Chapter Text
Stoick had missed whittling when he became the Chief of Berk. As a teenager small wooden figurines had lined every flat surface of his father’s house and he’d been good at it. Tributes of his friends and family had been his specialty, as well as replicas of their serpentine foes. Thinking back on it, the auburn haired Chief could recall when Gobber, Alvin, and a visiting Oswald found his tributes to Valka and discovered his crush… That had been a long day.
Still, they were no longer at war with the dragons thanks to his son and Hiccup was well on his way to taking over as Chief of Berk. Since the young Viking’s defeat of Drago Bludvist, where he’d watched his heir come into his own when the twenty year old ordered Stoick to stay back and then rescued his best friend from the madman and the bastard’s Bewilderbeast, it had only been a matter of time. Bludvist had tried to seize Berk, thinking Hiccup dead in a block of ice at Valka’s nest, but wound up only on their island for his final judgement. And when he refused peace Hiccup had swung his sword, Dragonblade, to take the tyrant’s head himself.
Now, with Valka home and Hiccup a Viking seasoned by war, Stoick had slowly started pushing his daily duties onto the younger man. He didn’t tell Hiccup that he was doing so, but in the year since his wife’s return there had been more and more free time.
So, Stoick had rediscovered whittling.
With his model of Toothless finished the night before, he had returned from the Great Hall after breakfast, where everyone was preparing for the start of Dragon Racing season, to start a statue of Hiccup to match it.
Berk was reaching new heights of political importance with Hiccup as Sergeant of Arms for the tribe, officially, and acting as Chief, unofficially. Toothless was ever at his side, along with his team of battle hardened Dragon Riders. Things were taking such a fine shape that Stoick had finally been able to summon Grimmel the Grisly back to Berk, in order to guide their son on this new, much larger, political front.
When Warmongers from the South had threatened the archipelago, before Valka was taken, held at bay only by their lack of knowledge on how to fight the dragons, all Vikings had banned together to forge a peace with those who would have overtaken them. The Great Chiefs had sworn to conquer the dragonshore and rid the Vikings of their reptilian enemy, in addition to sending off fleets of ships, armed to the teeth with warriors, down south to battle the growing dragon population there. All of it to form a one sided alliance with the Southerners, their only goal to keep them out of the North until they were strong enough to fight the threat to the Viking way of life.
His first husband, Grimmel, had been part of the price they paid.
But, just like it had changed everything on the homefront, Hiccup’s friendship with Toothless also changed the destiny of Berk abroad. It was hard to believe that just over six years ago his son had been worshipping Grimmel as the Night Fury Killer and Pale Poacher. He’d longed to walk in his Ergi’s footsteps for all the wrong reasons, rather than realizing that he had gifts from the man that were sorely missed on their island, since Stoick’s husband departed to lead Berk’s fleet.
Still, after the Battle of the Red Death, once Stoick was sure their son would make it, the Chief and Grimmel had begun making plans for him to return, and for Berk to lead a united Viking world against the Southern War Lords.
Then Drago had been sent by the Southerners before Grimmel could extricate himself and his fleet. Instead of catching Berk off guard and reigning destruction upon them as the War Lords planned, Hiccup had only proven how much more he was ready for. He had taken the head of his Ergi’s only equal and rival in the War Lords’ factions, without ever realizing who Bludvist was, and forced the Southerners to make an alliance of peace with Grimmel, allowing all Vikings to come home.
Soon, any day now as a matter of fact, the legend would return to Berk and by then Stoick would demand Hiccup take his fur and set a time to marry Astrid. It was time and Berk would need something to celebrate as Hiccup led all Vikings, who were ready to name him their King, and their dragons, into another great battle. Neither he nor Grimmel were naive enough to think the War Lords would actually stay in the South for long.
He looked up when Gobber walked into the house alone. At his inquisitive brow Stoick’s second husband only shrugged, “Astrid wanted to talk to Valka.”
That made him hopeful. When a betrothed woman was ready to marry it was tradition that she seek out her mother-in-law, or father-in-law, if the other wasn’t available. For years he’d thought he’d be the one that Astrid would approach, but Frigga had other plans, “Do you think?”
“It seems likely,” Gobber admitted, “Odin knows, if it’s left to the boy they’ll never tie the knot. You’ve got him so busy running this place already! I thought the plan was to get him married before you sucked him into Chiefdom?”
Stoick could easily remember how heartbroken Grimmel was, no matter how the small Viking had tried to hide it in his letters, when he took another husband. It wasn’t Gobber, Hel there had been a time when Grimmel, Gobber, and Alvin had all been expected to take a place in his house, to aid he and Valka with the village and their children. However, after the loss of their wife and Grimmel’s forced departure to keep the South at bay, the knowledge that another would be the one to help him raise Hiccup had hurt the brilliant strategist.
Having been on Berk to see the fierce bond that Gobber forged with his son through fire and blood, Stoick understood that jealousy. He reminded the blacksmith, “That was before Drago. He’s needed to be ready to lead at any moment ever since and manage the load. Although, I will agree that it’s long passed time to add marriage to the pile.”
Gobber sat with him at the table, studying the Chief’s face, “Have you heard from him?”
“No, if a fleet had reached Nadder Isle, Lady Ingerman would have sent word,” The Chief huffed, “Hiccup’s deploying Gustav’s regime to Bear Island next week. If he arrives after that they’ll spot the fleet first.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’ll be a nice welcoming party! A Monstrous Nightmare and a young Viking looking to prove himself to his idol; what could possibly go wrong?” Gobber asked sarcastically, “Why don’t we warn Hiccup? Maybe tell the team to get ahead of trouble?”
“Grimmel has done my bidding to keep the South at bay for twenty years,” Stoick reminded him, his large hand hitting the table for emphasis, “If his only request upon returning is that I let it be a surprise for Hiccup, I’m honoring that request.”
“I thought he said there was something to discuss?”
“That too!”
“Fine, but I just want it acknowledged both Valka and I think it’s a bad idea.”
“Fine,” Stoick shrugged, “How are preparations going for the first race?”
The first Dragon Race, the start of the racing season during the few warm months on Berk, was their biggest event besides Snoggletog. And Hiccup won every year since it started... Other than the Drago fiasco and that was technically a forfeit. Thor forbid, he say that to the boy again, Hiccup would just throw black sheep into Astrid’s basket again like he did at the Final Race the previous season.
If he could get his son alone for a few minutes today, Stoick hoped to be announcing his son to be marked as Chief at the end of the season. These days that was easier said than done unless someone was talking to the Sergeant on the run. Hel’s name, Astrid was probably ready for the wedding just so there was a reason Hiccup had to see her every day… That would be interesting once they moved out and the mighty Hofferson was the new Chief’s main advisor instead of him, Gobber, and Valka.
“It’s the biggest event since Hammish the Second took his fur, as requested,” Gobber informed him, “I know the big announcement got ruined last year with Drago, and repairs from the battle, and Valka’s return, of course, but we still don’t have to rush your retirement!”
“I am sick of you dragging your feet on this, Gobber…”
“I only got the one!”
“He is ready! He has been ready. Why are you trying to push this off so much? My gods, he’s a Viking! He’s the Viking that all Vikings are ready to name their King! We’ve done our job as fathers. I want my elder status and grandchildren immediately, for as long as Odin is willing!”
“He’s only twenty-one, Stoick! And he’s facing a kingdom and marriage, then soon fatherhood. What if it’s too much? The boy has united the Vikings of the world around dragons for six years! When he steps out against the South…”
“He carries all of us with him. He’s a Viking! He’s defended Berk and our allies from Red Deaths and foreign invaders with dragon armies for years now. His fur is screaming his name and so is the tribe!”
“He’s only twenty-one, Stoick!”
“And we were twenty!” The Chief shouted, “By his age Valka was pregnant and we were running things! At least be honest with me about why you stalled this all last season! Why you avoided him all year!”
“We were doing repairs,” Gobber muttered.
“Gobber!”
“He’s the only son we’ve got,” The smith finally whispered, “When he takes on those Warmongers what if something goes wrong? What if he…”
Realizing what his husband couldn’t quite say, the Chief sighed. Slouching in his chair, the larger man reached over and grabbed the blonde’s remaining hand, “He’s a Viking; it’s an occupational hazard.” That earned him a glare from his husband of twenty years, “We can’t stop him, Gobber. We could only prepare him and we’ve done that... But he knows you’re resistant to him accepting the crown, so he’s been putting it off. We can’t always be there to protect him.”
“An elephant never forgets,” Gobber huffed, running his hook over Stoick’s finished tribute to Toothless, his husband only shooting him a dirty look, “I’ll talk to him when he comes to the shop to check on the race. Only time I see him these days.”
“Who are you telling?” Stoick demanded as Valka came rushing back into the house smiling. He returned to trying to get Hiccup’s hair right, “I still have to tell him that tomorrow’s the day. I’m announcing that he takes the knee after the final race.”
“We’re going to have more to announce than that,” Valka squealed.
“When did she consent to the wedding?” Gobber demanded, already planning the event in his head.
“Berk’s first snowfall,” Valka admitted, sinking into the chair next to Gobber, across the table from Stoick.
“Timing couldn’t be better,” Stoick admitted, glancing over at his wife for a reference to get the boy’s face right, “I wish Grim would get back here for the announcement tomorrow.”
