Life with the Night Furies
A/N
This isn't a new installment in the "Lightning and Death Itself" timeline. It's just a few scenes from daily life in Berk, shortly after the end of "Dragons Against Drago." I'm posting it to reassure this story's many fans that I haven't abandoned the tale. I have some definite ideas for the next expansion (tentatively titled "Hail to the Chief"), but nothing solid enough to write about... yet. In the meantime, enjoy the vignettes.
o
Chief-night-fury faced his first test less than twelve hours after being anointed as the chief of all intelligent beings on the island of Berk. Two burly shepherds approached the Nest as the sun began to rise, angrily shouting and gesturing at each other. Night-fury-mother-of-twins was the first to wake up, quickly followed by Thing One and Thing Two. They glared down at the shepherds from their second-floor sleeping space. Night Furies, like all dragons, love their sleep and don't like having it taken away from them without a good reason.
"Hey, up there!" one of the men shouted. "Chief dragon! You need to straighten this idiot out and give me back my sheep!"
"Me? You need to straighten him out and get his sheep out of my pasture!" the other one yelled. The first one began a heated reply when Astrid silenced them both with a sharp snarl. The shepherds were accustomed to seeing dragons in their village, but they still had a healthy respect for the huge creatures; they stood stock-still and silent.
Astrid turned to her drowsy mate and tapped him with her tail. "Wake up, Chief-night-fury! You're a wanted dragon."
Hiccup groaned and stretched. "Couldn't they wait until after breakfast?"
"Apparently not," she replied. "It's time to start earning your big fat wages as the village chief."
"Big fat wages," he grumbled. "Yeah, right! I eat the same fish as before, I sleep on the same rock as before... what can a Viking village offer a dragon anyway?" He jumped off the platform, glided in a tight circle, and landed at the base of the Nest. The ground there had been scraped free of rocks and vegetation, so it was suitable for dragons to write runes in the dirt.
WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?
Both shepherds began talking at once. Hiccup had to do what Astrid had done, and startle them into silence with a quick snarl.
YOU FIRST
He gestured with his head at the one on the left. That one took a breath to steady himself – he wasn't used to tribal chiefs snarling at him – and began. "Our flocks got mixed up during the night. When we got to the pastures this morning, we found them all mixed together in his pasture land. I want to claim what's mine and go, but he won't let me. He says I'll take the best sheep for myself."
Hiccup turned to face the other shepherd, who had been holding himself back, waiting for his turn. "Every one of my sheep is in my pasture land, along with all of his animals. My sheep are fleecy and well-fed; his sheep are scrawny and weak. I don't want him taking my good animals and leaving me with the dregs of the flock."
"My sheep are scrawny?!" the first one exploded. "Your sickly flock wouldn't make enough wool for one pair of mittens!"
The first was about to reply heatedly when Hiccup stamped his forefoot to cut him off. He realized that if he had to snarl every time he needed someone's attention, he'd be hoarse before the day was done.
CAN'T YOU CALL YOUR OWN SHEEP?
The second one hung his head. "My sheep are idiots. They'll answer any shepherd's call."
"Same here," the first one admitted.
DIDN'T YOU MARK THEM?
"They got all kinds of rainbow markings for the last dragon race," said the first one. "Now they're all very colorful, but we can't find our own markings anymore."
SO WE HAVE TWO IDENTICAL FLOCKS
THAT ARE MIXED TOGETHER?
Both shepherds nodded. The Night Fury grunted in frustration. He was accustomed to dealing with problems as the dragons' Alpha, but for some reason, he'd thought humans would be more rational and easy to deal with than dragons. He should have known better; his past as a human had given him plenty of proof that humans can be the most irrational beings on the planet. Well, maybe it was time to stop trying to act like a human chief, and stick with what he knew best – being a dragon.
SHOW ME YOUR FLOCKS
They led him to a good-sized pasture on the east side of the town. About fifty sheep were grazing contentedly, unaware of the controversy they'd caused by mingling together overnight. Chief-night-fury turned to the first shepherd.
HALF OF THESE ARE YOURS?
The shepherd nodded. Hiccup sprang into the air, gained a bit of altitude, then swooped down at the flock with a roar. The sheep hadn't gotten the memo that the dragons were no longer a threat; they scattered in total panic. Hiccup adjusted his flight path so half the scattered sheep ran toward one side of the pasture, and the other half went in the other direction. He landed in front of the stunned shepherds.
HALF FOR YOU AND HALF FOR
YOU, DIVIDED RANDOMLY
AND FAIRLY.
