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Chapter Three: Rough Hands and Gentle Touch

Astrid wasn't one who was especially wealthy. She had few items to trade here and there, but beyond that, she didn't have much to offer. So when Gothi took her and Snowdrop in after the Skrill set their house on fire, she went to work to help. It didn't mean she was very good at it. She was good at chopping wood, riding Stormfly with tact and precision, and brutalizing Vikings who wronged her. When she was fourteen, she took out her anger on trees by smashing a hand-axe into it repeatedly; now, six winters later, she could do far worse with a sharpened weapon.

But when it came to working for Gothi, she had to pull on a more comforting stature. Beating things to death had to be replaced by tenderness and comforting words. She began to get the knack of it when her father died. With her mother, she had to hunt not only for herself, but for a child. And when her mother was captured and killed, it left Astrid with Snowdrop and a huge pile of learning things over. She was growing used to being a motherly figure to Snowdrop. Being caring and tender and gentle for someone else was a different type of dragon all together.

Astrid crept into the chief's house as quietly as she could. She closed the door behind her and looked to the fire where Stoick and Gobber sat, discussing politics. They looked up at Astrid with thankful expressions and waved her over. She approached carefully and let Stoick envelope her hands with his. She looked around awkwardly, not entirely sure if she was allowed to look right at him.

"Thank you for all your help," he said gruffly. "I trust your sister is fairing a bit better?"

Astrid nodded and smiled tiredly. "She is. She's staying with Gothi until she can shake the cold, but she is getting stronger every day."

Stoick nodded and motioned to the staircase. She took her leave and let the men resume their conversation. She climbed the steps and entered Hiccup's room. He lay in his bed while Toothless sat across from him on his dragon pad. He looked up, dragon fins back and eyes in slits, teeth bared. Astrid put up a hand and he immediately calmed. His eyes went wide and his fins perked up.

It was warm in Hiccup's loft. Toothless hadn't gone outside unless he needed to relieve himself so the mixture of a hot fire and Toothless' body heat made it almost overwhelmingly stifling. Astrid unclipped her fur hood and her cloak (it had snowed lightly that morning) and draped them over the chair by his bedside. Soon, she was in her riding gear. It was a simple leather suit that mimicked Hiccup's with some Astrid adjustments worked into it. While Hiccup loved having red marking on his clothing, she opted for blue. And she kept her pauldrons. Her father made them. She turned out to be quite sentimental about many things after her parents left; she didn't dare admit that to anyone else and no one brought it up with her.

Free from her winter clothing, she stared at Hiccup and bit her lip. She wasn't entirely sure where to start. He was pale and sweating, his hair stuck to his forehead and his breaths calm and deep. Gothi's matrons gave her a bag to take with her when she came, and it was full of poultices in vials, dressings, and a needle with sinew. She hoped that wouldn't be needed when she remembered it was in her bag. But she also told them she didn't have to be the one to assist with Hiccup. The matrons merely chuckled with one another, gave her a grin, and shoved her out the door. They certainly weren't modest.

"We saw you kissing him in the Great Hall!" one had laughed.

"Because he saved my sister. I would have kissed anyone who did that," Astrid had growled.

The matron in question snorted and rolled her eyes and readjusted Astrid's furs around her chest before she was sent out. Astrid made sure to mess them up afterwards; she wasn't for the primping and preening her Nadder was used to. This was a serious job, not one for flirting and courtship. Besides, what was the point? Astrid was promised to someone else until she was ready. As if.

She hovered her hands over Hiccup's sleeping body and hesitated. This felt weird. Invasive. She almost wanted to punch herself into sensibility. She pulled the blankets from Hiccup and felt even more awkward and warm when she found him not wearing as much on his body as she was used to. His riding suit, slashed apart by the Skrill, was gone and being repaired by Gobber. Bandages wrapped around his torso over and over, showing off his chest and shoulders.

She felt her chest throb painfully and she gritted her teeth. Along his bare chest were the sharp thin lines of lightning scars. She knew what she had to do: replace his bandages, do the routine the matrons instructed her to do, and leave him be.

