Winter in Líf's Holt

by Midoriko-sama

Hiccup is back on Berk after having been missing for five years, just on time to hunker down for the Winter. But will the seemingly endless season hold beauty and happiness for him, or will everything that happened so quickly finally catch up with him? Rated for violence, colourful Viking language and some adult situations.

23. Extreme Position

A massive warning goes with this chapter: It is a battle, there is blood and death. Violence, people, serious violence. This chapter is not child-friendly, be warned. Skip to the bottom if you want a basic overview. And Hiccup goes utterly freaking batshit insane. This is not because he is actually possessed. Remember the medicine from the previous chapter? Yeah …

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Berkian Eddur - 2

Winter in Líf's Holt

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Chapter 21 - Extreme Position

When the final result is expected to be a compromise, it is often prudent to start from an extreme position.

― John Maynard Keynes

The sun set behind the thirty ships, exactly the amount Hiccup had told them. All of Berk's fires were lit, all the huts looking merrily lived in and happily preparing for a quiet night from their vantage point on the hill.

The ships came from the South East - again as Hiccup had said, and the last place anyone would have expected them. They anchored off Thor's beach, and small boats began to drift towards Berk like sharks.

Astrid stood next to Bertha and Wolftooth's teams, three battalions ready; she was in command in Hiccup's absence. A few people had been disappointed that he and Toothless would not be fighting, but had been silenced by an axe-blade to the throat. Specifically hers.

Everyone else had heard the word 'fever' and needed to be told nothing else. Astrid thought they probably all assumed he'd taken ill on his voyage - they could assume what they wanted. She wasn't telling them he was injured and helpless. She didn't trust anyone at the moment.

And the news was arriving to them through the terrors and through their few riders.

The nadder snorted against Astrid's hair, and she scratched her under her chin. Adderbite had decided to join the battle, and Clover had come, too. Stormfly was with the babies, and the majority of the dragons were there … but they were discovering some amazing things, even now. Nightmares, it would seem, left the young to their males. Night furies too. Nadders and gronkles on the other hand, seemed to favour both parents or the female taking the lead nurturing role.

So Fireworm was there. And so was the female night fury. Astrid gave her a significant look.

"Thank you for doing this, girl," she murmured. "We will take care of your young as long as you need. I promise."

The night fury snorted, and butted her head against Astrid's shoulder, gesture soon followed by Clover and Adderbite. She felt bolstered and ready, the war-paint fresh on her skin and giving her courage.

Berk wouldn't fall. She had her husband's pride and honour in her hands, and she would not let him down.

"They're coming," someone whispered to her right, and she tensed. A hush fell over her battalion, twenty men and women, all with a dragon beside them they could not ride, but who would fight beside them. Astrid brought out Brisinga, blood smeared from her blood oath bringing out the words on her. She signalled, everyone doing the same and being careful to keep their weapons low so that they would not reflect the light from the distant fires of the village. The night fury seemed skittish for a moment, but then Astrid gave her a look.

"These are like your teeth," she whispered. "They only come out when we fight, and we only fight our enemies. You are not our enemy."

The dragon actually gave a slow nod, looking at the other dragons, who had grown accustomed to being around the variety of sharp pointy objects their Viking companions favoured. Astrid wished for a second that she had time to properly get to know this lovely female.

The dragons went stiff; the humans followed suit and snapped forward. Even before they could see or hear them themselves, they knew that the main attacking force had reached the decoy of the empty village. Astrid felt her back tense, the usual excitement of battle tempered by all they had to lose today; the women, children and non-fighters on the beach, the baby dragons, barely days old. And her beautiful, beautiful Hiccup. She didn't know if Stoick was right, but in that moment, he was all she could think of.

Then there were the footsteps. Clashing metal steps, telling them already before they even saw that their enemies were heavily armoured. But every single fighter on the allied clans' side was clad in some of Hiccup's miraculous chainmail which some of the men had begun calling Gleipnir - Astrid raised the hood on her mail, swallowing and allowing the battle-readiness to sweep over her.

This was it.

The warriors came into the light. They were all wearing the typical dark armour of the Berserkers, blackened cloth adorning the armour and the blank helmets, some completely covering their faces, some open to their chin and eyes. Nothing of their face could be seen in the harsh contrast of light from the fires, and Astrid almost shuddered at the image they portrayed, as if their helmets were empty, and they were drougrs come to haunt them.

A scream arose from them as they stormed the halls. There were many of them, and no doubt many more attempting to surround the area. The actual flying troops had been dispatched to pick-and-drop duty, where the darkness their enemies were using to sneak up on a rear-attack would be used to their advantage as they would never see the dragons coming, but the dragons would most certainly see them.

Astrid held her breath. Soon, now. She raised her left hand.

The troops breaking into the halls regrouped at the centre, furious screams and yells being heard. A hall was set on fire, then another. They had known this would happen - it was why all the valuables had been removed. Astrid barely breathed as she waited for the next phase of the plan to snap into place.

The gronkles led by Farthog suddenly rose up. They began spewing their incredibly rapid fire, lava leaking out of their mouths. From Astrid's high vantage point, she could see the wall of quickly hardening, deathly hot lava being erected around the village. The troops within where being summarily trapped.

"Stoick!" one of them screamed. "You coward! And where is Hiccup! Where is he so I can bate in his blood and that of his night fury!"

Astrid snarled. The night fury beside her did the same.

"NOW!" she snapped, watching as Fireworm rose into the sky in an incandescent arc, and all of them ran screaming down the hill, the nadders shooting endless strings of tail spikes and impaling men before they could even look up and shriek. The female night fry took off, screaming the typical call that sent many Berserkers sprawling.

"That one is mine!" screamed the mad voice, and Astrid knew it was Dagur, and that his adult name was aptly given.

Berserker warriors began to surround them, and Astrid, flanked by Clover and Adderbite, began fighting one of the bloodiest battles of her life. She swung Brisinga until it shone red like the rubies of its namesake, cursing when it got stuck in a rib-cage and Clover had to bail her out of an attack at her back. Her accuracy with throwing knives was tested, and though she was not as good as her betrothed, there were not a few eyes she hit, watching the empty helmets suddenly spew blood through their sight holes and the hit men screamed and clawed at their face.

One man tried to bring Clover down, going for his leg, and almost managing as the dragon was occupied covering Adderbite's flank, and Astrid particularly enjoyed killing this one, trapping him in a bola first, and then hacking his head off with his own hatchet. How dare he go after the dragons in her team?

The screams and yell of battle around her raged as she sprinted across the battlefield, her eyes sharper than usual, her ears more alert than ever, every single sense in tune to the nuances of her surroundings. The smell of blood and sweat was a boost, an additional stimulation to the already whirring fire of her anger, and thirst for revenge.

These people had come into her home, planning to take their lives, their happiness.

Dagur wanted to bathe in Hiccup's blood. She would bathe in his first.

A bottleneck had been left open in the lava wall around the village, and the Berserker warriors were being forced out of it, being felled like so many ants in a line by pecking birds. The Hooligans dropped into the enclosed village from the sky, dragons coming down with them claws cocked and jaws ready, and began setting fire to their own halls in order to smoke their prey out - or burn them alive, if they had taken refuge inside. A smile began to spread on Astrid's face as she heard more and more screams, men wearing the dark armour screeching as the fire took them - or the dragons did.

The allied clan warriors were all clad in the Gleipnir armour, and the beautiful metal shone like stars, making them almost seem like they were blessed, the blood in Astrid's veins pumping all the harder for the thought.

Their's was a righteous battle - they were betrayed, attacked by allies who sheared through a treaty like they'd tried to shear through their village and their lives. They were on the Gods' side, and the Gods were on theirs. Hiccup called her Asta - she would not let him down.

The battle lulled within the area she was in as she unstuck her axe from inside a helmet, more blood and body matter dropping onto the once-green grass. Everything shone red and golden from the fires and the slaughter, and Astrid screamed when she saw some of Berk's good men dead, rushing to the aid of a fellow fighter - Hoark! Oh Asgard, Hoark! - whose hand had been cut off and whose opponent was now raising his axe against for the final blow.

The armoured hilt of Brisinga went directly into his abdomen, and Astrid felt such satisfaction at hearing the pained yelp and loss of air whooshing out of the man's mouth. She yelled at Clover to get Hoark over the wall - the dragons had all been shown the healers' hidden positions, and Clover took off, Hoark in his claws. With a snarl, Adderbite chomped down on the man, but Astrid screamed again - this time in horror, as he twisted away just on time and brought his axe down on her wing.

