Текст книги "How to Train Your Dragon"

Автор книги: Cressida Cowell

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he could get his breath back, he exploded all over the place, as the boys stood, shivering violently, in a bedraggled line.

"NEVER ... in FOURTEEN YEARS .,.

have I come across such a load of HOPELESS

BARNACLES as you lot. WHICH OF YOU USELESS MOLLUSKS WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR WAKING UP THE DRAGONS????"

"I was," said Hiccup. Which wasn't strictly true.

"Oh, that's BRILLIANT," bellowed Gobber, "just BRILLIANT. Our Future Leader shows off his magnificent Leadership Skills. At the tender age of ten and a half he does his best to annihilate himself and the rest of you in A SIMPLE MILITARY EXERCISE!"

Snotlout sniggered.

"You find something amusing about that, Snotlout?" asked Gobber, with dangerous softness. "EVERYBODY IS ON LIMPET RATIONS FOR THE NEXT THREE WEEKS."

The boys groaned.

"Smart work, Hiccup," sneered Snotlout. "I can't wait to see you in action on the battlefield."

"SILENCE!" yelled Gobber. "THIS IS YOUR

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INITIATION, NOT A DAY OUT IN THE COUNTRY! SILENCE, OR YOU'LL BE LUNCHING ONLUGWORMS FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIVES!"

"Now," continued Gobber, more calmly, "although that was an absolute mess, it wasn't a total disaster. I PRESUME that you do all HAVE a dragon after that fiasco . . . ?"

"Yes," chorused the boys.

Fishlegs took a sideways glance at Hiccup, who was staring straight ahead.

"Lucky for you," said Gobber, ominously. "So you have all passed the first part of the Dragon Test. There are, however, still two parts that you have to complete before you can become full members of the Tribe. Your next task will be to train this dragon yourself. This will be a test of the force of your personality. You will assert your will over this wild creature and show it who is Master. Your dragon will be expected to obey simple commands such as "go" and "stay," and hunt fish for you in the way that dragons have hunted for the Sons of Thor since anybody can remember. If you are worried about the training process, you should study a book called How to Train Your Dragonby

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Professor Yobbish, which you will find in the fireplace of the Great Hall."

Suddenly Gobber looked very pleased with himself. "I stole that book from the Meathead Public Library myself," he said modestly, regarding his very black fingernails. "From right under the nose of the Hairy Scary Librarian . . . He never noticed a thing . . . Now THAT'S burglary for you. . . ."

Wartihog put up his hand. "What happens if we can't read, sir?"

"No boasting, Wartihog!" boomed Gobber. "Get some idiot to read it for you. Youtdragons will begin to go back to sleep, because this is still their hibernation time" – some of the dragons had, indeed, gone very quiet inside the baskets – "so take them home and put them in a warm place. They should wake up in the next couple of weeks.you will then have only FOUR MONTHS to prepare for Initiation Day at the Thor's-day Thursday Celebrations, and the final part of your Test. If, on that day, you can prove that you have trained your dragon to the satisfaction of myself and other elders of the Tribe, you can finally call yourself a Hooligan of Berk."

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The boys stood very tall and tried to look like proper Hooligans.

"HEROES OR EXILE!" yelled Gobber the Belch.

"HEROES OR EXILE!" yelled eight boys fanatically back at him.

Exile,thought Hiccup and Fishlegs sadly.

"I. . . hate . . . being . . . a . . . Viking," panted Fishlegs to Hiccup as they stumbled back through the bracken to the Hooligan village.

You didn't really walkon the island of Berk, you waded– through heather or bracken or mud or snow, which clung on to your legs and made them difficult to lift. It was the sort of country where the sea and the land were always falling into one another and getting mixed up. The island was shot through with holes burrowed by the water, a maze of criss-crossing underground streams. You could put your foot on a solid-looking piece of grass and find yourself disappearing up to your thigh in black, sticky mud. You could be making your way through the ferns and suddenly find yourself fording a river, waist-high and icy cold.

The boys were already soaked to the skin with

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seawater, and now the snow had turned to horizontal driving rain, blowing in their faces with the strength of one of the gale-force winds that were always shrieking across the salty wastelands of Berk.