NOW MARK THEM!
He stalked off indignantly. What a waste of time and effort! If this was what it meant to be the chief of the village, then maybe he should have let Spitelout have the job. No, that would have been bad for the dragons, and not so great for the humans, either. Hiccup had done what he had to do.
He didn't even make it back to the Nest before he had to invoke his authority again. This time, it was the dragons. A flock of Terrible Terrors was picking over one of the feeding trays, looking for fish small enough for them to swallow. As soon as one of them found a likely meal, three others would descend on him and try to steal his fish. They were doing more fighting than eating, and the commotion was keeping several full-sized dragons from getting their own breakfasts from the feeding tray.
Hiccup got all their attention with a small firebolt that burst in mid-air, just above the tray. "How many times do I have to go through this with you?" he demanded. "Form a line, and pick your fish one at a time! There's plenty for everybody now – you don't have to fight over them!"
"Oh." "We forgot." "Sorry." The Terrors did as they were told, and the chaos ended. Hiccup sighed. He knew he'd have to go through the same thing with them again in two or three days. The Terrors weren't trying to cause trouble, but they had the memory capacity of a fishing net, and old habits died hard.
He let Gobber know he was going off-duty for a while, gathered his family, and winged out to sea. The fish in the feeding trays were free for the taking for all dragons, but after they'd been in those trays for a few hours, they just didn't taste fresh enough. Night Furies weren't the choosiest dragons, but they did like their one big meal of the day to taste good, which often meant they hunted their own breakfasts. Their fishing time also served as a chance to spend time together as a family.
Today, almost the whole clan was together – Chief-night-fury, Night-fury-mother-of-twins, Night-fury-six-shooter and her mate, Night-fury-faithful-brother, Night-fury-makes-one-heck-of-a-bang, Thing One and Thing Two, and the youngest, Small-boy-night-fury. Their second daughter, Night-fury-full-of-surprises, was elsewhere on the island; she was probably teaching Agnarr, her newly-transformed friend, about how to be a dragon.
"We need to come up with a proper dragon name for Agnarr," the chief said through a mouthful of fish.
"How about Night-fury-smith-helper?" Thing One asked.
"For one thing, he's not a smith's helper anymore, and for another, this flock has three Night Furies who used to be smith's helpers," her mother answered. "He needs something unique for us to call him by."
"We could just let him earn a name, like the rest of us did," Six suggested.
"Like most of you did," Faithful-brother reminded her.
"Point taken," Bang nodded, "but Night-fury-faithful-other-brother just doesn't sound right to me."
"Well, we need to come up with something!" Thing Two exclaimed. "Our mouths can't form all the sounds in 'Agnarr'."
"Yeah," her twin sister added. "When a Night Fury says his old name, it comes out a'arr."
"...and that definitely won't work!" Chief-night-fury concluded. "Depending on how we voice it, a'arr could mean anything from 'the sky is very blue today' to 'don't fly under me, I'm about to relieve myself'." Thing One snickered.
"We don't have to decide today," Mother-of-twins observed, "so let's keep thinking until one of us comes up with something good." She spun in mid-air and confronted the younger dragons. "And if any of you calls him a'arr before we give him a real name, then you watch how you voice it!"
"Yes, Mother." "I'll be good, Mother." "Okay, Mom." Small-boy-night-fury probably needed that warning, but Thing One and Thing Two actually meant to keep their promise... unless disobeying looked like it might be fun. Few creatures were more mischievous than a juvenile Night Fury, with the cleverness to invent new kinds of trouble, but without the wisdom and experience to stay away from that trouble. Hiccup and Astrid could never relax their vigilance over their growing family. That put a special burden on Astrid, now that so much of Hiccup's time and energy would be taken up by being the chief over the humans.
o
Varinn had the forge to himself that morning. Gobber wasn't feeling well, so he'd gone home early and left his apprentice in charge, with firm instructions to not let himself get transformed into a Night Fury like the last three apprentices did. It was a fairly slow day, without many customers demanding instant repairs on their bent pitchforks or dull fishing gaffs. He'd done some cleaning-up and some reorganizing, but those were never his favorite activities. If he had time to himself in the forge, the thing that intrigued him the most was the back room that used to be Hiccup's. It hadn't been changed or reused ever since that apprentice had become the first Viking to get turned into a dragon; it was still full of his drawings, models, and prototypes, all proof of talents and skills that Varinn could only dream of. But it was fun to leaf through the old drawings.
