'"Les hommes ont oublié cette vérité, dit le renard. Mais tu ne dois pas l'oublier.

Tu deviens responsable pour toujours de ce que tu as apprivoisé."

"Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it.

You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."'

The Queen's Provider

Hiccup did not move on the next day. He told himself it was because he'd found a wonderful little stream full of freshwater mussels only a couple inlets farther north, and that it would be a shame to pass those up…

Which is how sunset found him on a rocky prominence again, stuffed with roasted mussels and snacking on tender new shoots of lamb's lettuce. His sketchbook lay open but forgotten in his lap. Preoccupied, he instead watched the same Terrors from the previous day tumble about the rocks nearby, pouncing on one another and play-fighting for possession of some empty mussel shells. This night was different, however, and when the sun hit the horizon the Terrors gathered, chattered at one another, and retreated south down the coast. Their piping contact calls faded long after they were out of sight.

Though he spared a thought for this change in behavior, Hiccup was sad to see them go more than anything. With a sigh for his lost company he turned his attention back to the sky, keeping a cautious lookout that his rational mind refused the think of as a stake-out.

But if the idea of him finding a Nightfury was absurd, then absurdity still stalked him as closely as it ever had in Berk.

There was a flash of movement against the dusky blue sky as soon as the uppermost tip of the sun sank out of sight. A sliver of black detached itself from the top of a sea stack and sank to the ocean's surface in a long, even glide. Viewed side-on the form was thin and fleeting. Hiccup almost lost sight of it in the distance before it rose in an ever-broadening spiral, with only an occasional wing beat. It passed high but almost directly above his head on its widest loop before it locked into another glide and silently slid away to the east.

Hiccup craned his neck and did not take his eyes off of the shadow until it disappeared over the mountains behind him, then let out the entirety of his held breath in an extended sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan. He flopped onto his back, arms thrown out to his sides.

"Wow." The young Viking breathed. "Wow…"

But he didn't stay down for long. There were likenesses to be sketched before the light failed completely- the very first of a Nightfury ever. And below his outlined silhouette and sketched sea stacks he dropped in the note:

"Quick as I'd imagined, but silent. It seemed to make an attempt to conceal the location of its roost by gliding almost out of sight before it gained height. Clearly intelligent."

The following day dawned chilly, windy, and drearily overcast. Miserable weather for digging clams, so Hiccup hooked a couple of small trout instead and tucked himself into a rocky depression covered over with enormous pine trees. It wasn't comfortable or perfectly watertight, but it was shelter from the wind and insistent blown mist. There he set his fish to cooking on a spluttering, neglected fire while he pored over his sketchbook. He touched up the hasty illustrations of the previous night and added a few more small ones, but in the end his charcoal pencil stilled and his brow furrowed.

It wasn't that the drawings were bad- no, considering the subject and less than optimal conditions there was not much more he could do with them- but that was just it. The rest of his sketchbook was filled with detail. On the dragons, yes, but also his blueprints and many other animals- darting weasels under the ferns, bobbing seals, rangy rabbits, countless soaring seabirds and fish flashing in a stream- even shells and plants and the occasional sweeping landscape. His Nightfury was tantalizing, fascinating in its obscurity. Not bad, it was…

It was a good start.

Hiccup ran a hand across his face and groaned, resigned to the fact that he had apparently already made up his mind. One way or another, he had to find out more about this Nightfury- and he lay awake half of that cloudy night coming up with a plan.

"Not my best plan. And coming from me, that's saying something…"

Hiccup stood at the mouth of the inlet where he had first seen the Nightfury. A small triangular raft lay at his feet, lashed together with odd bits of twine he had brought with him. It wouldn't hold his weight, but it would make his relatively short swim that much easier. The water close to shore on this side of the island was fairly shallow- inconvenient for even the low draft Viking longboats, but perfect for children who wanted to sneak into the lair of the most dangerous dragon in the world.

The water was cold but thankfully not freezing as was its usual habit. Hiccup's journey to the Nightfury's sea mount was a long wade and a blessedly short swim. The day was warm and he arrived early enough to spread out on a low rock ledge and dry in the sun as he mulled over the next phase in his plan.

It was by far the trickiest part. Hopefully the Nightfury was asleep and had not noticed his arrival. Hopefully it would glide straight away come nightfall, just as it had done two nights previously, and leave Hiccup a brief window to explore its roost before darkness overcame him and he had to retreat to the island.

