Thirty One.

They walked through the small trading post, close together but wary. Hiccup was sticking close to Astrid, his scrawny shape still wracked by coughs. Astrid had brewed him a mint tea before they had left the Port but it hadn't really helped his cough or bad chest. They inspected the stalls and looked for casual work. Hiccup, as usual, headed for the forge but the blacksmith politely explained he didn't need any help and the boy couldn't help feeling rejected. They managed a little menial work and earned enough for bread and some fish but they could tell the little outpost wasn't really welcoming. They moved on.

The dragons didn't seem to mind the wandering lifestyle-as long as they were fed, fussed and flown. They were adept at sleeping curled up out of sight during the day and understood the need to stay away from strangers. The little terrible terror Hiccup had rescued did survive, though he was rather timid for a Terror and stuck to his saddle-bag nest unless Hiccup called him. The boy automatically began to train him and had named him Fang because the little dragon would bite at anything that came near him-except Hiccup.

The next small village was much the same-wary of the outsider, though this time, Hiccup did manage to get some work at the local forge. Astrid was able to also help at the village kitchens, curing fish and preparing the stew to feed the village. The two outsiders-posing as a young couple-gratefully accepted food and the offer of a bed for the night. There were some comments as they went for a walk together along the shore about 'young love' but the two managed to visit their dragons unseen and snuggled together in a stable in the village under a borrowed blanket. Hiccup curled up tight, worried that he was ruining Astrid's reputation and chances with a future suitor. But the simple fact was that if they pretended to be a couple-they both agreed brother and sister simply wasn't plausible-they would have to appear to sleep together.

There was another reason why Hiccup felt guilt for sleeping against Astrid: his nightmares. They hadn't lessened or improved in any way since her return and every night was fractured by him screaming and pleading with his unseen tormentors to spare him the horrific tortures he had already endured. But most pitiful-and which more and more brought tears to her eyes-were the pathetic whispered apologies to Astrid herself, suing for her forgiveness for being ruined by Dagur's abuse. The more she thought about his situation, the sadder it made her, because it was clear that Hiccup did not deserve any of the pain he had suffered and that he had hoped and dreamed of her for years-and he was now convinced that it was a lost cause. Astrid, though, wasn't so sure. Because she found that every time he was terrified by his nightmares-even when he woke and was ashamed and fighting tears of misery-he calmed in her arms and clung to her for comfort. And when she snuggled against him, he calmed and slept peacefully.

They had been in the village for three days when a routine packet boat came in from the main Port-and with it, messages for the village Chief. And once they had been read, the teens became increasingly aware of suspicious looks at them-especially Hiccup. He retreated to the back of the forge and sighed.

"They know," he told Astrid. "Dagur has sent out word-and a description of me-out with an offer of my weight in silver for my return to him." She gasped.

"Hiccup!" she whispered. "If it's got here..."

"Then I doubt anywhere will be safe for long!" he sighed. "I mean, here is pretty remote..." And then they stopped as the blacksmith walked in on them and stared at them.

"You're him," he said quietly. Hiccup stared at him.

"Um...little help please?" he asked. The smith stared at him.

"The escaped slave," he said in an accusing tone. Hiccup sagged.

"No!" he said definitely. "I was bought by Stoick the Vast of Berk and freed. I did NOT escape."

"Dagur the Deranged of Berserk claims you are his and is offering a generous reward for your return..." the smith told him.

"And you are going to collect?" Hiccup asked him wearily. The smith grasped his arm.

"No," he said quietly, "but others are. You have to leave." Hiccup offered a wan smile.

"Thanks," he said sorrowfully. The smith shrugged and pressed a few coins into his hand.

"You seem like a decent lad and you're a skilled and hard worker," he admitted. "And I don't hold with slavery, me."

"Me too," Hiccup added, clasped the man's hand and grabbed his cloak. Then he and Astrid sneaked out the back of the forge and made a run for their dragons. They barely took off before an armed party of villagers reached their hiding place looking to collect the reward. Hiccup glanced over his shoulder at the torches and sighed. "This doesn't look good," he muttered.

The pattern persisted for the next couple of weeks-never able to stay longer than a couple of days before the news reached where they were hiding, always running. They worked hard, posing as a young couple with no Tribe or family, always pleasant and decent and they always ended run out of town with a few coins and a further blow to their hopes of managing to spend anywhere in peace to recover and take stock.

