There was a sense of urgency all over the Big Black Isle.

It was late into Haustmanundr already, and the Hooligan Tribe was beginning to run out of summer to finish building their shelters before the first frost. Nobody knew how intense the winters here would be; the isle seemed to receive warm bursts of a sweet western wind on its coastline, and a rich current along with it from places unknown. But there was a chance that the warm, moist air of summer would snap and turn bitter earlier than they expected, or that the dampness would become ice and snow when winter arrived. It all seemed to hang over a blade's edge, unknown and uncontrollable until they'd just bucked up and lived through it.

To the credit of Hooligans' sense of hard work, most of the important structures had been built already. They had homes put together from strong, good oak - albeit plain, but there would be time to carve and paint in their favorite garish colors later. There was a Great Hall being started at one far end of the isle, facing the open sea and sitting proudly in its place like a crown. There was a forge in full production now, where Gobber nearly lived at this point to keep on top of all of the tools they needed in order to build a whole new village from scratch. They had some food storage, a few scattered sheep pens and lambing sheds - it was only the finishing touches that remained, but everyone knew that it was those touches which often made the difference between comfort and scarcity.

Chief Hiccup was supposed to be overseeing all of this with purpose and confidence, bolstering everyone's strength as they worked their long, hard days and prepared for an uncertain future. The problem was that he wasn't full of confidence at all; it had been his idea to drag them away from their old home, and though nobody could complain of the beautiful new place, of the extra room, the warmer weather, he'd realized that it was only luck and nothing more that had landed them here. They'd left in a hurry and out of fear - there was so much that they'd been forced to leave behind, things that hadn't seemed important at the time but now he was sorely wishing for. He fretted about food constantly; they had a little salted cod, some barley to make bread and weak beer with, bits of dried fruit and brined meat here and there - but how would they survive when they hadn't been able to farm anything substantial?

Valka had found herself answering him point by point when he was up at the fire late at night, hands fisted in his hair, eyes glassy.

"We have all we need," she said gently. "There is more than enough food in the forests and streams."

"But we can't live on that alone, can we?"

"We're Vikings, son, we can live off of tree bark and sand if we make our minds up to."

He was not satisfied with any of her answers, that distant look on his face never fading. Valka resigned herself to that some nights; on others she would reach and pat his shoulder comfortingly.

"I just need to sleep," he would always say, and she would frown a little at the corners of her mouth. "I'll feel better when I sleep."

But Hiccup didn't sleep; he napped, with fits of night terrors thrown in just for fun. He imagined it like a goblin sitting on his chest, crushing him, hanging the bad dreams above his head as he slept. There were only two kinds of dreams now; falling happily through the clouds, and falling towards a hard, relentless ground. With the first one he always awoke with a renewed sense of optimism that he couldn't explain, before reality slapped him hard across the face - he would never fly like that again. There was no beautiful, black shadow falling along with him, ready to wrap him in protective wings. The disappointment he felt on waking to an empty room always managed to make him feel sick.

The second type was more like a distorted memory. He could feel Grimmel's hands tearing at him in desperation and spite, and he could feel the certainty of death. He had thought he would die, after all - he'd hoped it might be enough that he could save his best friend, just as Toothless had plunged himself, free falling, into a great plume of fire to save Hiccup's life so many years ago. But as he reflected on it, dreamed about it, he felt fear that he hadn't at the time - and so he had begun to dread the nighttime, knowing he would just relive it over and over without end.

"You look awful, babe" Astrid had finally said after two weeks of this, though not unkindly. "Are you sleeping at all?"

"Nope!"

Her face had taken on that stern quality he'd seen on his mother's before. He felt exposed before her at once, though he didn't know why - Astrid had always been so good at finding the roots of what ailed him, what worried him, so he ought to have been used to it.

"It's okay," he'd amended quickly, "I don't even notice anymore."