Slapdash, at best.

The sun set. Hiccup pressed his back to the seamount and waited with his leather pack, empty of all gear except a rope, hugged to his chest. The Nightfury took to the sky right on time, so close Hiccup could hear the hushed sound of it passing overhead. He made a note of where it took off and watched until it spiraled up in the distance and glided away.

Hiccup threw himself at the cliff wall without delay. The first part was easy, but the slope quickly became sheer. Just when he thought he was stuck he'd find another ridge to shimmy along, another ledge to squeeze onto. Only when he reached a massive overhang of rock did he stop, stymied. A glance down at his distant bobbing raft showed just how high he was, and convinced him that looking down again would not be the wisest of ideas. With a cracked eep of fear that he was glad no one was around to hear, Hiccup pressed himself into the crack below the lip of stone- and his hand came down on something cold and slimy. It almost startled him off of the cliff face. With an even less dignified sound and a deal of scrambling he regained his footing and identified the culprit.

A fish. Slimy but not yet rotten- and clearly gnawed on.

He sucked a deep breath in through his teeth and edged along the horizontal crack until it widened into a deep cleft, tall enough for him to stand up in. There, the first thing Hiccup did was tie his rope securely about a rock and toss the free end down the cliff side. A rope would make his descent comparatively easy, even in poor light. With his escape plan set, he was free to explore.

The dragon's roost was cleaner than he expected- fish bones were scattered here and there, but no rotting carcasses. Rocks covered the floor, the larger ones seemed concentrated at the edge of the cleft. Upon closer inspection Hiccup found not only fish bones scattered among them, but small black disks slick as oiled metal- Nightfury scales- and something different. Shards. Curved, smooth and speckled grey-black on one face, white with a papery, almost chalky feel on the other…

Hiccup could scarcely believe his luck. Eggshells- they had to be- of the most elusive dragon of them all. He picked along the ground, hardly daring to breathe as he stuffed the finds into his pockets, until a twitch of movement halted him in his tracks.

That's when he saw them- three nestling Nightfurys staring at him from the back wall, drawn up thin and so wide-eyed they looked startled. Their dark, mottled bodies blended with the shadowed rocks so well he might have missed them if it weren't for their eyes- three different shades of yellow-green.

"Oh," Hiccup sighed, and relaxed his reflexive cowering posture when the little Furys remained still. "Hello, hello. You're all kinda cute…"

Which was true but Hiccup, very aware of his limited time, looked them over with an artist's eye. Their bodies were roughly the size of a cat, but oversized wings and forearms, long tails and great flat heads made them appear larger. Silvery markings and spots down their sides broke up their outline. Though they sat huddled in a pile, they were very clearly different sizes. Like birds, Hiccup reasoned, they must have hatched out a day or two apart, the youngest one perhaps more than that. It was drastically smaller than its siblings and not nearly as chubby and round with baby fat.

Which made sense. It probably competed with its larger siblings for food.

Hiccup felt a little bad for staying close to the Nightfury chicks for so long when they were clearly frightened of him, so he backed off with haste and did one last, quick circuit of the nest to make sure he hadn't missed anything big. With more time he was sure he could learn so much more, but he didn't have more time. What he'd seen already was a rare privilege. One of a kind, in fact. Still, as he retreated to where his pack lay next to his anchored rope, something nagged at him. Just as he took up the rope to start down, he realized what it was.

In seabirds, at least, the young, small chicks that had to compete against their older siblings very rarely survived.

He paused, one leg already off the ledge, and looked up at the baby Furys. The smallest one was easy to pick out, shoved to the side a little bit, eyes tinted with more green than its fellows'.

"Crazy." He muttered. "That's it! I'm crazy!" and sprang back onto the ledge and to his feet in one movement. He pulled his now empty leather pack off his back and darted forward.

The nestlings panicked at his approach, pressing themselves to the wall with hoarse hisses and burbling growls, wings half open. The movement shunted the youngest to the side, but it kept its feet as the older two staggered and stumbled over themselves. It even dodged Hiccup's first grab, baring its tiny, spade-shaped teeth, but the Viking was not about to be foiled. He leaped forward, pack held out in front of him, and pinned the little Fury with a triumphant cry. The creature squirmed like a fresh caught fish when he scooped it up and continued to growl indignantly as he closed and hauled the pack onto his back.

