How to Train Your Dragon

Excerpts File - "The Dragon and His Boy"

Disclaimer

How to Train Your Dragon was created by Cressida Cowell and adapted for motion pictures by DreamWorks.

Author's Notes

This is a repository for my H2TYD short stories and excerpts. They are not necessarily related although most have the continuity and the fanon of my under-development full-length story 'Saga of the Ages'.

This story is set about a year after How to Train Your Dragon and is also set fifteen years after the movie. You'll see what I mean in a moment.

This is a bit of a whimsy on my part. Very few of us, if any of us, are what we wanted or imagined as children. What would our child-selves have thought if they could have seen us now? So, I faced Astrid, largely as she is in the movie, with an older and very different Astrid who has lived a life that I bet her child-self could never have imagined. What will they think of each other?

I freely admit that I fail at Berk Viking names. I did my best and I can only apologise at the names I've given to the OCs both featured and mentioned in passing here.

Censor: K+

Echoes of Yesterday

Astrid Haddock, wife of Hiccup Horrible Haddock III – Chieftain of the Berk-Wyrm clan of the Vikings, dragon-rider and all-around hero – had decided that her husband was right. Loki did find their clan a source of amusement and did treat them as his playthings!

"Okay, for future reference, keep your mouth shut when you have a passing whimsy," Astrid muttered to herself as she stared at her young visitor.

It was such an innocent thought. She had been tidying up the disaster area that was the living area of the Haddock family longhouse. As she did so, Astrid had found herself thinking about the changes that had occurred in her life that had brought her to this time and place. She had to admit that, if her pre-teen self had known of her future, she would have been horrified. The thought of being a wife and mother, keeping house and being domestic like her own mother would have seemed a fate worse than death! Of course, Astrid had to admit that, sometimes, she wasn't sure how she had reached this point herself! Life had not always gone the way she had planned but, in the end, it had been following the path of duty and honour and being true to her heart that had led her here. Still, she thought, I have to wonder what I would have thought, in that heady summer after Hiccup defeated the Green Death and we later defeated Alvin for the first time, if I had seen me as I am now?

It was at that point that the door to the longhouse slammed open in a most forthright manner and a loud, bossy, young and feminine voice called for Hiccup. There was a pause and then the voice, now edged with menace, continued: "Who are you and what are you doing in Hiccup's house?"

Instinctively, Astrid had whirled towards the hauntingly familiar voice, dropped into a crouch and drew her knife in one smooth motion. Then, her eyes went very wide when she recognised the girl standing in the doorway, brandishing her knife in a posture that perfectly mirrored her own.

"Well? Who are you? Some kind of thief?" Thirteen-year-old Astrid Hofferson spat angrily and twenty-seven-year-old Astrid Haddock finally realised that the gods did have a perverse sense of humour.

Astrid couldn't help but smile nostalgically at her younger self's closed expression of paranoid suspicion and barely-contained rage. Knowing how much of a hair-trigger temper she had in her years going through puberty, Astrid made a deliberate show of relaxing and sheathing her knife. "Would you believe that I live here?" she asked rhetorically as she straightened up.

Her 13-year-old self smirked viciously. "Not even for a moment!"

"Didn't think so." Astrid narrowed her eyes at her visitor. If she had learnt one thing in the last fifteen years it was that nothing was automatically as it seemed. She was still the paranoid one and she liked to think that it had kept her more trusting and open-hearted husband alive on occasion. "So, who are you?"

The blonde girl's chin rose proudly. "I am a warrior of the Berk! That's all you need to know!" she declared.

Astrid somehow managed not to roll her eyes in annoyance. Merciful Odin! I really was the most arrogant, uptight little twit, wasn't I? Frankly, no-one could have delivered that line with any degree of seriousness except herself before long association with Hiccup and her other friends extracted the iron rod from her ass. She met her younger self's gaze fearlessly before replying aloud. "Very well, warrior of the Berk, know then that I am Astrid, daughter of Ingrid, daughter of Burntpan, by law woman of the family Haddock, by blood woman of the family Hofferson, Rider of the Deadly Nadder and warrior of Berk. May Odin strike me down if I lie!"

Young Astrid cocked her head, clearly missing the clues in that comprehensive identification. "That has to be a lie!" she insisted. "I don't have any aunts or cousins who have married into Hiccup's family!"

