How to Cheat a Dragon's Curse (The Heroic Misadventures of Hiccup the Viking)

by Cressida Cowell

  "WOW," breathed Camicazi, looking over his shoulder. "What is it, do you think?"

  "I have no idea," said Hiccup, putting it back in his pocket, where the ticking would be muffled. He would think about it later. "It's some kind of Hysterical invention, I suppose. Those Hysterics are mad as mackerel, but they are good inventors."

  Please, Thor, please, thought Hiccup to himself, please let it be all right somehow after all...

  It began to rain, and the rain melted the blue snow, and it dripped like tears off the horns on Hiccup's helmet, down into blue puddles on the deck. The American arrow lay, half drowning, on the edge of one of these puddles, and Hiccup picked it up and put it carefully in his arrow case.

  Within five minutes, all the snow had gone, and Camicazi, Hiccup, Toothless, and One Eye all looked as if they'd had some kind of weird accident with a lot of blue paint. Their hair, coats, helmets and horns all

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  coated and streaked with the blue of the bluest of blue skies.

  Tick tock tick tock tick tock said the metal thingamajig in Hiccup's pocket.

  Tick tock tick tock tick tock went Hiccup's heart, hopeful in spite of itself.

  Back on Hysteria, steaming through the pouring rain, you could see the bright flame of fire and a column of smoke coming from the Hysterical Great Hall.

  Norbert's Papa was finally getting his proper Viking funeral.

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  18. FISHLEGS

  Stoick was waiting for them, in pouring rain, on the Long Beach. Stoick was FURIOUS.

  He had only just found out that Hiccup had not spent the night at Snotlout's house, and Snotiout had told him that he had seen Hiccup and Camicazi sneaking away in a sleigh from the Freya'sday Eve Celebrations, heading out onto the great sea of ice.

  When Stoick demanded why Snotiout had not told him this earlier, Snotiout could not answer.

  Snotiout could hardly give the real reason, which was that he had been rather hoping that Hiccup was doing something STUPID and DANGEROUS, and he didn't want Stoick rushing out to save him at the last minute.

  But Stoick the Vast saw the real reason in Snotlout's eyes, and in the delighted way that Snotiout looked out at the melted ice in the Harbor. Snotiout was PLEASED that Hiccup could have drowned somewhere out there in that grey, grim sea.

  For the first time, Stoick realized that Snotiout

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  might not be the best choice of friend for his son Hiccup.

  I am afraid that Stoick the Vast gave Snotlout an old-fashioned spanking.

  This WAS the Dark Ages.

  Stoick then ran to the Long Beach to see if he could see what was going on, and, to his MASSIVE relief, the first thing he clapped eyes on, picking through the icebergs out to sea, was the tattered, round shape of his son's funny little boat, The Hopeful Puffin.

  "WHAT IN THOR'S NAME DO YOU

  THINK YOU HAVE BEEN DOING?" roared Stoick the Vast, storming up to them as the nose of The Hopeful Puffin landed on the sand. Hiccup, who appeared to have turned an extraordinary blue color, clambered out of the boat and looked his enraged father straight in the eyes.

  "I have been to Hysteria, to try and bring back a Potato to save Fishlegs's life," said Hiccup.

  Stoick exploded.

  "I ABSOLUTELY FORBADE YOU TO DO ANY SUCH THING!" bellowed Stoick the Vast. "HOW DARE YOU DISOBEY ME, YOUR CHIEF, AND RISK YOUR LIVES LOOKING FOR A

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  VEGETABLE THAT NEVER EXISTED, ON A WILD-GOOSE CHASE FOR NOTHING --"

  Tears poured down Hiccup's face. "The potato DOES exist," he interrupted his father, "it DOES exist, because we stole it, and Norbert the Nutjob nearly chopped our heads off, but you are right, it WAS all for nothing, because the Doomfang ate it and now Fishlegs is going to DIE."

  Stoick the Vast's anger could not last in the face of the utter hopeless misery in his son's eyes. His fury melted away, like the snow dissolving into rain all around them on the beach. He patted his son awkwardly on the shoulder.

  "Now, now, son," he said uncertainly. "Of course Fisheggs isn't going to die ..."

  Hiccup pushed his father out of the way and stumbled over the sand to Old Wrinkly's house, followed by Stoick the Vast, Camicazi, Toothless, and One Eye. He flung open the door without knocking.