“I’m sure I could be persuaded to move my return up,” A new voice in the house made them jump, “So I don’t interrupt the start of my son’s reign.”
All three of them shot up from the table, eyes going toward Hiccup’s loft. Stoick automatically went for his axe, while Valka went for her staff, and Gobber, of course, always had his hook. It took them a moment to process the sight their husband made, where Grimmel the Grisly sat at the edge of Hiccup’s floor, long legs extended before him and crossed at the ankles, his back leaning on the house wall, with a Deathgripper dragon’s head sleeping on his lap.
Valka came back to herself first, staff clattering to the ground as she took in her other husband for the first time in over twenty years, “You’re back! When did you get here?”
The silver haired Viking scratched the dragon under the chin, stirring it just enough that the beast moved off him, “This morning, before Stoick came in to start Hiccup’s likeness. At least… that’s who I assumed it was.”
They all looked down at the little wooden statue that the Chief had been working on since breakfast. It was about complete; looking just like Hiccup had the year before in his Berk armor, when he’d taken Drago’s head.
Grimmel had been there all day watching.
The Commander flung himself from the loft.
Gobber had known this was coming since Stoick ordered the smaller man back to Berk. The Chief was too much of a hopeless romantic like their son and the blacksmith had refused to take away any of Hiccup’s happiness at his mother’s return. But, as he watched the Night Fury Killer soar to his full height and tower over Valka, he saw that the woman’s best friend was about to address what no one else in the tribe could.
Blue eyes that were hard as dragon scales looked on Valka demanding, “Now, I’ll ask the same of you.”
The brunette Viking had been waiting for this moment since she and Gobber first locked eyes within the Bewilderbeast’s nest. Admittedly, Valka had thought it would be Stoick seeking to throttle her and not the ever logical Grimmel, but it was no less than she deserved. When the Chief started forward to defend her, the woman quickly raised a hand to halt him, “Hiccup found me last year.”
Silver hair leaned just a bit closer as Grimmel growled in her face, not sounding unlike his Deathgripper, “I spent twenty years living amongst our enemies, so that Hiccup could grow into the Chief that the tribe needed. My own son won’t recognize my banner when my fleet sails to Berk! And you deserted him!”
Tears were already streaming down her face as Grimmel turned, pacing to the fireplace and back, “And for what? Because dealing with us Vikings was too hard? Look at what he’s done in spite of your absence! Imagine where we would be if he had his mother!”
“I know,” Valka admitted, “I wondered every day who he would become.”
Stoick and Gobber both stared at her. No one their age had heard Valka mention the two decades that she spent with the Bewiderbeast’s nest. Hiccup asked questions of his mother, but that was it. Even a year later, most were still torn between embarrassment of their past treatment of Stoick’s wife, who tried to speak for the dragons long before Hiccup, and outrage at her actions, after watching Stoick’s heartbreak and Hiccup’s hardships. Both Vikings were curious and dreaded to hear what she would say next.
“I wondered every day if he would be as stubborn as Stoick, or as inventive as Gobber,” Valka sized up the man who had been one of her only two friends during her childhood, “Or if he’d develop a mind like yours.”
“Three for three ain’t bad,” Gobber commented to Stoick, where the two had propped themselves up on the kitchen table to watch the two come to terms.
The Chief snorted as his only reply.
Grimmel rolled his eyes at the pair. No matter what may have changed around Berk, those two never would. He felt some of his anger dissipate as his gaze trailed over Valka for the first time without attempting to keep his incandescence closer to his chest than armor, though some embers still burned, “And your love of dragons.”
“The one thing I never considered,” She told him honestly, as she allowed her friend to pull her close for an embrace. And it never had. That Hiccup would love dragons like her was absurd whenever she’d thought about his life on Berk.
Once the two separated, Stoick stepped up to pull in his husband, “Where is the fleet?”
“They should cross Bear Island today,” Grimmel disclosed taking Hiccup’s usual seat at the table.
The others quickly rejoined him as the Chief asked, “Is that what you wanted to talk about?”
“No, what I had in mind is far less pleasant,” The Commander told his husband.
Valka studied his venomous blue gaze that had locked onto Stoick. She had only thought that their husband was mad at her, but the rage in his eyes now was a murderous sort of scary and it was all for the redhead. No one had glowing reports to give about the Chief and Hiccup’s relationship prior to Toothless, but Gobber had given her the full story on the two; the good and the bad. Studying the Chief’s two husbands, Valka realized that it had been foolish to assume the smith wasn’t telling Grimmel about every move the two made for the last twenty years, as often as they could at least.
Breaking a fierce glare on Stoick, Grimmel looked to the Ergi that had helped Hiccup through so much when Gobber sighed. His silver brows went up in inquiry for the other man’s thoughts, as the blonde grabbed the Night Fury bust to fiddle with it using his remaining hand. The Pale Poacher had left Berk at a time when Hiccup was the only good thing left in their lives, so Grimmel recognized the melancholy currently surrounding their blacksmith all too easily.
Gobber shrugged, “I have spent the last six years making it my life’s mission to find out what happened in this house that day. I know I’m about to find out… And now, I’m not sure that I want to know.”
“Do you want to go find Hiccup?” Grimmel offered because he saw no shame in that.
He didn’t even want to know, but was desperate to understand his son. Knowing this meant that he could look into his son’s eyes for the first time in two decades and fully understand the King that Hiccup had become. That didn’t mean he found any joy in the hardships that the baby he’d left behind had been forced to face.
Stoick realized in vivid calamity what this was about. He and Hiccup spoke of what he said before the Battle of the Red Death only once after the boy woke up. Finally ready, the teenager had forced the hard discussion of their family that Stoick had avoided since the worst Viking Berk had ever seen turned ten. Once it was over, Hiccup made him swear that what happened in their house that day before the battle, that their fight’s contents, would never leave its walls.
He watched as Gobber shook his head. The blacksmith had begged to know what happened when Stoick came down to the ships with tears in his eyes, his husband having already spotted the saddle. Gobber had been the one to casually inform him that Hiccup was riding the beast… Toothless. Stoick hadn’t been able to even hear his husband, not really, his last words to his son roaring in his ears too loudly, all the way to the nest.
There was no one but Gobber now, as Hiccup’s only other parent on Berk that day set the stage for the others, “He’d just been handling a Monstrous Nightmare in the training ring. If this one hadn’t spooked Hookfang by throwing his hammer down, I can only imagine what Hiccup’s dramatic little fifteen year old self had planned…”
The Chief flinched, no one was ever going to say that he’d been at his best that day.
Gobber never even noticed his reaction, “...but then Toothless came to save him. I spotted the saddle as we were taking Toothless to Stoick’s ship, Astrid was right in my ear screaming that she’d ridden him too and that it wasn’t Hiccup’s fault…”
Stoick hadn’t known that either. He was sure Gobber told him that day, but when he said he hadn’t been able to hear a thing over his own head… There was no doubt that he was already aware of how much he’d erred long before the Red Death emerged.
Yes, as a Chief, but more importantly, as a father.
“Then you came out of this house and you had tears in your eyes. You wouldn’t talk to me. For the first time in fifteen years… All you did was prepare the ships,” Gobber’s stare was steady, even as it judged him, “I rushed up the hill and I found Hiccup just picking himself up off the floor. He… I started trying to check him over, but there was a look in his eyes that stopped me in the doorway; it was just like you. I’ve never known what he was looking for, but I remember that he was refusing to let himself cry, same as you. Then, he turned and walked out that damned back door!”
Both Valka and Grimmel got the sense that Gobber had cursed the house’s secondary entrance point before, “The next time I saw him, he was riding a Deadly Nadder in to save our lives. After, when Gothi and I were treating him from the battle… I never knew if all the injuries were just from the fight or if...”
“Did you strike him?” Valka gasped. She’d thought that Stoick might be angry enough to lash out at her when he first saw her, but even in that moment he’d been gentle. It terrified her that he might have hit Hiccup when he’d only been fifteen.
“No!” Stoick was horrified, he’d never known that Gobber had been worried about that. Though he realized that he wasn’t totally innocent either. Pushing off from the table, he paced over to the fireplace, “I shoved him, I… We fought, or argued rather. He was begging me for Toothless’ life and then he mentioned having been to the nest and I got tunnel vision. He tried to warn me. He begged me to just listen and I… Oh Gods, I shoved him and he hit the ground. I told him that he wasn’t a Viking… Or my son. But I didn’t... I never would have struck him!”
All three of his spouses stared at him, mouths agape. Stoick had been the one to push for Valka and Grimmel to marry him at nineteen, insistent that who fathered any of Valka’s children was irrelevant. Most Chiefs had never taken an Ergi into their household until their wife’s first child was established, if they weren’t already married prior. Grimmel joining them right after their marriage had been a big scandal on Berk, but none of them ever thought Stoick would say something like that to any of their children.
“Do we have to vote on someone to slap him?” Grimmel asked the other two, “Or should we just start a line?”
“You complete and utter bastard!” Gobber yelled standing and charging over to stand an inch away from the Chief. After staring into those green eyes for a moment, his stomach rolled and the blacksmith had to escape back to the table, unable to look at him anymore.