"A narrow escape from horrible death first thing on Thursday morning," complained Fishlegs, "followed by complete rejection by the junior half of the Tribe . . . Nobody's going to talk to me for YEARS after this – except for you, of course, Hiccup, but then you're just a weirdo like me – "

"Thank you," said Hiccup.

"And on top of everything," continued Fishlegs bitterly, "a two-mile run carrying a deranged dragon on my back" – the basket on Fishlegs' back was plunging wildly from side to side as the dragon inside tried

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manically to get out – "and only a dinner of horrible limpets to look forward to at the end of it."

Hiccup agreed that it wasn't a delicious prospect.

"You can have this dragon back if you like, Hiccup. I warn you, they're filthy heavy when they're wet and angry," said Fishlegs, miserably. "Gobber is going to go off like a typhoon when he finds out you haven't got a dragon."

"But I HAVE got one," said Hiccup.

Fishlegs stopped and began to take the basket off his back. "I know it IS yours REALLY," he sighed wearily. "I think I'll just go straight past the village and keep on running till I reach somewhere civilized. Rome perhaps. I've always wanted to go to Rome. And I haven't got a hope in Valhalla of passing Initiation anyway, so –"

"No, I've got anotherone, in my basket," Hiccup insisted.

Fishlegs' jaw dropped open in disbelief.

"I got it when I went back into the tunnel," explained Hiccup.

"Well, blister my barnacles," said Fishlegs. "How in Thor's name did you know it was there? It was so dark you couldn't see the horns in front of you."

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"It was weird," said Hiccup. "I sort of sensed it when we were running down the tunnel. I couldn't see anything, but as we were passing, I just knewthere was a dragon there, and that it was meant to be MY dragon. I was going to ignore it, actually, because we were in a bit of a hurry, but then you said about not having a dragon and I went back, and ... there it was, lying on this shelf in the tunnel, just as I'd imagined it would be."

"Well, jigger my jellyfish," said Fishlegs, and the boys started running again.

Hiccup was bruised all over, shaking from shock, and he had a nasty dragon wound in his calf, which was stinging like crazy from the saltwater. He was freezing cold and there was an irritating bit of seaweed in one of his sandals.

He was also a bit worried because he knew he should not have risked his life trying to get a dragon for Fishlegs. This was not the act of a Viking Hero. A Viking Hero would know not to intervene between Fishlegs and his Fate.

On the other hand, Hiccup had been worrying about Dragon-catching Day for longer than he could remember. He had been sure he would be the only one

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to come back without a dragon, and shame, embarrassment, and awful exile would follow.

And now, here he was: a Viking warrior WITH a dragon.

So, on the whole, he was feeling fairly pleased with himself.

Things were looking up.

... ..You know, Hiccup," said Fishlegs a little later, as the wooden fortifications of the village appeared on the horizon, "that sounds like Fate, you sensing the dragon was there like that. This could be Meant to Be. You could have some sort of wonder-dragon in there. Something that makes a Monstrous Nightmare look like a flying frog!You are the son and heir of Chief Stoick after all, and it's about time Fate came in with a sign about your destiny."

The boys stopped, puffing with exhaustion.

"Oh, I'm sure it's just a Common or Garden that wandered away from the rest," said Hiccup, trying to sound careless but unable to keep the excitement out of his voice. He could have something marvelous in there!

Maybe Old Wrinkly was right. Old Wrinkly was Hiccup's grandfather on his mother's side. He had

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taken up soothsaying in his old age and he kept on telling Hiccup how he had looked into the future and that Hiccup was destined for great things.

This amazing dragon could be the beginning of his transformation from ordinary old Hiccup, who wasn't particularly good at anything, into a Hero of the Future!

Hiccup took the basket off his back and paused before opening it.

"It's very still, isn't it?" said Fishlegs, suddenly less certain of the Fate theory. "I mean, it isn't moving at all in there. Are you sure it's alive?"

"It's just very deeply asleep," said Hiccup. "It was stone cold when I picked it up."

