When you're riding a dragon, communication is key. You almost have to read each other's minds... or else. And you have to have an open mind, because sometimes, your dragon knows better than you.

Reign gripped onto me tightly as Toothless zoomed through the air. She was still getting used to the tricks that we did, and I'm not entirely sure she was too fond of them to begin with. After all, her first experience on Toothless involved him swooping and diving, and dangling her above the trees until she agreed to not reveal that he existed. That kind of thing likely scars a person at least a little.

"Low-level evasive maneuvers," I ordered Toothless. The others followed in suit behind, with Astrid right on our heels. "Come on, bud." We dodged around a few trees, then I shifted my foot, which fully opened Toothless' artificial tail fin. From below, I could hear Snotlout scream.

"What are you doing? Are you trying to kill me?" Hookfang roared, almost mocking his Rider. "We've gotta go back. I think you missed some branches..."

Astrid and I were neck-and-neck now, and I managed to catch a strange look she flashed Reign's way. The redhead on the back of my dragon chuckled.

"What are you planning?" I asked her, throwing up one of my eyebrows at her smirk.

"Oh, nothing," she answered innocently. I looked forward again to see Astrid barreling toward three trees that had fallen against each other.

"Stormfly, up!"

"Uh, Astrid, I think it's down..." Reign cried.

Astrid suddenly stood on the back of her Nadder, and just as it looked like she was about to smash into the trees, she jumped into the air, over the treetops, and landed on Stormfly's back perfectly, aside from the fact that she was screaming the whole time.

"You were right, Reign. It was down. I almost died."

"Almost died?" Snotlout scoffed. "I would have died." Reign laughed out loud at his appearance: plants and leaves were stuck in his helmet, while two small branches of pine needles stuck out from his nostrils.

"That's a good look for you," she commented teasingly.

"Hey, has anyone seen Fishlegs?"

"I saw him yesterday," Ruffnut responded. "Does that count?" I rolled my eyes and flew straight, going over the dense coverage of the forest, until I finally found Meatlug trapped in a tree with Fishlegs caught in one across from it.

"Whoa. There you are, Fishlegs." I landed Toothless and the two of us hopped off.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Just... hanging out. It's not like I crashed or anything..." He wasn't even convincing himself. "Okay, I crashed. There, I said it." I shook my head and reached up, trying to pull Fishlegs down. However, I really only made things worse.

I'll spare you the details.

"Oops..." I muttered.

"And there goes my dignity..." I reached for Fishlegs' foot and pulled as hard as I could, but the Viking barely budged.

"Yeah, you're pretty stuck. I think I know how to get you down, but you have to stay perfectly still."

"Why? What are you gonna do?" His voice wavered nervously, but there weren't many other options left to get him down.

"Careful, bud. He's not wearing any pants."

"Hiccup..." Reign sighed, putting her head in her hands and shaking it violently.

"Huh? Wait a second... what does my lack of pants have to do-" Toothless fired a tiny shot at Fishlegs, just enough to knock him out of the tree, and bounded forward to catch him. "Thank you." He carefully hopped off and walked toward me. "I believe those are mine." I tossed the pair of pants to Fishlegs, glad to be rid of them... and that he had put them back on.

"Now, what are we gonna do about Meat-" I was interrupted by a loud crash as the branches holding Meatlug up gave out. "-lug..."

"Can you not tell the others that Meatlug broke the trees? She's sensitive about her weight..."

"How did this happen?" Reign asked, clearly concerned for their safety.

"I don't know. I was just flying along, taking notes on the flora and the fauna- typical guy stuff- and something weird jumped out of the bushes. It was like a... like a flaming squirrel."

"A flaming squirrel?"

"Or a chipmunk. Or some other flammable rodent... I don't know, Hiccup! It scared us! Isn't that enough for you?" He hopped back on to Meatlug and they flew back toward home. I turned to Reign with a smirk on my face.

"Did you hear that? A flaming squirrel." I helped her back onto Toothless, then got on and took off. "Everyone knows there's no such thing as a-" Suddenly, a blast of fire shot out, knocking us both off of Toothless. "-flaming squirrel!" We both tumbled to the ground. "You okay?" I asked her.

