Round and round the garden, like a teddybear.

Berkian Eddur - 2

Winter in Líf's Holt

Chapter 9 - Frailty

"The forest did not tolerate frailty of body or mind. Show your weakness, and it would consume you without hesitation."

― Tahir Shah

Stoick had looked on worriedly as Snotlout helped Hiccup to his bed. His son's features were twisted into a grimace, and he really didn't know what to do. He'd been ready to chew him out - more than chew him out - remind him that he was the heir of Berk now, that he had to behave appropriately, that whatever he had done and whatever habits he had acquired during his years away he could not continue them here.

Instead, Snotlout told him tersely that Hiccup had been framed by something or other related to the UglyThugs, and then that he'd been in so much pain that they'd flown him to Snotlout's hall because it was closest and he'd passed out on Snotlout's bed. And the UglyThugs were apparently not to be trusted, his son had said through gritted teeth as he got behind the curtain and Stoick could hear him opening the jar of honey ointment.

"We have to be careful, dad," he'd repeated again and again. "There's something going on, and I think they may spring it on us today. I did what I could to avoid giving them more ammunition yesterday, but it's obvious that they're not done yet."

"And Hiccup says I can't be brought up as witness till they make a move." Snotlout obviously didn't agree with that, if his scowl said anything.

Then Astrid had walked back in, and things had begun to spark like a blade on a spinning stone. The moment she had opened the door to find Hiccup and Snotlout in front of her, she had gone red, obviously livid.

"Oh look, the adventurous boys of Berk, back to the nest for a kip after your night out on the town." Her tone was acidic and caustic.

Stoick had watched as Hiccup buckled his foot on really quickly, wincing as he watched him tighten it too much and stand too quickly, his sock on the wrong way around.

"Astrid!" He'd hobbled out of his bedding area trying to walk as normally as possible, but she had only sneered at him.

"You can stop the comedy. With the leg I mean; unless you hurt yourself last night with all the dancing."

"No, Astrid, look; I'm sorry. It isn't anything to do with the dancing-"

"It's everything to do with that! It was our first feast as promised! You shamed me in front of the village, in front of the whole tribe! In front of the entire allied clans!"

The door to the hall had been open. Stoick had hated seeing all those people gathering at the foot of the hill in the plaza.

"Astrid, please, you have to let me explain-"

"I'm not listening to anything you have to say!"

"Fine, then let me show you!" he reached down for his prosthetic buckle.

"No, Hiccup. I think you 'showed me' enough." She turned and left, bucket splashing onto the ground as she dropped it. She stopped to take an axe off the wall, unholstering Brinsinga and throwing it onto the ground with vindictive force. "You can keep that. I don't want your false promises."

Stoick looked at his son again, sitting beside him. He was still pale; pale enough that even his lips were white, and his eyes still held that haunted look that had taken over the moment that axe had met the floor.

The conversation around them ebbed and flowed; something about sheep, and agreeing on a common time to shear them so that the prices would remain in their control. He had half an ear on it, and he also admittedly knew that his son was listening attentively, despite his sickly-looking face.

Stoick turned his head slightly, exchanging a look with Toothless and Fireworm. Both of them were also looking at his son with frank worry.

The conversation that had followed Astrid's departure hadn't been pleasant either.

"Son, give her some time to cool off."

"What was I supposed to do? Refuse Sleet and risk Madfoot saying I had offended their whole tribe? How can I be sure the other clans will back us up on a claim of personal offense! There would be a duel, could even be a war! Why won't she listen to me? She didn't even give me a moment to explain! Does she not trust me at all?"

"Son, look at it from her point of view. You practically jilted her in front of the whole allied tribes."

"That's why I wanted to explain! I know what it looks like, but doesn't she care to see what it looks like for me?"

"I think she cares too much."

"Oh, of course. How stupid of me, her telling me that she'll listen to nothing I say is caring. I should have seen that. You know, for once in my life, I'd really like it if you were in my corner."

"Son…"

Hiccup had refused to talk after that, hobbling back to his bed and washing his face and chest, medicating his stump properly and changing into fresh clothing. Then he had apologised; Stoic sighed again, turning to the discussion. Hiccup had become a man while Stoick blinked, and now he realised that he did not know how to help him. The situation was … admittedly horrible. Hiccup had been protecting Berk and her needs. He'd been behaving like a good chief and putting the interests of his people even in front of his personal happiness, and gained a spy in the process.

