How to Train Your Dragon: How to Seize a Dragon's Jewel

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How to Train Your Dragon: How to Seize a Dragon's Jewel Page 20

by Cressida Cowell


  ‘I am sorry, Father,’ cried Thuggory solemnly,

  and he bowed formally to his father as a son should.

  ‘But Hiccup is right. If the dragons were free, they

  would not make war on us. It is time for a new world,

  a better one.’

  Thuggory stopped in front of Valhallarama,

  very brisk and soldier-like, and knelt and removed his

  helmet as if he were becoming a Warrior.

  Valhallarama put the Dragonmark on his

  forehead.

  ‘Hiccup for King!’ yelled Thuggory, jumping to

  his feet and punching the air.

  ‘Well, only one person!’ scoffed the witch.

  ‘You’re not going to get very far with only one foll—’

  ‘Hiccup for King!’ roared a whole cohort of

  young Meatheads, clearly friends of Thuggory.

  Suddenly all around the courtyard, the young

  teenagers of the Tribes pressed forward to get the

  Mark. Camicazi landed in the courtyard with Fishlegs

  on the back of the Deadly Shadow, and had to

  push her way to the front and threaten several

  Danger-Brutes to get her Dragonmark first.

  Because even the young of the conventionally

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  vicious Tribes such as the Danger-Brutes and the

  Visithugs were clamouring for the Mark now.

  How was this possible?

  Well, a strange thing had happened during the six

  months of Hiccup being an Outcast.

  Hiccup had turned from the most unlikely,

  scrawny, puny little Viking ever, into a romantic figure

  of rebellion.

  Many of the younger Vikings had been secretly

  following his progress as Hiccup set free dragon-traps

  and eluded the forces of the Wilderwest in yet another

  brilliant and hair-raising escape.

  They had been whispering in secret stories

  of Hiccup’s adventures, and suddenly they were

  whispering them not as evidence of what a weirdo he

  was, how bizarre, how freakish, but of how clever, how

  extraordinary, how bravely unusual he was…

  ‘Have you heard how he discovered the Land

  That Does Not Exist?’ they had been whispering.

  ‘Have you heard how he defeated the Sea

  Dragon? The Strangulator? How he tricked the

  Romans at the Fortress of Sinister? How he stopped

  the Exterminators at Lava-Lout island? How he slipped

  through the witch’s fingers once again in the land of

  Nowhere? How he found EVERY SINGLE ONE

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  of Grimbeard the Ghastly’s Lost Things, and Alvin only

  stole them from him?’

  When you put it like that, it seems extraordinary

  that no one had noticed what a Hero they had in their

  midst already. Short of going round with a big fat arrow

  on his head saying ‘HERE IS THE

  GREATEST HERO YOU’VE HAD IN THE

  ARCHIPELAGO FOR CENTURIES’ there isn’t

  much more that Hiccup could have done to make this

  blindingly obvious.

  But it can sometimes take a while for people to

  change their minds about things.

  Even Hiccup’s ridiculous birthday, the 29th of

  February of a Leap Year, a source of shame to him for

  his entire life, was suddenly in his favour.

  ‘And I’ve heard he’s only three years old,’ they

  whispered, in hushed respect.

  ‘To have done all this when he is only THREE

  YEARS OLD. Why it’s superhuman!’

  This is the way that legends begin.

  You remember what I said, way way way back at

  the start of Hiccup’s adventures, how this would be the

  story of becoming a Hero the Hard Way?

  Now you can begin to see exactly how hard the

  way has been.

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  Alone, Hiccup had stood up against Alvin the

  Treacherous and the entire weight of the Tribes. Alone,

  he had stood up for what he believed in, for what he

  felt was right, even when everyone else thought he was

  wrong.

  That was something, in the end, that the Vikings

  could respect.

  And somehow, along the way, Hiccup with his

  masked dragonskin fire-suit, his inventive equipment,

  his raggedy Windwalker dragon, his championing of the

  weak and friendless, his weird little toothless hunting-

  dragon, his actually really-rather-cool tattoo…

  (For when you come to think about it, a tattoo

  in the shape of a dragon on your forehead, is kind of

  cool.)

  Somehow with all these things, Hiccup had

  become…

  … a Hero.

  And not just any old Hero either.

  The sort of person people will follow into battle

  and risk their lives for.

  A King.

  It wasn’t just the young either.

  Even Mogadon the Meathead found himself

  looking anew at Hiccup, and changing his mind.

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  How is it that things can change so quickly, as it

  seems, in an instant?

  The fact is that things had been changing anyway,

  without the Vikings really realising. The existence of

  Prison Darkheart had been an unspoken source of

  shame that the non-slave-trading Tribes had tried very

  hard to forget about.

  Most of the Vikings were fond of the dragons

  they had grown up with, and even with the war going

  on, the thought of a world without dragons was

  depressing and frightening.

  Plus the witch and Alvin had already enslaved

  many friends and relations, and a large number of

  people in that courtyard had a vague anxiety that they

  could be next.

