"Hiccup?"
He was looking away from me as he swung the hammer, loosening his arm. He barely twitched when I spoke.
"Hiccup, please."
I no longer cared that my voice was close to furious tears. I no longer cared that he thought I was just like Ruffnut. I just wanted him to look at me, once.
"Let's just spar," he sighed. And crouched down, hammer held before him.
I threw down my axe. "No."
He sighed again, but his eyes were still resolutely looking past my face. "Astrid, I need to learn this. Muscle memory. I'll learn, and then we'll go our different ways, all right?"
"No!" I growled. "No, I don't want that!"
His grip shifted on the hammer. "You have to defend yourself. Never lose your weapon. Rule three. You taught me that."
"I did," I stood up as tall as I could.
"So pick. It. Up," he bit. For a second, hurt and anger blazed from him, and I felt it. Felt something other than icy indifference from him.
Good.
"No," I spat. "N. O. No. Trouble with your hearing, Hiccup?"
His eyes actually snapped to me. "Trouble with your axe, Astrid?"
"Oh, nothing's wrong with it," I held his gaze, and as before, refused to let it go. "Only, I don't think it's mine anymore. You see, a friend fixed it. A very special friend. And I hurt him, thoughtlessly, stupidly. And now he can't even see me. So I don't think I deserve it."
Hiccup's eyes were suddenly incandescent with fury. "You can still see him, though, can you?" he snarled at me. Oh, but he was beautiful angry as well. But there was a skinny fourteen year old screaming inside that lovely exterior. And I hadn't trusted him.
"I can now. I couldn't then," I raised my chin, holding myself as still as a stone in front of Hiccup's poised blow. The hammer was now trembling – with anger? I couldn't tell.
"Oh really? You can… Am I some sort of a game to you? A prize to be won in a dragon-racing contest?" he snarled. "My dad has to think that way, and I suppose Ruff always has, but you…"
I stayed silent. I didn't know what to say.
"I get it, okay? I get it. I'm just a toy, a rope tugged between two teams for fun. Not like stupid useless Hiccup actually feels any…" He broke off, breathing hard.
"Hiccup, I'm sorry," I began, but he raised the hammer higher.
"Are you? Do you know what you even did?" he said wildly.
"I didn't trust you," I replied flatly. "I didn't trust us."
His face twisted up, and he gripped the hammer harder, before whirling fast as Toothless on his metal foot and hurling the thing against the nearest tree. Then he sank down onto a boulder, his face in his hands.
"Why did you do that, Astrid?" his voice was muffled from between his fingers, then he ran them roughly through reddish hair, staring at the ground. "Were you bored with me? Did I do something wrong? Was I away too long, or was I always just a joke to you? Did you find someone else, then? I thought I knew. When I went away, I knew, we... that I was yours, you… were m-mine, it was all…"
"Understood," I breathed.
He nodded miserably. "Everyone knew."
"Oh, Hiccup," I sighed. He still didn't realise.
I wasn't brave enough to go over to him. Instead, I went to stand over by the stream running through the cove, and I stared into it. Heavy, silver fish flashed by. How to explain.
Maybe…
"Hiccup, did you think I'd changed?" I asked softly. "When you came back. Six months away. Was I different? Look different?"
Hiccup's voice was still muffled. I didn't dare turn around. "Not really. Still Astrid, still blonde hair, blue eyes, still…" a swallow, "beautiful. But I didn't think you were different." A snort. "And I'm still always wrong."
I watched the fish. "No, you weren't wrong. You were right. I hadn't changed. A bit older. Bit taller. But not really. You changed though. A lot."
His voice was less muffled; he'd brought his head out of his hands. "I got taller…?"
"You got gorgeous, Hiccup," I smiled sadly. "Absolutely stunningly gorgeous. Ruffnut said you were Baldur and Freyr with the legs of Honir. She wanted you the minute you got off that boat."