And yet Astrid, who had become like a daughter to him already, was also right. Hiccup had shamed her, had behaved so terribly with her in front of the entire archipelago's worth of Vikings. He had refused her request to dance on their very first feast together, then danced with another woman. To her it must have seemed like he did it with spite, purposefully in her face to tell her what he thought about her dancing offer and their engagement in general.

And … he remembered what his son had said about his feelings for the girl, not a few weeks ago…

"Berk will lose a good three weeks of business by then, though," Hiccup spoke up. "Our Spring comes sooner, but then so does our Autumn. We may disrupt the wool's quality if we change the shearing time by that much. I think two weeks is the most we can stretch it."

"It's the same for us," Bile said, rubbing his chin. "And the traders don't come to us as often, with our infested waters. Sure, it will start getting better with the dragon training now, but I don't see that happening overnight. And with this sea dragon migration, things may get even worse. No, no; I vote for two weeks, too. That should put the shearing date something in the middle for us all, and we can all reach it without leaping."

"Now that is very nice," Madfoot started, and Stoick bristled immediately; the man was unfortunately not speaking out of turn this time, as Bertha had allowed some of her clanswomen generals to give a report on their fishing problems. Stoick could see Hiccup stiffen right away, his already white face going so pallid his freckles stood out terribly.

"You can sit there, speaking with authority about our seasons and our grain and our reserves of food," Madfoot snarled on. "And that's because you've had the luxury of getting to know our islands and our homes on the sly."

Stoick felt his blood run cold. That accusation was …

"Madfoot," Wolftooth said mildly. The man turned to his chief with earnestness on his face that was so poignant it could not be real. Vikings were not known to be good actors.

"Sir, with all due respect," Madfoot started, that humble note in his voice sounding out of place on him, and therefore so obviously false, that Bertha raised an eyebrow. "I think I should voice what everyone is thinking. We have a spy in our midst."

A hushed silence followed that statement as a chill went over the room.

"Oi!" Gobber said, a stand-in for Astrid as (practically) a member of his family beside Spitlout and Hoark.

"Speak for yourself," Bertha suddenly said, her voice a growl. "That thought would never cross my mind."

"It did not?" Madfoot said with so much innocence dripping from his voice it smelt like honeyed mead. "But how is that possible? That boy masqueraded as a nobody, infiltrating our villages, getting to know our customs, our traditions, even our seasons it would seem. Then he comes back to Berk with all that information about our villages, all that information he gained while he was hiding under a false name, and brings it to good use here; having the gall to show his face among us while he does it to our face."

Stoick felt nothing at all for a moment. The amount of nonsense he'd heard at that precise moment, all spun and couched out of context and bastardised to his own ends, seemed to flow over his head at its absurdity.

Then they flowed back, like the waves of the sea passing over the sand again, and sunk in. That's when the blinding, white-hot rage at the insult began to thrum in his veins, his ears pulsing with his blood as he heard nothing but his own overwhelming bloodlu-

A cool hand settled on his elbow and he almost jumped, his shivering perception of the room almost sparking his poorly suppressed urge to take the man's head and introduce it to his knee. He turned to find it was Hiccup's hand, and the details of the room around him returned as the haze of anger receded slightly.

"I can say that the Meathead clan does not appreciate your insinuations," Thuggory said. Brawlknife had over-indulged last night, and Thuggory was currently his stand-in. Cami had stood and left at the beginning of the meeting, the young lass stating it was in difference to Meathead's numbers, but had asked the other heirs to stay to honour Thuggory's position. He had not understood her logic, but she had been polite about it, and Bertha had not objected.

There was a collective mumble; the Slugsnot and the Trollguts tribes were obviously opting to stay out of it as their suddenly collectively folded arms indicated. The Bog women were all glaring at the UglyThugs as they began to finger their food menacingly. The Meatheads stood staunchly behind Thuggory; however, a few of them were unsure; the man's words, of course, made sense, if you twisted the facts until they soothed his theory.

"Those are some grave accusations," Hiccup said with a mild tone, hand still on his father's elbow as he never took his eyes off Madfoot. "Does your chief share them?"

