Dragon's Love

Why didn't I kill it?  I'll admit, you're right: it was an easy kill.  Scrawny, hardly any muscle, no weapons to speak of, and too cowardly to kill me.  I could have snapped its neck like a twig.  Almost did, too.  But I didn't.

I should have.  It tore off my tail fin, which hurt quite a bit I should mention.  I could hardly fly.  Even as I tried to escape that cove, I knew I'd never fly again; you know how it is.  Our wings are everything.  Hello, wolves?  Panthers?  Vikings?  Other dragons?  Dead Night Fury walking!  Free meal, come and get it!

Then it came back.  No, not that!  The Viking boy!  It wouldn't leave me the hell alone.  It started feeding me and it fixed my tail.  It kept me alive.  Which was very strange.  This was a new method I'd never heard of: I supposed it was leading me into a false sense of security, so it could kill me.  But it didn't.

It was a strange circle of confusion and confuddlement (that one isn't even a word, but it fits the situation quite nicely, I think).  I should have killed it, it should have killed me.  But then it started calling me Toothless.  Nowhere near as noble as my actual name, as you know, but oh well.  Let it have its fun before he killed me, I was figuring.

I realized a few days in I wasn't thinking of 'it' as 'it' anymore.  I was thinking of 'him' as 'him.'  Like he was a rational thinker instead of a Viking.  That was the day I touched his hand.  I suppose I was realizing how lonely I was around that point.  We Night Furies hunt on our own, but we enjoy physical contact very much; lost and alone, I wasn't getting any contact from any species of dragon.  I was hungry for affection.  Even from a scrawny Viking mutt who called me Toothless.

And at that point, I decided he wasn't going to kill me.  And I knew I wasn't going to kill him.  In fact, I was beginning to look forward to the food he brought and his affectionate pats.  In fact, even though I knew all the Dragons back home would kill me for it…I was beginning to like him.

He even taught me how to fly again.  I couldn't fly without him, though.  He had to control my new tail fin.  And he did quite well.  Almost as if we had the same mind.  And maybe we did.  I've heard legends that, back before this damn war, Dragons had bonded with Vikings to the point where they were practically indistinguishable.  I never really believed it – I can tell by your expression, you don't really believe it, either -- but at that point, I was beginning to wonder.

We had some adventures, but I'm sure you've already heard about them from him or from the other Dragons.  You know, the whole "defeating the Red Death" thing.  Hell, you were there!  But he doesn't know what happened while he was unconscious.  And actually, you're the first one I've ever told about this.

I cleaned the blood from what was left of his leg; it hurt me so much, to see his leg so mangled and severed.  Almost as if it were my leg that had been crushed.  In a subconscious state, he squeezed my tail and snarled – like a Night Fury, I was damn proud of him! – as they cut off the mangled part and set the new metal leg.  I realized something as I kept watch over him, refusing food or drink or what have you.  We were a matching pair now.  Two broken fools who couldn't kill each other.  And I stayed by his side, like a damn dog, until he woke up.  

And do you know why?  Of course you don't, why else would you have asked me?  It was because I loved him.  I loved him with everything I had.  You felt the full force of that passion when you so coldly tried to kill him, my dear; aha, I see that look in your eyes, you do remember.

I just realized how I put that earlier.  Two broken fools who couldn't kill each other.  An interesting way to state it.  We were both outcasts, very different (he was inventive, I was foolhardy).  And we just so happened to run into each other.  We needed each other.  How could we have killed each other?

Well, Fireworm, you asked why I didn't kill that scrawny mutt, and why I'm so submissive to him even though I am a mighty Night Fury.  Now you know.  Its because Hiccup is my boy and I am his Dragon.  We were – still are, and always will be – completely inseperable.  I look into his eyes, and I see myself in him.

I love that boy with everything I am.  And I don't think I can make it any clearer than that.