The man was followed closely behind by Stoick, Gobber and Spitelout, though they were wary of his dragon posted outside the door.

The night fury nuzzled at the man's chest at seeing his safe return, and the Vikings looked confused at this evident display of affection from a *dragon*. They had only ever known them as savage, mindless beasts.

More and more people started returning as word spread around, now not caring about the incessant rain. They all wanted to see the mysterious dragon tamer and the legendary night fury.

Astrid stomps up towards him, glaring at the floor the whole while. The whole village turns to look at what will ensue, and with it being Astrid, it was probably going to be violent. Vikings love violence.

About 17 paces from him Astrid unsheathes her axe, but doesn't stop walking. When she was just less than 5 meters away she stops and throws her axe...

Directly into the ground in between the man's feet. He chuckles nervously, "Ah, uhm, it appears I have incurred this Valkyries' wrath".

Astrid stood in front of him, staring at his feet, soundless.

"At least ya din't make tha mistake of callin' her a child or a littl'n", Gobber laughed, "As then yer'd find yerself without yer head".

Stoick elbowed Gobber out of the way and crouched in front of Astrid, putting his hand on her shoulder, "Anything you want to say to him lass?"

Astrid's mind whirled with everything she wanted to say in that moment but opted just with a simple, quiet "No". She stepped forwards, yanked her axe out if the ground and turned on her heel, stomping through the rain back towards her hut.

But she stopped when she heard Stoick address everyone who had gathered, "And everyone please welcome our new ally, our solution to a problem a thousand generations old, the dragon master!"

"Oooh, dragon master" Tuff contemplated, "Good name, right amount of mystery yet concise enough to roll off the tongue".

'Oh shut up Tuff', Astrid thought, and turned away back to her house.

When she got there she threw herself on her bed and lay there with her head buried in her pillows. She grumbled, trying to figure out why she was so determined to be angry with him.

Not even twenty minutes later, there was a knock on her door. Her parents still being out, she grumpily made her way to her door and swung it open with force.

She had a double take at the man standing in her doorway. The dragon master. He asked for entrance to her house out of the downpour, she huffed, but stepped aside to let him through to the living area.

She slumped in a chair and asked grumpily, "Well then, what do you want?"

Seeming slightly taken aback by her disgruntled manner, he answered "Uh, sorry, uhm Astrid is it? I just wondered if I have inadvertently done anything to deserve your hostility".

Astrid huffed and answered simply, "Yes".

Seeing she clearly wasn't in the mood to elaborate, he moved to leave. But then Astrid spoke up, "You remind me of somebody I used to know. Someone I lost".

He seemed to stiffen slightly, but quickly relaxed, nodded and left back into the blustery weather.

He was met on his walk by Stoick, who came to offer him accommodation for the night. "I'm sure we have a place that could house you and your dragon, though are you sure you wouldn't want it in the stables?"

"*He* wouldn't like it as much in the stables, he prefers the warmth of a house and when possible a bed".

"Yes yes, of course. Well I think we have one next to the Hofferson's house. Though I've heard Ingrid's snores are like small earthquakes. How anyone catches a wink o' sleep in that house is beyond me" Stoick laughed.

"I'm sure it'll be fine" he assured him while his head unhelpfully added, 'Oooh, we'll be neighbours with Astrid'. Trying to take his mind off of Astrid, he whistled for his dragon.

A slightly darker patch of shadow detached itself from a nearby roof and glided down next to the two men.

"Hey there Toothless! Have a nice nap eh bud?" he asked the night fury and got a groggy grumble in reply.

"Toothless?" Stoick asked, bemused.

The dragon master chuckled, "Show him bud". To which the night fury opened his jaws wide.

But to Stoick's ever growing confusion, the night fury had a full row of sharp, shining teeth.

"Aw come on, not playing fair today are we?" The dragon master reprimanded, "Go on, show him".

Toothless let out a disgruntled warble and sniffed, but then proceeded to retract his teeth into his gums.

"THOR ALMIGHTY!" Stoick yelled, as Toothless warbled in mirth. The dragon master also was laughing at the chief's reaction, and soon enough, Stoick too was chuckling. "Well, I never thought I'd be lookin' down the throat o' a night fury and it not bein' the last thing I see, let alone see som'in' like that. Well son, want to see your new home?"