"Yeah. What about you?"

"Unharmed, just a little spooked. You saw that, right?" She and Toothless nodded at the same time, and my attention was called to a fallen tree branch, which now had a large, smoldering hole in it. Slowly, Reign and I peeked over, and off in the distance, hidden between some rocks, saw a frightened-looking baby dragon. Reign gently made her way over to it and smiled.

"Hey, little guy," she whispered. "Who are you?" It looked at her for a moment, then jumped forward and attempted to bite her hand. Toothless and I decided that was the right moment to go over to her. "Whoa! Settle down, big fella." She tried to gain its trust again. "I've never seen anything like it." I knelt down next to her and smiled at the baby dragon. Toothless got a little closer, sniffed, and then backed away, growling.

"You're not helping," I sighed.

"I think we may have discovered a new species here." Suddenly, Toothless cut his way in front of Reign and I and tried to nudge both of us away.

"Whoa, hey, Toothless! What has gotten into you?" The baby dragon scurried back into the hole it had found.

"He looks hurt." Reign tried once again. "Don't be afraid. I'm a friend," she cooed. "Hiccup, can I have some of that stuff you keep in your vest?" I pulled out some Dragon Nip and handed it to her. The baby dragon slowly inched its way out. "It's okay. It's just a little bit of Dragon Nip." It finally got close enough for Reign to help it, when Toothless roared, causing the baby dragon to do the same. It scurried into her arms, and she sighed. "Hey, come on. Play nice," she scolded, until she cried out. "Ah! Little dragon, big claws." She picked it up and held it a few inches away from her, while I worriedly examined her stomach from afar. She noticed and rolled her eyes. "Relax, Hiccup. I'm fine. Now, come on. Let's go. We'll fix you right up."

"I was just making sure you weren't seriously injured," I defended.

"I know, I know..."

"This is so exciting!" Fishlegs exclaimed, almost dancing with anticipation. "It's a whole new species!"

"Doesn't look like a flaming squirrel to me."

"We have no idea what it's capable of!" The baby dragon sniffed the ground, curious about where it was. "There's no telling what it might do." Tuffnut kneeled in front of it.

"Flame. Do it." Instead of shooting out fire, the baby dragon lunged forward and bit tight onto Tuff's nose. "Aah! Get it off! Get it off! Get it off!" He managed to pry it off, but it then jumped onto his sister's nose. "Hey, that is funny."

"Come on, you guys. This is serious." The dragon jumped into my arms. "We have to figure out what to do with him. He's hurt."

"He's hurt?"

"He's just really scared," Reign added. "He'll settle down."

"Um, new species, remember? We actually don't know what he'll do."

"Well, somebody's gotta take him home," Astrid sighed. Everyone stepped back, including Reign.

"Well, big guy... here's your somebody." It growled and looked at me, confused, for a moment, before seemingly understanding what was going on and almost relaxing. Everyone else decided to get on their way except Reign, leaving her and I alone with the dragons. "Why didn't you step up?" She sighed and brushed some of her hair out of her face.

"The Hoffersons have been kind enough to take me in. I don't want to push anything with them." She bent down slightly and smiled at the baby dragon before stroking the top of its head. I couldn't help but smile. "You know your father's gonna protest you keeping this thing, right?" I rolled my eyes at her.

"Sure, Reign..."

"No, no, no."

"I told you," Reign muttered.

"He's not staying here. I've got a one dragon limit."

"Oh, come on. He's not a very big dragon. Think of it more like... a flaming squirrel." A tiny laugh escaped Reign's mouth.

"Don't want one of those either." My father set down some logs into the fireplace. "Toothless? What are you waiting for?" My Night Fury prepared a blast, but before he could light the logs, the baby dragon shot out fire and did it instead, causing Toothless to jump back. "Ah. Looks like you got torched." Toothless growled. "Oh, that's his name, by the way. Torch."

"So, he can stay?"

"Well, we can't throw him out now. We just named him."

"Dang it..."