  So people had been changing their minds

  without really realising, and when things build to a

  tipping point, a revolution can happen in just five

  minutes.

  ‘M-U-U-U-U-U-UTINYYYYYYYYY!!!!’

  screamed Alvin the Treacherous. ‘LOYAL CITIZENS

  OF THE WILDERWEST, ARREST THESE

  TRAITORS, BURY THEM IN THE DEEPEST

  DARKEST DUNGEON YOU CAN FIND, AND

  THROW AWAY THE KEY!’

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  Absolute chaos then ensued in that Prison

  Darkheart, as in one life-changing second, everybody

  tried to decide which side they were on and,

  furthermore, work out which side everybody else

  was on, which wasn’t so very easy on the spur of the

  moment like that.

  All the slaves were on Hiccup’s side of course,

  and some of the guards began to set them free from

  their chains immediately. Most Tribes like the Bog-

  Burglars, Peaceables and Hooligans were already

  thoroughly fed up with the whole Treacherous regime.

  But the witch and Alvin still had plenty of

  supporters among the Murderous and Uglithug Tribes,

  the Danger-Brutes and the Berserks. I’m afraid there

  were plenty of vicious and heartless humans in that lot.

  And because there wasn’t time for everybody

  who wanted it to get themselves clearly marked with

  the Dragonmark so that everyone knew where they

  were, the ensuing battle very quickly became extremely

  confusing.

  The night air rang with the b
right sound of

  sword on sword, and cries of ‘What are you doing? I’m

  on your side!’ and ‘Oh, I’m so sorry, I just assumed

  because you were a Murderous that you’d be for the

  witch,’ and ‘Oh, you did, did you? Well, let me tell

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  you, some of us Murderous are just as sensitive as the

  next guy…’ And so on.

  Firing arrows at a ridiculously systematic rate,

  Valhallarama fought her way to Stoick’s side and

  HIYYYAAHHH!!!! with one swing of her battle-axe she

  chopped through the chains that bound him.

  Hiccup was close enough to hear what his

  mother said to Stoick.

  ‘You were not my first love, Stoick the Vast,’ said

  Valhallarama. ‘But you are my last…’

  Stoick’s tired eyes lit up. And then Valhallarama

  grinned, just like she must have grinned, once, when

  she was a wild little girl.

  ‘Welcome to the Company of the Dragonmark,

  Chief.’ And she handed Stoick her second best sword.

  Stoick’s chest swelled. The years fell off him. For

  Thor’s sake, he was not an old man after all, a little

  past his prime perhaps, but the best years of his life

  were ahead of him and he could feel the dance of war

  beginning to tingle in his feet…

  ‘Valhallarama, my darling,’ said Stoick, ‘that is a

  lovely thing to say, and you were magnificent, as ever!’

  Valhallarama had drawn the Nevermiss, and the

  two of them rang their two swords together grandly,

  affectionately, as if they were lifting glasses in a toast.

  Roaring like a charging bull, Stoick launched

  back into battle, swinging his sword at Alvin’s warriors,

  creaking a tiny bit at the knees perhaps, but mostly like

  he’d never really left.

  ‘GUARDS OF THE WILDERWEST! COME

  FIGHT FOR YOUR KING!’ screamed Alvin.

  ‘NO!’ yelled the witch. ‘The Dragon Rebellion!

  Don’t forget the Dragon Rebellion!’

  But the guards on the battlements left their

  positions on Alvin’s orders, and the attack of the

  Dragon Rebels became louder and more furious, and

  there was a danger that at any second now they would

  break through and overwhelm the prison itself.

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  30. THE BATTLE OF PRISON

  DARKHEART

  No wonder they called this bay the Dragons’

  Graveyard. Indescribably sinister it was, this past and

  present battlefield, and the wind wailing through

  those dead dragon skeletons seemed to carry voices

  of a millennium of ghosts.

  Now the tide had risen again and the living

  dragons were waking.

  The red sand below the sea was giving birth to

  live dragons, swarming in their thousands out of the

  scarlet sand below and bursting out of the bay, and

  none of them were Hiccup’s favourite species.

  Serpent-tongues writhed and twisted around

  the white dragon bones, shaking out their wet

  wings. Sandrazors, Hellsteethers, Darkbreathers and

  Tonguetwisters joining them from the Forgotten

  Forest and the Open Ocean. The darkest types of

  dragon species, the monsters, the ones that hated

  the humans most.

  They were chanting the beginning of the

  Red-Rage and sharpening their talons on the bones of

  their dead dragon brothers. They saw the little human

  ants and their terrible weapons of exploding fire and

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  spears departing from the battlements, and they

  knew their time had come.

  Crouching in the centre of the ghastly graveyard

  of dragons’ hopes and dreams and lives, was the

  Dragon Furious. It is difficult to describe the beauty of

  Furious. Now that he was no longer a captive, his skin,

  though scarred, had returned to its former glory. It was

  a blue so blue that you have never seen that colour

  before. Deeper than the blue sky, more royal than

  cerise, brighter than sapphires.