Adderbite went down, and it was all Astrid could do to throw her last knife at him so that he wouldn't kill her. She missed, which made her roar in anger, but she had just enough time to climb onto the dragon's prone body and launch herself at him, Brisinga raised high.

His weapon could not measure up - never, ever could. Brisinga had a longer reach, tougher metal, and the genius construction of her wonderful Hiccup's hand. Within moments his blade was chipped, and even as he screamed and went into a battle frenzy, he could not catch her. When she knocked his helmet off, she realised that she was facing Dagur himself, and her blood boiled to the point of hatred like she had never felt before.

"You fetid wretch," she hissed at him, angrier than she had ever been. This man was the cause of it all. This man was the reason all this was happening; the reason she was not with Hiccup right now, the reason good men were dead, the reason she had betrayed Hiccup. He was the reason she could not be happy with Stormfly, and the reason the Thing had been so hard, and this Snoggletog was going to dawn on a Berk drenched in blood.

"Oh ho," he replied, laughing as if she had just asked him what colour his boots were, "I like your language! I will make sure to use your mouth thoroughly once we are done with this place!"

Her body went rigid at his remark, and what had before been mad frenzy became concentrated fury. He had proposed to touch her. He would die by her hand.

She began to attack with alacrity rather than keeping the defensive. She snarled and bit at him, taking out chunks of his armour and taking first blood, ignoring his screams and splitting his weapon open. She gave him a predatory smile just as she raised Brisinga, ready to take his head where he was lying prone.

Adderbite gave a gargle, but she was too late. Astrid was only in time to turn and see both men coming at her; she kicked and bit, she disarmed them, but they overwhelmed her and held her by both arms, pushed her down to her knees, wrenching her hair until she screamed in frustrated fury. Dagur stood up, seemingly unconcerned with the battle raging around them as he ordered the two men to hold her still, and keep her kneeling.

"Yes, yes I like you," he said, with that demon shine in his eyes, like one of Helheim's own creatures, laughing and throwing his head back with a mirth that was unnatural and insane. "I want this one. I want this one later. I really, really like her!"

"I don't quite agree."

Warm, sticky, viscous liquid suddenly erupted around Astrid. She looked to the side, incredulous and dismayed, even as the grip of the two men on her relented and she shot up.

She was covered in the two men's blood as their heads rolled away, her hair sodden against her scalp, stomach lurching as she spat some of it that got in her mouth. She could not get her eyes away from the lowering arc of the flaming sword that had done the deed, however, because Hiccup was standing right there, wearing the trousers she had left him in on the gurney, now blood-drenched, his sword, and nothing else. There was not a scratch on him, but Astrid could see his fever bright eyes as he looked around, seeming almost bored.

Oh dear gods what was he doing here!

"Hiccup!" Dagur yelled, taking his sword out too and looking at her betrothed with a happiness and hunger that was usually reserved for vicious, cruel creatures that dwelling the deeper reaches of the darkest realms. "I was waiting for you! I've been waiting for you forever!"

He licked his blade, the whites of his eyes showing.

"I will enjoy this!" he growled in pleasure.

An arm grabbed her and jerked her backwards. She was about to maim when she heard Snotlout's voice.

"Move, move back, it's about to get ugly!" he hissed.

"What are you doing! We have to go help!" she growled, ready to break his arms and ribs if necessary. He didn't manage to get her too far away, but as soon as they were behind an upturned cart, he threw them both to the ground and huffed, looking almost frightened.

"Trust me, he has things under control… now where is that damned … there it is!" Snotlout shot away and Astrid followed like a shadow. She saw him grab an hour glass and shake it to empty it. Once it was clear on one end, he raced back and signaled to Hiccup, who was apparently more lucid than she thought.

Or more feverish. What was happening!

"You may want to look away," Snotlout said, and there was a tremble in his voice that made Astrid's stomach rise to her throat.

"Like fuck," she hissed, turning back to watch as Hiccup and Dagur circled each other. Whatever this was, whatever was happening; she would be there. And if necessary, she would bathe Brisinga in more blood.

=0=

Hiccup awoke slowly, unsure what was happening. He had a sense of impending … something. As if he'd been expected somewhere, and he'd fallen asleep when he'd only meant to rest his eyes. There was something resting on his chest, and it sort of reminded him of sweetness and light. There were voices and murmurs and campfire noises and smells.

When he opened his eyes he felt like he'd been suckerpunched. The world around him was awash with colours, beautiful and fragrant. The campfire was letting out music which he could see, clear as they were flowers waving in the wind on a spring day. The wind whispered to him, the dryads singing songs that he could suddenly understand; there was the noise of clashing, somewhere. There was something happening, the dryads told him, and he needed to be there.

He sat up; the weight on his chest turned out to be a sweet little girl, and Hiccup knew her right away. This was his child. His.

He stood the rest of the way, putting the child down. His body felt strange, a mix of the inside and outside. He could feel all of the air around him, hear - hear for miles around. He could see the wind moving in the trees as it left bright lighted paths for him to follow. His eyes didn't need to focus to see in the darkness - but he could not tell where his body ended and the air began.

He'd become part of the air, and the Aesir were speaking to him through the taste of the noises and the smell of the colours.

But he could hear clashes … and he knew one thing. The dryads were right. That is where he needed to be.

The prosthetic was loose and he tightened it, forgetting about it as soon as it began to work properly. A pile of his belongings was sitting neatly beside him, and he took up Smoulder - he would need nothing else tonight. He could taste it on the campfire crackles. Quietly, he covered his little child, and then waved his hand over her, watching as the lines of colour he drew in the air settled over her. She would be protected.

He began moving towards the clashes, the lines of colour in the trees telling him which direction to go as the noises made multifaceted ripples in his surroundings. He moved rapidly, aware of every stone and every branch, every root and every leaf; but they were not his target, not his goal. He had to move forward, go the place where he was needed.

He knew he arrived there when the colours were everywhere. The numbers rising in the air around him told him all he needed to know, the wind crying out and tasting of blood and metal, screams and groans tasting bitter. A wall that should not have been there blocked his way, but he lit Smoulder and then one of his brothers came.

The blue nadder allowed him on and he scaled the wall. There was a sea of moving bodies like moving waves, and when he was halfway over, he jumped off.

He could feel the slick grass under his toes in the same way that he could feel the grain of the wood pop, a few meters away, as the fire ate. A man came at him - but he wasn't man. He was a drougr, his hair an array of serpents that rose and writhed against his skull. and he watched him come, the very air around him crying in protest as he passed through it, the vileness of this creature offending the creation of the Aesir.

The armour around him flashed, and then he knew what stars sounded like as the warriors around him shone brightly - those were his men. His. These … these others were to be destroyed.

The first one got Smoulder in the face - it was a pity, because the vile blood got on his arms. He pushed it off with a foot to the chest and watched it writhe as it defiled the soil with its fluids. The ground would need to be burned too. Two men were fighting against one of His. He quickly moved forward, sensing the blue dragon following him. He slashed one of the vile creatures' legs off, letting him fall like a felled trunk. The other turned and screamed, but he needed to move forward, because the dryads were still singing, and he couldn't waste too much time on these vermin.

Bubbles began rising around him as he watched the second man die, Smoulder flaming out of his chest. His sword's flame did not disappear, and he could smell her singing, like waves on a rock. The bubbles around him turned colour, drifting with every clash and noise, joining the rivers of colourful noise in their brightness. All around him, he could see the shining warriors who were his brothers, the ones he was fighting with, to protect the city. He knew one of them would drink blood tonight. They would not fail, and they would not fall, and all the creatures that the fetid ice-giant who controlled Niflheim had sent would be sent back in pieces.

He walked forward, dragons coming in and out of his peripheral vision, which was all around him. and the battle noises got louder as the colours got brighter.

Something told him to duck - he saw it, the flash of colour and movement of bubbles, and he stepped the side and brought Smoulder upwards, impaling a man who had been attempting to kill him from behind. He was drenched in the foul being's blood, Smoulder wrenched from his hands with the thing's own weight, and the horrid insect legs twitched and writhed when Hiccup kicked its empty head to kill it, Smoulder coming out with a squelch that Hiccup felt to be slimy and sore on a place that was not his skin.