It almost felt like pride had turned into a morning star1 and hit him in the chest with its iron-heavy, spiky ball. Just like his Hiccup; smart at the head and at the mouth, diving right to the heart of the matter. Bertha looked slyly around at her tribe, narrowed and eying Wolftooth like a nightmare eyed a fish in a jar.

And Stoick didn't want to look around at all the generals of Berk. He knew all they needed for war-cries to start going up was to make equally enraged eye-contact.

"I do not presume to know what you had in mind when you chose to take on a different name," Wolftooth said carefully, body deceptively relaxed as his eyes carefully assessed the room. "But I would of course hope that there was nothing at all that would damage the allied clans among your intentions."

Slimy, venomous, slippery…

"You of course presume correctly," Hiccup replied with an equally calm body language and smile, turning his words against him. "I would never dare endanger our treaty. My decision to travel under a false name was to see, purely, whether I could make it."

Stoick held in a wince; that wasn't even a lie, either. His son had been trying to learn his way in the world outside his tribe. It was the motivation that was left up to the other tribes' assumption. They thought it was a coming-of-age adventure. Hiccup had merely been trying to survive.

"It would have been easy to make my way across the various tribes of Berk's allies, being treated as an honoured guest as son of an allied chief. But then what challenge or hardship would that be? And what if I was followed by enemies of Berk and captured, putting a strain on my clan if a ransom is demanded?" Hiccup shook his head. "It was the only possible solution. Not to mention that, as an outsider, I was never allowed into Council unless I could give a direct input on the dragons and always asked to leave right after. It was the safest solution, for everyone."

His son had obviously thought this through. He was certainly very glad that Snotlout had not managed to convince his son to stay off the leg that morning; Stoick was an old hand at this, but he would have started a war by taking a mutton hip-bone to the man's head when he'd finished saying those words. And he was also terribly, terribly proud.

"Although now, there is of course the problem posed by insult," Hiccup went on with the same nonchalant tone.

"It is true!" Madfoot replied, looking gleeful, and Stoick looked at his son with disappointment blooming quickly on the heels of pride as the other man continued. "You practically forced my daughter out to dance with you last night, drunk as you were. No doubt your lustful ways while you were 'Cattongue the Reticent' could pass under our noses, but not anymore now!"

"You misunderstand," Hiccup replied with a smile that did not reach his eyes, and Toothless suddenly began growling, as if picking a cue from his friend. Stoick looked back at him. Hiccup, however, did not; he did not even raise a hand to calm the dragon at all. "I meant the insult incurred to me, as heir to my tribe, by you, a general of yours."

Again there was silence in the hall as the statement made everyone hold their breath, the dragon growls resounding around the table. Gobber looked as red in the face as he must be, if his burning ears were any indication, and the anger in him barely kept at bay had any outward sign. Bertha looked like her birth anniversary had skipped a few weeks and come early.

Wolftooth suddenly looked very, very tense, eyes wide and completely, for once, taken by surprise.

"You have insinuated that I was spying on your clans, without proof and without provocation," Hiccup said, still smiling pleasantly. "Even when I have not, as you say, used any information against you in these talks; anyone here who has travelled by sea knows the whims of the season well enough not to drown. Of course, the usual course of action would be a duel." The subsonic rumble of the night fury's growl deepening in pitch, making his bones rattle. Fireworm's tones joined in, and soon, all the other dragons in the hall save a few were growling. Stoick tried to calm Fireworm, and others followed, but all the dragons refused to subside. "Of course, that would be rather superfluous. I would not be able to fight you, with my current physical condition."

"Yet you danced with my daughter, yesterday!" he replied, face suddenly puce.

"I was, of course, only doing your daughter an honour last night, in name of our old friendship. I knew she had tied her heart to a poor blacksmith, and when she found out my status, she thought there may have been a possibility, and I put the matter to peace. I incurred the anger of my beloved to do her that honour, too."

"Do not try to fool me, boy," Madfoot snarled. Stoick realised with rising satisfaction that he had rapidly lost control of his temper, and the situation. "Your arrangement with the Berk lass is political."

"And not less valid." Hiccup actually shrugged. Madfoot's scowl twisted into a more horrid mask of his features. "Besides, since when have arranged marriages prevented the involved from growing together?"

"There was no growing to be heard this morning," Madfoot said savagely, despite Woolftooth's sudden motion to cut him off, "when she was screaming her disdain for you for all to hear."