During the day he could just throw himself at completing a single task at a time - like raising a roof, or setting a post - and he could pretend he was just a villager like his people, with nothing to fret over but what he was doing in that moment. A pleasant trickle of sweat went from his temple to his neck under the midday sun, far preferable to the sort of sweat that had him up cold and shaking like a leaf in the middle of the night.

Despite how helpful that hard work may have been, he'd come to realize that it was just another way of running from his problems. His father's bearskin cloak had been untouched and unworn for the entire duration of Hiccup's time as Chief, as he'd found plenty of excuses to continue avoiding it - it only got in the way, it was too big for his skinny little shoulders anyway. Neither of those things were actually true; he could avoid that cloak forever and keep doing physical labour and think about how frightening it all was, or he could take the thing up and lead properly. His people needed him to stop being a frightened boy.

So on the night that marked his third sleepless week, when his night terrors inevitably woke him up, he just breathed through it, went down to the fire, and wrote himself a list of things to consider.

The first thing: the dragons were not here to help them. Every task was harder and slower now than it had been before. They'd come to rely on them so completely for even menial labors that it was a horrible shock to go back to their old way of life - a way of life that Hiccup had not even known in his adult years.

The second thing: they would have to, eventually, face the prospect of travelling by boat exclusively again. They would have to build a way to get to the bottom of their high, tall island and figure out how to get all their karves and snekkja up and down from the water below.

The third thing: Hiccup was going to have to explain all of this to Berk's friends and allies among the Archipelago, and he'd have to scope out the new surroundings. This new place was far enough away from their old home that it was pushing into unfamiliar territory, and he didn't know how any of the existing tribes out here would respond to his presence.

At last, he wrote down the final big worry on his mind: how could anyone trust him when he had failed them so enormously? It had been his stubbornness and pride that had gotten his father killed, that had led Grimmel to their home, that had forced the dragons to make their final great exodus to the Hidden World. As personal as those losses had been to him, they were not his burden alone. Berk had lost a friend and protector in Stoick, companions and kindred spirits in the dragons, and even the very ground beneath their feet when Hiccup had made the call to pick up everything and leave.

He couldn't ask them all to keep making sacrifices on his behalf. That was all there was to it.

Hiccup went over his completed list until he felt his eyes go unfocused, the words floating and dancing before him. The fire was low but still warm, the hard floorboards somehow more inviting that he'd realized - with his worries thoroughly noted, he fell asleep and didn't wake again until morning.

o0o

"You have that look on your face."

"What look?"

"The one you get before you say something either really, really brilliant, or unbelievably stupid."

Hiccup had to laugh at his betrothed, because she always said things like that in such a matter of fact way that he couldn't tell whether she was poking fun or being serious anymore. The fact remained that he was about to say something, and it would be one of those things.

Spread out on the newly cut floors of the Great Hall was every single book, map, and note he'd been able to scrounge up from his own belongings, and then some. People had been coming by all day, either to convene for a meal or to do some odd bit of finishing work on a beam here and a rafter there, and every single one had given him a hard stare and turned away. He looked insane.

"I need to know what we're working with," he explained, looking up from where he sat cross legged. Astrid crouched - carefully, trying not to disturb his little collection - and poked at one musty old map with her index finger. "We don't know what the climate here is like, long term, or the people who've passed through here before, or even who lives in the area."

"Hey, when you said ' off the map'... " she laughed, shrugging.

"I know, I know. What was I thinking, and all that," he chuckled in return. "I've gotten a couple of supplementary materials from others. Mrs. Ack had some family scrolls, I think Mulch should be coming back around with a travel ledger that's well over two centuries old. Anything people are willing to part with, I'm collecting."

"Any particular reason?"

Hiccup grinned.

"First and foremost, I want to make sure there aren't any records of, say, any flesh eating, murderous Viking islands in the nearby vicinity. Because if there are, you know I would probably be the first to be eaten."

"Just always make sure to have someone meatier around you," she snorted. "Snotlout's a good candidate. Nobody would miss him too much."

