Chapter Eighty-Five: It's hot, it's dangerous, it's probably hell
Hiccup first noticed it when he helped Conner with some reparations on the ship.
George's fight with Fighter two days ago had left some damage on the ship but neither of them saw it necessary to help. The two of them spend nearly all of their time together, rough-housing around, bonding and stuff like that.
Of course that was important but it was still strange.
Anyway.
Hiccup was nailing a piece of wood into the railing to stabilize it, when he happened to look up.
He frowned.
The sea was always misty and especially in the morning hours there could be a lot of fog hanging lowly over it.
But this….this was strange.
He put the hammer down and asked: "Conner, correct me if I'm wrong but have you ever seen so much…mist….over the sea?"
Conner too looked up from his work.
He frowned.
"Now that you mention it. It is pretty dense. But then again it's been hot these past days. Maybe it's just natural."
Hiccup nodded but not without a wary side-glance he returned to his work.
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It was two days later that Hiccup was certain something was amiss with their location.
And he wasn't the only one.
They all stood at the bow of the ship, looking ahead.
Well, they would have if they'd been able to look ahead but the dense walls of mist, fog or what-ever it was, hid everything beyond from their eyes.
To all sides and even above them there were these white walls. The sun was only a distant plate in the sky, unable to get all the way through to them.
The air was heavy and wet.
He couldn't decide whether he felt hot or cold.
Hiccup didn't like it.
It reminded him too much of the time they had encountered Zhang. And that had ended in a prison-break.
They had put a table near the canopied steering-wheel on which they had laid out the best maps they had.
Which didn't mean much since it was also one of the oldest but the only one that still had the 'Fire-Wall-Lands' painted on them as detailed as possible.
On every other map it was either a white spot or an incorrect version of how it might look like.
They stood around said table and were trying to estimate their most likely location.
Conner sighed.
"The last time I saw the stars was nearly four nights ago. The rest of the time the fog has blocked them out. We're only sailing by compass now but that won't get us anywhere in a long run."
Hope leaned forward and asked silently: "Do you think that this could be already the…the mist that swallows all the travelers? You know the one we talked about back at Conner's cave?"
Conner looked at the map.
"I don't think so…I know that we made good time and the wind has been in our favor and everything but we couldn't have possible made it there that quickly." He said doubtfully.
"I say we stick to the compass and the general direction. I mean the fog can't go on forever, right?" George said.
"That's what you said about the desert too." Hiccup reminded him, his eyes travelling the map.
"And it stopped somewhere."
"Yeah, after it nearly killed us." Kate reminded him.
Hiccup sighed.
"Let's go with that for now." He said. "It's not like we have any other options. But one of us is constantly at the steering-wheel and one is looking ahead, trying to see if there are any obstacles. The last thing we need is sail the boat head-first into a rock or something. I'll work out a timetable." He said. Everybody nodded.
"For now Conner, you take the steering-wheel, Hope, you are on look-out. George, see if the fire needs refueling. Kate, get us all spare ropes you can find. And Josh, get Zhang."
They looked at him confused.
"Why do you need the last two things?" Hope asked.
"Easy" Hiccup said with a grim expression "We'll take a look ahead."
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"Are you sure this is going to work?" Josh yelled over the head wind as Zhang pressed onward through the thick whiteness.
Hiccup on the back of Toothless floated elegantly closer and shouted back: "It's an ancient Viking method. Like this we navigate through unknown territory to not get lost."
"But why do I have to be the dog on a leash?" Josh complained.
Before they had taken off from the deck of their ship, Hiccup had knotted all the ropes Kate had brought him together into a very, very, very long rope and tied it to Zhangs leg.
Back onboard Kate had tied the other end of the rope to the main mast and kept them anchored.
Hiccup had done it so they would not get lost in the mist. If they wished to return, Josh would take the rope off Zhangs leg and it would guide them back to their ship.
The incident on Port East had thought them all a lesson.
Mist was a tricky thing.
"Stop complaining and see if you can spot anything." Hiccup ordered him, slightly chuckling.
But the easy atmosphere didn't last long.
It was as if the nothing around them sucked everything living out of its surroundings. Hiccup felt as if all his sense slowly shut down.
He heard nothing but the constant swoosh of the wind, saw nothing but whiteness, all he felt was the coldness and the wetness of the mist on his skin, soaking through the many layers of cloths and all he could taste was water. It all blended together to a monotone picture of misery.
His head was spinning. Everything looked the same. There weren't even the littlest sign of anything.
He steered over to Josh and Zhang. Both looked miserable. With chattering teeth Josh looked up at him.
"C…can…we…g…g…go…do…down?" he stammered.
Hiccup nodded defeated.
"Oh thank god!" Josh groaned and quickly untied the tow.
But his fingers were so numb from the coldness and slippery from the water; it slipped right through his fingers and fell down…
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Hiccup sometimes wondered why he bothered.
Apparently bad luck was the air he was breathing. So why care at all?
For a heartbeat both boys watched the falling rope with dumb expressions.
Them Hiccup clicked the tailfin into dive-mode and Toothless, wings pressed flatly against his sleek body plummeted head-first after the rope.
Hiccup pressed himself flat against Toothless's back, one hand outstretched.
He could see the rope in front of him.
His hands closed around it and Toothless stopped abruptly, hovering heavily in the air.
Zhang came to stop just paces away, Josh breathlessly asking: "Did you get it?"
Hiccup glared at him. "Yes I did." He said annoyed.
"Come on, let's get back.