"I told you." Reign angrily glared at me, and I backed off out of fear I would get hit. "L-Let's go get their fish..." Reign and I dashed out and grabbed the large basket of fish waiting for the dragons. "Okay, one hundred for you-" I set the basket down in front of Toothless, while Reign plucked a single, large fish off the top.

"-and one for you."

"There you go, boys. Your first supper together." We turned around, prepared to be able to sit down and eat ourselves, when Toothless suddenly roared at Torch, who scampered away. I looked down into the basket to see it completely empty. "Wow, Toothless... You sure are hungry tonight, aren't you, bud?"

"I can help you get things set up for the night. After that, I should probably head home."

"Oh, yeah, of course." She ran out and came back with a slab of stone, carrying it upstairs and setting it down close to Toothless'.

"There you go, Torch. This is where you're gonna sleep." The little dragon instead scampered to Toothless' slab and attempted to sleep, but the bigger dragon instead threw him off by his tail. Torch flew back over, and the two stared at each other.

"Aw, look at that. He's made himself at home. Toothless, you don't mind sharing your bed for the night, do you?" Toothless responded by growling and perching up on the roof. I sighed and sat on my bed. "I hope he sleeps through the night. He hardly ate."

"He'll be fine, Hiccup. And if something happens, you know where to find me. I'll see you tomorrow." I waved goodbye and waited until I heard her say goodbye to my father before blowing out my candle. Toothless hissed loudly again.

"And you... go to sleep."

"All right, Torch. Let's figure out what you are." Reign yawned over dramatically, to show how displeased she was that I had gotten her up early. Which, for her, was anything before noon.

"Oh, this is so exciting! Documenting a whole new species. Learning all about it."

"Wait, learning?"

"No, thanks." I sighed and pulled out the Book of Dragons, sifting through it to see if I could find a species that looked similar to Torch.

"There's nothing in the Book of Dragons that looks anything like him."

"We even get to determine what it's called... Ha, that is... that is a really big responsibility. I don't know if I'm ready for that."

"I am!" Snotlout bragged as Reign began to take measurements. "I'm gonna name the snot out of it."

"Twenty inches for the wings."

"That's a big wing span..."

"Bigwing! Bigspan? Bigwingspan!"

"May I have the honor of administering the claw test?" Fishlegs pulled out the scroll he kept with him and unrolled it, and Torch sliced through it, no problem. "Look at these talons. They're razor-like."

"Sharpclaw! Razorfeet! Razorsharpclawtalonfeet!"

"Hold on. Is he serious?"

"You know what's next, don't you?" I was getting slightly uncomfortable at how enthusiastic Fishlegs was getting about this.

"Not really..."

"Only the single-most important test to determine a dragon's reaction to eels!" I waited for an answer. "The eel reaction test." Fishlegs reached into the basket of eels we kept around, causing all the other dragons to scatter. Torch backed up for a second, then gently inched forward and sniffed the eel before taking its head in his mouth and swallowing it. Reign's eyes went wide, then she furrowed her brown, and her expression seemingly changed a million more times as she stared at Torch. "He ate it! He ate the eel!"

"Eeleater! Come on, that's perfect." I rolled my eyes and walked away.

"Fishlegs, has there ever been a dragon who wasn't afraid of-"

"Never in recorded history. We're in uncharted water, my friend." I took another glance at Torch.

"You hear that, Torch? You're one of a kind."

"Now we need to get it to fly."

"Maybe if Torch saw Toothless fly... Toothless!" I called up to my dragon, who hadn't wanted to come into the Academy for some reason. "Let's take a ride, bud." He completely ignored me. "Toothless!"

"Ha ha. So much for the 'dragon trainer,'" Snotlout teased. "We've got this." He hopped onto Hookfang. "Watch and learn." The Monstrous Nightmare suddenly took off at high speeds, taking Snotlout far away and up high before looping back around and landing in the academy once again. "Okay... your turn... But don't think you have to live up to that..." Torch warily inched his way to the end of the table and flew in a little circle, before landing and patting his wings on the ground in a strange pattern.