His legs were suddenly full of an energy he had not previously noticed, the area around him moving out of his way so that he could run forward, and then taking a hatchet out of a corpse he slashed at another two creatures, one half a mad wolf, the other a creature of slime and hatred that smelt of grave and dead fish. One of the warriors of his ilk, one in the shining Aesir armour, came forward to him and spoke, but he could not fully understand, not when the eyes on the back of his head were telling him to turn. And so he did, swinging the hatchet and letting it go, and watching with satisfaction as the weapon sang its life and satisfaction, colours rising and tasting of victory, the creature's fluids rising in an arc to echo the weapon and haze their surroundings in red surrender.

"Hiccup!"

The words seemed to coalesce in his mind, and he waved his head, looking back at his brother, shining in the light of battle. He recognised this man - he was a treasured ally, and he knew him well.

"Hiccup, what the fuck are you doing here? You're not even wearing any armour! Shit!"

He pushed his ally away, because he felt them coming. He leapt up, landed on their broad weapon, pushing the handle out of the creature's hand with his weight. His elbow landed on their throat, and the crack tasted incredibly strange, like eating sea slugs.

He took the weapon up, a sword that was large and unnatural, forged by a goblin who had never forged in his life. He drove the abomination of metal into the other creature's chest, invoking Thor and asking the blacksmith of the gods to punish all those in his path for the insult to their art.

He screamed then when he saw more of his brothers in the metal given to them by the stars, bleeding. He rushed forward, collecting a spear, and rammed it into a creature of disgust and wonder, who had been wielding a single-bladed axe about to behead a woman on the ground who he knew was precious. He looked down at her, and knew her name was Phlegma, and that she was important.

Fire began to descend from the sky before his eyes, balls of flame engulfing enemies around him, and he screamed in elated response, raising Smoulder and running forward once again. He thought the arc one creatures' arm made was beautiful, the numbers it spoke perfect for its death. Another's leg sung of mud and pain. Another's head only screamed, tasting of bitter ale and munched grass.

He didn't stop, the horrid, putrid fluids of these monsters covering him as he walked and ran forward, never stopping, never pausing. He was aware of a dear ally by his side, the one who had spoken before in many languages and many voices merging together in his head.

"Vile monster from the pits of Hel's rotted breast," he hissed at a monster whose body would not surrender his sword back to him. The creature gargled and frothed with information his mind refused to be corrupted by, and then his sword came free when he planted his fingers into the wound and tugged. The thin continuous blade was lit on fire again, and walked up to another drougr, bathed in armour of darkness, never hesitating to spill its guts. Behind it were two familiar faces, precious faces, dressed in the armour with a now muted light - it sang of sadness and loss, as the two faces were gone. The bodies hung from the ground with spears through them.

"Oddar … shit, and the baker…" the companion spoke. He snarled, now anger and contempt taking the place of the calm hunger for justice that had been curling his chest with warmth and fur-like reassurance.

Now the real hatred unfurled. His heart did not beat, it moved, flowing like a river with the forced of the water behind and in front, hitting the rocks and biting into the banks. The fires rose and spoke to him. He needed to go that way.

There was a foul voice, rising. One he knew, one he recognised as the cause for all this. His feet were told where to go by the ground, and when all the bubbles began dancing in light of pure red, he knew he'd arrived there.

The most precious one was being forced to sit, to scream as others touched her.

Something burst in his chest, then, a clarity that was unlike the previous one. He remembered things, things that were important; laws, rules, regulations. Things he could to punish he who was daring to have other men touch her, he who was daring to look at her.

"Find an hourglass. In the shed over there," he told his ally. "Take her when she's free. Stay where I can see you." Then he moved forward.

Smoulder was singing. She was begging to bite, begging to do what his fateful dragon brother could not, because of the tiny lives that were being nurtured and loved where the colours ran free. So he raised her, letting Smoulder sing to her heart's content, cutting the air and the colours, and finally moving through the black, dull heads of the creatures who dared touch his most precious one. Forseti spoke in his ear, telling him what to do as he watched his ally take his Beloved away.

The vile one spoke. The words were a howling of hisses and the bite of a snake, the punch of nausea and the fear of sting.

"I will enjoy this!" he finally understood from his ululating mouth, the curse of Niflheim already rising from the ground in so many empty, colourless tendrils, ready to take this maddest abomination down. Hiccup watched him circle, and followed suit, watching as the poor stupid creature did not realise that the fingers of its death were rising up to take it. He felt a presence behind him, the same one who had cleared his mind and given him the laws and rules he needed. He began to listen.

"You are the new leader of the Berserkers," he repeated after Forseti, the goddess of justice telling him what to say.

"Ahaaa!" the monster laughed, throwing his head back, his axe weapon mangled and chipped, his handle almost broken, and he immediately knew that his most Beloved had done that, because Brisinga's music was rising from that weapon's wounds. "I am!"

"Then I challenge you. You will duel with me. The winner will take all," he replied. Forseti's voice was sweet and reassuring, and he knew he would win. "I am the heir of this tribe, and I invoke the right to challenge you - to the death."

"HAha! Why should I accept! Why should I care! All around us is the battle to the death, it's never ending, never stopping! And ours will be a battle to the death too - your death, and my battle! I will bathe in your blood, I will wear your skin against mine. I will find your dragon, and I will steal it, rob it of its spirit until it obeys only me, or else I will kill it and - or maybe I will keep you alive, keep you alive long enough to watch me kill all those you love."

The creature's face writhed into what could be called a smile if it were human, the tendrils of blackness increasing around it as it spoke and signed his fate in his own ink.

"And then maybe I will make you watch as I take that woman you just saved. Yes, I will make you watch, because that one is yours isn't she? I saw how she looked at you, and I know that when she's screaming as I break her in, your eyes will not be able to look away, no, they won't. Not as I do to her what you want to do yourself, make her squeal like a pig and cry out like a whore…"

Forseti screamed in his ear, and then his eyes moved to the hourglass which had been flipped the moment the challenge had been issued. Enough sand had passed through.

"You have accepted my challenge!" he screaming, swinging his sword around in an arch and bringing it down with all the strength Thor had lent him. "You take my challenge as heir of Berk for our own as leader of this tribe of monstrous creatures from the depths of Niflheim! The time necessary has elapsed and the challenge is in place! The law states thus and may Forseti curse you!"

The being moved back, trying to block his blows. Hiccup screamed as Smoulder began to cut into his enemy, leaving fiery trails of broken song behind, his opponent counter attacking with his sword and cutting through the colours and bubbles with a wake of blackness. The men around them could not approach, the shining warriors who were his brothers refused to break a circle, and the disgusting filth from the depths of a cesspit either being held back, or fearfully cowering away from the combat and his sword.

"Ahaaa! I will take your life, and it will be worth a thousand songs, a million edda, and the generations to come will know my name, Dagur the Conqueror!"

Forseti whispered in his ears to move right, and he did so, watching the blade cut down beside him in a slow boring arc. He watched the other's mans face change colour and expression as Smoulder approached the soft underbelly, breaking through with a squelch and a call of rejoicing spring colours. He twisted the trusted sword, watching as the blood moved from green to red, watched the colour rise into the air and congeal into a blessing and a curse.

"Hiccup!" his most precious one screamed, and then he knew Forseti had whispered something, but he did not catch it. Right away he looked down, watching as the blade of a small knife shone up at him with a beautiful light before it sunk into his arm. It sang of fire and light as it went, called to Thor of his beautiful taste and the lovely smell of his spirit. Hiccup smiled at it, looking back up at the nothing disappearing before his eyes.

"The gods are on my side," he replied, knowing that he was smiling at this creature, wanting it to know that the knife was his, now, too. "I cannot feel a shit."

Thor laughed somewhere in the background and more fireballs fell from Asgard, throwing up in flames the few halls still standing. All was awash in bright white light and heat, the smells and numbers and a colours mingling as he stepped back, still feeling the happy smile on his face, the elation and lightness in his chest, and he pushed the vile creature off his beautiful sword. The thing gargled - Dagur, the deranged and dying - and Hiccup looked down at him dispassionately. The gods were waiting, just as he was, to see what the judgement was, what the outcome of the challenge would be.