Finally, Hiccup realised there was no hope of settling in any civilised area because the offer of a lot of silver was very persuasive. He sighed as he stared into the little fire and poked it with a stick as Astrid roasted a couple of fish over the fire. She looked at him worriedly. He did tend to brood and plan but his plans had all gone awry recently because Dagur had acted more quickly and ruthlessly than he had anticipated. And he only had two options: to continue further and further from the sea, where the dragons would be harder to conceal and feed-or return to the Archipelago and go into hiding there until he had sorted his head out.

"What's wrong?" Astrid asked him gently, handing him a well-roasted mackerel and a hunk of fresh bread. He sighed and folded the fish in the bread.

"If we go much further inland, there will be nowhere to hide the dragons and no chance that we won't be met with the same response," he told her, taking a bite.

"The people of the mainland won't be bothered what the Chief of a small tribe wants from way over in the Archipelago!" she told him but he waved his fish at her.

"Don't be too sure!" he told her in a depressed voice. "I may only weigh about ninety pounds but the offer of ninety pounds of silver for me is pretty serious. I'm surprised that there aren't bounty hunters out after us." She started: it was a horrible thought. The escape from the Dragon Trappers had been fraught enough but to think that there could be other people chasing after them...

"How would they find us, Hiccup?" she asked. He sighed.

"Wouldn't be hard to track all those villages we've been chased out of," he shrugged. "Especially that last one-they nearly got us..."

The last village had been scary and there had been no warning. Hiccup had been working in the forge, mending a ploughshare that had become twisted after hitting a rock. It was an unfamiliar task because the majority of his experience had been on weapons. So he had been concentrating a little harder and that had dulled his situational awareness-so he hadn't been alert to the three men creeping up on him-until the last minute. Terrified, he had lashed out with the plough and had caught one across the chest. The would-be captor had fallen back, bleeding profusely while the other two had grabbed at him, one catching his cheek with a punch that had him staggering back. But Hiccup had ducked away, his small size making up for his lack of legs and he had squirmed through the detritus at the back of the forge before they could stop him, racing away with no money and down one cloak. But with his life...

"Yeah, I think you're right," Astrid admitted. "That was far too close for comfort." He broke the fish into pieces, picking out bones absently.

"I don't think the mainland is an option," he said dully.

"Then where?" she asked him. He took a small bite of bread and chewed.

"The islands," he sighed. "We can island hop, find an uninhabited one, maybe find one where Dagur's message hasn't got-or no one trusts him..." Astrid nodded in agreement. Berserkers weren't often trusted in the Archipelago because Dagur seemed to see Treaties as an optional consideration when he decided he wanted to kill someone or conquer something.

"You don't wanna go home?" she asked him. He shuddered.

"What's changed?" he asked despondently. "I'm still the boy that Dagur enslaved, raped, sold..." He closed his eyes. "Do you think anyone on Berk will call me anything different if we walk back in there now?" She sighed. Hooligans were stubborn, often stupid and had a herd mentality. But they had very long memories for any transgression.

"No," she sighed. "Forget I suggested it." He looked at her carefully.

"You can still go home," he reminded her softly. He hadn't mentioned her leaving for a few days though he did, on occasion, check she still wanted to stay with him. She never mentioned her home but he knew from the occasional time he caught her murmuring to Stormfly and staring out to sea that she missed her parents and her two younger brothers. He hated that she felt an obligation to stay when she really wanted to go home. She lifted her head and her blue eyes studied him closely.

"What did I tell you last time, Hiccup?" she asked him in a Schoolmistress voice. He rolled his eyes.

"That you were here because you cared for me, that you weren't going anywhere and if I kept on about it you would axe off my other foot," he said quickly. "But I'm pretty sure you didn't mean that last one..."

"Wanna bet?" she asked him, eyes glittering. He poked the fire again.

"Don't tell me you don't miss your brothers...or your Mom...or even the others..." he suggested.

"Snotlout? Ugh!"

"Fish? Ruff? Even...Tuff?" he suggested. She stared at the fire.

"Sometimes," she admitted. "And you? Don't you miss Gobber...or your Dad?" He gave a very lopsided smile.

"Of course," he told her simply. "He's my Dad. And I would give everything to make him proud. But I...I can't get over how he just believed I would try to harm him, try to kill him. It felt like everything I had done my entire life counted for nothing. " He shook his head. "I'm not ready to go back there just yet." She scooched closer and took his hand.

"Then I'm not either," she reassured him. "We're in this together, Hiccup. Partners." He managed a wan smile.

"Just don't tell your father, please? He'll literally have my head!"

