How to Train Your Dragon: How to Fight a Dragon's Fury Read online

  must have played this game before! But you

  won’t be expecting… that…’

  BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!

  BONG! BONG!

  ‘Oh!’ exclaimed the Hogfly in surprise, ‘you were

  expecting that!’

  ‘Die, you fat little lapdragon, die!’ hissed the

  Sand-Sharks, shooting even more darts at the Hogfly,

  and of course that had absolutely no effect on the

  Hogfly whatsoever, and the anger of the Sand-Sharks

  led them to lose their heads, as anger often does, and

  they shot at him recklessly, getting too close to each

  other. The Vampire Spydragon watched, its red eyes

  mesmerised.

  With the Vampire Spydragon’s attention on the

  battle, Hiccup squirmed around to the other side

  of it. He gently picked up the rope trailing from the

  Spydragon’s tail, and tied it around a gigantic rock

  covered in big fat mussels. He tied it with the firmest

  knot he could remember, which was the Unbreakable

  Fast Reef Tough Knot, a knot his father had taught him

  long ago.

  How strange a universe is the human mind.

  Hiccup couldn’t remember he had a father, but he

  could remember the Unbreakable Fast Reef Tough

  Knot.

  He had just tied the last finishing touches to the

  knot, when the Vampire Spydragon slo-o-owly turned

  his head away from the riveting spectacle of the Hogfly

  and back to the boat again.

  Heart pounding, stomach churning, Hiccup

  crawled away as fast as he possibly could in the other

  direction, his forearm roaring with pain.

  The Vampire Spydragon looked at the boat,

  realised his teeth were not there, and swivelled round

  to see Hiccup who had frozen still as a statue, in the

  pathetic hope that the Spydragon would mistake him

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  for a rock with a bit of seaweed on the top.

  The sand-and-seaweed disguise wasn’t very

  effective, for the Vampire Spydragon recognised him

  immediately. The eyes of the Vampire Spydragon

  glowed red…

  With a spine-chilling scream, the Vampire

  Spydragon leaped towards Hiccup, claws out, fangs

  down, muscles rippling with impressive athletic power.

  Hiccup screamed, and scrambled backwards, and

  for one heartstopping moment it looked like he wasn’t

  far enough away…

  But in mid-leap, the Spydragon got to the end of

  the rope and it yanked him back in the nick of time so

  that his jaws clanged shut on thin air, inches away from

  Hiccup’s nose. Hiccup was so close to having his head

  bitten off that he actually smelled the bad breath of the

  creature as he snapped his mighty jaws shut.

  ‘Yowwwwwww!’ screeched the Vampire

  Spydragon in agony, for the rope tied round the rock

  pulled on his tail in the most painful way, and having

  your tail pulled, as everyone knows, is extremely

  uncomfortable as well as undignified.

  ‘Yowwwww!’ screeched the Vampire Spydragon

  again.

  And then the Vampire Spydragon went mad.

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  Bucking this way and that, it tried to get away,

  and only succeeded in entangling itself further. It

  tore at the rope, it heaved in all directions with all its

  strength, it fought so hard that despite the pain in its

  tail it actually managed to move the stone a couple of

  inches. But the Unbreakable Fast Reef Tough Knot

  held fast.

  This is where every Viking father since the dawn

  of time points out the importance of knowing your

  knots properly. ‘There will come a time,’ says the Viking

  father, ‘when you will thank your lucky stars that you

  have used an Unbreakable Fast Reef Tough Knot rather

  than a Slippy Slippy Slip Knot.’

  And it is absolutely true, that when you have

  tied up a Vampire Spydragon by its tail to a rock, it is

  extremely important to use the right kind of knot.

  However, it would be a better idea not to tie one

  up in the first place, and Hiccup was about to find out

  why. In fact, he was about to find out something new

  about Vampire Spydragons.

  A rather strange expression came over the

  Vampire Spydragon’s face, as if it were making some

  sort of momentous decision. And then it pulled forward

  on the rock with the utmost of its strength, screwed up

  its horrible bat-face, and crossed its red glowing eyes,

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  so fierce was its concentration.

  Uh-oh, thought Hiccup, looking over his shoulder

  as he half-hopped, half crawled across the sand. I’ve

  seen that expression before on other dragons. It’s dumping

  its tail. I didn’t know a Vampire Spydragon could do

  that…

  The Vampire Spydragon was indeed dumping its

  tail.

  A few dragons have this ability, but they only use

  it in very extreme circumstances, for most creatures are

  very fond of their tails and will hang on to them except

  in the most dire emergency.

  The Vampire Spydragon’s long curly tail detached

  itself from the rear end of the Vampire Spydragon, and

  fell into the sand.

  The Vampire Spydragon gave an evil smile. It was

  no longer attached to his tail, so it was also no longer

  attached to the rock.

  It was free.

  Free to get the horrible little tooth-burglar in its

  jaws and…

  It bounded forward like a great black tiger,

  muscles gleaming, screaming with mad fury, head down

  low, ready to pounce.