Stoick wasn’t surprised when his other husband’s dragon woke up and joined them downstairs. As a general rule, Toothless didn’t like any other dragons in the house, besides Hiccup’s team, whose dragons were like the Dragon King’s family. And babies, of course, they always came and went as pleased them. But, the poor Deathgripper and Grimmel didn’t know that, and the creature could clearly tell that the silver Viking was upset.
As Grimmel took Gobber’s place before him, the dragon took its place beside the Commander, growling at the larger Viking. No one would ever be more ashamed of what he said that day then Stoick was himself; he’d regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. The only thing he regretted more was being too stubborn to go back into the house and apologize like he should have.
Grim studied him, “And yet he still rode a dragon into a battle he couldn’t hope to win to defend Berk; to defend you. You must not have been completely useless the first fourteen years.”
Gobber snorted at the table, head held in his good hand, “He had his moments.”
“Did you make it right?” Valka asked where she’d bent to pick up her staff, fiddling with the small noise makers on the end.
“The second I got to him,” Stoick assured her. “Toothless was still trapped on the ships when the Red Death set them ablaze. I saw Astrid drop him onto mine and I just remember running. When the ship went down I dived after him and Toothless, pulled him up first and, once I saw he was breathing, went back for the Night Fury.”
Grimmel stepped away from him, content that the Chief knew how badly he’d erred that day. He wandered over to investigate a large chest that was tied shut; the Commander had been wondering what was in it since he got back to the house. Gesturing to the cabinet, he was disappointed when Stoick just shrugged.
“I know it’s something to do with Hiccup’s gifts for the Dragon Riders for the start of the Racing Season, but that’s all.”
“Why did you go back down for Toothless?” Gobber asked, as he’d always been curious. But, if he hadn’t been able to convince Stoick to tell him what happened after the fight in the arena, there was no way he thought his husband would share what the Chief had been thinking once the Red Death appeared.
“What in Hel’s name was I going to contribute to the fight?” Stoick demanded, “I mean, I was the one who’d gotten us into the mess. And the only one who knew what was happening, besides my boy, seemed to be the dragon. And, now that I think about it, Astrid, but she was a new addition back then.”
That made Gobber chuckle. Their son’s betrothed seemed to figure out just a bit before the rest of them just the sort of Viking their Hiccup would grow into. Astrid was a good one and he couldn’t wait for Grimmel to meet her.
“Did he even know who I was?” Grimmel asked once they’d all taken a collective breath. Did he like what Stoick said and did that day, no. But, there was a reality that he and Gobber had feared far worse for six years. He clarified his question, “Was he even aware that you could have not been his father?”
“He… Yes and no,” Stoick admitted, “I never would talk to him about it. Not until after the Red Death, when he made me. I think, by then, he was scared that… Anyway, he heard rumors, but all I ever told him was that he was my son and heir, and not to mind the gossips.”
“What was he afraid of?” Grimmel demanded, “Oh the irony of our lives.”
Stoick shared a look with Gobber. They were used to this now with Hiccup, once the soon to be Chief got a thought. Since they’d first seen him come into the loop about Johann’s treachery and leadership of the Dragon Hunters in the archipelago, Hiccup proved more and more how much he took after a man he’d only met once as a toddler.
Grimmel the Grizzly had been the legend of Berk, going off to battle the Night Fury species after Valka was taken, and he’d been all but successful to anyone’s recollection. Hiccup constantly held himself in reverence of, and then in opposition to, the man before them with distinction; distinctly before and distinctly after one Toothless of House Haddock.
Valka had to agree that the greatest joy and irony of their distinctly separate lives was Hiccup. He did it with dragons and Vikings in equal measure; their worlds coming back together showed it. She figured out, right before Stoick said it, what he and Gobber had seen coming from thousands of miles away.
“He’s so afraid of you,” Stoick quickly moved to elaborate at Grimmel’s startled look, “I mean… The first time the rumors got him to ask questions, he was ten and he already had me questioning my sanity with the way his mind worked. Sometimes… you weren’t just a legend, you were Berk’s only legend in those days. All the other kids thought you were Loki, himself, come to trickster Thor out of a hairy situation when the Hammer was stolen… Ragnarok itself beating at the door was held at bay by the ‘previous hiccup’ of Berk.
“A turn of phrase which, when paired with Valka’s ironic naming choices… Is responsible for you both owing us an apology for the fourteen years before Toothless, come to think of it!” Stoick glared at his wife and first husband, “Odin is truly the darker form of love. He didn’t have room for any idol of gods or men when compared to his worship of one god and one goddess; the Night Fury Killer and the Fallen Valkyrie. Neither of you were here and there was no room in his mind or heart for anyone else, not for years.”
“Not until Toothless,” Gobber agreed.
“You were jealous of us?” That surprised Valka.
It wasn’t logical, Stoick was well aware of that, “I wanted to connect with my son so much and always felt like I came up short. He didn’t have that Viking bravado, not until after Toothless, and I only ever tried to bring it out in all the wrong ways. Gobber was good at it… Hell, Spitelout was better at it than me some days.”
Grimmel might have been gone from Berk for two decades, but he still knew better than to point out such a thing would make sense. Given Spitelout, whose brawn always fell short compared to Stoick the Vast in the Berk of their teenage years, had been Valka and Grimmel’s third head on a Rageblast dragon, it was a very bad idea to point out that their best friend would be used to pulling out Hiccup’s more reserved sarcasm. Especially if the boy took after his mother and Grimmel’s style, as the Chief was implying. Saying that about Stoick’s old rival would only lead to pain for the whole family, as no one would ever hear the end of it.
“That’s because you were always afraid to push him too hard,” Gobber reminded, “You didn’t expect him to take after you and treat life like it had no limitations.”
“I know you’re right. I should have known the boy would come out big, at fifteen, with a Monstrous Nightmare underhand,” Stoick muttered, “Gets his dramatic flare from these two.”
They all knew that Hiccup was Stoick’s, of course. Green eyes didn’t run in either Gobber or Grimmel’s families, and they certainly hadn’t come from his mother. The fact was, though, that it never should have mattered, especially when the silver haired Berkian knew exactly why Stoick had gone blank at his son’s friendship with Toothless.
He’d laid waste to an entire species of dragons because he and Stoick blamed the Furies’ presence for Valka being taken that night. Hiccup making friends with any dragon was terrifying after what they’d lost, but Grimmel could imagine what his husband, his Chief, faced when a Night Fury came barrelling to Hiccup’s defense.
“So, after he battled and killed a Red Death on the back of a Night Fury,” Grimmel summarized, “Did you let him think I would turn my back on him?”
“I… He’d just lost part of his leg and there was a Night Fury sleeping in my house! I didn’t know how you were going to react; even Spitelout was nervous about what you’d do. And before he woke up, we were afraid to even…” Stoick trailed off and they could all see how horrified the Chief had been. There had been good reason as well. Losing a limb was dangerous and easily led to Valhalla if not properly cared for.
Gobber shuddered at the memory.
The Chief scoffed after a moment to collect himself, “The fact that you took it so well was a miracle, I mean… You were the Night Fury Killer. I… It was part of your identity by the time you came back when Hiccup was a tot. That’s how he knew you, how he idolized you, before Toothless. I couldn’t have stopped it from happening, even if I thought there was something to stop.”
“You came back?” Valka asked. She remembered that the fleets had been leaving one week from the night she was taken. It had been a hope of hers that her dragon knapping would be enough to keep Grimmel in the North, but even then, she had known that wasn’t possible.
“Twice,” The Commander admitted and Valka immediately noted that the Chief and blacksmith were surprised by that information, “I came back once, three years after the initial departure, to assure Berk that the alliance would be held, as long as dragons were purged, starting with the South.”
“So, Hiccup would have been three?”
Grimmel grinned at the memory, “He was precious. Thor Almighty, he was the cutest little… He looked up at me and called me ‘The Night Fury Killer’ when Stoick went to introduce us.”
Three seemed a little young to recognize Grimmel from name and by the title, Valka thought.
The silver maned Viking saw her question, “I asked. He said his dad always told the story of how the mighty Night Fury Killer went forth to avenge the Fallen Valkyrie… It was the first time I ever took genuine pleasure from the title.”
Stoick originally grew a beard to hide when he blushed, because his spouses were relentless in their attempts to embarrass him. It served its purpose well at that moment. But his stories had been the only way he had to connect Hiccup to his fallen mother and Ergi away at war.
“He was calling me Ergi pretty consistently by the time I left two days later, but I doubt he even really remembers it...” They could all see that the fact hurt him, “Regardless, he was my reason for existing all these years,” Grimmel reminded them, “And there is nothing that I would not do for my son.”
He wandered over to Hiccup’s desk, looking at the tail piece covered in dragon scales there,”So, when I got a letter saying that you’d managed to capture an adolescent Night Fury, and that you two had some sort of fight, but Hiccup ran out on Gobber, I invited myself back. Of course, by the time I got here, even with my Deathgrippers and airship, I was watching my son walk from this house, down a leg, and take off on the back of the dragon species I’d hunted to near extinction. Its tail was a sigil all Hiccup’s own and I had to learn about the Battle of the Red Death.”
