
"What do you want?" Hiccup pressed.
"Just to survey the scene." He replies.
He finally stood, his frame nearly matching the length of the window frame. He braced his hand against the wood frame and took a relaxed position, one foot crossing the other.
"She was so close to snatching you, hook, line and sinker." He cocks on eye at Hiccup. "You were this close to being reduced to just a mere puppet on a shelf, just begging, screaming, 'Puppet Master chose me!' Scrimshaw says, his finger squinting down until it barely hovered above his thumb.
"What?" Hiccup took a step back, his footstep crunching.
"But then he came along, the traitor, and he enticed you with such valid information. I don't really know if I should thank him, or kill him." Scrimshaw muttered, clutching his fist as it he could crush the traitor he spoke of into bits.
Hiccup took another step back from him.
"There's loyalty." He muttered, the shadows overtaking his form once again as Hiccup receded. "Ah," he said, and began to sing softly to himself in a lilting tune.
"Hush child,
the darkness will rise from the deep.
And carry you down into sleep.
Child,
The darkness will rise from the deep.
And carry you down into sleep."
Hiccup covered his ear, blocking out the sound. He turned away, even though he knew it wouldn't do any good, but anything to stop it. He couldn't take anymore songs. Behind him, Scrimshaw laughed, the lyrics of his dreadful song rising in volume.
"Guileless son, I'll shape your belief,
And you'll always know that your lover's a thief.
And you won't understand
the cause of you grief.
But you'll always follow the voices beneath.
Loyalty."
He grasped his ears tighter, as if trying to crush his skull. But it seemed like the sound was inside his head, echoing bouncing around the inside of his skull. The word mocked him. Beneath is, Hiccup could swear he hear the disembodied whisper of a woman.
"Loyalty, only to me."
What was he talking about? Loyalty? Did he mean Hadrian? Did he belong to the same woman who sent Hadrian?
"Guileless son, your spirit will hate her,
The flower who married my brother the traitor.
And you will expose, Her puppeteer behavior
For you are the proof, Of how he betrayed her Loyalty."
"Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!" Hiccup screamed as he bumped into the end board of his bed.
He hurried himself to bed. He threw back the covers and slipped under them, the rolled to face away from the demon and his song, blocking out his voice. He desperately grasped the hamsa around his neck, suffocated it in his grip.
But it doesn't work.
The more Hiccup tries, the louder it becomes. Hiccup clenches his teeth and squeezes his eyes shut. He can't for focus, form a single thought, so he just huddles into himself, doing his best to hang onto his sanity.
Hiccup dares a look back. Scrimshaw was still in the skylight, but now he had an entourage of black birds surrounding him. One by one. Perching on the ledge or on some furniture in his room. They kept a border around his bed, the birds repeating the word, Loyalty while Scrimshaw continued the torturous lullaby.
"Hush child,
the darkness will rise from the deep.
And carry you down into sleep.
Child,
The darkness will rise from the deep.
And carry you down into sleep."
A carefully orchestrated chorus of horror begins to spill out of their mouths. Hiccup tries to block out the excruciating lullaby.
If this is a lullaby, Hiccup wanted to wake up. Now! He tried to remember about how Grandmamma mentioned that if you know you're dreaming, you can control it. But the lullaby had infected his mind, and he couldn't form a simple thought, do the simplest task. His body paralyzed, locked in an iron grip, unable to break from it. Hysteria rising.
So he did the only thing he knew how.
He screamed.
Raw, agonized wailing that pierces the air. The lullaby begins to dwindle, but he doesn't stop. He can't, and he doesn't want to; fearing that if he does, the song will dare rise back, louder, higher. He can start to feel talons clawing, raking at his skin. As if he had disturbed the birds and the lullaby, and now they attack with vengeance for ruining the melodic song.
Hiccup didn't care.
He began to thrash and kick and claw. As if ravenous animal had just awaken inside him and is now desperately fighting back in a fit of maniacal rage. Hiccup started to pray to Thor that his father will hear him screaming once again as he tries to break from the haze. That he'll come and wake him and rock him gently to calm him down.
Hiccup's eyes shot open.
His body is trembling and is moist with sweat. He was awake. Hiccup tried to move, but it took a minute before all his senses awakened, and he could releases the iron grip on his body. And even after, he started trembling. His eyes flicked to the skylight and it was clear. A shadow moved at the end of his bed, and suddenly Toothless sprang up onto the bed. Hiccup yelped and scrambled back, slamming his head into the headboard. He grunted in pain, cradling his head until the world settled back into focus. His ears were ringing, but his body was free of the expected scratches.
Toothless coos but Hiccup doesn't pat his head. Swinging his legs over the edge, he tries to steady his breathing. Wiping his wet forehead with his tunic sleeve, Hiccup can still hear the song, and see the demon known as Scrimshaw.