"I… what? What?" Hiccup all but squawked. I shook my head.
"It… took me out of my mind for a day or so. I knew you were still, you know, Hiccup Haddock, my loveable little dweeb, but someone replaced you with this outrageously handsome man. It took a while for me to find you again. But one of the first things that happened whilst I was out of my mind was Ruffnut telling me she was setting her cap for you."
Hiccup was making choking sounds. I continued to resist turning around. I couldn't look at him. I needed to keep talking to the Hiccup in my memory, the one my height, with shorter hair and a slightly too-long face.
"I was terrified," I confessed. The words stuck in my mouth, I had to spit them out. "Ruffnut Thorston is pretty, wealthy, and well-connected. Her family are rich traders, she knows all sorts of things I don't, fancy cooking, that sort of thing. My father is dead these twelve years, and my mother is a shieldmaiden with myself and my little brother to care for. We're… we're poor. And the reason I'm always half in armour is because neither of us can sew." That little confession physically tugged at me like a loose tooth. "I was scared of losing you to her." So did that one.
"She baited me, I baited her," I continued. "I hated the idea that anyone could have you who wasn't me. And with the way you are now, well, I think we were both a bit crazy. But I was crazier. Because, see, I took her bait, though I should have known better. Mostly because her plans for you, well, they would have made you miserable. And a tiny part of me still knew that, and was just so angry for you. That tiny part of me still knew you were inside that… all that, and just wanted you to be happy. But it was still tiny, that part."
Hiccup was silent now. I could hear birds on the other side of the valley. I could hear his breathing.
"By the very next day, I knew that you didn't have any idea about how you'd changed. Or even that Ruffnut was trying to impress you. And I'd realised, dimly, that inside, you hadn't changed at all. You didn't even realise why that Brassie chieftess was so keen on you, or why I was going red when you went about shirtless." I smiled at the fish.
Hiccup made a sort of squeaking noise.
"Remember our first training session? We talked about how weaknesses show your strengths, and you made some bitter joke about how the list was at home. I saw the real Hiccup then, for the first time since you came back. My Hiccup. And I was furious that you could still believe all those horrible things about yourself, that all you'd ever been focused on was weaknesses, imaginary or no. I was so angry for you. Again.
"But it was the day we had that fight at dinner that I reallygot it," I sat down on the bank and dabbled my fingers in the water. It was freezing cold, and I let that distract me from the again-growing lump in my throat. "I wanted to see the carvings on your new foot. They looked lovely, and some of them looked like they were on the metal, and I didn't know how anyone could do that without a wax mold. But you…"
"It's an acid," Hiccup mumbled suddenly. "It's a liquid that scratches at metal like a chisel. It burns the skin, though."
My eyes closed. "Don't interrupt the longest apology you're ever going to get," I teased gently. But my heart was singing. He'd spoken to me, even if to cover his discomfort about his foot being mentioned.
"It was your foot, Hiccup, that opened my eyes," I opened them now. "The way you try to ignore it, the way you hate for it to be acknowledged in any way. As though you want to believe it isn't there."
"It's… it's not like I don't know," Hiccup muttered, and the bitterness he always hid was now immensely apparent.
"You always did that," I forged ahead. "Before you went away. Even before you lost it, you'd pretend to ignore – or even joke about - the things you hated but couldn't change. Your height, your strength, your loneliness. Until you couldn't. I saw it again that night at dinner. Ruff kept pushing at you, and you were unhappy. No jokes left, and no way out. And then you got angry."
"She insulted you," Hiccup remembered.
"And I didn't care," I replied. "I didn't care. I would have dragged her outside and thrashed her if I'd been my normal self, but all I could think about was you – and you being unhappy. That once tiny part that knew you were behind that gorgeous face was now all there was of me. The part that cared about you. My Hiccup, the Hiccup I'd always known, who was clever and awkward and sarcastic and silly. Not the beautiful face, but the beautiful... soul."
