Chapter 249

Hiccups POV:

It's been five days since Clavius' defeat and since then not much has happened other than the arrival of the king of Lincolnshire who arrived a day early, claiming that when you're the richest king in the world, you can arrive when you like. Unfortunately, when he arrived, Derek was off on a picnic with Odette to make up for missing their anniversary due to Clavius' lackey burning the fields. This led to me needing to help Rogers keep the king busy to avoid some major political issues between the two kingdoms and sadly this led to a whole lot of headaches for me and my family, starting with Hadasa. The reason for this is when he first arrived, Hadasa was in the fields that had been burned and was helping breath life back into the burned crops much to the joy of the farmers. When he got to the palace, he immediately began asking about her and how she was able to bring life to the burned crops but what made this annoying was he never gave us the chance to answer. By the time he finally quieted down, Hadasa had finished in the fields and walked into the room telling us that she was all done in the fields and that the farmers could look forward to a good harvest. Sadly, when she said this, she claimed her job was done which led the king to believe that the kingdom had hired her so he then began trying to hire her for his own kingdom on a permanent basis.

When we were finally able to explain to him that the kingdom didn't hire her and she only did it because I asked her to, his attention turned to me and he asked me how much I'd take in exchange for her services, going so far as to call her my servant. It took every ounce of will power not to punch him in the face since he thought Hadasa was simply a servant and when I explained to him that she was my wife he offered to hire me as an advisor to try and get her. Things only got worse when he met Astrid and Blanca since he took an interest in both of them after seeing Astrid's acrobatic skill, he figured she'd make for good entertainment while Blanca would make a good exotic servant to show off to the nobles. Rogers kept a hand on my shoulder to remind me to stay calm, but it was not easy to do so and then came his meeting with Toothless with him all but demanding a ride in the sky. I eventually took him up on Toothless just to shut the man up, but boy was that a mistake since he was screaming in fear at first and then in joy and it gave me a headache.

By the end, he was demanding that I sell him Toothless despite me telling him that Toothless was not for sale and it was then when we finally landed and made our way back into the castle, I am grateful to say that Derek and Odette had returned so he was their problem for the rest of the day and fortunately he was gone two days later. Sadly, those extra days he would not leave me alone, claiming everything had a price and as the wealthiest king, he would have no trouble affording the price for Toothless. For two days I had to endure this and if that wasn't bad enough, when I wasn't dealing with his demands for me to sell Toothless, it was his demands to move to his kingdom with my wives and serve him..

In order to avoid him the extra day that he was in the palace, I went to check out Clavius's base to make sure he was truly gone and ensure there was nothing left of the Forbidden Arts. After checking the volcano out, I found the lava had completely hardened and there was no trace of the Forbidden Arts or Clavius but there was one thing I found. The black longsword Clavius tried to kill me with had somehow been lodged into the upper wall of the volcano and survived somehow. Using the eye of the dragon, I found that there wasn't any form of magic left in it, leaving it a normal sword so I took it as a trophy from this little adventure. This didn't stop me from checking out the rest of the area though since I wouldn't have put it past Clavius to install a few hidden traps around the forest for intruders.

Besides that, I'd begun noticing some strange things going on with Chara and I wasn't the only one who'd noticed since the rest of the family had noticed as well and made their concerns known. I couldn't blame them for being worried since Chara was normally the first up in the mornings but now she's sleeping in and is drowsy during the day and what's more, her reflexes seem to be getting better. It wasn't that hard to figure out that she'd been hiding something from us which brings us to now, with me remaining in the shadows by Chara's bedroom door with the light of the moon shining through the windows since it was late in the evening. It was then the door leading to my little girls' room opened and Chara walked out, fully dressed for the day before she silently closed the door and rushed down the hall with me silently following.

We eventually made it into the garden where Chara lead me to the far side where the forest began and that's when much to my surprise, Wind was waiting for her. He then led her into the woods, and I kept close but as I walked, things began to make sense concerning her odd behavior as of late. We eventually ended up in a small clearing where Chara bowed to Wind who simply threw a kunai into a tree and then handed one to her which is when things began to add up but I couldn't be certain until after I'd seen it all so I got comfortable in a tree and watched.

