Well, here we are. Can you believe it's been twelve chapters since Hiccup and Astrid have actually spoken? I can't believe it either!

I hope that I have worked up to your expectations. As I've mentioned before, I feel that dialogue is my weakest point in writing, and in this chapter I strove to really try my best. I'm feeling very insecure about it, and I hope that you will all be honest with me, should you choose to review, concerning this chapter and how you felt about it. Your critiques will only help me become a better writer and improve the conclusion of this story (and arc two) in the long run.

HORIZONS

Arc 2: Verðandi and the End of All Things

Chapter X

It was approximately sometime around the middle of the day, but for all Astrid cared it could have been Ragnorok. She and her dragon were soaring some hundreds of furlongs above the Night Fury and his infuriating rider, and for some absolutely ludicrous reason, the two of them still hadn't even bothered to notice them. They were right above them for goodness sakes! Were they idiots?

The more she flew above them, utterly ignored and undetected by her prey, the more vexed she became. He tried to teach others about the stepping stones of flying, but he didn't even think to follow his own stupid advice? They could have attacked them from above hours ago! But Astrid knew better than that; she loved her Nadder very dearly, but when it came to the chase if Hiccup decided to flee, Toothless would most likely leave them both in the dust.

They would have to wait until Hiccup and Toothless touched down somewhere to rest before they sprung their attack. That was the only way she could be at an advantage against them, so long as Toothless' tack was off of his body. But even then, with the time it took Hiccup to strap his prosthetic leg into the stirrup, Astrid figured she could stop him from taking off in time. And if he did manage to get away? Well, he'd have to stop again eventually.

The air was becoming harder and harder to breathe as they continued to fly at such a high altitude, but Astrid knew that the light headedness was worth the trouble. As much as she wanted Hiccup to notice her, he was a flight risk and honestly, she was sick and tired of chasing his sorry tail-end across the Western ocean.

Well, he would be sorry once she got a hold of him and unleashed her wrath.

Quite suddenly, the dragon riding duo moved out from beneath her, vanishing into the ocean mist as if they had been eavesdropping on her silent musings. Astrid sighed dramatically and took a deep, taxing breath.

Lovely.

Toothless, who was nothing but a blurry speck in the clouds beneath them, banked sharply to the left and Astrid knew that they had finally been caught in their little game of hide and seek. She urged her Nadder to pick up the pace and the dragon happily complied, excited to finally put her pent up energy to good use.

They maintained their high altitude above the heavy clouds, knowing that the air friction only got more difficult to fly through, the closer they flew to the sea. The lack of visibility was a con, but with Toothless and Hiccup down there and the two of them high above, she knew that they would be more or less evenly matched.

She tightened the strap of leather around her left hand with her teeth, conscious that she would be forced to perform some back breaking acrobatics in order to capture the runaway boy very soon. Being tossed upside down certainly wasn't her favourite thing to do in the world, but this wasn't just an everyday situation. She was going to stop those two good for nothing vagabonds, and she was going to do it her way.

The clouds dispersed before her, falling away like a spider's silk, and she could clearly see them far below as they weaved back and forth amidst the choppy waves. It seemed that Hiccup and Toothless had all but lost their common sense in their panic to lose them; the thick, humid air of the sea would only serve to hinder their futile escape. Astrid allowed her dragon to take full control of their pursuit course and the dragon started to slowly descend, mindful that so long as the pair was slowed down by the seas, they were at a major advantage to catch up.

As the Deadly Nadder began to slowly close the gap between Hiccup and herself, Astrid couldn't help but think about how utterly anti-climactic this was all turning out to be. Why was he making it so easy for her to catch up? This was pathetic, almost like child's play—

The Nadder jerked violently to the left, barrel rolling out of the way just as a ball of cyan fire whisked past their bodies. Astrid glared daggers at the perpetrators down below them, vowing to plough both of their faces in with her fists for daring to fire at her. They had just travelled halfway across the world for them, only to be nearly singed in their seats?

Ooh. They would so pay for that.

"Go on," she whispered to her dragon, smirking in a rather frightening way, "Let's show them what we got."

The Nadder cawed elatedly and twisted her body sideways, nosing into a downwards spiralling dive so steep that it felt as if Astrid had left her stomach somewhere far above her. She held on for dear life as they broke barrier after barrier of dense, freezing clouds, just waiting for the perfect opportunity to pull up and scare the daylights out of their prey.

