Chapter 5:

Ice and Toothless

As they watched Hiccup and Marko walk into the blacksmiths, Ice and Toothless both circled the ground outside the blacksmiths before blasting their flames on the surface, and then lying down and getting comfortable, since it would be a while before they emerged from the shop.

"So, Ice," started Toothless, and Ice looked at him, "how did you and Marko meet?" Ice, after hearing this, looked at the ground, before sighing, "Well, it's seems only fair, since you did tell me. OK, I'll tell you."

"I first saw Marko at the human age of five. It was the Dragons Initiation Ceremony. It's where the Dragons pick their riders," explained Ice, for Toothless had a confused look on his face. When it cleared, Ice continued, "I could tell that something was different about him; the other humans were all looking at the Dragon they wanted dead in the eye, and hoped that they would give in and go to them, but Marko didn't: he was looking at the ground, as though he shouldn't had been there. I had heard his story beforehand, and felt sorry for him. That and we both shared a similar story: we both lost our parents when we were young." Toothless felt sorry for Ice: he had never known his parents, so he didn't feel the pain that Ice had for losing them.

"I'm sorry," whispered Toothless, but Ice looked at him, with a small smile upon her face. "Don't be sorry, I barely knew them. I was told that they were both very brave, and that's all I need to know. Now, continuing with the story, I chose Marko and when I did, he looked at me with great surprise, and the other kids were looking at him with jealously. I don't think he blamed them: I was the most powerful Dragon on the island," said Ice, huffing proudly. Toothless chuckled lightly, but when she looked at him, he quickly stopped and frantically turned his head to the forest, and asked timidly, "Uh, would you like to take a walk into the forest?"

Ice's eyes widened by his offer. After a few seconds of thinking, she smiled, and said, "Sure," and she walked past Toothless, and gently flicked her tail against his face. His eyes widened and he looked at her, shock and wonder in his eyes. Ice giggled softly, before she said, "Coming?" and Toothless came to his sense's and looked as though he was blushing, which made Ice giggled even more. Quickly, beforehe embarrassed himself anymore; he trotted after Ice, and they were soon gone past the tree line on the outskirts of the village, near the blacksmiths.

Hiccup and Marko

Marko looked around the blacksmiths backroom in amazement of all the drawings on ideas that Hiccup had. Hiccup just said it was nothing and when to get his apron on. When he came back, he was shocked to see a pile of swords, axes, daggers, and other weapons that had appeared upon his desk. He looked over at Marko, who just shrugged and said, "My weapons are in need of a good sharpen. I trust you can do that well?"

Hiccup, who was still stunned by what had just appeared, just shook his head and grabbed a sword on the very top of the pile, and set to work, grinding the sword against the rolling rock, sparks flying in every direction. "So, why do you think I would do better than Gobbler?" asked Hiccup, but Marko just looked confused. "My mentor," added Hiccup, and the confusion lifted off Marko's face. "Well, I only trust a few people to handle my weapons, and since you rescued and helped me, I trust you." Seeming touched by that answer, Hiccup continued to work on the weapons. While he was doing that, Marko went for a wander around the backroom, looking at more at the pictures and stopping every one and a while to look at a really good one. When Hiccup had finished with the sword, tested its sharpness, and had finished another 2 sword and an axe, Hiccup heard Marko ask him a question, but he hadn't heard him clearly, because of the stone grinding against the axe.

After he stopped the stone, and asked, "Sorry, what did you say?" Marko turned round, but had a finger pointed to an old picture Hiccup had draw a while ago, hiding under several of his newer drawings. "Is this your idea? It looks familiar." Hiccup put down the axe, and walked over to the drawing that Marko was looking at, and he soon remembered what it was: it was a design for a leather vambrace that went around the user's wrist, and had a blade underneath it, so you could stab somebody before they could stop it. "Oh, that, I thought of that a couple of years ago, it's basically a dagger attached to a vambrace that can be used to stab people." Marko was still looking at the design with interest, before he quickly said, "I've got something I want to show you."

Curious, Hiccup walked over to the work table where Marko was waiting, and when he got there, Marko placed his lower left arm on the table, so that the back of his lower arm was against the table. "OK, word of advice," warned Marko to Hiccup, "be careful of my left arm, from now on." Once Hiccup nodded, Marko clenched his left hand into a fist, and released it back into a flat hand; no sooner had he done that, a thin dagger jumped out of his arm, and Hiccup jumped back in shock, which then made him put weight onto his prosthetic leg, and caused him to fall over, but was caught by the arm by Marko, who set him up straight, before saying, "Yeah, I probably should have warned you about that."

Hiccup quickly nodded, and looked at Marko's left arm and he released a huge sigh of relief: the blade wasn't coming out of his wrist anymore. After making sure that he wasn't going to fall, he walked back over to the desk, and Marko walked over to the other side of the desk, and lifted his left sleeve up, rivalling a dark brown vambrace covering his lower left arm. "My tribe are all given this after we complete the Arena training. This is why I found your design familiar." Now that Hiccup got a better look at it, it was really rather good design: it looked as though the blade retracted into a rectangular piece of metal that was attached to the bottom of the vambrace, which had a symbol engraved into the metal. The symbol looked like the Mystery Class from the Book of Dragons.

