Chapter 28

Hiccup flapped his wings silently as they glided across the dark sky, Ignatius flying at his right as Toothless and Hookfang flew behind him. He knew he probably should have gotten irritated by Ignatius not flying behind him, but he didn't mind it much. 

"How long did the Dragon Hunters have you trapped for?" Hiccup asked the other Dragonborn. 

Ignatius's eyes darkened, "I'm not quite sure. There wasn't any light. They didn't feed me."

"They didn't feed you?" Hiccup asked, concerned. "Are you sure you have enough energy to make if to the nest?" 

"How far is it?" he asked, his exhaustion just barely peaking through his eyes. 

Hiccup turned to the sky, sniffing the air. "I'm not quite sure. But it took us about a day to get to where you were, so probably a while longer." 

The Sun Sweeper's ear flaps drooped slightly, his wing beats minisclulety slower. "Maybe. I don't know."

Hiccup nodded. "Okay, we'll find somewhere to rest." 

They flew for a few minutes more, Hiccup constantly searching the horizon for an island to land on. But the farther they flew, the slower Ignatius's wing beats got, and Hiccup could tell that he was struggling to stay in the sky, even though he didn't voice it. 

Hiccup turned back towards Hookfang, "Hookfang, do you think you could fly ahead and search for somewhere to stop?"

Hookfang nodded. "Sure, Captain." 

With a powerful wing beat, Hookfang soared away. 

"I could always carry you on my back if you get too tired," Hiccup offered to Ignatius. 

He shook his head, "No. I'm fine." 

Hiccup sighed, trying to think of ways to distract him from his tiredness. 

"How old are you?" Hiccup asked Ignatius. 

Ignatius's red eyes flashed towards Hiccup distrustingly for a second. "Why?" 

"I'm curious." Hiccup shrugged. 

Silence took them for a moment, before Ignatius answered, "I'm fifteen Winters old." 

Hiccup smiled, "Oh, we're the same age." 

Ignatius turned to look at Hiccup for a moment, before turning away again. "Oh." 

Hiccup's brows furrowed. Every attempt to talk to the boy was coming up useless. After Ignatius's initial thrill of being free and out in the sky again, he brought his walls back down. Hiccup could have asked about his past, but he had a feeling that that might be a sore subject. 

"Do you have a nickname?" Hiccup asked suddenly, making Ignatius look at him with a confused expression. 

"What do you mean?" 

"Like, Ignatius is a mouthful," Hiccup said. "Is there anything else I could call you?" 

Ignatius finally faced Hiccup fully, his red eyes staring at Hiccup with confusion. "You want to call me something other than my birth name?" he asked. 

"No," Hiccup said hastily, "I want to know if I could call you a shorter version of your birth name."

"Like what?" 

"Like," Hiccup thought for a moment. "Something like Ig, or Nati, or Tius." 

Ignatius blinked, "Those are horrible." 

Hiccup sighed, "Okay, what can I call you?" 

"Ignatius," he answered, turning back towards the sky. "That's what everyone calls me." 

"Alright, fine," Hiccup said, defeated. "I'll have to think of something better." 

"And why can't you just call me by my birth name?" 

"That name takes too long to say. Imagine you're in battle, and you scream for help, but you're dead before you can finish yelling because the person you were calling for had too long of a name." 

Ignatius turned to Hiccup again, amusement flashing briefly in his eyes. "That is a highly specific scenario." 

"But a possible one," Hiccup said, smirking. 

"Well, I'm definitely not letting you call me 'Ig'," he replied, "and 'Tius' is out of the question." 

"So, Nati?" Hiccup asked hopefully. 

Ignatius grimaced, "Never mind, they're all horrible."

"Oh, come on," Hiccup sighed. "Then how about we just drop the 'Ig' and call you Natius?" 

"That's only one less syllable than before." 

"So one less second needed to call for help." 

"I don't see the effectiveness of this." 

"Can I call you Natius or not?" Hiccup said, a slight laugh in his voice. 

He let out a sigh, "Fine. Go ahead." 

Hiccup smiled, "Thank you." 

"Um, so can we all call you Natius, or?" Toothless asked from behind them, making Hiccup startle slightly. He had forgotten he was there. 

"Sure," Natius said uneasily after a moments pause. "But don't overuse it." 

Toothless nodded, "Okay." 

A roar sounded ahead of them, and Hiccup turned to see Hookfang approaching them. 

"Captain," Hookfang greeted, nodding his head. "There's an uninhabited island not too far ahead of us. We should be able to get there soon." 

Hiccup nodded, "Great. Thanks, Hookfang." 

Hookfang fell into flight behind Hiccup again, and silence fell over them as the island Hookfang mentioned began to come into view. Soon enough, they were circling the island, Hiccup trying to find the best place to land. He spotted a large lake near the center of the island, and decided that it would be the best place to get water and hunt some fish. 

