The Purple Beast Incident - 2

- X - X - X - X - X -

"What did the Chief mean, no women at the front?" asked Guff as he waded at Phlegma's elbow.

"It's just a rule he's had, ever since Valhallarama died," Phlegma answered.

"His wife?"

"Yes—" Phlegma hauled herself up onto one end of a long slip of black rock, "She was one of his commanders.  Excellent sword-arm..." she mused, helping Guff up after her.  "But... well, after she died, Stoick only wanted men leading his warriors into battle.  He didn't want..."  Phlegma paused.  "He didn't want..."

Guff remained patiently quiet behind her as they walked over the slick stone.

Phlegma breathed deeply.  "He just didn't want it to happen again," she finally said.

They walked in silence for a moment more, ducking through a strange natural archway near the rock's crest.

"How did she die?" asked Guff.

Phlegma kept walking.

Valhallarama laughed, warmly and clearly.  Phlegma could see her smiling in relief as she finally sheathed her sword.  The stars were quite beautiful that night, even through all the smoke...

"Do you know?" Guff pressed.

"That story's not mine to tell," said Phlegma.  She quickened her pace slightly; the tip of the Scauldron's fan-like tail was threatening to disappear into the mist.  "You'll have to ask Stoick."

"Ask the Chief?" Guff gave a small, incredulous scoff, "Perhaps I'll just resign myself to not knowing."

"Or you could ask Hiccup," Phlegma added.

When Guff didn't respond, Phlegma looked back.  One glance at his face told her that he was considering all sorts of new scars, and that none of them seemed worth it.  She couldn't really blame him.  Hiccup was, in his own... special way... more dangerous than any dragon.

"Huh, well that doesn't make asking the Chief sound so bad..." Guff muttered.  "But there was something else—what about you?"

Phlegma's eyebrows flicked upward.  "What about me?"

"Well, you're one of the Chief's commanders, aren't you?"

"Ah, right," Phlegma nodded, "Well, Spitelout had actually gone to try and convince Stoick to move me up—he was down two commanders already."

"Two commanders?"

"First Valhallarama, and then Gobber had gone and lost his hand."

"Ah," said Guff.

They paused to climb back into the shallows as the rock finally gave out beneath them.  The water felt warmer still...

"Gobber still tried to fight just the same, though, at the next raid," Phlegma continued, "But his injury slowed him up, and the big oaf lost his foot, too."

Guff grimaced and gave a sympathetic moan.  Everybody made that sound with Gobber's story, no matter how many times they'd heard it.

"Stoick ordered him out of battle then, until he could fully recover.  Oh, he hated it, not being able to do anything..."

- X - X - X - X - X -

"No, no, NO!" Gobber bellowed from his chair.  With the stump of his right leg propped up in front of the fire, there was nothing he could do to halt Phlegma's approach.  "He's your responsibility, not mine—you can't—oy!"  He held up his hand, seeming to forget that he only had one, which was not enough to keep Phlegma from thrusting little Hiccup into his lap.

"Gobber the Purple Beast is out there—they need help.  Please, just two minutes..."

"Stoick entrusted him to you—not me."

"Well you're not doing anything right now, are you?"  Phlegma hefted her spear, "I can help them—"

"Phlegma," Gobber grabbed her arm, "leave the Purple Beast to Stoick—he'll take care of it.  If he can handle... THIS—" Gobber gestured to all of the boy on his lap, "—he can handle that three-headed devil."

"Then it should follow that since the Chief deems me also able to handle THIS—" Phlegma gestured to all of Hiccup, "I can also handle a Purple Beast!"  She turned to the door.  "I killed that Nightmare in the training ring—what's one more Zippleback?  I'll be right back."

"Phlegma!  PHLEGMA!"

- X - X - X - X - X -

"They needed more hands.  I was just trying to fill the gap.  And we did kill the Purple Beast after all," said Phlegma, "Spitelout told Stoick that if I hadn't doused its spark-head when I did... he would have been short another commander.  And several more warriors."