Hiccup shrugged again; if the comment effected him as badly as Stoick suspected, he didn't let on except from a slightly paler face. The thrum of dragon growls in the room, however, rose to a fever pitch. Every single hair on Stoick's arm stood standing straight enough to ache.

"She was angry. Astrid's is my betrothed just the same, and so she will remain. I will not be jeopardised with an unwanted relationship when my first priority is still towards Berk."

"You will not appease honour, then, and become engaged to Sleet? You would chose a fisherman's daughter over mine; daughter of a general!" Madfoot said, looking suddenly insane.

Bertha had to laugh at the audacity, looking at the plum-coloured man with eager eyes as she tried to light the flame under his oil. "Come now, he danced with her; hardly bent her over a table in the hall and had her in front of the entire assembly."

Madfoot's mouth began working maniacally.

"There is only one solution to this, then!" he yelled, standing up. Half the hall stood too, everyone fingering anything that could count as a weapon, as proper ones were left outside to avoid bloodshed if things got heated.

Like right now.

The dragons behind Stoick started snarling, their growl turning into a tooth-showing, eye-slitted look of murder.

"Of course," Hiccup replied before Madfoot could wrestle his mouth to talk with so many blood-hungry eyes looking his way. "You may as well kill me now. As I have already said, I am in no condition to duel with anyone."

Hiccup's nonchalant tone and blank face left everyone speechless, and Stoick almost felt like he were suddenly sitting in someone else's head, watching it all happen. His son had not just proposed how own death to a man who obviously wanted him dead; not his smart Hiccup. This had to be some bizarre dream. Nightmare; this was a nightmare.

Hiccup blinked, then turned to Toothless and Fireworm as if he realised that they were growling for the first time. He looked his dragon in the eye, holding his gaze wordlessly and without even a gesture, Toothless backed down. Fireworm followed, and soon, the other dragons.

Hiccup turned to Madfoot once again, looking at him with an almost bored expression. The contrasting silence rang in all their ears.

"Well?" he said. Madfoot's face twisted in fury again.

"Now hang on," Bile suddenly said. "You can't go and do that. You've all been shushing these beasties for nothing, and he does it with a look. I want the training promised to my tribe! Not to mention, there's no insult but the one in your mad head in this matter - and he has more claim to insult than you do!"

"Oh, aye, from us," Footsore also said. "There won't be a-fair, that, if you all get the dragons and we're cheated out of our chance. And the boy's right, no insult was made. Only incurred."

"And it was not the only one," Stoick finally said, his voice a barely restrained growl almost mirroring the dragon's earlier vocalisations. "My son," he said with emphasis, making sure to extend a hand and curl it around a still-too-bony shoulder. "Informed me that he would have eventually travelled to all the tribes to teach about his discovery with dragons, but unfortunately was unable to."

"Ah, I'd wondered why you didn't fly our way, lad," Bile said. Hiccup gave him a smirk.

"Eh. My journey was 'cut short'," he said in his usual, Hiccup-y tone. Bile blinked at him, and then half the tension in the room dissipated into snorts. "Ah, sorry, that was rather wrong footed."

A few slices of bread (and a few plates) flew Hiccup's way. Bertha shook her head at him. Hiccup merely smiled more comfortably.

"Still," Stoick continued, trying to regain control of the room with only a slightly reproachful look at his son. "There is the question of why you did not share your knowledge with us. It could, of course, be taken as a violation of the treaty, if any more hostile behaviour were to occur."

"The Meatheads thought we'd get used to the change first. And we honestly assumed you would all know, eventually," Thuggory said with a shrug. "Cattongue had been speaking about moving South; he would have probably come through Berk for Hopeless and Trollguts Islands if nothing had gone as it did."

A blatant lie; Hiccup had told Stoick everything of his visits to the allied islands. However, he had also stressed that the heirs had been nothing but friends - good, solid friends. This lie proved it. Stoick nodded to Thuggory to show he understood; he had probably rehearsed that with Hiccup earlier when they were whispering in a corner with Cami. Bertha snorted when he made eye contact with her.

"What he said," she replied irreverently. "Though we also thought that we women would look too menacing to you lot of male pussies if you found we had dragons. We were saving you white hairs."