"Are you Outcasts?" He asked, laughing. "Are you? Do you have Viking law or are you lawless monsters crawled out of the fetid lakes of Hess' islands?" Dagur's song began to fade, the colours around him being swallowed by the greedy blackness he exuded. "I wonder what you want. You have wives and children? Or do you come into the world full-formed, like that," he felt the sneer of disgust trickle down the back of his throat like a fine wine, his disdain and righteousness making arcs in the air and feeling correct. "What do you want for them if you had any? Do you want the protection of the treaty, or do you want death, rape and destruction?"

He looked a few of the creatures in the multi-coloured eyes, most wavering with fear as he invoked Forseti's power amongst them.

"Because I can give you both. I can give you death at the tip of this blade, or I can offer you the treaty…"

He slammed his metal foot down on the creature's chest as it tried to gargle, and it gave a whine. Dagur the dying flailed an arm as if it was trying to rise.

"Are you creatures like this, or creatures like us? Decide now." he pointed towards the hour glass in his ally's hand with his sword. The drops of crimson that left from its tip floated away, joining the bubbles around them and beating like a heart.

"No!" one of them screamed. "Spare us!" The creature threw itself onto the ground and Forseti sang beside him, her voice high and rising. Another sank beside him, then another, and another still. The colours around them began to blacken as the creature on the ground trembled and writhed, trying to rise, trying to die, failing at both.

"You will take the treaty, and the punishment of breaking it," he repeated, Forseti's voice so very clear and pure, like mountain water gargling from the source. "Or you will die here and now, by my hand. I will stain the ground with you all."

"We'll take the treaty!" the first one who spoke said again. He moved towards him with his metal leg first, kicking Dagur the dying as he went, the impatience in him, blood of his enemy smeared on him as he refused to die, wishing the time flowing around him would not flow so slowly, the sand-grains in the hourglass dancing like light rain on a windy night, time bending this way and that as the black tendrils rose, trying to take the stubborn creature who refused to go.

"On whose authority do you speak?" he asked the speaker, who was slowly melting away from the shadows of its monstrous form, taking on human form again now that Forseti had touched him, and he was on the side of the righteous again.

"I am Callous, Dagur's cousin, and next in line," he replied, and even his voice suddenly tasted of sense and reason. He felt Forseti smile.

"What is your title?" he asked, and looked at him with a tilted head, trying to read the colours the gods were showing him. They rose in wet waves off him. like touches of paint smearing the night sky in summer.

"I do not yet have one," he said, and his voice wavered like a human. All the others began to throw their weapons down, and their heads came off, thrown to the slick red grass, to reveal men and women, their monstrous aspects melting away as they shed their folly and knelt in front of the goddess of justice.

"You will have one, after this," he told him, looking around at the changing people, the quiet suddenly swallowing the music as the metal stopped singing and the air stopped tasting of red ripeness. "So, you all. You take this man as your leader, and you take his word as your law."

A number of noises rose, words and murmurs and yells and please. He looked around at them in disgust, waiting. Then he turned towards man in front of him again.

"Do they take you?" he asked, tilting his head. The man nodded, seeming almost terrified.

"Does anyone dissent?" he asked the newly formed humans again.

"I DO!"

A screaming, maddening cry rose as man made of slime and mud rushed forward, weapon raised and ignoring the pleas to stop from the new humans of his own ilk. "I am Philip the Jilter, and I will fight until my dying-"

A weapon swung right into his face, the pointed ball-head of a mace embedding itself into his skull with a crunch. His body rose to the air and fell as his feet kept running while his head was blown backwards. One of his allies, dressed in the shining armour, held the bloodied mace up. She spit at the corpse, wild blonde hair dotted with red.

"I hate jilters," she hissed, kicking him. "No real man would have a name like Philip, anyway."

Hiccup returned to the rest of them, watching the remaining monsters kneel with little care. "Do you refuse the treaty, then? Tell me now, so that I may kill you." The music of the night quieted for a moment, muted by the sense of something hidden in the night. But then it lifted again with the consent of the fires and the heat. "Very well. You are all our prisoners. Drop your weapons. Stand. Move to the wall. Those who refuse need only tell me so that I may have mercy on you."

Slowly, the creatures began to shed their vestiges of horror, parts of their demonic beings falling to the ground, leaving limbs and mantels of blackened, gnarled claws behind. They moved in a trickle towards the place he had indicated. They did not move again.

He turned towards the one still on the ground, Dagur the dying but not dead yet. His eyes were white all around, and there was a choking sense of red clogging in him that was drowning all the rest, and still he did not succumb to the black rising around him to take him away. He looked at the creature with interest, wondering how he could get rid of it now. They were no longer monsters, they were now men and women, and needed a leader of that same ilk - this one would not do anymore. And he had won his duel, won this being's life. He needed to put it out of its misery.

Then another voice rose, one he knew well because it had been born between his fingers. He looked around to it, and his most dearly Beloved was coming forward, bringing the sweet voice of ruby red with it. It was a voice that matched the same shade of red as the gargling, snarled knot in the Dagur creature in front him, and he knew that it could now be no other way.

He looked at her for a moment. She was a creature of beauty forged by the gods.

"Asta," he called, knowing that was her name. "I think your axe is singing for his head. You must appease it - it is what's fair."

"With pleasure," she replied, and the smile on her face was one that belonged on no face but hers, where the beauty met the war and the blood of Freya and Freyr ran deep and combined. Brisinga screamed in pleasure as she came down, and the arc it left behind was the most brilliant colour yet, piercing through the blackness snarling the monster lying prone in front of them, dividing the man from the monster in one motion. Then the monster took it all, swallowing all the remains in blackness, and there was nothing to worry about anymore.

The colours and songs were muted again, as they had been in the sweet child's mind when he'd woken up. His ally came close, Asta coming closer. The fluid of the creatures he had killed needed to be removed from his skin before it contaminated him. Asta was trying to stop his movement to pull out the blade - but it would remain there until he could wash the ichor off.

The men and women standing where he had told them to had not moved, and he could feel that the night was pleased, and that the dryads had begun to sing of calm and rest again. He looked around, and amongst his star-clad allies he spotted another all-important one, tall and imposing. With a nod, he waved an arm towards the newly formed humans.

"I leave them to you," he said. "Teach them how to be human again."

Then he let himself be guided out of the burning labyrinth of halls, singing their joy in heat and smell of happiness. Asta and his ally stayed close, and he allowed himself to be walked back the way he'd come, colours rising in the sky now sweeter hues, like flowers dotting the night. He allowed himself to be washed and tended to by her gentle fingers and his ally's strong arms. Once the ichor had been removed, he allowed her to remove the blade and then an old woman who smelt of time walked up to him to look him in his eye for a long time.

She use thread made of deer blood to close the hole in his texture, shutting out the colour and taste that was escaping his body, and he was then made to lie down, a worried child calmed and put on his belly, her eyes so much like those of Asta that he just knew this child was hers. The dryads sang of sleep and rest. The child looked at him with teary, sleepy eyes that lulled him, and he put an arm around her, watching the music in her breath became dreams and float on the colourful wind. This child was his, and so she was theirs. He knew, now, that it was true, and that as he saw the colours fading into the quiet, muted black of the night time, absorbed by the scales of his battle brother who had come to curl up around him, that the gods had fulfilled their will.

It would be well. The colours whispered promises of rest and quiet, mellow taste of peace. He closed his eyes, and let himself listen to their murmured entreaties to rest.

=0=

Snotlout was standing next to Stoick's hut, dazed and confused. The world was buzzing around him, and he was out of breath simply from trying to keep up. The calm after the fight seemed almost impossible, like a dream, rather than reality. Dawn had broken, but this Snoggletog was a hushed and tired one. The battle had gone from being one of the most dangerous things to hit Berk in a while to one of the ... most surreal experiences of his life.

Feeling like he'd received a blow to the head, and still reeling from what he'd seen, he stared into space, trying to make sense of it. The moment Toothless had come bounding up to him, a crying little girl in the gurney and nothing else, blood had rushed to his head and it seemed that it had never come back down until the end of the fight, leaving him lightheaded.

He'd raced into the woods, up the wooden paths in the darkness, swearing when he caught roots and fell in potholes sometimes to the knee. The smoke and choking smell of scorched human flesh had already permeated the otherwise quiet holt that divided the village from the rest of the island.

