A/N: I'm actually really glad I started writing this because, for whatever reason, it's helped me find my muse to work on one of my own original stories(that I hope to one day publish) again. Motivation seems so hard to come by these days, ya?
And I've definitely been reading and smiling at all of your guy's reviews, I promise! I'm just not always good at knowing how to respond ^_^; But I appreciate each and every one of you!
Also, I've been pondering whether or not to have this be before or after Nightfall and finally settled on "after".
Learning from the Masters
A How To Train Your Dragon Fanfiction
Based of Le'Letha's "Nightfall"
There was only one thing that weighed on his mind right now and that was that this was indescribably the very epitome of wrong.
Halves were not meant to be separate, they were meant to be whole and yes he and his Toothless-love sometimes were apart but not like this and not so far and not where they couldn't even see each other if they wanted and it was all so wrong bad wrong separate love gone where love where gone bad wrong where Toothless love go?
He heard an answer and he knew immediately who it was and that his beloved was still alive and trying to talk but didn't sound right and he couldn't see where or if he was safe or what the bad vile hurting pfikingr had done to his Toothless-half and he couldn't quite reach the side of the cage where he could see outside. All but the side with the door was covered by a large cloth that reached all sides, so he only had a narrow window of sight to the outside of it, and to the rest of the cave.
He gave another frustrated tug of the shackles just above his human paws, but all it managed to do was rattle the chain holding them, and he growled lowly in anger. The pfikingr had taken his dragon claws and knife and anything else he might have used to break free or unlock the key hole on one of the shackles. The chain was long enough to roam about his cage somewhat, but not reach the far end with the door where two of the humans stood watch, and he had already tested the parts of the cage walls he could reach for a way out, but there was none.
He snarled bad trapped where love Toothless love where bad angry scared bad restless trapped Toothless where angry restless separate gone wrong wrong wrong wrongwrong you me we us need bad separate bad wrong crazy crazy wrong!
The closest they had come to being separated like this had been on their attack of the dragon-eater's nest, but that had only been minutes. This time was hours and he couldn't stand it anymore!
He howled a distressed, mourning wail for his other half's company like he was dying, yanking on the chains that kept him away from his Toothless-half, and the dragon reciprocated his cry with one of his own, the two keening at each other you me we us need love love separate lonely need scared angry need love love love you me we us love separate wrong scared need together together yes love love love.
One of the pfikingr snarled something at him he could only partially make sense of, recognizing "stop"but very little else, the man banging on the cage with the gleaming edge of an ax loudly in warning.
The man had still-healing gashes that Hiccup himself had left on his flesh, but he was too agitated to feel smug, baring his teeth in rebellion, snarling back no free you free us we free bad pfikingr go out free we us free go bad pfikingr!
The pfikingr He growled something but it was lost to him amongst the gibberish of human tongue.
How could he make these stupid pfikingr understand when they couldn't speak right? How could he tell them that he needed to be with Toothless-mine more than anything and how badly being apart was eating him alive like a hoard of squirmy white dead-thing bugs that chewed out insides until the dead-things were hollow?
Cold was already creeping in on him like a dead-thing being away from Toothless' heart-fire so long but it wasn't the kind of cold that the wind or the snow brought. It was something worse that made him tremble like it was cold when it was not, but why else did anything shake like this? He knew that dragons shook with fear and sometimes anger when they were really, really mad but this wasn't either of those feelings. It wasn't a feeling of building power like anger but it was deeper and more cutting than the greatest fear, and not quite like the horrified heart-pain that had come with Uh strrrTT showing him his body was human and his conflicted thoughts of leaving his Toothless-self, but it was just as bad, if not worse in its own way.
It was a bad, hollow, emptying feeling that had him leaning on the side of the cage and sliding down to draw his body close to itself, softly banging the back of his head against one of the thick, flat, metal bars with a low, short clo-ng, whimpering his pain quietly lonely love Toothless love need lonely pain alone cold scared lonely we us need love love hurts lonely where lonely Toothless love need we us Toothless we together always lonely apart.
Eventually he dropped everything else, only repeating Toothless love love love Toothless love Toothless Toothless, the dragon uttering back a wrong-sounding love yes love Hiccup love here love Hiccup here love love yes love yes.
One of the pfikingr yelled something at him again and banged the cage with his weapon for silence, but Hiccup only snarled his dragon mantra louder in defiance, refusing to quiet himself for the bad hurting pfikingr that kept him and his Toothless-heart love us we yes you me we us apart. They couldn't physically be together but they still had their voices and they would sing their affections for their other half back and forth to each other no matter how angry it made the pfikingr and not lose each other even if they were apart.
