Toothless wanted to see where I spent most days. Specifically, he wanted to look inside the buildings.
He was communicating that to me without physically linking to my mind, French-kiss or otherwise. The teleporting must have altered some of the circuits in my brain so that I could hear his thoughtwaves "wirelessly" and I could broadcast my thoughts to him more easily. It was unsettling, disorienting, and I couldn't comprehend what he was saying in any way that could be easily translated, but it did save time: without the necessity of the trance, we could react faster.
Maybe I would get used to it.
Eventually.
I finally agreed to "escort" him around, on the condition that it be after all the classes were closed for the night. All the teachers had weapons; there was no sense whatsoever in putting either of us at risk. Also, he had to leave no mark on anything – no evidence that he'd ever been there.
Toothless agreed with that; he didn't want a fight either, and although he was convinced that no one would ever find him, he respected my desire to leave no mysteries behind. And he used to be much more at home in the dark anyway.
I had fun – a lot of fun – watching Toothless amble up and down the halls, sniffing the chairs, and putting his head in the desks. He quickly identified my most common desks, Astrid's most common desks (and he sensed the thought process that connected them, and found it funny), and even found Scott's and Fisher's desks.
Out on the hockey field, rolling around in the grass, Toothless was distracted briefly by the moon as it peered through the clouds. It wasn't the phase that signaled an attack, but it was close. He was sad, and…wondered how many of his former nest-mates had been eaten by the Dream Alpha last raid.
"My dad has been searching far and wide for your nest; he thinks if he destroys it, you guys will go away and leave us alone," I said softly. "It's probably in another dimension, though, isn't it?"
It was…though it did have an anchor in this dimension. Actually, destroying the nest wasn't such a bad idea; the little dragons probably wouldn't leave, since they could find shelter in almost any nook and cranny, but the Dream Alpha was too big for that and would have to find another home. Without the Dream Alpha demanding tribute, the little dragons would no longer have to raid the humans' farms and the two species could live in…relative peace, at least.
"Killing the Dream Alpha might even be a better idea, right? Making sure that it never calls its nest again, and that no other creature ever has to fear it?"
If the roiling sensation in my gut was any clue, that suggestion was blasphemous or sacrilegious or something very close to those lines and would be an extremely dangerous endeavor if anyone were to even dare such an atrocity…but in a quiet, heart-of-hearts whisper, Toothless agreed with me.
"What is a Dream Alpha, anyway?" It had occurred to me that what little conception I had of the creature might be inaccurate. If it was, all in all, as bad a thing as I thought, would the dragons really resist getting rid of it?
Toothless's concept was like a huge weight coming down on my shoulders. A Dream Alpha was always the most powerful dragon of a nest – either by mind powers alone, or a combination of mind powers and physical size. The mind powers were always important because a talent exclusive to Dream Alphas was to gather other dragons and combine their dreamscapes within its own; this allowed them to control all the other dragons with merely a thought – many hundreds simultaneously, if need be – should a carefully-organized maneuver be necessary for any reason. Its role was…supposed to be…to make sure the nest was warm and safe for the other dragons, to make sure they were all well-fed and healthy, and to lay the first block on the foundation of each new dragon's Name. The Dream Alpha was an important and sacred part of the nest's community; which was why the dragons of this nest were reluctant to take their dreamscapes back and either fight or flee, despite the fact that they were being sorely abused by their own protector.
"Oh, Toothless." I didn't know what else to say; I couldn't imagine a life like that.
Wait. Yes I could. Astrid was living just such a life with her own father, showing him respect for being her superior and hating herself for it because of how badly he treated her.
Astrid. Astrid?
Toothless suddenly jarred to his feet, his thoughts chattering something about Astrid.
"Whoa, wait, what?" I tried to wave him back down. "Slow down a minute, bud – what about Astrid?"
Sound poured through my head: athletic shoes fighting to maintain traction on smooth stone, the pounding of something large trying to ram through a synthetic-wood door, and a man's voice bellowing words that were slurred into incoherency. Threaded through all of that was a thought…not one of mine, not one of Toothless's…it was Astrid. It was grim determination and out-of-breath desperation, a bitter blend that ran both hot and cold – all her focus was on holding her bedroom door closed and praying it wouldn't give out before her father passed out.