"Ha, ha. Yes, I'm very concerned about that. But more importantly, I want there to be… some sort of record room in here. My old house had plenty of books and maps and things, but my dad and I were the only people who were ever able to see most of it. I want copies made of everything and stored where anyone can read and share them," he explained, his fingers twitching as he fought the urge to start gesticulating. "Doesn't it seem strange that we have seven generations of knowledge accumulated by countless families, but it's almost all being passed on by spoken word alone?"

"No," Astrid replied swiftly, but as usual with her, the rebuttal was not a shutdown. "That's how we've always done it, isn't it? What brought on this sudden interest?"

"Honestly, I think some of it's because there's so much I don't know about us and our way of life, but it seems like a weird thing for me to be asking everyone to explain."

"Do you find it less embarrassing to collect people's things than to ask questions, or-?"

Hiccup laughed, shaking his head. "I'm used to embarrassment! There's nothing else I could possibly do that would surprise people anymore, besides."

"I guess not," Astrid said, her face going softer suddenly. "But I don't think that's the only thing, is it?"

"Right as always," he sighed. "Like you're reading my mind."

"So, what is the real reason?"

Hiccup dropped his hands back into his lap, looking down between all the papers, scrawled in so many different styles of writing, covering topics from warfare to farming to cleaning those hard to remove grease stains. There was something comforting about knowing that in seven generations, Berkians were fundamentally what they always were - tough and adaptable. He'd never given them credit for that when he was younger, and believed that he alone was clever enough to make progress into the brighter, better world. But all it had ever taken for them was a little guidance.

"If my father had left me more than memories," he said softly, "if I had some way of knowing what he thought and felt about being a leader… gods, Astrid, the knowledge would be indispensable. I can never go back and ask him, and I'd never thought to do it before because I was too worried about goofing off."

"Don't be so hard on yourself. You didn't know."

"No, no. It's true and I needed to say it," he sighed, looking back up at her face. The traces of humor from before were gone, her brow furrowed slightly as she listened. "I want future Chiefs to be able to look back and know what to do when they're as lost as I am right now. There's so much to be done and a million places to look for the answers, but if we can condense it even a little into something reasonable, then I'll be happy with that."

"I think it's a good idea, then." Astrid had started plucking up some of the smaller bound leather notebooks, gathering them in her arms. "It'll take a long time. And copying everything will definitely be hard work, but…"

"So you do think it's worth it?"

"I do," she said, and in a swift motion she'd raised herself up, tucked the books under her right arm and offered her left to him. She hoisted him off the ground easily, smiling when he went a little unsteady and touched her waist for just long enough to get his bearings. "You look different today."

The last bit threw him off for a moment; it was random, almost too nonchalant for their previous conversation. He raised his eyebrows, waiting for her to elaborate.

"You look well rested, I mean."

"I've managed to sleep through the whole night, every night, for the last four days," he told her. "Isn't that a funny thing to be proud of? Mom said that it made me sound like I was an infant again."

Astrid tilted her head at him, considering. "It's not only that, though."

Softly, carefully, she reached to touch the fur on his shoulder. His father's cloak, sitting there proudly today - he still found it's weight unusual and felt that if he wasn't careful he might drag it along on the ground behind him, but it was no longer collecting dust. She had a fond look in her eyes, a mix of adoration and pride that he so loved and ached to see in her. Her fingers brushed down the grain of it, smoothing it like she was petting him, and then touched the side of his neck.

"I thought it might be good to bring the old thing out for an airing."

"It suits you," she said simply, fingers now sliding to the back of his head, lacing through his hair.

Hiccup glanced about for just a second, checking the hall for a moment - there were plenty of people here but they were scattered all about, focusing on things that were more important at the moment. More importantly, he sort of didn't care too much what they thought just then. One hand shifted to her lower back, bringing her flush to his body, and the other to her soft, rosy cheek.

"I missed you," he breathed, pressing his forehead to hers.