  Old Wrinkly was standing in the middle of the room, poking the fire with a metal stick.

  For a moment, Hiccup couldn't see Fishlegs, and then he realized Fishlegs was on the bed. He was lying completely still, his glasses off, white as a corpse.

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  Hiccup's heart stopped.

  And then to Hiccup's unspeakable relief, Fishlegs sat up and put his glasses on.

  He was still alive, then.

  Stoick the Vast, Camicazi, Toothless, and One Eye the Saber-Toothed Driver filed into the room after Hiccup.

  [Image: A man.]

  "WELL?" roared Stoick the Vast. "IS FISHEGGS DYING, OR IS HE NOT?"

  Old Wrinkly looked very embarrassed. He shifted guiltily from foot to foot. "Ah, yes, Stoick, I'm so glad you brought that up ... yes, the thing is, I'm not sure that Fishlegs is dying after all..."

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  "WHADDYAMEAN, NOT DYING?" yelled Stoick the Vast.

  "I'm afraid my diagnosis wasn't completely correct." Old Wrinkly giggled nervously. "Soothsaying from the fire is very complicated.... I won't go into the details, but take it from me, it's tricky ... and, what with one thing or another, it turns out that Fishlegs didn't have Vorpentitis after all. It was just a bad cold that set off his Berserk tendencies. I nursed him back to health with lots of bed rest and lemon-in-honey."

  Fishlegs stood up, slightly wobbily, and gave Stoick the Vast a big smile.

  "I'm fine!" said Fishlegs happily, throwing wide his arms.

  Hiccup couldn't believe it.

  It was going to be all right after all.

  "HE'S ALIVE!" cried Hiccup joyously, over the moon at this uncomplicated happy ending, and he rushed over to hug his friend.

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  Toothless gave Fishlegs a lick on the ear, which was a big compliment from Toothless. One Eye drawled, "Well, well, that was all worth it, wasn't it?" and Camicazi did a couple of celebratory cartwheels.

  But Stoick wasn't going to take this lying down.

  "DO YOU MEAN TO TELL ME,'' roared Stoick the Vast at Old Wrinkly, "THAT ALL BECAUSE OF YOUR LOUSY SOOTHSAYING MY SON HICCUP HAS GONE ALL THE WAY TO HYSTERIA AND NEARLY GOT HIS HEAD CHOPPED OFF BY NORBERT THE NUTJOB AND FACED THE DOOMFANG ALL FOR NOTHING?????"

  "Well, not for nothing, Stoick," explained Old Wrinkly. "If you'll just listen a moment, I'll explain. Soothsaying is a very tricky business and when I looked in the fire --"

  "Did Fisheggs have Vorpentitis, or did he not?" interrupted Stoick.

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  "No, he didn't," admitted Old Wrinkly.

  "THEN THE QUEST WAS COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY!" roared Stoick.

  "Don't give Old Wrinkly a hard time, Father," said Hiccup. "Why waste time getting angry when all's well that ends well..."

  Hiccup started to laugh, but something in the middle of the laugh went wrong when Hiccup's left arm suddenly went dead.

  Hiccup looked down at his arm in surprise.

  "I can't feel my arm," ' said Hiccup.

  And then the other arm went dead.

  Hiccup had been feeling rather hot all day, but he suddenly felt as if he were . burning alive. Sweat poured down his face, and great clouds of steam rose up off his shoulders and chest.

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  And Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third's entire body went rigid as a statue, his eyes staring and bloodshot, and he fell down lifeless on the very bed Fishlegs had been lying on just two minutes before.

  [Image: Hiccup and a dragon.]

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  19. THE FINAL CHAPTER

  Sometimes it is not until the Final Chapter that you realize what a quest has REALLY been about all along.

  Stoick's face turned from red anger to pure white terror.
>
  "The Doomfang." whispered Stoick the Vast in agony, rushing to hold his stiff son in his arms. "By Woden and Freya and Hairy Knuckled Thor, he did get touched by the frozen flames of the Doomfang ... and all for a stupid useless quest for NOTHING ..."

  Enormous, hairy Stoick the Vast burst into tears.