Both Chief and smith went wide eyed at the revelation that Grimmel had been back on Berk the day Hiccup woke up. He’d seen them. Stoick had been so relieved to see his son alive that he’d let Hiccup do his thing, showing everyone on the island how he could ride Toothless when not in battle. It had been the boy’s start as the Pride of Berk.
“I think it was easier some days, for him to think that maybe he was your son,” Stoick admitted, although the words tasted like yaknog, “There was a gap that I let develop. I was gone on the ships looking for the nest so often, once he turned ten, and when I refused to talk about the rumors when I was here… They were his greatest terror and hope in those days, all because I let him think I was disappointed in who he was. Because if he wasn’t my son and he didn’t know his mother, who was he possibly in the tribe?”
Stoick and Grimmel stared at one another for several stark minutes, “If he gave up his identity as the Night Fury Killer’s son, then how could he possibly be enough? He’d idolized you for so long...” The Chief snorted, “He did it anyway though. For his friend, his brother. And six years later, here we are.”
They all sat on that for a little bit and Stoick went back to finishing Hiccup’s figurine. It wasn’t quite a modern rendition, as the ginger informed his husband when Grimmel asked. Hiccup had changed in the last year, since he’d been running the village.
The four were still huddled at the table when they heard their son, and his Dragon Riders, coming up the path to the house. The sounds were dampened through the walls, but the trio of Berkians instantly recognized Hiccup’s voice, and with a nod Stoick let Grimmel know it was him, as the small army discussed marriages, since racing and wedding season always ran alongside one another.
“Come on, Hiccup, no one got married all winter,” Grimmel didn’t recognize the voices, but he saw that his spouses did, as their eyes rolled simultaneously, “Heather and I have been putting this off for a year. I don’t want to drag Dagur into this…”
“No need to threaten me with my brother’s unique brand of temper tantrums,” Hiccup dismissed, “It’s on the docket to discuss with Dad before the feast tonight. I’ll have slots for each of you before the Berserkers arrive.”
“Thank you!” The boy admonished; he sounded antsy. And from what Grimmel heard on the way to their house that morning, everyone knew the Chief of Berk had been in a rut since Drago’s attack the previous season. The Hooligan Tribe, at large, was ready to force Hiccup’s fur down his throat, if the Sergeant didn’t get a move on to his status as Chief, “The old man’s head is about to blow off Drago style from listening to my mother.”
“Try if from my perspective,” A girl all but hissed, “If one more person comments on Hiccup being unmarried by twenty-one…”
“Have you met my mother, Astrid?!” The loudest of the boys demanded again, “If I don’t get her moved down to the bottom of the hill…”
“Don’t start with me, Jorgenson!”
“As the Ergi that’s followed him around since we were five years old,” Another boy commented, earning a snort from Gobber. The Commander grinned, as he knew the blonde had followed a similar path with Stoick. He couldn't wait to sit back and hear about the last twenty year from the Ingerman's perspective; it was bound to be hilarious, “Shut your mouth. You know nothing of our parents’ nagging! The village had to wait for you two to flower.”
“It’s no picnic for the foreigner trying to get Ergi status either,” Now that was a voice that Grimmel was equally surprised and pleased to recognize.
He’d been terrified when his best friend’s boy, Little Eret, was moved under Bludvist’s command when the Southerners were trying to infiltrate the North. There was immense relief at knowing that when the man led his fleet into Berk, he could produce the boy safe and, apparently, discussing marriage to a Berkian. He wondered who caught the previous dragon trapper’s attention finally.
“We wanted to get married at Snoggletog! Repairs were done,” Another boy commented, “There was no reason to put it off!”
“You’ve gotta get your Dad over this hump,” A deeper voiced woman agreed, “You took your first head; it’s not the end of the world! Forget the honey, just go for the hatchet!”
Stoick rolled his eyes, but he knew Ruffnut was right. He’d been pushing off marriages since repairs finished, angry about his son not having been announced to take the knee, because Gobber was dragging his feet. It wasn’t fair to keep punishing the rest of the young Vikings because everything got put off.
The door started to push open and a loud whistle echoed through the house, “I am handling it! Give me a few hours, everyone will have their answ…”
“Serge!”
The younger Viking didn’t get to make his excuses and escape into the house, as the established Berkians recognized Gustav’s voice sounding from the air above them. Gobber heard the sarcasm in their son’s voice as he addressed the younger Viking.
“Gustav… Miss home already?”
“There’s a foreign fleet!” It sounded like Gustav had dropped to the ground outside, his voice ragged, “They have a leading party of a hundred and four hundred ships coming behind them just off Bear Island!”
Even from inside, unable to see Hiccup or any of his friends, Grimmel felt the energy outside change dramatically. He could hear the difference in his son’s voice as he became a Viking leader, a military commander, “Pull your team back to Nadder Isle, then no one moves until my team gets there. We send a message with the leading party!”
“Yes, Sergeant!” Gustav cried.
Stoick could hear him running back for his Monstrous Nightmare, Fanghook, and the beast taking off.
Hiccup came tearing into the house then, his team right behind him.
Stoick got ready to stand, to draw the team's attention to the fact that Grimmel’s fleet was friendly and originally from Berk, but the Commander’s hand raised to halt him.
Grimmel couldn’t help it, he needed to see Hiccup like this. He wanted to watch his son as a leader, before everything the young Viking did was colored by his presence. Once the Chief settled back into his seat, none of the Dragon Riders noticing them, Grimmel took them in fully.
Hiccup was bigger than he was expecting. After so long having to put up with slights against the young boy’s size, even abroad as word travelled, Grimmel wasn’t expecting him to be at least as tall, if not a little taller, than his mother now, and almost as built as little Eret. It shouldn’t have been surprising; blacksmiths and trappers tended to bulk up quickly once they hit puberty. That’s what had happened to Eret’s son; hiccups were just notorious late bloomers.
The one member of the group that he was familiar with had his back directly to the table. He looked well in a shirt of bright gold, its design like dragon scales. Big Eret would be relieved when he arrived with the fleet.
There was a beautiful blonde girl standing next to little Eret with her arms crossed. After a moment she moved to lean against him, using the larger Viking’s hip like a perch. An axe of a metal that was foreign to him was strapped to her back, its color bright silver with an orange tinge.
It didn’t escape the Commander that each of the younger Vikings had a different weapon of the same material. The strange metal was used on what looked like a small metal scrap that was laying before Hiccup’s seat at the table Grimmel had claimed. He wondered once again what it was and barely resisted the urge to pick it up.
From the smile that Valka gave the girl, Grimmel assumed that this was Astrid. He wondered if everyone had gone easy on her as Hiccup’s betrothed because she was beautiful? He would not be so easy to impress.
Next to them were two larger boys with their backs to the door of the house. One was a blonde boy, who reminded him of Gobber. Based on the other kids he recognized from Gobber’s descriptions over the years, sparse though their communications had been, Grimmel assumed that this was Hiccup’s best friend, Fishlegs Ingerman.
The other boy was the living impression of Grimmel’s best friend growing up, Spitelout Jorgenson, so he easily assumed him to be little Snotlout. He hoped that his son and the Jorgenson were as close as he and Spitelout had been, despite Stoick and the older Jorgenson’s rivalry. Hopefully the fact that Snotlout was part of Hiccup’s original team of Dragon Riders was a sign of that.
The other two, looking so much like his little brother and each other, made Grimmel smile. The twins were grown now and, from the conversation that he’d heard outside, planning their marriages. He hoped both had chosen well.
There were a lot fewer dragons with them then he was expecting. As a matter of fact, the only dragon that entered following the small band of Vikings was a baby Gronckle that crawled in after the team, and it was barely out of its egg.
Their son was giving orders the entire time Grimmel took him in, “Astrid, move to close down Berk, no one’s in the air that isn’t on patrol. Make sure the outer banks are secure, make patrols as often as you need; I’m sending the auxiliary riders back here as soon as I get out to Nadder Isle.”
“I thought you said Gustav could handle himself,” She demanded, voice as hard as his son’s.
It startled Grimmel to realize that Hiccup was talking to her like he would have Eret, his General. That certainly subverted his expectations, but he was nothing if not adaptable.
“He can, which is why he stays here with you to defend Berk,” Hiccup didn’t hesitate, pulling a hilt the length of his forearm from his belt. Grimmel felt dumb when it ignited, having not realized it was the famed Dragonblade that he’d heard tales of. He gave a second glance to the now recognizable hilt on the table. It was a new, incomplete, Dragonblade with other pieces scattered around it. His son continued unaware, “I won’t make the same mistake I did with Drago.”
The Commander picked up the hilt then, even as Tuffnut slotted himself against the Sergeant of Arms, gasping, “Does this attack mean we get our super secret Dragon Racing gifts early?”
That answered his inquiry about if Tuffnut had chosen a husband well; Grimmnut must have been ecstatic. Grimmel spotted Astrid and Eret roll their eyes in unison, giving one another a look at the two men’s dramatics. For all Little Eret was flashy in presentation, he was practical in behavior. It seemed Hiccup’s betrothed was somewhat similar.
Good for them, but the Pale Poacher still thought it was a boring existence.
“Never let it be said you aren’t the brains of this outfit,” Hiccup grinned at the Thorston, slicing through the ropes holding the cabinet together like warm yak butter.
