Ch. 15
For the most part the experimental tailfin worked as expected, Toothless rarely had to correct his flight, but his exhaustion was gaining the upper hand—nevertheless, he smiled at Eletra as he hovered. "what's wrong?" "We need to go—now." Toothless turned and sped away knowing Eletra would follow him. As expected, she caught up with him in no time. "where are we—" Eletra started to ask, but as she got close to him, she noticed his tailfin was repaired, and yet, it looked different than before. "Your…tail!" Eletra said flying up alongside him. "I came back Eletra. I came back for you. Will you be my mate?" This profound declaration of love made her completely lose her balance and just barely remain in the air. Toothless could see the shock on her face; she was not expecting that. "Please say yes, please say yes." Toothless thought as Eletra struggled to regain her composure. "Too—I—I" Eletra sputtered. "YES!" Eletra finally shouted, she could hardly speak. Toothless was ecstatic, Eletra had said yes to being his mate. He fully intended to thank Cloudjumper for the second opinion that boosted his confidence enough to come back for her. He had trouble remembering why he'd been unsure about coming back at all.
A light rain began as the two Night Furies neared Berk, Toothless ordinarily indifferent to rain quickened his pace. "Toothless? Is everything alright?" Eletra asked worriedly. Toothless didn't look at Eletra and instead circled away from the bright part of the island that shown like a beacon in the intensifying rain. "Toothless, Where are you headed?" Eletra asked keeping pace with the exhausted Night Fury. "Berk," was the only reply she would get that night. Soon the two dragons lay near each other sheltered from the rain by a dense covering of trees. "This is Berk? This island has a name? How peculiar, why does it need a name? Is Toothless hiding something from me? Is that why he didn't want me to get too close to the brightly lit areas?" These questions and much more flooded Eletra's head as she struggled to come to grips with all that had transpired in that day. It felt like an entirely different life when she thought about before Toothless had arrived on her island. "All I used to do was explore various islands nearby, eat, sleep and avoid Fright. How was I content with that?" Eletra thought curious how she'd been okay leading such a dull life. Finally, she lay her head down, closed her eyes and began to dream of her mother.
Eletra awoke to the dripping of rain runoff on her muzzle. "Wha? Where am I?" She looked around at the dark partly cloudy sky and remembered where she was and what'd happened. "It's…beautiful," she said looking at the unfamiliar patch of sky, the faintest tendrils of light started to separate the sky and the sea. Eletra was awestruck, for all the time she'd spend on her island she hadn't paid much attention to the rising and setting sun, beyond it waking her in the mornings. "how could I've missed this?" Eletra thought as the sky become a wet watercolor canvas with streaks of bright yellow running everywhere, dying the clouds a pastel orange as the color radiated outward. She followed the warm light as it beat back the darkness until it fell upon Toothless only a few feet from her. Eletra stared, frozen in place.
Toothless didn't have anything attached to him, save his autonomous fake tailfin. She was thankful Toothless hadn't woken up with the sunrise as she did, for she was staring at him unashamedly. "I—I, Toothless, you're magnificent." Eletra murmured in wonderment. "I knew you were attractive when all that stuff was attached to you but I never imagined…this," she said softly, not wanting to wake him. The morning light that had so wonderfully illuminated Toothless dissipated as the Sun said its goodbyes to the sea and began its daily travel across the sky. She finally tore her eyes away from her new mate and was flooded with thoughts and emotions she'd long since buried. "I love you Toothless." The full impact of Toothless's proposal hadn't yet sunk in as she was still capable of forming complete thoughts. It would be some time before it truly set in. In the meantime, Eletra stood ready to explore her new home, and it was then she noticed Toothless's tail once more. One real tailfin, the other tailfin resembled a tailfin but looked far from natural. It sent a chill thru her, and she wasn't sure why. Eletra knew Toothless only had one tailfin, and it only served to improve his standing in her mind. "that looked painful. " was her only thought on the matter before leaving to find answers to her questions elsewhere on Berk.
Not wanting to draw unwanted attention from Berk's inhabitants, whoever they were, Eletra begrudgingly refrained from flying and walked. "Maybe I'll find a dragon that can explain what this place is." With this thought in the forefront of her mind, she searched all over the forested areas of Berk trying to find answers. Eletra found no shortage of dragons going about their day but no dragons that took any special notice of her or what she said. It occurred to her that the dragons must've mistaken her for Toothless and didn't pay any attention to the differences. One dragon, however, did notice. "What's a Night Fury doing so far from home? Did you get lost?" the Windstriker asked as if she'd talked with Eletra dozens of times. Eletra tensed not wanting to recall the memory of why she left home anytime soon. Noticing this, the Windstriker eased off and did not ask again. "Please, if it causes you pain, do not think about it. But can you tell me what brings an attractive female Night Fury to Berk?" In Eletra's mind, she pictured Toothless sleeping with the morning sun reflecting off his scales, and she smiled.