The dragon master unbeknownst to Stoick tensed slightly at that, but answered "Yeah sure, lead the way Chief". Stoick smiling through his beard at the respect his title was getting even though the man had a literal *dragon*!

He followed slightly behind Stoick to his new home, and he could feel a watchful pair of eyes staring at him. He looked around to find the source, and located it in a window of the Hofferson's house. He saw a head of blond hair duck out of sight and he chuckled inwardly to himself 'Why is she watching me? Guess she doesn't trust me enough yet".

Up from behind the window Astrid was also trying to reason why she was staring at him, 'Well, what if he turned traitor and started destroying the village? He needs someone to make sure he doesn't do anything wrong. That's it, yes. I'm just making sure he doesn't do anything wrong' she thought, reassuring herself of her intentions of her actions. By the time she'd looked back through the window, he had already disappeared from sight into the house.

Toothless was running around madly inside the house, jumping through the rafters and knocking over everything. The chief watched as the dragon master ran around, picking up everything off the floor. Stoick chuckled good naturedly and watched as Toothless found a patch of floor to his liking and settled down, but still keeping a watchful eye on the burly chieftain.

The other man sat down wearily and looked over at Stoick.

"Yes, I think this place is great, thank you. And Toothless seems to like it" he said gesturing towards the mess still left over from Toothless' frolicking.

Stoick chuckled then said, "Well I hope this is a good enough thank you lad. And uh, may I ask you, how did you befriend that dragon of yours?"

"Uhm, well." The dragon master laughed nervously "The dragons took me to one of their nests and treated me as one of their own. And Toothless here had been shot by a ballista, so I made him a new tail fin." Gesturing towards Toothless' bright carmine red replacement fin.

Stoick sensed his nervousness but he asked, "So were you alone with the dragons at that nest?"

"Not exactly no", came the reply, followed by a short, awkward silence. Stoick could tell he wasn't going to get any more information from him tonight, so decided to let him rest and to bid him farewell.

"Well, I'm goin' to retire to my own house now, so I hope you'll have a pleasant night".

"Yes of course, see you in the morning Chief", The man stood with Stoick and walked to the door and held it for the chief.

Stoick bowed his head and walked out into the night, a swiftly retreating shadowy outline.

Astrid sat in her window, staring at the house adjacent. She saw, in a curtain, the dark silhouette of the dragon master sit down down in a chair. Then she saw him reach up to his head with shadowy hands and remove his helmet. The shadow cast onto the curtain wasn't clear enough for her to see anything clearly, but his fairly tousled and somewhat unkempt hair could be made out.

Shortly after, the large outline of his dragon jumped on him and Astrid watched in amusement as the dragon master had his face thoroughly cleaned.

She turned back into her room and ambled over to her bed, lying down. She looked up at the wall her bed was pressed against, and affectionately admired the drawings pinned up there. She sat up on her bed, pulled one of the daggers out of the wall holding a piece of paper in place and tenderly held the drawing.

It was a drawing of her, the one she had picked up off of the floor in the smithy when she had gone to get her axe sharpened. One of Hiccup's drawings. She sniffed, holding back a wave of emotions, feeling tears start to form in her eyes. 'No use getting sentimental over a drawing' she told herself but she knew that it was pointless. Those drawings were precious to her, Hiccup, her cute, scrawny, nerdy crush, had drawn them; now that he was gone, they were practically all she had left of him.

A sudden crash snapped her out of her sorrowful reverie; and she carefully placed the picture on her bed and rushed over to her window again. She looked for the source of the noise and saw that the neighbouring house had a hole where the window and some surrounding wood should have been. The dragon masters new house. There was a wooden support log lying half out of the hole, sticking through the wall.

Through the hole Astrid could see the night fury, looking apologetically for something he'd done. Astrid looked to where the dragon was facing and gasped inwardly.

The back of the dragon master's head was facing her and Astrid noticed his somewhat scraggly auburn hair was very similar to how Hiccups had looked. But then he turned around to survey the damage done, and both he and Astrid froze.