  Oh no…

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  Oh no, wept Hiccup, hearing the soft,

  bounding footsteps behind him, coming

  nearer, ever nearer. Hiccup staggered on to his

  one good foot and hopped down the beach as

  fast as he could, but let me tell you, it is quite hard

  to travel very quickly down a wet soggy beach when

  you can only hop on one leg.

  Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no…

  ‘Hogfly, help!’ screamed the

  hopping Hiccup.

  The Hogfly was already at the Vampire Spydragon’s

  shoulder, buzzing with concern. ‘Excuse me, Mr Scary

  Bat-Dragon, but I think you might have dropped

  something?’ squeaked the Hogfly, helpfully pointing his

  trotter back to the abandoned tail.

  The Vampire Spydragon ignored the polite

  question of the Hogfly, and sprang after the hopping

  Hiccup, in great tigerish leaps, dripping jaws wide

  open…

  The Hogfly flapped after him, shouting,

  ‘You’ve forgotten your tail, Mr Bat-Dragon! You’ve

  forgotten your tail!’ as loud as he could, in case the

  poor Bat-Dragon was deaf as well as forgetful. The

  obsessed Sand-Sharks were still sending a volley of

  darts in the Hogfly’s direction, all of which sprang back

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  off his bafflingly invulnerable round-ness like stones

  thrown at a roof.

  BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!

  BONG-ZING!

  The Vampire Spy
dragon stopped dead, mid-leap

  with a startled exclamation of rage as one of the darts

  rebounded off the helpful Hogfly BONG-ZING! and

  stuck into the Spydragon’s back leg. ‘Yowwwww!’

  yelled the Spydragon. The Hogfly caught up with the

  Spydragon, panting.

  ‘That’s right, sir, it’s just over there!’ squeaked

  the Hogfly, pointing back with all four trotters at the

  sad sight of the dropped tail.

  But the Vampire Spydragon didn’t appear to be

  listening.

  BONG-ZING! BONG-ZING! Two more darts

  bounced off the Hogfly and stuck quivering into the

  bottom of the Spydragon, a bottom that was still

  feeling rather sensitive after the whole tail-pulling and

  tail-dumping incident.

  ‘YARRROOOOOOOOOOO!’ squealed the

  Vampire Spydragon, jumping right into the air with all

  four legs outstretched. It stared down in disbelief at

  the darts. It could already feel its leg and its bottom

  going numb.

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  It forgot about Hiccup.

  Its red eyes glowed.

  It stretched open its mighty

  jaws, bared those dripping fangs,

  and with a mighty scream it

  turned and charged at the

  Sand-Sharks.

  With screams of alarm,

  the attacking Sand-Sharks

  hurriedly retreated, flying

  up and into the air, firing

  darts over their shoulders

  at the Vampire Spydragon

  as they went. Ten, twenty

  darts sank into the Vampire

  Spydragon but still it

  charged, catching up with

  and ruthlessly eliminating

  any Sand-Shark it could

  reach.

  It wasn’t until there

  were thirty darts buried in

  its skin that the Spydragon

  finally stopped, shivered a

  couple of times, and keeled

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  over in the sand,

  heavily asleep.

  The Sand-Sharks

  disappeared into the sky, shrieking furiously.

  All that remained on the beach were the sleeping

  Vampire Spydragon, the still bodies of about seven or

  eight Sand-Sharks, the buzzing little Hogfly wondering

  where everyone had gone, and Hiccup Horrendous

  Haddock the Third, covered with sand and wearing a

  very silly bit of seaweed on his head for a hat.

  ‘Oh my goodness,’ said Hiccup. ‘I don’t believe

  this… have we won?’

  It appeared that they had.

  ‘We’ve won!’ said Hiccup, punching the air in

  triumph. ‘We’ve won, Hogfly, we’ve won!’

  ‘Have we?’ said the Hogfly, uncertainly, and

  slowly, slowly deflating, and landing on Hiccup’s

  shoulder.

  ‘I’m quite surprised,’ admitted the Hogfly,

  ‘because the others seemed to be doing quite well…’

  ‘I’m quite surprised too,’ said Hiccup, making a

  fuss of the Hogfly by tickling him on the tummy. ‘All

  your brilliant “it” playing was ever so helpful.’

  Hiccup was impressed

  with himself.

  He had defeated all of those Sand-Sharks! And a

  Vampire Spydragon! All on his own with only a Hogfly

  to help him!

  Maybe he really was the Hero that this

  Wodensfang said he was.

  Maybe, wounded and unarmed and helpless as he

  was, he could do this.

  But then his momentary joy evaporated as fast as

  the deflation of a helpful Hogfly.

  For behind the departing shapes of the

  Sand-Sharks, now as small as seagulls as they flew away

  through the fog and the smoke, the mist had thinned.

  Hiccup could see right through to Murderous

  Island for the first time, and what he saw made his

  stomach flip over queasily, like it was doing somersaults

  on the deck of a ship at sea.

