The Soul of a Dragon

Chapter 13

Vara

"Where the HELL have you been?", a male voice scares me almost to the extent of falling off a snickering Aria. The snicker dangerously resembles laughter. Aria, the sadist reptile, is laughing at me. Great.

"Calm down, Malcom", I roll my eyes and try to ease the man's nerves. I should be surprised to have him suddenly show up next to us but it's Malcom, it's what he does.

Fireblaster opens his mouth in a way that is supposed to mimic a smile. He's so cute. Why couldn't he have chosen another rider? Someone...I don't know...nicer?

"Last I saw you, your arm was all messed up", Malcom points at me with his chin, "Who healed it?"

"Nobody", I answer and silently hope a Thunderdrum will jump out of the ocean and eat Malcom, "Can you leave us alone, now? Please?"

Malcom grins like the dirty creep he is and says whilst leaning forward, "You girls need some alone time?"

"Yes", without granting him a look I whisper a command to Aria, who immediately understands and beats her wings even faster. She fires off a powerful plasma blast, whereas I press my body flat against her back. With that blast, she casts us into invisibility.

Right before Aria and I are out of hearing range, I can hear Malcom saying with a scoff, "I hate it when they do that."

Fortunately, he doesn't follow us.

I can see New Berk stand out brightly against the cloudless evening sky. It's a beautiful island, there's no arguing about that. But even though Hiccup and I haven't been talking much lately, I know he doesn't want to stay here. Nobody has confirmed it towards me (still), but I know the stress and worry amongst the village has everything to do with this silver haired man.

Aria's muscles are tensing and all of a sudden, she huffs because some noise in the forest under us has scared her. She slows down to a halt and now we're flying in one spot, both of us looking down on the dark green trees. I can make out the voice of someone cursing. That someone must be walking – and be pretty pissed – because a trail of birds is flying up as the person is making their way towards...well, somewhere. I pat Aria's softly scaled and sensitive neck, asking her to land in a clearing of the forest. After I glide off her back, we stealthily follow the person. I concentrate on keeping enough distance to observe but not get caught. The person is constantly changing their walking direction and it's annoying me. Finally, they come to a stop and my dragon and I can rest behind a large cold rock. Leaning very closely against the rock, I don't notice a giant (very, very giant) centipede crawling on my right arm, its antennae tickling my skin as the insect tries to navigate its way up my arm to my ear. I shreek like a little girl and quickly sweep off the insect (I really don't like them). This cases both me and Aria to jump up as if we've both been burned by something. Nice job, Vara.

"Who's there?", the person asks. It's a man and I recognise the voice straight away. So much for stealthy. Again, nice job.

Standing up and dusting myself off (just in case the entire centipede's family decided to torment me), I lock eyes with Hiccup who's been stepping closer to the rock, Aria and I've been hiding behind. Toothless must have been playing in the trees, because he's sliding down a large branch as skilful and smooth as a snake.

"Vara?", Hiccup asks, confusion marking his face.

"I-uh", maybe moving away from the rock would seem less creepy and awkward, so I do that, "I heard someone talking and wanted to check it out."

"Oh", he nods slowly and doesn't say anything else. Something's going on in his head, but it's been weird between us ever since we've come to New Berk. I know I could simply ask what's troubling him, but...it doesn't feel right. He's been avoiding me and, granted, I've been doing the same. But I kind of got the feeling he doesn't like me very much. Knowing this, standing in front of him and looking into those...captivating forest eyes, makes it harder to talk normally to him.