With a small flap of his wings, Hiccup began gliding down towards the lake, Natius sluggishly following him at his side and Hookfang and Toothless following behind them. Hiccup swooped and landed on the mossy floor, immediately walking towards the lake for a drink. Natius landed next to him, staggering slightly before eagerly following Hiccup's lead. He drank the water savagely, clearly not having had a drop of water in days. 

"I can get some fish for you while you rest," Hiccup offered the Sun Sweeper. 

"I can get fish myself," Natius responded, his voice sharp. 

"Okay," Hiccup said, slightly concerned. "Just let me know if you need help getting any. You're clearly not at your strongest." 

Natius glared at him, but his shoulders sagged, clearly agreeing with his statement. 

The four dragons began prowling the bank of the lake, their eyes scanning the water for food. It was a bit harder to hunt in the dark, but Hiccup quickly had a pile of seven fish, five large ones and two smaller ones. Toothless and Hookfang had set their piles down near his, and curled up around their spoils before beginning to shovel them into their mouths. Natius was the last of them to lay down, his malnourished frame falling to the ground with a thud around his small pile of fish. He had only caught three fish, just one of which was actually big enough to satiate any hunger. 

Hiccup observed this quietly, and shifted into his half dragon form before throwing two of his large fish towards Natius. 

Natius glared at the fish, and then at Hiccup. "I told you that I didn't need your help getting fish." 

"Yes, but that is the smallest pile of fish I've ever seen," Hiccup replied, grabbing a fish in his hands and beginning to chew. 

Natius was about to retort, but stopped when he saw Hiccup begin to eat his fish. 

"What are you doing?" he asked. 

"Eating," Hiccup replied, digging a fish bone out of his mouth. 

"In your human form?" Natius asked, confused. 

"Half human form," Hiccup corrected. "And yes, I am. It may be harder to eat fish with human teeth, but your stomach fills up quicker because it's smaller." 

Natius's eyes brightened, "So, I would still feel full as a dragon if I ate as a human?" 

"Yeah," Hiccup replied. "Have you not done it before?" 

Instead of replying, Natius shifted into his half dragon form, sitting down with his tail curled elegantly around his body as he began to eat the fish. He ate like he hadn't eaten anything his whole life, the fish blood running down his face as he ate the fish Hiccup had offered him with no more objections. 

In moments, all the fish were gone, and he was licking the remaining blood off of his face and fingers happily. 

Hiccup laughed amusedly at the sight, making Natius look up to glare at him. 

"What?" he growled, his pupils thinning slightly. 

"Nothing," Hiccup said. "I just don't think I've seen anyone eat that quickly." 

"I've been starved for weeks." 

"Well, yeah," Hiccup said awkwardly. 

Silence over took them, and Hiccup continued eating, Hookfang and Toothless having finished their fish a while ago. 

"Can I ask you something?" Toothless asked Natius suddenly. 

"It depends," Natius replied. "What is it?" 

"So, were your Dragonborn powers triggered by a dragon, or were you born to two Dragonborn parents?" Toothless asked, making Hiccup straighten and wait for Natius's answer intently. 

Natius tensed. "No, I wasn't born with them. They were given to me by a dragon." 

"So it was a Sun Sweeper?" Toothless asked, his gaze intense. 

"Yes," Natius said tersely. 

"So there are other Sweepers out there?" 

Natius furrowed his eyebrows, "Of course there are. We all live on an island. The Sweeper Nest." 

An excited expression bloomed across Toothless's face, "So the myths are right? All the Sweepers didn't die? They just moved away?" 

"Yeah," Natius said slowly. "The Hunters caught me not too far from our nest." 

"Wait, why did you come with us if you had a nest to go back to?" Hiccup asked, suddenly worried that they had taken Natius from his home. 

"Because that's the first place the Hunters will look for me," Natius replied. "We have a rule in the nest. If you get caught by Dragon Hunters, and you escape, you aren't allowed to come back to the nest until you've been away from them for at least a year. That way, the Hunters will have stopped looking for you, and you don't risk revealing the location of the nest. And when a dragon gets captured, the nest goes into lockdown. No one is allowed to go past the magical barriers of the nest until the year has passed. It's how we try to keep our kind safe." 

"Magical barriers?" Hiccup questioned. 

"The King and Queen are Mated, and with the amount of subjects they have, their magic is great," Natius explained. "With that much magic, they use it to protect us. The barriers keep humans out. Meaning that if a human is on a boat sailing in the nest's direction, the magic will make them sail around the nest, but they think they're going in a straight line." 

"Interesting," Hiccup murmered. 

"What's the nest like?" Toothless asked Natius, his eyes wide. 

"Beautiful," Natius responded, a small bit of sorrow appearing in his red eyes. 

Toothless let out a mournful sound, "I wish that I could go." 

"You will," I told Toothless firmly. "Once the Queen is done with, I'll make sure of it." 

