The two stared at the Nadder, standing still on instinct. The dragon eyes them, walking closer, but not attacking yet. Thyra noticed something..off about the dragon. "Its eyes..." she whispers. "Look, they're round!" The dragon didn't even have it's spines up. It flexed its wings with a small caw, tilting its head to the side.

Both friends were wondering the same thing, why wasn't it attacking them like it did earlier?

"What the heck is going on?" Dusty asked Thyra as the dragon slowly came closer.

"Look at it! It's...it's acting so weird." Thyra says.

Dusty had a thought cross his mind, a crazy and stupid thought, but he wanted to do it anyway.

"I have an idea." He said as he slowly walked toward the dragon.

"Okay," Thyra agrees. "Slow movements."

"Don't worry bout me." he said as he stopped just a few feet from the dragon, he took a breath, before extending his hand and turning his head away. "Please trust me," he said under his breath.

Thyra watched in amazement as the dragon paused, lowered it's head and, sniffed at Dusty's palm...and slowly pressed into it, cooing. "Would you look at that!" she breathes.

Dusty looked up at the dragon as it looked right back at him, he put his other hand on the dragon's head. "Hey big boy, you actually like us don't ya?" The dragon gave a small squawk, as if he understood what he said. "Thyra, are you sure we're not imagining this?"

"No..." she whispers, walking up to the dragon and reaching out her hands gently. She scratches near its horn, and the dragon lets out a happy rumble. "We're not that insane!" she whispers with an astonished smile.

Thyra feels a weight press on her shoulder, and she looks over, to see the Terrible Terror sitting on her shoulder, giving her a smug smile.

"Are you kidding me?!" she shouts, batting at it gently. "Shoo! Shoo!"

Dusty started laughing, and the Nadder did it's own laugh.

The Terror jumped off Thyra's shoulder, and jumped onto Dusty's.

"Haha!" Thrya laughs now. "It's not funny now, is it?!"

Dusty gives the terror a 'really just really' look, and the Terror starts laughing.

"Well at least I'm not freaking out, like you kept doing." he said giving a smile.

"I wasn't freaking out!" she scoffs. "I was...frustrated!" she turns to the Terror. "She's had it in for me ever since I took wood from her nest."

The Terror looked at her, and sent a small blast of fire at her, just enough to annoy her. Everyone but Thyra laughed.

"Haha." she gives a sarcastic smile. "Was that a big bit of fire for you?" she asks the Terror.

The Terror gave a small roar. Then a small growl, clearly annoyed.

"Are you two girls done fighting?" Dusty asked after he got his breath back

"Maybe," Thyra sends the Terror a cheeky grin, "depends on our mood!"

The Nadder gave a squawk, and the Terror jumped off Dusty and onto his crown of spikes on his head.

"Well there you go, happy now?" Dusty asked.

"Very, so should we get out of here?" Thyra asks.

Dusty looks up at the sun, "We got at least an hour before noon, lets travel along the shore, see if we can find anything useful, and when noon hits, we can turn inland and look for shelter."

"Okay, but we better move quickly." Thyra nods.

"Alright, lets go" Dusty says and jumps off the boat to the sand below, Thyra follows and the Nadder behind her, they walk on the beach for a few minutes, before Dusty notices something in the distance.

"You see that?" he asked Thyra.

"Nope, but i'm guessing that's where we're headed." Thyra shrugs.

"Looks like another ship, but this one isn't as luxurious as the last one." He says pointing at the hunk of wood.

"Hmm. okay, well i guess we see if there's gonna be anything, but I wouldn't get your hopes up."

They arrived at the ship, if you could call it a ship, and started going through it.

"Got nothing in this crate! What about you over there?" he says throwing the lid to the side.

"Nothing." she shakes her head.

"We really need shields, or leather, or anything to eat."

"Let's face it, unless it happened a day ago, we're not gonna get any food from these ships." Thyra sighs.

"Less it falls out of the sky." He says jokingly

"Yeah," Thyra nods in agreement, before opening a crate. "I found...half a shield. Why would you even keep that?''

"Ask twelve people, and you'll get twelve different answers." He replied

"Uh...okay?" Thyra blinks in confusion, opening another crate.

"Now what we got in here." as Dusty opened another crate, to find...nothing.

"Yeah, this one's a ripoff." Thyra sighs, tossing a crate aside.

