22 Years Later

I never wanted this day to come. In fact...I sooner believed that this was all a dream and that it wouldn't really happen, but unfortunately, that's not the case.

It feels like just yesterday, Thora and I were seated on this outlook dubbed "Itchy Armpit". I spoke to her about my worries and she comforted me, and although we were little more than strangers...a bond began that day that can't simply be broken.

Thora lays in my arms, her chest rising shakily with every breath. I purse my lips and hold her closer to me, her body resting sideways over my lap with her head resting on my shoulder. Every now and then, I feel one of her especially long breaths against my neck.

"Hiccup?" she whispers, her voice soft with weariness.

"Yes?" I ask, trying to keep the edge of desperation from my tone.

Her brown eyes stare up at me with a sort of hidden amusement that, even to this day, only I can ever truly get out of her. Thora never shows a lot of who she really is around the others. That side of her remains as a secret between her and I.

Secrets...we have far too many, if you ask me.

"You're nervous," she notes, making me roll my eyes. "I can feel your heart racing," she adds, before coughing. "You don't have to feel like this."

"It's hard not to, milady," I say.

She laughs softly, a sound that is rarely heard and precious to my ears. "Milady..." she muses over the word. "I haven't heard you call me that in a while."

I run my hand along her arm, stuck in a sort of disbelief. "Thora, how can you be so calm when..." The words catch in my throat and I have to force them down. "When Valhalla will be calling you home at any moment?"

She doesn't answer right away, giving me the time to look at her. Despite being in her mid-fifties, like me, she still retains a sort of youthful glow to her. Her freckles are still prominent and her eyes haven't lost their depth, although a few grey hairs have appeared amongst her auburn strands. Her lips lift into the barest trace of a smile.

"I have done all I can, and I feel at peace," she says. "I did my time. Destin and Runa have grown up and found their own paths, the Night Furies are regaining their old numbers, and Berk is the peaceful place I have come to enjoy." She shuts her eyes for a moment, taking a slow breath in and out. "It feels...okay."

I can't help but smile just a little bit, amazed by how my wife, my wife with tendencies towards pessimism or at least negativity, is seeing such a happy life now. Now, when her time is ticking away little by little.

"Hiccup..." she breathes, her lips brushing against my stubbled jaw as she lifts herself slightly, her arms draped on my shoulders and almost at my neck. "I don't think I've ever truly thanked you for everything."

"Thank me?" I laugh shortly. "I don't think I need thanking."

"Oh, but you do," she retorts with a loving smirk, albeit she's looking more tired by the second. "I want to thank you for everything you've done for me since the day I showed up on the back of that Night Fury. You're...you're the one person whom I didn't have to hide from, and that's something that should never be taken for granted." Her smirk melts into a simple smile, no teeth, just an upward turn of her lips. "And, of course, you deserve to be thanked for all those times I lied or kept the truth from you and yet you never left me." She laughs as she hugs me a little tighter. "You're either very loyal or very foolish."

"I think I'm both, but I'm okay with being a fool," I say, pressing a gentle kiss to her forehead.

She sighs and slumps back against me, a short cough leaving her as we cast our gaze out towards the sunset. I shut my eyes briefly, recreating the picture in my mind of young me romping around, imitating the gruff voice of my father and thumping my chest...and making Thora, an anxious recluse with no connections to her past, laugh.

I miss those days sometimes.

"Hiccup," she speaks, breaking me from my reminiscent trance.

She's watching me again, so closely that I feel as if she's counting every one of my freckles or noting just how alike my eyes are to Destin's right down to the last speck of green. She always used to tell me, when Destin was a baby, that my eyes were her favourite eyes and that she was glad Destin got the same kind. I think it's kind of a silly thing to have a favourite pair of eyes, but that didn't stop my heart from warming up.

"I've only realized it in these past years, but..." She stops for a second to muse over the memory. "The time we sat here...talking about who we are and who we wanted to be, I think that was the moment that I started to fall in love with you." I don't respond right away, but she speaks again. "But, me being me, I don't notice those things. Ridiculous, silly girl, I was."

"But you're my ridiculous girl," I murmur, making her laugh and causing my gut to clench. How long until I'll never hear that laugh again?

"I love you so much," she says, her hand resting over my heart. "I always have, and I always will."

"Until death do us part?" I ask, my voice threatening to break.

She shakes her head. "No. Death isn't strong enough to stop me from loving you, Hiccup."

I lean down to kiss her softly. "I love you too, Thora."

We watch, waiting, listening to the sounds of each other breathing, and when the sunlight starts to disappear, Thora tenses up. Her eyes widen slightly as her mouth parts, her hand reaching out to grasp mine. Panic rises in my chest.

"Oh...it's beautiful," she whispers, her face slackening with awe. She squeezes my hand tighter, hardly wavering her gaze to me. "Hiccup, don't you see it?"

I see nothing except the dying sunlight, but I still nod and return the gentle pressure on her hand.

"Yes, I see it," I say, my tone weak. "It's amazing."

She smiles lightly, lowering herself back into my arms as she gazes out at the expanse before us that's lit up with the last light of the day. She turns her face so that she's looking up at me, a tear rolling down her cheek. She reaches up and touches my face, her fingertips brushing the scar I obtained as an infant.

"Take care, my love," she breathes. Her eyes start to lose their light. "Until...we meet...again..."

She shuts her eyes as a long breath leaves her, and then she goes still. I shut my eyes, tears welling at the edges as I hug her close to me, a familiar ache appearing in my chest. Not again...why did I have to lose her again?

A hand touches my shoulder, making me jump. I look over my shoulder to see a man, one who's no more than thirty years old, standing behind me. He's tall and rather slim by Berkian standards, a fur cape draped over his shoulders and a belt secured around his waist, the jewelled hilt of a sword visible from the top of the sheathe hanging from it. His eyes are blue, his cheeks dotted with freckles, and his short hair and beard are the same auburn colour as Thora's. I recognize him from a portrait hanging in my home.

"Hiccup, you have to let her go," Thord murmurs, his voice low and melodic, as if made out of the sound of wind in the treetops. "She's home. You don't have to worry about her anymore."

"I...I..." I croak, a few tears escaping to run down my face. "I d-don't want to say goodbye again."

Thord takes a few steps closer to me before he lowers himself into a squatting position, a gentle smile on his face. "Goodbyes are temporary," he tells me. "You will see her again. I promise you."

I return my eyes to my wife of thirty-two years, the peaceful look on her still face, and I nod slowly. I lean down and press a final kiss to her forehead before I lay her on the grass. Thord pats my shoulder once before moving past me, kneeling down next to his daughter's body and touching his fingertips to her forehead.

The faint outline of a funeral barge appears around her, becoming slightly more visible as she lifts into the air. She looks just as beautiful as the day I met her, laying there surrounded by the aura of Valhalla. Thord climbs into the boat as it shoves off, sailing out into the sun. I want to watch, but the light is too much and I have to look away.

When I look up again, the sun has set and my wife is gone. I turn my face to the sky, shutting my eyes and taking a long breath.

I have to go back home too.

End of Book Three