Her dragon screeched a fearsome battle cry and released a burst of fire that, as they levelled with Hiccup and Toothless, barely missed singing the hair off of Hiccup's head. Toothless squawked at the sudden attack and began moving evasively, but Astrid was having none of it. She led her Nadder upwards and unceremoniously dropped down beside them, shocking both rider and dragon until they almost fell into the sea.

"You idiots!" she shrieked, waving her free hand in a hysterical rage, "Are you trying to kill us?"

Hiccup and Toothless remained frozen like stone statues, their jaws agape with shock. Astrid took this as the perfect excuse to continue her lecture.

"Since when is it okay to fire at us? Didn't you think to maybe, oh I don't know, look before you try and shoot us out of the sky!"

If anything, their jaws only served to drop further.

"You stupid, pathetic trolls! How dare you just run off on some stupid adventure all by yourselves without telling anybody? When we land, I swear I am going to string you up by your toenails and wail on you until Ragnorok!"

Hiccup closed his mouth, then opened it again, gaping like a fish.

"What?"

Slowly, like a volcano nearing its imminent eruption, Astrid began to feel an absolute fury start to well up inside her. She clenched her hands into fists and didn't bother trying to hide the expression of all-consuming rage on her features, her skin as hot as lava.

"What? What? I chased you all around this gods-forsaken world and all you have to say to me is WHAT?"

"…I…uh…"

"Just shut up, shut up! Land on the next island or I will personally skin both of you and turn you into clothes!"

Sharing a look of utter horror, both dragon and rider nodded their heads in fear of their lives. Toothless may have been a Night Fury, but his hatchling's mate was the most fearsome creature he had ever encountered; he did not put her gruesome vows of murder past her.

She graced them both with a sneer that could give grown men nightmares before ascending back up into the clouds, leaving Hiccup and Toothless both alone again. Hiccup didn't have to say anything though; his facial expression was proof enough of how he was feeling about the sudden turn of events.

They were screwed.

The sun was just beginning its descent in the sky when an island came into view along the horizon. Toothless began to drop away from the tailwind they had been riding for some time with a flick of his wings, keeping one eye trained on the island and the other high above them in the sky.

Hiccup, despite his efforts, still hadn't come to terms with what had happened. In all of his wildest dreams (and nightmares), he couldn't figure out what Astrid was doing following him, let alone why. Was she crazy?

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Hiccup secretly revelled in the knowledge that she was crazy enough to go after him. The rest of his brain registered a daunting sagacity of common sense, in which he knew that he was about to get his arse handed to him by the woman of his dreams.

He was kind of looking forward to it.

Toothless landed with a thud, jarring him out of his sullied thoughts. He hoped that the chilly winter air would be a good enough excuse to explain the flush of red that painted his cheeks as he tried to shake her glorious image from his head. He then unattached himself from the saddle and hopped down, plonking his pack down in a large, concave grotto of rock that Toothless had settled beside. It was devoid of heavy snow for the most part, making it a decent place to rest for the night.

Or rest in peace. Where Astrid was concerned, he could never be sure.

He sighed and sat down on a fallen branch, crossing his legs awkwardly. His stump was killing him, and he wanted to take his prosthetic off desperately, but the last thing he wanted to do was show any kind of weakness, especially since she would most likely use that to her advantage. He was still healing and was as weak as anything; he didn't think he'd be able run from her very far before collapsing in exhaustion or from the pain in his leg, whichever came first.

He settled his elbow in the crook of his knee, resting his chin in the palm of his hand, and waited.

And waited.

The indentation in the rock was facing west and when Astrid finally began striding towards him, she looked to be completely enrobed by the setting sun. Nothing but her silhouette could be seen, and even though she was covered in layers upon layers of coats, she still managed to look amazing.

The way her hips swayed practically sent him into a sensory meltdown, and he had to shift uncomfortably on the branch just to get a hold of himself. She stopped a few metres away from him and crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes absolutely carnal.

"You're a prick, you know that?"

Astrid stepped closer, eyeing the boy closely. He looked horrible, if she was going to be honest with herself. His hair was bedraggled and his skin was paler than she had ever seen it. He was growing patches of hair of his chin, which would have been a redeeming quality if they weren't so sporadic and filthy. Astrid had to swallow down the urge to shove him in some water and make him take a bath.

