In Lieu Of A Tail

18. Stoick, You Really Let Yourself Go

Now that Hiccup wasn't in a fight-or-flight situation, he was able to notice more about the Chief's appearance. Stoick looked older, he seemed exhausted, as though simply existing as he did was too much. The room froze, the dragons edging closer to their respective partners, and Gothi glaring daggers at Stoick. Hiccup held his silent and somewhat hostile gaze on the Chief for several minutes, before the heels of his hands began to ache, his nails leaving crescent-shaped impressions in the skin and almost drawing blood. He forced them to relax, maintaining his gaze – he would not be the first one to look away, that was an admission of defeat with dragons, a surrender to the more superior.

Stoick looked away first, finding Hiccup incredibly unnerving. Hiccup cleared his throat, his dark eyes flashing – what happened to my son's bright eyes? – as he inclined his head as if to say what? The boy's arms were crossed and he stood up straight, his eyes dissecting the squirming Chief as he tried to figure out what to say.

"Well, Chief Stoick? How may I help you?" Hiccup spat as politely as possible, somehow the added politeness made the words sharper and more venomous. Stoick smothered the part of him that winced at the word Chief. Not Dad, not even Father, Chief.

"Your presence has been requested at noon in Mead Hall, for a council meeting." Hiccup almost scoffed at the formalities.

"And why is my 'presence requested'?" The scoff was barely noticeable, but Toothless had to stifle a snort.

"The Council of Berk is invoking the right to questioning. We wish to know more about you – and whether your being here is a threat." He muttered the last part, as though ashamed, but Hiccup's dragon-trained ears heard every word.

"Very well, I will be there at noon." The statement had a sense of finality to it that made Stoick realise he was being dismissed. He left and it took until he got outside his front door to realise he should be offended. He was, however, too afraid of his son to go confront him, so he headed into town to try to take his mind off of the fact that he – Stoick the Vast, Chief of Berk – was afraid of a boy who was a mere 20 years old and who had been known as Hiccup the Useless.

In fairness to Stoick, Hiccup had become an incredible fighter and leader, so it's not so unexpected that he was feared. Oh, and he had dragons that did his bidding.

Hiccup waited until the Chief had left the house before he released the breath he hadn't known he was holding. He sighed, knowing he only had an hour before the meeting. Toothless crooned, nuzzling his rider.

"At least he is definitely unsettled by you." At this Astra laughed, her brother shot her a glare –shut up –before continuing. "That came out wrong. My point is, he's thrown off, he is going to make some very stupid mistakes, as is the rest of Berk –you can use that to your advantage."

"Why does this pep talk sound like I'm about to go and fight someone?" Hiccup asked.

"Because, in all the time I've known you, this sort of thing has always ended in a fight."

"This sort of thing? What is that supposed to mean?"

"You know, when you find a possible ally and you try and talk them around to your side and you always end up have to prove yourself in battle or whatever."

"You mean diplomacy?" Astra supplied.

"Yeah, that."

"My dragon the wordsmith." Hiccup muttered. "How are we even gonna do this? We can't leave Astra to watch Aurora alone!"

"Yeah, I'd stay with you but someone might try something and I'm a little more threatening than Hiccup here." Toothless pointed out.

"Hey—yeah, no I can't argue with that." Hiccup agreed.

"Hey! I could destroy anyone who came in that door!" Astra protested.

"Yes, 'could', as in you could when you weren't injured, at the moment you could probably take on about 15 Vikings before you'd be completely overwhelmed. And that's just covering yourself, you'd be defending Aurora as well, you can't watch her alone."

"I will stay with them!" Heller squeaked. "I can help defend or go get you if Astra needs me to, not that she would."

"Thank you Heller." Astra whispered to him.

"Excellent." Gothi announced. "Now, we should head to the meeting, I want to get a good seat. And I need to make sure it's near a good patch of dirt for me to write."

"I'm assuming you don't want anyone to know you aren't as mute as they think?" Hiccup questioned.

"You are correct."

"Okay, why?"

"Have you ever watched Gobber trying to decipher them?"

"Yes?"

"Then do I really need to answer that?"

Hiccup snorted. "No, I guess not, it is funny."

"You two be careful, come get us if there's ANY trouble, I don't care if you think you can handle it or not, come get us." Toothless warned Astra and Heller.

With that, Toothless, Hiccup and Gothi headed to the meeting; Hiccup plotting the whole way. They kept to quiet backstreets as much as they could, avoiding as much human interaction as possible. They arrived fifteen minutes early, and while Gothi made herself comfortable, Hiccup and Toothless decided to terrify the Vikings. Toothless leapt at the wall, using it and the other walls to propel himself to a spot that was shrouded in shadows. Hiccup simply slunk into the darkest part of the room that he could find, a corner behind the doors where his Night Fury scaled armour helped camouflage him – he became practically invisible. They found perfect positions just in time, as the doors flew open to admit most of the council, who entered chatting about all sorts of things, Hiccup heard something about bad weather and food shortages, and something about allies going silent. He smirked and filed this information away for later. Once the present council members had sat down, the doors boomed open again, this time for the only two missing council members – Stoick and Gobber – Hiccup almost laughed there and then, nothing had changed, not even the people on the council.

About ten minutes had passed before someone said anything.

"Where is he? It's past noon!" Someone yelled, before everyone else started muttering to each other. Hiccup got bored after about thirty seconds of this and then did a dragon roar, which had the wonderful side effect of shutting everyone up. Then he emerged from the shadows, all his armour positioned perfectly to make him seem more quietly lethal than before. He smirked in the silence at their gobsmacked faces, then he spoke clearly, commanding their attention in a steady tone. He was not the Hiccup they used to see him as.

"Actually, I was here thirty minutes ago."

AN: I do not have an excuse I was just really busy reading Percy Jackson fanfictions and battling writers block I'm really sorry this is late and that I'm not using any punctuation in this AN so far.

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