The doors fell apart and all the room’s eyes feasted on the armor that was revealed inside. It was black as night and looked to be covered in dragon scales, from what Grimmel could see. He recognized them and knew they had to be from Toothless, the famed Night Fury that his son had claimed.
“Is that…”
“Fireproof armor,” Hiccup told his soon to be wife, “I was able to take a full powered plasma blast from Toothless at point blank range wearing this; only knocked me back with no internal damage. It will also make us blend in with our dragons.”
“Oh, it’s just what I always wanted!” Tuffnut exclaimed.
Hiccup grinned as he reached for the gloves first, then the arm guards, “Good, because you each have one in the Great Hall’s armory.”
“That place was destroyed by dragon fire years ago,” Snotlout snorted, “Why there?”
“Because I rebuilt it for Eret as a forge,” Hiccup admitted.
Oh, even better news for his best friend’s arrival to Berk, then.
The previous dragon trapper froze where he’d moved to fasten the Sergeant’s armor into place, his eyes going wide, “You what?”
“That’s what you’ve been doing out there every night?” Astrid demanded.
Ruffnut gave her best friend a look, “You didn’t recognize an entire forge going up around you?”
“When he’s moving lots of heavy things, shirtless, in front of you,” Astrid told her, “Then you can comment.”
Ruff looked Hiccup up and down like she was imagining the scene, “Point made, Hofferson.”
Stoick looked smug in the corner of Grimmel’s gaze, but Hiccup blushed like he wanted Thor to strike him dead right there. Still the Viking moved to answer Eret’s question, “Gobber isn’t speaking to me,” Grimmel saw the blacksmith flinch, but Hiccup still didn’t realize they were there so he just continued, “And once we’re married, you’ll need your own space. He isn’t retiring anytime soon anyway…”
“But I’m not a Berkian,” Eret interrupted, sounding more exasperated then confused, as if he’d said it a hundred times.
It was obvious why when Hiccup shrugged, dismissing it, “You will be. Astrid will take all of you, she knows where the armors are. Suit up!”
“Are we allowing negotiations, Serge?” Snotlout demanded.
“A hundred ships was a slow weekend back in mine and Viggo’s day,” Hiccup hissed, his hand that Eret wasn’t putting armor on going out for emphasis, just like Stoick.
He was unaware of his Ergi affrontedly mouthing ‘A slow weekend?!’ to his father in outrage.
Stoick had to turn away so that he didn’t laugh and give them away.
Hiccup continued boldly, “They can raise the white or negotiate with me when Mjolnir cracks!”
“To Ragnarok!” All the other Dragon Riders hollered in response.
As soon as they started turning to leave, Stoick had enough and soared to his full height, “Not that I wouldn’t love to see you negotiating in Valhalla, son, but its friendly approach!”
“That is not the banner of anyone we…” Hiccup spun on his father, ready to argue the point, but froze when he saw who was sitting at the table with his parents, “...know.”
Grimmel spotted Valka flinch out of the corner of his eye.
All the other Vikings turned swiftly to see their Chief, and the other adults at the table with him. They could see that Hiccup knew who the stranger among them was, but none of the others recognized the silver haired man.
Except for Eret, who misinterpreted Hiccup’s shock, getting nervous about what was about to happen, “Hiccup, this is…”
That seemed to shake his son from where he was mesmerized by Grimmel’s presence. He raised a hand to halt his betrothed, “No, I know! It’s alright, I know who he is.”
Grimmel gave the hilt he was still holding one more glance, before putting it down and standing to face his son, “I’ll admit you not knowing my banner hurts, though it’s expected after so long… And I’m not a man that hurts easily.”
Hiccup was breathless, his own ears only processing what he said next after the word had already left his mouth, “Ergi…”
“When I hear ‘To Ragnarok’ coming from this house, I just invite myself over!” A new voice approached the front door, “What in Helheim is going on around here?”
Grimmel broke eye contact with his son to take in Spitelout’s approach. It took the man a moment to follow Hiccup’s shocked gaze, along with his team’s, where their eyes were locked on the Berkian Commander. When his best friend spotted him, Grimmel chuckled, “What can I say? The means for dealing with unrecognized visitors may have changed, but the method, not so much.”
“Grim!” Spitelout shouted, rushing over to pick the other man up with his embrace.
“Spitelout!” He smiled warmly in his friend’s hold, returning it. When Jorgenson’s hand lingered on his waist as they parted, the silver Viking spotted Stoick giving the irritation of his life a dirty look, and Grimmel’s eyes rolled. Those two would never change, anymore than Stoick and Gobber would.
There was more yelling from outside. They all turned to look when an angry ginger came tearing into the space; he looked to be about Hiccup’s age if Grimmel was judging right. He had a clearly pregnant blonde woman dressed in all black and gold and another woman with black hair and lots of metal on her outfit trailing behind him.
“What is this I hear about an attack? At the start of our season? We will send a message with the first hundred for the rest, Brother!” The man shouted as he marched in going straight for Hiccup.
“Sweetie, if you had your way,” The blond woman said, warmly letting Astrid and Ruffnut join her by each arm and touch her belly in the doorway, “The next four hundred would find nothing but ash on the water when they get there.”
“That’s the message!” Both the foreigner and the dark girl chorused.
To be fair, Hiccup only laughed, “You know, Brother, that was my first reaction,” Then he seized hold of the other man’s chin and turned him to face the returning Berkian.
“Oh Odin’s great, full, majestic beard,” The fiery maned Viking muttered, “Uncle Grimmel!”
It struck him exactly who the other boy must be and Grimmel was embarrassed not to have recognized his nephew; Dagur had been a couple years older than Hiccup when he last docked in Berk. The surprise didn’t show on his face only because he’d spent twenty years among enemies of the North. His eyebrows went up at the pair of them.
After all, he’d heard the most interesting stories of their joint adventures.
“I just felt my arse getting tanned,” Dagur pulled his face away from Hiccup’s hand on his chin, but it wasn’t quite a jerk. Especially given that he moved to sit down propped up on the Viking Sergeant’s still open cabinet.
With an eye roll, Hiccup joined him, arms crossing over his chest, “Try it from my perspective. I took on you and Uncle Alvin.”
“I’m sorry, did you just say uncle?” The dark girl demanded. When she looked over at him, Grimmel recognized Oswald’s green eyes, just like his nephew’s. People always said that Oswald and Stoick should have been brothers; there had even been that possibility.
“Yes, of course, sorry. Sister Heather, meet Uncle Grimmel. He’s our mother’s younger brother; Uncle Grimmnut’s twin brother. The last time he docked on Berk, I was five, you were still leeching in Mom, and so, Hiccup was…?”
“Three,” The Sergeant supplied, his eyes wandering back to Grimmel.
“And Mom was Uncle Alvin’s twin sister?”
“Yes,” Dagur clarified, “That puts the last few years in context, really.”
“Woah,” The twins chorused, staring at him.
“Touch him!” Tuffnut demanded.
“No you!” Ruffnut shoved him closer, only for her twin to hit the floor.
“I’ve never prayed so hard for Ragnarok in my life,” Hiccup admitted to the ginger next to him, “Just unbridled rage, Hel on Midgard, reign down upon me; it would be easier than this.”
Both young Chiefs, one official and one not, looked around for a moment, like they were hoping the ground would crack open and Hel, herself, would appear before them.
Gobber had told him about the deaths of both Alvrid and Oswald, although he’d never heard how his sister met her fate confirmed. Grimmel could guess and would rather cut out his own tongue then ask for clarification in front of his niece, who actually looked so like his sister at that age. That was a terrifying realization. He’d take the tongue of anyone who mentioned the famed Thorston fertility in front of her as well.
“Hello, Heather.”
“Hello,” She waved but didn’t seem to know what to do with the information now that she had it.
“Speaking of family relations though…” Dagur trailed off.
“I just said I was handling it not ten minutes ago coming up the… Oh Odin help me, you were all in here for that,” Hiccup groaned at the realization that it hadn’t just been Stoick, or even Gobber and Valka, inside the house as he approached. Sighing, he continued, “Anyway, Dad, tell them we’re handling it.”
“He’s right,” Stoick agreed readily enough, taking control of the situation, feeling alive for the first time as Chief since the previous year, “Everyone will have a slot for their family’s marriages this season by dinner tonight.”
“And I’m beginning to realize how this reunion might have gotten out of hand,” Spitelout put the room together with an eye roll toward his best friend. When their gazes locked at the gesture Grimmel felt at home with the naturalness of it. The Jorgenson patriarch just grinned at him, “Allow me. Alright! If you are not currently able to claim the last name Haddock, you leave with me.”
“Can we make a case for really very much about to be?” Tuffnut demanded.
“The use of the word currently was very specific, Boynut,” Spitelout called back to him.
Spitelout was relieved for the Chief, honestly. Every man approached elder status differently and Stoick wanted his reverently. It was what had always motivated the mountain of a man and putting it off for a year hadn’t been good for him, but he was stubborn about the timing being perfect.
The only reason Hiccup hadn’t taken the knee in the dirt of Drago’s attempted siege on Berk was because he wanted to make his father happy. He delayed taking his place in the tribe just to let the man have his perfection. It was something they were all ready to embrace with reverence by this point. The life that its coming approach breathed into Stoick was welcomed back.
Dagur locked hands with his brother, ‘It was nice knowing you, Serge.”
