#its a real problem

The following chapter contains modern Scots Gaelic as a sort of culturally-appropriate “other” sort of language, which I’ve been learning via an app. Some of it I’ve been able to write myself, but other bits I’ve had to run through a translator, so if there’s anyone with more fluency who want to correct my vocab/grammar, please feel free.

Chapter1-2-3-4-5-FFN-AO3 

Basil meant for his peoples’ secrets to die with him. Now all that threatens to burn up in flames as he brings his daughter to the last place either of them want to go. [2746 words; a HTTYD!Whouffaldi AU]

The flight took what felt like both ages and nothing at all.

Basil’s skin prickled as they flew close to the island, with Idris flying true as she could back to the den of her hatchling years. His face began to shift into a constant scowl and his daughter took notice. She attempted to roughly chart the course while she rode atop Pilot, knowing that when they returned to Berk, she was going to have a better time of it if she handed her stepmother something at least close to a map.

Eventually, they came to the home of their ancestors: Gallifrey. Basil could feel its presence long before Bill could even see it on the horizon—there was a feel to it, an energy, and it was something that he had never wanted to experience ever again. They landed on the island—a rocky expanse of land—and dismounted from their dragons.

“Do you need me to…?” Bill began to offer. She held out her forearm, brushing it against her father’s elbow. He recoiled and pulled away, beginning to walk towards the entrance to the caves that was their former home. “Dad…?”

“Walking around blindfolded was part of our fun as children,” he explained brusquely as he continued on, unassisted. Head held high, he navigated the caves of Gallifrey, once teeming with life and dragons, now an empty husk of nothing.

Possibly, it was a good thing that he could not see the caves and what became of them. Dragon bones lay scattered around the floor of the main cavern and scratches gouged the walls, showing the level of struggle that the den had gone through in the days and weeks after they had first left. An uneasy feeling overcame both humans and their dragons, though they pressed on.

“Are you sure we absolutely had to come here?” Bill asked.

“Of course we did,” Basil replied. “There are some things that are only possible in the Home of the Dragon Lords.”

“Berk is that now.”

“Not in this way.”

Silence passed between them as they entered the tunnels of the humans’ living space, where there were alcoves carved into rock to make rooms, poorly separated by doors of rotting wood and cloth. There was evidence of smaller dragons making use of the alcoves for their own uses, but they too were long-gone and the spaces just as abandoned as the rest of the caves. Glowing lichen illuminated their path, though only one of them could see it.

“I know how long it’s been for us,” Bill mused aloud, “but I wonder how long it has been since Aunt Velda was here?”

“Long enough,” he replied. He continued along, not even needing to feel the wall to know where he was going. Bill followed him dutifully, though as they traveled further and further in, she began to shiver.

“I don’t like it here, Dad,” she said. “There’s too many memories in these caves… and not good ones.”

“More memories than the ones you’re aware of,” he stated. “I intended for them to become secrets, and for them to never reach you, but now I have no choice.”

“…what do you mean…?”

“You’ll see.”

They continued going deeper and deeper into the cave, past where Bill had remembered going prior. When she had been little, there were areas that had been off-limits, and she had reluctantly listened due to the inherent danger involved with below. Though she was now an adult, the winding, sloping corridors were still plenty unsettling.

“Why are we here again?” She looked at her father and frowned. “I would think that this is the last place you’d want to be… ever…”

“There’s a reason why Gallifrey was where our ancestors bred and raised dragons,” he replied. “There is a magic here that has benefited our efforts beyond measure…”

“I remember you saying there is no such thing as magic: only science and skill.”

“All magic is something we don’t have an answer for,” he stated. “There are some things we will never know how it works—never know the rules of—but while we are alive, we work to understand what we don’t already, because it means we are that much closer to understanding everything that we can.” He carefully felt along the wall, searching for a specific hold. “What many people refer to as magic is a thing we can do because we have discovered the rules and skills behind it—a Great Plan, chaos, happenstance, it doesn’t matter how—don’t think that because I said one thing now and another thing before that they are supposed to be wholly different.”

“They sound wholly different.”

“Yeah, and that’s why you’re still not a full Dragon Lord yet, despite declaring your Promise.” He turned his face towards her and smirked, knowing that all it did was irritate her—there were sixteen years he needed to catch up on, after all. Sliding his hands over the moist stone walls, he finally found what he was looking for, his fingers catching in a small latch. “Ah, yes, here it is.”