2 hours later

It's been two hours since I followed Chara and Wind out here into the clearing and since we arrived, I'd been watching Wind train Chara to use kunai as not only ranged weapons but close combat weapons as well. From what I saw, she had incredible aim and speed which when mixed with the flexibility I didn't know she possessed, made this form of combat with short blades perfect for her. For now, though, I couldn't help but wonder why both her and Wind kept this a secret from not only me and my wives but Brant as well since Chara normally tells him everything. It was then when Chara had once again failed to imitate a move Wind had just demonstrated and fell over, that I decided to make my presence known and climbed down from the tree and approached them as Wind helped her up. I made my presence known by saying.

"You need to twist your right foot as you spin for your body for the kick sweetie." Their heads immediately turned to me as I crossed my arms. "Now would either of you care to explain as to what you're doing here so late in the evening." Chara looked down.

"Master Wind has been teaching me how to fight with his kunai daddy." I nodded.

"And how long have these lessons been going on?"

"Since our visit to Japan." I nodded.

"And why didn't you tell me, your mothers or Brant about it?" She looked down.

"I was scared." I kneeled down before her and gently tilted her head up.

"Now what were you scared of?"

"That you'd make me stop because I'm so small and then I'd be alone again." My eyes widened.

"Alone again?" She nodded. "When were you ever alone?"

"In Japan, when Brant was training, you were in town and all my mamas were busy."

"Is that Wind began teaching you?" She nodded. "But how would training help stop you from being alone?"

"I thought if I could get good enough, Brant would let me train with him." I sighed.

"Chara, I want you to stop keeping these things from me and your mothers in the future." She nodded. "Furthermore, these late-night lessons are coming to an end since you need your sleep." She looked down sadly. "From now on, your lessons will take place during the day alongside your brother." She looked up in surprise as I smiled. "I've been watching you for the last two hours and saw you've come a long way so I'm not going to stop you from training with Wind, since it's also around your age that young ninja begin their training and I want you to be able to defend yourself." She smiled in joy but then yawned making me chuckle and gently picked her up. "Now come on, let's get you to bed princess." She nodded as I began carrying her back to the castle while giving Wind a look that said, we needed to talk about this.

10 minutes later

Chara was now snuggled beneath the blankets of her bed, soundly sleeping again as she should be at this time of night instead of out in the forest being secretly trained by a ninja master. I quietly closed the door after checking on Chara once more and let out a sigh before turning to face Wind who was standing there and waiting for me. I turned to him and gave him a nod and walked towards the outside patio where we could talk without being interrupted and without disturbing anyone else's sleep. Getting there didn't take long and when we got there I looked out into the garden for a few moments and took a breath before I turned to Wind and asked.

"I take it, you didn't tell me at Chara's request?" He nodded making me sigh and ran a hand through my hair. "That girl and her fears." I then lowered my hand. "I'll have to discuss this with her in the morning but for now I'd like you to tell me how far she's come in training since the move you were having her try out was something that still falls under the basics." He nodded once more. "How far in the basics is she into." He did some gestures with his hands. "So, she's still going through the basics but she's coming along fast." He nodded before pulling out a kunai and made some more gestures. "You've been training her to use kunai as both ranged and melee weapons and she shows most promise when it comes to throwing them." He nodded. "Alright, keep up her training but don't push her too hard since I don't want her to come out of training with bruises, broken bones, torn muscles and tears streaming down her face." He nodded. "Also, allow the others to join in training her since I want both of my kids to expand their skill and combat arsenal if there's ever the need for them to fight." He nodded. "For now, though keep up her training and I recommend you keep out of the sight of my wives." He tilted his head. "When they find out you've been keeping their daughter out late at night when she should be in bed, they're not going to be the least bit happy with you." I saw him shiver in fear and I couldn't blame him. "Now if you'll excuse me, I believe it best I get back to bed myself." As soon as I said that, he vanished while I made my way in.

5 minutes later

I pushed the door to the bedroom where my wives were and found each of them sitting down on top of the bed waiting for me but the second they saw me I could tell they all were holding themselves back from pouncing on me with their questions about what I found out. I took a breath and made my way over to the right side of the room and took my gear off, one piece at a time before hanging each piece up on the stand that I set up earlier. As I did so I could feel the girl's eyes on me and knew they wanted answers so as I did so, I said.