"What's he doing?"

"I think something's wrong..."

"Oh, man! We broke him."

"Maybe he can't fly." Torch suddenly began to spark at the mouth and fly in wide circles, creating patterns with the embers he left behind.

"Whoa..." He landed again and jumped into my arms.

"You... are one incredible little dragon." I noticed Reign's face changing again, and her hand flew up to the necklace. She was thinking about something... but what?

"Whoa... look at that burn mark." Ruffnut drew our attention to the pattern Torch had created.

"Huh... and look at this burn mark." Tuff shoved his smoldering arm in his sister's face.

"Did you see how it flew? It spun like... like a typhoon."

"And he came back just like a boomerang!" Astrid added.

"Hotspinner! Flaming-Comebacker!"

"No. Typhoomerang."

"Typhoomerang? Nah, I don't get it."

"I thought you at least had half a brain," Reign quipped halfheartedly. She was clearly still deep in thought.

"You okay?" I asked her, growing increasingly concerned.

"Huh?" She seemed to just notice we were here. "Oh, yeah, I'm fine. Just... tired."

"Yeah, okay, Torch. Just hold still." Reign was intensely concentrated on her drawing of him, wanting to get every detail right. "I'm trying to draw you. You're getting your own chapter." Torch thrashed and fought with my helmet, which he had found and somehow gotten onto his head. I looked down at him and smiled.

"Argh!" I attempted to come off as intimidating, playing with the little dragon. "Rawr!" Torch screeched back, and we continued to play until I heard Reign chuckle. I looked over to see her smiling at us, arms crossed against her stomach, almost looking relaxed for once. "What?" She turned red.

"Oh, uh... Y-You're distracting Torch! I need to draw him!"

"Oh, please. That's not it." She huffed.

"Fine. You and Torch playing together is cute. You're really good with dragons." I smiled and found myself blushing. "Now seriously, give me Torch back. If I draw the two of you in the Book of Dragons, people centuries from now will wonder what kind of freak of nature you were." Suddenly, Toothless came bounding into the room and knocked Reign off of her chair. "Ah!" I rushed over to find her pencil broken.

"Toothless. Look what you did." He just roared and growled.

"And now I've got to get more charcoal."

"I'm sorry about that..." Her eyes went wide.

"Oh, no, no, no! It's fine, really!" She scratched Toothless' head to show everything was good. "Can you come with me?"

"Sure." I turned to my Night Fury. "Behave yourself while we're gone." Torch tried to follow, but I stopped him. "Hey, it's okay, big guy. I'll be right back." We walked down the stairs so Reign could grab a replacement.

"You think Toothless is acting like this because he's jealous?" I looked at her.

"What?"

"He may feel threatened now that your attention isn't entirely focused on him." She began to wrap the spare charcoal around the wood.

"Is that what you were thinking about?"

"Among other things, yes. I'm just trying to figure out what Torch is and if we need to be concerned."

"Having second thoughts, eh?" She chose not to answer that, but it didn't matter. A few moments later, I heard a crackling noise from above, and looked up to see a fire in my room. Reign and I scampered up, and she grabbed a blanket to put it out. "Toothless!" Torch jumped into my arms as Toothless growled at him. "What- what is going on here? Toothless, why did you do this? What is wrong with you?"

"Hiccup-" Toothless roared before hopping out the window.

"Toothless! Wait!" Reign sighed and handed me the pencil.

"I'll be right back." She climbed up the wall and out the window Toothless had fled from. "I know, big guy. He's starting to worry me, too." I made my way back over to the desk, hoping maybe I could pick up where Reign had left off. I shifted the picture of Torch, when I noticed another one underneath it. Gently, I picked it up and examined it. She had only done the basic outlines, but it almost looked like two people riding a dragon.

Was this... her and I on Toothless?

I found myself smiling as I set the drawing down.

"It's weird. It's almost like Toothless is jealous." I sighed. "And my first girlfriend is a dragon..."

