Exile

It can't be my home

Sixteen.

"Oh good-I see you brought my slave back!" Dagur exclaimed cheerfully, his expression sadistic and hand lingering over the handle of his whip. "Hand him over. He's mine!"

Hiccup shuddered but was mercilessly thrust forward and went rigid as Savage grabbed his arm.

"I can't wait to watch what Dagur does with you now, you little traitor!" he hissed and cuffed the boy so hard he saw stars and sagged. He winced. "I'll whip you myself!" the outcast added, seeing the pleasing flash of fear in the boy's dazed eyes.

"Sir, we have something to say!" Astrid announced. The other riders stood at her back. Stoick scowled and Dagur gave a low snarl.

"This is grown up business!" he shouted.

"I don't want to..." Stoick growled at them.

"Sir! You were wrong to condemn and exile Hiccup when it was obvious the evidence against him is false!" Astrid insisted spiritedly. "We have all worked to prove that what you were shown was false!" Hiccup dropped his head.

"He had been condemned and cast out..." Stoick began but Snotlout walked forward.

"He's here, now! We all know that he is innocent and this is your chance to do right by him!" he argued brashly. Stoick scowled at the boy but felt he had to listen to his heir. It was, after all, the first halfway intelligent thing Snotlout had actually said. The Berserker watched his face and then threw his hands up in mock horror.

"Oh, come on!" he exclaimed. "Really? You kick the runt out, you send him to the Outcasts when you know how much they want to harm him? Sorry to remind you, Stoick, but you didn't want him-so I took him and when you send me back to my Armada, he will be dragged on along with me!" He grabbed the dishevelled auburn hair and pulled the boy towards him. Hiccup's eyes widened with terror and he swallowed once. Dagur deliberately stroked his cheek and neck as he went rigid, his eyes pleading. Stoick scowled at the scene then turned away, leaving his son to shudder as the Berserker Chief dug his teeth brutally into the boy's burnt shoulder.

"Oops," he said as the boy gave a strangled scream.

"Sir," Astrid said sternly. "We warned you about Lars and you didn't listen. He almost killed you this afternoon. Will you listen to us now before you make another catastrophic mistake?" Stoick spun back and his face was scarlet with rage but he forced himself to accept her point. She had clearly invested a lot in this effort and she was a good Viking. He nodded curtly.

"Speak," he growled. His expression remained sceptical when they calmly and determinedly demonstrated their evidence. His brow furrowed as he saw the comparisons of the two burns with the evidence where he was attacked and saw the drawing. Fishlegs was in turn squeaky with anxiety and enthusiastic about his subject, suddenly going into intricate details of heat signatures and breadth of flame spread. Dagur rolled his eyes.

"Pass my axe," he said with a deliberate yawn. "BORING!" Snotlout and Astrid concisely summarised the discussion with Gothi and then the door creaked as the tiny Elder walked in, her staff towering over her small, rotund shape. Gobber panted in after her and helped Fishlegs translate her scratches on the floor, confirming everything that had been said-and the only person who had obtained the poison Stoick had been given-Lars.

Fishlegs paused then showed him Hiccup's journal. The incriminating diagram was compared to Hiccup's other diagrams and his technical sketches for Toothless's tail. The difference in style and detail were pointed out but most of the Elders were looking confused.

"Hiccup couldn't have drawn them," Tuffnut explained suddenly. Then he held up two pictures of himself-both of them pretty bad. "This one..." And he wafted the picture in his right hand, "was drawn with my right hand and the other..." he waved the other picture, even worse, "with my left." He grinned. "It's obvious!" he added.