Part 2 – The Trappers

For the next twelve years of my life I travelled with the Hermansens on their ship and lived in several different places. I remember those first few moments on that ship. It wasn't a majestic affair, just a standard Viking longboat with a dull blue sail flying from the mast. I remember stepping onto the deck and seeing stuff literally everywhere; weapons, barrels, chests of food. I remember being offered some warm yak milk they had picked up as a gift from the Berkians. I accepted it and was lead into a room on the deck, which they called the study. The wooden tables were covered in parchment pieces depicting dragons of all species, and notes they had made about these dragons. I was fascinated but horrified by these people, studying the very creatures we were at war with. Mildriad invited me to sit on a bog-standard wooden chair and to drink my yak milk. Whilst I was doing so she asked me who I was and who my parents were. The warmth of the milk calmed my fear and my nerves, so I felt able to speak to her about my life and what I had just gone through. But then I quickly changed the subject before I started sobbing again, asking her what they were doing studying dragons. She told me that dragons weren't the monsters we thought they were; they were simply just protecting their young, territory or food supply. She told me that she and Bjorn were travelling the world studying different dragons to eventually persuade the Viking people that dragons were not monstrous beasts. I laughed at that point, Vikings have stubbornness issues. They'd never believe that. She smiled and said, "We'll see."

I grew up on that ship, plus on several different isles and in several different tribes. But none for more than three months. We went around living in different tribes so as not to look too suspicious going to study dragons constantly, someone would eventually find us out, so we were kind of undercover. Over the next five years since my first steps on that ship, they taught me about all sorts of different dragons: the Deadly Nadder, Gronckle, Monstrous Nightmare, Hideous Zippleback, Terrible Terror, Scauldron, Whispering Death, the super rare Skrill and the mysterious, fabled Night Fury. Nobody knew anything about this dragon except that nobody had ever met one and lived to tell the tale. And that it never misses. I'd seen purple projectiles fired at various buildings on Berk and setting them alight instantly. Every single time. Not one single miss. It is the unholy offspring of lightning and Death itself. Everything about it is shrouded in a cloak of mystery. And for some reason that made me want to meet one so much I became obsessed with the dragon; the Hermansens and me had long discussions about it that went on late into the night and for my eighth birthday, they got me a necklace; a beautiful one at that, it was a bright green jewel but with a bronze depiction of a Night Fury (which turned out to be pretty accurate) curled around it. Since then, the Night Fury has been my single all-time favourite dragon, and I spent my life trying to find one.

But my first real dragon study experience was when I was eleven; the Hermansens took me to Dragon Island (don't ask me how they found it). The first dragon we spotted was a blue Deadly Nadder, so we crouched behind some rocks on the beach to watch it in its cave. I remember the Hermansens asking me to remember everything they'd taught me about this beautiful dragon, not the 'extremely dangerous, kill on sight' stuff I'd read in the Book of Dragons on Berk at the age of four. I remembered that it was a vain dragon, always preening to look its best. Its spines are deadly sharp and shoot out of its tail at high speed. And oh yeah, it likes to eat chicken. Bit random I know, but it's good to know what a dragon likes to eat for various reasons.

Then they decided we get a little closer. We slowly walked into the cave, holding out legs of chicken so as not to be eaten alive. The Nadder took the chicken out of our hands then when it saw we didn't have any more, it lashed out with its spines. The Hermansens ran for cover, and I followed, but I wasn't quick enough. One of the spines lodged itself in the back of my left leg and held. It then caught on my skirt and as I tried to run for cover and pull it out at the same time it dragged up my leg in a crescent sort of motion, blood cascading out of my leg in a scarlet waterfall. I screamed at the sight of the blood coming out of my leg, but soon got over the shock and the Hermansens helped me to pull it out, and then helped me limp back to the boat before I passed out due to blood loss. I woke up a day later to see my leg stitched up and a red crescent running up my leg, from the base of my calf to my knee. I wasn't shocked, if I was going to study dragons I was going to have to get used to seeing injuries.

That was my first up close dragon experience, but this next one makes it look like nothing. I was thirteen. We were just sailing along, singing songs to keep the morale up, we'd been travelling in the same direction for three days now, and it was getting kind of boring, we hadn't found any land whatsoever. But then a cannonball just smashed into the deck literally right next to me and I whipped my head around to see another ship next to us, only it was much bigger than ours and had a lot more weaponry. As soon as the Hermansens saw the cannonball hit the deck they pulled me into the study and we tried to save as many dragon studies as we could and stuff them in our pockets for safekeeping. At this point the North Star had already begun sinking. When we had finished the water was up to our knees and another cannonball sailed over our heads, just missing the ship. The next thing we heard was "Surrender yourselves or you will be killed on the spot!" so of course we surrendered ourselves and the next thing we knew we were on board the other ship and when we turned around, the North Star was no more. She had totally sunk to the bottom of the ocean, never to be seen again.

A few minutes later and we were on an island. It was the most disturbing sight I'd ever seen, and I'd seen half my leg gouged out by a Nadder spine! But joking aside, this was much worse. There were half finished ships, half-finished weapons and get this, they were building these awful dragon traps everywhere. They were like metal and wood domes with metal teeth for a roof and I saw them chaining these dragons inside. The dragons were trying to defend themselves but they were only chained and tortured right in front of us as we were led to a dingy little prison cell with barely any room to move. We were shoved in and told that [some guy called] Drago would deal with us later. And by deal with us, his crony clearly didn't mean have a nice little chat. I wasn't going to stand for this. We hadn't even done anything! I wasn't just going to stand by and let myself and the Hermansens get bludgeoned with an axe or whatever for not even doing anything; and not only that but I wasn't standing by and watching these beautiful dragons get tortured. I was SUPER MAD.