That's when she felt something drop on her head.

She looks up in confusion, but frowns when she finds the source.

The Terror is above her laughing

"Uh...Thyra, there's a fish on your head. Why do you have a fish on your head?"

"Ew! Just gross." she complains, reaching up. "Keep your dinner to yourself!" she flings the fish off, before grabbing the terror and setting it on a crate. "Bad dragon, very bad dragon!" she scolds, pointing a finger. The dragon licks its eyeball gleefully.

"Well, I guess food can fall out of the sky." He says laughing

Thyra glares at him, picks up the fish, and throws it. She bursts out laughing when it hits his face, leaving a trail of drool as it drops down.

"Now that's just had sportsmanship!" Dusty yells as he wipes the hunk off his face.

Then he is knocked down by a hail of fish that falls from above.

Thyra sniggers, looking at the Nadder like a proud parent. "This dragon is my new best friend!" she laughs.

"And I thought the Nadder was on my side...We need a name for him." he says as he throws the fish off him.

"Well, I was going to say Fishy but...how about Flame?" Thyra suggests with a smirk.

"Well he's mostly red with some orange, so it fits."

"I can see that, I have eyes!" Thyra laughs.

Another fish lands on her.

"You didn't see that coming." he says laughing again.

"Okay, fair enough." she grumbles, throwing the fish at the newly dubbed Flame, who catches and eats it midair.

Dusty goes to the last crate, and pulls it open, and inside he finds a sealed jar of ink.

"Hey, I found some ink." he yelled over to Thyra

"What are we gonna do with it? Write a strongly worded letter of protest? And, by the way, you don't have to yell!"

"Think of it as payback for making me go deaf in the storm." he said much quieter,

"What? I can't hear you!" Thyra calls loudly with a smirk.

"I said think of it as payback for making me go deaf in the storm, he said loud enough for her to hear.

Thyra rolls her eyes with a laugh. "We should probably go."

"You never let me finish about the ink." he said with a sound of frustration

"Aww okay, little baby. Finish!" she teases.

"Oh shut up" he says with a small laugh, " and I was thinking we use that empty journal and make entries about what we learn, just so we can go back and not forget anything. Like how we, trained?, Flame."

"Alright, good point, I guess." Thyra admits.

"And you're right, we should get going." he grabs the ink and they started inland.

"Let's just find some food or something, get some shelter, and TRY to survive the night." Thyra says as they walk off the beach. Surprisingly, Flame and the Terror follow them. "Do you think they're just gonna hang around us? Because that Terror hates me, and I don't particularly enjoy her company either." Thyra asks.

Dusty turns and looks at the two terrors, wait two?

"Thyra...umm." He says looking at the two terrors sitting on Flame

"Must you always be the bringer of bad news?" Thyra whines, turning around to find what he's talking about. "Oh. Two Terrors. That's great." she mutters. "Just what I need. An entourage!"

"Let's just keep going, we can deal with this later." he says looking around.

"Yeah. I guess," Thyra glares at the terror half heartedly. "Let's go."

They walk for another few minutes, till Dusty sees something.

"Hey look, there's a cave." he says gesturing to an opening in the cliffside they were walking by,"there's a stream that runs in front of it, and plenty of trees for wood."

"Yes! Perfect!" Thyra cheers.

"Let's head on in and see how big it is."

"Right behind ya!" Thyra nods, eager to get to the cave.

As the group approached it, the terrors took a sniff, and high tailed it out of there.

"See, told you they would leave at some point." he says as the terrors flew away

"Freedom!" Thyra cheers jokingly.

They entered the cave, and slowly walked deeper into it.

" I can't see a freaking thing, what about you?" Dusty askes

"I'm about to trip over something, I just know because that's what happens when you walk blindly through unfamiliar terrain." Thyra glances where she thinks Flame is. "I hope he can see."

"Uh...Flame never came in." Dusty says, sounding worried.

"Then...what is that?" she squints in the darkness like it would help.

Two low growls break the silence.

"Thyra, don't make any sudden moves." Dusty whispered just loud enough for her to hear.

Thyra tenses. "You heard it too? I thought it was just me." she whispers.

"No, I heard it," he whispered back.

"How's that leg feeling?"

