AN – Hey, look who's not dead, guys – it's me! I know what you're all thinking, that I abandoned this story and all of you. I haven't. I've just fallen off the face of the earth a few times. Real life, brua. I do aim 100% to finish this story. Eventually. I've been reading a lot more and working on a book blog; for more info about that, if you're interested, check out my profile. (I read mostly YA Fantasy.)

Also, some events in this chapter might be unsettling for some people. Who they are, I don't know. I just thought I'd warn ya'll about the violence in the first part. It's a little higher than the other chapters.

X

Chapter 31

"Up!"

Astrid jumped at Hiccup's sudden shout. She barely had time to question it. His hand fastened around her arm and hoisted her to her feet faster than she could blink.

"Wha-"

"No time," Hiccup gasped. He jumped onto Toothless. At once the black dragon spread its wings for flight.

Stormfly had perked up at Hiccup's shout, wings spread, knees bent – ready for flight. Astrid jumped onto her dragon's back; luckily she had just finished striking camp before Hiccup had come barreling back from wherever he'd gone.

Toothless shot into the air and Stormfly followed half a heartbeat behind. Both dragons were on edge, no doubt about that, and it didn't take Astrid long to realize why. Men, six that she could see, were hurtling up the hill toward the cleaning, to where she and Hiccup had been asleep not that long ago. As the dragons rose above the trees, the men stopped. They pulled crossbows from their backs, aimed, and fired. The dragons easily dodged the incoming arrows.

But they flew a little higher anyway.

"Okay," Astrid exclaimed. "What in Thor's name did I miss?"

Hiccup gave her a sheepish, innocent smile, but it didn't last.

"Hunters?" she asked, looking again at the men circling below them. They didn't shoot any more arrows; they were smart enough to know the dragons flew too high. They looked like dragon hunters, but… not really like the dragon hunters that had attacked the Edge. She supposed that most men that lived in this corner of the human world had a certain scruffy hardiness to them.

"I-I don't know," Hiccup said. "I was on my way back, and I heard voices mention the dragons. They were following us, Astrid. Looking for us specifically. They were talking about a night fury and a deadly nadder."

She frowned. Sure, a deadly nadder was common enough, but there was only one night fury. She glanced back down at the hunters. They hadn't gone anywhere.

"Well," Hiccup said with that friendly grin on his face, "should we go say hello?"

She shrugged. "Might as well."

Toothless moved and Stormfly flew on his wing; they swooped down toward the hunters. Toothless blasted the ground, sending two hunters flying through the air and another two jumping back. Stormfly send barbs flying with deadly accuracy, knocking the crossbow out of one hunter's hand and sending it flying to the face of another, and knocking the helmet off two others.

Toothless send a blast into the ground, sending dirt and grass flying. The hunters screamed and ran the other way as the dragons swooped closer down over their heads.

The dust settled; all but one dragon hunter had run for it.

Because that one hunter had taken a barb to the thigh.

And all at once the metallic, bittersweet scent of blood threatened to undo her self-control. She gripped the saddle hard as Stormfly landed. The man had dropped his crossbow and his sword; he gripped the grass with white-knuckles, clawing at it, crawling to get away, desperate cries tearing through his throat.

Astrid felt herself go pale. The hunter looked no more than fifteen. A boy.

And she thought of herself at that age.

Toothless's warning warble pulled her back to the present –

"Hiccup, NO!" she screamed.

Astrid jumped off the saddle with all the speed she possessed, and threw her weight into Hiccup before he reached the wounded hunter. They tumbled onto the grassy ground, torn up by Toothless's blast, and Hiccup let out a hiss – a warning of a predator interrupted. Astrid pinned him stomach-first to the ground, but gods – Hiccup had the strength of a hungry, feral vampire. She dug her knee into his back.

"No, Hiccup," she said over his growls.

He barred his fangs at her. His eyes had gone bright red – hungry, instinct-driven red. He growled at her. All of the loving Hiccup that she knew had gone from his face, smothered in the need, the thirst.

What could she do?

If she left him go to fetch him something to eat, he would kill the hunter in the meantime. The longer she held him down, the more he would struggle, the more the thirst would grow.

He let out a throat-ripping growl; the wounded hunter let out a terrified cry, his desperate escape had only gained him a short distance away from them.

And the dragons – both Stormfly and Toothless had retreated, eyes wide and wary at Hiccup.

Hiccup looked at the hunter, then at her – like he looked at an enemy.

"Hiccup," she begged.

He hissed.

Had that been how she had looked before she had bitten him? She could see his face, terrified, in the instant she had pinned him to the floor in that arena. Now, their roles had reversed, but she still pinned him.

But for how much longer?

Hiccup gave a vicious thrust of his shoulders, nearly knocking her over. She held him harder.

"Let go!" Hiccup demanded, his voice deep and hoarse – hungry.

"No," Astrid said. "Don't let the thirst control you. You don't want to-"

He gave another violent thrust of his shoulders, knocking her off enough to gain the upper hand. He pushed her onto her back and jumped off her – toward the panicked hunter.

