I am so sorry for the mishap last time. I mostly don't check in on my story except in word so I didn't notice it. I put it in my scedule now to check in on it on sunday and if there are still these big errors later, please give me a notice about it. Without the reviews I probably wouldn't have seen it at all.

Chapter 10

"So, how does this work?" Heather now sat on Windshear for the first time since her rescue from Outcast Island.

"Well, since you already rode her once, the trust between you is already there." Hiccup began, standing besides Toothless. Having teached the nearly all of the Bog-Burglar population, this already became more like a routine than challenge. "First, you could try to let her walk around, so you know to have a steady seat." He offered.

Heather followed his advice and made a few rounds around her trainer and his Night Fury. Seeing as this was going well, he decided to advance to the next step. Hiccup raised his voice a bit. "Now try to stop Windshear with a simple sign." He said, not giving her any more help to figure out how much of a natural she was.

Heather put her hand on the silver-scaly neck of the Razorwhip, and she promptly halted, remembering to consider her rider not falling off. With this Hiccup was clear Heather could learn this all incredibly fast.

"Based off that and how fast Astrid managed to do it, we could start with flying right now, of course only if you want to." He explained to her, recalling when Astrid had learned flying, already being able to give simple commands like directions and speed after the first few hours of learning.

Heather gave a proud smirk, knowing Hiccup only for a few days, but understanding that a comparison to Astrid is a lot of praise. She circled back to his offer. "Why shouldn't we start with the flying? That's the best part." She exclaimed, hoping Hiccup understood this feeling even after so long of already flying.

"If you say so." He shrugged in response. "For the beginning, establish some sort of sign, for taking off and landing. For example, me and Toothless have the whole prosthetic tail thing, so when I want to take off, he knows by the switch in the tailfin." Hiccup explained to give show what he meant with it. Of course Windshear didn't need a prosthetic, but it helped more than letting her have a go at it with no knowledge at all.

After some consideration, she made her symbol and Windshear took off. "Okay. Now for the landing." She said to herself, trying to get her nerves under control. With another repetition of her previous sign, Windshear took the few feet she was over the ground and steadily reduced them until they were on solid ground again.

Hiccup clapped from where he observed. "Good. Now we repeat that for a few times until you are stable in the air and getting used to the feeling." He said and Heather followed his advice, repeating takeoff and landing.

Now being in the air for a few minutes at a time without getting nervous or self-conscious about literally flying, Heather thought to take it further. "I think we can go to the actual flying part."

"Do you have an idea of how to turn?" Hiccup asked and received a shake from Heathers head. "Do you still remember when you flown here on Windshear?" He continued and this time got a nod. That made it easier. "When we made turns or flew up or down, did you notice anything from Windshear?"

"Not really." Hiccup groaned a bit, unfortunately being noticed by Heather. "I'm sorry I didn't notice everything. I was a bit busy freaking out that I was actually flying on a Dragon and gone from that Thor forsaken prison."

Hiccup looked at her, a bit amused, hearing things he would most definitely say in that situation. He quickly turned back to serious. "It's okay, most people never even rode a Dragon before I teach them, so used to teaching it." He walked over to them, making sure Windshear didn't think he would harm her. In the last days, a lot of people made unfortunate encounters when coming close to the Dragon or her Rider. "Windshear, can you help me out here?"

With that, Heather got another question. While patting her neck to make sure Windshear knew Hiccup wanted to help, Heather turned to him. "How do they understand us?" She asked, often thinking that when talking to Windshear at the prison and getting comforting, happy or angry noises form the Dragon, mostly fitting to the monologue.

"I don't know, probably like me," He said, which didn't went unnoticed by Heather, but she wanted to her the explanation. "They connected different body gestures, volume of words and maybe even something with our smell to words and over time, learned to understand our language." He set a reminder to ask Toothless when bettering his Dragonese. "For now, the thing about feeling something while flying, I meant the muscles. Being right on the Dragons back gives us an easy place to feel when said muscles stretch and contract." He explained. "Windshear, could you please?" He petted the Dragons neck to show friendliness.

