“But of course,” said Hiccup. “I think you are an excellent Bardiguard. Even when you were trying to kill me, you did a wonderful job of saving me from yourself. Will you shake hands?”
Humungously Hotshot’s sad face lightened. He smiled.
They shook hands.
9. HOW DO YOU TAKE ADVICE FROM SOMEONE WHO HAS TAKEN A VOW OF SILENCE?
Old Wrinkly’s hole was a dried-up old well about six feet wide and really quite deep. Hiccup had been visiting him every day anyway, bringing him food.
Hiccup carefully climbed down the ladder. It was quite a relief to get away from the clammy heat, and the further you went down, the cooler it became. His grandfather was already awake and smoking his pipe on a small stool.
“I must say,” said Hiccup, as he sat down beside his grandfather, “you have been very lucky in the weather. Most summers this hole would be ankle deep in water and mud at this time of year.” He cleared his throat awkwardly. “I just found out about Humungous . . . and the Fire-Stone . . . and the Volcano . . . and everything that happened fifteen years ago.”
His grandfather turned his face away from Hiccup’s.
“Now, why would Alvin the Treacherous want to have me killed?” wondered Hiccup aloud. “He could just sit tight on Lava-Lout Island, waiting for the Volcano to explode. He must think I’m going to do something to spoil his plans . . . but what CAN I do? I can’t stop a volcano from exploding!”
Old Wrinkly stopped smoking for a second, picked up one of his books, and rifled through the pages. He stopped on one page and pointed with a bony finger.
THE RIDDLE OF LAVA-LOUT ISLAND, read Hiccup.
Through the open window came the clear sound of a bugle, calling all Vikings to a meeting of The Thing. A meeting at which no one was allowed to speak unless they were holding the Fire-Stone . . . the very same Fire-Stone that Stoick the Vast had stolen from the Volcano in order to win the hand of Valhallarama the Mightily Beautiful, fifteen long years before.
“THE FIRE-STONE!” shouted Hiccup. “Maybe if we RETURN the Fire-Stone to the Volcano we can stop it from erupting! Don’t worry, Grandpa,” said Hiccup, “I’ll make it all right.”
And Hiccup climbed the ladder back up to the real world.
10. A MEETING OF THE THING
The Thing was a real step forward for the Viking Tribes.
It took place in a gigantic circular dip on the slopes of Huge Hill. Steps had been cut into the dip to make an enormous amphitheater, and heather grew on the steps, which normally made them springy and comfy to sit on, but unfortunately due to circumstances beyond the organizers’ control, this heather had recently been burned to a cinder.
Everybody had to leave their weapons in a large heap before they entered the amphitheater, just in case discussions got heated.
There was Madguts the Murderous, deep in discussion with Mogadon the Meathead, and his son Thuggory. Norbert the Nutjob, Chief of the Hysterics, fiddling nervously with his beard because he’d had to leave his axe outside so he didn’t know what to do with his hands.
Grabbit the Grim was there, trying to hide from Big-Boobied Bertha because he’d rustled some of her reindeer a couple of months ago, and the sledgehammer fists and breathquenching breasts of Big-Boobied Bertha were the Terror of the Archipelago.
There was Deadlydog Dullard getting into a fistfight with Megalugs Mountain because Megalugs had laughed at his rather bright yellow leggings.
And there was Camicazi, Big-Boobied Bertha’s tiny, tangle-haired daughter, gently pouring Itchyworms into the back of Grabbit’s trousers without him even noticing, in secret retaliation for the reindeer-rustling incident mentioned earlier.
All around and above were the Vikings’ dragons, snapping at each other, shrieking, tripping people up by running through their legs, and having to be pulled apart by their owners as they got into dragon fights.
And right in the front row of this arguing, shouting, muscle-bound mess, sat Stoick the Vast, his chest puffed up with importance, swelling with pride and dignity.
Before him was a small plinth, and sitting on the plinth was the Fire-Stone.
And HE, Stoick the Vast, had stolen this Stone with his own fat hands, which made HIM the Big Man at this event.
The Thing couldn’t take place without the Stone.
You had to be holding the Stone in order to speak, so that everybody didn’t all talk at once.
The Hairy Scary Librarian blew the bugle. He took the golden Fire-Stone in his ancient old hands.
“WOULD THE PLAYERS PLEASE TAKE THEIR PLACES ON THE FIELD!” he wheezed.
The finest Warriors from every Tribe strode forward, flexing their muscles.
