A/N: Hi, thanks for reading my fanfiction. This is my second fanfiction, a mericcup story. I'm pretty much in love with this pairing. Please note, I will not be writing Merida or any other character with an accent, due to the fact that I just don't trust myself in writing her accent properly. I'd rather not have it in here and leave it up to the reader, than to absolutely butcher it. Leave a review or whatnot if you liked it and would like to see more. :)

The Northern Lights.

The castle of DunBroch was thriving with life in the early hours of the morning. Not that it wasn't normally a busy place during the day, it was even more so this one particular morning. The house maids cleaned and prepared each guest room. Chefs worked furiously to cook for the grandeur feasts that would be held later that day. Decorations and activities were being set up all around the castle and grounds. The Bear King Fergus and Queen Elinor slept on, undisturbed. Not too far from them, three orange terrors by the names of Harris, Hubert and Hamish snored in unison. And none too far from them, the young princess Merida snuggled deeper into her blankets. She rolled over, a slit of pale sunlight falling onto her face, waking her. She mumbled softly in her sleep, then gasped. Sitting bolt up right, suddenly realising what day it was, Merida knew sleep would evade her. A huge grin spread across her face as she jumped from her bed to the window and pulled back the curtains. It was still early, but she could tell today would be a glorious day. She began hastily getting dressed and gathering her things. As Merida grabbed her bow and quiver full with arrows, her eyes fell on one of the few books her mother had given her for 'princess lessons' that had actually interested her. The title read "Myths and Legends: The Study of Folklore in Highland". The book lay open, Merida having poured herself over it more than a hundred times since being informed of today's events mere weeks ago. She looked at the figure on the page, grinning again.

"Dragons!"

Not so far away from Castle Dunbroch, ships aplenty headed for the shoreline of Highland. Accompanied by a few dragons and their respective riders, they sailed steadily from the Isle of Berk. At the head of the pack was a young man, Hiccup, riding on a Night Fury. He leant down and gave an affectionate pat to the dark-scaled dragon, who flicked his head in return.

"Not too much further, Toothless. We're nearly there, bud."

He turned around in his seat to check on the others. A young woman with blonde hair riding a Deadly Napper was not too far from him. Astrid gave him the thumbs up, signalling everything was fine. Next to her rode Ruffnut and Tuffnut on the Hideous Zippleback. They seemed to be bickering about something, although Hiccup couldn't tell. Behind them, Snotlout was attempting to do some impressive trick with his Monstrous Nightmare, no doubt in the hopes Astrid would notice. However as usual the dragon would not comply with Snotlout's confusing directions, instead doing a strange spinning motion and crashing into Fishlegs who was nearly unseated from his Gronkle. As he righted himself however, the gronkle sent a small ball of fire at Snotlout, narrowly missing his left ear.

"Hey! Keep it together back there!" Hiccup yelled as Snotlout looked ready for a fight.

The last thing he needed was his father, Chief Stoick to look up at the dragons leading their entire tribe across the sea to a newly forged ally, only to see them fighting amongst themselves like pups. He turned back around to face the front, greeted by the sight of land in the distance.

"Better tell Dad. C'mon Toothless".

The dragon dipped obediently towards the huge ship that led the fleet, where his father sailed.

"Good Morning, Princess!"
"Morning, my lady!"
"My princess!"

All the guards greeted Merida accordingly as she ran through the castle corridors, not giving any so much as a speck of attention. She tore into the kitchen and remained long enough to steal a good few apples, some bread and a small pot of honey. Shoving them all into a small bag, she was off again. Long gone were the times where the guards and servants had actually tried to tell her to walk, not run. She reached the castles main doors and ran down the steps to the stables, where a stable hand was grooming Angus. Merida waited unseen until the stable hand left to get a fresh pail of water.

"G'morning Angus! Today's the day!" Merida said, barely able to contain her excitement.

Angus huffed, clearly not sharing her enthusiasm.

"I knew you'd be like that" Merida said reaching into her bag and producing a shiny red apple. "That's why I brought this. What do you say now, hm?"

Angus whinnied happily and munched up the tasty fruit from Merida's open palm. Within seconds Merida had saddled and reined Angus, jumping up onto his back. She dug her heels slightly into his sides and he took off, nearly knocking over the unsuspecting stable hand completely. Merida laughed as she heard the cries of the poor woman. Merida and Angus rode through the gates and into the forest, like so many times before. As they delved deeper into the forest, Merida equipped her bow and notched an arrow. She shot the first target hanging from a tree easily, pulling another arrow from her quiver. Angus picked up speed as they travelled along their path, Merida shooting her targets, never missing a single one. They made it to their destination, a clearing on one of the highest edges of the forest that overlooked the shoreline perfectly not much later. Here, she would have the first glimpse of their guests arriving. Merida dismounted from Angus, removing his saddle so he could graze the clearing in comfort. Sitting down on the grass she made a small breakfast for herself. The sun had truly began to shine down on her kingdom now, Merida happily lazing in it's warmth, munching on an apple. She sat there, for some time, waiting. She had been cleaning in the nooks of her bow when she first heard a distant roar, causing her to look up. Another roar, this time much closer and Merida looked intently at the sky. Suddenly, a dark figure flew from out of a cloud and Merida recognised it immediately as a dragon. Meridas heart skipped a beat and she stood up as 4 different looking dragons shot out after the first. There were people riding them, she noticed as they got closer. They sailed directly overhead Merida and she seen a brown haired boy on the first dragon look over it's wing, down at her. She jumped around unable to contain her excitement. Within seconds, all of the dragons had disappeared behind the tree tops. Merida saddled Angus and together they raced back to the castle faster than ever before.

Toothless flew alongside the lead ship, where Chief Stoick stood talking to Hiccup.

"I see it son. You best get back up there with the others."

Hiccup nodded and directed Toothless back up into sky where the others were flying. The clouds had gotten a lot thicker the closer they got to land. The riders had just flown into a particularly thick cloud, preventing them from seeing much until it they broke free. Immediately the vase lands opened up before them, all green and trees and wide fields. Hiccup looked down at the shoreline, to see someone on the cliffside, watching them fly over. It was a girl, from what he could tell of her figure, with vibrantly wild orange hair. The riders flew over the forest tops, circling back to meet with the rest of the tribe which had now begun to arrive on the docks.