Astrid couldn't fight back this time: he was way too drunk to perceive pain, if the way he was battering her door was any indication, and she would only make him angrier and he might kill her. She couldn't run: he was already at her door, and if she stepped away to jump out the window again he would be through before she could even cross the room. My only question was why she hadn't bailed before he got too close, but it didn't matter right now – she was trapped, and I could tell that that door was not going to hold.
He was going to get through, and he was going to rape her.
Not acceptable.
"Toothless, rescue mission!" I knew Astrid was no damsel in distress; that didn't mean she didn't occasionally need saving. And she'd saved me from my cousin and many other beatings by signing my cast; this could return that favor.
Toothless braced on all fours and aimed his nose at the ground, exposing the back of his neck – and a couple of peculiar hollow spots on the sides of his skull, right next to his spine.
I stared blankly for a moment. Then realization hit. "I can get into your head from in back, too?" That would be much easier on me if I could ride on top while we teleported; I was used to the idea of sitting on top, like bicycling. "Wait, I don't have to use my tongue, do I? Mine's not equipped to do what yours does."
Toothless gave me an affirmative to the first question, and a sort of vague "you can use your fingers" for the second. Then he focused on tracing Astrid's thoughts.
No time to experiment…or to worry about this type of connection having side effects. I climbed aboard and braced for takeoff, flattening down on his back and carefully tucking a couple fingers of each hand into the hollow spots – and taking a very big breath.
I almost passed out when his thoughts wrenched at mine. Then it was like I had passed out, as we entered the freezing blackness of the Void. There was one rather odd difference this time, though: the scar on my chest was burning, straining like it was trying to rip open. The only sensation in my body.
Did this version's side effects have to remind me of when Toothless was trying to kidnap me?
At least while we were in the Void, the rest of my body couldn't respond to the trauma by going into a panic attack. Though I could only vaguely hear my heart, it sounded like a steady rhythm – and I was holding my breath, so that didn't change.
Huh. That was something: there was nothing to hear outside the body I couldn't perceive, but I could hear the blood rushing in my ears. So it wasn't total silence.
Then light blazed in my face, and my hearing came back with a definite shock. Astrid was screaming; so was a man I didn't recognize, but was probably her father.
I blinked quickly until my vision cleared and looked around. Toothless had chosen to appear sideways on the wall above Astrid's bed; Astrid was on the bed with her nightshirt pulled all the way off her torso (though not off her arms or untangled from her hair, obviously it was being used as makeshift restraints), though the drawstring on her pajama pants was still knotted tight; her father was all the way across the room, scrabbling for anything to use as a weapon…and he had no pants on.
That's going to be in my nightmares…
Fortunately for me and Toothless, the only "weapon" in the room was standing by Astrid's bed: her hockey stick. As Toothless dropped down on top of Astrid, I shifted my grip on him to be one-handed and snatched the stick to my side.
"Trust him?" I called down.
Astrid pulled in a strangled breath. "The dragon? More than my dad!" Then she shrieked again – briefly – before clearly remembering my telling her that the Void was airless and gulping down another breath. Her hands scrabbled at the sides of Toothless's head before finding the business end of her stick (the head; I had the handle along my left side, partly supporting my cast) and clutching at it.
She was kind of covering Toothless's face with her shirt…not like he needed to see where he was going next.
Then we were back in the Void.
I was more than half sure that Astrid's second scream was because of Toothless's "rib-teeth" ripping into her. There's not a lot of choice about whether or not to hurt what you grab with your chest-maw, is there? I wasn't upset, merely curious.
I got the sense of a sigh. Not when in hurry. I heal her when we leave Void.
Good.
There was no blaze of light this time – Toothless had aimed for my bathroom, and the lights were off in there – but his claws snagged on the shower curtain in the re-entry, and he brought the whole rod down to swamp us all in it. Ignoring the curtain, he released Astrid as gently as he could and breathed his "breath of life" down the deep gash in her chest.
That, evidently, was the last straw.
With a muffled noise of desperation Astrid shoved Toothless back, clawed her way out from under the shower curtain, and crashed into something on the other side of the bathroom. A moment later I heard vomit hitting water.
"I guess nearly getting raped, dragged to a safe zone through outer space, getting your chest ripped open and then knit back together with fire, really takes it out of one," I joked at the back of Toothless's head. I know, I know, hardly respectful – especially considering that the conversation piece was just a few feet away and could probably hear me just fine. But I was shaking inside, and I hadn't even been the one targeted; humor helped me to feel better.
