"Can you believe him? I mean, out of all the ways to celebrate the anniversary, he picks a ball? Why couldn't it be a wrestling competition or something? Everyone knows I'm bad at that, so I don't have anything to lose," he argued as he straightened his fur cape around his shoulders, although the clasp now had a small polished scale fragment from Toothless in the crown.

She trilled in agreement, but for very different reasons. She was just surprised someone like Stoick, a man who valued physical ability above finesse, would even think to host a gathering this lovely. It was the perfect way to unveil herself. Hiccup turned around and threw his arms out to the sides. "Well, what do you think?"

She ran her eyes down him. Neatly brushed brown hair, absolutely adorable face, slim but still substantial shoulders outlined by the fur cape and gold clasp, and lithely muscular torso sadly hidden by the green linen jerkin ending in an intricate mass of exquisite leatherwork that doubled as a belt. From there, simple brown pants ending in one boot and one prosthetic shined almost to a blinding degree. Hiccup cleaned up very nicely in her opinion.

She roared her approval and Hiccup laughed. "Now it's your turn." He walked toward her wardrobe and began rifling through the different dragon dresses the seamstresses had made her. He drew out a light blue one, a good color for her green hide, but she only had her eye on one dress tonight. As he withdrew from the piece of furniture with the dress in hand, she flew past him and grabbed the dress Sophia had gifted her with a few days ago.

Eyebrows went up at her choice. "Alright, but I don't know how you would wear that. I'll put this behind the curtain for you just in case." He did so and slunk over to their bed, waiting for her to finish up. "You know, you can dance, Toothless," he speculated from the bed. "Remember that time in the forge? It might now have been a court dance, but it was fun." He laughed, not noticing the lack of conversation on her part. "What do you think Toothless," he asked turning back around to look at the screen. His jaw dropped.

The green dragon skin was hanging over the top of the screen.

He jumped towards her. "No, no, Toothless. You can't go to the ball as a big dragon, you'll scare…" And suddenly his throat went very dry as he saw the girl in the dress Toothless had brought behind the curtain.

The dress was a masterpiece, no doubt about that. Flaring as it reached the floor, but narrowing at such an angle that it hugged the woman's upper thighs perfectly, it maintained the woman's figure all the way to her shoulders. The color was a dark black, the same as Toothless' colors in her other form, with crystal beading around the waist and bust line, drawing your eyes but not interrupting the flow of the dress.

But the garment was nothing compared to the one wearing it. She was just about his height, perhaps an inch taller, but that dress made her look longer and more elegant than a graceful elm. The face was strong, stronger than what most would consider ideal beauty, but had well-proportioned features and lips the pink of their favorite fruit, strawberries. He wondered if she tasted like them too. He had the weirdest urge to grab and kiss her as he ran his hair through that long black hair to see if it really was as smooth and thick as it looked. Then he remembered the incident he'd had weeks ago. "It wasn't a dream."

She blinked. That was not what she'd been expecting. "What?"

"That night, the night I had that attack, a woman came and helped me through the pain. I thought it was a dream, but…it was you, wasn't it?"

She remembered now. "Yes, it was. But I had to do whatever I could! You were thrashing and you wouldn't listen to Mark, so I thought-"

He put a hand on her tensed shoulder. "I'm glad that it was you. But why on earth would you hide from me? You could have told me that night, I would have listened." She shrank from the question. She'd broken his trust with this, when she had only wanted to- "Were you afraid I wouldn't really love you if I saw this?"

No. It was impossible. No one could be that pure.

She looked back into his eyes, into him. Hiccup saw the action and answered it, using the hand on her shoulder to pull her into an embrace. "You don't need to be afraid of me, no matter what skin you wear." She rested in that knowledge, letting it engulf her. "But I will want to hear why you hid." She tensed. How was she going to explain? "Later. Right now, I want to dance with my beautiful wife and put those other women to shame."

He let go of her and offered his arm. "Shall we?" She smiled, purely human for the first time he knew of, and wound her arm around his. They left the room together and shocked the socks off Mark in the hallway, on his way to get them for the festivities.

The servant just stood there for several moments before his head settled enough for him to speak. "Excuse me sire, but who is that?" He pointed at the beauty on his prince's arm.

Hiccup's grin would have split his face. "This is my wife. I think she's quite beautiful this way, don't you?"

Mark did his best impression of a fish.

That expression became a common sight for the pair as they passed various servants, knights, and even a few of the guests in the corridors. Only a few went beyond gawking and actually talked to the pair.

Gawain closed his mouth in an effort to maintain his knightly image and approached Hiccup and the woman who had his mind in knots. "Sire, It is an excellent night for a ball. May I inquire as to why this young lady is accompanying you and not Milady?"

Hiccup feigned confusion. "But Gawain, this is Milady. She wouldn't miss the dance for the world, right?" He turned to his wife, begging her to play along.

Fortunately, Toothless loved a good prank almost as much as he did. "Of course, my dear husband. We must keep going, or we'll be late." And with that, they strode off in the direction of the ball room, leaving the knight somewhat stunned behind them. But then Hiccup winked at Gawain and the knight relaxed and followed the pair to the room where the cream of the land waited for the royals to process in and begin the celebration. Boy, were they in for a surprise.

There you have it. If anyone would like to know what the dress looks like, the link is in my profile.

Please Review! How did you like his initial reaction to Toothless? Did I make her too beautiful to be realistic?