Releasing the latch, Basil stepped back and let the door sink into the wall and shift away. He had last been there decades prior, when it was only him and his sister wandering the caves, though he remembered clear as though it had been the week before instead of in his youth. Once the door was fully opened, he stepped forward, prompting Bill to grab his arm.

“What are you doing?!” she panicked.

“Showing you something I should have a long, long time ago.”

As dragons and riders entered the new chamber, the room began to prepare itself for them. Torches gently sparked on from sconces in the walls thanks to a tripwire on the door, filling the stale room with much-needed light. The floor was smooth and dry, having been carefully-worked at some point in the past, and the walls intricately decorated. Closer inspection showed Bill that some of the decorations were actually bones from dragons and humans alike, which caused their mounts to remain cautiously near the entrance.

“Dad… what the hell is this place?”

“It was supposed to be our final resting place,” he said solemnly. He continued on, scaling a series of steps leading up towards a dais. “This was where I laid my parents, and where I should have laid your mother and aunt both, and now… we are seeing if the legend is true.”

“…which legend…?”

“One of the many that were supposed to die with me.” He made it to the top of the stairs and paused for a moment, knowing that there was an altar before him. The dragonsblood stone was smooth under his hand as he touched it, feeling the powers of the Old Ways jolt through his system for the first time in ages.

“Tha mi a’ faicinn dorchadas,” he told the altar, using words he last spoke long ago. “Nach fhaic thu mi? Leig dhomh faicinn, taibhsean… no am fàg thu mi a ‘fulang?”

I see darkness. Don’t you see me? Let me see, ghosts… or will you leave me to suffer?

“What are you…?” Bill wondered in trepidation.

“If you put your hand on the dragonsblood altar and challenge those who came before us, it is said they will grant your wish.”

“…so, legend states if you blaspheme atop a creepy dragonsblood altar locked away inside an even creepier crypt, Granddad’s ghost will heal you out of spite?”

“Essentially.”

“Doesn’t that sound stupid?”

“When you put it that way, of course it does.”

“…and what did you… um…?”

“You have to speak their language in order to challenge them properly,” he explained. He then turned back to the altar, sneering. “Freagair mi a-nis, taibhsean!”

As he challenged the ghosts of the bones in the crypt for a second time, Basil felt the altar beneath his hand warm to a point he knew was impossible for just his hand to accomplish. Bill gasped as she saw what was happening: golden dust was beginning to emit from her father and the altar, surrounding him in the light from when they were in her den. His head lolled back as he began to float in the air, the magic lifting him as it swirled around and poured from him. Bill even had to shield her eyes, as not only was it terribly bright, but there was a wind that was somehow picking up as well.

“Dad!” she shouted. “What in the hell is going on here?!”

He did not answer.

“Dad! Dad! Come on!” She tried to pull him down to the floor, yet it was no use—she couldn’t even get close to him, let alone touch his hand. The dragons growled from their spot by the door, unable to aid her in the slightest.

Eventually, Basil began to glow so intensely, he seemed white-hot. He slowly sank to the stone floor in front of the altar and crumpled in a heap. Bill reached out to touch him, yet there was a spark that shocked her hand away.

“Idris! Come over here!” Her call was answered and—now free of threat of the Old Ways—the dragon in-question bounded into the crypt. She nuzzled her snout against her human… she was able to touch him. “Wait a moment… how can you…?”

Bill thought for a moment; if Idris could touch her father, yet she couldn’t, then there truly was some sort of freaky Dragon Lord magic at play. She placed her hand on the dragon’s head, feeling her scales beneath her fingers.

“Listen,” she said, “I’m going to go get Clara. If she and Dad are the Hybrid, then she’ll be able to help him. I don’t think there’s much we can do right now.” She and Idris both glanced down at Basil; one more try and she still failed to so much as touch his face. “I’ll be back soon, yeah?

The dragon made a low rumbling noise in its throat and Bill knew it was going to be alright. She dashed for the entryway, Pilot waiting for her there, impatiently stomping his feet. They both ran through the winding corridors, careful in the tight spaces, with her hopping onto his back soon as the caves opened up. Within moments they were in the open air, headed back towards what they hoped was Berk.

There was no time for rest—she needed Clara.

She needed Clara to save her dad.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Don’t worry—I’ll get to the bottom of this.

That was what the note had said, and yet that was the one thing that Clara could do. Night after night, she paced and fretted and picked at her fingers, not wanting to leave Berk in case of her husband and stepdaughter’s return, and yet at the same time, she could not help herself but worry. They had taken both their dragons without even a hint as to where they were or had gone, making searching for them close to impossible.