"Astrid…ah, Astrid I—"

"For once in your life Hiccup, can you please try and form a coherent sentence without stuttering?"

Gods, she said his name. Hiccup swallowed anxiously, tugging at the collar of his outermost coat.

"S-sorry. I mean, sorry."

She glared at him, her eyes narrowed. He shifted again, wishing that she would stop staring at him like he was naked.

"Now answer me. Why did you leave?"

Hiccup looked up with a start, his expression betraying his surprise. Out of all the things that he had expected her to say to him, this hadn't been the one that he wanted to answer.

"What-what do you mean?"

She harrumphed, folding her arms even tighter against her chest, "You said in your letter that you wanted to explore Midgard, but I'm not that stupid. Why did you really leave?"

"I…I…I just wanted to travel?" he squeaked, ready for the world to swallow him up. He had expected to be beaten to a pulp, not interrogated.

"That's crap and you know it," she ground out, dropping her own pack onto the ground beside her. She opened the clasp and began going through the contents of the basket, finally latching onto what she needed. She pulled out a notebook, its cover looking categorically worse for wear, and flipped to the first few pages.

"Where did you find that?" Hiccup breathed, his eyes gaping wide. His heart started beating fervently as she leafed through the pages of his personal sketchbook.

"I was determined to find out where you had gone," Upon seeing the look of horror painted in his eyes, Astrid sought to placate him, "Just be lucky that I was the only one who found them."

"My father…?"

"No, and neither did Gobber. Your secret is safe with me."

"But...but..."

"Hiccup. Honestly," she took a menacing step forwards, her frightening glare inspiring him to shut his mouth before she moved any closer, "Did you really think that I was going to let you go? Without me investigating? You should know me better than that."

She sighed quietly, raking her fingers through her bangs, "When you left, you father, Gobber and I - yes, your father, believe it or not - went on a rampage trying to find out where you went. Thor knows if your father figured it out, but Gobber and I ended up tracking what you had done during the days before you left, including the people that you talked to."

"And then, you had the nerve to steal a map from my great Aunt! Did you think that she wouldn't notice? That map was priceless! And now you've probably gotten it ripped to shreds or something..."

Astrid sighed and uncrossed her arms, weary as the flood of anger began to wash away with the tide. She stared at the boy, squirming and looking incredibly uncomfortable beneath the heat of her gaze, and felt a sense of relief wash over her.

He was grubby and too skinny for what he should be, but at least he was alive.

She continued to stand, wringing her hands together as he desperately tried to avoid eye contact. He was just as awkward as he had always been, and by the gods, it was beginning to get on her nerves.

"How did you find me?" he asked finally, his voice almost inaudible against the gentle trill of the wind.

"Auntie told me what direction you were going in and I flew on a blind hope that I would eventually run into you. That, and you didn't even bothering covering the tracks you left on one of the islands we both ended up landing on."

"Yeah well," he replied, his trademark sarcasm finally coming back to him, "I wasn't exactly expecting anyone to stalk me across the ocean."

Astrid smirked, crossing her arms again and jutting her hip to one side in defiance, "Well, you obviously thought wrong. You didn't exactly make it difficult, you know."

"You always were the best tracker out of all of us," he muttered, unconsciously reaching down and massaging the bulb of muscle above his amputation. Astrid fought the urge to ask him about it, silently reminding herself that his handicap was part of the reason he left in the first place.

"And you always were the better teacher," she left her arms drop to her sides one more and then finally closed the gap between them, sitting down on the same branch a few feet away, "It was a Hel of a journey; I thought I was done in for a few times."

Hiccup breathed out quietly and gave up on faking out altogether, carefully rubbing the skin all around his amputation. The muscles of his calf - or what used to be his calf - were screaming with exhaustion, but it was just too cold to take off the prosthetic and see if he had done any damage to the healing skin. That, and Astrid was staring at him. Again.

"Let's not mince words Hiccup," she said quietly, breaking the heavy silence that had fallen over them, "I'm going to ask you again; why are you out here, on your own, flying towards Thor knows where for no apparent reason?"