The pfikingr growled more things he couldn't understand but he didn't care at all, only wanting to hear Toothless' voice answer his and assure each other that even now they were still together and still two halves of a whole and not even cages and sharp pfikingr weapons could fully stop them from being one-who-is-two.
The two cage-guards gave up their angry noises soon enough and instead ignored the dragon and dragon-man as they chattered and crooned to each other to ease just a sliver of the loneliness of apartness in the dark belly of different human trappings but the bad cold lonely bad-shaking alone feeling wouldn't leave.
He faltered slightly as one of the pfikingr figures approached whose likeness was burned into his mind like a hot coal on the flesh, the one that had chased and fought he and his Toothless-self on the preynoprey and even touched his Toothless-mine mine! with its filthy pfikingr paws and made Toothless hurt wing hurt no fly hurt where hurt?!
Hiccup heard Toothless squawk questioningly at his sudden silence love quiet why quiet love hurt?
Hiccup warbled reassurance, but his green eyes and attention were still heavily fixed on the preynoprey pfikingr.
He was a smaller pfikingr than the rest, smaller even than Hiccup's own size, with brown fur on his head and black fur and feathers as dark as Toothless' own scales around his shoulders. The pfikingr rolled his head around one lifted paw with a soft pop and yawned dull teeth, regarding the other two with eyes that looked half open, a pale blue like the sky on a cloudless day when the sun shone brightest.
The three pfikingr spoke their garbled language to each other and, with a wave of his paw, the smaller pfikingr sent the bigger ones away before coming to stand just in front of the cage door.
He spoke but Hiccup could make no sense of his words, though the tone of the voice was enough to make his neck tingle like when a breeze of frost ghosted his skin where his fur did not cover. It was not unnerving in that it was angry or snarly or loud or threatening like most pfikingr or even a scary mad dragon, or even like that of the dragon-eater Queen that rattled both him and his other half to the core.
This sound was soft. Quiet. Like the murmur of a small stream that barely trickled by. It was not intensity of feeling that rattled him, it was the lack of it.
Dragons and even most pfikingr were creatures of bold expression that talked with their sounds and their bodies and eyes and most did so quite loudly and sometimes outright flamboyantly that Hiccup could read fairly accurately within seconds.
This one pfikingr wasn't like that though. It was like trying to figure out what a rock was thinking or feeling, which was silly even to the dumbest dragon because what could something that cold and hard and unmoving and completely indifferent to everything be thinking or feeling? But that was exactly what came to mind as he tried to figure the younger pfikingr out in reading his face or tone or his body language that seemed non-existent.
When he did not respond at all, still stuck on what he should think of the not moving stone cold no feeling pfikingr no warmth cold stone wrong stone not moving wrong no feel stone pfikingr, they spoke again, in that same chillingly frigid voice that seemed hollow of everything living and warm and feeling.
The man continued to speak, but he could understand none of it, since pfikingr could not speak right, but it sounded even more wrong coming from this one in that cold, dead tone that made him question if he was even alive. Could dead pfikingr still move and talk? He did not think so, otherwise Uh strrrTT would not have been so upset that dragons had been fighting and killing pfikingr and asked for his help. And besides, the man didn't look or smell of a dead thing.
But there was still something about his stillness that Hiccup could not read that was wrong, like stagnant water that did not move and became murky and filled with bad smells and bad things that would make dragons sick to drink and bad to swim in because of nasty bugs that bit and stung and burrowed under the flesh.
Hiccup snarled teeth at the cold-speaking Viking if only to garner a reaction, something natural and feeling that he could actually understand and didn't make him want to retreat from the bad wrong cold stone no feel no warmth pfikingr.
They still did not even flinch at his threat display and Hiccup quickly dissolved into chattering nervously cold no feel no move no warm bad wrong why pfikingr sick wrong sick bad why no warm cold no feel sick?
He couldn't think of anything else to the wrongness that he felt about the pfikingr that didn't move and didn't feel and didn't talk like a not-dead thing. He had to be sick. There was something sick wrong about him like worse than a dragon that lost its heart-fire and what if that sick wrong cold sick no feel no warm thing spread to him? What if he'd spread the sick wrong cold to his Toothless-heart love beloved and took his heart-fire?!