Older Astrid smirked. "No, you don't. That's because I'm not you're aunt or cousin. I'm you!"

"Now I know you're either crazy or stupid!" Young Astrid replied scornfully. She brandished her knife threateningly. "You're coming with me and we're going to find Chief Stoic! He'll decide your fate!"

"Aren't you interested in seeing my proof?" That caught the younger Astrid by surprise. "Firstly, look at this!" Older Astrid pulled up her left sleeve to reveal an old, old scar running from wrist to elbow from where she had been accidentally slashed by one of Thunder's tail spines during one of her earliest attempts to wash her dragon. The scar, although old and faded, still had the puckered look caused by Nadder venom.

Much against her will, younger Astrid's eyes moved to where her leather arm-bracer covered the very fresh and still-livid scar on her left arm, something that she wore with combined pride and embarrassment - Why did her first scar have to be something she got by accident? "Th... That doesn't mean anything!" she insisted weakly. "I can't have been the first person to have been slashed by a Nadder's spines in that spot!"

"Would they have been able to get the Nadder saliva to heal it?" Older Astrid challenged. "Would they have even known to get it, as it wasn't until Thunder licked my arm that anyone knew that their saliva neutralised their venom? Still, assuming that you're right..." With a smile, she reached up and pulled something from around her neck, a length of cord with a brass medal at the bottom. Time had knocked off some of the blue glaze but the bronze Nadder curved around the outside of the brooch-necklace that Hiccup had given her as a Winter Solstice gift fifteen long years ago was still instantly recognisable.

Young Astrid's knife struck the dirt floor, compressed by years of feet, both human and draconic, with a surprisingly loud clatter as it fell from suddenly-nerveless fingers. Almost in a dream, she drew down the neck of her wool vest to reveal a duplicate of the medallion, this one still freshly glazed, its brass shining in the light streaming through the door.

The girl stepped forwards and walked over to her counterpart. Understanding the girl's wish (it was her, after all) the older woman knelt and let Astrid compare the two medallions. "Hiccup made this himself," Young Astrid whispered. "There's not another like it in the world! I... How... How is this possible? You... You're... me! You're me and you're... old!"

"Baldur's moustache! I'm not that old!" older Astrid muttered to herself. Okay, she was twenty-seven and had been married for a decade, but she was hardly ancient! Poor old Gobber was still hovering around at over the age of 60 and was passing himself off as the Clan Elder! That's old! Her younger counterpart didn't hear; her eyes were fixed on her older self's gravid belly, just visible under her baggy over-tunic in this fifth month of pregnancy. "Why do you think I was cautious?" she asked. Without asking, the girl put her hand on the bump, her expression showing a great internal conflict. "Our fourth," Astrid told her younger self quietly.

"Our...?" There was a look of painful confusion, of warring hope and fear on the girl's face. "P... Please...? Who is your... my... our... Who am I going to marry?" Suddenly, what her older counterpart said jumped forwards in the girl's memory. "Hiccup! I'm... I'm going to marry Hiccup!" Older Astrid couldn't help but grin at her younger self's expression as it went from horrified amazement through wonder, astonishment and, finally, reaching a joy that made her face shine. Yes, Astrid remembered, from those two nights after the battle with the Green Death that she had sat with Toothless, keeping vigil over the unconscious Hiccup, listening to his fevered murmurings, this was a destiny that had been in her heart. "Is he...?"

"The very greatest," Astrid insisted doughtily. "One day, sagas will be written about what he has done!" She stood and took her younger self's hand. "Come on. I think that we have a lot to talk about."

Young Astrid looked at the small pewter cup uncertainly. "I'm... not used to mead." The girl somehow managed to keep a scowl off her face as the woman that she was now sure was her older self rolled her eyes in mocking disbelief. Baldur's moustache! When did I start being such an impatient, condescending harpy?

"This is the watered down stuff I keep for the kids," older Astrid said in a patient tone that worked pretty well on her three 'little treasures'. She was amazed how much her experience with Cutter, Flashpan and Gutspill was giving her a handle on how to communicate with her volatile younger self. "It's the wrong season for fruit juice and fresh water's still something that we need to conserve, especially during high summer."

The younger Astrid took an experimental taste and noted, with some pleasure, that it was watered down to just the consistency that she liked... which made sense when you thought about it.