"Turns out our little girl has been sneaking out late in the evening to meet with Wind for training." They all stared at me in shock as I took off my shirt before Astrid asked.

"Did you just say our sweet little Chara has been training under Wind late at night." I nodded.

"Turns out she was lonely when we were in Japan when we were all busy which is something Wind noticed and took her under his wing as a student." Blanca then asked.

"Why did she not tell us she was training?"

"Apparently she feared we'd stop her since she thought we believed her to be too young to train and hoped to get good enough to prove us wrong before allowing her to join her brother in training." Hadasa then said.

"She isn't pushing herself too hard, is she?" I shook my head.

"No, turns out she's still going through the basics and the reason she's so tired as of late is she's been sneaking out to train at night so none of us would find out but we've all seen the issues that's caused." They each nodded.

"So, the question is now, do we allow her to continue the training or have her wait till she's older?" I sighed and used a cloth in a basin to wash my face.

"I'm afraid I already told her she could continue training since she's already come pretty far in it and besides, she's around the age where kids need to be kept busy to keep them out of trouble and I feel learning how to defend herself is a good way to do it." Astrid then giggled making me turn to face her. "What's so funny?"

"Oh, I'm just thinking back to when you were her age and how you kept busy in the forge with your inventions like that sheep shearing machine you made." I rolled my eyes.

"Don't remind me, Gobber never forgave me for that." Hadasa then asked.

"What did it do to him?" I groaned and rubbed my head as Astrid answered.

"Well you know how he has that long moustache?" Hadasa nodded. "Well he used to have a matching beard until he tried to figure out how Hiccups invention worked." Blanca then asked.

"So, it was shaved off?" Astrid giggled.

"No, it got caught in one of the cranks when the machine got turned on and it ended up pulling the beard right off." Astrid dropped back laughing while the girls all laughed as I groaned and said.

"Please don't remind me of that, in addition to not letting me near the forge for a week, Gobber didn't talk to me for a month." They all just continued to giggle. "Alright, that's enough jokes about the past for now so let's get to bed since we've got to deal with some visiting nobles from Uberta and Odette's fathers kingdom." They nodded since we all knew we were going to need all our strength for tomorrow since none of us were looking forward to dealing with the nobles as no matter where we went, nobles were a pain.

Afternoon

I was sitting outside on the patio at a table with my wives, Toothless behind me and the kids on the lawn, training with the ninja and I am happy to say, Chara was looking better today than she did in the past few days. So far, I am happy to say the nobles had been focusing on Derek and Oddete so they hadn't been bothering me or the girls, but I think Toothless may be a part of the reason. Either way, I was grateful for it since it gave me some time to relax, enjoy some tea and just enjoy a bit of small talk with my wives while enjoying the peace of the day which is rare for me. Sadly, I couldn't fully enjoy the peace since most of the nobles had their attention on my kids who were being taught new moves by my ninja who were demonstrating the moves of their clans for children their age.

It wasn't that hard to figure out that the majority of this group were hoping to see how skilled my ninja were and if they thought they were good enough; they'd probably try and hire them away from me. I wasn't worried about them though since my ninja were loyal to me and if the nobles tried to approach them, then they'd disappear into the shadows to avoid them. It was the other nobles who really had me worried since instead of looking at the ninja, they had their eyes on my kids and I couldn't blame them since Brant had the makings of a fine warrior while Chara who was still young, would no doubt be a beauty when she grew up. The nobles were probably figuring out if Brant would make a good guard for their homes or families while others were wondering if Chara should be set up with one of their own kids. Either of these arrangements would prove beneficial to them since in addition to gaining the strength of my children, they'd probably use it as a way to get into my good graces and use it to their advantage. It was then I was brought out of my thoughts by Derek with his bow in hand walking up to me saying.

"Hey Hiccup, care to join me and Brom in a little fun?" I smiled and sipped my tea.

"You mean shooting the servants with powder arrows?" He nodded.

"You and I still need to break that never-ending tie we seem to have at the end of each game." I smiled and stood up.

"Let's do it." I stood up and made my way over to him before he led me onto the grass where Rogers and Bromley were waiting, bows in hand before Rogers said.