The only thing was she wasn't sure how to move him. She reluctantly reached for his shoulders and rested a hand on his neck. She wriggled her other hand beneath his shoulders. She cringed. He was sweating like a Terror facing a Changewing. She was close to his face and she tried to keep her head far away enough to keep the strands of her loose braid from falling into his slightly open mouth.

Toothless made it to his legs and scampered over as Astrid tried to pull Hiccup up. He nudged his owner's head until it was over him and he lifted his master up gently. Now that Hiccup was sitting up more or less against his dragon, Astrid could replace his bandages. She sawed through them with a small knife after looking to Toothless to reassure him that she wasn't going to stab him. The bandages wrapped around his chest and she pulled them free. Toothless wrinkled his nose at the sight and Astrid sighed with distortion, like a breath taken after seeing something you didn't particularly want to see.

The cut was healing nicely, but it didn't look pretty. It started in the middle of his back and wrapped around his ribs to end around the front. The gash had been burned shut and pressed with a poultice of some kind, which Astrid also replaced. She didn't like pulling everything from the cut; it showed her how injured he was. She wasn't sure how Hiccup let himself get hurt like that. He never turned his back on dragons, never.

The skin around the cut was red and she dabbed at it with a cold cloth. She looked up at Toothless, held out a hand, and the dragon licked her palm grossly. She ran her hand over the cut and the redness went down under the sheen of Night Fury spit. She rewrapped his torso and chest and Toothless eased him back down. She washed her hands and looked to the Night Fury, who sniffed his owner's face and cooed as he wandered back to his dragon pad.

Astrid sat in her chair next to Hiccup and looked at him with worry. Her job was done but she didn't want to leave just yet. Hiccup's scars, the gash and the lightning marks, were all from him saving Snowdrop. She wasn't sure how… Hiccup wouldn't have let this happen to himself easily.

"You have to wake up sooner or later," she huffed. She only hoped that was true. Every day, she would wake up and be terrified to hear that he passed and would be cast into the ocean. Thankfully, no Viking funerals had been planned for brave Hiccup.

Astrid brushed his hair back with one of her calloused hands and she cupped his cheek.

"Hiccup," she began quietly. She ran her down to one of his hands. She held it gently as if to comfort herself more than him. She took a moment to feel comfortable before opening her mouth to speak, closing it, and opening it once more.

"Snowdrop is okay," she forced. "Sick, but that's normal for a child out in the freezing rain, right? Gothi says she'll be fine. And we're getting a new roof on our house, which is good. I mean, good because I don't have one anymore. The dragons have been taking turns using their wings to keep it from flooding. It's amazing…

"Stormfly is okay, too. Gobber found a salve to ease her wing cramps. I can fly her around the island and it seems to be working but… I'm not pushing her right now. And you should see the others. Snotlout had to send for his wife at the Academy yesterday because the kids somehow tied Tuffnut to the new ceiling. I think Ruffnut and Fishlegs helped a bit, but I was impressed. One of the kids told me to tell you to wake up before he asks Thor to do it for you, too."

She laughed lightly but it didn't improve her mood much. She wanted him to wake up. She stared at his face again and had a private realization. She stood up and looked to the stairs again before looking back to Hiccup. She ran her fingers into his hair gently, using her fingers to work along his scalp when she found the small bump Ruffnut had cracked when she tossed the ball-rope.

Crouching next to him, Astrid parted his hair to see the cut. It was small and healed over. She covered it with her palm, and used her other to move Hiccup's head slightly. She leaned over him, close to his face, and listened to him breathe for a minute. It was a lovely sound, the sound of someone living and recovering. The sound of silence was the most horrible sound when it came to injuries. Astrid used to sit next to Snowdrop's cot to listen to her breathe and murmur in her sleep to remind herself she still had her.

Hiccup's soft breath brushed along her face and she breathed him in, just to feel his life against her to reassure her for a single moment, keeping her hopeful that he would wake up.