They headed back towards the Archipelago, flying fast and high during the daytime and landing early, occasionally having Astrid sneak into a local village to buy supplies. Hiccup usually stayed away, knowing word of his value was out. He felt ashamed that he had to rely on Astrid so much but he was insanely grateful to her all the same. They flew high because dragons were rare on the mainland and few places had the catapults to shoot at them when flying high: in fact, most of the time, no one even paid them any mind.

They had stopped outside one of the first villages they had visited, a day's flight from the Port when disaster struck. Toothless swung round for a routine landing and the tail refused to move, stuck in the open position. Hiccup moved his foot frantically and then saw the ground coming up fast. He braced and threw his arms across his face.

"Look out...aaargh!" he managed as they slammed into a large holly bush.

It took Astrid a few minutes with Stormfly to fish them out, her axe used to slice away branches and free the limp boy and the stunned dragon. Toothless was apologetic and very worried about Hiccup-until the boy finally came round, his eyes fluttering and finally opening. He was badly scratched and scraped from the hard landing on a very prickly bush and there was a lump on his forehead the size of an egg. He winced, lifting his right hand gingerly and moving the wrist very cautiously. It was swollen but Astrid reckoned it was sprained, not broken. But his first thought was for his dragon.

"Toothless? Are you okay, bud?" he said in a wavering voice, wincing as he scrambled to his knees to hug the Night Fury. The dragon gave a small croon, miserably wafting his stuck tail in Hiccup's face. The boy crawled along and fiddled with the mechanism-until he realised the control rod had snapped. He sighed. "Not our best landing, bud-but not your fault. The control rod snapped. We gotta get a new one or we aren't going anywhere!"

"Don't you have a spare?" Astrid asked him, dabbing at his bleeding scratches with a wet rag. He shook his head.

"I was going to...but we never stayed long enough to get a chance," he sighed. She folded the rag and pressed it hard against the lump on his head and he gave a little sigh of relief and pain. "Thanks, Astrid," he murmured.

"We'll have to get you in and get it repaired," she murmured. "I think this is the village where the blacksmith, Egil, didn't hold with slavery. He may let you use the forge." He sighed.

"They do know about it here," he reminded her.

"It's either that or walk back to the Archipelago," she told him tartly and he winced.

"See if he will help," he said. "I'll wait outside town." She smiled and wrapped her cloak around him, pressing a small kiss on his cheek.

"Don't you worry, Hiccup," she said. "I'll persuade him.." He sighed.

"No axes," he murmured. "And take the control rod. If we let him see what we need, he may be more amenable..." She nodded and took the precious piece of metal. They walked into town and Hiccup hunkered down just beyond the village, not that far from the forge. He could smell the smoke, the hot iron, the warm leather and he smiled, curled up as waited. He missed working in a blacksmith's, the challenge of working the metal, the pleasure of using his skills, the joy of creating something solid and tangible. It made him feel useful.

He stiffened at the sound of a twig cracking, a footstep too close and unfamiliar...because he knew Astrid's steps. He tried to shrink back behind his cover-but a couple of large men round the tree he was sheltering behind and their expressions were cruel.

"There he is!" the shorter, squatter man said. "Thought he wouldn't be far when we saw the blonde girl in the village."

"Please, I mean no harm," Hiccup said, scrambling up and trying to back away, but a large hand clamped on his sprained wrist and he yelped as he was jerked close to the taller, leaner man with really bad body odour and a thick dark stubble on his lined face.

"Yer an escaped slave so yer have no rights!" the man breathed into his ear, almost making Hiccup gag. His hands clamped tight on the boy's other wrist. "We'll get yer tied up tight and then we'll take yer back to yer owner."

"Let me go!" Hiccup protested, writhing and kicking but he was hauled away, still struggling. He was hauled into town, fighting all the way. "Get off me! I am a free man!"

"Yer an escaped slave and yer master has offered a very generous purse for yer return, boy!" the squat man sneered. "And we're gonna collect!" They hauled him into a small shop and they roped him up tightly, his hands painfully tied behind his back and then they threw him to the floor. The door slammed shut and they walked away to hire a boat for the journey. Hiccup lay on the floor: stunned and shocked. The memories of being bound, of being manhandled and being locked up were all playing havoc with his self-control and he found he was shaking. He forced himself to struggle to his knees and slow his breathing, then looked around. He was in a weaver's shop, two looms set up and bales of carded wool and skeins of wool stacked to one side. Bales of folded material were on a table to the other side of the shop. There were some scissors and knives to cutting the wool for the loom but they were out of his reach. He opted for the roughened frame of the door and slid down by it, beginning to rub the ropes around his wrists against the rough wood. He wasn't giving up.