Understanding Hiccups request, Windshear opened her wings under Heather. With the rise of scales under her, Heather understood what he meant and felt something inside the Dragon move. When giving the sign to get into the air, the muscles moved with every motion and Heather felt it, even before they ascended.

"You felt it know?" Hiccup asked, standing at the ground with Toothless coming up to him. She once again nodded her head. Hiccup jumped on Toothless and in nearly a second, they flew beside her. "Great. That is essentially how you can steer." He explained, but got a look, more confused than before. "Just like you felt Windshear, Windshear can feel you and so by moving your body, you can indicate where you want." He explained.

…

One or two hours later, Hiccup broke up the lesson, still having to deal with building the forge. Heather learned quickly, already pulling of turns, dives and ascending with relative ease.

"How was it with Heather?" Astrid asked him when she came to help him with his project.

Hiccup turned around to see her arriving from the sky, a normal sight for the village, which would be a fright for anyone else. "Pretty good." He answered her question once she landed. "Windshear is really gentle with her and she is nearly as much as a natural as you are." He said, returning to his work of hammering nails in the wooden planks.

"You say that like I was some prodigy." She answered to his very obvious praise. "I merely let Stormfly fly and focused on not falling off. Besides, I would have never learnt so fast without someone to teach me who, might I say, found all that out on his own."

"And now you're overrate me. You know damn well how my first flights were. Every time I improved something, another thing failed. On my first flight, I nearly died, twice." He recalled, falling off of Toothless multiple times, once hundred of feet in the air, and crashing against things, luckily not the sea stack maze he went through.

This went on and on, both either giving each other compliments or well-meant insults. Toothless and Stormfly looked at the two humans, working and talking with each other, coincidentally having the same thought. 'How are they not mates yet?'

After some more contribution towards the forge, Hiccup thought maybe two or three more days until the forging area was finished, then about four days for his personal room, to store plans and prototypes, both went into the forest to continue, or rather begin, with their training session.

"So, what do you know about fighting?" She asked as Hiccup sat down and she began her daily work-out routine.

"Not really anything." He answered, unfortunately truthful. "Stoick never had any time and nobody else wanted to teach me. Gobber tried once when I began to work in the forge, but gave up when he saw I didn't have the strength to really do anything." He explained, trying to sweeten up his lack of pretty much any knowledge.

"Okay." She said to herself, thinking where to start. "For the Beginning, fights don't always depend on strength. I'm about as lithe as you, but that doesn't mean I couldn't beat up every one on this Island." She said, proud while throwing her axe in a near tree root as if it had insulted her uncle, making her statement sound more believable.

"That much was clear." He snorted but quickly shut up from a glance Astrid shot towards him. "Before we start talking about techniques, shouldn't we think about what weapon I should use. As much as forging is my hoppy, I don't want to make so many different weapons that aren't gonna be used."

Astrid gave him a smile. "Exactly. With weapons it's like with Dragons. Different sort of Dragons fit different people, as is it with weapons. As an example, Hammers are for people like Stoick or Snotlout who mostly take problems head on and try to outfight them." She explained and retrieved her axe before also sitting against a rock near Hiccup, but not forgetting to stay focused on the lesson unlike yesterday.

Hiccup nodded with the Information and looked at the waterfall, giving smoothing Background voice. If Astrid wouldn't be talking to him, staying awake could prove to be a challenge.

"With your demeanor, an Axe also wouldn't be the best." She rambled on. Hiccup would use weapons to defend himself or others and Axes are more offensive. "I would say something one-handed with a shield, but that could wear you down, which takes one of your few advantages over bigger opponents."

Hiccup turned, looking at Astrid as she talked about weapons and how good they could fit, sometimes taking short pauses to consider some more. "How would a sword be?" He piped in on the monologue. "I think it fits best, offensive as well as defensive, not that big, but enough to deal with things in other ways than sneak attack and more of a brains weapon rather than brawns.