"We've all been working ourselves ragged," she whispered back, melting into him. "I've missed you too."

She kissed him first, a soft, sweet peck on his chin, and he followed with an equally sweet little kiss on her lips. It always started very modestly with Astrid, he found, minus a few special occasions where he'd been overcome - but this was like many kisses they'd shared before. He felt every tension fall away, forgotten at once, putting all his focus into the way she'd angled her head to align their mouths better. She broke away the tiniest fraction and he simply had to follow her, this time urged along by her hand at the back of his head. He swept his hand along the planes of her face, fingertips to her high cheekbones, dancing across her temple as he swept a few strands of golden blonde hair out of her eyes. Her lips parted against his and he mirrored her, fascinated by the way their breath was shared, by the sounds that kissing made. It was such a simple, good pleasure.

He pulled back, watching her eyes slowly reopen, revealing wide, dark pupils ringed with pretty sky blue.

"Astrid," he breathed, for no other reason than that he loved the way her name felt.

"Hey," she breathed back, a laugh seemingly stuck in her throat.

Hiccup was going to kiss her again, he knew, a better and deeper one - they'd gotten no time to themselves since coming here, and it was making him feel antsy. She must have been feeling it too; her fingers gripped him more tightly and she was already opening her mouth again…

"I'm definitely telling on you.

Astrid pulled back like she'd been hit by lightning, her arm wrenching back and sending Hiccup stumbling for a minute, eyes wide. He knew that voice; it always doused him like a bucket of cold water and all the nice, pleasant warmth and buzz of intimacy vanished immediately. She'd dropped the books in her haste and he winced as they hit the ground.

"Go away, Oddr," Astrid shouted at the entrance of the hall, hands on her hips, saucy. "Don't you have a girl to hassle or something?"

"Yeah, but she's busy. You know, working, instead of sneaking off to-"

"We weren't-" Hiccup stuttered, putting his hands up defensively, before the other man had even finished speaking.

Oddr Hofferson, Astrid's second of three formidable older brothers, let out a hearty and rather well projecting laugh. He strode over, ignoring the attention he was attracting from the otherwise unimpressed inhabitants of the hall, picking up one of the fallen books on his way and finally waggling it at his sister.

"What's this?"

"Classified information," she said, glaring. "Not that you could read it anyway."

"Mumma wanted to see you," he said, ignoring her jab, "Says it's important."

"Oh, it's always something important, isn't it?"

"I just want to very kindly remind you and your boyfriend here that we're still legally allowed to break his good leg if he pulls any funny business, and Mumma will be first in line," Oddr sighed, clucking his tongue like he was scolding her very seriously. "She's very concerned about you!"

"I'm the Chief," Hiccup said, uselessly, "you can't break my-"

"So, anyway, like I was saying? This time it is actually important business."

Astrid sighed gustily, pushing at her brother's shoulder in irritation. "This was important business too, but fine, I'll bite. Sorry, Chief."

She threw Hiccup a look, arguably the look; it was all about suggestion, and she was very good at telling him everything she needed to with her expressions alone. Given the others in the hall at the moment, he wondered if maybe it had been a good thing they'd been interrupted after all. He swallowed heavily, casting his eyes back down to the fallen books - hopefully none of them had been damaged, given that they were all at least a century old and completely irreplaceable.

"Well, you know, who am I to keep you from your mother?" he said dryly, shrugging. "Go on, we can catch up later."

Oddr snorted, muttering under his breath, and Astrid bounced on her feet to spot him a quick and final kiss to his cheek. He watched her go, a little entranced by the irritatingly perfect way she flipped her hair back over her shoulder and the sway of her hips, but unfortunately - or, perhaps, fortunately, given that he still had plenty left to do in the daylight hours - Oddr tainted the otherwise lovely image before him with his overly loud laugh and his hand ruffling her hair. Hiccup was sort of glad for a moment that he didn't have any siblings.