  "Oh for Thor's sake, Stoick," cried Old Wrinkly, bossily pushing Stoick out of the way. "Will you just SHUT UP and listen to me? I'm really not that bad a soothsayer. This has nothing to do with the Doomfang." He took Hiccup's pulse, and looked under his eyelids, and tapped his chest, which had turned as wooden as a tree trunk. "This is VORPENTITIS."

  Stoick reeled back. "And what does that mean?" he whispered through white lips.

  "It means," said Old Wrinkly, "that one little weirdo looks very like another when you're soothsaying

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  in a fire, and it was HICCUP who was bitten by the Vorpent, and not Fishlegs. So HICCUP has Vorpentitis. And that means that since it is now ..."

  (At this point Old Wrinkly reached into Hiccup's breast pocket, hoping to draw out the potato, and in fact drew out the ticking metal thingamajig. He looked at the numbers on it and nodded his head.)

  "... oooh exactly five to ten in the morning on Freya'sday Friday!" continued Old Wrinkly, laying the metal thingamajig carefully on the bed beside Hiccup, "your son, Hiccup, who has Vorpentitis, has five minutes to live."

  Old Wrinkly chuckled. This didn't seem to be worrying him much.

  "Which wouldn't give a great deal of time for us to find an antidote. But luckily," said Old Wrinkly, in the spirit of a conjuror, "luckily, on your son's so-called stupid useless quest for NOTHING, he has brought back the antidote with him ALREADY. Camicazi, where is the potato? It doesn't seem to be here in Hiccup's pocket.... Have you got it?"

  Camicazi was as white as One Eye's back. She shook her head numbly. "No ... potato," she gasped.

  Old Wrinkly's mouth fell open, appalled.

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  "NO POTATO?" shrieked Old Wrinkly. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN, NO POTATO? YOU MUST HAYE THE POTATO!!!"

  Camicazi shook her head again. "No potato," she whispered.

  [Image: A dragon.]

  "But I was so sure," whispered Old Wrinkly. "I was so sure you would bring back the potato.... This is the last time I believe a single word those beastly fires say.... They told me DEFINITELY that you

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  "Oh, we got it all right," mumbled Camicazi miserably. "It was just that the Doomfang ATE it." "Oh, my goodness," gulped Old Wrinkly.

  NO potato.

  Suddenly Old Wrinkly looked every second of his ninety-three years. His whole body crumpled up like an old brown leaf.

  Little did Hiccup know, when he was crying on the boat for his friend Fishlegs, that he should have been crying for himself.

  For it was indeed HICCUP who had been stung all those many months ago, escaping from the Fortress of Sinister. And it was Hiccup who was now moments away from the death he feared for his friend Fishlegs.

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  "WHAT CAN I DO?" roared Stoick the Vast. "There must be other cures? Other medicines?"

  Old Wrinkly shook his head. "The potato is the only cure for Vorpentitis."

  "I'LL BRING BACK THE POTATO!" cried Stoick the Vast, drawing his sword, a Man of Action to the last. "JUST TELL ME WHERE TO GO AND HOW LONG I'VE GOT!"

  "Well," said Old Wrinkly sadly, "the nearest potato is now roughly three and a half thousand miles away on the distant shores of the country known as America to those who may believe in it. And you have ..." -- Old Wrinkly checked the clock sitting next to Hiccup's bed -- "... exactly THREE minutes to find it."

  Even Stoick seemed to feel that perhaps this might be a problem.

  He strode around the room, tearing at his beard.

  Old Wrinkly, Camicazi, and One Eye sat at Hiccup's bedside.

  One Eye didn't seem as happy as he might have been two days ago at the thought of one less Human in the world.

  A big tear rolled out of his one eye and down his Saber-Tooth and plopped onto the ground.

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  Hiccup was stiff as a board, and his body was now red, and boiling hot. Toothless licked his poor red face, to try to cool it down.

  "THE DOOMFANG!" cried Stoick the Vast. "I COULD TRACK DOWN THE DOOMFANG AND WRESTLE THE POTATO FROM HIM.!"

  "You're going to find the Doomfang in the vast and trackless wastes of an immense and fathomless Ocean," said Old Wrinkly wearily, checking the time again on the clock, "in TWO minutes?"

  "Face it, Stoick," whispered Old Wrinkly. "What you're talking about is not just im-PROBABLE ... it's im-POSSIBLE..."

  Fishlegs had drawn back into the shadows, and he was watching his friend's face.