"When you get your blade, you get a symbol that represents your name in Dragonese. That's what 'Marko' means: 'Mystery'." Hiccup was in shock and awe: he had only known Marko for little under two days, and he had already learned a lot from him. Hiccup then though of a question, "What does 'Hiccup' mean?"

Marko thought for a moment, then he answered, "'Hiccup' is 'Racmonca' in Dragonese, which is 'Chosen'." Hiccup, today, had learned what his name meant in Dragonese. "So, how are those weapons coming along?" Hiccup quickly looked over to the still quite large pile of weapons that he still needed to finish. "Um, I've finished three swords and that axe over there," he said, pointing at the small pile of four weapons on the other side of the large weapon. "I'll have them finished by nightfall, if I don't stop for anything." Hiccup let out a large sigh, and Marko stepped forward. "It's alright, I'll help you with them: there my weapons, so I should at least help out."

Hiccup was slightly taken aback from this, "Uh, It's alright, I can do it." But Marko put his hand up to stop Hiccup, and shook his head, "No, no, no. I WILL help you, besides; Ice isn't going to be back for a while, because, if I know her, she'll want to go for a fly with Toothless. Trust me; I've seen the way she looks at him."

Ice and Toothless

It had been a couple of hours since Ice and Toothless went to have a walk in the forest, and by then, the sun was starting to descend towards the sea, but they still had a good few hours left to get back to Berk. There had been little conversation between the two, as they had both been wrapped up in their own thoughts.

Toothless was thinking about how much he thought of Ice: her slender body shape, her beautiful, calming voice, and the way her eyes shone in the light... Toothless shook his head to clear his head. He was a Night Fury! His kind didn't of this about lower Dragons! But, now that thought about it, wasn't the White Fury near to his rank in the Dragon chain? "Toothless, are you OK?" asked Ice. Toothless looked up to Ice, and felt as though he were melting: the way that her body looked in the sun took his breath away. "Hel-lo, Toothless? Are you in there?" asked Ice, and Toothless shook his head, and blushed, which caused a smile to spread over Ice's face. "Y-yeah, I'm fine," stuttered Toothless, which caused Ice's smile to only widen.

When they continued their walk, Ice went back to her thoughts. Her thoughts about Toothless: they way he looked at, thinking that she couldn't see him, and when she turned round, he quickly turned to face the other way, pretending to be looking at something else, and his blush that was just noticeable under his scales, and that's what made her smile. She was actually smiling in the real world, but, thankfully, Toothless didn't notice. When she noticed it, however, she immediately got rid of it, and thought: I wonder if Toothless feels the same way as I do... No, he probably doesn't think of me like that...,

After a few minutes more of walking aimlessly, the two reached a break in the trees, and they saw the most beautiful sunset they had both seen in a long time: the sun seemed to blend into the clouds, as it went below the sea, and it resulted in a burst of colours, like red, yellow, orange, and blue. The two were mesmerized by the sight, but after a few minutes, they shook their head, and sat on the cold, hard earth: their body heat warming them. "Toothless," started Ice, just as Toothless said, "Ice...,"

"No, you first," they both said in unison, which resulted them both to chuckled for a few seconds. When they were finished, Ice took a deep breath, before saying, "Toothless...these past few days that I've been here...been with you, it's been...fantastic." And as she continued, they both started, unknowingly to them, to move towards each other, "and I just wanted to say...that I...," Ice stopped to take several deep breaths to calm herself, yet Toothless was still waiting for her to finish, "Yes?," whispered Toothless, it a way that made Ice shiver on the inside.

"I just wanted to say, that I..., um, that I've really come to like you, Toothless," said Ice, in no more than a whisper, "I REALLY like you," and, without a seconds hesitation, she quickly brushed her snout against Toothless', as a kind of dragon kiss, which left Toothless wide eyed and speechless. When he didn't respond, Ice dropped her gaze from Toothless' eyes, to the grass, and started to talk in a low voice, "I understand if you don't like me back...It just, well, you're not like the other dragons, Toothless, and that's why I like you," and still not meeting Toothless' eyes, stood up and slowly started to walk away, her head down, not caring where she was going.

Toothless was, one second, sitting down, wide eyed, looking at Ice's shrinking shape, and the next, he was running as fast as his feet would let him, after Ice, and roaring loudly, "ICE WAIT!" Ice stopped and turned back round, hope evident in her eyes. When Toothless caught up with her, panting slightly, he said, "Ice, I-I-I'm sorry I didn't say, but...I really like you, too," and after he said that, he barely had time to breath, when Ice came charging in to him, purring happily and rubbing her head against his neck. And with the force of Ice against him, Toothless fell flat on his back, which only gave Ice more of Toothless to nuzzle against, as she made her way down from his neck, to his chest.

"Wait," gasped Toothless and Ice looked up at him, wondering why he had asked her to stop, "Shouldn't we do this somewhere, a little more...private," Toothless whispered, and caused a chill to run down Ice's spine at the word 'private'. After getting off Toothless, he and Ice when to find a cave to spend the night...