"We were not aware that you did not know," Woolftooth said, and then with a swallow, continued. "Though I can see how it makes us look particularly bad. I also agree that no insult was incurred by my general's daughter; instead we rather owe young Astrid compensation. Sit down, Madfoot." The man had been about to speak again. "I think your household needs to make amends to the promised of the future chief, don't you think?"

Madfoot's face began to twist wordlessly again.

"Hiccup, do you have any preferences?" Wolftooth said. Hiccup tilted his head.

"Perhaps, Dogsbreath would be inclined to take Sleet under his tutelage for the dragons," Hiccup said in a mild tone. The girl would be protected. And Dogsbreath would have a spy at his hip. "For Astrid… I would like to deal with the domestic matter internally, if you do not mind."

Wolftooth gave him a piercing look. Hiccup was also manipulating him in this by putting his son in the middle of it. But as he'd offered; he could hardly refuse.

The session ended with no further incident. As soon as it was done, Gobber rose, saying something about speaking to a lass, and Hiccup rose after him, trying surreptitiously to make his limp disappear by resting on his dragon. Thuggory quickly flanked him on the other side, like a true battle brother, and pretended to finalise the sheep shearing issue while holding his elbow. Hiccup was right; a true battle brother, that one.

By the end of that memorable meeting, however, his son had gained something more. Stoick's ears sharpened as his son's name changed before his eyes. 'Hiccup the Red Death's bane' had suddenly become 'Hiccup the Negotiator'. Stoick smiled. That was certainly a name he could get behind.

=0=

Cami growled at the knot in the wood holding her mace fast. This mace was precious. This was Macey, first sweet, destructive gift from Tuff, and it was not going to remain stuck on Berk in a tree.

She planted her foot up and tugged with all her body weight, then screamed when it wouldn't budge. She fell off, leaping off her back and beginning to kick the tree furiously.

"Someone give me an axe! This one doesn't know what's coming to it!"

"I'm not giving you mine, it's my only good one," Astrid said with a scowl.

"I want my Macey back," Cami snarled, still looking at the stuck weapon and trying to figure out how to pry it away. She huffed. "Tuff gave me that. I'm not letting the tree keep it."

"Humph. A Bog woman, mooning over a weapon given by a man," Astrid replied acidly. "What would your ancestors say."

Cami turned on her, advancing until they were nose-to-nose.

"Say that again," Cami hissed in her face. Astrid was somewhat taller, but that didn't mean Cami was any less intimidating, or would allow herself to be stood over. She shoved Astrid's shoulder, sizzling for a fight.

"Boys, boys, your weapons are both pretty," Heather said with a tired voice and an eyeroll. She was sitting at the foot of another tree a short distance away, swathed in blankets and still looking somewhat green, and very much annoyed.

"And you're going to wake my gas-monster," Ruff said in her usual hoarse drawl, "She loves a good fight, but then she will fuss because she had to wake up to watch it."

"Then tell little miss butt-hurt over here to shut up. Just because she's an idiot, doesn't mean we all have to be."

"Who did you call an idiot!" Astrid said, standing even taller and obviously also raring to go to beat something up.

"You!" Cami said, whirling on her and taking out her bludgeon. Astrid pulled a shield up just in time to block the blow, and Cami felt a savage thrill as she watched the wood and metal vibrate. They'd brought all this stuff out here to vent steam; she was going to vent steam.

"And look who's a black, black pot," Astrid hissed at her, bracing against the wet grass and pushing her back. Cami didn't stay unbalanced for long as Astrid swung the shield at her, aiming to bruise and knock-out. So she ducked and swiped at Astrid's legs, who hopped and tumbled to the other side of the clearing. They began to circle one another.

"Oh Frigga, worse than the men, sometimes," Heather said.

"You're only sorry you can't join in," Ruff commented, cradling her daughter.

"Same as you," Heather piped back. Cami smirked along with them. Astrid, on the other hand, snarled.

"You find this all funny, don't you?" she said, "all so very funny when it's someone else who's the butt of a joke. But let's see how you like it." Astrid rushed her, using her shield as a ram and spinning quickly when Cami moved. "Wait; you don't," she went on provocatively. "The moment your chosen little boy-toy was taken, you lost your cool completely."

"Boy-toy," she hissed. "Is that how you view men, Hofferson? It's no wonder you have such little respect for Hiccup."