He'd almost lost track of time in that back room when he realized he had a customer. But it wasn't a customer of the two-legged kind. "Oh, hi, Agnarr," he said cheerfully, calling the dragon by his human name. "Can I do something for you?"
The dragon nodded "yes" and then spoke in Forge, the human/dragon language that he'd helped invent. "Want to use hammer in forge. I used to hammer all the time. I go too long without hammering."
Varinn scratched his chin. "There's a problem with that, you know. Your claws can't grip a hammer."
"Night-fury-faithful-brother had idea," the dragon replied, using his brother's dragon name. "That hammer." He gestured with his chin at a long-handled sledgehammer standing in a corner.
"You still can't hold it," the young smith objected.
"Your belly leather help hold it," the dragon replied.
"Belly leather? Oh, you mean my belt?" Varinn realized that the Forge language didn't have a word for "belt" because it wasn't a word that dragons were likely to use. He fetched the hammer, pulled off his belt, and fastened it around the dragon's foreleg to hold the end of the hammer's handle in place. His claws could grip the middle of the handle, after a fashion, and now the dragon could hold the hammer.
"What did you want to hammer on?" Varinn asked as the dragon walked over to the anvil on his three free legs.
"Not hammer on anything. Just hammer." With that, the Night Fury raised "his" hammer and brought it down hard, once, twice, three times... and stopped. He shook his head in irritation.
"Is something wrong?" the human asked.
"Sound hurts my ears," Agnarr admitted. "Feels like I hitting my own head."
"Back in the days of the dragon wars, Vikings used to bang on their shields with their hammers all the time," Varinn commented. "They did it to mess up the dragons' concentration so they couldn't shoot straight. I guess you're giving yourself the same problem."
Agnarr gazed sadly at the hammer that was strapped to his foreleg. Varinn tried to imagine what it would be like to lose the use of his hands so he couldn't do smithcraft any more. What a scary thought! He gazed at the dragon and tried to think of a way to help... and, to his own surprise, he came up with something.
He leaped onto the dragon's neck, pushed his ear flaps down with both hands, and held them down.
"Hey!" Agnarr exclaimed. "I can not hear!"
Varinn let one ear flap pop back up. "Of course you can't hear! That's the whole idea! Try hammering now." He pushed the ear flap back down.
The dragon took a hesitant swing at the anvil, then another, then another. He let out a short, excited roar. That was the last thing Varinn heard for the next fifteen minutes. The dragon just banged away on the anvil with wild abandon, the way a two-year-old child might bang on a cooking pot with a spoon, making the loudest din that the smith's apprentice had ever heard in his life. Agnarr's facial expression suggested total bliss. He didn't stop until he felt the sledgehammer shift in his grip.
"Wood starting to split," he said sadly. "Handle was not made for dragon."
"What?" Varinn shouted as he slid off the dragon's neck. "I can't hear you! All that banging has deafened me!"
"Sorry, very sorry," the dragon said. "Do not want!" He waited a few minutes until Varinn's hearing began to recover, then repeated his comment about the split hammer handle.
"I think that handle was splitting before you even started," Varinn replied loudly as he removed his belt and put it back around his waist. "That's why the hammer was set aside in a corner. It's not your fault."
"This was fun," the Night Fury decided. "I do again some time. But need stronger hammer, and need way to not make you deaf."
"Ask your brother," Varinn suggested. "He's the one with all the ideas. Maybe he'll come up with something clever so we can both stand the noise of a dragon-smith hammering in the forge. Do you have a project in mind, or were you just letting off steam?"
"Steam," Agnarr said. "Maybe do project later. I feel better. Thank you for help. Not usual work for smith."
"No problem, Agnarr. Like Gobber always told us, if a smith can't do it, then it isn't worth doing."
o
Night-fury-new-beginning was starting to enjoy life again. He'd been brought out of the darkness of an off-center mind by the other Night Furies, reunited with his long-lost nest-brother, and given a small nest of dragons to watch over. The last part was the hardest, because those dragons weren't accustomed to having a Night Fury around. They had been solving their problems by the law of the jungle for over a century, and no one else had cared about them (except for the human Outcasts, who liked to use them for target practice). They didn't take it well when he showed up out of nowhere and took charge of the nest. They were relieved that someone was bringing order; they just didn't like it when that order meant they couldn't get their own way all the time.