He'd stopped on the hill looking over the main village to catch his breath and had become involuntarily trapped by the horror of the sight. Half the halls were in flames, but that was nothing new. Sure, that was nothing new. The dragons had routinely kept the carpenters busy up until last Summer. His mother was going to be spitting mad they'd lost the hall again.

But those were … stupidities. Little things he caught first because he was used to them. The grass was green, the sky was blue and the hall's on fire.

The rest of it, though… it beggered belief. He had heard rumour of the Berserker warriors. Heard of the origin of their name, the things that it was rumoured they did. Witnessing it first hand was not something he was going to forget any time soon.

There were bodies … everywhere. Literally everywhere. He had gone in to a few meetings and knew what the main battleplan was, so he hadn't been surprised by the new wall that surrounded the main plaza and the halls around it. The fires in all the halls that had been caught in that circle of imprisonment were almost all blazing, and that gave enough light to watch.

One Berserker had been killing people with his bare hands, tearing their throat out like they were made of cheese. Another one was covered in blood from head to toe, and Snotlout'd found out why as he watched because he'd overpowered a man - a Meathead - trapped him facing down and then passed a pike right through his body, butt-cheek up. Evidently, Hiccup's metal could not be breached; this madman had gotten creative. Other, various levels of mutilation and atrocity were seen in other bodies Snotlout's eyes passed over - nearly all of them had had their mail ripped back first, judging by their positions, but all of them had brutality in common. And while there hadn't been many of their allies as the Berserker bodies outnumbered them … there had been just enough to make his blood boil.

And on the other side, Snotlout still remembered the shock of seeing … the Berserker bodies. Some were just lying there, dead. But there had been some other bodies that were just … discarded, like rag dolls.

Snotlout had descended the hill at that point, worried out of his mind about his cousin, roaming - half naked and delirious in this hell hole. The first thing that happened as soon as he reached the foot of the hill was that a man, foaming at the mouth, came at him with a mace, and Snotlout had cursed him and all his ancestry for the ten minutes it took to knock him out. The moment he raced for the walls, he began to look around, hoping against hope that Hiccup had stopped here, or that someone had spotted him and dragged him off. While there were fighters outside, they were mostly Hooligans and their allies, picking off the Berserkers who left through the tiny entrance they'd left, or in line to get dropped in by dragons. Immediately, Snotlout rushed towards the one manning the dragons dropping off their folk.

"Ballchain!" he yelled, almost out of breath. "Ballchain, get me over!"

"What's wrong?" The burly blond asked, holding tight onto a nightmare's snout.

"Hiccup," he gasped. "He snuck out of the safe beach - I followed his trail here - I have to get over that wall!"

"What? He didn't pass through here. And there's no other way over this wall except the Gap - and no one's going into the gap. They only come out. To die."

"Look, it's Hiccup." Ballchain just looked at him. "He can have any one of these dragons eating out of his hand, in seconds, and you know that." The blond Viking looked suddenly worried sick. "Let me over, man; now! I need to get in there, and get my cousin out. At least give him backup!"

"Get on," the man growled, and Snotlout quickly hopped onto the nightmare, staving off the colourful array of emotion riding this particular breed of dragon generated in him. As soon as they were over the wall, the nightmare tipped its neck and Snotlout jumped off - obviously they couldn't fly that low for long, or they'd be shot down.

It was mayhem in there. It was like Ragnarok had come instead of Snoggletog as a gift-wrapped surprise from Hel to Odin. The fire gave great visibility, but the walls cut the circulation off, so the stifling heat felt like the inside of the forge or the bakery. He was tempted to tip the mail hood back, but that went clean out of his mind when a sword swiped at the back of his neck seconds after his feet touched ground.

Luckily, the blow was wide. The blow was wide because Bertha had her morning star stuck in the man's skull.

"Evening, Jorgensen," she said gamely. "I thought you were confined making tea with the kiddies and distressed ladies." She managed to free her weapon with a final tug, shaking it slightly to get rid of any residue.

Snotlout gaped at her for a few seconds, aware that he looked like a stupid fish, but unable to decide whether to take the risk or not. Still, the Bogs had seemed to like Hiccup.

"My cousin snuck out. He's somewhere in here," he hissed. He spotted an assailant over her shoulder and tugged her down, picking up the sword that had missed his head and sticking it back into Berserker hands. Or abdomens. He didn't care for details. "I have to find him and get him out of here!"

"Wasn't he running a fever?" Bertha ask, Snotlout following her as she rushed forward. Three Berserkers fell by the time Snotlout had enough breath to answer.

"That's why I have to get him out of here! He can't take a battle right now, but he's stubborn and-"

"Nothing new, boy! I haven't seen him, so stop wasting time with me and go find him! DAUGHTER!"

"WHAT!"

Snotlout almost jumped, his battle-ready senses making him swerve to find the voice, and he saw Cami winking in and out of focus on top of her changewing.

"Apparently Jorgensen here is looking for his cousin, who got in here, he says!"

"Fuck!" the girl replied. "Hop on!"

Snotlout had little say in the matter as the Bog woman grabbed his fringe and janked him until he got on behind her, and then they shot up.

"This doesn't increase visibility!" he coughed, the wind blowing smoke onto them.

"Not for us it doesn't, idiot, but it does for her, and she's safe because no one can see her!" Cami hissed back, breathing thinly as the fire-smoke rose up and almost choked them. "Find Hiccup, girl!"

The dragon gave a quiet rumble, almost inaudible above the clashes and screams of battle. The moments where they were not blanketed in the noxious smoke, he could see the allied clans' fighters glittering in the firelight, the Berserkers looking even more ghoulish in comparison - but that gave them the added ability to hide better in the dark. The armour that was protecting the fighters was also giving them away.

The dragon under them suddenly gave a growl and dived, and Cami kicked him off suddenly without preamble when they were close to ground.

"Can't stay, have to rejoin forces! Get in there!" She yelled, and then a whoosh and the dragon was gone, the breed's ability to disappear essential as Cami used it to take out as many of the enemies as possible in her role of protecting the air troops. Snotlout looked around quickly, hoping to spot the reason why he'd been thrown off the dragon, and his blood went cold as soon as he did.

Hiccup was looking down at a man like he was in interesting insect on the ground. He was covered in blood from head to toe, which made Snotlout swear through his teeth as he began to approach as directly as discretion allowed him. His fear mounted as he realised Hiccup was wearing nothing at all – he was in the pair of long, sleeping linen trousers they'd brought him in on the gurney. Otherwise, he seemed completely – he didn't even have a shoe on!

"Hiccup!" he yelled, then had to stop in order to fend off another man who, alerted by his yell, turned and came at him. The man's sword came down in a wide arc and Snotlout caught it with the hilt of his hammer, the metal ringing against the gronkle iron core Hiccup had built into the centre of it. The man's surprise betrayed him, and Snotlout managed to trip him and smashed the hammer against the man's helmet.

He turned, racing towards his cousin, and he was on time to see the normally mild man not bat an eye as he kicked the man's head in with his prosthetic leg, the snap audible above the din of battle as Snotlout drew near and stopping him in his tracks. The smoke rose around them, the orange light of the fires turning everything red, the blood looking like puddles of black ichor as it reflected the fire and armour. The smell of human flesh and blood burning permeated the entire area, the haze of the fumes giving an other-worldly shimmer to the entire battle, as if the fates were all three looking on, making the threads of their tapestry evident even to the eyes of lowly humans. Hiccup was looking at him with eyes as black as night, only the faintest trace of green shining dragon-like around the rims.

But this was not like the dragons; his pupils were not benevolent when they were wide and open. He looked possessed, as though something had entered his flesh and taken over him. He moved differently, stood differently; naked as he was in battle, he hadn't an ounce of worry or fear in him, looking around calmly as if he was viewing the rising sun on a balmy dawn.

"May Glamr stay away," Snotlout whispered, feeling a tremor run down his spine. He didn't know whether it was the fever doing this to his cousin, or whether it even was his cousin at this point. But he had recognised his name, had looked up, and Snotlout was not about to take a chance.

He began trudging towards Hiccup again when a hail of arrows come down on them. Snotlout yelled and ducked, using a body of a dead Berserker to shield himself and throwing it off as quickly as he could, looking up frantically. He fully expected to find his cousin impaled and bleeding, but Hiccup had ignored the arrows completely, as if he'd known that he was just a few inches out of their range, to swiftly take a hatchet from the ground, pivot with more quickness than he'd ever seen and fling the weapon at a man who had been coming up behind him, never even batting an eyelash as his opponent shivered and choked before falling, weapon lodged in his throat between shoulder-plate and helmet.