Sitting on one of the benches at the dining table, she looked around the dining area, set just off the fireplace, which had a pot containing what she presumed was a stew for tonight's evening meal bubbling away on a hook over the flames. The weird thing was that she had been here only last night, from her perspective. She had dined with Hiccup and Stoic, mostly because her mother was busy fussing over her oldest sister, who was about to give birth to her first child and, frankly, didn't want her other children underfoot. However, despite the familiarity, many things had changed. There were children's toys lying around and new decorations on the walls. Being Astrid, her eyes immediately fell on two mismatched swords hung above the fireplace. "Are those my... your swords?"

"The bottom one is. The top one is Hiccup's sword, Gyrebane."

Astrid frowned. Hiccup was... Hiccup. Okay, he knew what end of an axe to hold and was able to protect himself fairly well with a shield but she had a hard time imagining him being able to actually fight, especially with his weird metal peg-leg encumbering him. From Hiccup's description of how he held off Alvin the Treacherous until the Monstrous Strangulator grabbed the Outcast pirate, it sounded like a fairly inelegant brawl, fought with fists, sticks and stones; hardly a classic duel out of the Sagas.

"It's his second, of course," her older self was remarking with a slight smile, her expression thoughtful as she remembered battles past. "The first was destroyed by the acid blood of a Deadly Shadow!"

"He killed a Deadly Shadow?" That question was asked in a much-impressed tone. It was funny that Younger Astrid should have immediately assumed that the sword was destroyed in delivering the death-blow to an evil dragon. No other scenario seemed to make sense to her.

"He killed the Deadly Shadow." Younger Astrid nodded in response to her older self's words, understanding this immediately to be a reference to the dragon that killed Hiccup's mother half a dozen years ago from her perspective. Older Astrid was continuing. "He forged Gyrebane from a sword he took from the Romans' war leader during their first attack on Bogg. It's served him well, through the years."

Younger Astrid's quick wits picked up on the unfamiliar name. "What's a Roman?"

"Hey! I'm not telling you everything!" older Astrid said with a smirk. "I don't know how much the gods will allow you to remember but I'm not going to spoil every surprise!" The woman shook her head. "Yes, Hiccup can use a sword, although we... I had to work very hard to get him to train himself to the level of competence he needed." The older woman paused. "The axe is mine," she continued, pointing to a long-shafted twin-bladed axe with hollow blades curving around an upper hand-grip, a small mace head at the base of the main hand-grip and a spear-point between the blades. "Hiccup designed it himself; said that it was meant to match my fighting style!"

Younger Astrid shook her head. "You still fight?" She flushed at the look her older self gave her. "Sorry, I guess I thought..."

"What? That I was all 'domesticated', waiting hand-and-foot on my husband and kiddies and not a warrior anymore?" Older Astrid wasn't so proud that she could resist the temptation to flex, letting her still-toned muscles make the arms of her tunic bulge impressively. Sparring with Hiccup and training her daughter in the war-crafts really kept her in shape! "Nah, I might spend a lot of time at home right now, but I'm still a Rider and I'm still a fighter at heart!" She couldn't help but grimace as some unwelcome memories surfaced. "Someone has to protect the village when the menfolk and the younger women are off saving the world from one threat or another!"

"That happened?" Young Astrid's eyes were wide and excited.

Older Astrid's mind flashed on that horrible day when the Saxon raiders attacked. Only the fact that Fishlegs was leading a band of novice Riders over the southern approaches and had seen their striped sails as they approached had given her enough time to organise a defence. Otherwise it would have been a massacre and she and her children would now all be dead or slaves. She clearly recalled being back-to-back with Ruffnut and Camicazi, slashing away with her custom war-axe and desperately trying to keep her mind on ensuring those womenfolk trained in war-craft remained disciplined and fighting effectively when her every instinct was screaming for her to run to her children, throw them onto Thunder's back and fly away as far and as fast from this threat as she could. "Yes," she said at last, that remembered fear making her voice flat and expressionless. "That happened."

"Sounds great!" Younger Astrid chirped naïvely. "I can't wait for it to happen! Was it exciting?"