He must've been another pawn for Jolene, or Lilith, whoever her name was.
The sound of steps snaps Hiccup's attention. His head jerks up in time to see his father coming up the steps.
"Morning son!" he says. Hiccup doesn't reply, and it looks like he doesn't need to his father is so built with happiness. "Glad you're up. Happy Snoggletog!"
Snoggletog.
It's today.
Hiccup scrambles out of bed and shoves open the skylight above his bed; too hesitant to open the one across his bed. A cold breeze rushes in his face, blessing his still moist skin. A fresh planting of snow had draped upon the village. Coating everything in a white, sparkling blanket, it looked like a world of fragile things.
"Come on Hiccup." His father called. Hiccup turned to him. "Odin placed a lot of goodies in your helmet. Let's get to those presents!" then without waiting for an answer, he headed down the steps.
Hiccup slumped into his bed. He fiddled for the hamsa, and for a moment, he gripped it hard, threatening to rip it off his neck and chuck it into the snow. But something stopped him. Hadrian said it was at least worth something. Releasing it, Hiccup sighed and worked to organize his thoughts. Stray tears filled his eyes. Without a word, Toothless' dark wings enveloped him, and Hiccup hugged his knees to his chest, and began to sob.
Hiccup didn't bring up the nightmare that morning while unwrapping presents. Though it was obvious he hadn't slept well, not even Gobber who Hiccup thought would have been the first to launch into an onslaught of questions, wanting to know about the dark circles under his eyes.
Maybe, Hiccup thought, sitting on the stool, wrapped in a quilt and clasping a mug of warm yak milk, no one was saying anything because it was Snoggletog. Then again, maybe it was because they didn't know anything at all. He hadn't told Stoick about the woman in his dreams, about Hadrian, Scrimshaw, even about Grandmamma coming over and abandoning him.
As for the dream itself, Hiccup knew better than to call it that. It had felt real. Whether Scrimshaw's visit had happened in waking life to within the dreamworld, however, was another question.
"Hey," Gobber said, calling to Hiccup from where he sat on the kitchen chair beside the Snoggletog tree, surrounded by discarded multicolored ribbons curls and box-shaped husks of wrapping paper. "Look alive, Hiccup."
He chucked something at him. Hiccup flinched, catching the small brick-shaped package just before it could smash into his nose. Covered in lumpy red paper and too much tape, the thing looked like it ah been wrapped one-handed by a toddler.
The box felt light in his hands, as though he would open it to find wads of old parchment stuffed inside. Hiccup glanced to Gobber, but he had since gone back to rifling through his fresh stack of clothes and blacksmith accessories. Behind him, Stoick sipped on his mug while admiring the new sword Hiccup had made for him using Gronckle Iron. A new silver sports gauntlet encircled one of his wrists and he had on the pair of studded shoulder pads Gobber had given him.
Sitting next to hiccup, Toothless flipped through a wicker basket of fish. Occasionally he would reach up and brush his nose against Hiccup's hand, purring.
Hiccup looked at the present in his lap. With cautious fingers, he began to peel back the tape and pry open the corners of the wrapping paper. He shucked the glossy red sheath to reveal an ornate helmet with a sheet of crumpled-up paper inside. Hiccup yanked the paper free, only to hear something else rattle inside the box. His attention went to the paper first when he noticed faint blue writing tucked between the crumpled folds. He opened the paper and read the lines of Gobber's sloppy handwriting.
Consider this a token of thoughtfulness.
Happy Snoggletog
Hiccup frowned. Confused, he released the helmet from its paper cocoon. He slid his fingers into the dome of the helmet, reaching around until they stumbled across something cool and metal. As he did, he heard Gobber's voice pipe up.
"Hey Stoick, do you have any more things needed to be unloaded in the back?"
In his palm, Hiccup held what appeared to be a small silver, oval-shaped locket. It felt light in his hand and when he tucked his thumb beneath it, it fanned upward and out with a quiet click, revealing the face of his mother in a thumbnail picture. The gift brought on a wave of happiness, and Hiccup latched to it with desperate fingers, unable to remember the last time he had felt this joyous.
Gazing at the picture, his mother had his same mud-brown hair, twisted into a fishtail braid down one shoulder. Her emerald green eyes brought on a sense of calm and peace, matching Hiccup's demeanor. She wore the usual horned helmet of the village, sitting upright in a poised, proper position, hands folded in her lap. She wore a navy blue tunic under her breastplate, and leather-wrapped gauntlets trailing up her forearms. Her smile gave Hiccup an unknown sense of relief, true she didn't look exactly like the way she did in his dreams, but this was even better. To see what she really looked like. Hiccup flashed back to the stitched Nadder laying in the crest of his headboard. He sniffed as he traced his thumb over the picture.
The thumbnail was clearly painted, no doubt by Bucket. But to get this form of detail, he'd need someone to describe it.