Hiccup kept his face tactfully turned away from her, afraid of her uncanny abilities to read him like a scroll, "It was..." he sighed, running his gloved fingers through his hair, "It was only a matter of time. Soon, people were going to see past the hero and everyone would see me for who I really am; killing a dragon didn't change me," he stared down at his prosthetic, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat, "I'm still me. Still Hiccup the awkward, Hiccup the nuisance. I just happen to ride a dragon now."

Astrid curbed herself from saying anything, knowing that it would fall on deaf ears. He'd been stewing over this for a long time, she knew, and it was going to take more than words to get him to see that he wasn't an invalid like he seemed to think he was.

She let him continue, "The only difference now is that people listen to me, but I know that someday it'll all go away. People won't need me anymore for dragon advice, and I'll become just as obsolete as I was before, but worse. Because now I know what it's like to fit in, to have friends, be respected. I mean, I'm expected to be the next chief! How am I supposed to pull that off?" Hiccup sighed, a darkness Astrid didn't like folding over his features, "Not that it matters. I'm gone now, and I'm not going back."

"You're not...what?"

"I'm not going back, not after experiencing this," he motioned with his hands all around him, and Astrid couldn't stop herself from raising an eyebrow in incredulity, "This is freedom. Zero responsibility, zero to deal with. All that matters is survival, and I think I've been doing a pretty good job of that so far."

Astrid pursed her lips, feeling her anger begin to simmer again, "So let me get this straight. You'd give up your family, your friends, your birthright...for this? For living alone for the rest of your life, providing that live long enough on your own, out in the wild. Are you insane?"

"You don't understand-"

"Of course I understand! I just spent the last weeks flying after you, alone, on my own, zero responsibility. And it sucks. You know why? Because I know that I left behind a family that loves me and friends that care about me!"

"My family doesn't care about me-"

"Doesn't care about you? Are you nuts?" Astrid raked her fingers through her messy hair, suppressing the urge to strangle him, "Your father was inconsolable after you left! He could barely function during the week before I left, and I doubt he's any better now. The whole village is up in arms over the loss of their hero, the saviour of their village. Gods Hiccup, you're denser than lead!"

"Vikings are stubborn, but now that you've proven yourself in their eyes, their opinion won't ever change! You're. A. Hero. Can't you understand that? Bum leg or not, you're still the symbol of what our island has become; a force to be reckoned with! We have dragons. Why? Because of you!" Astrid just wanted to slap the dumb look right off of his annoyingly handsome face, "We want you back Hiccup, we need you back. I need you back."

Astrid could see that her words hadn't sunk in entirely, and she knew it was time to fall back to the old fail safe. Closing the gap between them in the blink of an eye, Astrid walloped him across the face with her open palm, knocking him arse over tea kettle into the snow. He cried out in surprise and Astrid followed him down onto the ground, sliding across the snow on her knees. She crawled up on top of him, effectively pinning him to the ground by slamming her hands onto his shoulders and jamming his arms against his ribs.

Oh yes.

She had his attention.

He struggled against her for all of three seconds before his eyes bulged out of his head and his jaw dropped as he realised what kind of position he had tumbled into. His heart started pumping tenfold as Astrid leant closer, her gaze menacing.

"I don't care about your leg. Nobody sees you any differently because of it. You just finished telling me that saving the entire Viking civilization didn't change who you are; so what makes losing your leg any different than that?"

"I know there's more to this story than you're telling me, and I'm willing to wait as long as you need to wait for you to tell me. But I'm not listening to anymore of your insecure 'I'm handicapped' crap. And don't think that you're going to get out of this; I am going to follow you for the rest of this ridiculous journey, and you're going to deal with it. Got it?"

Hiccup gulped, unable to do much else considering his situation, and nodded.

"Good. Now listen closely: if I suspect any funny business, like if you try and lose me or something, I will hunt you down. I will find you, and I will not be nearly as merciful as I have been this time around. Understand?"

"Y-yes!" he squeaked, painfully aware of her thighs as they squeezed his arms against his body.

"Great. Now," Astrid pushed herself off of Hiccup and turned around, leaving him prone in the snow behind her, and walked over to her Nadder. The blue dragon was chattering quietly with the Night Fury against the most sheltered part of the indentation in the rock, and they didn't stop their lightning fast exchange even as Astrid dug her sleeping provisions from the saddlebags on the Nadder's back. She glanced back as inconspicuously as possible, watching from the corner of her eye as Hiccup pulled himself to his feet and brushed himself off, looking strangely at odds with himself. She frowned and tried to stay positive, hoping that at least some of what she had said to him made it through his thick skull.