Older Astrid absently rubbed the small scar that marked the place where a Saxon arrow had punched into her right thigh. "It was blood-drenched, frightening and painful. Ruffnut still has nightmares about it." I do too, she added silently. She sighed. "Don't be in a rush to be in a pitched battle, Astrid. I've been in many and the only thing I've ever felt is fear and rage." Younger Astrid made a show of scoffing but there was something in her older self's eyes that made her restrain a biting comment about 'losing her edge'. Suddenly, she remembered the gut-wrenching terror she felt when the Green Death seemed about to swallow Thunder and her in one bite and also the way she was reduced to cowering on all fours, vomiting helplessly when she saw the savaged ruin of Hiccup's left leg. Maybe she did understand after all.

There was a long, embarrassed pause as the woman and girl processed their different view-points on the experience of battle. Wordlessly, older Astrid pushed the wooden cutting board with bread and cheese on it towards her younger self. Younger Astrid shook her head politely. Right now, food was the last thing on her mind. She looked around herself again and saw the children's toys. With a sudden shock, she realised that they must belong to... to her children! "I'm... You're a mother!" she murmured.

"You can't be more surprised than I was," older Astrid remarked with a wry grin.

"How do you manage?" the girl wanted to know. "I mean... I'm..."

"Impatient? Surly? Prone to violence? More likely to chop someone's arms and legs off than talk through a problem?"

Younger Astrid blushed brightly and scowled resentfully at the far too accurate summation of her personality. "How could you... I have handled raising children? Let alone with only Hiccup as back-up!"

Older Astrid chuckled. "Well, I won't say it was easy. I mean, the twins especially taught me exactly what Ruffnut and Tuffnut's mum must have gone through! It was hard to know what to do and it was a challenge to handle it when things got difficult. Hiccup..." The older version of Astrid paused as she considered her next words. "He was my rock. Whenever I started wondering if I was capable of being a mother he'd be there, telling me that he believed in me. He gave me the confidence to carry on." The woman smiled in reminiscence. "I'll say this much: The moment when they put the twins in my arms, I knew that I'd live and die for them. It was that wonderful." She waved her arms. "Besides they're... they're kids! They can be demanding, they can be obnoxious and they get into stuff but it isn't as if I hadn't already gone through that with the rest of the Riders more times than I cared to! Okay, so I couldn't beat up the kids, but you'd be surprised how effective the Time-Out Corner can be!"

Young Astrid snorted in laughter. "I can't imagine any child of Hiccup being daunted by being forced to sit in a corner! He's at his worst when he's got time to think!"

Her older self laughed. "They're as much mine as his; Flashpan especially! She's all motion! Sitting in a corner is worse than death for her!"

My daughter is called Flashpan, young Astrid thought with a slight smile. It was a tradition in the Barbarian Archipelago, especially amongst high-born families, to give children unappetising names (allegedly to frighten off the goblins) and then let them choose a more... well, normal name when they reached adulthood. However, she had to say that 'Flashpan' sounded right. Again, that made a sort of twisted sense, given the situation.

"If anything, I was more worried about caring for them than the discipline side of things," older Astrid continued. "I... We've always valued our freedom and independence, after all. Being tied down is one of my earliest fears! I really worried how I'd react to losing that to a family, to a child dependent on me for everything!" The older Astrid smiled. "Hiccup was the key. He's always supported me, backed me up and even gave me time off when I needed to get away from caring for the babies!" Astrid smiled as she remembered seeing the four big, tough Viking warriors, Hiccup, Snotlout, Tuffnut and Fishlegs, inspecting the harbour and the fishing fleet whilst carrying their snoozing children in slings. "When I stopped believing, he believed in me and my ability to do this. When I despaired, he tried his best to give me hope." Older Astrid shivered unconsciously as she remembered that horrendous winter fever that took the lives of half the children in the village below five years old; of foregoing food and sleep to tend to the twins as their fevers burned for day after day. She was sure it was the stress of nursing them through that nearly-deadly illness that induced the miscarriage she suffered that winter.

The woman shook her head and returned to the 'here-and-now'. "Oh, don't get me wrong, Astrid: things haven't been all sweetness and light. We do argue and we do fight occasionally. The kids have driven me half-way to murder on occasions but, in the end, we Riders all leant to be a family before the kids came along. It was just applying the lessons and..." Younger Astrid puzzled over the look on her older counterpart's face. "Then there is love. Oh, you can grimace, girl, but the bond you feel for a husband and for a child...? It isn't something you have at once but it is easy to learn, especially when the person is as noble and as warm-hearted as Hiccup."

