Author's notes: this one's set a few days after Hiccup first bonded with Fenrir. enjoy :)
She was trying to get closer to him again.
Hiccup opened his eye as his ears caught the sound of shuffling along the grass of his camp. The Nadder stopped crawling forward when she realized he was awake, shoulders of her wings hunching and looking much like a child with their hand caught in the bread tin. The fire in the middle of a circle of rocks had died out hours ago, the only light the moon.
"You're persistent aren't you?" He felt silly, talking to a dragon, but it seemed to understand him. She tilted her head, looking at him curiously as he sat up against the rock he'd been using as a shield for his back. "I'll give you that much, dragon." She cooed, taking that as an invitation to sneak closer, talons barely making a dent in the earth. He sighed and gave a roll of his eyes, gesturing her over. She came to crouch next to him before she curled up at his feet, looking at him with wide, innocent golden eyes.
It had been a couple of days since the little princess had bonded him to this Nadder, and he still felt an uneasy thumping in his chest when it came closer to him. It sniffed at him, then shifted as close as it could until he shifted away, taking that as a hint that she was in as much personal space as he would allow. Once he was sure that she wasn't going to try any closer, he relaxed marginally, still on edge.
Hiccup fingered the dagger at his belt, rolling it over in his hand as he looked down at it, moonlight catching on the blade. It was a knife he'd had for a long time, one that had been the cause of his first dragon kill. He remembered the Terrible Terror, the way its chest had started moving fast under his small frame, the look in its eyes as he clamped its mouth shut and dug the knife into its neck. It was unmistakable now that it had been scared of him. Before, such an expression had filled him with an inexplicable need to kill more dragons, to prove his worth, but at the moment he felt sick to his stomach at the idea.
"What the Hel is wrong with me?" Seething in annoyance, he threw the knife, watching it hit dead center in the trunk of a tree opposite him. The noise made the Nadder lift her head from where she had nestled her head in the crook of her wing, a squawk of concern for her rider leaving her. Hiccup sneered at her before he noticed the expression on her face. Oh right, dragons didn't...like weapons. "Sorry, I...ugh, what am I apologizing for?"
Standing with a flourish from where he had been sitting with his back to his rock, Hiccup stomped over to the tree and yanked his knife back out of the bark, when something caught his eye. Kneeling down, he brushed some flaking bark aside until he pulled it back to reveal what looked like a heart and the runes for V and S, childishly carved like a crude secret.
Pulling his hand back as if he'd been bitten by an eel, Hiccup stared at the old carving, faded slightly with age but nonetheless profound. He knew little about his mother - Alvin had always ranted about Stoick, never about her - but he knew her name. Valhallarama the Brave, the Outcasts called her, strong as she was valiant and a renowned quester. "Mother..." The word left him before he was able to stop it, and he scoffed at himself, shaking his head before digging his blade into the bark of the tree trunk.
It took a bit, but he hacked the runes out of the bark, anger growing and bubbling inside before he snapped the wood off, breaking the heart in half and turning around to throw it into the fire pit. "Fenrir," he snapped, pointing in the direction of the pit and watching as the Nadder spat a blast of fire into it, alighting the old carving as Hiccup started shaking. With a croon, she stood, cautiously closing the distance between them before she saw him drop the knife with a clatter to the forest floor. She wrapped her long neck around his shoulders, watching him grip the sleeves of his shirt as he stared at the wood as it cracked and burned.
Hiccup dug his fingers through his hair, sighing as he felt the anger dissipate somewhat. He shook his head, nails digging into his palms. "I'm going to make him pay, Fenrir," he hissed out, hearing her trill in the back of her throat behind him as embers floated into the sky. "I'm going to humiliate him, show him what I could have been if he'd let me stay and then when he thinks everything is okay between us, I'll behead him like he deserves to be. And then Berk will know. Berk will know my fury and cower in the grasp of Hiccup the Horrendous."
He promised that.