I HAVE RETURED!
Hey guys its been a while, I'm sorry that it took so long to get this out. My computer broke about half way through july and I didn't have it again for about a month, but I didn't know how to continue the story, but the other day I got a few ideas that will hopefully help me post one chapter a week. Also a sort of extra long chapter for today because I've been gone so long. I usually shoot for 1500 words but this one is just over 1800, so more stuff for you guys! Also the chapter ends kind of weirdly I didn't really know how to end it so I just went with that. Any ways as always if you have any questions or suggestions please tell me they help out a lot. But I guess that's all I've got for now, read on my friends!
"Already!?"
"I'm afraid so."
"So what do we do?" Astrid said as she grabbed her old wooden sword off the wall.
"Leave and fight, there's not really any other option." Linken replied "Unless you want to stay back and wait for the military."
"So we need to leave soon."
"Very soon." He said, then realized that she had grabbed her wooden sword. "Are you actually bringing that thing? Don't you have anything better, like a iron sword?"
"No Linken, haven't i told you? They're illegal now unless your in the military." She responded "They're trying to keep people safe, taking all the weapons away, well all but our hunting bows and knives has actually kept crime in Hyrule to a minimum. But on the other hand, that law is not the best thing in situations like this."
"So all you guys have to protect yourselves are hunting bows, knives and wooden swords?"
"Yea, pretty much." Astrid answered as they left her house and headed down the path to leave Berk. "Ok, we have to be really quiet so Stoic doesn't-"
"So Stoic doesn't what?" She heard from behind her.
"S-Stoic, hi! I wasn't expecting to see you here! I'm just going to go for a walk, uh, see ya!" Astrid said and tried to make a quick escape, but naturally it failed.
"And where do you think your going?" Astrid heard as she began to escape into the forest path to leave berk.
"I'm uh-"
"No, I know what your gonna say Astrid, and the answer is no, you know your not aloud to leave Berk, especially after the incident." He said and placed a hand on her shoulder. "And now you definitely can't go, those monsters are getting close, I just hope the military gets here before they do."
"But I've been training for three years, and I'm not just a little kid any more, I'm nineteen! Why wont you just let me go!?"
"Astrid I'm not going to fight with you, your not going and that's final." He roared, Astrid jumped a bit at the sudden change in volume. Stoic sighed and placed his hand on her shoulder. "Come on, it's time for you to go to work any ways."
"Yes sir."
Astrid sauntered in the direction of Berks stables. As soon as she entered the large building a few of the horses whinnied and poked their heads out of their stalls. Stoic's Clydesdale Scull-crusher and Thornado nudged her shoulder gently with their huge noses.
"Morning guys." She whispered and pat their noses on her way by.
Linken trotted over to the other end of the building and grabbed a few buckets, then quickly headed back to Astrid and helped her get the horses fed. Once they had all been fed and given some water, Astrid began Brushing them then taking them one by one out to the pasture.
It took her most of the morning to get them all out, a few of them had to stay back because there hooves were overgrown or they just weren't felling well.
Astrid approached the last stall carefully, she kept her right arm out and gently placed it on the mares muzzle. She had just had a foal a few weeks before, and Astrid was the only person she trusted enough to go near her baby.
Astrid pulled the mares halter off the stall door and slipped it onto her face. Then she clipped her lead on and slowly lead her out of the stall.
"It's all right Lightning," she cooed as she loosely tied the mare a few feet away from her foal. "We don't want him to end up like Epona do we?"
About five years before Lightning had a brown and white filly, she was so wild and unpredictable that Hiccup named her Epona after the Hero of time's untamable horse in the legend. She was never a very tame horse and would go wild if any one approached her, and one day she broke free from her stall and stampeded out of Berk. Astrid had seen her a few times since wondering alone in Hyrule field, she had become completely wild. Some men even have competitions on who can get closer to Epona, or who could tame her. But still she remained wild, no matter how hard they tried to tame her, so now everyone just keeps there distance, but now they call her Epona the untamable.
Lightning whinnied and pressed her nose against Astrid's chest. Astrid backed away slowly towards the foal, she wanted him to get use to humans as fast as possible. He was laying down in the back corner of the stall. Astrid closed the stall door just enough so that the foal couldn't run away, but wanted to make sure that Lightning could still see her baby and he could still see her.
Lightning stuck her head into the stall and watched Astrid carefully as the blond knelt next to the foal. He looked up at Astrid and snorted, he had seen her a few times before, everyday since the night he was born she had come to see him, she sat a little closer each day. The foal stuck his head out towards her and smelt her, like Lightning did each time she came to visit.