So when the evening came and things had quietened down a bit (and Drago still hadn't 'dealt with us'. I was hoping he'd forgotten. Or wasn't told. One or the other) I scanned the area outside our little cell and luckily all was clear. I could hear laughing in the distance so they were obviously eating and having a drink. So I took one of the pins out of my hair (yes us Vikings do like to take care of our appearance. Or some of us anyway) and used it to pick the rusted lock. Someone really ought to up security, anyone could break out! Once I was out, I assured the Hermansens I'd be back for them. I didn't tell them I was planning to bust out all the dragons on my way. I ran to the first dragon trap/dome thing I saw and picked the lock again, constantly looking over my shoulder to see if I was being watched. Momentarily I looked up at the door I was unlocking and got the shock of my life. On the door in bright red letters were the words, 'Night Fury. Approach with extreme caution.'. The very dragon I'd been searching for for years was on the other side of this door.

At this thought I picked the lock with speed and opened the door, only for my dreams and my nightmares to come true at once. There, right in front of me, was a Night Fury. Black and menacing with bright green eyes looking straight at me. Then it fired those deadly purple fireballs at me, and I dodged them with skill and ease. Those things could kill a person at any range. I made my way carefully around the edge of the metal dome, the dragons' eyes following me, and as I did so, I saw all the heavy, deadly chains keeping this beautiful dragon contained. As I stepped closer, the Night Fury snarled and tried to move away, but the chains restricted its movement. It winced in pain and hung it's head, almost like it was giving up. I felt a pang of sympathy for this creature, not even being able to move. Still I moved closer, murmuring, "It's okay, I'm a friend. I'm not here to hurt you." holding my hand out just like the Hermansens had told me. They had told me that dragons and humans could actually have an alliance, and humans could actually ride dragons. Trust is key, they had said, a dragon has to trust you in order for you to train it. I turned my head away from the dragons face as I got to it, and put my hand out in front of me. I tried not to feel scared, as dragons can sense fear, but that was easier said than done. After a few long seconds, I felt something cold and scaly touch my hand. I turned my head slowly to see to my surprise that this dragon had closed its eyes and was actually showing me that it trusted me. Probably due to the dire situation.

I took my hand off the dragon's nose and grabbed a random tool from the edge of the dome. I raised it to cut the chains but the dragon snarled, so I lowered it and went around cutting the chains one by one, and finally coming to the dragons' metal collar. I cut through this slowly and almost gagged. The dragon's neck was stained dark green with its own blood and marks where the collar had dug in. I felt that pang of sympathy for the dragon again and was determined to destroy the people who had done this. Then, to my surprise, the dragon turned round sideways, inviting me to jump onto it's back. I did as much, and we flew out of the doorway I had come through and up, up, up into the sky. The island was big, but not many dragons were being tortured. I patted the side of the dragon's head and said, "Go for it. Bust your buddies out." So it shot forward like an arrow and fired it's purple fireballs at the nearest dome. However they did nothing. So it aimed for the slightly weaker part of the dome; the walls. They exploded into flying pieces of debris and went up in flames. The debris must have cut the chains of the other dragons, as one by one they flew into the night sky and away, probably to Dragon Island. It was a beautiful sight. I felt proud of myself and of this beautiful dragon.

But my moment of pride was destroyed straight away as we heard the Vikings come running out of wherever they were and seeing me hovering. Boulders and axes and arrows flew past my head but the dragon flew out of the way of each one. I thought I'd better make myself sound brave and cocky so as to prolong my life. "IS THAT THE BEST YOU CAN DO?" I yelled at these angry, raging Vikings. Then without warning the Night Fury I was riding shot down at high speed shooting at these Vikings, sending them running away from explosions left right and centre. It was almost like it was angry at these people. It was the best feeling in the world, riding a high speed dragon shooting purple fireballs at a bunch of dragon trappers. I yelled in excitement and punched the air before we swooped back up again to hear yells and projectiles fired at us. We dodged with ease and I said, "Right then, buddy, now to bust out my adopted parents."

We headed straight for the prison, I kicked open the cage door, and invited them onto the back of the dragon. They were both gobsmacked. "Is that...a Night Fury?" Bjorn was struggling to speak. "It is indeed. My new buddy. Busted it out of its cage and saved all the other dragons. We're being pursued though, so I'd hurry up."

Mildriad took a look at the dragon. "It's a girl." She said.

"How can you tell?"

"Years of studying dragons, Ingrid. Although I've never met a Night Fury, I know how to tell a male from a female. And this one is a female."

"Okay." I said and looked down at the dragon, which looked back at me. I spoke to her, "Sorry, girl, I didn't mean any offence by calling you 'it'" I patted the side of her face and introduced her to the Hermansens, and assured her they weren't going to hurt her. I got each of them to do the hand-to-nose thing and then we set off. We set towards the harbour, and she landed. "Why are we stopping here?" Mildriad asked me.

"We are going to steal a ship. To get them back." I replied.

"Are you crazy?"

"Do you want a ship or not?"

They couldn't think of a comeback for that, so we got on board the only ship that was intact, thanks to me. We were just setting off when we turned round to see dragon trappers wielding torches and varying weapons. I turned round and did my loudest most confident laugh, "Ha! See you later, suckers! Try getting your disgusting dragon trapping business back after THAT!" as we sailed away, never for them to see again. Or so I thought.

[Meanwhile, somewhere on the island]

"Sir, do you want us to go after her?"

"No, Eret, you will not go after her."

"Why not?"

"Don't question your leader!" Drago Bloodvist pinned Eret, Son of Eret against the wall. Then he let go. "No. She'll get a taste of her own medicine, trust me. We'll just wait it out."