when Astrid discovers Heather washed up on the beach after escaping an attack on her village, it leads to a revelation no one is anticipating, and paves the way for tons of adventures.
"Dad!" Hiccup called loudly. "Dad, you might wanna see this!" He looked down and picked up the horn in his hands. "Heather..." he mumbled, then felt something peculiar under his fingers. Removing them and holding the horn up to the lantern light, he found himself staring at a shockingly familiar symbol carved into it. "Wait a minute... That's..." "Hiccup!" came Stoic's voice as he walked into the room. "What's wrong?" Hiccup handed him the note, not taking his eyes off the carving. Stoic read the paper silently, then turned back to his son. "What's that?" "It's Heather's," said Hiccup handing it over. "I feel like you might recognize it, since... You know, it's... got your chief seal carved into it?" The chief looked at the carving, then sighed. "I knew I should have told her," he said quietly. "Dad, what are you talking about?" said Hiccup. "Told her what?" Stoic drew in a long breath. "When a chief has a child, Hiccup," he said, "that child receives gifts from all over. When you were born, I had Gobber make the smallest axe he'd ever imagined, with a handle tiny enough for a baby to grasp. I wanted you to start training the moment you opened your eyes." He chuckled. "Thought your mother was gonna... feed me to the boars!" "I remember that axe!" said Hiccup. "Yeah. You used it as a paperweight," said Stoic. "I... Well, um... D-dad, about the horn?" said Hiccup. "Yes..." said Stoic. He gave a long exhale. "You weren't even a year old, Hiccup... Your mother and I learned we were going to have another baby. You came out so small, she was terrified this one might not... even be born alive! But... she was fine. Loudest little set of pipes I've ever heard in a baby!" "Wo, wo, wo!" said Hiccup. "I... I-I have a sister?! Wh-what happened to her?!" "No one really knows," said Stoic. "She just... up and disappeared one night! She and her cradle were just... gone! Your poor mother was devastated. Not a month later was when she... Well, you know." "Yeah," said Hiccup. Stoic looked down, turning the horn over and over in his hands. "I never thought I'd see her again," he said. "But... then, you... brought her right into the house, like..." "Wait, wait, wait, wait!" said Hiccup. "Dad... are you saying... Heather's my..." "Hiccup!" came Astrid's voice as she ran into the room. "What is it, Astrid?" said Hiccup turning around to face her. "She's gone!" said Astrid. "Who?" said Hiccup. "Stormfly!" said Astrid. "Her saddle's gone, too, someone must've..." Then, she noticed the empty bed, and the horn in Stoic's hands. "Uh... where's Heather?" "Yeah... I think I know where Stormfly is," said Hiccup. The next thing any of the riders knew, they had all been waken up, and were in the air on their dragons. "I can't believe you let her get away with Stormfly again!" Snotlout said to Astrid. "I was asleep!" said Astrid. "And I can't believe Hiccup got you to help find them. I mean, I'd think since he found out Heather's his sister, he'd be in a bit more of a rush to find her." "Oh, yeah, that's really funny, Astrid!" said Snotlout. "How about you just..." "Enough!" said Stoic, flying Thornado up between Hookfang and Toothless. "The more ground we cover, the sooner we find my daughter and Astrid's dragon." "I still can't believe he knew Heather was Hiccup's sister the whole time and never told anyone!" said Tuff. "He was going to," said Hiccup. "Then, he saw that she already had parents who loved her, and he didn't want to get in the way of that." "Oh..." said Tuff. "Well, guess I can give you some brother tips then. Tip number one..." "Yeah, how about we actually find her first?" Astrid broke in. "Thank you!" said Hiccup. He assigned everyone different directions to go in, as well as a time and place to meet up again, and they went off to search. After a while, Hiccup, Astrid, and Toothless came to one small, rocky island, where they heard a nadder squawk from outside a cave in the side of a mountain. Astrid followed the sound, then gasped. "Stormfly!" she called out. Her dragon squawked in response, and Hiccup landed on the mountain near her. Astrid climbed down from Toothless, and ran over to her nadder. "Hey, girl..." she said hugging her. "Heather bring you out here?" Stormfly gave a squawk, then pointed her head inside the cave. "She's in there?" "Probably weng in there to rest for the night," said Hiccup. "I'll go check it out," said Astrid. "Be careful," said Hiccup. "We've been on some of these islands before. A lot of these mountain caves go back pretty far. Some of them don't have solid floors at the back." "I know," said Astrid. "I've got this." She