Soul of the Sky (HTTYD Runaway Fic)

In The Dark

6 Years Later
Savage
"Quietly!" I hissed to the soldier beside me. He smiled sheepishly, continuing forward with a horrendous clatter of armour. "Lucky the Berkians are all heavy sleepers." I muttered softly to myself, shaking my head. I had no idea how we'd managed to get this far.

The door of the Great Hall glided open almost silently. We crept inside, the other two members of the raiding party sounding like a herd of metal-plated elephants. "Savage, where's the book?" one of them asked, pulling out the tapestries from the wall. "It isn't behind any of the tapestries and there's no secret compartments." I banged my head against the wall in irritation. "Shut up. I'll get it." I responded. My footsteps echoed on the wooden floor as I walked towards the head of the table. The Book of Dragons was stored in plain view on the mantelpiece. "Berkians," I commented as I grabbed it, "are really stupidly obvious."

"I mean, they could have at least tried to hide it." I added as we left the hall. It looked like we'd got away cleanly, but unfortunately one Viking was an early riser. He looked half-asleep and didn't see us at first. I frantically signalled to the other Outcasts to hide, but they, being the idiots they were, are incredibly loud. The young man looked up, at first not registering our presence. When his eyes finally connected to his brain, he momentarily froze. Then he reacted just as I'd expected. "Outcasts!" he yelled, fumbling for a weapon.

"And we're screwed." I muttered, gesturing to the others to follow as I ran for the beach. For once, they did exactly as I'd told them.

*    *    *    *    *

We'd barely made it out of there with our skins intact. The entire village had been woken by the teenager's yells, and we'd been attacked by everyone from old men to an angry five-year-old with a rolling pin. But I had the book, and that was all that mattered. "Alvin will be pleased." I told the other raiders. "We got what we came for."

Stoick
The entire population of Berk stood expectantly before the dais, some still rubbing sleep from their eyes. "What were they after?" Gobber murmured in my ear.
I stepped up, facing my people. "The Book of Dragons has been stolen!"

Outcast raiders had snuck onto the island in the dead of night, snatching the prized text from its place of honour. I couldn't think what they'd want with it, Alvin had probably done it just to provoke a fight. But the fact remains that we'd been invaded, and I still vibrated with the outrage of the theft.

The entire crowd, as expected, erupted with angry yells. Vikings were many things, but sharing? Certainly not one of them.
"SILENCE!" I bellowed. "We need people to retrieve it from Outcast Island." That provoked a less enthusiastic reaction, most people subtly stepping back in a clear sign of 'not me'.
"Why do we even want it back?" one particularly brazen Viking called. "The raids stopped years ago. We don't need it anymore." Gobber sighed. "Because we can't just let 'em take it. What kind of Vikings would we be if we didn't stand up for ourselves?"

The crowd shifted from foot to foot, torn between the urge to stick it to the Outcasts and a reluctance to jeopardise the peace we've had since the dragon raids mysteriously stopped happening.

Fishlegs stepped up. "I'll go." he said determinedly. "I couldn't stop them, but I will get the Book back." The boy had grown up, less timid now than in the past. The other teens followed him almost as easily as they followed Astrid.
"We'll all go." she added, glaring warningly at Snotlout. He hadn't changed that much, and was still often a thick-headed idiot. I sighed. "You might as well try. Astrid, I'm counting on you to keep the others safe." The young Shield Maiden nodded. "I'll do my best."

The lass was a good choice. I thought to myself. When it became clear that I had to choose a new heir, everyone had expected it to be Snotlout. But the once obnoxiously egotistical teen had flat-out refused. "I don't deserve it." he'd said. "Pick Astrid instead." Spitelout had been furious when I'd agreed with his son, but she had never let me down. She was a determined warrior, a strong leader and she'd be a great chieftess some day. The thought reminded me of Hiccup. Would he have turned out so well? I wondered sadly. His memory still felt like a knife to the heart, even after all these years.

"Well then, be off with ye!" Gobber exclaimed cheerily, slapping Fishlegs on the back. "Stop wasting time!"

Fishlegs
"Remind me again why I agreed to this?" Snotlout asked.
"Um, because Astrid would kill you if you didn't?"

We'd been given a boat, some supplies and a ridiculous number of weapons to go after the Book. It was surprising that Stoick had let us go at all, given the current lack of able-bodied people to help rebuild the part of the village that the twins' pranks had trashed. You'd be surprised at how much damage those two could cause, especially when they'd gotten their hands on some old inventions of Hiccup's.

And there I go again, making myself depressed.

"So, plan?" Astrid asked, coming up behind me. I shrugged. "Get in there, knock out some guards, retrieve the Book, run for our lives?" She laughed. "Aren't you supposed to be the strategist?"
"Honestly, I'm out of ideas. Save for some kind of ridiculously complicated plan involving dragon costumes, decoy machines and a barrel of mead, that seems to be the best I've got." I wasn't lying, I had momentarily considered dragon costumes. And decoys (not machines though, none of us had the technical expertise). Mead didn't really come into it.

"And how do you propose we get such things?" Astrid joked. "Because that sounds like the kind of plan that will end in us fighting our way out, and I haven't had a good hand-to-hand brawl in ages."

The moment was interrupted by the twins dragging their ridiculous dead shark out on deck. "Let's use this!" Ruffnut was practically sparking with enthusiasm. "No sharks on Outcast Island, you stupid." Tuffnut sniffed, which immediately resulted in a twin vs. twin battle involving some strange weapons, an iron bar and a herring.

"They're impossible." Astrid groaned. "Okay. Use your dead shark. You can be the decoys. Snotlout, you and Fish take out the guards. I'll get the stupid book." She gave me a look that practically screamed 'why did I agree to this?'
"You owe me for this." she half-jokingly warned.

*   *   *   *   *

Outcast Island loomed on the horizon, ominous and imposing. "Why did they build their houses on a bleak grey rock?" Snotlout whispered. "Because they're insane?" one of the twins responded matter-of-factly. "No, because they like black!"

A subvocal argument followed, with the twins eventually silenced by a blow to the head with the haft of Astrid's axe. "They had no choice. No tribe would take an outcast. And all the good islands, and the slightly less bad islands, already had someone living on them."
"Makes sense."
"But why didn't they just..."
"Shut up! We'll get caught if you keep this up!"

We jumped off the boat as it ran aground on the rocky shore of a deserted cove. "I just hope we'll be able to get it back into the water again." Snotlout whispered, for once being serious. "Alright, everyone know the plan?"
Five nods of assent.

"Then let's go!"