How to Hide Your Spirit

Chapter 14

Pre-A/N: Warning: this gets a little OOC

Things weren't going so hot for me. I mean, in everyone else's perspectives, it totally was. In mean, miraculously becoming a brilliant dragon conqueror and possibly the best Human shifter in the history of Vikings in record time? Looked like I was having the time of my life in some others' eyes. But that was exactly what was screwing me over.

I was never left alone.

And without the help of Astrid getting them off my back (I still didn't know what was so horrible with what I'd said that caused this bad of a reaction), I looked EXTREMELY suspicious. Maybe not to the meat-headed hooligans known as my peers, but to Gobber. And it was life in Hel's Realm.

In the beginning, they were just barely above the poorly disguised prods to see behind the mask, like 'Sometimes, the worst we can do fer ourselves is not say somethin' ' or 'it can't get any worse from where yer at' (so maybe the last one was a little-above-barely-above). Then it escalating into dumb word-mind games like 'Words that start with a? Astrid what'cha been doing with 'er lately. She know somethin' I don't. You're turn for s!" And it'd hit it peek at "Listen, 'iccup, I don't know what to say. I can't make ya say anythin', but I really wish ye would. You've always scared me kid, but this is beyond that."

And now I was moping on a ledge with Toothless behind me, sleeping.

"You look worse than usual."

Well, not anymore.

I turned around and sighed.

"How am I supposed to fix this? Am I supposed to wait this out, or-or say something? Maybe… maybe I should just lea-"

"No." Toothless quickly cut me off.

"What?" I looked up at him. Most of these sounded like bad ideas (and who would be surprised? They were coming from Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, the king of the Worst Ideas Ever to be Created), but I could tell the last one was more to Toothless than that.

"Leaving… would be a bad idea. So does everything else, for that matter, but the last one being the worst."

I narrowed my eyes.

"...why..?" I asked cautiously.

Toothless shook his head and laid back down, frustrating me. But he looked at me like he wanted to… really wanted to.

I knew I couldn't put my trust in my village anymore, my father I never did, Gobber was fighting a losing battle for it, and Astrid didn't want it. But Toothless…. Let's just say, that I wanted to take pride in trusting him enough to let it go, but knew deep down that, despite knowing we had gotten it all wrong, I was abandoning Berk and everything that defined it.

And it hurt more than I wanted to admit.

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It was part of what I was thinking about, amongst other things as I flicked my pencil up and down and up and down and up and… It was soothing and, for once, I allowed myself to understand why most Vikings vetoed the idea of using any brains. It was peaceful. Like nothing was wrong.

"You've been keeping something from me, son."

A low, gravely voice startled me. I leapt up from my desk, quick to hide any papers that could possibly expose what events my whereabouts were really pertaining. Once I realized it was my dad and not some dragon or whatever, I let out a small sigh of relief. It didn't last too long, as I realized what he just said (in which my heart began thudding out of it already too soft shell).

"Y-y-you do?" I stuttered out best I could. What'd been with me and stuttering these days? Right. I'm part dragon.

Completely serious Dad, sat down. "Yes, and we have to talk."

A lump rose in my throat and I started fidgeting.

"Dad… Gods...I-I can explain this. I'm so sorry-" I began rambling when Dad cut me off.

"Sorry?" Dad's booming voice jarred me a little, "Son, I'm proud!"

"You...are?" I realized we weren't talking about the same thing anymore. It wasn't even a good feeling. I just numbed out like I always did.

Dad grinned wildly, "YES! Finally, finally, you're a real Viking! The longest time, the worst Viking to live, and then this!..."

He said more. I know he did. But it was muffled in my ears and my mind wandered. Deep down, I hoped that Dad had been talking about my Spirit- my real one, I mean. Or Toothless. True, it would have been terrifying, and the results would have been just below disastrous, but it would have been over. No more lying.

Another part of me scolded the other half. They would have taken away Toothless if they had known. Either directly (the most terrifying way) or indirectly. Indirectly as in closing off my-freak-of-a-spirit self away from the world, where all I'd ever know are people that know nothing about me or know how I am… at least, not like Toothless did.

Again, really beginning to understand why most Vikings turned off their brains.

"- a gift."

"Huh?" I suddenly pulled myself back into the conversation.

"It's, uh, a helmet. From your mother's breastplate."

I flinched a little.

"I have the other half."

I cringed.

He set it on my head and I tried not to twitch more than I was already doing. Besides, it was something of my mother's. I never saw anything that was hers anymore. Dad didn't even know what her Spirit was, let alone tell me. Guess that just added to the mystery of her.