  Hiccup was trying to say something, but his frozen, burning mouth made it difficult for him to say the words.

  In fact he looked very like the Doomfang, when he was trying to speak to Hiccup out on the Sullen Sea.

  "Ooot me ... ," mumbled Hiccup desperately. "OOOOOT ME!" and he tried to point, but his arms were as stiff as if they were made out of wood.

  Old Wrinkly patted his hand, and bathed his forehead with water. Stoick's shoulders heaved with sobs.

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  "OOOOT ME!" cried poor Hiccup again.

  Fishlegs tried to follow where his friend's eyes were looking, and it seemed like they were staring at the table by the door.

  On that table lay Hiccup's furry coat and his helmet, bow, and arrows that he had thrown there when he first came in the room.

  "One minute left," whispered Old Wrinkly.

  "OOOOOOOOOOT ME!" repeated Hiccup desperately.

  Sometimes it is only a True Friend who knows what we mean when we try to speak.

  Somebody who has spent a lot of time with us, and listens carefully to what we are trying to say, and tries to understand.

  Fishlegs understood.

  He didn't know why he was supposed to do what he was about to do, but he trusted Hiccup, who always seemed to know the right thing to do.

  Fishlegs picked up Hiccup's bow.

  Out of the arrow case he drew an arrow, a singularly beautiful arrow, decorated with feathers from birds Fishlegs had never seen before.

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  Fishlegs fitted the arrow to the bow, and pointed the bow toward Hiccup.

  Stoick looked up from his sobbing, in amazement. Here was his son, moments away from dying, and that weird fish-faced friend of his appeared to be about to SHOOT him. TYPICAL. What a nutcase.

  [Image: A man.]

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  cried Stoick. "DON'T SHOOT!" Stoick threw his vast bulk across the room in an attempt to shield his son from the arrow.

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  Of course, he was trying to protect Hiccup's heart and chest. He didn't realize what an appalling shot Fishlegs was, so he jumped far too high.

  Fishlegs let the arrow go, and it soared in a wobbly unsteady arc, finally landing in Hiccup's right big toe, piercing through his wet boots, and into the skin.

  [Image: An arrow.]

  It was a bit of a miracle it hit Hiccup at all. In fact, it may just be the only time Fishlegs has EVER hit something he was actually aiming at the arrow that pierced the skin of Hiccup's big toe at ten o'clock on the morning of Freya'sday Friday was the same arrow that had been soaking for the last fifteen years in the magical juices of THE POTATO.

  Over the past decade and a half, those juices had concentrated on the surface of the metal, and the antidote now made its way into Hiccup's bloodstream, taking its cooling, healing work up every little vein,

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  down every little artery, into every little corner of Hiccup's poor, rigid, boiling little body.

  In front of their eyes, Hiccup's stiff arms softened. His chest rose and fell. The breath blew out of his nostrils, and his eyes opened.

  "Hello, Father," said Hiccup.

  This was just too much for Stoick. He fainted dead away, on the spot, all six foot seve
n and three-feet round of him, and it took a great deal more trouble to revive HIM.

  He was out cold, and Old Wrinkly slapped him, and Hiccup shook him, and Camicazi tickled his feet, and eventually it was Fishlegs who ran out and filled an enormous bucket full of snow, and threw it right in Stoick's face. That brought him to his senses, and Stoick sat bolt upright, spluttering and spitting snow out of his beard.

  "You're ALIVE!" he shouted joyfully, and he hugged his son so hard Hiccup thought his ribs might crack. "By the Bristly Beard and Thunderous Thighs of Great Goddess Freya, you're ALIVE!"

  "He is alive," said Old Wrinkly pointedly, "and I think some apologies are in order."

  Stoick's brows lowered. However relieved and

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  happy he is, a Great Chieftain used to absolute power does not like to apologize, but after a short struggle, Stoick swallowed his pride.

  [Image: Men.]

  "You are right," said Stoick. "I have been thoroughly wrong, and I am sorry. Old Wrinkly, you are not the most pathetic soothsayer in the uncivilized world, and I am sorry I ever said you were. Hiccup, you were right to go on the quest for the Frozen Potato to try and save the life of your odd little friend."

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  Stoick turned to Fishlegs.

  'And most of all, FISHEGGS," he boomed solemnly, "I have misjudged YOU."

  Fishlegs blushed. "No, no," he stammered.