The amphitheater exploded with noise as everybody sitting round about on the sooty seating yelled in support of their own Tribe. “GO MEATHEADS GO!” “KILL ’EM BASHEM-OIKS KILL ’EM!” “VISI-THUGS, VISI-THUGS, VISI-THUGS!” etc., etc., etc.
The Hairy Scary Librarian blew the bugle again and threw the Fire-Stone in the air.
All heck broke loose, with the Warriors on the field pushing and shoving each other out of the way to get underneath it, and the supporters on the benches shouting at the top of their lungs and barely able to control themselves from storming on to the pitch to join in.
Shortlegs of Glum had the slightly doubtful glory of catching the Stone.
And then both Shortlegs and the Fire-Stone disappeared into a yelling scrum of muscly arms and legs and tattooed fists.
Stoick the Vast waited casually some way away, hovering near the plinth, confident that his Warriors would pull it out of the bag for him.
And, sure enough, after a few minutes, the hand of Gobber the Belch emerged from out of the heaving mass, chucking the Stone toward the larger of the Vicious Twins, who threw a long pass to
Stoick the Vast . . .
. . . who dodged out of the way of Mogadon the Meathead, belly-charged Madguts the Murderous, caught the Stone in one fat hand, and touched it down on the plinth.
“TOUCH-DOOOOOOOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” yelled the happy Hooligans. “EVERYBODY QUIET! STO-ICK! STO-ICK! STO-ICK!”
Now the Rules of the Thing said that everybody had to stay ABSOLUTELY STILL and silent while they listened to Stoick. The heaving mass of the scrum had to stay absolutely as they were, legs and arms not-so-lovingly intertwined, while Stoick had his say.
Stoick the Vast, holding the Stone, cleared his throat importantly and began to speak.
“Friends, Enemies, and Fellow Barbarians!” bellowed Stoick the Vast. “We are all facing a Common Enemy today, an Enemy not seen in our Lands for hundreds and hundreds of years. These Extermi-whatsits are coming, and apparently there are a few of them. SHOULD WE FLEE LIKE THOSE COWARDLY BUNNY RABBITS THE LAVA-LOUTS?”
“NOOOOOOO!” bellowed the Vikings, drumming their feet on the incinerated heather. (You were allowed to reply, when asked a question.)
“Could you repeat that?” asked Shortlegs of Glum, from the very bottom of the scrum, for Grabbit’s elbow was nestling in his ear-hole, and he couldn’t hear a thing.
“I SAY WE FIGHT!” screamed Stoick the Vast. “ARE YOU WITH ME?”
“YAAAAAAAAY!” yelled everybody happily back at him.
“ARE WE THE KIND OF PEOPLE TO
LET A PIDDLY LITTLE THING LIKE A TINY VOLCANIC ERUPTION GET US DOWN?” asked Stoick the Vast at full volume.
“NOOOOOOOOO!!!!” yelled back the Vikings.
“YOU BET YOUR BARNACLES WE AREN’T!” yelled Stoick the Vast. “FOR WE ARE BARBARIANS, AND THE THING ABOUT BARBARIANS IS, WE NEVER SURRENDER! CAN YOU SING IT OUT FOR US BARBARIANS, GUYS?”
All the Vikings jumped to their feet and sang their hearts out, with Stoick conducting the chorus, the Stone held like a Bashyball in one fat hand only: “RULE BARBARIANS, BARBARIANS RULE THE WAVES . . . VI-KINGS NEVER EVER EVER SHALL BE SLAVES . . .”
Hiccup and Humungous had arrived at The Thing just after the second bugle had sounded, and Humungous was watching the p
roceedings with his mouth gently open.
Here was a version of democracy that he had never even dreamed of.
“OK,” whispered Hiccup, “my father’s minute is nearly up. I want you to go and hover near the plinth, Humungous, and get ready to touch-down the Stone . . .”
“Righty-ho,” said Humungous, elegantly flexing his humungous biceps. This looked like his sort of game.
Hiccup sidled up to Camicazi, who was cheering on the Bog-Burglars.
Camicazi was a friend of his, despite the fact that she belonged to another Tribe.
“Camicazi, can you do me a favor, and sneak into the scrum and pinch the Stone for me next time they blow the bugle?” Hiccup asked.
“But you’re on a different side!” exclaimed Camicazi in surprise.
“Oh, I’m not playing for the Hooligans,” explained Hiccup. “I’ve formed my own Team.”
“Oh, OK then,” said Camicazi excitedly. “Thank you for picking me!” She was a little fed up because her mother Big-Boobied Bertha always said that she was too small to play at The Thing.