At first, they tried to fight him. That lasted about two days. New-beginning was still haunted by memories of his abusive past and didn't want to fight anyone, but when it came to self-defense, no dragon could outfight a Night Fury. When the dragons realized that fighting him meant losing, they turned on each other instead. Those fights had grown more frequent for several weeks; then they tapered away, replaced by a more passive resistance. If two dragons both wanted the same sleeping space, Night-fury-new-beginning would intervene and decide who ought to get it, and then both the winner and the loser would shun that space for a night, just to show the new black dragon that he wasn't as much a boss as he thought he was. That went on for over three months. At last, the dragons realized that the Night Fury wasn't going away, he really meant it when he said he was trying to keep everyone as happy as possible, and maybe resisting him was just as counter-productive as fighting each other all the time.
The younger dragons warmed up to him first. They asked him questions about the world beyond Outcast Island; they asked for suggestions about how to handle the hostile Outcasts. One key moment came when three of them asked him to settle a dispute. They'd found an unusual sea shell on the shore, and all three wanted to keep it.
"That's simple," he'd answered after a moment. "The one who can pick it up with his claws and carry it home is the one who can keep it." They all tried, several times, but (as he already knew) dragon claws are ill-suited for picking up and holding small objects. None of them could hold onto the seashell for more than a second or two.
"Are we being stupid?" one of them asked.
"Dragons don't own things," he explained. "That's because we can't hold them and we can't do anything with them. The pretty things in this world are there for us to look at and enjoy, not to keep. Remember that."
As he walked away, he heard one of them say to another, "That makes sense." He knew that those particular dragons wouldn't cause him any more trouble.
One by one and two by two, he convinced the rest of the dragons in the nest that he really knew what he was talking about, and he had the best interests of the whole nest at heart. Many of the adults changed their minds about him the second time he stunned a school of fish so they could eat an easy meal. When he did it the first time, they thought he was showing off, but when he did it the second time, they realized he was doing something kind for them. The last few holdouts had been convinced when the Outcasts sent a hunting party into the dragons' part of the island, and New-beginning had led a counter-attack that sent the humans running back to their village with their pants on fire. Now the nest was as peaceful and orderly as any other dragons' nest. That meant he still had to break up disputes and solve disagreements on a daily basis, but the dragons respected him now. That made all the difference.
Today had started off peaceful, but near the end of the dragons' breakfast time, a fight broke out. A brown Nadder and a mottled Hotburple were snarling angrily at each other and preparing to flame each other. Night-fury-new-beginning flew right between them, which startled them and fixed their attention on him instead of each other.
"Okay, what's it about?" he demanded.
"It's about that school of fish down there!" the Nadder exclaimed. "I saw them first, so they're mine!"
"But you didn't do anything to catch them!" the Hotburple retorted. "I'm the one who stunned them with my fire, so they're mine."
"How did you know they were there?" the Night Fury asked the Hotburple.
"I saw that one flying in circles, so I knew there must be fish down there," he answered.
"You admit it! I saw them first!" the Nadder cried.
"Aren't there enough fish in that school to feed both of you?" New-beginning wondered.
"But if we just chow down, he'll eat more than me because he can grab them while he's hovering, and I can't," complained the Nadder.
The black dragon thought fast. "When I was small, my nest-brother and I played a game called 'jump fish' that might come in handy here. Stay where you are." He dove toward the water, extended a paw, and scooped up the first fish he found. Rather than attempt to eat it or hold it, he flipped it back and batted it with his tail so it flew straight up between the other two dragons. "Jump fish!" he shouted. "Who gets it first?"
Both dragons lunged at the fish, and nearly collided. The Nadder backed off at the last moment, and the Hotburple got the fish. "Okay, he went first," New-beginning said. "Nadder, you go next. Then the Hotburple gets one, and you keep going back and forth until all the fish are gone. Is that fair?"
"I guess so." "I suppose so." The Nadder dove toward the floating school, and the Hotburple didn't follow until the Nadder had claimed a fish.
"Well, that takes care of that," he muttered as he turned away. "For now."
"Well done," came a vaguely familiar voice from behind him. He turned... and nearly froze in mid-air as his blood ran cold. Two dragons had glided up behind him and had watched the whole thing. One was one of the young Night Furies from the East, Night-fury-chi-wen. The other was a face from his past.
"Hobblegrunt-long-legs?" he gasped. This was one of the dragons from his old nest. One of the dragons whom he had abused and mistreated for years. One of the dragons who had good reasons to hate him for the rest of her life.
"Yes, that's me. I'm glad you still remember me," the Hobblegrunt said mildly.