Astrid yelled a wordless cry and rushed her again, red and livid. Cami bolted to the side and took her down with a trip-up. Astrid rolled and slammed her hip with the sharp corner of the shield, making Cami grunt and catch Astrid's shoulder with a good bludgeoning. The protective padding rang with the blow, caving slightly inwards.

"Respect!" Astrid hissed, leaping back and rotating her shoulder. "What respect does he deserve! And look at you, a proud Bog Woman defending men like they're your heroes!"

"Just because we think they're a bunch of pussies doesn't mean we don't respect them." She sprinted and turned, waiting for Astrid to brace her shield before shifting on her heel to make good use of her shorter height and catching Astrid across the back with her weapon. The other girl fell forward with a groan, but growled on. "And the first thing we learn to know is which men are worth it, and which men aren't."

Cami kicked Astrid as she got back up, rolling her to face the sky and then stepping on her shield, pinning the girl down with her own weapon.

"You're lucky Macey's stuck in that tree. Otherwise Hiccup would be mourning you for what you've said."

"Mourning," Astrid spat, still snarling.

"Yes, mourning." Cami spat down into the grass, angry beyond all measure and belief. "I could really kill you right now, you stupid woman."

"Go ahead and do it!" Astrid hissed.

"Yo, you two…"

"Hey…"

"Don't tempt me!" Cami yelled, feeling her hand ITCH around her bludgeon to cave that stupid face in. "You have everything I want!"

"What?" Astrid suddenly bucked her off, rolling up to her feet and snarling. "You're another one of Hiccup's many conquests now, too?"

"Oh Freyr, keep my hand from slaying this ignorant being!" Cami yelled to the sky, tripping her up again and trapping her in the same position. "Why the hell would I ever want Hiccup! He's been after you for as long as I can remember!"

Astrid seemed to falter, and Cami took vicious, cruel pleasure in driving the nail home.

"But nooo, you were always more interested in other things. Every time we came here for a Thing, you were the serious-faced wet-blanket, cold as an ice-giant in the Winter! And every time Hiccup spoke of you, it was always about how much you trained, how much you worked, how much you ignored him." Cami smiled at her with absolutely no mercy, feeling her own heart-ache take satisfaction in causing it to another.

She wasn't a nice person. She was a Bog Burglar. She wasn't a nice person at all.

"And now here he is, a beautiful man, with women on all sides of the archipelago wanting a piece of him, and now you notice him." Cami's disdainful glee, vindictive and sharp, only grew as she saw Astrid's face twisting and contorting in pain that reflected her own. "Why would he want you, is a better question? Why would he even want the stupid, unremarkable warrior woman when he can have daughters of chiefs and generals?"

Astrid's face was growing paler by the minute. Cami took a savage satisfaction from it.

"I'll tell you why, since you seem to be too stupid to figure it out." Cami bore down on her, putting more of her weight onto the shield and Astrid's twisted arm, smiling with all the horrid, gleeful, vengeful and jealous malice she felt. "Because he cares for you. A great deal - for a long time. You were all he could speak of when we were children, and he never looked at any of the other women who tempted him. He cares for you the same way I care of my Tuff."

She reared her hand and slapped her.

"But what would you know? You're so lost in your little world of feeling sorry for yourself that you wouldn't notice even if he told you in plain words. And here you are, just as proud and as cold as an ice-giant as you used to be. Did you let him tell you why he danced with someone else, yesterday? I'll bet you didn't even give him a moment to speak." Cami spat at the grass again.

"He practically jilted me," Astrid replied. But this time Cami at least had the satisfaction of hearing the other woman's voice tremble. There; she didn't deserve to be spiteful and angry. She had no reason to be spiteful and angry.

"You don't know what jilting is." Cami looked her dead on. "All the problems that you have with him you're creating yourself. Step out of your head and your expectations for a moment and look and listen, and maybe you'll be able to see that you're the only woman he's ever looked at. He had a reason for stepping out with that lass last night. Did you stop to think about it, before you decided it was about you?"

Astrid sighed, going limp under the shield, and Cami let up, moving her foot off and stepping back. Astrid sat up, looking like she'd taken more of a beating than she actually had.

"You're wrong," she said quietly, and Cami stepped forward to really bludgeon her head in this time. "There was another woman, and I think he still loves her. Her name is Sepha … he kept calling her when he was delirious from his wound."