“I want you to nick that Stone, and then throw it to that big good-looking bloke over there.” Hiccup pointed at Humungous. “Can you do it?”
“Of course I can do it,” snorted Camicazi. “Us Bog-Burglars can burgle ANYTHING. You should try stealing the underpants off Madguts the Murderous; this is easy-peasy in comparison. Watch and learn, Hiccup my boy, watch and learn . . .”
And Camicazi skipped off merrily toward the scrum.
The Hairy Scary Librarian blew the bugle, which was the signal that Stoick’s one minute’s talking was up.
There was a great roar from the crowd as Stoick threw the Stone up into the air. A forest of arms came leaping up out of the scrum to catch it, and then the Stone disappeared again.
Stoick waited, confidently, for Gobber the Belch to bring the Stone out for him so that he could speak again. Gobber the Belch was the best Bashyball player in the Archipelago, so Stoick and the Hooligans tended to dominate the proceedings at The Thing.
However, to Stoick’s immense surprise, when the golden Fire-Stone eventually emerged from the knot of bodies in the scrum, it was in the arms of a tiny child with a great deal of long blond hair, who wriggled out through the legs of a burly Visithug, neatly eluded the tackle of a great lumbering Bashem-Oik, and threw a truly magnificent long pass to . . .
. . . Humungously Hotshot, by the Armpits of Woden, what was he doing on the field, looking irritatingly Heroic and perfect as ever?
Stoick thundered toward Humungous, trying to intercept the Stone.
I am afraid that Humungous couldn’t resist the impulse to show off a little. He sidestepped Stoick, caught the Stone, juggled it from hand to hand while Stoick made clumsy grabs at it, twiddled it on the end of one finger tauntingly right in front of Stoick’s nose, and then gracefully touched it down on the plinth.
Who can blame Humungous for that very gentle tease?
“TOUCH-DOOOOOOOWN!!!!!!!!” roared the crowd. “NICE STONE SKILLS!”
“NOT FAIR! WHOSE TEAM IS THIS GUY PLAYING FOR!?” bellowed Stoick the Vast.
Humungously Hotshot handed the Fire-Stone to Hiccup.
Hiccup cleared his throat awkwardly and stepped up to the plinth.
This was going to be hard.
“Um, he’s playing for MY team. Sorry, Father. LISTEN TO ME, FOR I AM HOLDING THE STONE!” Hiccup called out. “The plague of Exterminators is going to be too strong for us to fight. I’d like to introduce you to Humungous the Hero.”
There was a gasp of amazement from the watching Viking Tribes, and cries of “WOW! Humungous the Hero! Where has HE been for the last fifteen years?”
And “Humungous the Hero — was he the one who went on the Quest to tame the Rude-Rippers? Ooh, look at his moustache, I wonder if I should wear mine like that . . .”
Hiccup held up his hand for silence. “Humungous here has been on Lava-Lout Island, and he tells me there are THOUSANDS of these Exterminator Eggs, isn’t that right, Humungous?”
Hiccup handed the Stone back to Humungous.
“That’s right, guys,” agreed Humungous the Hero. “HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS . . . Trust me, there’s no point in trying to fight these Creatures, Word of an Ex-Hero.”
That was enough for the Viking Tribes.
If Humungous the Hero, the bravest, coolest man in the Archipelago, who had slain the Rude-Rippers, who had fought the Slobberings, who had done a thousand daring Quests in his day, if HE thought they should flee, then it was clearly Fleeing-Time.
They leaped to their feet and thundered out of the Circle, Meatheads, Bashem-Oiks, Ugli-Thugs, and all.
“HANG ON A SECOND!” yelled Hiccup. “I’M STILL HOLDING THE STONE! THIS ISN’T THE ONLY WAY, MY FATHER IS RIGHT ABOUT NOT SURRENDERING . . . WE COULD RETURN THE FIRE-STONE TO THE VOLCANO AND SEE WHETHER THAT STOPS IT FROM EXPLODING . . .”
But nobody was listening anymore. Panic had set in, and now they were stampeding out of the Circle, down toward the Harbor, in a desperate hurry to get to their ships and out of the area.
“Errrr . . . what do we do now then, Chief?” asked Gobber the Belch.
Stoick was looking like a thundercloud.
“BETRAYED! BY MY OWN SON!” fumed Stoick the Vast.
Hiccup flinched.
Stoick removed the Stone from Hiccup’s hands and drew himself up to his most impressive height.
“HICCUP HERE IS RUNNING AWAY,” shouted Stoick.