"Another thing we have in common." I had gone to talk to Gobber about this whole situation, hoping he knew something. Well... I was also trying to distract myself from the fact that I hadn't seen Reign since she left last night. "Something must be going on under the surface. Dragons are complex creatures, Hiccup- operate on many emotional levels. Me? I've only got the one." I turned my head at the sudden roar of Toothless. He began screeching and screaming at me.

"You see? This is what I've been talking about. Toothless, settle down!" Torch jumped down from my arms and inched closer to Toothless, who suddenly snatched him up in his mouth and began to bound away. "Gobber, grab him!" Gobber jumped out in front of my Night Fury.

"You want to dance, big boy? Because I've got my dancing shoe on!" Torch struggled and snarled, then suddenly sparked and flew out of Toothless' mouth. Toothless began to chase him, but Gobber grabbed onto his tail, trying to slow him down. It did absolutely nothing, however, and he ended up getting dragged along, before being smashed into a shelf. "My pan pipes! Now I can get the band back together!" I rolled my eyes and stood in my dragon's way.

"Toothless! Back down." He growled and refused to drop his defensive stance, so I stood my ground and locked glares with him as Gobber began to play his pan pipes. "Not... helping... Gobber..."

"Sorry."

"I don't know what's gotten into him, but I don't like it." Toothless growled angrily and stalked away. As the sun began setting, Reign finally appeared, thankfully looking unharmed. "Hey! Where'd you go last night?" She suddenly looked panicked.

"Oh, um... chasing Toothless just really wore me out. I'm sorry if I scared you or something."

"No, no, it's fine. I was just surprised you left all your drawings there."

"You didn't look at any, did you?"

"Um... no," I lied.

"Good." Her mood seemed to brighten. "Hey, you wanna take Toothless down to the cove?" I nodded and Reign called over the sulking dragon, who reluctantly allowed us to climb on and took off. However, he suddenly turned in the opposite direction of where we were supposed to be going.

"Whoa! Whoa! Toothless, the cove... is this way." I tried to pull him in the right direction. "Where are you going? No! We're going to the cove." I shifted my foot to extend his tail wing and steer him in the right direction. I hopped off as soon as we landed. "Okay. You've got to stay here. I never thought bringing Torch home would lead to this. I've got to separate you two until I figure this out."

"Seriously?" Reign held on as Toothless jumped in front of me. I sighed.

"Toothless, Reign, this is serious. He's got to stay here." They refused to let me go. "Okay... a crazy, out of control dragon and an equally as crazy girl blocking my way out."

"Excuse me?" Reign spat. I started to walk one way, then quickly ducked the other and climbed the rocks to the point where Toothless couldn't get me.

"Or not." I sighed down at the redhead. "Reign, come on. Let's go." She crossed her arms defiantly.

"No."

"Come on. You're being ridiculous."

"Just go, you jerk!" She hopped off Toothless and glared at me, then stormed to the other end of the cove. I stood there in shock for a moment, then rolled my eyes and made my way back home. Exhausted from what had just happened, I immediately climbed into bed. But as I sat there, things began to creep into my mind. I alternated my focus to Torch, and my eyes wandered to Reign's sketch. I couldn't help but smile at it. That's when the sinking feeling occurred.

What have I done...?

"You did the right thing with Toothless," Astrid attempted to assure me. "He'll snap out of it. As for Reign... I'm sure she will, too."

"Yeah, but what if they don't? Then you won't have a dragon to ride. And if you don't have a dragon to ride, then you can't be the leader of the Dragon Academy! Ha! And Reign wouldn't be here to take your place!"

"Yeah, then I'd take over. Do you really want that?" Ruff and Tuff finally made their way around to us.

"You guys will not believe what we just saw."

"Excuse me, we're having a power struggle."

"We're not having a power struggle," I grunted.

"The whole forest... ultimate destruction."

"It was beautiful. The whole thing was torched." I suddenly became very alarmed.

"Torched..." I looked down at the little dragon in my arms. "Show me." I hopped onto Stormfly with Astrid and we all headed off in the direction the twins had come from. Sure enough, there was a large, brown spiral in the center of a clearing, just like the one Torch had made.

"Just like we said. Ultimate destruction!"