Alone again, he set to picking up all those papers and documents and ledgers, and started sorting out piles on one of the great, wide tables.

o0o

Somewhere past sundown, Hiccup had fallen asleep. It seemed like now that he was back to sleeping again, it hit him anywhere and everywhere - he only woke up because he felt a gentle hand pushing at his shoulder. He'd wiped out with his face against the table, hunched over in a way that would surely make his back ache terribly. On top of that, he'd managed to drool over his cheek - his nose wrinkled in disgust as he hurried to wipe it away.

"Hrnn?" he mumbled, very eloquently.

"You've been away all day," the fuzzy, soft voice was saying. "Thought maybe you'd gone somewhere."

He jerked up, still shaky from sleep, and blinked up at his mother's calm, grey eyes. She had her head tilted at him, as though remembering something particular - he noticed that she was holding something but he was too foggy in the head yet to ask her about it.

"Oh, sorry," he muttered, bringing the heel of his palm up to his eyes to try and get the crusty sleep out. "Have you had supper?"

"Don't worry about me," she laughed. "I was more concerned that you hadn't eaten anything. Have you been here this whole time?"

"Most of it," he admitted, standing, cracking his joints and sighing in relief when the ache in them subsided. "I actually had an idea today!"

"Astrid told me all about it."

"That… takes the wind out of my sails. Half the fun of it is patting myself on the back for being so clever."

Valka chuckled, a pleasant sound that had the effect of always making Hiccup feel lighter in the heart. "It's good to see you being so industrious, son. I'll go home and get some pottage started-"

"Oh no, please don't do that," he blurted, partly because he felt a bit rude for having spent the whole evening snoozing and also because he dreaded undercooked barley with a burnt bottom. "I can get it tonight.

"Alright, alright. I can at least make sure the fire's still burning," she relented, rolling her eyes good-naturedly. "Here, I've got a present."

"For who, little old me?"

"It's from your betrothed, and she says she's sorry she couldn't give it to you herself," Valka said, and she pressed a small notebook into his hands. "And to expect more forthcoming."

"Ah, vague, I like it," he snorted, cracking the spine and flipping through it. "It's blank."

"Not the first page, son," Valka hummed, and turned to go. "I'll leave you to that. You might want to hurry along home when you're finished cleaning up, just to make sure I don't make something truly dreadful to eat out of desperation."

"I got it, mom! I'll be right behind you."

He grinned after her for a moment, turning the pages to the front of the little book after Valka had slipped off into the darkness. Sure enough, Astrid had scrawled out a message to him:

You said that you wished you could know what your father thought and felt about ruling - maybe you can't anymore, but your heirs should have the chance to know you as you are now. I hope that this is helpful to you.

He reread it over a second time, and a third, the words not sinking in at first. And then, at once, it hit him - she meant it to be a sort of journal, a record of his exploits and fears and worries and triumphs still yet to come. It was such a small thing, but it carried a lot of promise with it; his word caught on the word heir on his fourth reread and his heart jumped up into his throat. It was such a breathtaking thing to imagine this place settled, worn in, full. It was even more breathtaking to imagine his own children growing up here - it made his eyes go blurry suddenly, and even as he blinked away the moisture he felt tight in the chest.

They'd survive this winter. He'd make sure of it.

Hi all! It's been, whew, 8 years or so since I wrote fic for this fandom and a lot about my writing has changed - but what hasn't changed is how captivating i find these characters and the world they're living in. I saw the Hidden World twice in theaters and knew immediately I wanted to write something for it.

Some general notes: I'm trying to stick to some amount of historical accuracy, because I think research is really fun, but I also am taking a lot of liberties. Hopefully they're good ones and not distracting or bad.

I also haven't watched the entire show or anything and just have a vague knowledge of it, so if I make any errors in reference to bits of canon/non canon then please let me know! I love con-crit and I know I'll be coming back to this and tweaking it as I go, so feedback is hugely appreciated.

Thank you and enjoy!