29. The damage

"HICCUP!"

All the dragons jerked their heads up to notice a large Timberjack and another skrill approaching the island, with, to the dragons' shock, several humans riding on their back. Toothless recognized them as Syn and the other teens from Selardalr. He assumed they must have followed them here a while after Hiccup and he had taken off for the nest. storm and the Timberjack landed on the shore of the beach, sweeping away the ashes and pebbles gathered in that spot. The teens clambered off of him, Syn rushing towards him and Hiccup while the others only stood taking in the scenery.

"What the heck happened here?" Leif asked, noticing the giant hole in the side of the volcano and the rocks piled everywhere.

"I'd say Toothless wasn't too keen on finding an entrance..."Juliane guessed.

"Are you kidding? No way Toothless did that going in!" Sven exclaimed pointing to the hole. "I'd say something else did... coming out..."

"Well, what could possibly have done that? Some super-mega dragon?" Leif asked.

"Ah, well..." Sven sheepishly scratched the back of his head. "It's a distinct possibility...?"

"Forget the hole in the wall, take a look around, morons!" Raoul shouted. They turned to find him staring face to face at the army of dragons circling them. Everyone yelped in panic and huddled together – even their Chief wouldn't survive against this many!

"Well, Mr. Viking Prodigy!?" Leif quietly chastised to Raoul while nervously gritting his teeth. "You wanna do something?"

"YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS! YOU THINK I CAN TAKE ON THIS MANY!?" Raoul blurted out. The dragons flinched at the loud volume, some wanted to defend but still found themselves spinning at everything that happened with Hiccup.

"Great, thanks for shouting, Raoul. Now we'll be dead a whole 5 minutes faster!" Juliane complained.

They simply shut their eyes, expecting the attack that would bring their end, praying Valhalla would grant their souls passage. But after an eternal moment of waiting... nothing. Sven cracked open an eye to see the dragons were still there, just watching them showing no signs of attacking.

"Hey... guys? Shouldn't we be dragon food right about now?" He asked.

"If my understanding of Viking history is correct, then yes." Leif sarcastically pointed out. "Then again, Hiccup's pretty much been turning history on its head ever since he showed up."

Raoul still had his eyes shut waiting for death; it was true he had started to think a little better of dragons thanks in no small part to the flight over here on timberjack, but that didn't mean he was now a dragon lover. In fact he was just waiting for the dragons to show aggressive behavior and confirm that Vikings had it right all along. He wanted to show up Hiccup and prove that he was the one that everyone should have listened to all along. He had honestly had enough of the fishbone undermining his authority and gaining favor in the process. Leif had been grasping his shoulder and shaking him to snap him out of it, but the young prodigy gave no response.

"I guess they aren't going to attack. Maybe Hiccup tamed them all before we got here; gotta say, he works fast!" Juliane cheerfully spoke with her hands on her hips in pride.

"You think Hiccup did this? I don't know." Sven argued timidly. "As good as he is with dragons, I don't think even he could tame this many in such a short amount of time."

"You sure about that?" Leif argued while still shaking Raoul. "He's got some real charisma when it comes to dragons. He probably only needed to tame a few and the rest just... I don't know, came around."

"Maybe, but that doesn't explain the hole in the cliff side." Sven complained. "Hiccup couldn't possibly have done that, nor could any of these other dragons."

"I guess we'll just have to ask Hiccup about it." Leif reasoned.

"Uh, speaking of Hiccup, where is he?" Juliane finally asked. The three of them looked around, Leif even forgetting about Raoul, to look around, yet they found no sign of Hiccup anywhere. They suddenly remembered Syn, who had run off in the opposite direction, and looked to find her, calling out her name to the sea of scales and wings before them. While Raoul had finally opened an eye to see that he was actually still alive, the others had managed to spot Syn over by a pile of rocks, next to storm, a Nadder, and a black dragon that looked like Toothless, laying down on the ground. Determining that Hiccup must have been nearby, they all rushed to her side, Raoul following after a few more moments. When they had gotten close they heard silent sobbing coming from her, her shoulders trembling.

"Syn?" Juliane asked, placing a hand on his shoulder. She turned to face them all and left them all shocked to find tears cascading down her face like a waterfall.

"Hiccup... he's... he's..." Syn just fell into Juliane's chest and squeezed her, sobbing uncontrollably. Juliane had to wince a little at the strength of Syn's grip, but shared the concern she felt with the others that something terrible had happened to Hiccup. They looked to Toothless, but surprisingly, there was Hiccup, knocked out in his dragon's forelegs. He seemed to be sleeping peacefully, but the others couldn't help but notice the numerous bruises and burns racking his body as well as the pale tint of his skin.

"Wow, somebody did a number on him..." Leif pointed out, eyes as wide as plates.

"I've only seen wounds that bad on the adults after raids." Sven gasped. "Was Hiccup... fighting a dragon?"

"I don't know, but..." Juliane wondered, but her ears perked up at the sound of Hiccup's slight breathing. Looking from Syn to Hiccup she noticed that, although barely noticeable, Hiccup's thin chest was rising and falling, a sure indication that he was still alive. "Hiccup seems okay for now. We just need to take him to the elder and he'll be patched up good as new. Nothing to freak out about, Syn."