Thus, for near two weeks, she was left to wait… and if there was anything she was not good at, it was waiting.

“This isn’t good,” she said, brow furrowed in worry. She was panicking, doing laps around the ground floor of her house as Danny sat in one of the chairs, her friend holding a sleeping Aodh. A fire was going in the hearth and a pile of hatchlings slept in the corner. “What if he needs me?”

“Relax, Clara,” Danny insisted. “Something tells me he’s gotten into worse scrapes than whatever he’s in now.” He stroked Aodh’s hair as he rocked the chair gently. “It’s Bill I’m concerned about.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean: can we trust her?” he mused. “It feels very convenient that soon after she shows up and dumps her dragons here, the two of them vanish.”

“We can trust her,” she nodded. “That’s not even close to why I’m worried.”

“…but the last time we encountered a family member of his, some things happened.” He gestured to his prosthetic leg, which caused Clara to exhale heavily in guilt. “I want to be wrong on that, Clara, but you can’t help but admit it’s suspicious. She seems like a good person…”

“I know, I know,” she sighed. She rested her hand on her stomach—a reminder of what it was at risk. “I just wish it wasn’t like this.”

“All you need to do is say the word and we’ll deploy.”

“I know.”

“We’d figure it out.”

“Without a doubt.”

Clara continued to flit around the room anxiously as Danny held her son and kept quiet company. She couldn’t help but worry—there was so much going on in her head that she wondered what could have possibly been going on in Basil’s. There had been no indication that he would do anything like this—he was done running—so why was he gone…?

Just then, a dull thud could be heard outside and the front door flew open. Bill and Pilot came thundering into the house, causing Clara and Danny both to jump in surprise and Aodh wake with a start.

“Clara! You have to help!” Bill gasped.

“What’s going on?!” Clara asked. “Where’s Basil?!”

“Gallifrey.”

Both Clara and Danny felt as though weights dropped in their stomachs.

“Are you sure about that…?” Danny asked, the small child in his arms now clinging to him crankily.

“I spent the first eight years of my life there, and Dad confirmed it,” Bill replied. “Dad’s in Gallifrey, and he’s in trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?!” Clara demanded. “What’s going on?!”

“Dad… he took me to Gallifrey, and showed me this room I’d never seen before,” Bill tried to explain. “It was big and creepy and then he, like, dared Granddad to make him better, and now I think the dragonstone’s too much on him and he’s going mental!”

“…and you just left him there?!”

“I had no choice! I couldn’t get close to him!” Tears welled in Bill’s eyes—she was just as scared as they were. “That place does weird things to people, Clara. I just got Dad back and I don’t want to lose him again—I don’t want to lose anyone else to that hellhole. Please… help me.”

“Of course,” Clara said resolutely. She held Bill’s shoulders at arm’s length, looking her directly in the eyes. “Your dad is my husband, my children’s father, and I will do anything to bring him back to us.”

“I can gather the Stealth Riders and be ready to go in the morning,” Danny said. Bill shook her head.

“We’re going to need to plan this,” she replied. “Gallifrey didn’t exactly survive for as long as it did because it’s easy to find.”

“…but you just came from there…”

“I had no stars to guide me—it’s often cloudy there, shrouded in mist, and the large amounts of dragonstone ward off many dragons not from the den. The fact my mum was able to sail there was a bloody miracle.”

“Then we wait until morning and gather together the best we got,” Clara decided. “We’ll get the Riders, maybe some accompanying boats, supplies…”

“Bill… where’s Dad…?” Aodh asked, finally awake enough to realize what was going on. His sister took him in her arms and hugged him close.

“Dad’s back where we lived when I was your age,” she explained. “It’s a very scary and dangerous place. Mum and I have to figure out a way to fetch him.”

“Is he hurt?”

“In a way, but we can get him back,” she assured. “Idris is there—she won’t let anything too bad happen to him in the meantime.” She kissed her brother on the brow and held his head to her shoulder, hiding her face from him. It was hard, as she grit her teeth and closed her eyes in an effort to not cry. “We’ll bring Dad home.”

“Promise?”

“I promise, hatchling,” she cooed. “Dad and I found each other the long way around before—we don’t have the time to do that again.”

“You don’t…?”

“Not if we want to spend as much time with you as we can,” the young woman admitted. It was the truth, that was what mattered. The boy hugged his sister while his adults all looked at one another, concerned as to how they were going to live up to that promise.