Whispers of Another World

Prologue

   "Woohoo!"

   Astrid laughed and yelled out in excitement as she felt her loose blond strands of hair smacking her cheeks, as though scolding her with the faint sting for getting distracted and not returning after her patrol.

   Stormfly squawked as she pulled away from the deep blue-black water, making Astrid jerk up and down from the bounce of her dragon's flight.  She curled her fingers tighter around the slight lump on the front of the leather saddle, a grin stretched wide across her face as Stormfly tilted her head down and folded her wings in close to her body, allowing her to dive quickly past the cliffs of the island and nearly hit the dark green water that was the ocean.  A Scauldron raised its sea-green head and hissed at them in dismay, flinging its wings up and roaring an annoyed call.

   Stormfly squawked back to it as she pulled up and abandoned her bouncy flight in favor of a calmer glide, the wind lightly tugging on her wings as it carried her along.  Her small yellow eyes flickered back to Astrid as her rider laid back, using the lump on the dark brown leather saddle as a footrest.

   Stormfly flapped again, bumping Astrid up with a soft surprised yelp.  Her dragon had seen something, she could tell by the quick rhythm of her wingbeats and the way that her spines had snapped out of place, ready to fire.

   There was a silver dragon soaring just above the clouds.  The pair could see the white tufts flickering and moving as the dragon tucked its wings in and dove, giving them a better view of the black spines and underneath of the strange wings.  Silver scales formed falling icicles against what seemed to be a night sky, but it vanished as the dragon circled around - moon-like scales nearly hide the silver teardrop-like scales in the corner of its light blue eyes - and ducked away into the canyons.

   "Come on, girl,"  Astrid whispered.  "Let's go get Hiccup.  This is more his thing."

   Hiccup flattened himself against his dragon's back, which seemed like a part of the sky in the full-moon night that they'd flown through.  Toothless glanced up at him with wide, questioning, dark green eyes.  

   "Astrid said her and Stormfly saw a new dragon around here, bud!"  Hiccup said, a smile stretched across his face.

   "Look at this!"  Fishlegs squealed, holding the card that he'd started the moment Astrid had been able to describe the strange dragon well enough for him to draw it right.  "It's - it's like a mix between a Deadly Nadder and a - a - a NIGHT Fury!"

   "Do you think we finally found one?"  Hiccup asked, his eyes brightening.  To his surprise, Toothless's excitement dimmed, as though there had been a false alarm too many times for him to be excited about it anymore.

   "No, the body shape is too different - it's like nothing we've ever seen before!"  Fishlegs squealed.  Meatlug lolled her tongue out and flapped up beside her friend, who gave her a dead-eyed stare until Fishlegs' words caught up with him.  He grinned, his teeth back, as he shot forward toward the canyons that marked the island.

   "Woah, slow down, bud.  We don't know what this new dragon is capable of, so let's just take this nice and...slow..."  Hiccup trailed off as a shining silver dragon, whose silhouette matched the drawing, flew up in an arch past the rising sun.  But there was an unnatural lump there.

   Hiccup pulled out his spyglass, shifting his metal leg slightly while making a soft clicking noise.  That's when he saw it - a fuzzy black coat that created a mane around the figure and blocked Hiccup's sight of its face.  But there was no denying it - that was a human. 

   "A dragon rider!?"  Fishlegs squeaked, the excitement in his voice slowly changing to confusion.  "What does that mean?"

   "It means we're going to have to take this slow."  Hiccup said as the dragon burst back out of the canyons on the other side of the island before vanishing below the unstable rocks again.  "And split up.  You and Meatlug take this side of the island, Toothless and I will take the other.  Shriek if you need us."

   Fishlegs opened his mouth to protest but Toothless shot away with a last howl to Meatlug before he could.

   Hiccup and his dragon slid through the canyons, every once in a while being hit by tiny rocks that fell from the few small dragon nests that were nestled on the ledges of the cliff edges.  Both of them were on high alert, and Toothless's ears were as pricked as could be.  Hiccup signaled Toothless to go down another canyon, and, despite his grumbling, vanished in the shadows

   A few small pebbles fell again, but this time it felt worse.  It didn't feel natural.  This time Hiccup's heart tried to leap out of his throat as it tightened and tried to strangle him.  He was being watched.  He had a hunter, and he was the prey.

   Hiccup tensed, his muscles locking him in place in the center of the shadowy canyon.  Then, from the other side of the island, Hiccup could hear Fishlegs scream.