Gobber POV
I was staring over the docks, the morning mist still clinging to the water like a stubborn dragon refusing to let go of its prey. Thorfinn was at my side, pressed close to my leg as if he was trying to draw warmth from me, though the morning wasn't particularly cold.
Hiccup, on the other hand, was perched on my shoulders, his small hands gripping my hair as he waved enthusiastically at the departing ship. His father had already boarded and the boy seemed determined to wave until the very last sail disappeared beyond the horizon.
Thorfinn waved as well, though he did it very timidly, his small hand barely moving above his waist.
Speaking of Thorfinn, the boy had certainly made rounds in the village over these past months. He didn't go out much, that was true enough, and when he did venture beyond the armory, he avoided the other children like a plague. He rarely spoke unless spoken to directly, and even then his responses were short.
In fact a rumor had begun to spread that the boy had sacrificed his voice to kill the Nadder, of course it was just that a rumor, but I was sure some kids believed it. So it wasn't like he did much.
But what he did do was carve.
By Thor's hammer, did that boy carve.
Every scrap of wood I brought home found its way into his hands. He would sit for hours, hunched over whatever piece he was working on. He carved out whatever dragons he saw in the attacks, and there had been plenty of those in recent months.
The boy was getting quite good at it, disturbingly so.
The other thing Thorfinn had taken to was Hiccup. Or rather, Hiccup had taken to him, and the boy had simply accepted this development with his usual quiet resignation. It started small, Hiccup reaching for Thorfinn's distinctive white hair whenever they were in the same room.
Thorfinn had become a babysitter of sorts, though he never asked for the role and I never officially assigned it to him. It just... happened.
Whenever Stoick needed to attend to chief business and I was busy in the forge, Thorfinn would appear at my elbow, silently extending his arms to take Hiccup. He never complained about the drool, the crying, or the way Hiccup would sometimes grab fistfuls of that white hair and refuse to let go. If anything, those were the only times I saw something resembling peace in the boy's deep blue eyes.
Stoick had laughed boisterously whenever Hiccup called out to Thorfinn, which the toddler did with increasing frequency. Snow had become part of Hiccup's limited vocabulary, whenever Thorfinn was near.
My thoughts were interrupted as Stoick's booming voice carried across the water from the ships, which had already caught wind in their sails and were being sent out to the Archipelago, to the island of Ivar who had called this mysterious meeting.
"Forward to Kattegat!"
Kattegat.
It was a small island, maybe three weeks away by boat if the winds were favorable and dragons didn't interfere too much with their journey. The return trip would likely take longer, as it always did when you were carrying the weight of new information, new alliances, or new enemies. All told, it would be around two months before Stoick returned with his company.
I looked at the vikings who had taken to their posts on the boat. Stoick had brought with him six of the finest dragon killers this side of the Archipelago, men and women of Berk, men and women he could trust.
And yet it I felt a worry in my gut start to grow, then again I may just be hungry.
As the boat sailed away from view, growing smaller and smaller until it was just a speck on the horizon, Hiccup seemed to have grown exhausted from all his enthusiastic waving. His small head dropped to rest against my own, his tiny body going limp which made him weigh ten times more for some reason.
"Well then," I said, my gaze lowering to meet Thorfinn's steady blue eyes. "To Stoick's home we go."
Thorfinn shook his head.
"What do you mean no?" I asked, genuinely puzzled. "Stoick already said I could use his home for the next few weeks, mainly so Hiccup doesn't get worried at not being around stuff he knows. Besides, I don't have a proper bed for him at the forge."
Thorfinn looked up at me, his gaze sharpening.
"What, you think I'm lying?" I asked, trying to inject some humor into my voice to break the tension.
His gaze sharpened even more, and I felt beads of sweat begin to form at the back of my neck.
"It's true!" I said, perhaps a bit too loudly, my voice carrying an edge of defensiveness that I hadn't intended. "I'm just thinking of what's best for everyone involved here."
Again, that piercing stare.
"Fine, fine," I sighed, running my free hand through my hair in defeat. "It isn't entirely true. I just didn't want to haul Hiccup's crib and all his things all the way down the mountain to the forge. It's murder on my back, especially with this peg leg, and you know how the boy gets when he's not in familiar surroundings. He'll cry for hours, and then neither of us will get any sleep, and then I'll be too tired to work properly, and then people will complain about their weapons being subpar, and then—"
"Okay," Thorfinn interrupted quietly, his voice cutting through my rambling explanation. "We can stay at Chief Stoick's home, but only because of Hiccup."
I let out a breath I didn't realize I'd been holding. "Thank you, boy. Thank you for being reasonable about this, I know it's not ideal but—"
However, he interrupted me again before I could launch into another explanation.
"But we can't go into the chief's room."