“Bold of you to assume I wouldn’t take you with me,” Hiccup informed him, “Astrid, make sure the Berserker Chief doesn’t leave Berk.”
“On it,” The pretty blonde’s voice threw back, already out the door and Grimmel heard a Deadly Nadder chatter, then, “Stormfly! Who wants their Uncle Dagur?!”
“Oh Hel is Great,” The redhead muttered, unsheathing his axe before running out the back door, and Grimmel heard a Triple Stryke sound off. He couldn’t help but wonder at such a creature’s loyalty; they tended to need warmer climates and Berk, even in the summer, was not.
“Who wants their Uncle Dagur? You do, yes you do!,” Astrid demanded again, “Alright, fetch!”
Grimmel felt the stubborn burn of appreciation spark against his earlier skepticism. Hiccup was far too experienced to call on his betrothed for aid if she could not follow through. That she was ready to act in his stead with both powerful dragons and Viking Chiefs was telling. He wondered if she knew how to use the axe she carried, but if Dagur’s reaction suggested anything, the answer was yes.
Hiccup looked at the large blonde Viking who was heading out behind Snotlout. Fishlegs, as long as Grimmel wasn’t guessing wrong, “Go out to Nadder Isle and warn your mother. You might want to check in on Gustav and make sure he’s not…”
“Having a panic attack? Got it!” The other boy chuckled, “Don’t think this is what he was expecting on his first week of patrol… Meatlug!”
The baby Gronckle followed him out as well, Grimmel noted.
Tuffnut was the last out the door behind his sister and Eret. Grimmel spotted Ruffnut giving him a curious glance as she left behind Fishlegs. His niece and little Eret both stopped in the doorway to hear his nephew’s parting words for Hiccup, “Remember details, there will be an interrogation later. Torture may be invovled.”
“That part I believe,” Hiccup told him with a grin and wink.
Stoick snorted, “Eret!”
The previous dragon trapper looked at the Chief, not sure what to expect after what he realized the man must have heard.
“It didn’t sound like Hiccup told you yet so…” Stoick gestured for Hiccup to take over.
That brought a genuine grin to the Sergeant’s face, now that battle wasn’t impending. Hiccup told his lover, “I talked to Dad. You’re being welcomed into the Hooligan Tribe tonight with the other trappers from your ship. And he’s even presenting you with your own dragon.”
“Really, who?”
“Skullcrusher,” Stoick told him. At the flabbergasted look he received the mighty Viking chuckled, “With Thornado back from parent duty, they’re about to fight. And he’s a younger dragon; he needs someone who can keep up with him and Toothless. Welcome to the family!”
That caused a blinding grin to sprout on the young man’s face and Grimmel couldn’t fight a smile for the boy. He was glad Stoick had taken a liking to the previous dragon trapper and now blacksmith, even before he revealed that he’d made friends with the boy’s father abroad. Whatever the younger Eret was getting ready to say was cut off by the Night Fury Killer’s best friend.
“Let’s go you three,” Spitelout’s voice called back from further down the hill.
“Thank you, Chief!” Eret offered as the door closed.
“We will talk later,” Tuffnut reminded his fiance in the last second before the family was alone.
Hiccup took a deep breath, then just turned to stare at all four of them.
Stoick gave him a moment, but didn’t let it linger too long, “I thought Gustav was being deployed next week?”
“I thought if a fleet I wouldn’t recognize was coming to Berk, I’d be the first to know.”
“Boys,” Valka corrected them quickly. She had felt awkward doing it since she came back, usually wanting to defer to Gobber, but, as more time passed and the smith stubbornly refused to give his blessing to Hiccup, or confide in anyone about why he refused, the result had been silence between the man and his previous apprentice. So, step up she had; no one would survive Stoick and Hiccup if they were left unmanaged.
Hiccup sighed, “Sorry, that wasn’t fair. You know how Gustav is. He completed all his training a week early and was drilling his team harder here then if I just let him go. So…”
Stoick nodded, knowing that it was well within Hiccup’s power to ship the teenager off, as well as how enthusiastic Gustav could be, “Your Ergi wanted his arrival to be a surprise. I didn’t count on…” He made an emphatic gesture toward the door.
Hiccup snorted, his eyes sliding toward the silver Viking, “Welcome back to Berk. Still not for the faint of heart…”
Grimmel hummed at the greeting, “Not for the faint of heart indeed, especially when wars seem to start at the drop of a helmet this close to freezing to death.”
Hiccup blushed, knowing that Gobber must have told his other Ergi about his vivid descriptions of Berk in his youth. Grimmel watched him get nervous and start looking for something to fidget with. Just like setting a trap, he backed away from Hiccup’s seat by half a step, more of a weight repositioning really, drawing his son’s attention to the abandoned hilt.
Like a dragon to dragon nip, Hiccup was less than a foot away from him in a moment, picking up the device as he muttered, “Where did Dagur go again? I swear he should be here for this thrashing.”
“I believe he’s on the run from your future bride,” Grimmel reminded him. The truth was that he had very little interest in his son and nephew’s squabble and told the boy as much, unable to look away from Hiccup now that he was in arms reach, “You and Dagur were teenagers. Even that skirmish with your Uncle Alvin was really just he and your father still having their temper tantrums.”
That earned a deep laugh from Gobber, while Stoick crossed his arms and dropped back into his chair. The other Ergi told his smaller counterpart, “Thor Almighty, I missed you.”
“I’m more interested in how you managed to turn Viggo Grimborne against his only boss in the entirety of the North.”
Hiccup started, looking up at his Ergi for the first time since he’d wandered over, “You knew Viggo?”
“Hmm, he answered to me before he was dispatched here. Krogan answered to Drago Bludvist. The South wanted their dragon hunters to establish a foothold in the North,” Grimmel chuckled, though it was dark, “Viggo had no problems, until he did. I wish he’d said who his rival was before, I would have… What happened?”
“He changed his mind,” Hiccup admitted, “I… We, the Dragon Riders, established our own island…”
“Yes, the Dragon’s Edge,” Grimmel acknowledged, “Your father said you’d be back in six months, bored like all restless teenage Vikings, with no problems. Gobber and I both thought he underestimated you.”
“I don't have to put up with this,” Stoick reminded them, but didn’t move from his seat.
Hiccup rolled his eyes, “Tuffnut and I never liked Johann. By the time we were taking on the Dragon Hunters… Dagur, his wife Mala, our allies to the West, and the Dragon Riders, we came together to dismantle them in the North. When Krogan gained Johann’s favor after Viggo lost sight in one eye, he turned for us… He sacrificed himself to get me away from Johann. Then the traitor… Well, the traitor always dies.”
“That’s the shortest summation of those years I’ve ever heard,” Gobber muttered.
Grimmel smiled down at his son, though not by much, “My sister’s husband, Oswald, used to say that a lot.”
Hiccup grinned at him, “Dagur says it too… Well, hello there.”
The Deathgripper had gotten antsy when so many new people came flooding into the house and made a break for under the table, behind Grimmel. Now that Hiccup was the only new person, like most dragons, the creature couldn't resist investigating him. The long time dragon poacher watched how easily Hiccup reached for a creature, one of four, who barely tolerated any other human long enough to get through meetings with other Vikings, or War Lords. The female was almost hatchling-ish as Hiccup backed her into the room, hand hovering over her snout, seeming to play with her.
“That’s Sifang,” Grimmel introduced them, “You know, I was expecting to see a lot more dragons, maybe even a Night Fury, around these parts.”
“Oh Hel, Toothless!” Hiccup’s attention broke away, leaving a surprised Sifang in his wake, and made for the door.
All his parents laughed at the fact that he’d forgotten his friend was still outside, probably having been waiting for battle at Gustav’s alert. Although the three who had met the Night Fury were well aware that it wouldn’t have been more than a few minutes before Toothless invited himself into the house, once the other dragons took off.
Grimmel watched closely as his son opened the door. He couldn’t fight the instinct to protect him from a threat, no matter how many letters he’d gotten from Stoick and Gobber in the last six years. As soon as the door opened, Hiccup was talking, “Didn’t you hear Spitelout? All Haddocks are in the house!”
There was barely even a flash of black before Hiccup was raised off his feet, lifted into the air as a larger form charged into the house. Grimmel tensed, he couldn’t help it, and was relieved when Valka grabbed his hand to steady him. Despite how angry he was at her, because she’d given up a chance with the boy before him that Grimmel had been denied, the Commander acknowledged that she was much more familiar with dragon civility then he was.
The Night Fury didn’t seem to hesitate as he and Hiccup rough housed in the middle of the floor. The only hiccup, besides his son, was when the creature noticed Sifang. There was a little bit of growling, but quickly Grimmel noticed that his docile girl lowered her head, and then his son’s dragon was fine again. The offspring of lightning and death itself jumped up on the beam of the doorway, hanging there like a bat, and pawing at Hiccup, who jabbed back at him, as if they were really fighting.
After a moment, Hiccup turned to face him once more, and Grimmel could feel his trepidation across the room. Probably used to all sorts of Vikings seeking out the Chief, the Pale Poacher hadn’t warranted much attention from the Night Fury, but once Hiccup’s attention came back to him, that changed. In a blink, the dragon was backing him up against the table, sniffing at his hand.