Gothi nodded to Astrid when she came back. She set her bag down and put her furs away before she went to Snowdrop, who was sitting up in bed being fed her soup. She squeaked at the sight of her sister, then coughed loudly. The matron left with the soup while Snowdrop reached forward for a hug.

"Hello, my tiny dragon," Astrid said happily. "How are you?"

"Good!" she wheezed. "I almost finished my soup!"

Astrid smiled widely and poked Snowdrop's nose. "That's how you're going to be strong and train your very own dragon!"

Juniper, a younger matron, approached Astrid and checked in with her for a moment about Hiccup. Snowdrop gasped and tried to jump up. Astrid had to grab onto her before she fell out of the bed. "Hup!" she cried. "Hup!"

"Hush, hush," Astrid said. "Hiccup is alright. He's sleeping."

"He got an owie…" Snowdrop said sadly. "I saw it."

Astrid frowned and looked up at Juniper, who listened intently. Lifting her sister up, Astrid sat on the bed with her back against the wall and Snowdrop cradled in her arms. "How, Snowdrop? Can you tell me how he got hurt? So we can make him better?"

With this new task, Snowdrop nodded and thought for a moment, obviously scared of the Skrill that had attacked them. "I was cold. Like, really cold. It was wet and I was playing hide and seek and then I was all alone. And then this big dragon came up and lit the sky on fire!"

Astrid flinched slightly but kept her arms around Snowdrop's tiny body. "And then?"

"I was hiding behind the cart with all the swords and Hup pushed it over. Then the Skrill ripped away the roof, the one we usually make Snotlout hang off of when we're bored."

Her older sister nodded and hid the fact that her heart was racing. "That dragon roared really loud and Hup like… made a little fort over me… like this."

Snowdrop clambered up and reached over Astrid head, putting her petite hands against the stone wall and straddling her as best as her short legs would allow.

"See? Like a little fort."

Astrid reminded herself to breathe. Hiccup turned his back to the Skrill to shield Snowdrop. He had used his entire body to protect her.

"Then he put me on Toofless, and there was a bright light and he began to shake around. His body was covered in light like the dragon and he fell against Toofless and we left. Then I came back and I missed you so much, Astrid, did you miss me?"

Snowdrop grabbed Astrid's face and squished her cheeks. Tears threatened to roll down her cheeks and she held onto Snowdrop, burying her face into her tiny shoulder. When she pulled away, she looked to Juniper, who had a hand poised over her mouth in shock.

"I have to tell Stoick," Astrid said shakily. "I think… I need a walk."

Juniper nodded and took Snowdrop, who was growing sleepy. Astrid made her way from the bed, grabbed her furs, and rushed outside, tears threatening to freeze onto her face in the frigid air.

She knew Stoick was scouting the island with Snotlout and the twins, and Astrid didn't bother looking for him. She went straight back to Hiccup's house, ran through the door, panting from the hills and steps to get to the chief's house. She ran up the stairs and threw her furs off.

She then realized that she had no idea what to do or say or think. She stared at Hiccup, who hadn't moved, and grabbed his hand.

"Why in Thor's name would you do that?!" she cried. "You could have died, you could have been mangled, why would you do that to me?! But Snowdrop… I want to be mad at you and I can't because you saved one of the only things I have left on this stupid island! But you were another one of those things, you foolish, crazy boy! I could have lost both of you and now you won't wake up!"

Astrid grabbed onto his face and turned him to face her. "You need to wake up, Hiccup! Please!"

She got quieter as it became harder to breathe. She brought her face down and kissed his forehead. "You need to wake up."

She kissed his nose and his cheeks. "Wake up before I snap you in half, please…"

She kissed his mouth and let her shoulders bob from sobbing quietly. She prayed from him to make a sound, to kiss her back, to shove her off him, to be offended by her words. Nothing. She kissed him again and again as if each little peck would wake him up.

"Please…" Astrid begged.

And a hand ran up her side weakly.