The Soul of a Dragon

Chapter 75

Hiccup

The skies are calm today, but there's an undercurrent, something I can't quite explain. Toothless is beside me, his sleek black scales gleaming under the afternoon sun, but his eyes keep drifting, scanning the horizon with a distant intensity. It's been happening more often. He's here, but his heart isn't. His mind is somewhere else, somewhere far away.

The Hidden World.

Despite my happiness of being together with Vara and having the promise of her as my future wife, Toothless' longing for another world causes my mind to swirl with fear and hurt. I try to focus on the task at hand – helping Fishlegs and other villagers fix the perimeter fencing along the eastern cliffs. Ever since the last few storms, we've been reinforcing the area to make sure no more rockslides come down on the new huts. But I can't keep my thoughts from straying. I glance over at Toothless, watching as his tail twitches impatiently, his wings rustling as if he's ready to leap into the air.

"Got your mind somewhere else, bud?" I murmur under my breath, but Toothless only lets out a soft, distracted trill. I know what he wants. I know what he's longing for.

And I'm still not ready to face it.

"Hiccup, are you even listening?" Fishlegs' voice cuts through my thoughts, pulling me back to reality. He's giving me one of his typical concerned looks, like I'm the one who's drifting too far off. Maybe I am.

"Yeah, yeah, I got it," I say, waving off his concern and pretending I've been paying attention this whole time. We finish the fencing in silence, but the weight in my chest remains.

As the sun dips lower, painting the sky in soft hues of orange and pink, I hear a soft thrum, like wings catching the wind. Aria swoops down from above, and Vara follows, her hair wild from the ride. She lands gracefully beside me and my heart always skips a beat upon seeing her, but there's a tension in her posture, something that mirrors the anxiety I've been trying to ignore.

"They're at it again," she says softly, nodding toward Toothless and Aria, who are now flying low over the cliffs, circling each other in a way that feels different – more purposeful, more wild. "They keep going farther each time."

I sigh, my shoulders sagging as I watch them. "I know."

Vara moves closer, her warmth radiating against my side, and I can feel the weight of what she wants to say. We've had this conversation before, but it's getting harder to avoid.

"They want to go home, Hiccup," she whispers, her voice gentle but filled with that inevitable truth. "We both knew this was coming."

I close my eyes, my hands gripping the edge of the fence as if holding onto it will keep everything from slipping away. But I won't allow myself to snap again, so I grab Vara's hand and take comfort in her squeezing it. But yet I repeat myself, "I can't... I just got everything back. The village is safe. We have peace. I can't let him go."

"Hiccup, look at them." Her hand moves to mine, softly coaxing me to look at our dragons as they dip and dive, their movements almost primal. Her voice is filled with the pain that aches inside my heart. "They're not themselves anymore. Not fully. They need to be wild. They need to be free."

"I know that," I whisper. I hate this part of myself – the part that can't let go, that clings to what I have, even when I know deep down it's selfish. "But I'm not ready."

Vara doesn't criticise me. She never does. Instead, she steps closer, wrapping her arms around me, grounding me. "You don't have to be ready right now," she says quietly. "But you have to trust that this is right for them. We'll have time to say goodbye. But we need to accept that it's coming."