Disclaimer: How to Train Your Dragon belongs to Dreamworks, not me.

In all that happened, she blamed the Night Fury.

She wasn't even supposed to have a Night Fury. They were rarely seen, and when she did spot them they traveled in small tight knit pods, sticking with their own kind. But in her third year in the dragons' nest, she found a lost hatchling, about two years old (the same age as your own baby, a traitorous voice said in the back of her head), that had been separated from his pod. He was smaller than most Night Furies she'd seen- most likely he'd been the runt of the litter and left behind. He was a stubborn thing, though, and despite his small stature he grew up strong and thriving, and eventually reached a decent size. She tried to name him, but unlike the other dragons, he didn't seem to respond. The other dragons learned their names, and Cloudjumper would alight at her side if she so much whispered, but the Night Fury never heeded her, no matter what she called him. Eventually she gave up, and let him be.

It was nearly her fifteenth year in the nest when the Night Fury went missing.

It wasn't uncommon for him to wander off for days at a time. She suspected he was looking for his pack; he always came back with his tail drooping and he wouldn't eat for a few days after.

This time, though, he didn't return after a few days. Or weeks. And when a month passed, she took Cloudjumper and went in search of him.

She hadn't gone this from the nest since she had been taken. It was both terrifying and liberating, to fly free over unfamiliar lands and seas. At night she slept in small caves and hollows, avoiding any of the villages that might be nearby.

She found the Night Fury on her second week, downed in a cove. "There you are!" she called in relief as she slid from Cloudjumper's back onto solid ground. "Where have you been, you foolish boy?"

The Night Fury warbled in a happy reply and bounded over the grass to her. She flung her arms around his neck. "What's kept you?" she asked. "It's not like you to be gone this long."

He huffed a warm breath on her cheek, twisting around her, and she spotted the ragged edge of his tail. "Oh, my poor love," she murmured, her mind already racing. No wonder he hadn't come back. And how was she supposed to get him back to the nest if he couldn't fly?

"Toothless!"

She froze.

"Where are you?"

It was a boy's voice, still young and cracking on the edges. Valka took a step back, tugging at the dragon's neck.

"Come on, bud, come back here."

Valka tried to pull at the Night Fury's neck. "Let's go," she whispered, but he snorted and tugged back at her. "We can't be seen."

A boy climbed over the ridge and skidded down the rocky side into the cove. He was young, maybe thirteen or fourteen, with tousled brown hair. Valka held her breath, her arms still tight around the dragon's neck. She knew full well that Viking children were just as fierce as their adult counterparts. No telling what this boy could do.

But he didn't hold any kind of weapon, just an armful of metal rods and thin leather bundled up in his arms like an unwieldy baby. "I built a new prototype," he said cheerfully. "C'mere, Toothless, let me try it out."

The Night Fury broke out of Valka's grip, bounding over to the boy, and she stared in disbelief. She'd spent years trying out names like Sparkstrike and Skyflint only to be ignored, and now he answers to something as childish as Toothless.

She was so shocked, in fact, that she forgot to hide.

"This one's a little lighter than the last model, so hopefully it'll-" The boy's voice trailed off and he took a sharp step back. "There's a person. Oh, there's a person."

Valka stood rooted to the ground. The boy darted forward in front of the dragon. "Please, don't hurt Toothless," he begged. "I know that Vikings kill on sight, I know, and yes, he's a Night Fury, but please, please don't…" His voice trailed off. "You're not from Berk."

Her voice died in her throat; she swallowed hard and tried again. "No," she rasped. "Are...are you?"

"Uh-huh," he said warily. The Night Fury- Toothless- nipped lovingly at the boy's shoulder. He scrunched up his face at the soft bite, and the way his mouth buttoned up looked so startlingly familiar that Valka took a step forward.

"You're from Berk," she repeated. The boy nodded slowly, eyes wide. They were green- a bright warm green, fringed with short thick lashes. Freckles dotted his nose and cheeks. There was a small gap in his front teeth.

"Who are you?" he asked.

She saw the scar on his chin- a thin white line, nondescript and easy to miss. But she saw it. And she remembered.

"Hiccup," she breathed.

He scrambled back, clutching his homemade prosthetic tail tighter to his skinny chest. "No, no, no," he said. "Uh, how do you know my name?" Toothless yelped, pushing at his elbow, and he pushed back with his eyes still glued to Valka's face. "Who are you?"

She wanted to run, but she couldn't move. He was still staring at her and she realized in a daze that he deserved an answer. "You don't know me," she whispered.

"Yeah, I know, but clearly you know me, and it's kind of freaking me out," he said. "Have we met before?"

"No," she said. "Yes. Sort of."

"We've sort of met?" he repeated. "How...I don't understand."

With every word, every gesture, every expression, a memory came flooding back. Rocking her baby to sleep, sitting up late at night when he was fussing with a fever, nursing him in the stillness of the early morning, cradling him in her lap while his father made him shriek with laughter.

"You don't remember me," she whispered, and it hurt more than she expected to say those words aloud. "But...a mother never forgets."

