It was weird flying with other people, but definitely not unpleasant, I was snapped out of my thought by a voice beside me "so how old are you?"
Gasping I flung one hand to my chest in a fake wounded pose and said "how can you ask that? Don't you know it rude to ask a lady her age"
Rolling her eyes Astrid replied "well good thing you're not a lady so how old are you?"
Rolling my own eyes at her stubbornness I said "about your age"
"wait what?"
Shrugging I said "I'm about your age, 25 right? Why?"
The whole group looked surprised "oh well we thought you were older, but with an immature streak"
Snorting I was about to reply when toothless spoke up "oh yeah got the immature bit right"
Gaping at me dragon I said "i am not"
"are too"
"am not"
"are too"
"am not"
"are too"
"i am not immature! End of story got it or do you need another mineral scale mask?"
Calming up the dragon said "okay okay fine you win, happy? Sheesh immature much"
"pink really isn't your colour toothless don't push it"
The dragon sighed but didn't say anything else satisfied I looked up to meet a lot of shocked faces Fishlegs recovered first "did you just... Did you just have an 'are too, am not' argument with your dragon?"
"what I thought you couldn't understand dragon?"
"i can't but it kinda looked like that was what you were doing and you just confirmed it"
"oh uh yeah no I wasn't, didn't I mean oh for the love of... Toothless stop laughing it's not funny" pouting I flopped backwards to lay flat on Toothless's back ignoring the others asking if that was safe, rolling my head to the side I blinked "oh look there it is" twitching my foot toothless banked sharply towards the huge iceberg in the middle of the ocean, several dragon shaped objects could just be made out flying towards us.
As we got closer I could see the lead dragon was a storm cutter and it bore a rider sitting up straight I frowned, okay not good they did not look friendly. Toothless whined "shush I know just hang in there we don't know their hostile" a huge fire ball flying towards us solved that problem "oh so they are hostile. Okay split up there is a dragon for each of you, work to incapacitate only try not to hurt them yeah. Right go!"
Everyone split off and all of the opposing dragons split up to follow a rider, so it just left me and the storm cutter. Circling each other I could see the other rider studying me, a twitch of my knee had toothless performing a neat arched barrel roll allowing me to reach out and brush a hand lightly across the top of the other riders helmet.
The other dragon let out a startled squawk at the sudden change of direction as I shot off towards the nest, the rider and storm cutter raced after us, I could hear the other dragon muttering to itself 'get back here stupid hatchling, oh when I get my hands on you rider argh' rolling my eyes I let them catch up some before spotting a small opening on the surface of the nest, placing one hand lightly on Toothless's head I said "take it steady I trust you, this bit it up to you bud" nodding the night fury shot into the cave swerving and turning rapidly as we went shooting down tunnels so fast it was all a bluish white blur to me, eventually we rocketed out into a large empty cavern.
Landing I jumped off and pulled out my sword, inferno, but kept the blade retracted, waiting, the storm cutter shot in and circled once before landing the rider sliding off to land not far from us. We watched each other warily for a moment before the other rider brought their staff thing down on the ground hard, the loud boom echoed around the cave to the point that I almost missed the sound of flapping of wings. I watched as hundreds of dragons descended into the cavern, smiling slightly at the sight I sighed softly when they all landed, Toothless growled slightly and I could feel him charging up a plasma blast, reaching down I placed one hand lightly in the middle of his nose and he looked up "what? They are threatening you?"
I could hear a couple of dragons muttering amongst themselves about the silly hatchling thinking the human would understand him, smirking behind my mask I said softly "yeah I know bud but chill yeah you can't take out all of them and we don't want to hurt anyone"
The shocked murmurs that spread through the dragons gathered made the other rider look around, shaking the staff thing all the dragons around the cavern opened their mouths letting an array of different coloured lights fill the chamber, gazing around in surprise I let out an appreciative hum. Peering at the rider I said "hey there uh I come in peace?"
The other rider crouched slightly approaching slowly almost like an animal, pausing just in front of him they lifted their hands to their mask then mimed lifting it, frowning slightly I touched the bottom of my mask, grimacing lifted the mask of revealing my face for the first time in nearly a week. The rider studied me for a moment before suddenly jerking backward like they'd been burned. Frowning I stayed still as they came back hand hovering just in front of my face. If I didn't have such sensitive hearing I probably wouldn't have heard the muffled "Hiccup?"
Gaping I spluttered "wha...wh...what? Do i... Do I know you?"
The other rider took their helmet off revealing an older woman with brown hair, smiling sadly she said "no, but a mother never forgets"
Freezing I whispered "mum?"
The woman smiled and said "oh hiccup I'm so sorry" reaching out she hugged me and I just stood there not really sure what to do tentatively wrapping my arms around my mum I just struggled to wrap my head around that my mum was hear right in front of me. "can you ever forgive me?"
Stepping back I said "i don't know..."
The sounds of approaching wing beats and ineligible shouting cut me of turning I saw Astrid and the others approaching, turning away and yanking my mask back on I muttered "they don't know who I am"
"what how can they not know?"
Shrugging I said "i left berk some time ago, they only know me as Draco or 'dragon lord'. Hey don't look at me like that I didn't come up with it"
Landing not far away Astrid threw herself of Stormfly and came running over pausing in front of my mother, she said "uh who are you?"
Floundering for a second my mum struggled to come up with something, stepping in I said "she is the rider that protects this nest"
Seeming relieved she shot me an appreciative look and then finally asked "well what are you doing here?"