Suddenly he had a strong feeling that the gods were on his side. He KNEW that this dragon was alive.

With trembling fingers, Hiccup undid the latch, took off the lid of the basket, and peered in. Fishlegs joined him.

Things weren't looking so good anymore.

There, curled up fast asleep in the bottom of the basket in a tangled dragon knot, lay perhaps the most common Common or Garden Dragon Hiccup had ever seen.

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[Image: A small dragon]]

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Absolutely the onlyextraordinary thing about this dragon was how extraordinarily SMALL it was. In this it was trulyextraordinary.

Most dragons that the Vikings used for hunting purposes were about the size of a Labrador retriever. The adolescent dragons the boys were collecting weren't quite that big, but they werenearly fully grown. This dragon was more comparable to a West Highland Terrier.

Hiccup couldn't think how he had overlooked this when he picked the dragon up in the tunnel. He supposed, miserably, that it was rather a pressured moment, what with three thousand dragons trying to kill him at the time. And dragons in a deep Sleep Coma do tend to weigh more than they do when they're awake.

"Well," said Hiccup at last, "that's a sign, if you like. Youreach for a Deadly Nadder and what do you get? A Basic Brown. I grab a dragon in the dark and what do I get? A Common or Garden. The thing is, the gods are telling us we're Common or Garden folk, Fishlegs. You and I, we're not meantto be Heroes."

"It doesn't matter about ME . . . ," said Fishlegs,

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"but you aremeant to be a Hero. Remember? Son of the Chief and all that? And you willbe one, I know you will. . . ."

Fishlegs put the basket back on Hiccup's back and they trudged toward the village gates together.

"... At least, I sincerely HOPE you will. I don't want to be following Snotlout into battle. You've got more ideas about military tactics in your little finger than Snotlout has in his whole fat head. ..."

While that may have been true, not only was Hiccup notabout to be the future star of Dragon training – but with this particular dragon it was even going to be difficult for him to take his familiar place fading into the background.

It was so small it was going to make him look ridiculous.

It was so small that Snotlout was going to have some very unpleasant things to say about it.

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Chapter 4 HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON

"HA HA HA HA!"

Snotlout was laughing so hard that he hadn't managed to say anything at all.

The boys were hanging about the village gates, taking the opportunity to show off the dragons that they had caught. Hiccup had tried to walk through without being noticed, but Snotlout had stopped him.

"Let's see what pathetic creature Hiccup has got," said Snotlout, and took off the lid.

"Oh, this is BRILLIANT – look at it!" said Snotlout, when he finally got his breath back from laughing. "What IS it, Hiccup? A brown bunny rabbit with wings? A flower fairy? A fluffy flying frog? Gather round everybody and see the magnif icent animal that Our Future Leader has caught himself!"

"Oh, Hiccup, you are useless,"crowed Speedifist. "You're the son of a CHIEF,forThor'ssake. Why didn't you get one of those If

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new Monstrous Nightmares with the six-foot wing-span and the extra-extendable claws? They're really meankillers, they are.""I have one," grinned Snotlout, Igesturing to the terrifying-looking, flame-red animal fast asleep in his basket. "I think I shall call her FIREWORM. What are you going to call yours, Hiccup? Sweetums? Sugarlips? Babyface?" Hiccup's dragon took this particular moment to give a huge yawn, opening his tiny mouth wide to reveal a flickering, forked tongue, very pink gums, and ABSOLUTELY NO TEETH AT ALL.

Snotlout laughed so hard, Speedifist had to hold him upright.

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"TOOTHLESS!" cried Snotlout. "Hiccup has found himself the only TOOTHLESS dragon in the uncivilized world! This is too good. Hiccup the

USELESS and his dragon, TOOTHLESS!"

Fishlegs leaped to Hiccup's defense.

"Well, youare not allowed that Monstrous Nightmare that you've got there, Snotface Snotlout. Only the son of a Chief is allowed a Monstrous Nightmare. That Fireworm dragon is Hiccup's, by right."

Snotlout's eyes narrowed. He grabbed Fishlegs's arm and twisted it viciously behind his back.