Toothless ignored me, sniffing curiously at a little heap of fabric on the floor.
Which, I suddenly realized, was Astrid's nightshirt. She must have pulled it off altogether in her haste to get out of the curtain.
She was standing over there, emptying her stomach into my toilet, completely bare from the waist up.
My face went volcanic, and I loudly cleared my throat. "Say, um, Astrid…I…am going to jump Toothless back to my room. So I can get my crutches. Will you be okay in here for a little bit?"
The toilet flushed. Then Astrid's voice came back – raw, and broken with dry heaves or maybe sobs. "Can dragons…sense where danger is before they teleport to an area?"
I blinked. "I think so." If he could locate a mind he knew so he could teleport to them, surely he could seek out minds to avoid them.
"Can you go get my clothes? And my homework? Maybe my toiletries? I'm moving in."
I gaped at Astrid – well, in the direction of her voice. Then I shrugged. "Okay."
"I am not going back there. Ever."
"Not arguing." I patted Toothless's neck and conveyed what we were doing. He muttered his agreement, and we were off.
Mr. Hofferson's mind was completely silent for the entire time we were ransacking his house for Astrid's stuff; Toothless made it pretty clear that it was impossible for a living and aware creature to be that psychically quiet, so he'd either passed out in some room we didn't search or was running amok in the streets. I didn't relax, however, until we'd loaded all the essentials into her blanket and taken the huge bundle through the Void to my room.
Should I put her clothes away for her, or just tell her where to put them? She'd never brought more than one outfit with her at a time when she came to spend the night, and simply kept it shoved in an overnight bag. I wouldn't feel right putting clean clothes away without folding and organizing them, but doing that with Astrid's clothes – without her permission – just seemed like a pervert's hobby. I'd emptied her drawers by the armful just to avoid that feeling; being nervous about her dad possibly walking in had also been a distraction.
Toothless looked blankly at the side of the bundle with her clean clothes. Then he started nosing through the clothes at the other side (I'd grabbed all her clothes, clean and dirty, and just took care to keep them apart) and pulling them to my hamper.
Uh, pile them nextto the hamper for now. I didn't know how picky Astrid would be about losing her clothes in my laundry.
Even without the stuff in need of a wash, the "running-away-from-home" bundle was still something of a monstrosity nudged into the corner; it would be a relief when she came out of my bathroom and moved it into the guest room where she usually stayed when she slept over. I wondered how long she would stay, even if she didn't think she would ever go home.
As I pulled on my pajamas, Toothless trotted across the room with his thoughts chattering along about Astrid. Right before he reached the door, however, he suddenly went completely rigid and stared at it like the Dream Alpha was on the other side. Sinking to the floor, he…slithered…backwards to disappear under my bed.
Not Astrid, his mind reported, heavily fear-laden, not Gordon/Fisher/Scott.
Not AstridFather? I just about wailed back, suddenly too frightened to speak.
Not AstridFather, Toothless reassured. Don't know him, but…
He never got to finish the sentence before my bedroom door opened, and the opening was completely filled by a gigantic man with a gigantic beard and a fierce scowl.
"Dad!" I nearly had a panic attack on the spot. Rocking violently on my crutches, I managed to stand up beneath his gaze, trying hard not to think about the dragon under my bed or the huge pile of girls' stuff that he would see if he just glanced to the left. "You're home – early! I, I was…um…everything's fine here, so…" Astrid and I had not discussed this; not really. I thought we had time to work it out, I hadn't been expecting him back until…
"You have tried to pass a lot of things off as fine over the years when I return from the searches," Dad cut me off, "But that is a whole new level for you." He gestured at my cast.
"Oh, um…this. Uh…" I offered the cast, "…Sign it?"
He made no move to pull out a pen or reach for one of mine. "What's this I hear about you getting into fights?"
Fights, plural? I only knew of one. Maybe two. "Uh, not knowing what you heard, I cannot offer comment on any of it." I lowered my leg again. "Except that panic attacks were involved."
Seriously, a miracle would be good right about now…
I heard the bathroom door swing open. Dad did, too, and he took a step back to look.
Astrid's voice echoed down the hall, crisp and respectful. "Hello, Mr. Haddock."