walked inside. The light from the cave's entrance was almost completely faded when Astrid came across a small figure curled up on the ground. Bending down, she could just make out a girl's sleeping face peaking out from a cluster of thick, black hair. "Thank Thor!" she breathed, then gently shook her by the shoulder. "Heather... Hey. Wake up." Heather groaned and blinked her eyes, then scrambled to her feet and took off farther into the darkness! "Of course! Because why would she make it easy?" She ran after her. After a few minutes, she came to a place where the moonlight broke into the darkness through a few small holes in the ceiling. In front of her, she saw that Heather had stopped, maybe because she was ready to listen, but more likely because she'd hit a dead end. In any case, she had stopped, and Astrid was grateful. "You... You can really run, can't you?" she puffed out. Heather just shrugged, then sat down on the floor, curling up as small as she could. Astrid shook her head. "I can still see you, Heather," she said, then sighed. "Look... I get it. You're scared, you don't want to get used to being in another family just to lose it again. I don't blame you. You've been through... a lot in the last few days. But... do you... really want to just keep running away from everyone forever?" Heather looked down into her knees, then rested her head on them. Astrid bent to the floor and moved a bit closer to her. "We're not going anywhere, okay? We've got our dragons to protect us. Well... unless you keep stealing them in the night. Hm... Come to think of it, could you make off with Hookfang sometime?" Heather giggled, looking up from her knees. Astrid smiled, then held out a hand. "You don't have to be alone. I... We'll be here for you. All of us. I promise." Heather slowly uncurled and took Astrid's hand, and they stood back up together. "Come on," said Astrid. "Let's get out of here." Heather nodded, then jumped slightly as they both heard a loud crack! Astrid looked down to see the floor under her friend starting to break from her weight. "Heather... don't move. The floor under you isn't solid." She thought for a moment. "O-okay. Don't panic. Just... get down on your stomach... slowly... and..." Before she could finish, there came an even louder crack, and the next second, the rock under Heather gave way! Astrid tried to tighten her grip on her hand, but couldn't fast enough, and a split second later, heard her screaming as she fell! "HEATHER!!!" Astrid hid her face, not wanting to see what was coming! But the next moment, she heard Hiccup's voice. "Nice of you to drop in, Heather!" he said. Astrid looked through the newly-made hole in the floor to see that her friend had fallen right onto Toothless behind him! She sighed with relief. "Nice catch, Hiccup!" she said, then made her way out herself. A while later, the time came for everyone to meet back up. "Found her!" Tuff shouted seeing Heather as he and Ruff landed. "Seriously?" said Astrid getting down from Stormfly. "What?" said Tuff. "Oh, wait! I see Stormfly, too!" Astrid turned and looked at Hiccup and Heather. "H-he's joking, right? He can't be serious!" she said. Hiccup looked at Heather, then just shrugged. "Hiccup! You found her!" said Stoic landing Thornado. "Well, actually, I found her, chief," said Tuff. "Oh, my Thor, you are serious!" said Astrid. Stoic ignored him as he got off Thornado, and walked up to Heather. "You alright?" he said bending down. She nodded. "I don't think we'll have anymore problems with her running off," said Hiccup. "Astrid talked to her. I... think she even wants to stay with us." "Is that right, Heather?" Stoic asked her. She nodded again smiling. He smiled as well, then took one of her hands. "You'll always be safe on Berk, Heather." He put his other hand up and cupped her cheek. "I promise." At the feel of his hand on her face, Heather suddenly went pale! She slowly looked up at him, eyes starting to fill with tears. "What's wrong?" Stoic asked seeing her face. "Is it something I... I-I'm sorry." He went to pull his hand away, but Heather grabbed it with both of hers and held it in place, even pressing it against her cheek as she closed her eyes. Astrid looked at Hiccup. "One of the only things she could remember about her dad was..." she began. "... The... feel of his hands," Hiccup figured, looking at the two in front of them. Stoic gently lifted her face up, so that their eyes met as she opened hers. "You remember me, don't you?" he said quietly. She gave a small nod, then let his hand drop before wrapping her arms around his neck tightly. The chief let out a breath, putting his arms around his daughter, softly rubbing her back. "My beautiful little girl! We didn't know what happened to you, you just disappeared!"