All the color drained from Hiccup's face. He stumbled back, his armful of leather and metal falling to the ground with a clank. "You're not...are you really…" he stammered. The backs of his legs smacked into a large rock and he sank down in shock. "You're dead."

"No," she said. "No, I'm...I'm not dead. Wasn't dead."

"But you left," Hiccup said. "You left, and I-"

His eyes were so bright. Valka couldn't move.

"I have questions!" he blurted out. "Where did you go? What have you been doing for fifteen years? Why...why didn't you come home?"

Hiccup huddled on the rock, his hands balled into fists as he looked her square in the eye. "Hiccup, I-" she started to say.

"Why?" he interrupted. "Why, Mom?"

It would have been easier to bear if someone had ripped her heart out of her chest. She dropped her spear at her side and approached Hiccup carefully, like she would a spooked dragon. "I'm sorry," she said softly. "I am so sorry, Hiccup." He met her gaze, his chin lifted but his mouth trembling. She knelt down in front of him and held out her hands, palms open and her fingers softly curled. "I had my reasons, but...oh, love, I'm so sorry."

Hiccup inhaled deeply, his mouth tugging tight. She held her breath, terrified of what he might do next.

He blinked slowly, like he was waking up from a long dream, and reached for her hands. He touched her wrists gingerly, drawing her palms closer until she was cupping his cheeks, and then he looked at her. Really looked at her. Without meaning to she smoothed the pads of her thumbs along the curve of his cheeks, still babyishly round.

Suddenly he hurtled towards her and Valka found herself with a lapful of gawky teenager.

She froze. It had been fifteen years since she'd held her baby, and this wasn't an infant, nor was it one of her little hatchlings. What was she supposed to do? How were her arms supposed to bend? Should she even try to touch him?

Hiccup's thin arms clutched tightly around her neck. "Mom," he whimpered into the crook of her shoulder, and Valka found herself pulling him closer without knowing exactly what she was doing.

She sat back on the grass, her arms wrapped around him tightly. Her heartbeat raced, pulsing in her throat. Hiccup huddled in her embrace, a strange soft warm weight, and his arms kept a death grip around her neck till she could barely breathe. "My baby," she whispered into his soft hair. "My baby, my baby."

She cupped a hand under his neck, marveling at the fact that he was flesh and blood and here. So many nights she had held her baby in her arms, counting every rise and fall of his tiny chest and praying he would survive the night, the week, the winter. Now here he was, small for his age and gangly and skinny, but here.

Hiccup suddenly yanked himself back, leaning away at arms' length. "Where have you been?" he demanded. She hadn't heard crying but his eyes were wet.

"With dragons," she confessed. Now that she had him she couldn't bear to let go; her hands curved around his upper arms.

"The same dragons that killed you?" he said. He shook his head. "Well, I guess they didn't kill you. But kidnapped you?" He screwed up his face in confusion. "They kidnapped you but didn't kill you?"

She nodded, sitting a little more comfortably and tucking her legs underneath her. Hiccup scooted closer to her side. "You were six months old," she said. "Just a wee thing, asleep in your cradle. It was the middle of a raid, and I saw a dragon breaking into the house. I panicked when I saw him standing over you, but...he was just curious." She glanced away and smiled at the grass, remembering. "You woke up and started cooing and laughing. But he scratched you, and you started crying, and your father ran in and started shouting. And I think...Cloudjumper thought I was being threatened, and when he took me he meant to save me."

"Cloudjumper?" Hiccup repeated. He sat close enough to lean his elbows on her bent knee.

"My dragon," she said. "A Stormcutter." She chucked Hiccup gently under the chin. "But I see you found yourself a Night Fury. Clever boy."

He blushed red at the praise. "Well, it wasn't so much found as...shot down and accidentally maimed," he confessed.

Valka frowned. "What did you do?" she asked.

Hiccup scratched the back of his neck. "It was an accident!" he said. "I wanted to prove I was a real Viking, and I thought the best way I could do it was by killing a dragon, so I made this bola slingshot thing, and it worked, Mom, it really worked, but I...I ended up hurting Toothless."

He hung his head at that, his narrow shoulders slumping, and Toothless padded up behind him, nudging at his cheek. Hiccup sort of smiled at that, scratching him lightly behind a neck ridge. "At least he doesn't seem to hold a grudge," he said.

"He's never been the type," Valka agreed. "I've watched this one grow up. He has the most honorable heart I've seen in a dragon."

Hiccup tilted his head. "You raised him?" he asked.

Valka smoothed her hand over the top of Toothless's head. "I did," she said. "He's the same age as you, you know. It made me think of you."

Hiccup sidled closer. "Really?" he said.

She slid her fingertip over the scar on his chin. "Really," she said.

Hiccup smiled, but his face fell in solemn lines. "So that's how I got that scar?" he said. "I never remembered, and Dad always changed the subject when I asked."

She cupped his cheeks in her hands and pressed a soft kiss like a prayer over the narrow white line. Hiccup closed his eyes. "It's going to be dark soon," she said. "You ought to go home. Your father...will be wondering where you are."

"Oh, no, he kind of lets me wander wherever," Hiccup said. "Besides, he's out on a recon mission, looking for the dragons' nest."

