-
"Alright, gang, looks like we have another Rider with us! Well, I mean, we will once she gets her own dragon. Not that she's not allowed to join us until she has her own dragon -."
"Welcome Ska'i!" Astrid saved Hiccup, offering a hand to her.
"Until she finds her own dragon, she is welcome to ride on mine," Snoutlout winked.
"Hey!" Tuffnut shouted. "You will not talk about Ska'i like she's not here!"
"These are two too many double-negatives," Fishlegs squeezed his head in his hands.
"Guys!" Ruffnut butted in, then flourished her hands around Ska'i. "I got you."
Ska'i shot her a humble smile of thanks at her and stepped into the crooked circle. "I, uh, I was thinking maybe alternating? Between the bigger dragons, Stormfly and Hookfang -."
"Yes!" Snotlout prematurely shouted a celebration.
Ska'i shot him an eerie, silent death glare, invoking an apology from him.
"Oh, I like her," Astrid complimented. "Great choice, Tuffnut."
"I second that," Ruffnut added.
"Yeah, I kind of like her, too," he confessed.
Her smile instantly killed her glare, and she pushed on, "-and Toothless, to kind of ease up on travels."
"That sounds like a great solution, Ska'i," Hiccup conceded.
She had already said her goodbyes to her father that morning. He wanted to make it into a whole ceremony, but she remained adamant. She didn't want her people mourning her, like she was someone worthy of ever leading them. No, leave that up to Homake, Ahu, or even Koi! She just wanted to slip away, and have them remember her as the one who accepted the visiting Viking Dragon Riders. And that they were the ones who helped calm Pele's fiery rage.
After packing some leftovers from the night before, they slipped their way through the mostly hungover village and took to the sky.
"How did you guys get that stone, anyway?" Hiccup asked.
"Yeah, and how did you even know that throwing it in the volcano would soothe the lava in the first place?" Fishlegs added.
Ska'i relayed the story of how it was found when she was around three years old. Some type of huge sea dragon had washed up on their shore, looking to have died from old age. The type to never let anything go to waste, they chipped the scales off and began to gut the stomach, when they came across the stone. She remembered them not being able to describe it, other than the fact that it simply looked important. And that her father told her to save it for an emergency. She twisted around behind Astrid, to shoot Tuff an embarrassed smile. With a confession, she admitted, "You know when I told you to drop that stone in Olawai, I had no idea what it would do."
"What?! You send me away on a fools' errand, knowing that you could have died, and I would have never seen you again?"
She gave him a weak smile and a little shrug, asking for forgiveness.
"But hey, it turned out alright in the end!" His sister comforted him
'Yeah, I suppose so," he grumbled, unwillingly shooting Ska'i a grin.
"I wonder if there're any more," Fishlegs murmured.
"What do you mean?" Astrid asked.
"I mean, that water is just one element," Fishlegs pointed out.
Everyone looked at each other, with a mix of dismay, and predisposition.
Hiccup broke the silence, "I have a feeling we have a long road ahead of us."
