“No, no, no and no!” boomed Thurman the Arrogant for the sixth time.

“But with respect, sir,” said Erland, determined not to give up. “When we find evidence that dragons exist, think of how famous your tribe will be!”

Thurman considered this. As he name suggests, he was very full of himself and loved to be in the limelight. But he would rather stay in the shadows and not be humiliated that try and be in the light and risk being humiliated.

He grunted grumpily. “Still no!” He was about to walk away, but Erland hopped in front of him.

“Please! I know I've let you down a few times-”

Many times, thought Thurman.

“-but I can make it up to you if we find a dragon!”

The chief sighed. “Erland, you're a decent lad, and these fantasies about dragons and inventing things in your labradoodle have gone to your head and are distracting you from what's important for a Viking boy. Just give it a break for a bit.”

Erland scowled. “Firstly, it's called a laboratory, and secondly, no I won't give it a break.”

“So be it,” Thurman walked away calmly, and at first Erland thought that he'd just given up, but then he heard him shout: “Burn the labradoodle at midday.”

Hearing this, Erland felt nothing but sadness and anger. His laboratory was like family to him, and Thurman was just going to go and destroy it!

Clenching his fists, Erland shouted at the chief. “I'd rather be banished from this stupid village than see my laboratory burnt for no reason!”

The boy didn't see it because Thurman was facing the other way, but the big Viking man secretly smiled under his beard. Finally the runt would be out of his way and he could be a chief in peace! “Consider it done. From this second on you are officially banished from the tribe. The only person to which you may speak is Dagmar, and you must leave tonight at sunset.”

Erland bit his tongue. He'd always believed in saying what he thinks, but this time he'd gone a little too far.

There was silence as Erland and Dagmar went out of the village and into the perilous forests beyond the walls.

Finally, Dagmar broke the silence. “Why did you speak up like that?”

Erland looked down at his hands. “My laboratory means everything to me. I couldn't let him burn it.”

“So you decided to get yourself banished instead?!”

The boy picked at some skin around his thumb and said nothing, which was probably for the best.

Soon they arrived in the heart of Dark Tree Wood, possibly the biggest and thickest forest that was outside the village. Thurman must have brought him here to make sure he wouldn't try and find his way back by himself.

“I'll see you, er...” Dagmar hesitated for a second. “At some point.”

And with that, she left, leaving him alone with a bag of coins and a quilt, with nothing but the oncoming darkness as company.

***

“AAGH!”

Erland woke up all of a sudden. He had had a nightmare about something coming to get him from the darkness of the trees, something with large green eyes. He rubbed his head, wondering where in the world he was, but then he remembered: banishment.

Now that he was awake, he thought he might as well get up and go for a walk in the cooling night breeze to send him back to sleep, forgetting completely about the nightmare. He set off in a random direction, not caring if he got lost, seen as he had nowhere to go anyway.

Suddenly, he heard a twig crack. He looked at the ground and noticed that it couldn't have been him, seen as there was nothing but grass underfoot. Spinning round, he noticed a shadow move quickly out of the bushes. Erland tried to follow the shadow with his eyes, but it was moving too fast for him to see. Even though the boy was scared, he wasn't a coward, and wanted to find out what this thing was.

He approached a nearby rock, feeling sure that he had seen movement behind it. But before he could check, a large black creature with piercing green eyes leapt from behind it and pinned Erland to the ground – just like in his nightmare.

In what little light there was, Erland recognised this creature: green eyes, sleek black scales for skin, massive wings, and a tail fin replaced with a prosthetic...

It was the Night Fury from the legend.

The boy felt as if he was staring death in the face, as the green eyes above him pierced his soul. He closed his eyes, getting ready to go to Valhalla, but no plasma blast came. Erland felt the Night Fury get off him and the boy opened his eyes slowly.

There was the dragon, sitting in front of him, just like one of Thurman's hunting dogs would. Why didn't the beast choose to kill him when he was vulnerable?

Just as Erland asked himself this, he noticed that the dragon had done something extraordinary:

The Night Fury had bowed his head to the young Viking.

“What?!” Erland exclaimed out loud. “Why are you bowing? I'm far from royalty.”