"We've seen that burn mark before."

"Not this big..."

"You know what this means. Big burn mark..."

"...big Typhoomerang." A large, red Typhoomerang suddenly flew up in the distance, shooting fire below.

"He looks really mad." I put things together, and the pieces suddenly fell into place.

"Uh, it's not a 'he.' It's a she..." Everyone looked at me. "That's Torch's mother..."

"Torch is a baby!" I was a little shocked Astrid hadn't figured that out.

"That's what Toothless was trying to tell me."

"Whatever gets between that mother and this baby... is gonna get fried!" Fishlegs tossed Torch to Tuffnut, who ended up passing it down to Snotlout through his sister.

"Just leave it, and let's get out of here." He passed Torch off to me and backed away. The little dragon began calling out for its mother, snapping her attention to us.

"Uh oh..." I set him down. "Go, uh... go home to your mama." She barreled toward us, mouth aflame. "Run!" Everyone scrambled to their dragons. "You guys go that way. I lead her into the forest away from the village."

"Hiccup!" I ran as fast as I could, trying my best to lose Torch and his mother. But the baby followed, and as long as he did, so did his mother. "Oh, please stop following me!" I ended up leading them to the cove. "Reign! Toothless!" I jumped down in hopes of still finding them there, and sure enough, they were ready to go. Reign caught me and helped me adjust on Toothless, and we flew up. "Thanks, you two. I'm so sorry. I should have listened to you."

"You can offer your overdue apology later. We've got a mama Typhoomerang to fight!" We just barely avoided a shot of fire.

"Toothless, evasive maneuvers." Reign gripped on tight as Toothless sped up. However, we couldn't shake this dragon off our trail. "Oh, why won't she stop?"

"Um..." Torch suddenly popped up from behind a very panicked looking Reign,

"What the- Torch? What are you doing? You need to be with your mother."

"Maybe he thinks you're his mother," Reign teased. "Wait, actually, that might be it..."

"Toothless, we have to try something else. We'll use her size against her. Toothless, up!" Toothless sharply rose as high as he could. "Now, dive!" Just as quickly as we had gone up, we went back down. The Typhoomerang tried her best to follow the sharp turn, but ended up crashing to the ground instead. We landed and I tried to look closer from my position on Toothless. "I hope she's okay..." Torch screeched and scampered over to his mother, nuzzling her face until she woke up. Two other baby Typhoomerangs jumped down from their mother's back and greeted their brother. "Good job, bud. Everybody's back where they belong. Goodbye, Torch." The mother Typhoomerang flew away in a spectacle of sparks. "Let's go home, Toothless."

I tossed a fish to my dragon as my father cooked dinner and Gobber once again played his pan pipes.

"I wrote this just for the occasion."

"I should have known you were just trying to protect me." I scratched the top of Toothless' head. "That's what you do." The doors suddenly opened, and Reign entered my home, walking over to me. "That's what you do, too."

"Huh?" She crossed her arms and stood over me. Toothless suddenly made a face and spat up half of the fish, like he had those first couple of days training him.

"And then you do that..." Reign shook her head and tossed the fish from my lap.

"Hey, I'm sorry I didn't just tell you about the mother Typhoomerang. I guess I was hoping you'd trust Toothless' instincts."

"It's okay. I should have known something was wrong. You really only get this stubborn when something is." Anger flashed on her face.

"What?" I turned red and grabbed her folder of drawings.

"Uh.... here's your drawings back!" She snatched it from me and sighed.

"That's what I came here for. Thanks." She began to look at them as she walked out, then stopped when she got to the one I had seen. On the back, I had written 'Can't wait to see the final product! I know it will be amazing. -H.' She looked panicked for a moment, then she eased into a smile and looked back at me. "Thanks Hiccup. It's yours, when I'm done." With that, she left and headed back home.

"Those two are gonna get married. I feel it."

"Seriously, Gobber?" I grunted.

Communication between dragon and rider goes both ways. Not only must the dragon follow the rider's lead, but the rider must listen to the dragon as well... because sometimes, what the dragon's saying is what you really need to hear.