  Suddenly Hiccup understood what the

  Wodensfang had been trying to tell him. These

  Sand-Sharks, this Vampire Spydragon, they were just

  minor problems.

  The REAL PROBLEM lay ahead.

  Murderous Island had mountains that pointed

  straight up to the sky like witch’s fingers, and that

  island was teeming with dragons.

  Hiccup had never seen so many dragons.

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  There were thousands and thousands and

  thousands of them, smothering the island in such thick

  dense numbers that you could barely see the rock

  beneath.

  Dawn was breaking, so the dragons were

  beginning to wake up, rising above the mountains in

  great choking clouds, wheeling, and screeching and

  fighting and hovering, like a swarm of angry locusts.

  With the same ease with which he could speak

  Dragonese despite not knowing who he was, Hiccup

  found that he could identify the different species

  of dragon from their wing shapes, and their cries,

  and their ominous outlines, and they were the most

  terrifying species in the Archipelago.

  They were like a vision from a nightmare.

  Fire Starters, Breathquenchers and Poison

  Darters. Brain Pickers, Tongue-twisters and

  Flamehuffers with their long tongues lolling

  out, Rhinobacks, Razorwings, Riproarers and

  Raptortongues, Sabre-Tooth Driver Dragons and

  Polar-serpents and Driller-Dragons and Dreaders and

  Darkbreathers and…

  There was such a bewildering number of

  dangerous and violent species, that it was almost

  impossible to take in.

  Oh for Thor’s sake, weren’t those Snubbed Nose

  Hellsteethers? And Savagers… and… Triple-Headed

  Rage-blasts… and the long, terrifying necks of Thor’s

  Thunderers, shooting lightning from their nostrils…

  And… Oh, by the Great Curly Whiskers and

  Hairy Armpits of the Mighty God Thor!

  Wasn’t that the gigantic form of a

  Woden’s Nightmare, surfacing

  in the waters in front

  of the island? Woden’s Nightmares were many-eyed

  giants that lived in the dark and wild depths of the

  Open Ocean and they never came this far into the

  inland seas. Their eyes shot lasers and they were, as far

  as Hiccup knew, invincible…

  All around the great grim shape of the Woden’s

  Nightmare in the water, were the dreaded sight of the

  serrated fins of Sharkworms…

  Hiccup could see the faint outlines of other

  islands in the Archipelago way in the distance, all of

  them in flames, smoking like they were volcanoes, and

  over every island there hung a cloud of more

  dragons, more and more and more

  of them, stretching on

  forever…

  Oh for Thor’s sake.

  Every single word the Wodensfang had said was

  true. This was the Dragon Rebellion. This was the last

  day of Doomsday.

  Hiccup may have just won a victory over a few

  Sand-Sharks and a Vampire Spydragon.

  But the Sand-Sharks were flying back to the

  Murderous Mountains, back to the Dragon Furious,

  back to the Dragon Rebellion,
and they would tell this

  Dragon Furious where Hiccup was.

  And the Dragon Furious wouldn’t send

  Sand-Sharks to get Hiccup this time, or even a Vampire

  Spydragon.

  No, he would send

  Tongue-twisters, Gorebreathers, Brainpickers – all

  the most fearsome dragons in his dragon army, and

  they would fly across the little strait of the sea to hunt

  for Hiccup, and on an island this small there would be

  nowhere to hide, nowhere to run to, and no way for a

  Hiccup, a Hogfly and an unconscious Wodensfang to

  fight back.

  What had the Wodensfang said he had to do?

  Hiccup tried to think back to the Wodensfang’s

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  story. It had been a little difficult to take in, there had

  been so much going on at the time…

  Hiccup had to get to an island called Tomorrow.

  He had to be crowned King instead of somebody

  called Alvin.

  And then he had to persuade this Dragon Furious

  to call off the Dragon Rebellion.

  In one day.

  And he didn’t have a BOAT, or any

  LOST THINGS, or any WEAPONS.

  The Wodensfang was right.

  This was a problem.

  4. THE LARGER PROBLEM

  Meanwhile, lying half-submerged in the waters of

  Wrecker’s Bay, just to the north of the Island of

  Tomorrow, there was the most gigantic dragon.

  The Dragon was very, very still, as if

  War had turned him into a mountainside, a

  volcano perhaps, for great yellow clouds

  of sulphurous steam rose from his

  battle-scarred body, gouged and scraped

  with many wounds and burn-marks.

  A great smoking mountain, he was. Nothing on him

  moved, not a whisker, not a muscle, not a ripple on his

  skin, not even a beating heart, to show he was alive and

  not made out of rock, just that steady smoking.

  But what was that, up at the top of the

  Dragon-mountain? A crack splitting in the rock… The

  Dragon was opening his eyelids, just a tiny, tiny sliver,

  and you could see the buried fire in the eyes that lay

  beneath, seething and raging like lava in a hole.

  War had changed this Dragon, and not for the

  better.