"Ar scáth a chéile a mhairimíd."

"We live in the shadow of each other."

In Which Hiccup Meets Lightning and Death

Hiccup awoke to a pair of green eyes staring down at him out of a black, inquisitively tipped head. Two nubby, scaled lobes were pricked up atop it like the ears of a cat tipped in listening. He could've sworn the corners of that wide mouth curved up in a smile.

"G'morning…" Hiccup slurred.

At the sound of his voice the little Fury disappeared in a flash, back into his pack. It peeped out at him, only one round eye visible through a gap under the flap.

"Oh- yeah…" The Viking smiled and spoke softer. He held back both a laugh and a yawn to avoid further startling the poor creature. Dead leaves and twigs had pressed into his bare skin in the night, and when he moved to brush himself off and stretch his right shoulder burned, the skin there tight with brown, dried blood.

Hiccup didn't get a chance to examine his injury until he'd crept back to the coast, located his stashed belongings, and scurried back to the safety of the trees. With the Nightfury in his pack, he hiked with the rest of his resources stacked precariously in his arms and did his best to keep from tripping until he hit a stream. Only then did he lay his upper body in the cold water. His pants had dried stiff with salt as he slept, but were his last article of dry clothing and he was careful to keep them that way. Luckily, the wound on his shoulder gave him little trouble. It stung more than hurt, so he wasn't surprised to find that it was not a deep cut. Even if it was as wide as a finger and stretched from the outside of his shoulder and across his shoulder blade, almost to his spine, he could deal with it. It bled very little, even after he soaked and washed it.

"'Occupational hazard', right?" Hiccup said with a shaky smile when he sat up and found the little Nightfury staring at him, head poked from its bag.

This time the dragon did not recoil, but cocked its head and flicked a reptilian ear. With eyes as round a saucers and pupils expanded to match, Hiccup could have sworn it looked curious. The sparkle of morning sunlight off the tumbling mountain stream caught its attention almost immediately. Hiccup's smile eased into something more genuine as he watched reflected light dance across the enraptured nestling's dark scales.

"Now, what to do about you…" Hiccup felt sharp eyes on him as he rooted through his bundle of gear and returned to the stream, up until the moment he flipped a brown trout out of the water with his hand line.

At the sight of the fish, the little dragon fairly went through itself. It seemed unsure if it wanted to stare at Hiccup, wriggle out of the still fastened pack, or pounce on the fish- and so settled for attempting all three at once.

"Heh, I guess that's a yes!"

The Nightfury stilled as Hiccup approached, pupils narrowed to catlike slits. It took his measure, but warily opened a gummy mouth when offered the still flopping fish.

"Toothless?" Hiccup paused, and briefly wondered if the nestling would need its food cut up or mashed. "But I could've sworn you had…"

The fish was gone in a flash teeth. In one go the dragon tossed it up, then snapped it out of the air and swallowed it whole. It licked its teeth and stiff lips with a flat, shallowly forked pink tongue. When it looked back at the Viking its pupils were round again.

"… teeth…" Hiccup finished, one had pulled back in a reflexive movement that would have been much too slow to save his fingers.

But the dragon looked expectant, so Hiccup let it out of his pack and laughed when it batted at the water, nostrils flared, while he set about catching more fish. He- or rather 'Toothless', as Hiccup decided to call him right then- ate three more fish, one rather large, with such enthusiasm that Hiccup struggled to remove the hook from each one before it was stolen away. Only when his belly was visibly distended did the little Fury slow. With the fumbling movements of a young thing full of food, he flopped himself on the surprised Viking's lap. So pinned, Hiccup caught himself some fish, then a few extra for Toothless when he awoke, before finally giving up and shifting the sleeping dragon to a sun-dappled patch of ferns so he could retrieve his fire striker.

He ate with his new friend dozing at his side, then laid on his stomach to observe the little beast in the light of day. Small bumps just barely rose from his spine at his shoulders and hips and similar ridges, so small Hiccup almost missed them, lined the back of his rounded lower legs. Two softer bumps sat at the base of his ear-lobes like tiny, secondary ears. But, even as a tottering nestling, he was undeniably streamlined. With two wings and as many pairs of fins, his little body was bent to tear through the skies as a longboat plied the waves. Even the color on his back and spots down his sides were not silver, as Hiccup had assumed. The scales there were glossier and had a metallic iridescence in the light, but were as black as the rest. In the darkness, the little dragon would have no more color than any other shadow.

Young or not, the creature next to him was every inch a Nightfury.

"Toothless, you'll like it here." Hiccup ran his palm over the fine, soft scales, struck with some sort of awe as he felt the rise and fall of each of the dragon's breaths. "You can have as much fish as you want without fighting for it. You'll grow fast, now. But until you fledge," Hiccup's smile was small but fond. "We can be fishbones together."

It wasn't much longer before Toothless woke. When he began to nose about for the fish he smelled, Hiccup fed him and wondered at how the little dragon had room for so much food in his small body. Comfortably full, Toothless was asleep again in record time. Hiccup caught some more fish since clearly the Fury would be able to put them away, then set about loading all of his gear into his newly vacated pack. With his sun-dried clothes donned and axe strapped across his back, Hiccup swung on his pack, scooped up the still soundly sleeping Toothless and turned himself north to hike until nightfall. It seemed the adult Nightfury was a creature of the air that would not pursue him into the forest on foot, but that didn't stop him from flinching at every rustle in the undergrowth or freezing like a hunted rabbit when a shadow passed overhead. He swore by all of the Gods he knew of that, by nightfall, he would be as far from the nest as his legs could carry him.

That evening there was not a single sign of Nightfurys. But Hiccup, who had settled in a thick copse of birch trees, kept his fire small. Just in case. Toothless, long since tired of pawing after glowing cinders, had all but wrapped himself around the fire, tail draped over Hiccup's legs. The Viking had his sketchbook out in his lap, open to a page full of the little dragon playing, tumbling, and sleeping. He was zoned out, watching the firelight glow through the membrane of a tailfin, and was about to put the sketchbook away when he paused. Among the doodles he wrote:

"Toothless will come to me for food when I call him, now. He still cannot fly, though his wings seem big enough. He's just too wobbly. He did try to balance on my arm once but didn't last long. Good thing. He's lighter than he looks, but I can't hold him on one arm outstretched. Before he fell asleep he kept making little chortling growls in his throat.

I think he likes me."

I'd be tempted to feel sorry for Hiccup for how quickly he's bonding with this little Nightfury- if I was under the illusion that I would act any differently. And if you claim you would I'd be mighty suspicious.

Today's quote is a Gaelic saying and its common English translation. The Irish version of the 'No man is an island' concept. When I googled it, the president of Ireland informed me that scáth literally means shadow, but can be translated as 'shelter'. So. He's either overly poetic, mistaken, or this quote is way more fitting than I originally suspected… Next person to name their predominantly dark colored pet Scáth wins. (It's Gaelic, so pronunciation's a tossup. Could be pronounced 'cream cheese' and we'd never know.)

Shout out to reviewers, favs, and followers! I know most authors say it, but I appreciate you using your time to let me know what you think. Serious. It's fun to see people run across this, but it chuffs me to bits (to bits, I say!) to know for sure that some enjoy it as much as I do. You lurkers are great too, though, and don't let anyone tell you different. You thought I wouldn't notice! But I did.