Astrid rolled onto her knees and elbows just as the hunter let out a shrill cry. Astrid shut her eyes. She felt the pull to the scent, the sweetness of fresh human blood, and she dug her nails into the soil to keep herself from it.

The hunter let out a gurgle of a cry, and Astrid focused instead on a song she remembered – one that someone used to sing. Not her mother, but her sister, or a neighbor – someone motherly. She hummed it to herself, pressed her forehead against the cool soil, until a pair of calm footsteps approached her.

Hiccup's boots.

She carefully sat back onto her feet, and Hiccup knelt with the grace of a well-fed cat. His eyes were dilated, nearly all black. Blood smeared his mouth, his chin, and his fingers.

The guilt hadn't set in; the high hadn't warn off.

Hiccup pressed his bloodied fingers into her mouth, and the scent and the taste undid her. She closed her mouth around his fingers, and he removed them only to replace them with his mouth. Gods, the taste – sweet and strong, heady and meaty. Fresh. She couldn't get enough of it, enough of Hiccup. His tongue met hers in a feverish haste, and she made sure no blood remained in his mouth. Anywhere.

He wanted her, and she gave herself to him. He brought her to release before himself, and then he collapsed onto the grass beside her and closed his eyes.

She pushed sweaty hair out of his face. Hiccup cracked an eye open to see her – the darkness of his pupils had retreated, and forest green looked at her once again.

The high was wearing off, and soon he would realize what had happened. And she would be there to help him when it did. He would need it.

But before that, she needed to deal with the pressing issue.

Naked, she stood and kissed Hiccup's temple. "It's alright," she whispered. Then she whistled for Stormfly, who held her packed supplies. She retrieved her axe. Heaving a sigh, she started toward the hunter.

Like she excepted, feared, Hiccup hadn't been able to drain him dry. The hunter still lived. Wobbly, near-unconscious eyes turned to her. Wandered over her nakedness.

"I'm sorry," she said to the hunter.

She raised her axe and swung it down over the hunter's throat.

X

Astrid held Hiccup as he cried. He clutched onto her with a desperation that broke her heart in two. He didn't ask for an explanation. He didn't beg her to tell him that it had been a dream. As the sun set and the moon rose, he got his grieving for himself and for the stranger out. They did not go hunting. Astrid could have used something to eat, but Hiccup needed her more than she needed a drink.

"What happened to him?" Hiccup asked, his first words since he had come to, and realized what he had done.

"Dead," Astrid said simply. Hiccup's eyes widened, and she added, "I killed him. He still had blood in him, and he might have turned otherwise."

Hiccup nodded, too aghast to ask for explanation of her actions. He didn't ask about why she hadn't let him turn, why she hadn't waited to see what the hunter might do – she had seen that story enough to know. The odds of surviving the turning were slim to begin with, and this way… the elders wouldn't know what Hiccup had done. What Astrid had allowed to happen – he was her ward, after all.

"This way," she said, her voice small with her own guilt and shame, "no one will know what happened. We won't have to worry about a new vampire, or the elders fretting over it."

Hiccup nodded. He looked sick with guilt.

Astrid scooted a little closer to him. Below them, the rocky shore steady fell into the ocean below where the steely blue waters crashed onto the rocks, into one another.

"When I was younger," Astrid started, "a younger vampire, I mean, Eret had this bright idea to take me out to a port town for an annual celebration there. He thought it would be something to lift my spirits. We got there and there was singing and dancing and food and all the ale and mead a person could want. No one paid much attention to us, mostly because most people were drunk or drinking, so it wasn't that bad. It felt like I had gone back to the human world, and for a little while, everything was great. But then."

Astrid heaved a sigh and turned her face toward the half-moon.

"Then?" Hiccup asked.

She turned her face to him, and said, "I wandered away from Eret to where people were dancing. It was a dance that I had seen before. I joined, because I thought it would be fun, but one of the dancers fell and scraped his shoulder. He was bleeding."

Hiccup inhaled; he knew where the story was going.

"I lost it," Astrid admitted, her voice a near whisper. She turned her eyes again to the steely waves. "People were screaming, yelling, threatening me with all kinds of things, but it was too late. The boy I'd jumped had lost too much blood, too soon. Eret found me and dragged me and the boy away." She took a deep inhale. "Eret slit his throat and threw him into the ocean." Into waves that looked frighteningly similar to the waves crashing below.

"I'm sorry," Hiccup whispered.

"Eret said that no one had to know, because it had been his idea to take me to the party in the first place," she said, her memory of that night, of him, as clear as if it had happened yesterday. "He said that it was his fault, that he should have known better, that he was sorry that I would carry guilt because of him." She met Hiccup's gaze.

"Astrid," he started. "You didn't do anything."

"It doesn't matter," she argued. "I took you out of the only safe haven for our kind, let you return to the human world under my supervision. A part of your guilt is my fault, and there's nothing you can say or do that will change that."

Just as his turning had been her fault, as her turning had been Eret's fault. There was nothing to be done about it accept forgive.

Hiccup stared at her, his lips parted. He nodded. "Now what?"