There was a long pause as young Astrid digested this. "Are you happy?" she asked at last.

"Oh yes," older Astrid assured her. "Make no mistake, it was just duty to the clan and family honour at first but, once we had spent time together, co-operating and living in each other's pockets? Then we were able to build on our friendship, on all the times we had saved each other, made each other laugh and smile and were able to turn it into love. I found that Hiccup wasn't the sometimes-annoying joker and bumbler that I used to think. He's a thoughtful, caring and courageous man with the most amazing ideas. More importantly, I learnt that he is the sort of man who lives and dies to see to it that his duty was done. That's what motivated all his stunts, you know, the desire to do his duty to the Clan."

"I never thought..."

"Of course not; you're still only barely more than a child, Astrid. You still see things from that perspective. I promise you that, as you and Hiccup get older and... events take place in your life, then you'll see more of the real man he is, not the good-natured kid who's always trying harder than he can manage."

Younger Astrid sighed and looked down at her hands in despondency and self-doubt. "I don't know if I can do this," the girl whispered. She looked at her older self's confused expression. "I mean... most times I can barely stand not having my way! How am I supposed to completely submit myself to a man... even to Hiccup... and have my whole life defined by him and his children? I... I'm scared!"

The girl was shocked when her older self knelt beside her and lifted her chin with a gentle touch that reminded her oh-so-much of her mother. "Astrid, never forget this: This is not something that was forced upon us. It was my... our... your choice. Hiccup offered to have his father void the contract if I asked it of him but I didn't! I wanted this as much as he did, maybe even more! I knew that, as a woman, this was part of my duty to our clan and I knew that there was only one man with whom I could imagine having that manner of relationship! The only one who I could be sure would want Astrid rather than some kind of housekeeper!"

Young Astrid frowned. "Is he a good man?"

"He is the very best. He is gentle, loving, firm when needed and a comfort to me. Astrid... I love him so very, very much." The older woman sighed. "I don't know how much of this you will remember, Astrid. I don't know if this is even real or if it is some kind of vision sent by the gods for some reason. All I know is this: Get to know Hiccup and you will see that I am right, that he is the man to lead our clan and the man to hold your heart."

Young Astrid stood, frowning in concentration. "Thanks... I think..." she said at last. She looked up and saw the angle of the light coming in through the upper windows into the central hall and this made her gasp in horror. "Thor's beard! I promised to meet with the twins by now! I've got to go!"

"Hey, wait!" older Astrid called out as her younger self raced through the door and vanished in the glare of the sunlight compared to the shade of the interior of the house. "Hold on! You've forgotten your...!" Astrid ran out of the house in pursuit of her younger self, onto the flat, rocky platform overlooking the centre of the village, then paused and looked around in confusion. There was no sign of the young blonde anywhere. "What in the gods' names?" The girl was gone as if she had never been... which perhaps she should have expected. She looked down at the blade in her hand. "I never did find this knife again, did I?" she muttered to herself in confused recollection. "That replacement was the first weapon Hiccup ever made for me personally...!"

Astrid braked to a halt half-way down the hill and slapped her forehead. She'd forgotten her knife in her rush! A knife was more than a weapon, it was an all-purpose tool and no Viking worth the name would be without one. She turned on a heel and ran back to Hiccup and Stoic's house. The first thing she saw as she stepped inside when she arrived was the guy she'd originally come here to see. "Hey! Astrid!" Hiccup grinned up at her from where he was packing his pack, slotting a thick sheath of drawing parchment inside. "I'm just off to Gobber's shop!"

"Hiccup! Have you seen my knife?" The boy shook his head. "Come on, I know it's here!" the girl insisted. "I dropped it when I realised that she was... she was..." The girl's voice trailed off as the memories danced out of her mind's grasp, as tenuous and elusive as sea mist.

"She who?" Hiccup asked, his face twisted in confusion.

"I... I don't know! I... I can't remember!"

Hiccup was genuinely worried at the look of confused disorientation and mild panic on Astrid's face. He reached out a hand and touched her forehead. "You're okay, right? I mean... you're not feverish? Haven't hit your head or anything, have you?"

Astrid punched the boy on the shoulder. "I'm fine!" she snapped. "I just had a really weird feeling that I've just been talking to someone important and... and it's gone!"