When I was younger, I would picture that Mom was the complete opposite of Dad; caring, always there, and accepting of me. I'd stopped after realizing I was missing still someone, whether it was my always-gone Dad or my forever-gone mother. I wasn't helping myself. And that was always what I'd ever tried to do. Help myself.

The idea straightened my spine.

"So let's talk about dragons. Beating them, breaking them, a tooth? You get out a tooth? There's all kinds of rumors about the magic you have in the ring!"

Let's not.

I glanced at the floor and shuffled my feet a little. Bright side of practically being Dad-repellant was knowing how to get him gone. Never thought I'd find that helpful until now.

Dad cleared his throat. "Good, uh, talk. Good talk."

I nodded, my eyes flitting at the walls.

"Night." Dad said.

"G'night," I replied, in broken, awkward syllables.

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I tried to stop glancing at Astrid. She, of course, was glaring. But I was nervous. This was the final round, and I need to… not pass this. Technically, the Elder decided on that, so if I just stood and did nothing, she still could decide on me being the victor. However, I still probably had a much lower chance if I waited and hoped that Astrid got the Gronkle before she killed me.

Allow me to explain these. After the end of training, there is a final round, one designed to have the two final, most eligible Spirit trainees compete for the "honor" of slaying their first dragon in front of the entire village. It was a big deal. I remembered Dad bringing me to these, telling me that it was the ultimate honor and the pride it gave their families, never telling me I had to win these, but not giving much other mental room for any other idea.

Now and couldn't have wanted it less.

Stuck in my head, I didn't notice the Gronkle had been let loose, or that she was charging at me, really, really, really angry. Where was Astrid? I knew she'd been angry with me but this had too much on the-

My nervousness blinded me from the firebird closing in. I just threw out my hand a scratched where I knew Toothless had a sensitive spot. She was out before I knew it. When I looked up in my daze, the crowd was going out of their minds with cheering, and Astrid giving me looks of nearly-pure hatred, mixed with slight dollops of surprise and worry. Very slight dollops.

I looked up to see what the Elder would say, but I already knew who the ancient stick attached to her poor hand would point at.

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"And… we're leaving. Pack you scales up dearest reptile we are taking a little vacation! Forever." I groaned and heaved down the basket. I looked through to find what I'd brought; some clothes, journals, pencils, fish, my lovely butterknife dagger... I glanced at the helmet. Huh. Didn't think I'd put that one in there. Must've shoved it in after the conversation with and been too busy packing it up to notice.

"So that's it? That's how the infamous Hiccup Haddock goes out, huh? Running away. Have to say, I didn't see this one coming. Though, I guess I should have."

I'd jumped slightly at the sound of Astrid's voice (or maybe it was the sound of her sharpening her axe. Tough call), but relaxed and stood up.

"You're one to talk." Where'd Toothless go? Probably back in the small overhang-

Astrid grabbed my arm, threw me down on the ground, the shoved the axe handle into my stomach (if I began spitting blood, I knew who to blame).

"OW!" I yelped, "Why would you do that?!"

Astrid yanked me back up off the ground by the collar of my shirt and shook me.

"Listen. You're not going to make Viking history and leave!" She yelled.

I leaned away from her overly dramatic voice.

"Does it count as 'making history' if I'm the worst Viking 'in history'?" I snipped at her.

Astrid let go but didn't leave.

I glanced away and then went to grab my basket.

"If you leave…" Astrid began, but trailed off. I turned to give her an impatient look, just to annoy her, but she continued before I could, "If you leave, you take everything you've learned. That Vikings and dragons aren't incompatible. That dragons like… reflected light and grass. That-that… that not everybody is the same, and we can work with that. That it can be a good thing."

I sighed and leaned to head to the sky, screaming something along the lines of "araagggharhhh!" and then taking deep breathes.

No one talked for a while. Where was Toothless? But I just had to think.

"I… I didn't learn that being different's a good thing." I said after a minute.

Astrid didn't reply. Instead, Toothless head butted me to the ground and glared at me from his higher level.

"Listen to the girl." he huffed.

Astrid leaned over and grinned along with Toothless. I huffed with a mixture of disbelief and laughter.

"Did you two… conspire for this?"

A unanimous shrug was made (for Toothless, more of a head twitch).

"Unbelievable." But I let my head hit the ground and just laughed.

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A/N: I think we've established I take FOREVER to update. But I'm pretty inspired for the next part (spoiler: Hiccup promises to stake it out if Astrid gets over her fear of heights, hence the flight commences). Hopefully.

But OH MY GODS are you guys supportive of this. I don't think I've encountered ONE day where someone isn't either following, favoriting, or reviewing. Seriously. Y'all are CRAZY! XD 3

Thank you!

~ Sam