I have no idea if Astrid's entrance made things better or worse. I do know, however, that I was never more in love with her than I was at that moment. She'd nearly been raped, had her chest ripped open, been teleported, was healed in fire, and threw up – and she was still able to pull herself together enough to be presentable to the chief. I could practically see her, with her pajamas all the way on and smoothed out (though my mental picture had her shirt inside out, since that was the only way I'd seen it) and her composure regained, standing straight and tall or perhaps leaning casually against the bathroom doorway. Nothing you need concern yourself with, Sir.
"Astrid, wasn't it?" Dad asked in surprise. "What are you doing here?"
I slumped on my crutches in relief, even though it was technically too early to count the day – well, night – won. I was probably grinning like a loon, and I couldn't bring myself to care.
"Penance. Coach Gordon suggested – strongly – that since it was my fault Hickory has a broken leg, I should make sure he wasn't in need of anything until the cast finally comes off."
I could hardly believe it. My real name actually sounded weirder than my nickname, when Astrid said it. Maybe it was that she hardly ever used my real name, or maybe it was that she made Hiccup sound like it was a good quality while Hickory got no such special treatment.
Wait, did she just say that she was babysitting me? I wasn't sure.
"So you've been spending nights here?" Dad wasn't sure either, by the sound of it.
"Past two weeks – thereabout." I could almost see her shrug. "I've actually gotten to like your son. He's been tutoring me when I haven't been making sure he doesn't fall and break his neck."
I really had been doing homework with her, not only on nights when she was visiting but also in the school library…but I wouldn't have called it tutoring. Astrid's mind was as razor-sharp as her tongue, and often just needed a little peace.
"Where have you been sleeping, exactly?" Dad looked back at me – no, he looked past me – and then back at Astrid. "You seem to be making…quite an impression."
I looked over my shoulder – and saw exactly what he'd seen: the indents in my mattress, too widespread to have just been made by me and my cast.
Ack – Toothless! I hadn't thought that Dad would ever look at my bed for any reason, so I hadn't considered hiding that evidence of a roommate; if I had, I would have maybe asked Toothless to flip the mattress for me.
Astrid, bless her heart, realized at once what Dad had seen and rolled with it for Toothless's sake. "He wakes up in a lot of pain sometimes; it's better for someone to be there, to make sure he gets his medicine and some water without any trouble. And if I'm in the bed, I can keep him from rolling around and jarring that cast on everything and maybe falling on the floor." I could hear her smile, and it was a doozy. "And don't worry about me, sir: you've raised a perfect gentleman."
Oh yeah, I definitely love this woman.
Dad sighed heavily. "Does your father know about this?"
If there was a hesitation, I didn't catch it. "I did tell him, back when I started; he might not remember, though. Now, if it's all right with you, Hiccup and I have school tomorrow and it is very late."
Dad nodded at her and gave me a slight smirk, before turning and thumping back downstairs. A minute later Astrid appeared in my doorway.
"Do you think he's going to come back up and check on us?" she whispered.
I shook off my stupid haze and dragged my gaze from her chest (were those stars on her nightshirt?) up to her face. "I don't know. Why?"
"Because if he did, and we were sleeping in different rooms when he looked in…he might get suspicious about what we were really doing before he got home, that we needed to change our MO so drastically. Then one or both of us would be in trouble – any answer he could come up with, right or wrong, would be bad."
"Oh." I thought about it. "He doesn't look in often, but he does look in; usually when he's heard something about me from my teachers." I shrugged. "And since, in the event of that happening Toothless was going to sleep under the bed until further notice…you might as well sleep here. Your stuff's all still here, anyway."
Astrid nodded and closed the door, waiting – with relative patience – for me to climb into bed and settle down before approaching herself.
The first few minutes in the same bed were…awkward. My bed was kind of narrow for two people – unless they were very good friends – and I'd never bothered to find another pillow because Toothless had been content to snuggle and share mine. Astrid had to fit right up against me, and she was so tense that clearly she wasn't comfortable with that idea.
It's just like when we were first sharing, I sent to Toothless. Only I was the rigid one, and you were the one at ease.
Toothless sent amusement back, and a kind of she get used to it; you not fighting like herDaddy.
A non sequitur occurred to me. Technically, I'd seen Astrid naked from the waist up (that shirt stuck on her head didn't count), and I'd been in too much of a hurry figuring out exactly where I was and where Mr. Hofferson was that I didn't even perceive it. Granted, once we were safe Astrid would have beaten the crap out of me if I'd ogled her, but still…I didn't even have a good memory of that image. And now I was jealous of Toothless, who'd had a much longer and better view but was disinclined to appreciate it; the topic had never come up of what a male dragon considered "attractive" in a female, but it couldn't have been breasts because dragons didn't have any.
