The Runaway and Outcast (A Httyd Fanfiction)

Chapter 2: Five years later

A/N: Jumping five years in the story, Hiccup takes on the alias Fjalar meaning deceiver to protect his true identity from mercenaries and bounty hunters that are on the hunt for him. He doesn't know Valka by her real name, she goes by the alias Hedda. Valka will discover that Fjalar is in fact her son and her whole world will be turned upside down.

(Normal pov— Five years later)

Valka Haddock was crouched down on the back of her beloved and faithful dragon, Cloudjumper. The two of them were leaving the remnants of a Dragon Hunter base, which was now engulfed in flames. Despite the ferocious fight, the Dragon Hunters put up, Valka was pleased that she and Cloudjumper were able to free over a thousand dragons from being sold to become enslaved beasts of war or killed off for their hides, teeth, or bones. Whatever the Dragonn Hunter's reasons for capturing the dragons, Valka and Cloudjumper foiled their plans and crippled their operation in this region.

The early morning air was crisp and cool, a most welcome sensation to Valka as she raised her mask to allow the air to caress her sweaty face. Gods, being in the air and feeling the air run through her hair and caress her skin was a sensation Valka would never tire of. What she was doing, has been doing for the past two decades has been something Valka has no regrets about because she's free from the abuse, scorn, and hatred that Berk showered upon her.

She was always an outcast even as a girl because she was... different.

Unlike most Viking women, who strived to fight in the shield wall or do their duty to their respective tribes or kingdoms, Valka was somebody who believed that dragons weren't the bloodthirsty monsters that Vikings said that they were. She even went as far as stopping Berk's warriors from killing the dragons they managed to bring down when the winged reptiles raided the Hooligan's home. Such actions were spat upon and many believed Valka to be mad for protecting the "devils" who've been making their lives difficult for the past three centuries. In order to keep Valka in line and to ensure she wouldn't do anything to further taint her reputation and family name, Valka's parents arranged her marriage to Stoick Haddock. The news enraged Valka, she didn't want to spend her days with a man who would not only take over Berk and lead Vikings who are incapable of seeing that dragons aren't monsters, but she didn't want a partner who thought that every problem could be solved with a sword, battle-ax, or war hammer. Valka, however, was given no choice in the matter, she was commanded by her parents to either perform her duty to the tribe by marrying Berk's future chief or she would be cast out of her home.

Valka did what she had to do in order to survive.

She married Stoick, but she was unhappy. The two of them would argue constantly about their beliefs on dragons and how humans should treat them; she believed they weren't the monsters Vikings saw them as and she voiced her belief that man and dragon could come together in coexistence. Stoick, however, was infuriated about his wife's words and voiced the complete opposite— that the dragons have killed hundreds of their people and that they need to be wiped from existence.

Valka would constantly flee from her husband's grasp and seek sanctuary in the forest to release her anger and frustration by screaming until she could no longer or weep until her tears ran dry. She was a young woman who was eighteen winters old who was married to a man ten years older than she was, not just any man, the future chief of Berk. Many on Berk or visiting Viking tribes voiced their suggestions to Stoick saying to dissolve his marriage to Valka because she's a lost cause and a dragon sympathizer, Stoick, however, refused to dissolve his marriage with Valka because he believed he could help steer her on the correct path and see that she was wrong about dragons.

But he was wrong, so very wrong.

When Stoick voiced his desires to have children, Valka had to please her husband's desires. The last time she refused to lay with him, Stoick was drunk and he slapped her into letting him indulge in untold pleasures. It was agony to please a man who was a mountain of muscle who could easily crush her, and when she failed to please him, he would beat her.