Someone . . . like his father.
Still, he didn't get what the gift had to do with Gobber's cryptic note.
"Hiccup,"
His dad had stopped sipping his mud and now, instead, watching him.
"There's something else." He said.
Hiccup set the helmet aside, unlatching the clasp of the locket and attaching it around his neck, it rested just above the hamsa, the cool surface spreading gooseskin across his chest. What did he mean, "something else"? He looked toward Gobber again, but he only remained expressionless.
"I mean you have one more present left to open."
Brow arched, Hiccup looked at the already hefty stack of gifts that sat next to him on the floor. In addition to the new pencils and brushes for his sketches, his father had gotten him a new saddle for Toothless - quality made, two tunics and a pair of pants. Considering his recent magic training and the locket, Hiccup hadn't expected to get nearly as much as he did.
"What is it?" he asked, feeling oddly guarded.
Standing, Stoick walked over to the tree, bent down, and pulled a thick, medium sized wooden box from behind the tree. A big red ribbon wrapped around all sides. Stepping around Gobber, he made his way to where Hiccup say on the stool. He had an odd, pinched look on his face as he held the box out to him.
"I was meant to give it to you when you turned eighteen." He said.
Hiccup took the both in both hands, but the thing was so heavy, it plopped to the floor with a heavy thud. As he pulled on one end of the ribbon, his father stood next to him, hands folded in front of him. Because of Hiccup's pile of presents, though, he had to stand a little further than he wanted.
The ribbon shrank before unraveling and puddled around Hiccup's knees. He opened the box, its hinges squeaking like a scared mouse.
Inside, folded neatly to fit was a dark green tunic with scale mail armor down the middle. He gazes at it in awe as he reaches in and lift it from the box. In full view, it would reach to his knees. The scale mail armor wrapping around the skirt of the tunic, it gleamed in the morning sunlight. Underneath it was a small note. Hiccup refolds the tunic and takes out the envelope. The silhouette of violet lines showing like dark veins through pale skin. He runs his thumb over the smooth surface of the paper. He holds it against his chest for a few heartbeats before open it. A breath hitches in his throat as he reads his mother's handwriting in elegant lines of purple ink.
My darling Hiccup,
If you're reading this, it must be Snoggletog,
And your father has actually waited to give it to you.
Hiccup chuckles as he reads on.
I made this myself just for you.
I know you're only eighteen, or even younger,
But I just wanted to leave you with something special.
Something other than a helmet made from my breastplate.
I hope that when you wear this, whenever that may be,
Your coronation,
A birthday, or even a feast.
You'll wear it with pride.
I'm sorry I'm not there for the holidays,
But just know, I am you mother.
And I will always be there for you,
And I will always love you.
-V. H
Hiccup stared at the paper in his quivering hand, able to do little than trace and retrace, through his searing vision, the deep violet ink that comprised that final line. Despite its literal meaning, he knew what she had meant to say.
She will always watch over him.
Always, he thought, trailing a fingertip over the swirls of those carefully crafted letters.
"How long ago did she make this?" Hiccup asks.
"When you were just a baby." Stoick answers. "She wanted to make it for you. She was looking forward to seeing you wearing it, the day of your coronation." Stoick's voice hitched, and he sniffled.
"Thank you Dad" Hiccup say, and he gets up and hugs his father. He muffles into his father's shoulder. "Thank you so much. You don't know what this means."
"I just wanted to give you something, special. You know . . . with everything that's happened." Stoick said.
Hiccup weakly smiles, and as he refolds the tunic and gingerly places it back into the box, he hears the two necklaces clink against one another. It was then he remembered that he still needed to tell Stoick about the dreams, Hadrian, and Grandmamma running out. But with such a meaningful gift still lingering in the air Hiccup decided to wait only a little longer, until the feel of the mood diminishes.
As Gobber gets up to go in back and brew up some more yak milk and cookies, Hiccup starts to organize and round up all the present. A quick knock at the front door caused Hiccup's head to jerk up. Stoick and Gobber didn't call to him to answer, they didn't hear it. It came again, louder this time.
Hiccup pushed to his feet, and made his way toward the door, expecting to see Snoggletog carolers. He fastened his hand to the door. Opening it, he steps out, the winter air clinging to the bare skin of his face. A few stray flakes drifted from an otherwise tranquil sky. The sunlight bouncing off the snow eared Hiccup's eyes. He squinted through the glare, scanning the quiet scene of his neighborhood.
No one was around. Fear tugged at his gut when he noticed the set of fresh footprints in the snow, which led all the way up the curved sidewalk and wooden steps. Hiccup stepped back.
Suddenly he heard the door creak open behind him.
Hiccup froze. Turning his head he caught the sight of a dark blur as it slid away from the scalar siding and darted inside his house.