Chapter Ten: A month
"PULL!"
With combined forces the Vikings pulled at the rope. A giant net full fish appeared at the side of the boat. The Vikings cheered.
"Looks' good chief. That's gonna fill the food storage just fine for the upcoming winter!" one of the men called out.
Standing at the helm, Stoick just nodded.
The men set to get the fish aboard and filling the lower deck with them.
Gobber stood at the stern deck and watched his best friend/chief.
A little more than a month had passed. They had told the village that Hiccup probably was attacked be a dragon and most likely dead.
But they still hadn't found a trace. They had searched the whole island and the small surrounding islands. Nothing.
The whole village had given the chief their condolence. Like that would make the loss up.
Since that day, Stoick had darted into work and alcohol.
He was still a good chief and anybody who didn't know him that well would say that he was like always.
But Stoick couldn't fool Gobber. They'd been friends since they could crawl. They had been together in dragon training and fought many battles side by side. Gobber had been there when Stoick had met Valhallarama, had been his best man at their wedding and had changed little Hiccups diaper when he was born. And he'd been there at Val's funeral. And he'd been there to see how father and son had grown apart. And then, he'd been there, when Hiccup disappeared.
This was more than even a Viking like Stoick could handle.
But he wasn't the only one strange behaving.
The teens, who had picked on Hiccup their whole life, where more silent, more cautious and weren't as energetic as at the beginn of dragon training. Snotlout didn't want to believe that his cousin had been killed by a dragon and had search the whole island again on his own. Fishlegs was completely destroyed. Hiccup had been the only one he could have a decent conversation with.
The twins, well, no one was sure if they really understood the situation but even they hadn't blown up as much as usual in the last month.
The only exception was Astrid Hofferson. She went straight to the top of the class again and had the honor of killing the Nightmare.
She didn't talk about Hiccup and she didn't participate in the searches.
Gobber sighed. Stoick was a wreck. He stayed up long, drunk a lot and got up early again to work.
Between all of this, the raids had abruptly stopped. No one was sure what to think. If they should be happy or worried.
Many were suspiciously. The raids just stopped out of nothing as if all the dragons had disappeared. They were still there, the Vikings had seen a lot but none of the attacked ever again.
Still the people were wary. Such thing just didn't happen.
Some of the older Vikings said it was a sign of the gods. A blessing. And others said that there was giant plot running and the chieftain sons' disappearance was part of it.
Gobber didn't know what to think.
Sure this all was suspicious and what not but he was as sure as trolls stole all left socks that something was up.