"Uhh... why are you...?"
Night-fury-chi-wen answered. "I just finished my stay in the mountain-lake nest. Hobblegrunt-long-legs said she wanted to visit Berk and see how we did things here, so I brought her along when I came home. Someone mentioned you, and she wanted to see how you did things, too."
"I really wasn't sure what to expect when I got here," the Hobblegrunt began, changing her scales from purple to yellow as she spoke. "We all remember what you used to be like, but we knew something had changed when you left us, instead of trying to convince us of anything. It would not have surprised me if you'd just knocked those two dragons' heads together. Instead, you were patient with them and left them both feeling like they didn't lose the argument. That's what we all thought Night Furies were supposed to be like."
"Until I showed you all what a jerk I was," he said, unwilling to meet her gaze.
"You certainly were," the Hobblegrunt agreed, turning red in her extremities for a moment, "but you aren't anymore. You have really changed! You're not the Night Fury who terrorized our nest anymore. You've appeased my curiosity. And, I promise you, when I go home to the lake nest, I'll tell everyone what I saw and heard this morning. If you ever come back there again, you'll get a much more pleasant welcome than last time."
New-beginning was speechless.
"What is the matter?" Chi-wen asked him. "Have you never heard of the word 'forgive'?"
"I... I... well, of course I know the word, but..."
"When you first came to our nest, before you went out of control, I remember you working with some of our young dragons," the Hobblegrunt said firmly. "I recall you teaching them that dragons can't hold onto things, so they shouldn't try. Does that include grudges?"
There wasn't much that New-beginning could say to that. He nodded slowly.
"Maybe we'll meet again some day," the color-changing dragon said as she turned away. "Even if we don't, it was good to see firsthand that dragons can really leave their past behind and do something good with their lives. Rule wisely, Night Fury."
The two dragons turned and flew away toward Berk, leaving Night-fury-new-beginning to his nest and his thoughts.
o
The two shepherds were back, and they looked irritated and embarrassed at the same time. Hiccup landed on the ground next to them.
NOW WHAT?
"I did like you said," the first shepherd said. "I put a black mark on the tails of all my sheep, so I'd know which ones were mine and which ones were his."
Chief-night-fury rolled his eyes.
LET ME GUESS. YOU BOTH
PUT BLACK MARKS ON
YOUR SHEEP'S TAILS?
They nodded... sheepishly.
THEY'RE ALL MIXED UP AGAIN?
Again, they nodded. Hiccup was getting very close to losing his cool. How was he going to handle this absurd situation? He tried to think of any advice he'd gotten in the past that might apply here. All he could think of was Toothless telling him over and over, "Don't fight the dragon." Well, the dragon in Hiccup wanted to do something dramatic. Maybe that was good advice.
WOULD IT HELP IF I SENT
SOME MONSTROUS NIGHTMARES
TO EAT ALL YOUR SHEEP?
"No!" "Don't do that!" "Please don't eat them!" "They're all I've got!"
DO YOU THINK YOU CAN SOLVE
YOUR SILLY PROBLEM WITHOUT
INVOLVING THE CHIEF AT
EVERY TURN?
"Uhh... yes." "I guess so."
GOOD. GO TO YOUR PASTURE
AND SORT OUT YOUR FLOCKS.
DON'T MAKE ME COME DOWN THERE
He added a snarl and a foot-stomp for emphasis.
"Yes, sir!" "We'll figure it out somehow, sir!" The shepherds high-tailed it back to their pastures.
"Another problem solved?" Astrid asked him from the second floor of the Nest.
"It's a lot like dealing with dragons," he grunted. "It's one-fourth tact, one-fourth creative problem-solving, and one-half knocking their heads together."
"You're doing fine so far," she said encouragingly as she glided down to land next to him. "You make a good chief, just like you make a good Alpha."
"I knew it wouldn't be easy," he nodded, "but this is absurd! Dad never mentioned that pair before. I wonder if they were testing me."
"If they were, then I think you passed the test," she told him.
"Thank you," he said. Then he sighed. "The parents of those young Gronckles who keep fighting each other are headed this way. I think I'm about to face another test. Will it ever end?"
"I think it's just beginning," she commented.
o
A/N
At some point in early April 2016, this story went over the 600,000-hit mark. To all the readers who are doing all that reading: thank you from the bottom of my heart. You've made this one of the most popular fanfics in the HTTYD fandom. I know that the best "thank you" I can offer would be more chapters for the story, and rest assured, I'm working in that direction.