Astrid cautiously placed her hand on his nose and stroked his muzzle softly. He leaned against her hand and began to crawl closer to her until he was laying up against her.
"Well that was easy." Astrid whispered as he rested his head on her lap. "He's a lot different then his big sister isn't he?"
A few minutes later Astrid lead the mother and foal out to their private pasture. She spent most of the afternoon cleaning out the stalls, putting fresh hay in them and trimming the other horses hooves before taking them to the pasture as well.
It was around dinner time by the time she was finally done, which was earlier than usual, so she decided to take Lightning for a bit of a joy ride. Astrid saddled her up and tied her foal to her saddle, then they went on a stroll through Berk.
One of the things Astrid had noticed ever since all the children had been taken was that the village was much quieter, though a few babies had arrived since the incident Berk was still nothing like it use to be.
The foal was trotting happily along side his mother, he was always happy to explore the small village, it was much more interesting then his pasture. He enjoyed watching the villagers go about their daily lives, but Astrid kept him a safe distant's away from them, just in case Lightning got too protective.
Astrid had almost completely forgotten about the approaching monsters after spending the day in the stable, at least until she saw that a small bit of the military had arrived.
She slowed Lightning to a stop and tied her loosely to a near by tree, then headed up to the crowd surrounding the men. Linken fallowed closely behind but made sure he stayed completely blended into his surroundings.
There were about twenty men there, all of which had shiny metal armor and were mounted on brown or black horses. However, the man in the front had black armor and a white horse, and he looked quite familiar.
"People of Berk," The man said "I am General Finn Hofferson, me and some of my men are here to help you evacuate Berk and get to Castle-town safely."
He proceeded to give the villagers instructions, they were told to gather only a few of their things, and get on a horse as fast as possible, the work horses where to be hocked up to a carriage and pull the remainder of the public. Family pets were aloud to tag along in said carriage if there was enough room, or if they could keep up with the horses.
Astrid mounted Lightning again and when home to gather her things.
As she packed her things she heard a quiet knock on the door.
"Come in!"
The door swung open and her uncle stepped in.
"So you really do live in a tree." Finn said as he entered.
"Yea, Stoic helped me carve this out last year."
There was a long pause. Before he left to join the army Astrid and her uncle Finn had been practically inseparable. Since her parents were always busy with their jobs all day Finn would keep her company, they'd usually play games, ride his horse and sometimes even go fishing. But about a month after she turned five he left to join the army in castle-town, he was always so busy that he never came to visit, so this was the first time Astrid had seen him since he left.
"Hey, did you know that the tournaments are still happening?" Finn said, trying to break the silence.
"The sword fighting one? I though they had canceled it."
"The princess thought it would be a good way to keep peoples minds off of the monsters." Finn replied.
After a few more minutes of awkward silence Finn decided to leave so Astrid could continue to collect her things.
"So that's your uncle." Linken said, Astrid replied with a small nod but continued to focus on the task at hand. "So what's this tournament that he was talking about?"
"It's an anual thing that happens in castle-town, any man can enter the competition. It works like any other tournament, but of course we use wooden sword and fight until some one gets hit, then the winners battle each other and see who the best swordsman in Hyrule is. Uncle Finn use to take me every year, but when he left dad took me, and now I usually go with the Haddocks. But all it really is is basically a bunch of guys trying to impress girls." Astrid said.
Linken chuckled, then he and Astrid left her home. He noticed that she seemed a bit upset, she was slouching and staring at her feet.
"Is there something wrong?"
"Yea." she mumbled "I just want to help with the whole monster problem, and I want to find all those kids, but no one will let me. They haven't said it to my face, but its probably because I'm a girl, so that automatically makes me some frail damsel."
"Frail?! I've seen you take on a bear with your bare hands, and win!"
"Win? It's not like I killed it or anything."
"Who cares, you still sent him running, and I've never seen any man do that."
"Stoic probably could, once Stoic, Hiccup and I were exploring it the woods and a rabid wolf came out of nowhere, and Stoic grabbed him and snapped his neck like a twig."
"Hey Astrid, I just got the perfect idea." Linken whispered "What if you entered the tournament."
"The tournament!? There's no way I could, Stoic would never let me, and even if he did you have to be a guy to enter any ways. And if you couldn't tell Linken I'm not a man."
"Who said you have to be?"