Toothless put up one of his front legs and the boy noticed a scrap of burnt paper carefully and securely tied on to it. Approaching the dragon cautiously, he managed to grasp at the paper and remove it from the dragon's leg. For some reason Toothless let him do this and made no move to attack him.

Erland tried to make out what was written in old, smudged runic symbols on the burnt paper in what little light there was in the forest:

If you're reading this, it means my dragon trusts you with both our lives.
For so long people have thought I am but a legend, but from seeing Toothless in front of you with your very own eyes, you must know that I'm real.
My Night Fury is brave and clever, and the best friend a Viking could ask for, but even he needs assistance. For one reason or another he's chosen you to come and help us win a war we've been fighting in for nearly a century.
Thor speed, brave Viking, and let the wind catch your wings.
- Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Chief of the Ancient Vikings

Erland couldn't believe it. Why had a small, skinny boy with no muscle like him been chosen to help two legendary heroes in a war? But he trusted Toothless, and knew that if the dragon had chosen him, there was a reason for it.

The Viking slipped the note inside his pocket and nodded at Toothless. The dragon obediently picked Erland up gently by the neck with his fangless mouth and placed him on his back. As the Night Fury took off, Erland was sent back because the wind was hitting him like rocks, but soon managed to withstand the speed they were going at.

Erland had no idea if this was a dream or if it was reality, but either way, it was the first time anyone had thought him capable of anything.

The next day, Dagmar sat sadly in Erland's laboratory, thinking of her adoptive son. She had always avoided him, tried to make him like a true Viking, tried to change him, but now that he was gone, she wished that she had just treated him like a son and not an orphan.

“This is all my fault,” she whispered to herself, hanging her head and staring at the ground. “If I had just been a mother, then none of this would have happened.”

She walked out of the laboratory, head still hanging. She was about to go back to her house when she heard two Vikings mention Erland's name.

Instead of charging into the conversation like any Viking usually would, she slowly and silently moved towards the two men and eavesdropped on what they were saying.

“They can't find him anywhere,” said one Viking. “He's just completely disappeared!”

“What do you mean, disappeared?!” said the other Viking. “The Chief wants him dead. While he's still lurking he can't live in peace. He's always had something against that kid, and as long as he's alive, he'll be in an even worse mood than usual.”

Dagmar was shocked. She knew that Thurman and Erland weren't really friends, but to want to kill a child was too much. She ran back to her house and quickly grabbed a leather bag and filled it with what Erland would usually bring when he went for a walk: spyglass, compass, notebook.

Before anyone saw her, she slipped out of the town walls, praying to Thor that she would find her son before Thurman's assassins.

*

It was early in the morning and Toothless and Erland were still flying. The boy had gone to sleep hours before and almost fell off Toothless many times, but the dragon always caught him just in time.

Just as Erland woke up, they finally landed in an old burnt down forest which seemed to continue as far as the eye could see. Erland took out his spyglass from his bag and tried to make out the edge of the forest, but it was so vast that no limit was visible.

“Was this because of the war?” asked the boy, putting his spyglass back into his bag.

The dragon nodded.

Erland took a few steps forward, feeling the ashes and bits of burnt wood under his feet crunch as he walked. They were so close to finding Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Erland's hero, but a shadow crept into his mind. “Are you sure Hiccup is even alive?”

At the thought of his rider being dead, Toothless growled angrily at Erland and the boy backed away from the dragon. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry!” he said. “But if this is what the edges of the battlefield look like, then what state do you think Hiccup's gonna be in if he's been captured?”

Toothless looked down, considering this.

“How long have you been searching for help?” asked Erland.

The Night Fury drew three lines into the ashes beneath him with a single claw.

“What does that mean?” asked the boy. “Three days? Months? Years?”

To all three of those words, Toothless shook his head.

Erland's eyes widened. “Three... centuries?”

Toothless looked up at Erland with his big green eyes, full of hope of finding his beloved rider again, and Erland put a kind hand on his nose. “Oh Toothless,” he said sadly. “You're determination to find Hiccup has blinded you of the obvious.”

The dragon looked at Erland, not quite understanding what he meant.

The boy sighed. “Humans aren't like dragons. You might be able to live for centuries and centuries and get nothing but a few grey scales, but humans don't work like that.”

Toothless' pupils adjusted, as if finally understanding what Erland meant.

“Hiccup's gone.”