"N-No, you d-don't under-s-stand." Syn choked. "H-Hiccup, his-"

"GREAT ODIN'S GHOST! WHAT THE HEL HAPPENED TO HIS LEG!" They all heard Raoul shout. They turned to glare at him, but quickly noticed that his skin was a mix between a disturbed white and a sickly green, staring hard at something enough for his eyes to pop out, his breaths were short and forced, slowly turning into heaving. A look at what he was staring at soon provided the answer: Hiccup's leg was all but destroyed, blood flowing outward across the bunt, dead skin and protruding bone marrow and spots of black and green forming around the deep puncture marks shaped like dragon's teeth. Leif and Sven suddenly felt weak in the knees and collapsed to the ground at the horrifying sight.

"Dear gods..." Leif said before feeling something in his stomach rise back up to his mouth. He shot his fist to his mouth to block it while using his other hand to hold his ill organ. "Up, there's my lunch."

"I-I-oh." Sven tried to speak, but his eyes rolled into his head and he fainted face-first to the ground before anything came out.

Juliane just couldn't stop staring at the ruined appendage. "W-What happened?"

Syn managed to compose herself enough to rise from Juliane's chest and take a deep breath to speak. She turned to Toothless and noticed that the dragon was staring at her expectantly. It didn't take a mind-reader to see that he was begging for her to help. She sucked another breath in and nodded; she had to take charge right now, or things would get ugly, she reasoned.

"We have to get him back to Selardalr, before the wound gets infected." She said as she shakily stood up. As strong as she tried to be, she couldn't hold back the tremble in her tone. "He doesn't have much time left."

The others agreed unanimously; Juliane rushed to get the supplies they had brought as quickly as possible from The Timberjacks' back and brought it to Syn. Together, they had placed some medicinal herbs on Hiccup's useless leg and wrap it with clean bandages to stop the bleeding and hold back the wounds from worsening. They placed a cloth soaked in the water on Hiccup's head to help the fever that was now building up. Leif managed to get Sven back on their feet and snap Raoul out of his stupor, and together they carried Hiccup over to storm, resting him on the dragon's back. It wasn't perfect, or very comfortable at that, but it was the best they could do to transport him safely. The other teens got onboard on the timberjack as well as Syn at the front hovering over Hiccup to inspect his condition. The dragons spread their wings  and just as they were about to lift off...

"Wait!" Sven shouted. "What about Toothless?" He gestured to the dragon that was still lying on the ground, looking at them with sad puppy-dog eyes.

"Good point," Leif said. "We can't just leave him here, and it looks like he's in no condition to fly." They all knew that Toothless needed a rider to operate the tail fin that Hiccup had made for him. But aside from the bruises that Toothless had on his body, they noticed that the saddle was ruined, and the tail fin was nowhere to be seen. Without that prosthetic, Toothless was as good as grounded.

"Well, the dragons can't take any more." Syn reasoned. "There's no way they can carry us AND a Night Fury all the way back!"

"And Hiccup won't be too happy to hear that we left his dragon behind." Juliane said.

Raoul growled his signature frustrated growl. "I told you we should have gotten Harold and the other warriors before we left! They could have come in a ship and then we wouldn't have this problem! But NO! You HAD to be in a rush to go after your suicidal boyfriend!"

"Wait, so... you're worried about Hiccup and Toothless?" Leif raised an eyebrow in skepticism.

"I'm NOT! I'm just worried that Selardalr will lose its surefire defense against the dragons by the time the next raid rolls in!" Raoul argued, turning away to keep the others from seeing the blush on his face.

A roar came out from the mass of dragons behind them; turning they gasped at the sight of another large dragon coated in an armor of bones approaching – a Boneknapper. Boneknappers were considered imaginary creatures to most Vikings since they were only seen by one or two throughout the Archipelago, said to be searching for the perfect bones to complete their armor. Very little was known about them, so it was only logical for them and even Storm and the timberjack to raise their guards up once more.

The Boneknapper only passed by them and made eye contact with Toothless, before looking at a couple of his legs and one of his wings, and finally turning to them and letting out a small growl. The teens were confused for a moment before Syn made a guess at its strange behavior.

"You'll... carry him home?" She asked. The teens gasped when the Boneknapper nodded its head as if it understood her. No mindless beast could do such a thing, they all agreed looking at each other.

"All right then. Follow us." They finally took to the sky, hovering over the peak off the island; the Boneknapper lifted up slightly and scooped Toothless up in his claws, lifting him up with no problem. The three dragons made their way towards Selardalr, but as the teens looked back to the foreboding island where the nest was, they gasped in shock to see that every one of the dragons gathered there had taken off after them, and were now following them back.

"W-What are they doing?" Sven  asked.

"Don't tell me they want to come back with us!" Raoul shouted angrily.

"Hmmm well, we all wanted dragons." Leif stated, remembering the conversation they had on the way over to the nest. "At least now, we'll have a wider selection."

Syn looked back to see the plethora of dragons that were flying back with them, surprised at all the different types she saw. But what shocked and impressed her the most was the feeling she saw in each pair of eyes that hers happened to cross upon despite the distance between them. It was a look they gave whenever they were led into battle, a look they constantly gave her father: a gaze of true, undying loyalty, and each and every one was aimed right at Hiccup. Like Toothless, these dragons were ready to fight and die on his behalf; they pledged their lives to this boy, ready to stand by his side no matter what fate threw their way. A small smile crept on her face seeing that – to inspire such a look, Hiccup really was an incredible boy.

"I don't know, Raoul" syn said still looking at the dragons. "I don't think we'll be getting raids anymore."TO BE CONTINUED.....