"Maybe you saw one of the gods?" Hiccup teased. Astrid shot him a sarcastic, quelling look. Hiccup waved his hands as if to ward off blows. "Look, message received; if you're sure, then I believe you, okay? That still doesn't answer the mystery of the knife! I know that I'd notice it if it were around here!"

Astrid sighed. "I know! I've had that knife since mum first let me out on my own! Now it's gone, blast my luck!"

"Tell you what," Hiccup offered, "we've just finished some new blanks down at the smithy. Come with me and I'll forge a new one for you while you wait!"

Astrid sighed. "Hiccup, I don't have that sort of money; I don't want any more gifts..."

"Not a gift," Hiccup said firmly. "Listen, Dad says that you guys are my War Party now. That means I'm responsible for you and I'm not having one of my team running around without all her gear! Come on! It's for the good of the Clan!"

Astrid chuckled and shook her head at Hiccup's sly tactics. "Whatever! Okay but I'll pay you back as soon as I have some coins to my name!"

"Great! Toothless!" In response to Hiccup's call, there was a high-pitched sound like a storm wind and Toothless seemed to explode out from behind the Haddock family Longhouse and was alongside the two young Vikings in an instant.

Hiccup mounted his dragon and slotted his metal 'foot' into the control stirrup for Toothless's prosthetic tail. He then offered Astrid a hand to haul her up behind him, which she knocked aside contemptuously and then mounted herself with an acrobatic vault. Then the Night Fury was airborne and gliding down towards the smithy on the harbour front.

"You know," Astrid shouted over the slipstream, "I've been thinking. Maybe we should move out of the village? I mean, Toothless is pretty good at avoiding knocking stuff over with his tail but Snotlout's Firewyrm keeps on freaking out and catching fire every time he sees an axe blade and one day Fishlegs's Horrorcow's gonna knock over a house!"

Hiccup nodded. "I've been thinking about maybe moving us all up to the old beast-hold up on the southern slopes!" He patted his pack. "I've go the drawings for the buildings right here! We can put up a longhouse or two for us riders and barns for the dragons! That way we can train and not scare the snot out of people!"

Astrid smiled. "You really can think ahead! Why haven't I ever seen this before?" Maybe you didn't really want to see, a sarcastic voice responded. Astrid suddenly realised that there were hidden depths to this boy. There was more to him than the Dragon-training prodigy and the goof who never failed to make her laugh, the only guy around whom she felt able to just be Astrid rather than some role. She'd always known that, really. Now it was time she explored this side of him a lot more deeply.

Toothless landed with incredible delicacy beside Gobber's shop, making the screams of 'Night Fury!' and panicked retreats by various large Vikings all the more ridiculous.

Astrid looked on as Toothless idly walked up to the shop and spat out a burst of blue-white flame that flash-heated the cobblestones beside the smithy. The Night Fury settled down on the heated stones with a sigh of pleasure and gave the impression that he was going to sleep. "Does Gobber mind him napping beside the shop?" she couldn't help ask. Certainly she'd found it difficult to convince her parents to let Thunder sleep by their house (she hadn't had the courage yet to ask them to let her bring the Deadly Nadder inside!).

Hiccup grinned. "Gobber is willing to endure his presence for the 'fringe benefits'. He isn't anywhere near as deeply asleep as he looks and he gets… very annoyed when people get loud and disturb him. It's certainly cut down on the number of guys who think that shouting and screaming can get them a refund! He hasn't eaten anyone yet, but there is always the risk…!" Hiccup winked mischievously and Astrid giggled, surprising herself at her reaction to that quip.

For a while the girl watched as Hiccup went to work in honing a blank into a knife. Normally, Astrid found the sight of Hiccup at work nearly hypnotic and sort of blanked out. This time, she found herself watching his whole body's motions for the first time and found that there was a surprising level of agility in movements as he swivelled between furnace, anvil, cooling basin and tool racks. "Hiccup, have you ever thought about learning how to use a sword?" Astrid was surprised by her own words and puzzled over the sense she had that this was right as Hiccup made a self-deprecating demurral. She overrode his false modesty with a snort and a rude gesture. "You can't expect Toothless or luck to win all of your battles, especially now Alvin is so determined to get you!"

