A Chief Protects His Own.

Chapter One

Faint black images ran across his vision, just out of reach, teasing him almost.
His head, there was something wrong with his head. He had hit it on something? Or someone had hit it, he wasn't too sure which. There was a voice, someone was talking to him. He struggled to hear through the fog in his head, it felt like his brain had been chewed by a terrible terror and spat back out again. It was... A girl's voice? He didn't know her, at least he didn't think he knew her. The voice was gaining urgency. Something nagged at him to listen, to be strong for someone, someone who needed him. He strained to hear and words started to come through the fog.

"Wake up! Hey come on! Wake up! Oh Odin don't let him be dead!" There was the sound of clinking, as if someone was chained. With great effort he slid on eyelid open, and was blinded by a bright light. He grimaced.

"Your awake!" The voice whispered, "don't make it too obvious or they might start it again." He opened his eye again, and this time saw that he was in a green iron cage, on a ship. There were cages everywhere, some empty but most held huge dragons. He opened his other eye as the fog began to fade from his head. Turning he saw the girl who was talking to him. Amber eyes looked back at him, framed by auburn hair. She had blood on most of her clothes and skin, and she looked like she hadn't slept for a week.

Probably hadn't slept, he thought to himself. He noticed it was night, and the light that blinded him was a lantern directly above his cage. He remembered something that his captor, Ryker Grimborn, had said to him the previous day.

"You will soon be out of everyone's hair, Hiccup, I have orders to end you on the 'morrow. You brought this upon yourself, all it took was some information and you would have been a free man" Ryker had leered as Hiccup had slumped in the chains keeping him up against the wall. Hiccup had cursed him to burn in Helheim for his deeds. That had earned him a couple of knocks on the head. Explains the headache, he thought.

"Hey," She hissed, "we need to get out of here, tonight. I heard some of the guards saying that Ryker is going to kill you tomorrow." She started to strain against the chains holding her hands together, being careful not to make much noise. She stiffened as a guard came past humming to himself as he went. Hiccup winced as he sat up, Ryker had enjoyed himself yesterday, he thought as something warm started to trickle down his back.
The girl had managed to remove her bonds, though how he could not figure out. She grabbed a small dagger from her boot and held it up against the lock. She quickly checked for any guards and then rammed the blade into the lock mechanism. Hiccup heard a faint click as her cage door opened up. She slipped out and crouched in front of his cage. Opening the door she rushed over to him as he tried to sit up. Slipping an arm under his, she helped him stand up. She looked around and seeing nobody she started to walk towards the nearest dragon cage. Leaning Hiccup against the side of it, she opened as many cages as she could. The dragons slipped silently away into the night as soon as the door was opened. When she opened the last cage a dark shape threw itself over top of her and bound over to Hiccup.

"Toothless," Hiccup whispered placing a hand on the nightfury's nose. Suddenly a shout could be heard below the deck of the boat. The girl ran over cursing under her breath.

"Burn it all that darned beast has woken them up with his galloping all over the place!" She grabbed Hiccup practically throwing him onto Toothless' back. Leaping up behind him she slipped her feet into the tail mechanism. "You'll have to teach me on the fly, we can't wait any longer!"

Toothless leapt up into the air, she almost plunged them into the sea below but moved the tail just in time. "I said you would have to tell me what I'm doing!" She hissed at Hiccup, suddenly she noticed the beads of sweat glistening on his forehead, his face was sunken and pale, his breathing ragged and his eyes shut. She looked and saw the red stain spreading on his shirt. "Alright," she whispered placing a hand on Toothless'side, "get him home as fast as you can fly boy!"

∆Time Skip ∆

The sun was rising over a solemn Berk. It had been 7 days since Hiccup had been captured by Ryker Grimborn during a raid at one of his dragon auctions. Every rider sent out to find him had come back with nothing. No one knew where Hiccup had gone.

Stoick looked out over Berk as people began to get up and start the day. He could see the gang getting ready to go on another scouting mission, but they were obviously missing a blue Deadly Nadder.

"Astrid..." He sighed, turning to the blonde viking standing behind him, "He's going to be okay. I promise" Astrid looked up at him and a single tear dripped on the edge of her chin. Stoick looked at her unsure what to say, he started to walk towards her when somebody shouted "nightfury!"