Snotlout ran up, then, grabbing Hiccup by the shoulders.

"Hiccup! What the fuck are you doing here! You're not even wearing any armour – shit!" He grabbed for his cousin, but Hiccup had pushed him face down, and before he knew, it the slight man had first disarmed and then taken possession of the man's sword.

"This is not a sword," he growled, hefting it. The Berserker seemed to sense that he was not facing something quite real, quite human, and backed a step. "The Saracens my brothers have wrought iron since the advent of Midgard. The smiths of our tribes have brought hammer to anvil before the dwarves even tried it. And you bring me this! This abomination!" Hiccup growled, then, attracting many a warrior around them, both enemy and ally. "May Thor curse you and your lineage, and may they never again hold a sword in their hand that does not cut off their hand!" The sword went into the other man, hilt deep, with a sickening crunch that had Snotlout vomit into the grass. "Foul demon from the depths of Hel's realm – go back there and tell her that her metal has no place on Midgard!"

He turned with a snarl, and Snotlout got up again, flanking him and looking around frantically at all the Berserker warriors who had begun to advance around them. His hackles rose, both from the threat of the enemies, and from standing so close to this man who was Hiccup and yet at the same time didn't seem to be. Hiccup hissed at them like a snake, and it arrested their step as if he really were; Snotlout knew that he was not the only one, then, who had sensed something … other-worldly about his cousin's current state.

One of them yelled and ran forward, and all the men surrounding them rushed towards them at once. What happened next was something Snotlout was never going to forget, for as long as he lived. Hiccup ignited Smoulder and went ahead to take on the near eight warrior almost on his own. He wore a snarl on his face Snotlout didn't recognise, but he ran calmly forward, beheading two men at once, turning on his metal heel, impaling another, and in the same motion of bringing his sword out stabbing a man with it behind him. He jumped to the side as another came with a spear; Smoulder bit right through the spear like butter, then he cut the men's legs off and never looked at him again as he collected the broken spear and jumped over him to run at a man holding an axe over Phlegma with a scream right out of a haugbui's mouth. He rammed the spear into the man's gut, making him double over, and then spun and separated the man's head from his neck with the strength of the rotation.

"Are you alright?" Hiccup asked, and Phlegma could only nod, trying to get to her feet. Hiccup whistled and a dragon landed, as if it was his very own and he'd trained it for years. The baffled rider took one look at Hiccup and gasped. "Take Phlegma to safety. She's not in a state to fight."

"Neither are you!" the woman cried as she tried to struggle out of Hiccup's grip. Snotlout felt more fear flood his gut like ice when she didn't manage, and Hiccup didn't even seem to notice her struggles.

"These horrifying creatures have come here, trying to kill my loved ones and take my home." Hiccup turned to the carnage around them, the same placid, cool look on his face. "And it's made me terribly, terribly angry. I will kill every last one of them with my bare hands if I have to."

"Get her out of here!" Snotlout said, ignoring Phlegma's protests and covering the dragon as it took off, realising that his cousin's focus had shifted again.

Snotlout could admit that his memories of the battle were a haze; scattered at best. But he could also swear that he had covered Phlegma's escape for a few seconds. When he turned around, Hiccup was gone, racing down the hill silently, moving like a shadow. The Berserkers didn't see him coming, between the speed of his movement and the lack of the shining armour. He moved through the people around him as if he were a nár-fölr, skin pale beneath the blood covering him but no less deadly. His body moved like black water stained with blood, flames on his sword firing up randomly as it swung in an arc, Hiccup moving from one form to the next with a flawless, seamless sort of motion which usually happened only in practice.

Snotlout rushed to flank him, but there was little need. Hiccup stepped to the side as an axe blade came down and lunged, cutting the man's arm, and then following through with a pivot that took an eye out of another man with a throwing knife in his right hand while the left one, still holding Smoulder, cleaved the other man in two even as he held his bleeding stump in disbelief. The blinded man tried to stab his stomach, and Hiccup simply stepped back before punching him in the face with the dagger's hilt, sending him reeling. A step forward again and another man found the first man's axe embedded in his skull while another Berserker got his knee broken with a well placed kick of the prosthetic. Without missing a beat or ever even doubting his balance, he cut another Berserker's leg off and pushed him onto yet another, Snotlout ready with his hammer to kill them both. Three others came at them all together, and Hiccup nailed all three between the eyes with throw knives before they made two steps, and then proceeded to step over a corpse to retrieve a spear and launch it at an archer who was aiming for Wolftooth, catching him in the leg.

"Watch out!" Snotlout yelled as another hulking warrior came at Hiccup from behind. Snotlout dispatched another Berserker with a hammer-smashed skull and moved towards Hiccup, because he hadn't shown any indication of having heard his warning. Hiccup moved aside as if he had eyes at the back of his head and drove Smoulder upwards and backwards, the tip of the thin, empty blade emerging under the man's shoulder blade. He gave a coughing gargle – obvious his lungs had been turned to mush, and Hiccup pushed him off, but the hulking beast took Smoulder down with him.

"Vile monster from the pits of Hel's rotted breast!" Hiccup roared at him, tugging at the hilt. The sword's empty middle had evidently caught something with the body in its hook-like structure – probably a rib – and the man moaned at ever tug. Not that Hiccup seemed to notice. His skin was almost invisible under a layer of fresh and dried blood mottled like earth, mixed with ash. Snotlout go close enough to realise HIccup hadn't a scratch on him – even his nails were intact, and his knuckles were unsplit. The way Hiccup was moving … Snotlout had seen it before, but he somehow couldn't place it. He almost felt scared to look too hard, because Hiccup had evidently been touched by the gods that day, and one did not question their gifts.

Finally, Hiccup lost his patience and kicked the man's head with his metal leg, diving his hand into the man's open chest to tug the blade free of whatever was keeping it there. The man wailed like a tortured animal, and Snotlout vomited again as he caught a glimpse of his still-beating heart amongst the carnage of his ribcage when Hiccup finally tugged Smoulder free. Snotlout brought the hammer down on his head, and considered it the greatest act of mercy he'd ever bestowed. That man's ascent to Valhalla was all but secured.

Smoulder was lit again within seconds, emitting the putrid smell of burning flesh. Snotlout had to hold his stomach down when he realised the sword was burning off the remains of that man's lungs. Hiccup drove the knife into a gloating man's back from behind, gutting him in one swift motion and watching him twitch dispassionately for a second before he turned to look at Snotlout, who'd screamed.

There were spears jammed up two men, coming out the shoulder from beneath their Gleipnir tunic. One of them was Oddar the Oddhead, a good man with children, and another was Berk's best baker. Tears sprang to Snotlout's eyes as he realised he had a great deal of memories with Burp, who had loved to sneak the children treats even though it was bad for trade to give things for free, and made the best cream pies this side of the grey sea.

"Oddar … shit, and the baker…" he moaned, blinking the tears out of his eyes as the adrenaline transmuted his sense of displacement and loss into anger. Then he froze, realising that if he was feeling this, Hiccup was probably…

Snotlout turned to the left slowly, only to see a snarl unfurl on Hiccup's face that he had seen before. On a night fury's face, just before he angrily attacked anything that moved as he protected his beloved master. All of a sudden, Snotlout realised exactly how the gods had helped Hiccup that night, and realised where he'd seen the movements before. They had imbued him with the spirit of a night fury. The snarl on his face was ghastly, especially paired with the blood smeared skin and plastered hair glinting red and black.

Hiccup threw his head upwards like an alert dragon, shoulders straight and stiff, chest heaving. His black eyes scanned the whole battle scene, it seemed, and then he froze like a figure carved out of stone standing in the Great Hall. Hiccup's head roved as if following a moving object, his eyes tracing a line in the air in segue of nothing Snotlout could see, and he began walking towards a very definite destination.

A number of Berserkers approached them, but Hiccup stopped them in their tracks with a look like a wolf did a subordinate. They faltered and stepped back the second they met his eyes, warriors three times his size and probably twice as experienced. Snotlout followed him anyway, holding his hammer high in guard in case any of them decided to risk it; none of them did. The men who stopped stayed where they did, as if their feet had been sunk into the earth.