"Nobody's listening to you, you plankton-hearted, fish-legged, disaster area," sneered Snotlout. "Thanks to you and your sniveling, sneezing disability, that whole military operation was nearly a total disaster. When I'm Chief of this Tribe the first thing I'm going to do is boot anybody with a pathetic allergy like yours straight out into exile. You're not fit to be a Hooligan!"

Fishlegs went very white in the face, but he still managed to gasp out, "But you are NOT going to be Chief of this Tribe. HICCUP is going to be Chief of this Tribe."

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Snotlout dropped Fishlegs's arm and advanced menacingly on Hiccup.

"Oh, he is, is he?" jeered Snotlout. "So, I'm not allowed that Monstrous Nightmare, am I? Our Future Leader is keeping very quiet about it, isn't he? Come on, Hiccup, I'm stealing your inheritance. What are you going to do about it, then, eh?"

The boys all looked solemn. Snotlout really had broken an ancient Viking rule.

"Hiccup should challenge you for the dragon," said Fishlegs slowly, and everybody swiveled around to look expectantly at Hiccup.

"Oh, brilliant," muttered Hiccup under his breath. "Thank you, Fishlegs. My day just gets better and better."

Snotlout was a great brute of a boy who didn't really need Dogsbreath's help when it came to bashing people up. He wore specially constructed, bronze-tipped sandals in order to cause maximum damage when kicking people. Hiccup tried to stay out of his way as much as he possibly could.

But he couldn't ignore this insult to his status, now that Fishlegs had helpfully pointed it out, without looking like a coward in front of the other boys. And

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if you became known as a coward in the Hooligan Tribe, you might as well go the whole hog and wear a pale pink jerkin, take up playing the harp, and change your name to Ermintrude.

"I challenge you, Snotface Snotlout, for the dragon, Fireworm, who is mine by right," said Hiccup, trying to hide his reluctance by speaking as loudly and formally as he could.

"I accept your challenge," said Snotlout super-fast, grinning all over his horrid, smug face. "Axes or fists?"

"Fists," said Hiccup. Because axes were a REALLY bad idea.

"I shall look forward to showing you how a real Future Hero fights," said Snotlout, and then he

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remembered something, "AFTER the Initiation thing on Thor'sday Thursday, though. I don't want to stub my toe or anything while I'm kicking you all around the village."

"Hiccup might win," Fishlegs pointed out.

"OF COURSE he won't win," boasted Snotlout. "Look at my sporting ability, my Viking courage, my capacity for mindless violence. I shall win just as surely as I shall be Chief of this Tribe one day. I mean, look at my dragon and then look at HIS dragon." He pointed mockingly at Toothless. "The gods have spoken. It's only a matter of time.

"In the meantime," Snotlout carried on, "I shall live in fear of being gummed to death by Hiccup's terrifying, toothless terrapin."

And Snotlout sauntered off in a lordly fashion, giving Hiccup a nasty kick on the shins as he did so.

..."Sorry about the challenge," Fishlegs apologized, after they had left the baskets with the dragons in them under their beds at their homes.

"Oh, don't worry about it," said Hiccup. "Somebody would have gotten me to do it anyway.You know how they all love a fight."

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Fishlegs and Hiccup were going to the Great Hall to look for the book Gobber had recommended: How to Train Your Dragon,by Professor Yobbish.

"As it happens," confided Hiccup, "I know a bit about dragons already, but I haven't the foggiest clue how to start training one. I would have said they were virtually untrainable. I'm really looking forward to getting some tips."

The Great Hall was a hullabaloo of young barbarians fighting, yelling, and playing the popular Viking game of Bashyball, which was a very violent contact sport with lots of contact and very few rules.

Hiccup and Fishlegs found the book tucked away in the fireplace, practically in the fire.

Hiccup had never noticed it before.

He opened the book.

(I have included a basic replica of How to Train Your Dragon,by Professor Yobbish, here – in order that you can share the experience with Hiccup of opening that book for the first time, full of hope and interest and expectation. You will have to imagine that the cover is unusually thick, with huge golden clasps, and that some scribe has covered it in elaborately fancy gilt lettering. It looks very inviting indeed.)