I have never felt so awkward, so clumsy and exposed. I don't do that sort of thing. But he needed to know. That was more important.
Hiccup made that choking noise again. I heard the click of his metal foot.
I watched the fish.
"I told Ruff," I remembered, "not to push you about your foot. I told her not to call you 'Hic', because you hate it. And I thought: she's not allowed to hurt you. Even if you chose her, she wasn't allowed to hurt you. And I still didn't realise that I'd already done that, that I'd sown the seeds in a fit of jealousy and resentment and fear."
My throat was growing very dry. I've also never talked so long without anyone interrupting. My eyes hurt. I hated it, every second. I've never felt so… naked.
"You did it again, you know," I said, and my voice sounded slow and thick to my own ears. The fish darted closer to me, tame as dragons. "You thought you weren't a Viking. But Hiccup, a Viking is where you're from. You're a Viking no matter what. If you're born in Gaul, you're a Gaul, if you're born in Denmark, you're a Dane. You're a Viking. You're from Berk. And I meant it, that day. You're the best, the very best of us."
I pushed at the fishes' silvery noses, tickled their broad sides. "Hiccup, if you don't want me, if we don't have an… an understanding any more, then I'll… I get it. I'll leave you alone, and you can choose Ruffnut, or whoever your father finds for you. But I want you to know, whatever you choose, that I'm sorry. I hurt you, and I lost who you were, and I'm so sorry."
I stood, and finally turned to face him. His face looked pale, and bewildered, and very, very lost. He just stared at me, mouth slightly slack. The silence stretched out between us, painfully thin. I felt so empty after all those words.
"I'll leave you to think," I dropped my eyes and stepped away.
He immediately lunged at me. "Nonononono," he blurted, and grabbed my wrist – and instinct, or maybe muscle memory, took over.
I span, automatically twisting his wrist painfully behind him, but he retaliated, spinning in turn out of my hold, and suddenly long arms were holding both of mine behind me, one of his elbows pressed against my throat.
My favourite chokehold. I huffed a laugh through my hurt and discomfort.
"Don't, please don't go, Astrid," Hiccup was staring at me now. His face was still bewildered, but the lost look was gone. I was simply glad he was looking at me again. Green eyes, green as a Night Fury's. Green as summer. I'd missed them. And though his longer hair made them appear even greener, they were still the same shape.
"Look what you did," I croaked, smiling at him and tugging at the hold. He'd done it perfectly.
He looked gobsmacked. Again. I liked it on him as much as I always had.
He released me abruptly, his hands hovering at my shoulders, before he dropped them to swing uselessly by his side . "Um. Did I hurt you?"
"Nope, all fine," I rubbed my throat. "See? Muscle memory!"
"Yeah, I did it! I did it, wow. Yeah." He looked down for a moment, then his chin jerked up.
And he punched me in the arm.
"Ow! Hey!" I rubbed at it. It really did hurt.
"That," he said with a certain amount of smug satisfaction, "was for hurting me, and forgetting who I was."
"Hiccup!" I groaned, but I was suddenly aflutter with what might come next.
He didn't disappoint. Long fingers wrapped around my shoulders, and very soft, very insistent lips pressed themselves to mine. My chin was tilted back and I was trying hard not to cry, even as my head swam.
"That's for, well," he whispered, his forehead resting on mine. "You know."
I wrapped my arms around his waist and held on as hard as I dared. "Hiccup, I…"
"I know. Me too." His hand pushed my too-long fringe away from my eyes. "Oh, I've wanted you forever. Gods, Astrid, you are so beautiful, so stubborn and strong. I can't believe you couldn't tell."
"What?" I was incredulous. "Me? Tell what?"
"That I love you, genius," he teased softly. "I love you so much. I must give myself away a hundred times a day. I swear, I'm never so stupid as when I'm with you."
"Oh," my mouth was dry. "I was about to say I'm sorry. Again."
