Riders of B E R K

Part 52: Judge or be judged

Fifty-Two: Judge or be judged.

I persuaded Gobber to release Hiccup to my custody-which mean the infirmary in the first instance, so I could get Gothi to check him over. He was quiet and withdrawn, head down and unable to meet the hostile and accusing glares that everyone was firing at him as I led him in and took him straight to Gothi. She stared up at him for less than a moment before hugging him and it was touching to see him crouch forward to fold his long arms around her tiny, bowed shape. Then she pulled him to the couch and he passively allowed her to check him over, asking short queries in her mechanical voice. I made to leave, to give him his privacy but he stretched an arm out to me and his eyes begged me to stay, so I moved from jailor to next of kin without missing a beat.

Gothi's verdict was pretty damning. He had lost weight and had been badly beaten. There was a hairline crack on one cheek-from his father's punch-and he was concussed. There were older scars on his body that had happened in the last couple of weeks since we had been captured, confirming my guess that though he had supposedly joined them, none of them had treated him well. The cut to the side of his neck worried me: he flinched when she asked him about it and clammed up, which I recognised was him trying to cope with a traumatic experience. He really had never learned to talk-to trust-anyone. So I swore to make him trust me.

Once she was done, I took him to the mess: it wasn't official mealtimes but I had commed the chef and he and his team had whipped us up something and I locked the door and made sure he ate it, watching him wolf the plate like a starving man. Breathing hard, he looked up at me as he had almost finished and finally asked me: "Why?" And I had a much better answer than he managed to the same question.

"Because I love you, doofus, and I'm not having you wasting away or suffering if I can do anything about it!" I told him determinedly. His eyes widened and then he smiled, though it was a very melancholy expression.

"Um...fairly sure I'm about to stand trial for treason," he sighed. "I think they shoot you for that!"

"Not if I can help it," I said firmly. "Your father is being wholly unreasonable and I am certain...from reading his dossier and reports of his previous missions...that he has granted far greater latitude to officers on his teams when on mission. He expects standards from you that are unachievable and unreasonable even from fully trained specialist covert ops soldiers," I told him softly. He sagged.

"I'm never going to be good enough for him," he murmured and turned back to his plate, but his appetite seemed to have gone. I leaned forward and grasped his hand, my thumb stroking over the back of his hand.

"You're good enough for me," I murmured softly. "And I won't let him harm you, Dragon Boy. If I have to recruit every damned officer in the base, I won't allow him to convict you and lock you up. You did what you felt you had to and you may have done it from a place of fear but it was the right decision-I understand that now." His eyes flicked up and there was sudden relief and gratitude...and I felt a huge weight of responsibility to him now that he had been crushingly and finally rejected by his father.

"Thanks," he said quietly, staring at his plate. He visibly forced himself to clean it and then look up. "So what now?" I rose and took his hand, gently leading him along to Pen Two, where I led him in. His access codes had all been revoked as had his unique visual ident system and his com was effectively a tag, like they put on criminals: if he removed it, he was to be hunted down and imprisoned. But I didn't think he'd run from this place because the only things he valued were here-Toothless, his best friend...and me. I let us in, shoved him through the portal and closed the door swiftly, then shoved him forward and whistled. The caw as Stormfly swooped in was matched by the roar of a Night Fury and the broken expression on his face lightened to a smile as Toothless bounded into view, his gummy smile and wide green gaze locked only on his beloved Rider. Hiccup didn't even have a chance to exclaim before the dragon landed on him, licking him furiously until he was drenched in tenacious dragon saliva and laughing in happiness at the reunion.