She gave him a surprised glance at first, not expecting him to come up with a fit himself, but scolded herself. This was Hiccup she was talking about. If he could help in any way, especially when it came to think of something, nobody could or should stop him.

"You're right." She eventually settled on. "Now, let me have a look at that wound." She said, attempting to make her voice sound indifferent and failing at that. No matter how much she tried to hide it, with no one else around for weeks and living in the same house as him for nearly two months now, she grew more attached to him, even more than she did before, and seeing that wound sparked a fear she only felt when looking for him or when her parents told her about the untimely demise of her uncle.

Hiccup did as told, not understanding why so and having completely missed the bit of worry in Astrid's voice. As she examined the wound, healing at a good pace, regardless of his disregard of any rest, except sleeping in the Nights, he grew more and more curios.

"Why exactly did you have to look at that?" He asked after pulling his shirt down again, blushing slightly as he realized Astrid just seen him partly exposed.

She took her spot beside him again and watched him, as he started to make images in the sand, mirroring some of the flowers or the waterfall. "Despite strength not being the most important trait for us." She came back to his question. "It's still needed in a fight and I don't know how good your stamina is, so I based it on your health if we start with a bit of training before you get your weapon ready." She explained.

"Okay." Hiccup muttered, trying to get a small curve of the picture he was currently engraving into the ground. When that worked, he pulled his attention back towards their conversation, but not stopping to draw. "So what does Milady think of my predicament."

"With how everything is going, we could start tomorrow with stamina training and the day after with the rest." She voiced her opinion, in no way could she be considered a healer and rarely had she attained any injury from Dragon raids, so she more or less hoped he would be fine.

Hiccup finished his sketches, a replica of the cove they were in, filled with little but detailed dots as the flowers, the waterfall, seemingly coming out of nowhere and even the roots casting a shadow quite like they were now with the sun already being on the descent.

"With that and the weapon thing settled, is there anything else you want to do or should we quit for today?" With how everything has been going these last few days, he never had any early sleep and dozing in the living room meant, when Astrid awoke, so would he.

Astrid pondered about her answer for a short time before answering. "I suppose we can make a stop here." She said and stood up, helping Hiccup stand up too, who managed not to step on the scribbles, despite them being right in front of him.

…

A walk through the slowly familiar path and a quick dinner, finally not consisting of fish and even more fish after their trip to the markets, both Hiccup and Astrid went to bed, a bit early for their usual schedule, but both needed the rest.

"How was it?" He heard the rumble from behind him, shaking his body as he still slept against Toothless' side.

Hiccup gave a smile. As much as he loved spending time with Astrid, nothing in this world could beat the choice of befriending Toothless and he tried to take not one second of his presence for granted.

"Good." He gave a simple answer, but considering he spent enough time with the Dragon to understand him, Toothless could probably understand his emotions with a single glance.

Like expected, Toothless uncanny ability to understand his human better than anyone else did not disappoint. "How come you this happy?" He warbled, thinking that, with how much happy hormones came off his friend he wouldn't even need his superior smell to notice it.

"With everything how everything's going, why wouldn't I be?" He asked his Dragon. Toothless gave a questioning warble. He changed his voice to a whisper, feeling the sleep take over him with every passing moment and knowing Toothless understood him perfectly fine. "I can understand you better every day, Astrid and I spent even more time together and, in a few days, she'll actually spar with me, the forge is nearly up and running and we have a whole Island full of people who don't resent us for who we are. Don't you think it's going great bud?"

Toothless turned his head a bit to have a look at Hiccup and mirrored his expression. "You're right."

With that, both drifted off to sleep, having wide smiles on their faces and still held those for a long time, even being found by Heather in that state, who wanted to talk to him but couldn't find it in herself to wake him up.