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HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON

-BY-PROFESSOR YOBBISH

BA, MA Hons, Cantab. Etc.

BIG AXE BOOKS 10th Anniversary Edition

WINNER OF THE BEST BOOK FOR BARBARIANS GOLD AWARD

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This book is dedicated to mommy, with love from your dearest you.

Copyright © Professor Yobbish, Dark Ages.

The publishers, Big Axe Books Ltd, would like to point out that they take no responsibility whatsoever for any injuries that may occuras a result ofany person or persons following the advice given this book. Thank you for your attention.

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MEATHEAD PUBLIC LIBRARY

A note from the Hairy Scary

Librarian: Please return this book or before the last date stamped or I will be VERY ANNOYED. I think you know what I mean.

DO NOT REMOVE THIS BOOK OR WE WILL BASH YOU!!!

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Professor Yobbish (BA, MA Hons, Cantab. etc.) has spent many years in the wild observing dragons in their natural habitat. This book is the culmination of his research and it is the definitive textbook on the subject of these fascinating creatures.

Professor Yobbish lives alone in a cave on the Isle of Doom. He is the author of Looking After Your Killer Whaleand Sharks and Other Great Pets.He is currently writing a book about butterflies.

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CHAPTER THE FIRST (AND LAST)

The Golden Rule of Dragon– Training is to...

YELL AT IT!

(The louder the better.)

THE END

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How would YOU train a dragon?

Look inside for ALL the answers in Professor Yobbish's hugely entertaining, and informative book. Follow his simple advice and you will soon be on your way to becoming the Hero you've always wanted to be...

Praise for How To Train Your Dragon:

"This book changed my life." Squidface the Terrible

"A brilliant book." The MeatheadMonthly

"Nobody yells better than Professor Yobbish. This is a sensitive and well-researched book that contains all the information you need to turn your dragon into a pussy cat." The Hooligan observer

"Yobbish is a genius."The Viking Times

PRICE: 1 SMAUISH CHICKEN 20 OYSTERS

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"THAT'S IT??!" said Hiccup furiously, turning the book upside down and shaking it, trying to see whether there was anything other than that single page of paper inside it.

Hiccup put the book down. His face was unusually grim.

"Okay, Fishlegs," he said, "unless you're any better at yelling than I am, we're on our own. We're going to have to work out our ownmethod of dragon training."

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Stoick the VAST

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Chapter 5 A CHAT WITH OLD WRINKLY

The next morning, Hiccup checked the dragon under his bed. It was still asleep.

When his mother, Valhallarama, asked him at breakfast, "How did Initiation go yesterday, dear?" Hiccup said, "Oh, it was fine. I caught my dragon." "That's nice, dear," Valhallarama replied vaguely.

Stoick the Vast looked up briefly from his bowl and boomed, "EXCELLENT, EXCELLENT," before getting back to the important task of shoveling food into his mouth.

After breakfast, Hiccup went to sit on the front step beside his grandfather, who was smoking a pipe. It was a beautiful, cold, clear winter's morning, with not a breath of wind and the sea all around as flat as glass.

Old Wrinkly blew out smoke rings content-I edly as he watched the sun coming up. Hiccup shivered and chucked stones into the bracken. Neither of them spoke for a long time.

At last Hiccup said, "I got that dragon."

"I said you would, didn't I?" replied Old Wrinkly,

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very pleased with himself. Old Wrinkly had taken up soothsaying in his old age, mostly unsuccessfully. Looking into the future is a complicated business. So he was particularly pleased that he'd gotten this right.

"Something extraordinary, you said," complained Hiccup. "A truly unusualdragon, you said. An animal that would really make me stand out in the crowd."

"Absolutely," agreed Old Wrinkly. "The entrails were undeniable."

"The onlyextraordinary thing about this dragon," continued Hiccup, "is how extraordinarilySMALL it is. In that it issuper-unusual. I'm even more of a laughingstock than ever."

"Oh, dear," said Old Wrinkly, chuckling in a wheezy way over his pipe.