She laid her sleeping sack down beside her Nadder, happy that the dragon had taken the initiative to melt all of the snow around her. She slid her boots off of her feet and placed them inside her pack, turning a blind eye as Hiccup approached his own dragon and began preparing for the night. She crawled into the sack and wrapped the pelts as close to her body as possible, hating the way that the air seemed to only get colder and colder as night fell. She buried her face in the furs and closed her eyes, hoping that sleep would take her sooner rather than later.

"Astrid?"

She grumbled into her blankets and opened her eyes, staring up at the cloudy skies, "Yes?"

"Why…why did you come after me?"

Astrid went to open her lips to reply but only ended up with a mouthful of fur. She coughed and rolled over onto her stomach, glaring over at Hiccup who had settled down beside his own dragon. He was sitting up in his sack and trying very hard to avoid her stare.

"I already told you."

"You told me that you came to hunt me down, but that's it."

"Well, you wouldn't answer my entire question, so what makes you think that I'll answer all of yours?"

He sighed and scooted down into his blankets, gazing up at the sky, "Touché."

Astrid harrumphed and rolled back onto her side, hoping the conversation was over. She was incredibly cold, not to mention starving, but she honestly didn't have the energy to eat, let alone move.

"Will you tell me why in exchange for me telling you something?"

Astrid scrunched her eyebrows together in frustration, "I suppose. Will you shut up and let me sleep after?"

"Of course."

Astrid glared up at the sky, deliberating whether or not to actually tell him the truth. After a moment, she chose the former, "I followed you for a few reasons. One of which was because I thought you were an idiot."

Hiccup snorted from his bed a few feet away, and Astrid couldn't help but let her own little smirk race across her lips, "I was worried you'd end up killing yourself somehow, since you seem to attract danger like hornets to honey. The last thing I needed was your death on my conscious."

"You were worried about me?"

"Of course I was–" she cut herself before she divulged anything further, taking a deep breath, "Yes. You happen to be a very important asset to everyone."

Hiccup wasn't buying it, "That's all?"

"Yes, that's all!" she snapped, pulling the furs up above her cheeks to cover the blush, "I followed you because you're important and I didn't want you to die."

"So, for no other reason then?"

"Hiccup!" she shrieked, and when Hiccup laughed she knew she had been caught. She buried herself deeper into the warm pelts and tried to tune out the embarrassment that was plaguing her, "Fine. I followed you because I lo…like you. A lot. There, you win. Happy?"

"Yes," Astrid could practically hear the smile in his voice, "It's nice to see you again Astrid…I missed you."

The young warrior grumbled into her blankets, hating the way his confession left her breathless, "Now tell me why you left."

The smile dissolved from his features as Hiccup remembered the other side of their bargain. He closed her eyes and rolled over, dreading her reaction to what he was about to say, "I wanted to find the end of the world. I know, I know it sounds stupid. But I just thought…you know, maybe there would be a way to…"

"A way to what?"

He didn't answer for the longest time; he took a few deep breaths and hung his head, silently condemning himself as he finally voiced the truth.

"A way to see my mother."

Astrid took a sharp intake of breath, the story finally piecing itself together before her very eyes. She rolled over and stared at him as if she were looking at him for the first time, eyes wide and puzzled as she soaked in his profile, illuminated only by the muffled light of the moon.

Without really having any control over her body, Astrid pulled her boots out of her bag and shrugged out of her sack, shoving her feet inside the freezing rawhide. She dragged her sleeping bag over to his and placed it down beside him, kicking her boots off once more and crawling back in.

"I guessed as much," she divulged quietly, still gazing at his profile. He continued to stare up at the sky, a frown gracing his features, and Astrid felt her heart reach out to him. Once again, losing power over every ounce of self-discipline she had ever entertained, the young warrior placed her gloved hand on his arm and gave him a reassuring squeeze.

"Goodnight Hiccup," she whispered, watching as his frown slowly dissolved into a small, but potent, smile.

"Goodnight."

So...what did you think? Did I do their reunion justice? Was the dialogue good enough? Please leave me a review and let me know...I haven't received any feedback from my friends nor from my beta concerning the content of the story and I'm really quite concerned...

:S

Brontë