I sighed regretfully.
Astrid rolled over to put her mouth next to my ear. "What is it?" she murmured.
Her breath on my ear nearly shorted out my brain. I had to fight air into my lungs before I could speak, and by that point I knew that if I told Astrid exactly what I was thinking about…well, it wouldn't be pretty. "You'd probably strangle me if I answered that," I managed to say – in a whisper, fortunately.
"Would not."
"Yeah, actually, I think you would."
"After all the other crazy things you've survived saying to me, you actually think I'd kill you over this one? It couldn't possibly be worse than Fearless Astrid Hofferson; besides, I've resolved to use more passive responses to things that offend me."
I gave in. "Okay…I was merely regretting that, when Toothless and I came after you, I didn't take the opportunity to get a decent eyeful; I just sort of vaguely remember your shirt was most of the way off."
Astrid went so very, very still that I worried she would break her new resolution any minute. For a long time we both lay in silence, and I was too tense to fall asleep now.
"Astrid?" I finally ventured.
"I'm…amazed at myself."
"That you're restraining your rage?"
Astrid snorted into my hair. "That I can't decide if you seeing my bare chest is more offensive than you not remembering it afterwards."
I actually relaxed a little. "If the most offensive piece of information in the room is that I don't remember, I could probably ask Toothless to show me; he must have had a good look when he healed you back up tonight."
Astrid pulled a hand out from under the covers and brought it down on my face. "I should hit Toothless, except he's not even human and wouldn't know what he did wrong. Dragons don't wear clothes; whatever makes the sexes attractive to each other, it all hangs out all the time."
Since I'd already thought of that, I just moved her hand off my face.
"I've gone insane."
"What?"
"The first reason to not hit the dragon was not that he would strike back and kill me."
I laughed. "Well, he probably wouldn't," then I had to pause as she covered my face again, this time more on my mouth. I mumbled the rest of my sentence through her hand. "He's from the least-aggressive class of dragons; he's more likely to just give you this sad-confused-puppy face."
Astrid stifled a laugh in my hair, finally relaxing against me.
"Astrid?"
"You should be sleeping."
"I was just wondering…why weren't you able to escape your dad on your own this time? I can't quite see that he would catch you by surprise, if he was that noisily drunk."
Astrid went quiet again. Then she shrugged. "He didn't. He did catch me on the stairs, and he's fast even when drunk. I barely had time to get to my room and close the door before he was trying to ram through it; I never would have reached the window from where I'd started, even if I didn't stop to close the door. All I had time to do was barricade."
"Oh."
A moment later Astrid spoke again. "Hiccup?"
"Are you going to blame me tomorrow for lack of sleep?"
"He saw you, didn't he? You were riding Toothless; he had to have seen you. And if he got a good enough look at you, he would go straight to your dad – just to report the attack in general – and by the time he described you well enough your dad would actually recognize you. Then he'd be all over you demanding answers."
I blinked at the dark ceiling. "You didn't get a good look at me, did you? Everything was happening so fast, and then Toothless was on top of you…he and I were night riding before we came after you. I was wearing dark clothes, with a scarf on my face and my cast all wrapped up. I wasn't really thinking about hiding my identity, I just didn't want to be the bright spot in the moonlight, but…no. Your dad wouldn't have seen enough to give a good description to anyone."
"Hmm…"
"I'll grant you he would have seen that the dragon had a rider tonight. But he was drunk; if he has any intelligence left, he'll write it off as an alcohol-induced nightmare. Even if he does believe it and report it, who would believe him? Not my dad; not if he smells any beer at all on the other guy."
"Mmm." Astrid settled again.
"One more question."
"Mmm?"
"Did Gordon really suggest at one point that you stay over?"
For a moment, Astrid didn't answer. Then her arm drew around me. "He said I should take responsibility for the things I break; this probably wasn't what he meant, but…I've slept at people's houses for dumber reasons and enjoyed it a lot less."
Somehow, I liked hearing that.
"Go to sleep."
I carefully fitted my arm around Astrid and closed my eyes. Listening to her breath, I hoped she would still be there when I woke up.