Back on the ship, dressed in dry and warm cloth they told the others about the nothingness ahead.
That night everybody went defeated to bed, unsure what the next day would bring.
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The next day was grey. The sun was hidden not only by the mist but also by clouds, which only intensified the strange phenomenon they had expected and dreaded.
Kate saw it first.
She was sitting in the crow's nest on look-out when she suddenly cam barreling down and towards the canopy there Hiccup and Conner discussed their rout.
"Tell me I'm imagining things but could it be that…that the air is…glowing over there?" she asked and pointed ahead.
Both boys looked up.
She was right.
You needed to concentrate to see it but there was an orange tint to the air…
But that orange-red glow ahead only got stronger after another day.
By then they were surrounded in the orange glow that sucked the color out of everything, making it all a dull grey color.
The air now grew hotter and the mist denser. It was like breathing water at times.
George swept the sweat from his brown and muttered: "Gods help us. It's the 'Glow of Hell'. We're close."
Hiccup gulped.
"What is this place?" Kate asked softly.
"I think we are about to find out." Hope whispered.
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Hiccup thought at first it was the sound of thunder.
The rumbling noise had been there all day, distant and ominous.
But as the day went on and on, he soon discovered that it couldn't be thunder rolling.
That didn't really cheer him up. A storm was at least something he knew. This…this scared him.
Not being able to see, only hearing scary noises from up ahead were they were going, always fearing with the next wave they would smash against some rocks was unnerving.
Also he missed the sunlight.
He'd lost all sense of time.
It was as if they were trapped under a dome of fog, cut off from the outside world.
The only indication that days were passing was that sometimes the air grew darker and then a little bit lighter again.
But there was no total darkness anymore.
The orange light was ever-present. Just like the mist.
It was Nowhere-Land.
This really was a godforsaken place. He could understand that people got lost here and were never seen again. You could probably sail round in a circle all along and would never notice. Good thing they had a compass.
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The atmosphere between the others was tense.
Approximately one week they had been trapped in this mist now and there was nothing to do.
Loud disagreements were a common thing, everyone snapped at the slightest thing but Hiccup couldn't hold it against them. He too was barely keeping it together as it was.
He tried to keep them occupied with training and discussions about their mission and what they were thinking and making plans but that only helped a little.
The training-fights were brutal and hard with everybody letting go of their frustrations. Things like target practice turned into competitions, the discussions were half-hearted and short-lived.
They all knew that they had to keep it together, that they should try harder to not let this situation affect them so much but it was so damn hard.
Hiccup told himself again and again: This is only another test. To see if you are patient enough to wait and keep going and don't lose it so easily. Maybe that is what killed all the other people that wanted to go to the 'Fire-Wall-Lands'. They didn't pass this test because all they wanted was the gold and didn't want to wait for it. Their greed and hast killed them ….or the lack of food after some months.
Hiccup sighed and continued staring ahead.
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The rumbling sound grew louder and louder. By the second day after it had appeared it was so loud it was hard to fall asleep peacefully.
On the morning of their tenth day at sea (or so they thought) it happened.
They were all on deck for their morning combat exercise, when Josh's eyes suddenly widened and his jaw fell down. He was standing in front of them, so they couldn't see what he was gazing at.
Confused they turned around….and froze.
For the first time the mist-wall in front of them broke apart and revealed a sight that couldn't be real.
"The 'Fire-Wall-Lands'." Josh breathed in awe.
"We're like the first people to see this in…in ages!" Kate whispered.
"Only if we live to tell the tale." George mumbled but he too was overwhelmed by the sight.
"Gods almighty." Hope breathed. "What a sight."
"If this isn't hell, I'm sure as hell I don't want to go to hell ever!" Kate muttered.
In front of them rose rampant black volcanic mountains into the sky, stretching on to both sides before they were swallowed by the mist again. They were spiky and dangerous looking like the jagged teeth of some monster, with thorns all over it.
They loomed over them like the shadows giants but that was not the impressive thing.
Hiccup had seen lots of mountain-ranges like this.
But what made this place so unique and breathtaking and dangerous was the lava.
These weren't just volcanic mountains; they were actual volcanoes and from the top and from cracks in the sides of their walls spilled molten fire in wide rivers down the hillsides into the sea.
Its orange glow was so strong; it seemed to shine through everything.
The air was heavy with the smell of sulfur and heat.
The sea was hissing where the lava touched it.
Steam rose and the wind blew it away.
Again there was that sound of thunder rolling only ten times louder and they watched in awe as on top of one of the volcanoes something exploded and chunks of rock and balls of fire rained from the sky.
Every now and then the mountains would break apart to reveal small and narrower or some wider passages through their midst and into what lay behind them, but every time Hiccup peaked into them as they sailed by, he saw lots of boulders in the shallow waters, lava falling from the brims above and winding paths that sneaked through there like a maze.
In front of them another volcano exploded and again chunks of stone and lava hit the water,
not too far away and they all gulped slightly.
"This is very dangerous." Conner stated.
"And somewhere inside that maze is the 'Island of Tomorrow'. On which Illiona is held captive." Hiccup said tonelessly.
"Well, they really don't need to worry about people trying to invade secretly. You need to survive getting there first." Josh said in a similar voice.
Hiccup sighed. "Let's go and look for somewhere to anchor for tonight. Somewhere save."
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AN: Yeah, it's been a long time but now the weekend is here and I can chill out a bit and write.
Thanks for following the story, thanks for reviewing it and thanks for sticking with me. You're great.
Lots of love,
Kate.