“No, Father,” said poor Hiccup, “that ISN’T what I’m saying, please, will you just LISTEN, I think we should—”
“SILENCE!” roared Stoick. “YOU HAVE HAD YOUR SAY, HICCUP, AND NOW IT IS I WHO AM HOLDING THE STONE!”
Hiccup was silent.
Stoick struggled to contain his anger, and then continued speaking, with great Chiefly dignity. “My son is deserting, and you have my permission to follow him. But I am going nowhere. I shall stay right here, and fight to the bitter end. ‘Never Surrender’ is the Horrendous motto.”
The Hooligans looked at each other.
“And we shall fight with you!” yelled Snotlout.
And Hiccup looked on in total misery, as his father patted a smirking Snotlout on the back, and told him he was glad to see someone who had the spirit of the Horrendous Haddocks in him.
“NEVER SURRENDER!” yelled the happy Hooligans.
They all joined in a rousing musical chorus of “These bogs are OUR bogs . . . these bogs are YOUR bogs . . . ,” sung in male voices of such beauty, that they would have set the gods a-weeping on their thunderclouds.
“Oh brother,” moaned Hiccup, his shoulders drooping.
“What are you doing still here, Hiccup?” asked his father sternly. “I thought that you were leaving.”
Stoick pointed sternly toward the exit of the amphitheater.
When they came out, Fishlegs was waiting for them, with his Running-Away Suitcase on his back.
“So?” he said eagerly. “Everybody seems to be seeing sense at last, and getting out of here.”
“All except for us Hooligans,” said Hiccup gloomily. “Apparently we Never Surrender.”
“Quite right, too,” said Camicazi, appearing out of nowhere, swinging her sword. “I’m ashamed of us Bog-Burglars, running away like bunny rabbits at the first sign of a little danger. So, what’s the plan, then, Hiccup? What does Team Hiccup do now, then, eh?”
“We can’t leave without the other Hooligans,” said Hiccup. “And they’re clearly going to stay here whatever happens . . . in which case, we have to try and stop the Volcano from exploding ourselves.”
Fishlegs’s mouth dropped open. “I don’t believe I’m hearing this,” he said. “Stop a Volcano from exploding? How are we going to stop a Volcano from exploding? With our bare hands? Ask it, pretty please?”
“If the Fire-Stone is powerful enough to keep a volcano dormant for thousands and thousands of years,” said Hiccup, “maybe if we RETURN it to the V
olcano, then we can stop it from erupting . . .”
“Maybe!” squeaked Fishlegs. “What happens if not?”
Hiccup said nothing.
“Oh goody!” smiled Camicazi, absolutely delighted at the thought of a Truly Perilous Quest.
And from the front of her waistcoat she produced the Fire-Stone.
“Where did you get that?” gasped Hiccup.
“I grabbed it from under Stoick’s fat nose while he was busy singing,” said Camicazi breezily.
Humungous turned to go, but Hiccup stopped him.
“Where do you think you’re going?” said Hiccup. “I need you to show us the way to Lava Lout Island.”
“I suppose I am still your Bardiguard,” said Humungous. “But I will only go with you as far as the island. Climbing up the Volcano is Hero work, and I am out of the Hero Business forever.”
“Right,” said Hiccup briskly, “all we have to do now is borrow a fast boat, sail to Lava-Lout Island, chuck the Stone in the Volcano before it explodes, and sail back home again. Follow me.”
“That’s all we have to do now?” squealed Fishlegs.
They had to fight their way through the crowds of fleeing Vikings at the Harbor.
The ship they borrowed, The Peregrine Falcon, was the fastest Hooligan ship in the fleet.
“We’ll bring it back,” said Hiccup to himself, feeling very guilty, “and if we don’t . . . well, if we don’t, it won’t matter anyway.”
On that cheery note, with the sun climbing high in the sky on Sun’sday Sunday, Hiccup, Fishlegs, Camicazi, Humungously Hotshot the ex-Hero, Toothless, the Windwalker, and the White Dragon sailed off out of Hooligan Harbor on the Quest-to-Stop-the-Volcano-from-Exploding.
11. THE-QUEST-TO-STOP-THE VOLCANO-FROM-EXPLODING
The Peregrine Falcon was a very fast ship.
It was still absolutely baking hot, but there was a feeling in the air that the weather was about to change, that it was building up for something stormy.
For months, the seas around Berk had been as eerily flat and glassy as a puddle. But overnight, a hot wind had sprung up, carrying with it large flakes of soot from the scorched devastation of the Highest Point and sending them flurrying across the Isle of Berk and out over the Sullen Sea like autumn leaves.