And then Snotlout saw Astrid being held down by two men and knew that things were going to become insane. Hiccup could go ballistic about Astrid while he was in his right mind – his jaw could attest to that. But while he was in whatever state the gods had placed him in right now?

Hiccup took a deep breath into his chest, his head bending down into an ominous growl, chin nearly touching his chin, before he raised his head again, never blinking.

"Yes, yes I like you," Dagur said, laughing in an abandoned manner that was most definitely insane. He was glorying in the blood and carnage and looking at Astrid in a manner that made Snotlout sick. "I want this one. I want this one later. I really, really like her!"

"Find an hourglass. In the shed over there," Hiccup told him, a calmness in his voice as he looked at Dagur with the unblinking gaze of a hungry wolf. Or dragon. "Take her when she's free. Stay where I can see you."

Then he moved.

"I don't quite agree," he simply said, and took both men's heads off with one swing. Blood jetted up into the air, making Snotlout's revolted stomach protest again, but he ignored it as best he could as he dashed forward, taking hold of Astrid before anything else could happen.

"Move, move back, it's about to get ugly!" he hissed. Dear gods, if Hiccup was ruthless and enraged before, it was going to be nothing compared to this. Astrid had been held down by two men as Dagur talked about his intention to rape her. Snotlout realised he had begun trembling at the mere thought of what his minute, quiet, violence-hating cousin was capable of doing when pushed.

Astrid was not making it easy, either, the blood from her detainers making her skin slick as she tried to move back towards Hiccup.

"What are you doing! We have to go help!" she screamed, and he finally managed to find purchase on her wrist guard, dragging her behind an upturned cart as he broke the door into the partially burned shed just behind them, ramaging through its content and praying to Freyr that whatever power the Aesir had granted Hiccup had also enabled him to know that an hourglass was in that shed.

He found one almost immediately. Snotlout did not feel ashamed when his trembling became even more pronounced as he tried to reassure Astrid, then held the thing up triumphantly, shaking it to make the stupid, stupid sand descend all into one half of it. With a quick look, he raced out, cursing as he felt Astrid follow, and by the time he was crouching in the cover of an overturned barrel, the sand was clear. He signalled Hiccup, who nodded subtly.

"You may want to look away," he told her with a swallow, his voice cracking badly as she tried not to tremble, fingers on the hour glass he obviously had to flip. He had an idea of what Hiccup had in mind – his father wasn't Stoick's second for nothing – but it just scared the living crap out of him. He heard Astrid's hissed denial abstractly, knowing even before she spoke that she would not go, almost grateful that she wouldn't. Whatever the gods had done to Hiccup, he was still in there, and yet at the same time had turned him into a creature of death that was so far from his cousin Snotlout could not reconcile the two things he was seeing wrapped in one bloodstained, unblemished body.

"Oh gods, he's covered in blood!" Astrid choked beside him, as if reading his mind. "He's not even wearing shoes!"

"None of it's his," he hissed out, trying to reassure her; it came out more like the feared mention of a drougr.

"What?" she gasped.

"You are the new leader of the Berserkers," Hiccup said, ignoring all of Dagur's bluster and threats with an airy tone that sounded almost bored, almost like he was repeating dictated words.

Dagur laughed with gusto, with the thrill of the blood and fire around him. "I am!"

"Then I challenge you. You will duel with me. The winner will take all," he replied. "I am the heir of this tribe, and I invoke the right to challenge you - to the death."

Snotlout's suspicions proved real as he quickly switched the hour glass, marking the approximate amount of time with a smudge of blood.

"What's happening!" Astrid hissed. "Tell me he isn't doing what I think he is!"

"He's invoking the right of single-duel," Snotlout replied. "He kills Dagur, the battle's over and we win. He dies, all of us are done for." He shook his head. "He's not going to lose. There's something … something going on with Hiccup."

"What do you mean!" she asked fearfully. The whites of her eyes showed all around as they flitted from the scene with the two men to him and back again. Snotlout kept a sharp eye on the sand, trickling down more slowly than he had ever seen it.

"I think … I think the gods gave him the spirit of a dragon, Astrid," he replied, almost fearfully. "He doesn't move like a normal man. He sees things coming at him from the back, he ran out here wearing nothing but sleeping clothes and never got hit once, even by arrows." He looked at his cousin, who was looking at Dagur with a blank face while the other man gloated and attempted to goad him into attack, a hungry gleam in the Berserker's eyes which didn't even hold a candle to the bloodlust in Hiccup's. "I think he has night fury spirit in him, tonight."

"Oh, oh gods…" Astrid choked. "What's he even doing here…"

"Snuck out of camp, walked here in the dark, got over the wall … Astrid, the gods led him here. There's just no other way-"

"You have accepted my challenge!" Hiccup suddenly bellowed, raising Smoulder, and Snotlout's eyes snapped to the hourglass he'd placed within Hiccup's view, the sand suddenly reaching the blood-mark and more. "You take my challenge as heir of Berk for your own as leader of this tribe of monstrous creatures from the depths of Niflheim! The time necessary has elapsed and the challenge is in place! The law states thus and may Forseti curse you!"

"He doesn't even speak like Hiccup," Snotlout moaned, almost wishing he could back away, but at once unable to abandon his cousin. Astrid's knuckles were white as she gripped the barrel, eyes glued to the fighters.

"I didn't accept any challenge!" Dagur growled, losing ground under Hiccup's savage blows even with two weapons in hand.

"You call yourself a chief!" Hiccup replied, though his growl was slurred and almost unintelligible. "When you don't even know the Viking law? How are you leading your tribe when you don't know the laws required to lead it? Are you Outcasts? Are you slut-sons from between the legs of Loki's consort, unfit to walk among other men of the allied tribes?" Hiccup disarmed him, snarling his axe within Smoulder's gap and flinging it away, sending it whirring in the air to embed itself into a flaming building. A number of Vikings ducked, both allied clan and Berserker troops halting to come around the fighting pair. Snotlout's heart began beating in his throat and he grabbed Astrid's hand, holding it tightly. She spared him a glance.

"If Hiccup loses, we're all dead, but … he's not going to lose," he told her.

"You sound almost more afraid of him winning," she said, looking terrified as her eyes followed the two fighters. Hiccup was still moving like a creature from another world, a night fury without scales poured into human skin for a night. His eyes never blinked as he moved out of Dagur's sword's path. He almost looked like he was dancing, his steps measured and sure as Dagur's attacks failed to touch him. Dagur took a swipe at to his head and Hiccup ducked with a good margin of time; Dagur went after his legs and Hiccup calmly hopped back and kicked out with his metal one, chipping the Berserker's blade; Dagur tried to stab at his stomach and Smoulder knocked the blow away like a practice master correcting a stance.

For his part, the mad Berserker seemed to be enjoying it. "Ahaaa!" he screamed with glee as Hiccup kept dancing out of his way, his unnatural black eyes open, never blinking, and never looking an inch away from Dagur, "I will take your life, and it will be worth a thousand songs, a million edda, and the generations to come will know my name, Dagur the Conqueror!"

And then, Hiccup lunged. Snotlout watched as with one single, unbroken movement, Hiccup sidestepped the falling blade, descended with the blow as if he were accommodating Dagur's stance, crouched at a nearly impossibly angle, and then straightening with all the strength of his legs to drive Smoulder up into Dagur's belly.

There was a hush broken only by the crackling flames, the noise of a hut collapsing in on itself punctuating the quiet as Hiccup's serene expression looked at his blade protruding out of his opponent's back.

"HICCUP!" Astrid screamed beside him, and Snotlout didn't even know why until Dagur, through the pain the movement must have caused, raised an arm and brought a dagger down, blood running down the corners of his mouth as he smiled when he plunged it, aiming for the heart. Hiccup moved slightly and it sunk into his arm to the hilt.

The plateau stood unmoving for a moment longer before Hiccup smiled. "The gods are on my side," he replied, his tone definitely dragon as the predatory gleam in his eyes made Snotlout choke on his own fear. "I cannot feel a shit."

The rest of the hall beside them caved in on itself, flames rising in a flash of bright light, flaming ash floating around them as Hiccup grabbed Dagur by the shoulder and pushed him off his sword; flung him to the ground. The expression on Hiccup's face, so empty, would be something he was going to carry with him for the rest of his-

"Snotlout?"