  ‘The humans are fighting among themselves,’

  whispered Furious, and his eyes blazed with triumph.

  And I mean, quite literally, blazed. An

  extraordinary feature of fully grown Sea Dragons is

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  that their eyes

  can catch fire and

  smoke. Little bursts of

  bright red flame, as sharp as lasers,

  darted from the pupils.

  ‘ATTA-A-A-A-A-A-CCCKKKKKKK!!!!!!!’

  roared the Dragon Furious to his second-in-command,

  a great Sea Dragon called the Thunderer.

  ‘ATTACK!’

  And so

  began the Battle for

  Prison Darkheart.

  For the first time in a thousand

  years, the dragons of the Dragon Rebellion

  flew over the undefended battlements, and into the

  prison itself.

  The humans fighting each other were now in

  disarray. They could not reach their Exploding Things.

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  Their weapons of destruction were now being blown

  up by the magnificent winged serpents invading from

  above.

  Valhallarama, under attack from warriors of the

  Wilderwest and dragons simultaneously, killed four

  Sandrazors that were launching themselves with sword

  sharp wings pointed straight at her neck, and shouted,

  ‘COMPANIONS OF THE DRAGONMARK!

  RETREAT FROM THE PRISON AND MAKE FOR

  THE SHIPS! OUR STRONGHOLD SHALL BE

  THE BOG-BURGLAR ISLANDS TO THE WEST!’

  Alvin and his supporters were now fleeing to the

  ships as well, and the witch was organising their own

  retreat to the Uglithug territories in the east.

  Everyone had to make their choice. West for

  Hiccup and the Dragonmark, east for Alvin and the

  witch.

  The Wodensfang and Toothless couldn’t really

  choose of course, they were going with Alvin whether

  they liked it or not, for they were swinging in the

  amber-nets over Alvin’s shoulder.

  ‘We’re going the wrong w-w-way!’ squealed

  Toothless. ‘We need to go with H-H-Hiccup! This is a

  disaster! Toothless is the most important Lost Thing,

  Hiccup can’t possibly do without me!’

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  The Hairy Scary Librarian seemed to feel that

  maybe he was quits with Hiccup, and he had a new

  score to settle now that he had realised the emptiness

  of a witch’s promise. So he headed west, to the Bog-

  Burglar Islands.

  In the middle of the battle, Gobber the Belch

  passed Snotlout, deep in thought, looking to west

  and east.

  Snotlout couldn’t decide which way to go.

  He knew what the witch and Alvin were now, and

  he hated them almost as much as they scared him. But

  taking Hiccup as his King? His despised little runt-boy

  cousin? His pride revolted at the thought. Hiccup had

  stepped in to save Snotlout, but even that was kind of

  irritating.

  ‘Snotlout!’ called Gobber. ‘You can still fight

  for the right side, Snotlout. You are one of the best

  Warriors I have ev
er taught. You remember the

  Black Star you won against Alvin at the Battle of the

  Lucky Thirteen? You’d be a tremendous asset to the

  Company of the Dragonmark. Come with us!’

  Snotlout did not answer, and Gobber shrugged

  his shoulders, and left him there.

  Snotlout reached into his pocket and took out the

  Black Star medal, one of the highest awards for bravery

  the Archipelago can bestow. He turned it over and

  over, trying to decide. West or east? West or east?

  Which way would Snotlout go?

  And that is where we will leave him, standing

  undecided in the middle of the battlefield.

  Thinking.

  Valhallarama fought her way across to Hiccup.

  ‘DUCK!’ yelled Valhallarama.

  ‘What?’

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  ‘DUCK!’ she yelled again, pushing him

  downwards, and firing an arrow over his head that

  killed a swooping Sandrazor stone dead mid-swoop.

  ‘OK, Hiccup,’ said Valhallarama. ‘It is too

  dangerous for you to stay with us. Take the Jewel

  and hide from both dragon and Viking. Deadly

  Shadow dragons know how to hide. Make your way

  to Tomorrow for the Crowning day, and your father,

  the Company of the Dragonmark and I will meet you

  there. In the meantime, no one must know you are

  alive.’

  ‘But I haven’t got any of the Things!’ protested

  Hiccup. ‘Alvin has everything apart from the Jewel!’

  ‘The Jewel is the most important Thing of all,’

  said Valhallarama. ‘Be careful of it.’

  Just before the Great Warrior turned away, back

  to the battle, Hiccup put his hand on his mother’s

  metal arm. Even though he was particularly bedraggled

  after his long and tiring day, streaked with Monster

  juices and ocean, he was somehow less small and

  unlikely than he had ever been before.

  He looked… Oh dear, what did he look like?

  It was all such a long time ago.

  But I think he looked a little more…

  … grown-up.

  373

  ‘Thank you,’ said Hiccup to Valhallarama.

  ‘You have nothing to thank me for,’ said

  Valhallarama. ‘I am your mother. Oh and

 

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