"Oh," he pulled back sharply. "Oh. Well, ah, see what I mean?" he joked weakly. I grabbed his face and pulled his forehead back down to mine.
My chest was tight again, full and tight with the thought of him, the nearness. His breath was sweet and he smelled like metal, leather, clean sweat and woodsmoke.
I'd spent so much time playing with the fish, I hadn't ever seen how clear the water was. And it was suddenly so clear, so clear.
"But I love you too, idiot," I growled. "I love you. So stop that."
"Ah," he said, diplomatically I thought, and relaxed against me once more.
The silence wasn't all that thin anymore. But eventually, he broke it with;
"Do you really think I'm gorgeous?"
And he still doesn't believe me.
"Hiccup, gods!" I buried my face against his shoulder and fought for patience. I was exhausted inside and simply wanted to be near him, and quiet, and soak up some of what we'd regained. But I needed to see it through, I suppose.
"Astrid, you can't be serious," he sounded very logical and practical. "I'm too skinny, I'm not strong, I'm all freckled, except when I burn, and I'm missing…"
I felt his body tense. "Go on," I commanded him in a low voice.
"I'm missing my left foot," he said in a very small voice. It might have been the very first time he'd ever said it aloud.
"Yes," I snapped my head up to glare at him. "You are. Hiccup, you're missing a foot. But you are without doubt the handsomest, most stunning, cleverest and bravest man there has ever been to walk this island, with two feet or none!"
"Astrid, it's awful," he blurted. "It's…"
"It's part of you," I kept my glare up. I was getting good at staring down those big green eyes. It was a skill that might come in handy. "Show me."
"Astrid," he moaned.
"I love you, Hiccup," I lifted my chin. It was easier to say it the second time. "All of you. And that includes scars and steel and missing limb. Show me."
"It's not…" he swallowed and looked away. "It's awful."
"Yes. You said," I pushed him back down on the boulder. "Show. Me."
He flushed, and then started pulling at his leggings. The left leg was bound, not with leather straps as Gobber's had been, but with a kind of leather and steel harness that fit up to Hiccup's knee. He unbuckled it reluctantly, and I sensed the reliance he felt on his creation of metal and wood and leather. I put my hand on his.
"Hiccup." I tried to regain my calmest voice. My gentlest. "Let me."
His breath stopped. His hands were shaking, tense and stiff, but finally he gave my hand a squeeze and dropped his own into his lap.
I found the other buckle on the other side of the leg, and undid it as gently as I could. Hiccup seemed afraid to move, afraid to breathe. I traced a carving, etching rather, on the oiled metal base of the foot. It was beautiful, so elegant and graceful. I patted the side of his knee reassuringly, and drew off the cylindrical harness. Underneath was a leather sock somewhat like Gobber's lambswool one. I felt, rather than heard, Hiccup's indrawn breath of apprehension. Of fear.
"Hiccup," I said steadily and looked up into his once-more pale face, "if we move forward with this, you have to be sure you're okay about me seeing your leg. Because that means you're not okay with me seeing a part of you. And that really means you're not okay with part of you." I leaned forward. "You're still clinging to this idea that you need to be like everyone else. You're like nobody else. That's… that's why I... that's why. And this," I rubbed his knee, "this is still you, as much as anything else is. And it doesn't matter how it got that way, either."
He looked down at his truncated leg, and then back at me. "Um," he managed.
"What is it?" I rubbed his knee again.
"It sort of does matter," he muttered, "how it got that way, I mean."
"I know," I decided to cut across the fumbling and the words. "I know it was Toothless. That he saved your life, but it cost your leg. I know you felt angry, and guilty that you felt angry at him. That you hate being reminded of it, in part, because it makes you feel guilty for blaming your best friend."
His eyes grew the largest I had ever, ever seen them. "Who… who told you that?" he gasped.
"Gobber told me about Toothless," I said bluntly. "The rest because I know you."