"The Queen?" Natius asked, "What Queen?" 

 "The Red Death," Hiccup answered darkly. "She rules over a nest in the Viking archipelago, using her alpha powers to make her subjects raid Viking villages, and bring the food they get back to her to eat." 

"And if they don't bring back enough food," Toothless said, "she'll eat them instead." 

Natius looked slightly horrified, "That sounds awful." 

"Which is why I've made it my mission to stop her," Hiccup responded. "I'm just not powerful enough yet to do so." 

Natius looked at Hiccup curiously. "That's brave." 

"No, I've just seen too many Vikings and dragons die because of her rule," Hiccup said dismissively, finishing his last fish. "It's not brave. I'd just feel guilty not doing it." 

"Hiccup, it's bravery," Toothless said. "Guilt or not, you're still planning to go up against a powerful alpha queen." 

Hiccup sighed, "Fine, it's kind of bravery." 

Toothless rolled his eyes, "Well, I'm going to sleep. Wake me up when the sun's risen." 

"Me too," Hookfang said, and the two of them curled up to sleep. 

Hiccup shifted into his dragon form, standing up and heating the ground below him with his plasma before laying down on it. He could feel Natius's eyes burning into him, and looked up to see the Sun Sweeper looking at him with interest. 

"What?" Hiccup asked. 

"Your magic is blue," Natius observed, and shifted into his dragon form too, flashing red. 

"And yours is red," Hiccup responded. 

"It's because you're born to the Moon Goddess, right?" Natius asked, his head tilting. 

"Yeah," Hiccup responded, his head seeming to act on its own accord as it raised and looked towards the moon hanging in the sky. 

"What's it like?" Natius asked, his eyes wide and curious. It was an expression Hiccup hadn't yet seen on the other Dragonborn's face, the red eyes lacking the defensiveness they previously had.

"What's what like?" Hiccup asked after a moment, having to remind himself to answer. 

"How do you see the moon?" Natius asked, "When I see the sun, I see the Sun God's magical rays covering the skies."

"You see the Sun God's magic?" Hiccup said, intrigued.

Natius nodded, "Yes. Do you see something similar with the Moon Goddess? I've always wanted to ask a Moon Sweeper, but I didn't really get along well with all of the Sweepers at the nest." 

Hiccup frowned, "Why not?" 

Natius shrugged, "They all criticized the Sun Sweeper who gave me my magic for bringing the Dragonborn back. They thought it would only end badly." His eyes darkened. "I suppose they were right." 

Hiccup shook his head, "It would have been wrong for that Sun Sweeper to just leave you in the human world. I know that I never fit in there." 

"I didn't either," Natius said.

They stared at each other for a moment, before Hiccup remembered his question. 

"Oh, right," he exclaimed. "Yeah, I do see the Moon Goddess's magic. It's like giant rays of blue light dancing across the stars." 

Natius smiled slightly, "Sounds familiar." 

Silence overtook them again, but Natius looked away after a moment, his small smile slowly fading away.

"Sorry," Natius said. 

"For what?" Hiccup asked. 

"I lied a little bit," he replied. "The other Sweepers didn't like that I was Dragonborn, but they also didn't like me." 

"Why?" Hiccup asked. 

"I can be a bit," he hesitated for a moment, "much." 

"I don't think you're a bit much," Hiccup said. 

Natius laughed bitterly, "Trust me, once the real me comes back from those really long days locked up on a Dragon Hunter ship, you'll change your mind." 

"No I won't," Hiccup said, swearing by every word. "I promise." 

He looked at Hiccup hesitantly, "So if I drop the nice thank-you-so-much-for-rescuing-me facade by the morning, you will try your best to not be upset?" 

Hiccup laughed, "I don't think I've seen much of that facade." 

"Trust me," Natius said, "if you hadn't just saved my life, I would have put up a lot more of a fight with every decision you've made in the past few hours." 

Hiccup looked at him confusedly, "Which decisions?" 

"All of them," Natius sighed, seeming miserable at his own answer.

"Why?" 

"I don't know," he said. "I'm just used to fighting with everyone I meet. I grew up in an orphanage where if you didn't show others that you were the one in charge, then you would get your stuff stolen and your clothes burned off your body. The only dragon that was able to stand me was the Sun Sweeper who gave me my magic." 

Hiccup considered him for a moment, "I think that's fine. I wonder if I'm doing the right thing with every decision I make, so it'd be nice to have the full and honest opinion of someone else every once in a while." 

"It'd be more than just once in a while," Natius said sheepishly. 

"Even better," Hiccup said, smiling. 

Natius still looked unconvinced, but he smiled back at Hiccup. It wasn't quite a true smile, but Hiccup took it as a start. 

Natius turned away, curling up on the ground. "Night, Hiccup." 

Hiccup set his head down on the ground."Night, Nati."

The Sun Sweeper slapped him over his head with his tail.