"I can run if I need to." he replies

"Good, good. Because we might need to very soon." Thyra whispers. Just then, a sudden purple light emits from within the cave.

"Oh, no! I know that glow."

"Please tell me it's not what I think it is." Dusty says tensing up to run

"I wish I could." Thyra murmurs, dread setting in.

"I think now is the time to run."

"Agreed."

Both friends turn and run out of the cave as a purple blast misses them by inches.

"What'd ya know? They can miss!" Thyra shouts hopefully.

"Less talk! More running!" Dusty yells as they run out of the cave.

Then Dusty's leg gave out, and he fell.

"For the love of Thor! Could it get any worse?"

"Less falling, more running!" Thyra heaves him up, and shoves him. "Go!"

Dusty started running again, but something shot past him, and knocked both him and Thyra down.

"No!" Thyra cries out as they hit the cold stone. They try to get up, but both of them are met with the faces of two dragons, illuminated by the purple glow from their mouths.

"Night Furies, it had to be two Night Furies, Thyra, any ideas?"They cringe back as far as they can.

Dusty looked into the Green eyes of one of them, while Thyra looked into the bright blue of the blue eyes of the other.

Only one thing went through their minds

They were looking at death itself.

The dragons didn't move, only their stares got more intense. It was like the only thing Dusty and Thyra could look at, aside from the dangerous glow that got bigger by the second. Was this the end for them? already?

Then that's when the strangest thing happened, the two dragons cut their glow, and just started at them, and just stayed on them, like it was looking into their souls. The one on Thyra moved her sleeve enough, to where she saw her brand. She let out a small growl, and the one holding Dusty found his brand. They looked at each other, then back at Dusty and Thyra then back at one another. Then they spread their wings, and showed their teeth, and roared as loud as they could into the teens faces, then flew off into the cave.

The two slaves winced, the sound was deafening, even if it wasn't truly there anymore, it still bounced around in their heads. Despite their scattered, panicked thoughts, they both wondered the same thing. Why were they spared? Why did those dragons stop? Leaving them with only a headache. Not even a scratch on them.

"Did...did that just happen?" Dusty asked

Thyra nods wordlessly.

"No one lives to tell the tale, how...why?" Dusty was horribly confused, but still relieved that they were alive.

"Unholy offspring of lightning and DEATH...so why... why?" Thyra can barely get her thoughts organized.

"We should be dead right now, but we aren't."

"So...we should probably go, before they change their mind..." Thyra murmurs shakily, looking around the pitch black cave.

Dusty never shot up quicker to get out of there, "already ahead of you!" He yells as he's running out into the clearing.

Thyra is hot on his heels, and lets out a relieved sigh when the light hits her. She doesn't stop looking over her shoulder, the blue eyes imprinted in her mind. "I don't think i'll sleep...ever again." she murmurs.

Dusty and Thyra stopped a few hundred feet away from the cave, to catch their breath and let the adrenaline slow down.

"I just had a thought...did the dragon that have you," he pulled up his right sleeve,"See this?

"Yeah, and after that...it stopped. And the one that had you...what did it do? Did it stop?"

"It's eyes widened, they weren't slits like they were, and it seemed to show me pity or something, but it wasn't as aggressive.

"Same, but, they're dragons. I-It's crazy, right? But they almost seemed...sad."

"You don't think, they know what this means? Now I'm sounding crazy!"

"Why else would they stop? Because they liked the look of it? I hate to admit it, but there doesn't seem to be any other explanation!" Thyra exclaims.

"I don't know," he looked up at her, "but I want to find out, they were protecting something in that cave, why else would they have been ready to ambush us?"

"Do you think they knew we were coming? And what would be so important to protect? Eggs?" Thyra wonders.

"There's only one way to find out, we have to get back into that cave." Dusty says with determination.

"You're crazy." Thyra sighs. "But i know you're right. And surely they won't kill us? Right?" she doesn't seem too confident in her words, these were deadly dragons, after all.

"Or, we can do what we did with Flame, train them, if that's possible."

"Something tells me it's not going to be as easy as it sounds. We'll have to earn their trust. That's gotta be easier said than done."

Dusty's face had a smile on it, "What do dragons like the most?"

"We feed them. All dragons like fish, right?"

"Exactly, you still got that old net on you?"

"Mhmm." she nods, holding up the folded fabric.

"Well it looks like we're going fishing."