"Hiccup!" He started: it was Astrid's voice.

"Astrid?" he hissed. "Where are you?"

"Outside, obviously," she whispered back. "Are you okay?"

"Well, tied up and imprisoned so normal for me," he said sarcastically. "You?"

"Outside trying to work out how to rescue you-normal for me!" she shot back.

"Have you got the control rod?" he asked. She nodded.

"Yeah..."

"Thank Thor. Could you ask Egil to repair it?" he asked. She smiled.

"He already has. That's why I was gone so long. He was worried about you coming into town because a few people have shown too much interest in you."

"I'm not sure if you can get me out?" He heard her move and the door rattled. His heart sank.

"Locked." He sagged.

"I've got nothing here," he admitted. "The only option is to bring...the others with all our stuff and leave from here. I don't think they'll leave before dark but don't take too long."

"You got it, babe," she called, her voice filled with forced cheerfulness. She didn't want him to hear her concern. But he could.

"And be careful," he said. "Any trouble and leave, promise?"

"I'll be back," she said, not promising anything. He sighed as he heard her move away and then he struggled back to his position and continued working on his ropes.

The light was definitely fading and his shoulders and arms were burning but the ropes were holding strong as he paused for a break. He was hungry, anxious and still imprisoned. His legs were cramped as well so he staggered to his feet, walking around the little shop and looking for any way out. And then he saw it: a curved blade, jammed into the wood. The edge was tricky to access but he manoeuvred himself and began rubbing the frayed ropes against the jagged edge until they finally parted.

He almost sighed in relief at being able to get his arms free and he tried to rub some life into them. Then he cast around: now he was free, he could try to get out of here. He peered behind one of the looms and saw a hole in the wall: not big and he would get muddy slithering through but it was better than staying. So he stuck his head through, checked no one was around-and then he wormed his way through, scrabbling up to his feet and pressing his body against the wall. He could hear footsteps approaching and then he ducked behind a water barrel. The two men were heading for his temporary prison so he waited until they had rounded the corner-then headed towards the smells of the forge-and the forest beyond.

The cry went up before he even reached the forge: 'HE'S GONE!" And then he put his head down and sprinted as best he could through the muddy streets, ducked under grasping hands and breaking through the line of the houses. He threw his head back, cupped his hands to his face and gave his very good version of a Night Fury roar. And then he ran on, sprinting past the place he had been captured-but steps were closing. He stole a look over his shoulder and almost tripped onto his face. his arms flailed and he slashed his hand on a bramble. Then he staggered on, his breath burning in his chest and heart pounding in fear.

A roar sounded ahead and he redoubled his pace. The familiar croaking cry of Stormfly echoed overhead but he could hear something large running towards him and he was really really hoping it wasn't a bear or a boar. But then the sleek and familiar black shape of Toothless bounded towards him and he almost sagged in relief-and then a hand snagged his collar and jerked him back. He squirmed and kicked back, breaking away-and then Toothless arrived, growling and swatting the men aside with his tail. A volley of spines drove the men back as the Deadly Nadder swooped overhead.

"I see you couldn't wait for me!" Astrid called down.

"Control rod?" he shouted and she tossed the vital piece of metal down. He ducked by Toothless's tail and swiftly fitted the mended rod, his fingers running along the metal and feeling an expert fix-as good as he could manage himself. He offered a silent prayer for good fortune for Egil the blacksmith as he clipped the rod into place and checked the prosthetic tail moved again. Then he flung himself into the saddle as the men gaped.

"This wasn't on the description!' the man with bad body odour shouted.

"What-did Dagur forget to mention I ride the unholy offspring of lightning and death itself?" Hiccup shouted sarcastically, leaning low over the Night Fury's neck. "Odd that. Still think capturing me is worth the money?"

"Hel, no!" the squat man said and dragged his friend back as Toothless growled louder to encourage them to rethink. They turned and ran and Hiccup sighed. He patted Toothless gently.

"Thanks, bud," he sighed and looked up at Astrid, who landed briefly. "They'll be back-with friends," he told her. "And word will get out that we're dragon riders."

"It's okay, Hiccup," she soothed him but he shook his head.

"No," he said tonelessly. "People are seeking me. They are willing to capture me. We can't stay any longer." He stared at the sky. "I guess it's time to go back to the Archipelago." He shifted in the saddle. "Thanks for coming to rescue me, Astrid," he told her.

"Hiccup-I will always come for you," she assured him as they took off. "Always."