Pleased to finally be getting down to business I said "well we are teaming up to wipe out Drago Bludvist and we wanted to know if you wanted to help, looking at some of these dragons I would say some might appreciate the chance to get some good old fashioned revenge. You don't have to if you don't want to and we are only taking back willing dragons so if you have any volunteers..."
Before I could finish a large greyish coloured typhoomerang shuffled forward and spoke up "i want to go" I studied the dragon it showed no signs of an ailment so I wondered what Drago had done to the dragon to make him want revenge, seeming frustrated by my lack of response the dragon continued "what did you lose your ability to speak to dragons, if you ever had it to begin with" the last bit sounded bitter.
Frowning I said "no I just, was curious as to why you wanted to go"
The typhoomerang snarled and said "that man took my mate, and broke her beyond repair, she died not long ago"
Sucking in a sharp breath I apologised "I'm sorry..."
"why do you humans always presume to apologise for things you had nothing to do with?"
Giving the dragon a sad smile "it helps us to show we care and sympathise for the loss you have suffered in this case at the hands of another, and that we wish we could have helped or stopped it from happening, as well as a way for us to remember to be grateful for what we have and to remind us that it can be taken away so very quickly"
The dragon looked surprised "all that from 'I'm sorry'?"
Nodding I said "we are creatures of few words usually and we don't like to talk about grief often, so we find ways of saying what we mean without having to actually say it"
Shaking its head the dragon said "typical" but he almost sounded amused now better than bitter like before.
Grinning I said "well anyway I will take any willing volunteer so if that is what you want I will not stop you from coming, and thank you"
Turning around I saw my mother standing behind me looking shocked "you can speak with them?"
Smiling at her awed expression I said "yep" popping the 'p' I added "it made communicating with toothless much easier"
"toothless?" glancing over at my dragon I gestured to my mum and he stepped forward and smiled at her exposing his pink, toothless gums. Peering closer she said "what the?" a faint 'shnick' sound singled the arrival of Toothless's teeth, my mum let out an incredible squawking sound as she reeled back in shock and I had to fight not to laugh, leaning back in she examined his gums and teeth with fascination. Stroking his tongue she said "amazing".
Nodding I said "do you know if there are any other dragons that would wish to fight?" before she could answer the room was filled with dragons voices rising as they all tried to tell me at once that they wanted to help, shaking my head in amazement I said "well I suppose that answers that"
Grinning my mum said "would you like the grand tour?" gesturing around the ice nest we were currently residing in
Smiling I nodded and said "yeah I believe we would?" turning I made it sound more like a question as I waited for the opinion of the group behind me, they all nodded so I turned and said "lead the way, dragon lady"
My mum blinked and said "i didn't introduce myself did i?" shaking her slightly she said "my name is valka,"
The other teens looked startled "valka as in hiccup's mum?"
Instead of speaking she just nodded and then turned and started leading the group deeper into the nest ignoring the incredulous whispers behind her. We wove through the icy tunnels for several minutes before we arrived in a large cavern filled with dragons, gazing around I let out a low whistle of appreciation. Unintentionally gaining the attention of a large number of the dragons, including a small flock of baby scuttleclaws that promptly mobbed me. Flailing my arms I called out "help I'm being mobbed, toothless, help me!" the aforementioned dragon was far too busy rolling around laughing to bother helping me. Growling I called out "toothless you useless reptile get your overgrown puppy butt over here and help me!" this just caused everyone that hadn't been laughing to start and just increased the volume or intensity of everyone else's humour.
Not happy I finally managed to extract myself from the pile of baby dragons only for a huge dragon to appear at the edge of the ledge we were all stood on. Turning slightly I saw my mum bow down to the dragon, the others copied her movement. Turning back I saw the dragon was now looking directly at me "interesting, this one doesn't seem to be intimidated"
Blinking in surprise I said "well I have met another dragon you size once before that was controlling a nest of dragons through fear and terror so me and toothless defeated her and freed the dragons of her influence."
The behemoth of a dragon looked started as it said "you speak to us and you defeated a dragon of my size, even with a night fury companion that is an incredible feat"
Smirking I said "well I didn't come out of it unscathed" my hand automatically going to my left leg which had a huge amount of burn scars on the outside.
The dragon nodded and said "but still," it fell silent for a moment, seemingly deep in thought about something, apparently its decision was made because it suddenly looked down at me and said "i will gift you something" before I could ask what he was talking about, the giant dragon breathed out a gust of icy air right at me shutting my eyes I struggled not to move. When the wind ceased I opened my eyes to see my armour slightly frosted on the outside but otherwise nothing looked different, before I even open my mouth the dragon was speaking again "you will know what to do when the time comes"
Blinking at the dragon I was trying to think but everyone was talking at once, asking what that had been about and it was getting harder and harder to hear my self-think. Raising my voice I said "be quiet" once it was silent I said "right I am thinking we should get back to berk before Drago attacks" at everyone's nods I turned and started back the way we came, a few other dragons volunteered from this cavern as we were leaving and I welcomed them.
Once we were standing at the exit I remounted toothless and stared at the sky above us, patting Toothless's head I said "come on bud lets go kick some 'dragon controlling maniac' ass"
Warbling his agreement we took to the air leading the way back to berk.
thanks for reading please review and i hope you like my update speed I'm trying to get them out regularly :)