He seemed so unfazed, but Valka felt her chest clench. Stoick should be home. Stoick should be worrying about Hiccup. Stoick should be everything she never was.

"I mean, it's not like he doesn't care or anything," Hiccup said, as if he heard her thoughts. "He cares, in his own...gruff and manly Viking way." He grinned, puffing out his chest and flexing his thin arms. "Hiccup, pay attention! Hiccup, you'll never learn how to be a good Viking chief if you can't sit still! Hiccup, stop drawing on that!"

It was such a perfect mimic of the Stoick she remembered, that deep voice and that strong bluster, that she burst out in a throaty, rusty laugh. "Oh, you dear thing," she said. "You sound just like your father."

Hiccup's whole face brightened like a small sun. "Mom," he said. "Will you come home now?"

She faltered. "I...I don't know," she said, and she hated herself for the way the light dimmed in his eyes. "I've been gone so long. My place isn't in Berk, my place is with my dragons."

"Yeah, but you can bring your dragons!" Hiccup said. "If I've learned anything from Toothless, it's that dragons and Vikings aren't meant to fight. We can change things, Mom! And you probably know a whole lot more than I do. And Dad will listen to you. He will. All of Berk will. We can make everything-"

"Hiccup," she interrupted, tugging on his hands. His fingers were long and slim, a sign of how tall he would eventually grow when the rest of his body caught up. "Hiccup, my love, it's not that simple."

"Why?" he asked. "Why is it not that simple?"

His eyes shone with that bright surety that only a child could manage. She finally reached out to stroke his hair; it felt sun-warm and silky. She wondered what his first words had been, how old he was when he took his first steps, what foods he liked and what he was afraid of and what he hoped to become. She wondered what Stoick would say if she came back, and what he would say if she came back with a flock of dragons in tow. She wondered what he would say when he found out she stayed with the dragons who took her rather than returning to her family.

She wondered what Hiccup would say if she told him she spent fifteen years imagining him as a young Stoick, killing her dragons without mercy.

"Because I'm your mother and I say so," she said at last. Hiccup snorted and rolled his eyes, breaking the moment, and she forced herself to smile. "Really, love, it's getting dark. You should get home."

"But I was going to try out the new tailfin for Toothless," Hiccup protested. "See? I built it." He hastily unrolled the leather wing for her to see. "I've gone through a couple different models, especially after the first one was shredded, but it's working."

"It's clever," Valka said and really, it was. "You're a clever boy, Hiccup."

His ears turned pink. She wondered how often he heard praise like that. "I mean, it's not that fancy," he said, shrugging as he looked down at his handiwork. "It's mostly trying to get the proportions right. But Toothless seems to like it, right, bud?" The dragon yelped and bounded around, his half-tail bouncing lightly behind him, and Hiccup laughed.

"Have you taken him flying?" Valka asked.

"Yeah," Hiccup said. "I never imagined that flying could be that amazing. But it is."

Valka felt a sudden burst of pride. "My son, the dragon rider," she said, squeezing his shoulders.

"Yeah," Hiccup said, flashing a lopsided smile. "I'm a dragon rider."

She stood up, pulled him to his feet, and then turned him around towards the ridge of the cove. "Now go home, little one," she scolded, swatting him lightly on the behind.

"Ow," he complained, but he was grinning. "Will you be here tomorrow?"

"Most likely," she said. "I came here to bring back my Night Fury...but it seems like he's yours now. I'm not entirely sure where to go from here."

Hiccup faltered. "You can always come back to Berk," he offered again.

She kissed his forehead. "Go home," she repeated.

"Okay," he whispered.

He said his goodbyes to Toothless, scratching him under the chin, and gathered up his prosthetic tailfin. Valka watched him, hungry for every move and expression and gesture.

"Bye, Mom," he said.

"Goodbye, lovey," she said, and she watched him climb over the ridge. He paused at the top to wave, already small and distant, and she waved back, knowing full well that he was taking her heart with him.

Author's Notes:

Well, hello, everyone!

It's been a terribly long time, I know. And this isn't even my usual fandom.

Well, to sum things up, just as my life was settling down last year...a new wrench got thrown into the mix and I still haven't properly recovered. I've chosen not to get into it at the moment, but suffice to say what was supposed to be a joyful year of new beginnings turned into me being a secretly sobbing wreck. Things are better, and I'm stronger than I thought, but I'm still not 100% there.

But at least I'm able to write again.

I've loved HTTYD since it came out (ask me about the cake I made) and recently saw HTTYD 2, which pretty much killed me. Like I was laugh-sobbing through it. And sparked me into writing things. And not only this; I've started working on Rise of the Brave Tangled Frozen Dragons stuff. So that's happening.

So please! If you liked this, please let me know. And there's two more parts to this, so follow if you'd like to see the rest! But I'm super rusty on writing, so any encouragement is super super appreciated. And I'm on the tumblr; I recently switched over to a new blog at themetaphorgirl, although my hellogidgett and redbullandcupcakebatter tumblrs are still up and running. I'm always looking for new friends, so come on over and introduce yourself!