Hiccup thanked the Gods for rope and wasted no time descending the face of the sea stack. His arms ached by the time he reached the bottom, but he was shivering with adrenaline and vaulted over the rocks to his raft. Stars were visible, even the western horizon was a dark blue, but he could still see the mountains of Berk outlined against the sky. It was all the reference he needed. He swung the now quiet pack down onto his raft and kicked off into the water. With the waves at his back he made good time, which was fortunate as not even the lapping water could drown out a faint, high pitched whistle…

A shadow eclipsed the stars and flashed by him, so close he felt the wind off its wings. Hiccup choked on a mouthful of seawater as he spun to watch it. The dragon had to have seen him, but it hooked its wings and snapped straight up to its nest.

Hiccup turned back toward Berk and swam for all he was worth.

Unfortunately it seemed that Nightfurys could count, and that this one missed its third chick. A moment later there was a roar the likes of which he'd never heard- his pack shifted and squeaked in answer- followed by a rush of wings as the beast threw itself from the sea mount.

He dared not look back, kept struggling on as his feet hit bottom. A whistle in the air built to a roar. That was the sound he had heard during raids, just before-

A flash, and a mass of purple light smashed into the ocean a dozen yards before him. He was dusted with warm spray and lifted by a wave a moment later but he never slowed, only reached forward to hold his pack so it didn't tip and fill with water. There were spots in his vision, but he had eyes only for shore.

No more purple blasts came, but the Nightfury didn't give up. It made pass after pass, growing, snarling and snapping, coming closer each time. Hiccup pushed his raft before him, and at long last the water level dropped below his waist. He snatched up his pack and sprinted for the cover of the trees, but his boots were heavy with water and he stumbled on the sand. The Nightfury chose that moment for its last, desperate pass. It snapped by so close and fast that the edge of a tail fin slashed across Hiccup's shoulder, shearing through his thin woven shirt and into the flesh beneath.

Hiccup yelped and fell hard, but cradled his pack and kept the baby Fury from the worst of it. He threw sand as he scrambled to his feet. Trembling, heart in his throat, he ran blindly into the safe darkness of the forest. For a time he kept running, tripping and clipping tree trunks in the dark, his pack clutched tight to his chest, until he realized that he could no longer hear the flight of the pursuing Nightfury.

His weary jog turned into a staggering walk until he finally dropped into the dip beside an old tree stump. The night was not cold and he was out of the breeze, but the soaked, clammy cloth on his skin had him shivering. Hiccup peeled his shirt off over his head with unsteady hands, winced as he brushed the cut on his shoulder. He discarded his waterlogged boots before he collapsed on the ground with a shaky sigh, utterly wrung out.

The night air was cool across his back. When he heard his pack shift and twitch he rolled to his side and dragged it to him. The little Nightfury went still again but its quiet breathing was just barely audible. When he found that the leather had repelled the water nicely and was dry he pulled it, and the little nestling inside, to his chest. It wasn't a blanket but it was warmer than nothing and he fell asleep as soon as he closed his eyes, right there on the ground with a bagged Nightfury hugged to his chest.

I gift this mental image to you: little fishbone 14-year-old Hiccup boogie boarding across the straits on his driftwood raft, on his way to steal yo Nightfury…

That bit with the youngest of the baby sea birds dying- I did not make that up. Many species of colony nesters hatch two chicks, but only fledge one. Others, like herons, can raise four or five chicks in a good year, but the youngest always have the lowest odds and die if food is not plentiful. (This is less of a problem with smaller birds so, if you see a small chick in songbird nest, do not fear and LEAVE IT ALONE.) Perhaps he would have died in a lean year, but I think Toothless would have survived without Hiccup here, though he would've ended up smaller, leaner, and more aggressive than his sibs.

Juvenile coloration. Very common throughout the animal kingdom. Somewhere along the line someone noted that Toothless's spots were fainter in HTTYD2 and proposed that young Nightfurys had prominent spots. I was charmed instantly. But fear not- he is still very black and his patterning will quickly fade.

Today's exceptionally pertinent quote was brought to you by Antoine de Saint Exupéry, from his French novella Le Petit Prince. Which I should really get around to reading in full. Listen to le renard, Hiccup. Those vulpes know things.