She shrugged. "I'd like to say this is where you wait a few days to feel better, but it might take longer than that. I still feel guilty for that boy's death. I keep thinking… what if we had let him turn? What if he had become one of us? A friend? But then I know what the council would then say. If we can't control ourselves, they would make a mandatory waiting time until a vampire could leave Home, and knowing them it would be something like a hundred years."

"I don't know about you," Hiccup said, a hint of his tenor returning, "but a hundred years in that place is a little too much."

"I agree," she said.

A beat passed.

"What about you?" He nudged her. "Hungry?"

She nodded. "I could eat."

He stood and offered her his hand, and together they hunted down a boar – but with less gusto than before. She knew it would take a while for Hiccup not to think of that hunter every time his mind wandered, for hers still went to the ashen-faced boy from time to time. She would do as Eret had done for her, not mention it until Hiccup was ready to face it, ready to talk about it.

Then, she would be there for him.

X

"Why do you think those hunters were after us?" Hiccup asked about midday – or, midnight. They had searched the coast, but whatever ship the hunters had been on had vanished.

"Who knows," Astrid said. "You said the hunters often attacked the dragon riders on sight."

"But they never hunted us down like that before," Hiccup said, a furl in his brow. "And something seems off about it. Them. They didn't look like the typical hunters."

She didn't want to talk about the hunters, didn't want to make him talk about the hunters, either, but he had insisted on looking into it.

Hiccup heaved a sigh. "Well, we know of one place we could look for some answers." His eyes went back to the forest, to the clearing.

"Hiccup," Astrid started.

He met her gaze. He knew.

"Let me go first," she said.

He nodded.

Stormfly landed closer to the decapitated corpse, while Toothless landed a safe distance away. She swallowed. The boar had satisfied her hunger enough, but the scent of fresh blood lingered on the air.

She knelt by the dead man and searched the body. Coin purse. Slingshot. Dagger. Flint. A rolled up piece of paper.

She untucked the paper. Her first thought painted the mysterious paper as a treasure map, but her matured thoughts shot down that fanciful notion as soon as it appeared. She unrolled the paper.

Gods.

This would explain why they had hunted them down.

"Hiccup," Astrid called, standing and heading toward where he stood. "You need to see this."

X

Ryker tossed his dagger up, caught it, and repeated. Bored. He'd never been so damn bored. He hadn't gone so long without caging or killing a dragon, either, and he wasn't keen on all this waiting around his younger brother insisted upon.

Viggo sat at his desk, turning over plans and thoughts in his silence.

Gods, this frigid northern air would be the death of him! He refused to pack on another fur. He didn't want the men to think him weak. Bleh, he was a man, a warrior, and he could beat the cold.

He tossed his dagger up again.

"Our friend should be arriving soon," Viggo said casually.

"Which one?" Ryker asked. Viggo had no friends, not in the sense that a friend was a friend. He had accomplices, lackies, and informants, not friends.

Viggo lifted his dark eyes from the map to meet his brother's lazy stare. "A friend of a friend," he said, as if that explained everything. "He assures me that-"

And at that, the man in the crow's nest sounded for an incoming ship – a friendly ship.

Viggo straightened. "Ah, that must be him."

Ryker followed his brother onto the deck of the ship, where the icy winds blew and the water rumbled underneath with the threat of an incoming storm. Ice and snow. Their hunter ship hadn't been equipped for such weather, not like the northern hunter ships with their icebreakers and thick hulls, not like the incoming ship.

A gangplank was lowered and secured. Both ships remained a safe distance from each other, lest the unbiased sea crash them together and send both crews into the freezing waters.

The fur- and leather-laden crew stood at attention as a taller member of their number stepped onto the gangplank, and walked across it as if it were standing still.

Arrogant bastard, thought Ryker as he and Viggo stood to meet this friend of a friend.

"Viggo," said the man in a southern accent, this words thick but clear. From underneath his thick hood, Ryker could see dark eyes and dark brows and tan skin of the south. The hunters behind him were armed to the teeth, a mixture of northern and southern eyes and skin. A collection of the best.

"Krogan," Viggo said with a friendly tone, though he did not make a step toward the stranger.

"I hear you've got a vampire problem," said Krogan, his words threatening and dancing with arrogance.

"Indeed," Viggo said. "And your presence here implies your eagerness to bring that problem to an end?"

Krogan chuckled and his dark eyes glittered. Ryker held his shoulders straight. He didn't like this Krogan. He had yet to prove himself, yet he expected the respect of someone who had. Ryker would like to shove him overboard and see how he fared then.

"I've seen your bounty of the two of them," Krogan said. "I'm here to discuss payment. And procedure."

Ryker bristled at the word procedure. The way Krogan had said it – Ryker didn't like what it entailed, though he found himself wanting to know.

"This way, then," Viggo said, motioning toward the captain's quarters. He stepped back to keep Krogan in his view.

Ryker walked a step behind his brother and Krogan, ready to knock Krogan's head from his shoulders if he so much as implied a threat to Viggo – though a part of him also wanted to knock their heads together.