Hiccup looked at him reproachfully. Old Wrinkly hurriedly turned the laugh into a cough.

"Size is all relative, Hiccup," said Old Wrinkly. "ALL of these dragons are super-small compared to a real Sea Dragon. A REAL Sea Dragon is fifty timesas big as that little creature. A real Sea Dragon from the bottom of the ocean can swallow ten large Viking ships in one gulp and not even notice.

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A real Sea Dragon is a cruel, careless mystery like the mighty ocean itself, one moment calm as a scallop, the next raging like an octopus."

"Well, here on Berk," said Hiccup, "where we haven't any Sea Dragons to compare anything with, my dragon is just considerably smaller than everybody else's. You are getting off the point."

"Am I?" asked Old Wrinkly.

"The point is, I just don't see how I am ever going to become a Hero," said Hiccup gloomily. "I am the least Heroic boy in the whole Hooligan Tribe."

"Oh.pshaw,this ridiculous Tribe," fumed Old Wrinkly. "Okay, so you are not what we call a born Hero. You're not big and tough and charismatic like Snotlout. But you're just going to have to work at it. You're going to have to learn how to be a Hero the Hard Way.

"Anyway," said Old Wrinkly, "it might be just what this Tribe needs, a change in leadership style. Because the thing is, times are changing. We can't get away with being bigger and more violent than everybody else any more. IMAGINATION. That's what they need and what you've got. A Hero of the Future is going to have to be clever and cunning, not just a big

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lump with overdeveloped muscles. He's going to have to stop everyone quarreling among themselves and get them to face the enemy together."

"How am I going to persuade anybody to do anything?" asked Hiccup. "They've started calling me HICCUP THE USELESS. That is not a great name for a Military Leader."

"You have to see the bigger picture, Hiccup," continued Old Wrinkly, ignoring him. "You're called a few names. You're not a natural at Bashyball. Who cares? These are very little problems in the grand scheme of things."

"It's all very well for you to say they are little problems," said Hiccup crossly, "but I have a LOT of little problems. I have to train this super-small dragon in time for Thor'sday Thursday or be thrown out of the Hairy Hooligan Tribe forever."

"Ah, yes," said Old Wrinkly, thoughtfully. "There's a book on this subject, isn't there? Remind me, how does the great Professor of Meathead University think you should train a dragon?"

"He thinks you should yell at it," said Hiccup, gloomily chucking stones again. "Show the beast who is Master by the sheer charismatic force of your

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personality that sort of thing. I have about as much charisma as a stranded jellyfish and yelling is just another thing I am useless at."

"Ye-e-es," said Old Wrinkly, "but maybe you'll have to train your dragon the Hard Way. You know a very great deal about dragons, don't you, Hiccup? All that dragon-watching you've been doing over the years?"

"That's a secret," said Hiccup, uncomfortably.

"I've seen you talking to them," said Old Wrinkly.

"That's NOT TRUE," protested Hiccup, going bright red in the face.

"Okay, then," soothed Old Wrinkly, calmly smoking his pipe, "it's not true."

There was silence for a bit.

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"It istrue," admitted Hiccup, "but for Thor's sake don't tell anybody, they wouldn't understand."

"Talking to dragons is a highly unusual skill," said Old Wrinkly. "Maybe," he said, "you can train a dragon better by talking to it than by yelling at it."

"That's sweet," said Hiccup, "and a very touching thought. However, a dragon is not a fluffy creature like a dog or a cat or a pony. A dragon is not going to do what you say just because you ask it pretty please. From what I know about dragons," said Hiccup, "I should say that yelling was a pretty good method."

"But it has its limitations, doesn't it?" Old Wrinkly pointed out. "I would say that yelling was highly effective on any dragon smaller than a sea lion. And positively suicidal if you try it on anything larger. Why don't you come up with some alternative training schemes yourself? You might be able to add something to Professor Yobbish's book. I've often thought that that book needs a little something extra ... I can't quite put my finger on it. . ."

"WORDS," said Hiccup. "That book needs a lot more words."

