There's No Such Thing As Normal (Hiccstrid)

Chapter 7

Astrid's P.O.V.

I woke up in my parents house and sat up before grunting in agony. I got up and walked down stairs to meet my parents by the fire. "Are you okay, Astrid?" my father asks slowly. I paused, remembering the night before, and debating whether it was a dream or not. Finally, I shrug with a slow shake of my head as I walked for the door.

"Why didn't you tell them?"

Because it was no more than a dream.

"It was real, Astrid. If you don't believe me, lift your shirt." I paused before lifting my shirt a tiny bit. "WOW!" I rolled my eyes as I saw the wrap from last night, ignoring Ember as I walk through the forest. "So, why didn't you tell them?"

Would you believe me if you weren't there? I'm sick and tired of being called a lying psycho!

"Your parents don't call you that!"

But everyone else does! What happened last night is between you and me. Got it?

"Who am I gonna tell?" I roll my eyes as I push a branch out of my way. 

I push through the undergrowth before finding myself on a cliff of a cove. I drew air into my lungs before letting it out with my voiced raised in a scream. My lungs start constricting but I still let my voice ring on the rocks and water, moving the branches of the trees around me and scaring the birds into flight. Tears start to leak into my eyes but they don't fall. Finally, my voice gives way and I drew air into my chest again before looking around, the sun almost blinding me as it bounced off the pond in the cove.

"What?!" I screamed to the sky. "What did I do?!" My voice echoed back to me, as if Thor was repeating me. "What right does he have?! What can I do?! How can I get them to see me as...as...." I didn't know what I wanted them to see me as. Did I want them to see me as normal? A Viking? An equal? My head started spinning. There's no such thing as normal, there's no actual standards for a Viking, and no one is really equal. We're all better than others at something. So what did I want them to see me as?

"You want them to see you as you." The voice wasn't Emeralds. I stiffened but didn't move. I was too terrified to turn and see who heard me. No one ever hears me; I make sure of it. "Why don't they?" the voice asked. I paused in thought as I heard footsteps walking toward me, crunching the leaves of the forest floor.

They've called me psycho for so long, I've started to think that's what I am....

"You gotta say it. That's the only way I can help you," the man says. "You say you want to be a Viking, an equal; you want to be normal. Hate to tell you this," he puts his lips next to my ear and whispers, "But normal people don't keep their mouths shut for half of their life. Come on, you can do it. Say it."

"They've called me psycho for so long, I've started to think that's what I am," I say stiffly, almost cringing at the sound of my voice.

"So show them that you're not. Show them that you can be just like them; make them see your worth. If they won't look, turn their heads for them," he breathes in my ear.

"I can't."

"You can still talk to Emerald. Just do what you've been doing for the past 5 years and talk in your head. But when I leave, I want you to go back to that village and yell at Stoick and anyone else that's ever laughed at you. You understand me?" I was starting to think he was Snotlout, but it wasn't his voice.

"W-who are you?" I ask.

"All you gotta do is turn around," he says. "Going once," he says as I hear slow foot steps, signalling him walking away. "Going twice," I hear a few clicks and jingles. I really wanted to turn around, but I was paralyzed! "Gone," he says before a black dragon shot over my head and flew away. The dragon made a breeze blow against me as it took off.

Emerald?

"Don't. Even. Ask." I look at the ground and see that the dragon had left some scales behind. I stared at them with furrowed eye brows as an idea started to form...

Evening

I fiddled with the necklace around my neck--I had made it from the scales of the dragon--as I sat at my table in the Meade Hall. "Hey, Psycho, seen any Night Furies lately?" Snotlout sneered as he and the others walked by.

Yup.

"Snot, you should know she's not gonna talk to you," Tuffnut says.

"Yeah. She has too many people in her own head without you trying to break a barrier," his sister laughs. I then count on my fingers, the amount of people I had in my head. Me. Emerald. Two.

Emerald, how many people are in there with you?

"three."

Three?

"You, the guy from the cave, and that guy from this morning."

Maybe I do have too many people in there.

I walked out of the Meade Hall and went to the forest. After a while, I heard a weird creaking and looked up before jumping out of the way of a falling tree top. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to pull my leg clear from one of the branches and, next thing I know, the wind was driven from my lungs by the pain. 

I let out a scream of agony as I felt the bone shift away from itself. I tried to pull myself free, but it was too heavy, and when a dragon landed in front of me, I was paralyzed with fear. The Timberjack spread it's wings, slicing a few trees in the process, and roared at me. I shielded my head as the trees fell around me. Suddenly, someone ran from the undergrowth and jumped in front of the dragon before pulling out a flaming sword. He slowly swung it over his head a few times and the Timberjack seemed to follow the movement with wide eyes. Suddenly, the dragon flew away and the man put the sword away before turning to me. He stepped over the tree and hurried over before crouching next to me. He had a mask, strange armor, and a peg leg that made him walk with a slight limp. I tried to move away but ended up yelping as the tree branch weighed down on my broken leg.

"Shh, try not to move," the man said as he wrapped his hands around the branch. "I'll have you outta here, and back to the safety of your village before you can say 'flight'," he says before lifting the branch off of my leg and moving it as he sat it back down. I fought through pain and clutched my shin before electricity shot through my body, driving the breath from my chest. The man grabbed my hands and forced them away from my leg with three scolding clicks of his tongue, "Tsk, tsk, tsk. Don't do that, we have to put a proper splint on it." He gently runs his fingers over the purple and black, swollen skin before grabbing four sticks. 

"This might hurt a little bit," he warns before pressing the sticks to my leg so that they surrounded it. I let out a pained grunt as he snapped a shortish rope from his bag. At first I thought he was going to gag me, but he wrapped the rope around my leg and tied it, at my ankle, to keep the sticks firm as they caged my leg. My breathing increased as I tried to catch the smallest amount of air. The man pulled out another rope and tied it the same way, closer to my knee. "Okay, that should hold until we get you back to your healer," he grunts as he stands up.