“Easy, Toothless,” Hiccup called but the creature was already backing off at sensing Grimmel’s… He was going to allow the feeling in his stomach to be called nerves.
He had ruthlessly hunted the entire Fury species to near extinction, he wasn’t afraid to face down a Night Fury. But, even though Toothless had no idea who he was or what he had done, it was quite different to have such a beast underhand with no intention of doing anything except meeting his son’s best friend. When the dragon backed up to sit next to Hiccup, looking to the Viking to explain the new human’s fear, the Sergeant moved to introduce them.
“Ergi, this is Toothless,” That his son started with the title, especially seeing that the boy did it because he was nervous and falling back on how he thought of Grimmel, was endearing, “Toothless, this is my Ergi Grimmel.”
When the dragon took a step closer, clearly wanting to investigate once more, Grimmel stuck out his hand. He glanced toward Hiccup, as he’d just seen the younger man doing it with Sifang minutes ago, to make sure that was right.
Hiccup nodded and Toothless came closer.
After sniffing his hand for a few moments, Grimmel felt the beast place his snouth against his hand and couldn’t stop a slight jump.
“Well, that was different,” He admitted and instantly saw Hiccup’s relief that he wasn’t going on the warpath. If only he didn’t want to ruin the surprise for his son, but instead he said, “Would you take a walk with me? Just you and Toothless? I just have a gift fo…”
“Of course we will,” Hiccup was already agreeing, “Let’s go out the back. Maybe half the tribe won’t find us.”
“I want you two to have all the time together you need,” Stoick cut him off, “But we have to get these marriages sorted out. Do you have a plan?”
Hiccup deflated but seemed to reorganize himself quickly, “Yeah, I do.”
“It won’t take long,” Stoick tried to encourage him.
“It’s fine,” Grimmel agreed with his husband, “Get it done.”
“Does that mean you’re going to be cooperative for once?” Hiccup asked his father, taking his seat at the table and picking his new sword back up.
“Only if you are not trying to change the whole social structure of the tribe,” His father replied, taking his seat at the opposite end of the table.
Valka snorted and moved off into the living area to sit with Grimmel by the fireplace. Gobber stayed at the table between the father and son, but his old friend thought that had more to do with being back against the wall with no way to escape.
Luckily, Stoick smelled the blood in the water.
“First things first, Gobber,” The Chief named the problem, “Speak to him or so help me, Thor, I will get my axe.”
Hiccup waited in silence for a long minute, but, when Gobber only tried to start and struggled, he took over because he just wanted this fixed, “Can you at least tell me what I did?”
The blacksmith was startled by that, “What?”
His previous apprentice shrugged, “Well, you were fine when Toothless and I led the babies and team back to Berk. Then after the Battle for Berk you started avoiding me. What did I do? Was it Drago?”
“No!” Gobber insisted, “You didn’t do anything wrong, Hiccup! I… It wasn’t after the battle, it was after the last race. When Dagur delivered the offer of the crown, all I could think was…”
“I’ll turn it down if you don’t think it’s the right choice for Berk,” Hiccup was steady as he said it. He meant it too. Gobber raised him and if the blacksmith thought it was a bad course, he wanted no part of it.
Grimmel wanted so badly to tell him that he would do no such thing. The North’s greatest, and only chance, was for the Vikings to unite. The only person every Viking would give a crown was Hiccup, and he did not spend decades in the South, enacting his and Stoick’s plot, to have their son lose hope because Gobber got cold feet.
“That’s not it. No one else could unite Vikings the way you have,” Gobber admitted, “My problem hasn’t been political. It’s personal, because I don’t know what I would do if anything happened to you.”
Hiccup smiled at him, “We’re vikings; it’s an occupational hazard.”
Gobber rolled his eyes, both he and his son looking over to see that Stoick was absolutely beaming, “There will be no living with him after today.”
“Speak for yourself, I’m going to stay with Eret,” Hiccup informed his blonde Ergi, “Only person on this island I can trust to hide my arse out.”
“I could sleep in the forge,” Gobber thought, then second guessed his son’s comment about hiding out with Eret only, “What about Astrid?”
“Astrid gives definition to face your problems head on,” The Dragon Rider shrugged.
“That’s true.” Valka contributed, “I suppose I could go back to living with the dragons.”
“So what, I get home and he’s my problem?”
“Until this fur comes off, I can and will banish every one of you,” Stoick reminded them, but he was smiling at his reunited family.
Just before it happened, Grimmel spotted Hiccup’s face transform into sheer deviousness, and then the Sergeant suggested, “I’m sure Spitelout would take you in, Ergi.”
Stoick’s glare was hot like dragon fire, “Is that really how you want to start off these negotiations?”
Putting the last piece into place, Hiccup ignited his new sword, that was forged from dragon metal; a unique mix of Deathsong Amber and Gronckle Iron. He was naming it Peacekeeper. Toothless and Sifang were instantly mesmerized by the fire and he played with the two while continuing their conversation, “I don’t think you’ve got as much wiggle room as you think you do, Dad.”
The Chief had to own that part, “I know everyone is antsy.”
“Dad, if Ergi hadn’t been here, Spitelout might have actually taken your head off,” Hiccup told him, gesturing with the ignited blade. He moved so naturally with it, Grimmel noted, that Stoick didn’t even seem to register that Hiccup had a deadly weapon in his hand; no one did besides him, “And Gods, Uncle Grimmnut… I thought he was going to kill me in the Great Hall earlier.”
“What exactly happened?” Grimmel demanded, “I mean, Odin, there was a huge battle. With a Bewilderbeast from what I was told. How mad can my brother be?”
“It’s not about things getting delayed because of Drago,” Hiccup sighed, turning to his Ergi to explain, “Last year, the day racing started… No, let me back up. When Dragon Racing started five years ago, some events were considered honors in the tribe because it coincides with the summer weddings.”
That made sense to Grimmel. There were certain events that were huge traditions during his day too. The two months during the summer where one couple could marry a day, as well as the first snow and Snoggletog during winter, the two times during the rest of the year that weddings were allowed to take place, were huge events. Particularly in houses where prominent families had people between sixteen and their early twenties; competitions were fierce. Indeed, Hiccup’s team were probably getting talks of public executions from their families, if everything didn’t go off perfectly this season; especially if his husband hadn’t approved any weddings during the last winter either.
He was grateful that they would have at least a year before the South could even think of massing against them. He wondered if he could convince Hiccup to take his crown at Snoggletog? For his son’s sake, as he’d then be a married man and Chief, the timing would be spectacular, “I’m beginning to see where things might be a little hairy for you. Really, Stoick, you’ve left him bare for the vultures while you’re sitting here whittling? You’re not an elder yet, Chief.”
The relief that came over Hiccup’s face was immeasurable as Grimmel reclaimed a seat at the table, this time stealing Valka’s, “Oh Gods, I’ve missed you so much! Please don’t ever leave Berk again!”
“Alright, you cannot let him turn this into anarchy just because you’ve been gone,” Stoick told his husband, “Let’s hear this plan of yours, so I know how much the Council is going to hate me as I retire.”
“I’m really not going as rogue as you might think, Dad. I have one risque choice, but my reasoning is sound.”
“Explain the Big Four to your Ergi.”
“Okay, at the Opening Night feast tonight the first marriage occurs. That’s considered the highest honor and the first of the season’s Big Four weddings. Then tomorrow is the second big night, since the marriage occurs after the first Dragon Race of the season. Third is the Middle Marriage, because it takes place in between the first and second month of the season. Then, the final marriage that takes place after the final race at the Grand Feast; that’s the other big one, besides opening.”
“So naturally you’ll take the first and the last,” Stoick told him, “Marry Tuffnut tonight; it is the highest honor and keeps your uncle securely off our backs. There might be some resistance to you taking a foreign Ergi at the Grand Feast, but we did far more risque in our day.”
“Not even as risque as you might think,” Grimmel offered, “Eret’s father, Eret the Elder, is my General. He’s the one bringing in the fleet for me.”
Stoick and Hiccup both bore matching looks of shock, but his husband recovered first, “Oh Odin be praised! That makes this rather simple…”
“Woah, woah!” Hiccup called the meddling parents back, “We’ve come right up against that unorthodox choice I mentioned earlier.”
The Chief sighed, “Well, let’s hear it.”
“Alright, background,” Hiccup started, “As Dad will recall, last year Dagur married Mala in the Hooligan tradition at the Opening Feast. I was supposed to marry Tuffnut in the evening after the first race and Dad was supposed to announce that I would be taking the knee at the end of the season at the wedding feast.”
“Instead…” Gobber muttered, trailing off with an eye roll.
“Instead?” Grimmel prompted when their son only glared at his father and Gobber. Both men crossed their arms at him, waiting.
“Dad went to inform me that morning, mind you, and I took off. There had always been a plan for me to set a date to marry Astrid when I was announced and I knew if I threw the first race, which I’d never lost, that she’d find me. Which she did… But, before I could ask her, we found Eret and his trappers blown to icy bits by Mom’s Bewilderbeast, while we were riding a Night Fury and Deadly Nadder, and I got my first introduction to the name Drago Bludvist.”
Grimmel let that information sink in, humming, “Now, there was maybe a day between the Battle of the Bewilderbeasts and the Battle for Berk, correct?”