"I should've guessed." Eletra snapped out of it and looked to the Windstriker who was staring at her. "Toothless, the resident Night Fury. Been on or near Berk since before the defeat of the Red Death, or so I hear." Eletra was confused, "or so you hear?" she asked, it was the Windstrikers turn to tense up; "we all have our bad memories dear, just like how you came to be here is painful for you, how I came here is troubling for me. " Eletra felt bad; she hadn't wanted to upset the only dragon that bothered to speak with her. "As I said, I'm still new to this island. If you want a good idea of what goes on here, Stormfly would be a good choice." The dragon said cheering up. Eletra was about to inquire who Stormfly was when the Windstriker spoke yet again. "No, she won't do; a bit of a gossip that one, hmmm…Cloudjumper is good. He's still somewhat new here as well, but he picks up on things fast. Dependable too." Eletra was starting to think she'd need to interrupt to speak. Luckily she didn't have to. "Is there anything you still want to ask me? I'll help however I can. "
Eletra was relieved she didn't have to interrupt. "what does Cloudjumper look like? You've told me nothing about him, and I haven't even found out what your name is." The Windstriker was initially taken aback by this but realizing she'd not said anything useful did not take offense. "Please forgive me, Cloudjumper is a fully grown Stormcutter, four wings with head frills; can't mistake him. As for my name, it's Percilla. Yours is..?" Eletra paused, not out of suspicion but whether to give her real name or not. "I don't think it'd do any harm to give out my name," she thought, "Eletra, my names Eletra." "Fabulous, well, I should be going, Melancholy does worry so when I'm away. I hope everything works out for you." With that the Windstriker flew off, Eletra cared not where. Instead of wondering who Percilla was referring to, Eletra tried to remember if she'd seen a four-winged dragon during her exploration of Berk.
Cloudjumper was in fact, not on Berk at all; he was with Valka seeking out and destroying dragon trapper's camps and then liberating any dragons they'd caged. Valka had, some time ago, gone back to her abandoned dragon sanctuary and recovered everything she could. This recovery allowed her to reconstruct her armor, with a few improvements courtesy of Hiccup's mechanical know-how. Eletra, of course, did not know this, so when Cloudjumper did return, she was not expecting or ready for the mysterious thing on the Stormcutters neck. "Are you Cloudjumper?" Eletra called up to him as the dragon flew by overhead. "Did something call me?" Cloudjumper thought as he passed over Eletra not giving it much thought. His curiosity quickly spiked and he and circled back wondering what could've called him.
"Alright, we'll see what's down here and then go log our findings," Valka said to herself feeling Cloudjumper begin to turn. "Wait? That's Toothless, why would Tooth-le-ss." The thought trailed off in the dragon's mind when he saw Eletra and that she had two intact tailfins. "I—I thought Toothless imagined her." Cloudjumper landed in front of Eletra now more curious than ever. "Cloudjumper?" Eletra stated questioningly, "Yes?" Eletra then noticed the very strange looking..thing next to him. Eletra quickly jumped back frightened. Valka quickly removed her head-coverings and gave Eletra a quick once-over. "That thing is a Viking?!" She said shocked, Eletra quickly fled with only a fearful look as her goodbye. "Wait! Night Fury, she's friendly!" Cloudjumper called after Eletra but it was no use, Eletra had disappeared. "Cloudjumper we need to find her, she must be half mad with fright." Valka was worried that she might injure herself being frightened on an unfamiliar island. "There must be some reason a second Night Fury is on Berk; I didn't even think anymore existed."
Frightened, Eletra ran until she unknowingly ran out of ground. When Eletra realized she was falling, the water was only seconds away to greet her. "ACK! I hadn't planned on taking a swim today" Eletra quickly exited the water and calmed herself down, looking around she discovered she'd fallen into a cove of some kind. "I didn't catch your name before" Eletra looked up[ to see Cloudjumper had appeared above the cove. "Who Is that with you?" Cloudjumper landed, without answering. Valka dismounted Cloudjumper to examine the new Night Fury closer, or so she hoped. Eletra stared at Valka trying to make sense of what she saw. "I'm not going to harm you. I didn't think any dragons like Toothless remained ." Eletra wanted to trust this Viking, and she wanted to get some answers to her questions. "This, this is all so new I don't…" Eletra said just before leaving once again, this time, however, she flew. Valka was curious to see why another Night Fury was on Berk but feared pursuing the dragon any further might make it leave Berk. "I wonder If Toothless knows anything about this?" Valka found herself wondering.