I gasped, placing my free hand over my heart in mock offense. "You'd think I'd intrude upon his privacy? That I'd go rifling through his personal belongings like some common thief?"
His gaze sharpened once more.
"Fine," I muttered, my shoulders sagging in defeat. "I would have snooped around a bit. Maybe looked through his things, see if he had any interesting books or weapons I hadn't seen before. By Loki's scepter, you're a tough interrogator, boy."
After that exchange, the boy turned to look out over the sea, his gaze following the direction the boat had sailed. The ships were nothing more than tiny dots now, barely visible against the grey-blue expanse of water that stretched endlessly toward the horizon.
I waited for a moment, watching him, and then I saw it.
His body.
Trembling.
I had noticed that it happened whenever he looked at fire or at water, I guess that choking on seawater does that to someone, still the boy seemed to manage it well enough as in the next moment it was all but gone.
"I'm going to Gothi's," he said suddenly.
"Say hello to the Old Bat for me," I replied, adjusting my grip on the sleeping Hiccup. "Tell her I said she still owes me for that last batch of prosthetics I made for her patients."
Thorfinn nodded and waved at me as he began running up the wooden ramps that led back to the village proper.
I watched him go, then looked up at those same raps, then down at my peg leg, then to the ramps, then my peg leg again.
I sighed.
Gods, this was going to be a long walk back to Stoick's house.
Thorfinn POV
I ran as fast as my legs could carry me.
It wasn't long before I stood in front of a familiar wooden door, completely new, likely it had been torn down in a dragon attack, maybe the one from last week or the one a month and a half ago, not sure. I raised my small fist and knocked.
The sound of three distinct steps resounded from inside, Gothi's two feet and her cane. She opened the door without preamble, a smile on her face.
She was weird like that she never seemed to get mad or sad, she'd just go from indifference to happiness then back to indifference. She stepped aside, gesturing for me to enter with a sharp nod of her head.
"I'm here for the gel," I said, though I knew she already knew why I had come.
Gothi nodded, her scarred arm pointing toward the familiar chair by her workbench. I took my place and began to pull off my shirt, the fabric catching slightly on the raised edges of my scar. The burn mark stretched from my left hip to my left pectoral, a twisted spiral of damaged skin.
Gothi walked over slowly, she propped her cane against the wall and began to search through one of her many cabinets, her gnarled fingers gliding over each bottle she had prepared, a clinking sound echoing in the room.
A familiar jar soon appeared in her hands, the scarring gel.
This particular concoction was quite magical as it would allow the scar tissue to grow along with the rest of my body as I aged.
It sounded like it might be a bad thing, keeping the scar active and present, but it was actually the opposite. Without this gel, the skin on my chest and torso would remain rigid and inflexible, unable to accommodate my growth. The result would be constant pain, weakened skin that tore easily, and probably physical deformities that would only get worse with time.
Thankfully, I didn't have to worry about that future, as long as I kept up with these regular treatments.
Gothi handed me the gel, and I took it gratefully, removing the cork stopper and beginning to apply the cool, greenish substance to my scarred skin. The gel had a strange tingling sensation as it absorbed into the damaged tissue, and I'd learned to find the feeling oddly comforting over the months.
I looked up at Gothi, who was watching me in silence.
"So," I said, trying to keep my voice casual, "has there been any progress on that other potion, Gothi?"
Gothi looked at me for a long moment, then shook her head slowly. The gesture made my heart sink.
"Yeah, I thought so," I sighed, letting the gel continue to work its way into my skin. I looked back at Gothi, hope flickering in my chest despite my better judgment. "Not even one ingredient?"
She shook her head again.
I felt my teeth clench together involuntarily, my jaw muscles tightening with frustration that I struggled to control. The sleeping draught, that's what Gobber had called it, it was something I'd been asking about for weeks now. The ingredients were rare, as they came from very particular dragons.
It's fine, I told myself. It's fine.
I'd just have to learn to deal with it, just like I had been dealing with it the last few weeks when the potion had run out.
Then I felt it, Gothi's weathered hand coming to rest gently on top of my head, her fingers surprisingly warm against my white hair. She smiled down at me.
I smiled back, but I still felt disappointed.
I needed that potion. I needed it take away whatever dreams my mind came up with. Gothi had said (well not really said) that they were very likely my memories from before Berk but I didn't want to remember my life before Berk.
Especially if it was at all like my dreams.
I sighed one final time, noting that the gel had fully absorbed into my skin by then.
I walked toward the door, pausing to look back at Gothi one more time. She was still standing by her workbench, watching me with those knowing eyes that seemed to see far more than they should.
"If you get any new ingredients, any at all, please tell me," I said, and I could hear the plea in my own voice despite my efforts to sound casual.
Gothi smiled again, a small nod answering me.