He jumped terribly, looking around in fright for a second before he realised that he was safe, sitting on the grass outside Stoick's hall and he had been reliving the nightmare in his head again, for the umpteenth time since its end. The chief's house, far from the plaza up the hill, had survived the calamity.

The Berserker soldiers were being held hostages – what was left of them. Of the two-hundred odd Berserkers who had landed on Berk, there were only around thirty left. Though the Allied Clans and Berk had certainly suffered losses, they had apparently been cut short the moment Hiccup had entered the fray.

Snotlout blinked at the girl who walked up and sat beside him, putting her red-haired head on his shoulder and curling close to his side. His mind was still trapped in that horror. He'd not known that something like that had been lurking inside his cousin's quiet, kind demeanour. And that time, all those months ago, when he'd committed his horrible act towards Astrid, he'd been very lucky that he'd only received a bruised jaw. Hiccup had gone out there, the spirit of his night fury battle-brother infused into his blood, and decimated sixty men single-handedly on the final tally, with a sword and throw knives, or with weapons he lifted off corpses and his opponents. He had not been wearing armour or protection, and had received nothing graver than a shallowly stabbed arm.

It had been both fantastic and terrifying to watch.

"Is it true that Hiccup shared Toothless' soul for the battle, because his dragon couldn't join him?" Lauga asked, sounding awed. Snotlout swallowed, terrified of the admiration in her voice not for reasons he usually would be. That had been like witnessing something that … shouldn't. Awe was not the tone he would use.

"Yeah," he choked, nodding. Lauga sat closer to him, her warmth seeping into his side feeling comforting and real, and pulling him away from the world of flame and shadows inside his head. "Yes, he did. It was something I hope … never to see again."

"Really?" Her head came off his arm and she looked at him deeply, considering his words and tilting his head, trusting his judgement and waiting for him to elaborate. Snotlout had been smitten with her for a while, but it had been nothing but a passing fancy before, because Astrid had always been his sole aim and target. Lauga's grey eyes above white freckled cheeks, framed with her flaming red hair, however, had become a fascination he didn't mind when he had made peace with Astrid's impossibility, and when he had noticed her falling into dangerous circles, he'd quickly intervened to make sure she stayed out of them. She'd even tried to protect what she had considered to be the interest of a friend, standing up to the heir of the Boggies, of all people.

"Lauga, it was something I'm glad no one but the warriors saw," he admitted. "It was unnatural, as if he was unkillable and invincible."

"He went out without armour, right?" she replied, still considering his words as she looked at him attentively. "And remained unwounded." She sounded impressed, but then she stopped to think on it. "I can see how that is unnatural."

"It was," Snotlout said in a hushed whisper. "I could feel the gods' hands all over it, and I'm not even sure whether it was Thor or Loki's doing, either. We're lucky that Hiccup is so strong, or he may have been driven insane worse than a Berserker. He kept his mind together, knew who his allies and enemies were … but when the gods step in … it's not natural."

"Hmm," she replied. They were silent for a moment, watching the line of chained men in the plaza, Callous at the head of them, forced to stand for three days with only bread and water as punishment. "What a Snoggletog," she sighed. "I had a gift for you, you know? It burned down with my hut." She shrugged, her cheeks going red. "I was in the Hall all day, and my mother didn't pack it away."

"You're safe," he replied generously, though it didn't much feel like the usual flirtation as the truth of it sunk in. "That's gift enough."

He felt so gratified by the colour rising up her face, so different from the cold and indifferent responses he had always received from Astrid. And while he'd charmed a few of the more … open barmaids before, Lauga had never submitted to advances beyond a mortified blush and a skittish step away. Her blush, now, meant something different, and it bolstered his spirit in the face of what he'd just lived through.

"Say …" he went on, looking up at the grey clouds that had dawned over Berk on this bleak, bloody Snoggletog. Almost everyone was in the great hall, living there until the halls could be hastily repaired or rebuilt before the great freeze set in. "How about, when all this calms down, you and I go for a walk?"

"Alone?" she asked, unsure, looking at him carefully.

"After I speak to my dad, perhaps. And yours." He shrugged, leaving it open. She would either take him up on the offer, or she wouldn't. Her keen grey eyes scrutinised his features as he spoke. "I need to take Hellion out there anyway. Hoark told me that nightmares needed a lot of exercise; you know, to tire them out enough to train."

The tiny dragon was curled up on his other side, mottled, rainbow hide warm against Snotlout's waist as he looked at the burned plaza with interest. Fireworm had brought her baby after the battle, taking her clean off Hoark's nightmare and plopping her in Snotlout's lap without preamble. Confused and dazed as he'd been, he hadn't disputed the sudden ownership, and now felt majorly disinclined to.

So now he had a nightmare again. And Fireworm still sidled up to him sometimes for a good scratching, when Stoick was unavailable.

"I won't mind that walk," Lauga finally decided, and Snotlout felt a small smile break a corner of his lips. "You'll speak to our dads first, though, right?"

"Promise," he replied, deciding that he would take a page out of his cousin's book in this too. Hopefully his father would approve. Lauga's family weren't too wealthy, but they weren't at the bottom either, and her work at the Hall during the Thing had made it very evident that she was a good homemaker.

And Snotlout really felt that he needed her by his side, especially now. Her presence was calming, a balm to the horrors he'd seen - he still saw every time he closed his eyelids. When she smiled, the day seemed brighter even though the sun was hidden, and he really liked the way she smiled at him often.

Both of them turned their heads to look when Stoick exited his hall, looking more haggard and tired than Snotlout have ever seen, even during the harrowing years of Hiccup's absence. Standing and pulling Lauga with him, he accosted him discretely.

"Sir, how is he?" he asked quietly.

"Fine. Astrid is with him – she fell ill from her exposure the other day, and both of them need bed-rest. But Brunhilda says that're stubborn as angry mules." Stoick gave a huff of laughter, his eyes showing that his mind was far away as he looked at the grass at his feet. "They'll be ok."

"That's great," Snotlout sighed, tensions slithering down his shoulders and out of his abdomen. "Are you going to the Hall, sir? I will stand for Hiccup and Astrid. I won't let their place be vacant after all they did."

Stoick looked at him for a second, then clapped his back and nodded, moving towards the Hall. Lauga quietly let go of his arm and moved beside him. Snotlout was bone-tired and shaken, but Hiccup had proved to be more than a role-model, a good cousin and a good friend. As they passed the line of Berserkers chained to one another on the plaza, he glanced at some of them, and he saw in their eyes the same fear that he still felt himself.

Hiccup was their future chief, the first dragon rider, and he shared a soul with his night fury companion. He was protected by Asgard, chosen as a hero, and anyone who went up against him died a horrifying death. He was Hiccup the Negotiator – and you had better wish he was in a mood to negotiate with you, because the gods help you if he wasn't. Snotlout had heard them all, the rumours circulating about his cousin's feat, as he sat there on the grass awaiting news, lost in the looping horror of the battle.

His cousin had become a one-man fire curtain, capable of reducing the Berserker men to shivers at the mention of his name. And that, for Berk, was the biggest boon of all. And while Hiccup recovered from the touch of the gods, Snotlout would stand in for him, and protect not just his cousin, but Berk's new legacy.

=0=

Well then, this chapter was probably unexpected, and definitely fragmented. That is on purpose – after I wrote it, I actually went back and added or removed things to make things even more messy and confusing. Hiccup is under the influence of the medicine he was given, and is thus experiencing a rather horrible trip. While I have not dabbled in drugs myself, I suppose this is what I imagine it would be like. Hiccup remembers strange, incomplete things, and his memory of the night is going to be sketchy at best.

Again, I did not pull punches. This fic is rated M mostly for the violence.

So the basic overview is that the Berserkers attack, Berk counter attack, Hiccup manages to escape the safe beach - but in the grips of a powerful hallucination that make his senses hyper aware and makes the armour of the Berserkers make them seem like creatures from Norse' underworld. As he has lived with Toothless for very long, he has assimilated some of his movements without realising, and this grace of movements is brought out by the drug he was given. With his inhibitions gone completely, he goes out there, kills a large number of people while only wearing trousers, challenges Dagur using Viking law and wins, ending the conflict. Many lives are saved and Snotlout is forever traumatised. And the Berserkers will be checking under their bed for Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the III in the far future.