That must have been why he was feeling strange bad awful shaking cold bad-shaking cold and like his heart-fire was going out because that sick cold wrong bad pfikingr had touched him with the sick wrong when they fought and then touched his Toothless-half and now they were both probably going to become sick wrong too and were apart and suddenly he couldn't breathe and he was pacing restless sick wrong no sick wrong love Tt-(click)-th-uhp-ss sick wrong bad pfikingr sick wrong scared why sick no no no no Toothless! and he could hear Toothless shrieking distress back at him hurt Hiccup hurt confused sick wrong where love love confused safe yes where here love here!
The bad sick wrong pfikingr was watching him as he tried frantically to pull free and run to his dragon-half and out of the trap and fly far and fast and away from the bad sick wrong sick bad wrong wrong thing and keep flying until it stopped holding onto him and his Toothless-beloved and they just had to fly fast and hard and away from those sick wrong pfikingr eyes that stared and hunted him even when his body and the rest of his face did not and Hiccup frothed stay away bad pfikingr sick wrong bad away Toothless we us fly fast far away sick wrong away pfikingr hurt sick wrong Toothless we us Toothless safe love love Toothless love!
The pfikingr stood still and merely continued to watch, showing nothing, not even a twitch of feeling warmth heart-fire only cold unmoving no feel cold stone wrong sick bad wrong, and then his lips twitched slightly, moving without sound at first, and then the noise that escaped them made the dragon-man freeze because he knew that sound and that sound was a name and it wasn't his name but it was a name that was that of his other half.
It did not sound right like how a dragon would speak but it did not sound wrong in the pfikingr way either, rolling the sound over and over, sounding faintly more right each time that he did.
"Kthss… Cthh-ssss. Thhh-sss."
Hiccup listened, hardly believing it for a moment, before he hissed it back more clearly, wanting to see if the sick wrong pfikingr would parrot him.
"Tt-th-ss."
"Tthhh-ss?" It still wasn't quite right but it was something close, or at least closer than the wrong pfikingr way that Uh strrrTT or St-t-t-t-t-t-kk say it when he sometimes sees them. He had almost forgotten the chill he felt hearing that voice in lieu of his surprise that not only was the sick wrong cold no warm pfikingr picking out what he was saying but that he was saying it in an almost dragon way.
He spoke again in the pfikingr way that he could hardly understand but he could pick out Toothless and drakkn in what he could only guess was a questioning sound, though it was hard to know because his tone was so hollow and soft.
The sick wrong pfikingr looked at him for a long moment that he soon figured was expectation, waiting for an answer, asking what he thought was the same thing again with something about Toothless and drakkn.
"Yssssh! Tt-th-ss, drakkn!" He struggled to continue, not knowing how to properly communicate the rest, but maybe this pfikingr could speak or understand proper dragon if he tried hard enough to get his message across?! Were there pfikingr that could speak proper dragon? He did not consider himself one but he was like pfikingr in body but dragon in soul so maybe there were others that were like him and could speak properly? Toothless safe together we us see together we us free go yes please maybe us together free?
Hiccup could not tell if he understood, concentrating hard to read his face and his eyes and anything that would tell him the pfikingr understood and would let them go and let him be back with his Toothless-love because they were two halves that were only one together and they couldn't be apart and he just needed the pfikingr to understand.
The human spoke to him again but other than hearing something of Toothless he could not figure out what the man had said, nor figure out from that tone that was still cold and detached as rock. His hopes dropped as the man turned away now, moving away, and Hiccup cried out a plaintive wail of protest like a wailing hatchling and yanked at the chains on his paws.
He was sure that the cold wrong pfikingr heard him, but did not respond, interacting again with his own kind briefly, probably talking in that wrong-speaking human tongue again. Hiccup huffed in irate frustration and paced for a while, watching the pfikingr go about doing their strange pfikingr things and forgetting his and his other half's presence, then settled for sitting on the ground and mulling over how he was going to make these stupid pfikingr understand.
Unlike before though, he held a small prick of hope that maybe things would not turn out too bad. So far the pfikingr had kept him and Toothless and other dragons he heard occasionally shifting or chattering to themselves alive and one of them could speak something that was almost like proper dragon speech, even if it was only Toothless' name. Maybe they didn't want to hurt or kill him. Maybe they expected him to do something for them, like Uh strrrTT had wanted him to make raiding dragons go away from Buh-rrrK, and he could bide his time for now until he could get his Toothless-half out.
He did not trust that the pfikingr wouldn't hurt them eventually, but he at least had a starting point to work with, with the strange cold wrong pfikingr that could talk kind-of like a dragon. Just maybe, he could teach him to talk the right way, just as Uh strrrTT had tried to play the game-of-sounds with him, and then Hiccup could outwit and convince him into letting them free.