"Your usual color of red Hiccup?" I nodded.

"You know me too well Rogers." He simply smiled and handed me the bow he was holding, followed by a quiver of red powdered arrows before he blindfolded each of us and it was then the game began for me thanks to my ninja training allowing me to see where the servants were through the sound they made.

1 hour later

It's been an hour since our first game begun and since then we'd gone through multiple matches with everyone ending the same way, me and Derek tied while Brom scoring nothing unless you count one of the visiting nobles. After that Brom had to leave the game as the woman was not happy having her afternoon tea interrupted by an arrow being shot right into her bottom. My family had a good laugh at that since it was a funny sight to see a fully grown man, running from a woman in large dress with a sky-blue patch on her bottom.

Now I was leaning on the railing of the patio and watching Brant try to perform a complex combat move with a wooden staff for the sixth time under the teachings of Fire while Wind was teaching her a move to quickly restrain an enemy while using two kunai. It wasn't that hard to tell that my son preferred long pole weapons to swords, axes and bludgeons while his sister clearly showed great potential when it came to ranged attacks and duel wielding short blades like knives. I figure I'd have to forge Brant a weapon that could be collapsed, making the pole shorter and easier to carry while making Chara a pair to see if she could be trained to use them as her main weapon in the future and possibly a belt to hold her own kunai. It was then Derek walked up next to me and said.

"I have to say Hiccup, in the time I've known you, I've never seen you look at something with such a look of pride in your eyes." I shrugged.

"I've taken on monsters, bandits, sorcerers, demons and even a god at one time along with a titan who had the ability to control time." (AN: Chapters 180 and 103 guys.) "I've always taken a great deal of pride in those accomplishments but I always feel the most pride whenever I look at how far those two have come from the quivering and scared children who I found in the storage hold of a slave ship." I could feel Derek stair at me.

"I'm sorry but did you just say, the storage holds of a slave ship?" I nodded before I realized what he asked and turned to him.

"Oh, that's right, I never told you how I came to adopt them did I?" He shook his head. "Well the short version of the story is I was visiting my aunt and uncle while a group of slavers, pretending to be performers were on the island." I turned back to the kids. "After they exposed their true colors by using tossing a collection of herbs in a bag into a fire and releasing a smoke that knocked the villagers out, I had to deal with them but only after I saved the villagers." Derek nodded.

"But where do Brant and Chara come in?"

"Well shortly after I took the slavers down and had them locked up in the village dungeon, I sent a few automatons to check out the ships." I looked down sadly. "That's when I found them in a tight storage hold and as I later found out, their parents tried to take over the ship and were killed for it before their bodies were thrown overboard." I sighed. "They were traumatized by that but me and the girls have done our best to help heal them from that experience."

"Well I'd say you've done a pretty good job since I can't even tell they have any problems emotionally." I shook my head and pointed at Brant.

"Look at Brant and what do you see him doing right now?" Derek looked at my son trying to pull off some complex moves with the staff.

"I see him training hard with that staff he was given."

"He's pushing himself to his limits because of that day his parents were taken from him, he told me he never wants to feel that weak again." I sighed. "I worry that one day his bodies going to give up on him which is why I felt this vacation would be a good chance for him to take a break but here he is, training again." Derek placed a hand on my shoulder.

"Maybe it's best if you and your family leave the castle tomorrow afternoon and go have a relaxing family day out, maybe enjoy a picnic or family flight on the dragons." I smiled.

"Maybe that's exactly what Brant needs to take his mind off training hard and becoming stronger."

"Then I'll tell you some of the best places in the kingdom to enjoy a day out." I smiled.

"Thanks Derek, to be honest with you I think I also need a day to unwind and forget about all my problems so I can just enjoy a quiet day with those I love." I then turned my attention back to Brant and Chara just as Chara began cheering when she finally hit the target with a kunai. "For now though, it's best to let them finish their training for the day or they'll want to try and make up for it tomorrow." With that said, I returned to the afternoon tea, but I kept an eye on the kids to make sure they didn't overdo it with their training.

