Hiccstrid Shorts

Jealousy

"Wait," Hiccup said, stopping in his tracks and putting his hands up in front of him in a 'pause' manner. "Are you flirting with me?"

Though his tone was incriminating and accusatory, there was no denying the note of amusement -- and confusion -- that it held. Coupled with the glint in his eyes as he lifted an eyebrow... As a result, Astrid couldn't help but cautiously slide her gaze toward Hiccup as he looked at the other viking they were conversing with.

The viking, who was from a completely foreign tribe.

That they just so happened to come across during one of their mapping expeditions.

...Who was also so obviously hitting on Hiccup.

She couldn't blame the girl. When a mysterious, handsome, green-eyed dragon rider with a charming smile swoops into your village, trying to catch his eye was a pretty reasonable way to respond.

Yeah, it happened sometimes (the foreign tribe thing, at least), especially what with how far they had been travelling from Berk. It was impossible for them not to come across other villages, but when they did, it was always... interesting, to say the least.

Once most people got over the fact that they rode dragons -- which took a varying amount of time, depending on the tribe -- they were relatively easy to befriend. For the most part. Some situations required a little convincing, and others... Well, others were just overall less than savory experiences. For example, there had been one (several) incident(s) in which entire villages either completely evacuated the premises or armed themselves from their eyebrows to their pinky toes.

And that's not even an exaggeration.

It became something less than out of the ordinary rather quickly. On this hand, however, the almost immediate acceptance of the average Berkian's dragon-training ways yielded very intriguing results that were a little surprising, if Astrid were to be frank. It was one thing to propose a diplomatic alliance with the Hairy Hooligans of Berk, but it was an entirely other thing to propose a diplomatic alliance in the form of a nuptial union.
In other words?

Marriage.

The Mugtrock chief offered them food, resources, and even suggested a brief tour of the island to clue them in on their own dragon situation. Apparently, there had been ulterior motives present. While she couldn't fault the tribe's chief for wanting to ally with a people who had dragons on their side, and while she still couldn't fault his daughter for finding Hiccup attractive, that didn't mean that she had to like it.

And Odin, did she not like it.

All they had been doing was walking throughout the village (which was a lot less mechanically advanced in comparison to Berk, Astrid noted pridefully in her head) with the Mugtrock chief's daughter walking backwards and acting as their tour guide. Astrid and Hiccup walked alongside one another, flanked by either of their respective dragons. Then -- oh, then -- the chief's daughter, Eir, dropped a comment noting how impressive and admirable Hiccup was for accomplishing the feat that he had.

Astrid didn't disagree. She stood firmly beside the prospect that Hiccup deserved every ounce of praise that he received, but it had been the daringly suggestive quirk of Eir's mouth and the exaggerated flutter of her lashes that made Astrid's skin begin to crawl. Like an entire colony of Fireworms scuttling across a boulder over and over and over.

It was tempting to slip her hand into his, as a silent way of staking her claim, but she refrained. Astrid was prideful, not petty. Most of the time.

...Fine. So, maybe there had been literally no verbal suggestion of a marital union between the Mugtrocks and Hairy Hooligans -- not yet, at least! Astrid simply had an immediate feeling that the way that Eir was making goo-goo eyes at Hiccup was enough of an indicator of how the rest of the hour would play out, and a Hofferson always trusted their gut. Whether Hiccup noticed the doe-eyed looks he was receiving or not, he didn't address them at first -- he only acknowledged the more direct attempt of them all: the remark about how great and worthy of honor he was. That's when he asked her outright -- 'was she flirting with him?'