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
A second later, Astrid could have sworn she saw something shiny sliding down his cheeks. She looked at Hiccup. "Uh... is he..." she said stopping herself. "What?" said Hiccup. "No! No, no, no, no, no! Come on, Astrid, my dad doesn't cry. But... don't go spreading rumors about it. It could really mess up his reputa... Oh! Okay!" His sentence was interrupted by Heather abruptly hugging him. Astrid giggled. "Aw!" she said. "She just realized she has a big brother!" Hiccup gave a shy grin, then returned the hug. The next moment, there came a loud snore. Everyone turned to see that Snotlout had fallen asleep on Hookfang. Stoic chuckled. "It's very late," he said. "We should be getting back." "Hey, Heather!" said Astrid eyeing Hookfang. "Remember what I said about... You know..." Heather grinned, then felt a hand on her shoulder. "Yeah, no," said Hiccup. "You can ride with me." Heather pouted, and Astrid folded her arms. "Better get used to it," she said. "Your brother's no fun." The next day, Hiccup and Heather arrived at the Dragon Academy late. "'Bout time!" said Snotlout. "What the Thor took you so long?!" Hiccup shot him a cold glare as he helped Heather off Toothless. "Oh, you know, just... giving Heather's adoptive parents and their whole village a proper send-off to Va Hallah," he said. "Oh..." said Snotlout. "Yeah, that could take a long time." Astrid rolled her eyes, then hit him upside the head before going up to Heather. "Hey," she said. "You okay?" Heather nodded, then hugged her. Astrid hugged back, rubbing her back for support. "Good." She smiled, then punched her arm. "Astrid!" said Hiccup. "What was..." "That's for stealing my dragon again," said Astrid folding her arms. Heather looked down rubbing her arm, then gave a start as Astrid grabbed her tunic, pulling her into a kiss! "That's for... not dying." She turned around and looked at Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruff, and Tuff, all staring at her shocked. "What? Hey, are we training now, or not?" "Uh, y-yeah," said Hiccup. He looked at his sister as Astrid walked back to Stormfly. "Think you can... give me a hand controlling this bunch?" She nodded, still in a bit of a daze, then looked over at Astrid as she pushed her hair back from her face. That night, there was a new bed across the room from Hiccup's. "Covers..." he said happily, getting under the blankets again. "No offense, bud." Toothless rolled his eyes, then went over and sniffed at the fresh wood and paint on Heather's bed. She smiled seeing him, and scratched his head. "Dad sure went all-out with that," said Hiccup, looking at the carved and painted flowers on the foot and headboard. Heather smiled, then gave a squeal as she was picked up from behind! "Strange-looking terror," said Stoic. "Don't you think, Hiccup?" Hiccup laughed. "I don't think I've ever seen a dragon like that before, Dad!" he said. The chief chuckled. "No," he said pulling the covers back, then laid her in the bed. "But she sure is beautiful, isn't she?" Heather smiled shyly as he brought the blankets up to cover her. He gently strolled her cheek with his thumb, then put a kiss on her forehead. "Sleep well, my beauty. Night, Hiccup." "Night, Dad," said Hiccup, and Stoic left the room. Toothless licked Heather's face, then went and laid down on his stone slab. "Oh, you give her a good night kiss?" said Hiccup. The nightfury grunted, covering his eyes with his tail. Heather giggled. Hiccup shook his head, then smiled at his sister. "Sleep well, Heather." She gave a nod and smile, and they both settled down to go to sleep.
One thing about living on Berk is that you can never really assume you've seen everything. And maybe that's not such a bad thing. I don't know if Heather will ever start talking again, but if nothing else, she's home now. My dad has his little princess back... and I have my sister.