4 days later

It's been four days since Derek, and I enjoyed our match in the castle gardens and since he advised me to take the family on a relaxing day out to ourselves and since then, we've gone out to enjoy ourselves every day. The day after I spoke with Derek, we spent our day in a flower covered meadow with a cliff that overlooked the castle and the lake to provide us with an incredible view to enjoy. This picnic was spent with Hadasa using her powers to manipulate the flowers, making them move around with Chara and Brant playing among them with Twilight and Astrid while I lay down on the blanket, head in Blanca's lap as I watched. We spent the entire day in the meadow having a good relaxing with me being able to forget about my worries while the kids were able to take some time off from their training.

The following day was spent with all of us spending some time in the forests, exploring the various trees and collecting old discarded traps that I figure I could either sell or dismantle for parts. We ended up finding a few traps that were most likely left by Clavius's minion and a few that were a few years old and had degraded over time to the point that I had to scrap them just to stop them from harming others. It was from this trip that we learnt there wasn't that much wildlife calling the forest home other than some bird species, mice, raccoon and the occasional lone wolf and deer.

Yesterday was spent exploring the nearby village and enjoying a combing of the local market for anything that would catch our eye even though my hopes weren't high since it was still a small village. Still though, it had a nice little book shop where I was able to pick up some books that I felt would be an excellent additions to my library while also stopping at the local farmers market to pick up some of seeds for the local spices for the crop garden. Other than that, we spent a little time just enjoying the beauty that only small villages could possess since it had its own unique charm that I was able to enjoy while watching the kids play with the locals. I had to admit that it had truly been a wonderful three days together with my family and like all our time together, were memories I'd always treasure within my mind and my heart.

Now the fourth day had arrived and with it comes the end of our vacation with us standing in the garden with the royals, Roger, Bridget and Brom. We'd just finished most of our goodbyes and now I was saying goodbye to Derek who said.

"Although I treasure our friendship and can never thank you enough for all your help, I hope the next time we see each other is a long way away since you only seem to show up when there's trouble." I chuckled.

"Yeah, it's a curse I seem to have." He chuckled before Odette said.

"Well hopefully next time you come, you and your family shall be able to enjoy a peaceful trip without any fighting outside of simple duels, sparring, training and archery practice." We all nodded and with that said we gave our last goodbyes and took off through the portal door.

Nightfall

Night had fallen over my island and now I was laying in bed with my wives who were silently sleeping in their usual places with Astrid and Blanca at my sides and Hadasa on top of me. As usual sleep didn't come as easy to me since I always had a hard time falling asleep without going over the events of the day first and thinking about what could be done to make some parts easier. So, as I lay down there listening to the silent breathing of my wives and thought back to how my day had spent my day after we returned home. After we got home, I had the kids go and unpack their bags in their rooms with my wives going to do the same while Toothless went towards the stables with Twilight to let the dragons know he was back and to spread word to the others around the island as I went to handle my own jobs.

I started off by going to the trophy room and hanging the black great sword I got from my battle with Clavius on the wall where it will remain to remind me of my battle. Following this I dropped off the seeds in storage to be planted tomorrow while the books were placed on a table in the library and then left to let everyone on the island know we were back. As expected, by the end I was covered in the saliva from multiple of the islands inhabitants who were all too happy to have me back on the island. Following this we all went to Berk to let the people know we were back from our vacation and as anyone could expect, we were pelted with questions and asked to show what happened using my golden spider the second a sorcerer was brought up.

After reviewing these memories I figured it would help if I built an automaton to handle things in the library with the ability to no only sort the new books and put them away but also help find ones that were needed since the shelves were filling up fast and it would become hard to find the needed book. I also figured it best to enjoy a little down time here on my island and maybe get back to some of my old hobbies like exploring other islands, looting old shipwrecks and other things. One thing I knew I definitely had to do was spend some time in the forge to make new magical weapons since it seemed like such a waste to have all that empty space in that large storage room for them. For now though, I was happy to just stay here in bed in the loving embrace of my wives and forget about my worries as the sweet embrace of sleep claimed me.

AN: And that brings an end to another chapter but I have to say I'm a little disappointed that the last one only got two reviews so here's hoping that this one gets a few more. Anyway, I'm trying out a new pattern of one action chapter followed by a few peaceful chapters but peaceful ideas are something I'm low on so if you have any ideas for them, please let me know through a PM. Now stay safe, review kindly and have a nice day.