The Rider of The Misty Mountains

by Gabenator5

In the Misty Mountains, a rumor spreads of a black-scaled beast with a black-scaled Rider. Not of the Nazgul are they; orcs and trolls they hunt and slay! And at night, with fire bright, travelers see their antics that inspire fright as they dance betwixt Giant's hurled stones. Laughing at the angered rocks among the Peaks of Zirakzigi! What truth do these rumors hold?

1. Prologue

I DO NOT OWN HTTYD OR LOTR. -Gabenator5

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PROLOGUE:

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"They have taken the Bridge and the Second Hall. We have barred the gates, but cannot hold them for long. The ground shakes... Drums. Drums in the deep. We cannot get out. A Shadow moves in the dark... We cannot get out... They are coming." – The final entry in the book of Marzabul, the last words of Balin's folk who had sought to reclaim the dwarven realm of Khazad-dum.

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Within the depths of the mountain realm, all had fallen into silence. The corpses of the slain had ceased to reek, and the victors snuck about in fearful quiet, for none wanted to stir the embers into a blazing flame and awaken doom upon themselves for their folly.

While the realm within the mountains once more slept, it was without that the world was stirring. The winds blew cold over the rocky slopes, and the mighty pines did shiver, their bristles at such a chilling caress, in protest.

The mountain streams flowed pure and clean from the melts of the snow that sat thick and shining upon the mountain peaks like crowns of fervent silver, adorning mighty titans of stone. Upon the wooded slopes, the howls of beasts could be heard at night, while in the sky, the birds took flight.

Upon the mightiest of the mountain peaks sat an ancient tower long forgotten, its stonework hewn from the living rock, worn with age and the slow decays of time immemorial. Durin's tower, this place was named in days of old when the kingdom below was alive and well, and the dark shadow had not yet come to dwell.

Upon the summit of the tower, a spell unknown didst light devour. A sphere of darkness so complete that space itself didst bend its knee, and warped around the spherical plane that so unnaturally sat in place.

The mighty wind howled in rage at the sphere that it tried to move in vain, but naught was heard upon that peak, for noise itself the sphere did eat.

Such was the way of things for days on end until suddenly, without prior portent to its intentions, the sphere of darkness didst distend and expand into an orb of shadow that covered the tower top, only to shrink back to its former limits like its sudden growth had never occurred.

But all was not the same upon the sphere's return to its prior size, for upon the tower's top, two new additions didst wobbly stand. Confusion and utter bafflement on each being's face, for their arrival was neither planned nor approved by either of them.

And that is how one Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the third and his dragon came to be upon the mighty tower-adorned peak of Zirakzigil the Silvertine, greatest of the Misty Mountains and home to the mighty depths of Khazad-dum.

Or, as Hiccup would come to call it...

Myrkheim, the dark realm.