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Chapter6 MEANWHILE, DEEP IN THE OCEAN...

Meanwhile, deep in the ocean, but not so very far from the Isle of Berk, a real Sea Dragon such as Old Wrinkly had been describing lay sleeping on the sea-bed. He was indescribably large. He had been there so long that he almost seemed to be part of the ocean floor itself, a great underwater mountain, covered in shells and barnacles, some of his limbs half-buried in the sand.

Generation after generation of little hermit crabs had been born and had died in this Dragon's ears. Hundreds and hundreds of years he'd slept, because he'd had rather a large meal. He'd had the luck to catch a Roman Legion camping on a clifftop – they were completely cut off and he had spent an enjoyable afternoon wolfing down the whole lot of them, from commanding officer to lowliest private. Horses, chariots, shields, and spears, the entire lot went down the ravenous, reptilian gullet. And, while things such as golden chariot wheels are an additional source of fiber to a Dragon's diet, they do take some time to digest.

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The Dragon had crawled down into the depths of the ocean and gone into a Sleep Coma. Dragons can stay in this suspended state for eternity, half-dead, half-alive, buried under fathom after fathom of icy-cold seawater. Not a muscle of this particular Dragon had moved for six or seven centuries.

But the previous week, a Killer Whale who had chased some seals unexpectedly deep was surprised to notice a slight movement in the upper eyelid of the dragon's right eye. An ancestral memory stirred in the whale's brain and he swam away from there as fast as his fins could carry him. And, a week later, the sea around the Dragon Mountain – which had previously been teeming with crabs and lobsters and shoals and shoals of fish – was a great, underwater desert. Not a mollusk stirred, not a scallop shimmied.

The only sign of life for miles and miles was the rapid jerking of both the Dragon's eyelids, fluttering up and down as if the Dragon had suddenly gone into a lighter sleep and was dreaming who knows what dark dreams.

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Chapter 7 TOOTHLESS WAKES UP

Toothless woke up about three weeks later. Fishlegs and Hiccup were at Hiccup's house. Everybody else was out, so Hiccup decided to take the opportunity to check on Toothless's basket. He pulled it out from under the bed. A thin plume of bluish gray smoke was drifting out from under the lid.

Fishlegs whistled. "He's awake all right," said Fishlegs. "Here we go."

Hiccup opened the basket.

The smoke billowed out and made Hiccup and Fishlegs cough. Hiccup fanned it away. Once his eyes had stopped watering he could make out a very small, ordinary dragon looking up at him with enormous, innocent, grass-green eyes.

"Hello, Toothless1," said Hiccup, in what he hoped was a good accent in Dragonese.

"What are you doing?" asked Fishlegs curiously. Dragonese is punctuated by shrill shrieks and popping

[Footnote: 'This should, of course, read "Howiieeliooiieetiere, Toothless," but I have translated it into English for the benefit of those readers whose Dragonese is a bit rusty. Please read Hiccup's book, Learning to Speak Dragonese,for a crash course in this fascinating language.]

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[ Learning to speak Dragonese

Introduction

In ORDER train your dragon without using the traditional methods of yelling at it, you must first learn to speak dragonese . Dragons are the only other creatures who speak a languages as complicated and sophisticated as humans

Here are some common dragon phrases to get you started

Nee-an crappa inna di hoosus pishyou

No pooing inside the house please

Mi Mana no likeit yum yum on di bum

My mother does not like to be

Bitten on the bottom

Fishyou keendle gobha oot mi freeundlee?

Please would you be so kind as to spit my friend out?

Doit a wummortime

Let's try that again]

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noises and sounds MOST extraordinary when spoken by a human.

"Just talking to it," mumbled Hiccup, very embarrassed.

"Just talkingto it???" gasped Fishlegs, in astonishment. "What do you mean,you're talking to it? Ifou can't talk to it, it's an ANIMAL, for Trior's sake!"

"Oh shut up, Fishlegs," said Hiccup, impatiently, "you're frightening it."

Toothless huffed and puffed and blew out some smoke rings. He inflated his neck to make himself look bigger, which is something dragons do when they are scared or angry.

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