Cami stopped cold, staring at the girl. This, she hadn't known. Still, what she knew outweighed anything this girl had made up as consolation for her own imaginary injuries.

"How do you know it's a woman? How do you know it's not the weird arse name of a man? Heck, it could be the name of a dragon for all you know!" Astrid blinked up at her. Cami realised that she'd struck the nail on the head. "You don't know! You're just assuming! By the gods, I thought you were a fierce warrior, not a sappy, cowering little milk-maid! Corner him and ask if you have to know! But know one thing."

Cami grabbed her by the tunic and hauled her up; shorter or not, she was too strong right now in her anger.

"You are lucky, luckier than you can imagine. The man you want is tied to you, and he wants to be tied. If you don't think so, go face him and ask! You want to know what jilting is, stupid girl?" She threw her back, and Astrid managed to keep her balance barely. "There was an understanding between Tuff and I. There are letters that can be brought up against me in allied clan councils. Tuff gave me gifts and I did the same. But now his family have tied him off to someone else, and for me, that's it."

Cami knew she was yelling, and knew she was huffing, and knew that her eyes were stinging but she ignored it. She was too occupied staring this stupid woman down, who had everything and was throwing it away.

"Bog women don't marry. But the chief and her heir do. We marry men we choose from our allied tribes; we were too frightening and too powerful for those poor little trembling willies some fifteen generations ago, so they decided to make the marriage a condition for the peace treaty. And it's fine, the kids are considered legitimate by all the tribes that way, and no one can contest any loophole bullshit. Of course, there's a catch."

Cami got into Astrid's face again, holding up a finger. "We get one try. One. If that try to snag a man doesn't work, we can't make another one. And like I said, there's - there was an understanding between Tuff and I, and more than enough evidence to prove it." She shoved her again. "So don't you come here whining about being jilted."

With that, huffing like a bull, Cami kicked a clod of earth and turned, heading away from them all to go … kill something.

"Hey."

Apparently Astrid liked offering herself to be murdered. Astrid, instead, threw her axe into the tree next to Cami's mace, missing it by a few inches and embedding it beside the pointy weapon.

Cami blinked at her. Then she turned to look at the tree, both weapons stuck fast, the axe vibrating from the blow and making the mace beside it quiver almost in sympathy. Then there was a crack, and Macey fell out with a thunk.

"Maybe we both need an ally," she said. Cami blinked. Then tilted her head.

"Are you offering …"

"Yes," Astrid shrugged. "And I … I apparently need all the help I can get."

"You always have," Ruff drawled again behind them, and Cami started, she and Astrid turning to look at the two satisfied looking women. Fuck them, and their husbands, and their pretty daughters. "You've had your head stuck up your arse for so long you can't find your way out again."

"Humph," Astrid replied, folding her arms.

"If you got your head off training for five minutes back then, you'd have known what everyone else did," she continued to taunt.

"What Astrid said counts for us, too, Cami," Heather added, shoving some blankets off to put a palm on Ruff's shoulder. The taller blonde rolled her eyes, but rocked her child and nodded. "If us women don't help each other, no one will."

"And we should totally let Astrid's mother in on it." Ruf's grin became evil. "That woman is pure genius, sometimes. As for Tuff…" She sneered. "They made me promise I wouldn't tell, not that I wouldn't help. I totally cut ties with the clan now. Count me in."

"Then it's decided," Cami said. She turned onto the rest of them. "Hiccup's already working on something, or so he said. But …" she shrugged. "If you're all offering, I'm taking you up on it. Betray me and you die, of course, but I still appreciate it." She gave Astrid a wooly eye. "And you, go talk to your man. Other woman or not, he's yours now, and if you want him, then keep him that way. You've gotta take care of these poor sod males, or they wander off, get lost, and then whimper like a blind pup for a teat."

"Hear hear," Ruff and Heather said at once, sharing a wry, knowing look.

"Though I'll wager," Ruff went on, "If you offer Hiccup your teat, Astrid, there won't be any whining to speak of."

=0=

1 A morning star is a weapon of this period comprised of a stick, at the end of which is a chain, at the end of which is a solid iron ball covered in spikes. It is the best melee weapon that humanity has ever created, and if anyone wants to court me, they can totally sod the flowers and get me a morning star. I'd get a lady boner right away.

=0=

And Astrid gets a reality check. She may also want to check for concussion. Meanwhile, in politics land…