He fell back, his hands falling behind him to brace against the boulder. "I don't blame... Gobber knew?" he croaked.
"Gobber knows dragons, and he knows you," I replied. "I'm the only one he told."
A small fire of anger was now rekindled in Hiccup's eyes. "Why did he tell you?" he exclaimed.
"Because he thought I needed to know," I snapped back. "And was he right to tell me?"
Hiccup's mouth worked soundlessly as he tried to stoke his anger, but eventually his head fell back with a groan. "He was right."
"Thought so," I answered. I touched the leather tube around his leg. "Can I?"
He looked at it with thinly veiled distaste. "I don't know why you want to," he muttered. "Still, be my guest."
I shook my head. "Hiccup, I already told you why I want to. Now," I started working the leather sleeve off his leg, discovering that it was lined with lambswool after all, "you might feel fine about hating and ignoring a whole part of you, but I'm not."
The sock came off abruptly, and I inspected the inside briefly. "Hmm. You sewed this?" I asked him.
"Ah, yes," he said, clearly incredibly uncomfortable at having his leg revealed, and bewildered that I hadn't looked at it yet.
"You are something else," I shook my head and smiled. "Maybe you can teach me."
"It's not hard," he said, and shrugged awkwardly. I reached for his hand and gave it another squeeze. Then I lifted his knee and gently straightened it out.
There was maybe a handslength, maybe a little more, of his shin still attached under the knee. The thick, angry scars were not as red as Gobber had led me to believe, the neat rows of toothmarks clearly visible on the sides of the leg. The end had obviously been sawn off, and skin stretched over it to create the neat cap. It was cold in the crisp morning air, and goosepimples were forming on his knee.
"Oh, awful, is it?" I smiled at the leg. "Honestly, Hiccup. You're afraid to acknowledge this?"
"It's pretty awful, yeah," he sounded defensive. "You know, the whole best friend ripping off a limb thing, and trying not to be angry that it's gone, and hey look, guilt 'cos he saved my life, and the scars and prickling and phantom pain and the learning how to do everything all over again…"
"Like fly?" I ran my hand over the bumps and valleys of the pinkish scars. In a few years, they'd be silver.
"Like flying, right!" Hiccup crossed his arms, and then shuddered uncontrollably when I ran my finger over the bumpy ridge of a bite-scar.
I pressed my lips against the ridged line where a battlefield sawbones had pulled a flap of his skin closed over the wound that was spilling out his life. "Hiccup, you idiot," I breathed against his scar.
"What?" he asked irritably, and then swallowed hard when he saw what I had done.
"Say, as awful as learning to fly after your best friend injured you for life, ensuring that you'd never be able to do it for yourself again?" I tapped his knee significantly.
"What do you mean? I can fly Toothless just-ohhhhh," he breathed out, his eyes suddenly guilty. "I know. I know. I did that. But he forgave me... and I don't blame him for...I don't..."
"Relax," I nudged him, "he knows exactly what you're going through. He's probably been through every single moment, had every thought you've had. And he loves you."
"But he never… and I spent all that time… he never… I was just so angry…" Hiccup looked stricken.
I nodded. "And you'll spend more. It's not something we can fix overnight, Hiccup. But we'll get there. Just don't hide it from me, okay?"
He still looked worried, but his nod was decisive. "Deal. As long as you tell me any time you think you're likely to forget who I am again," he retorted dryly.
"That's less likely, but deal," I kissed his knee and stood up. He seemed unsure, until I rolled my eyes, and pulled him up by the forearms. He hopped once, before his arm fell naturally onto my shoulders. "See? We fit," I said softly.
"Astrid, I can't just…" Hiccup began. Again.
"You can too," I said firmly. "Get used to the idea that you'll be leaning on me for a long, long time, Hiccup Haddock."
He gave me a long, searching look, and then he smiled. It was utterly radiant. "I could get used to it," he said.