"Astrid, I'm not really a fighter. Even if I was, my leg…"

"We can work around that," Astrid said with an idle wave. "Hiccup, you've got a lot more agility than I think you realise. In any case, I'm not letting the leader of my 'War Party' run around not being able to defend himself! You might not have the raw strength needed to use a battle-axe or a war-hammer but something tells me that a cutting blade like a sword will be perfect for you!"

"Astrid, I…"

Astrid glared at her best friend. "This isn't a suggestion," she growled. "Meet me at the practice arena after evening meal and bring a sword!"

Hiccup swallowed. He wasn't sure that he could fight. However, Astrid was right about being able to defend himself against Alvin's Outcasts. As hopeless as it sounded, he needed to at least try. Besides, he wasn't a fool and when Astrid Hofferson spoke to you in that tone of voice, only a fool refused her.

"Astrid?"

The woman looked up from her consideration of her knife, twenty years old and yet still fresh and unmarred; testament to the impossible manner in which it had been returned to her. "Hiccup!" she responded and, without hesitation, rose to her feet and stepped into her husband's arms.

Hiccup Horrible Haddock III, Chieftain of the Berk-Wyrms, smiled as he embraced his wife, lowered his head and smelt the unique scent that was ineluctably Astrid in her hair. The woman looked up and returned her husband's smile; their lips met and they silently reaffirmed their love.

"Yuck, Mum! Dad!" Astrid rolled her eyes and waved dismissively at the disgusted cry from her oldest two children. Cutter and Flashpan rolled their eyes too in a disturbing mirrored move.

"Why do they have to do that in front of us?" Nine-year-old Cutter asked his twin sister.

"I think they're punishing us for something," Flashpan replied. With a shrug, the girl turned and jogged up the stairs with her Terrible Terror companion, Grassburn, fluttering in her wake.

"Out of the armour," Hiccup instructed his oldest son. Cutter nodded respectfully and with his lazy Terror, Starlight, squeaking at the sudden jerky motions, ran up the stairs after his twin so they could both store away the practice armour they had been wearing at the arena.

"So, how was your day?" Hiccup asked. "Gutspill wasn't any trouble was he?"

Astrid sighed as her thoughts turned to her four-year-old youngest, probably the one of her children who most took after their father. "It depends on how you define 'trouble' she said as she began to put plates out on the dining table. "He's had his nose buried in the Sagas, Dragon Manual and your drawings all day again! Mark my words, Hiccup, teaching him to read is going to lead to trouble one day! He's going to end up a lore-master like Fishlegs at this rate! Or worse still an inventor!"

"Hey I didn't turn out so badly did I?" Hiccup asked lightly, recognising an old tease when he heard one. Astrid seemed to have to think about that with a forbidding expression on her face. "I thought you liked me and my crazy scholar ways?" Hiccup countered with a 'kicked puppy' pout. He walked over to Astrid and cupped her cheek in his hand, drawing a thumb over her lips. "I know that you like it when I use my head!"

Astrid closed her eyes at her lover's caress and sighed in both resignation and in pleasure. No, she was no good at staying mad at Hiccup, especially when he started to arouse her. "You've also managed to get yourself in a lot of trouble," she replied, not willing to let him have an unequivocal win.

"I also got out of it, with the help of my friends of course." Hiccup cocked his head. "So, what's got you suddenly so thoughtful about the paths our children might take?"

Astrid thought about that for a moment. Then she walked over to the nearest bench and sat down. "Hiccup, do you remember when I proposed that I teach you to sword fight?"

Hiccup paused for a moment and nodded. "Yeah, it was the summer we built The Aerie, wasn't it?" Hiccup grinned. "You're a hard task-master, my darling wife, but I have to say that your teaching has paid off!"

Astrid smirked for a moment before re-focussing on the point of her story. "Have you ever wondered why I suddenly went from just enduring your weirdness to trying to actually get you to learn discipline and some of the arts of war?" Hiccup didn't respond but Astrid could see from the way his green eyes narrowed that he was focussed on the question. "That morning, I just suddenly had this certainty that you could learn to be a warrior. I somehow knew you'd be good with a sword and that, if you stopped trying to be your father, you could be great in your own way." Astrid put her returned knife on the table.

"Hey! I recognise that!" Hiccup sounded surprised. "That's the knife your mother bought you years ago! I thought that was gone for good; where did you find it?"

Astrid grinned lamely. "Right where… and when… I dropped it." Then she began to tell the tale. Much to her surprise, her husband believed it.