"Tomorrow then." She mumbled to herself

…

The next morning, Hiccup found himself waking up to a fully lighted house, the sun already long gone over the horizon. "Good morning sleepyhead." Astrid looked over to him at having heard Hiccup sitting up and yawning. "Morning Toothless." She added. Ever since learning to talk to Dragons, both included them in normal things like these.

"Morning" Both answered in unison, also stretching like they were one being.

Astrid shook her head at the two acting like twins living together their entire life. Maybe not exactly like that considering Ruffnut and Tuffnut's antics. "Heather came to me earlier. Said she wanted to talk about something while training"

Hiccup was surprised at the sudden message, but knew this is how Astrid does anything. Straightforward and to the point. "I can deal with that later. Have you already eaten?" He asked and she nodded before gesturing towards the portion she left for Hiccup. "Thanks."

He got a bag of fish for Toothless before digging in himself. He wondered what Heather could be thinking about, but before going to their lessons he had another thing to do. The only downside of being the Chief of an Island full with Dragons and humans is the chief part.

"I'm off then. See you at the forge.". Astrid nodded in response, having stayed while he ate for a conversation with Stormfly.

A short morning flight to wake up and organize his thoughts for the day and Hiccup found himself asking around if Cami has been spotted somewhere.

"Hey Frida, do you know where Cami's been off to?" He asked their friend. Practically every minute Cami did not spent annoying somebody she went around with Frida, tending to their Dragons or having a pleasant conversation.

She looked up at him in surprise. "No, why? Has something happened to her?" Frida asked worried for her best friend.

Hiccup gave himself a mental slap for bringing this up in the first place. "Not that I know of, but I wanted to talk to her about something and nobody has seen her for the last few hours.".

At this, the Bog-Burglar visibly relaxed and instantly burst out laughing.

"Okay, what is happening?" Hiccup asked himself, not sure if he should be worried for Frida if she has gotten insane or happy she isn't worrying.

"I don't think you have to search for very long." She pointed behind him and Hiccup turned around to see Cami roaming around, a smile on her face followed by a purple Nadder Hiccup could remember perfectly.

"Where have you been off to?" He sprinted over, a bored Toothless trudging behind him. "And Hello again big girl." He directed towards the Dragon.

"Missed you." The Nadder chirped happily at seeing her savior. "This human so nice to me. Wants to be friends."

Hiccup smiled at being remembered by the Dragon. "Missed you too. I'm glad you found a friend." He spoke to her while patting the Nadder's snout. "I wanted to talk to you about your Dragon problem, but I see you managed that just fine." He turned to the girl.

"Yeah, I found her in the forest while- Wait a minute. Did you understand what she said?" She asked, realizing he answered to the Dragon's sounds like it was an actual sentence.

Hiccup stiffened at her question, until now, nobody knew he could talk to Dragons except Astrid who is learning to herself. He figured lying to Cami is way worse than anything that could result in speaking the truth. "Yeah. I began to understand Toothless when we left to search for some Dragons. At first it was singular words and since then I gradually became better. I can understand Dragonese so good, each sentence only misses about two or three words." He explained to her. At Cami's mischievous grin, Hiccup knew this could be a mistake. "Please don't advertise this me as a translator."

As much fun teasing or annoying Hiccup was, Cami knew he had enough on his plate and she wasn't cruel, so after a second of letting all that sink in, she got back to explaining how she stumbled on the newly named Deadstriker.

"Okay. So first thing of my bucket list done. Now we have training Heather, building the forge and some stamina training." He counted off the things on his fingers. "And of course help if anybody needs me.". That was always the thing he had to account for in the back of his mind. Despite the forge being one of his favorite hobbies and training with Astrid in the cove relaxing, as Chief, the village goes first and with how It's going, he wouldn't have it any other way.

"I can train Heather. After you and Astrid, I am the best flyer and you already have done so much in the last days." She offered. Cami herself didn't know why, but helping Hiccup felt like the right thing to do.

Hiccup was surprised and grateful for the offer. "Thanks, but she said she wanted to discuss something with me while training, so I'll have to decline."