“Not even,” Gobber grouched.
“How long was there between that First Race and the Battle for Berk?”
“Maybe a day,” Hiccup blushed.
That made the returning Berk hero laugh, “Life’s never boring with you around, is it, son?”
Hiccup waved him off with a shrug, “So, with us doing repairs, no one got married last season after that. And Dad refused to let any of the Dragon Riders marry during the winter celebrations, nor did he announce me to take the knee at either event, and now the Jorgensons and Thorstons want their pound of Haddock flesh.”
“Alright, what’s this idea of yours?” Stoick demanded again.
“What if we let Snotlout and Heather marry tonight? Hear me out!” Hiccup demanded, hand with the sword going toward the older Viking, although Grimmel could see it was emphasis, not a threat.
Stoick still didn’t even seem to notice what Hiccup had, just that he’d been told off for interrupting, as he rolled his eyes and recrossed his arms.
But he was listening, Grimmel noted.
“Thank you,” Hiccup noted his effort verbally, “They were supposed to get married at the Grand Feast last year, after Tuffnut and I took the night of the First Race, and Fishlegs and Ruff took the Middle Marriage. Giving them the Opening Feast is an apology that no one can deny. Fishlegs still wants the Middle Marriage; he and Ruff agree that it’s lucky. If you let Tuff and I take the First Race again, I’ll make sure he wins and, between the wedding and victory for his son, that should buy me out of the stable with Uncle Grimmnut!”
“I find out that you have two Ergis and Astrid wanting to marry you, and you give up the biggest honor,” Stoick murmured, “Is this my punishment for being in a rut?”
“You know this will work!” Hiccup insisted.
“You do not have to take a lesser event to appease my nephew,” Grimmel said tersely when he saw that Stoick wasn’t going to. It seemed to him like a political decision on Hiccup’s part because of Dagur’s status as Chief. He was upset that his husband seemed to be considering the plan, “Or throw your record to appease my brother! I’m back now! I can easily walk down the hill and yank the knot in his chain free.”
Hiccup grinned at him but still waved off his Ergi, “It’s really not like that. Tuffnut has always wanted to win, ever since we started Dragon Racing. He wants the victory more than he wants to be the best and I’d rather be the champion than the victorious. It’s why we work. Doing it this way just makes my wedding present really convenient.”
“You won’t feel guilty for not maintaining your record?” Grimmel demanded, “I doubt anyone counted that botched forfeit before the Drago fiasco.”
That pulled a full belly laugh from the younger Viking, “They tried that. So, when we were all determined to have the final race of the season despite repairs, I threw the winning sheep into Astrid’s basket.”
“Oh… If it’s so easy for you to win, I’m surprised others still compete.”
“We’re Vikings, we’ve got stubbornness issues,” Hiccup shrugged, as the Night Fury came to swat at his prosthetic leg. Grimmel was surprised when he took it off and threw the leg into the house, so Toothless could give chase, without so much as pausing their conversation, “Everyone wants to be the one to defeat Toothless. But, no luck yet.”
“I don’t think it’s just Toothless,” His Ergi assured him.
“That’s the truth,” Gobber said, watching as Sifang also took off after the leg, once she watched Toothless for a few passes of fetch.
“That’s also why he only competes in the first and last race of the season these days,” Stoick chuckled.
Hiccup sized his father up, putting Peacekeeper on his belt, discarding Dragonblade to the table, “Dad, I know things with the Jorgensons have always been… complicated, but I was raised with Snotlout, for good or for ill. I want this for him. I’m asking you to let him have tonight.”
Stoick sighed, “And what about marriage requests for the non-formative days?”
While they were working things out, knowing that was Stoick’s concession, the Chieftess of Berk decided to check on those who had left. Valka walked out of the house to find Spitelout sitting on the group of large rocks in the middle of the twenty yards between the Chief’s house and the Jorgensons’. She walked down and perched beside him, “So, what’s happening?”
“Well, I told the kids to make themselves scarce once they got their armor and not to appear until the feast tonight,” Snotlout said, “Chances are one of them is getting slotted to marry. I figured Hiccup can meet up with them whenever Grimmel finishes with him.”
“How did you know he wanted to talk to Hiccup alone?” She asked, always surprised how Spitelout predicted Grimmel with ease, especially after how long they’d been apart.
“Everyone always thought he was such a smarty pants,” Snpitelout muttered, “Manipulative, strategic, all of that yak dung. But he’s still just a man. He’s been away from Berk for twenty years! He wants his spouses and his kid; anything he has to put up with to make those goals are just the necessary obstacles.”
“Alright, so the children, who are about to start running an entire region, mind you, not to mention them taking over the tribe and marrying, are out of the way for a few hours,” Valka agreed.
“So, then I told the Council that Hiccup and Stoick were discussing the marriage schedule,” He shrugged.
“That’s all?”
“Is anything else, anyone else’s business at the moment?” She hummed in response, “I didn’t think so either.”
Valka had long envied Stoick and Hiccup’s easy conversation with everyone. Still, in this moment, if everyone was like her best friend, then she could imagine it being easy, dealing with people. As easy as dealing with dragons, even.
“Then I told the council that if anyone needed anything I’d be sitting here, so that they are not disturbed. Funny how no one ever needs anything when I do this.”
“It’s like they think they’re Odin and Thor almighty sitting up there,” Valka admitted. She’d never done well with the attention that being a Chieftess afforded her. If she’d come back... The Viking liked to think that she would have learned to deal with it, but she had her doubts. She barely got by with Hiccup, Stoick and Gobber bearing the brunt every day during the last year.
“And Loki himself, though they don’t know it.”
“How often have you done this in the last twenty years?”
Spitelout’s head tilted for a moment, “I used to do it whenever he came back from the ships. He lived on those dragon scourging ships after you were taken. At first determined that he could find you, because you always insisted the dragons wouldn’t hurt you. Then, after… Nevermind. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter,” Valka insisted, “I never stayed away because I didn’t care. I cared so much. Your lives mattered to me everyday and I need to know, as much as Grimmel does.”
He huffed, “Grim probably doesn’t know this, I never told him, but Stoick and I had it out right before he came back a little over fifteen years ago. When you were taken… Stoick was in a bad way, Val. He stayed away, he wasn’t acting as Chief.”
The Chieftess knew exactly how her husband and his tunnel vision could be.
“Hiccup had been nursing off my wife, living in my house like Snotlout’s twin, but when he started calling me ‘Dad’ like my own son, I’d had enough…” Spitelout trailed off for a moment, then, “I told Stoick if he wasn’t going to raise Hiccup or run the village, I would, but he had better not expect everyone to halt their lives waiting on him to come back to us, especially not his son.”
Valka flinched at her husband’s pain, as well as the mess that she’d left good people like Gobber and Spitelout to deal with in her absence.
“We didn’t speak again until Grimmel docked in the harbor and he called us on it,” Spitelout admitted with a shrug, “And, Stoick never left the village during the winter months again. But, he packed up and lived to find the nest during the Summer months. He’d come in though, for a night here or there to restock during the warm months, and I’d end up right here.”
“I know it got bad,” Valka had heard the stories of Hiccup and the Chief before Toothless, “But were they close when he was little?”
He shrugged, “After I threatened to take Hiccup, Stoick always made sure to be with him whenever he was on Berk, even when they couldn’t hold a conversation between them during those rough years. And it’s the only time Stoick ever wanted for just his family. So, I made sure no one bothered them.”
“Despite your irritating methods, Spitelout Jorgenson,” Valka told him, arm wrapped around his shoulders and kissing his cheek, “You really are a softie.”
The dark and silver haired Viking grimaced, “I know, much to our parents’ disappointment, we never had a romantic spark between us, but I never would have let anything happen to your son, Val.”
She swallowed back tears at that, fiddling with her staff, “Is that why you sent the letter to Grimmel after the Battle of the Red Death?”
At the Jorgenson patriarch’s startled look, Valka shrugged, “Grimmel admitted to coming back to Berk one time, other than fifteen or more years ago. He said he got a letter; I’m sure Stoick just assumed it was Gobber, but I saw that he was surprised too. Who else would have sounded such an alarm?”
Spitelout sighed and confessed, “He’d just defeated a dragon as large as Berk on the back of a Night Fury and come out alive when Grim got here. But, I’d known that we lost control of the situation when Stoick pounded that hammer and startled Hookfang.”
He smiled at the memory of the arena, “Until then, I’d finally seen Hiccup find his Viking bravado and he looked good with a dragon underhand… It was the perfect blend of you and Stoick. I got excited and didn't know see him losing it until after the damage was done. I'm sorry for that."
"What would Stoick have even let you do?" She acknowledged.
He seemed to side against saying anything further in that vein to the dragonlady, after a moment of appraising her, "And, when Gobber told me on Stoick’s ship, that the man refused to say what went on in the house… I knew we were out of our depth in reaching the Chief; turned out Hiccup still wasn’t, but I thought Grim was our only option.”
“Thank you for being there, for both of them.”
Before he could respond, they both heard the door to the Chief’s house open. The pair of Vikings turned to take in Stoick and Gobber’s emergence, but Valka quickly felt her exasperation blossom when the ginger glared daggers through their proximity to one another… The absolutely lecherous smile that Spitelout shot her husband did not help matters.