"Oh?" said Guff.

"See, while the spark-head was busy trying to chew me up, the gas-head was spewing out the hugest cloud of dragon-gas Berk has ever seen.  Gnarl told me about it later—said it was like walking through pea-soup before it all settled to the ground...  Anyway," Phlegma went on, "it had seeped into most of the houses by Pepperbeard's bakery—you know where there's sort of that little dell in the ground?"

"I know the spot."

"All the gas had pooled in there like a bog, a stone's cast from end to end, and four feet deep in the middle," said Phlegma, "The volume of it all was just mad.  If that dragon had sparked, that gas-cloud could have blown up half the lower village."

Guff cocked one eyebrow at her.

"...I'm serious!" said Phlegma, "Ah, you weren't there.  Never mind.  But when Stoick saw how much gas I'd kept from lighting up... he conceded to Spitelout that I might actually have some use on a battlefield."

"And he made you one of his commanders?" asked Guff.

"No.  Actually, he was a bit furious that we'd picked that spot to bring the Beast down," said Phlegma, deflating a little.

"Why?"

"Well, there was no wind that night, so all that gas was still pooling there.  It was a hazard—you couldn't bring so much as a candle anywhere near it.  We had no way to get rid of it all... except to blow it up anyway."

- X - X - X - X - X -

The moon shone brightly overhead.

A throng of Vikings, all bearing shields, stood at the north end of the lower village.  Every home on the south side had been evacuated, and all valuables had been removed to a safe distance.

Stoick the Vast held up his arm for attention.  The crowd quieted, watching with wide eyes.  Mothers and fathers covered the ears of their children.

"Let fly!" the Chief shouted, and the four archers beside him released their flaming arrows, which sailed in a perfect arc, right down into the center of the gas-bog.

The ensuing fireball flared up into the sky in one roaring, deafening instant, blooming like a mushroom, shaking the cliffs and rattling the ships in the harbor.  Thick waves of heat rolled over the onlooking Vikings.  Bits of flaming wood rained down to bounce off of raised shields and horned helmets.

And then, as quickly as they had sprung up, the flames exhausted themselves and went out, leaving a ball of smoke the size of a small thundercloud hovering over the village.

It was a spectacular display.  The Vikings cheered.

Stoick didn't waste any time.  "All right, now, everyone get to house-raising!" he bellowed.

The Vikings groaned.

Out of necessity, the residents of Berk were excellent at rebuilding homes.  But it wasn't really anybody's favorite job.

- X - X - X - X - X -

"...and it blew up... half the lower village," Phlegma asserted.

Guff's brow had furrowed and his jaw had dropped slightly.  "I think I remember that!" he declared, "Right.  Father asking if I wanted to see the fireball... and then the Thorstons staying with us for the next two days because their house blew up.  Hah, I remember that..." he chuckled to himself, "Oh that was ages ago..."

And then he started, "Wait... the south end... so that would have included your house, too, then?"

"Eh, it was bound to happen—'You can't go home every day'," Phlegma quoted one of Berk's oldest sayings.  "But once the new houses were raised, we were able to mount some fine trophies over the doors—I got the spark-head, Spitelout got the gas-head, and Gnarl took the extra.  Of course, those eventually burned down in later raids..."

"But if the Chief didn't make you a commander then," Guff started, "then... when?"

"Well, Spitelout couldn't convince him," Phlegma sighed as she and Guff skirted a long line of twisted spires, "So he came to me."

- X - X - X - X - X -

"You were Valhallarama's second," said Spitelout, thumping his flagon back down on the table, "Her warriors are accustomed to taking orders from you anyway."

Phlegma took a long pull from her horn.  "Any orders they might get from me, they can get just as well from you or Ack or Starkard—"

"Maybe they could," Spitelout cut her off, "if we weren't also bogged down with Gobber's men.  The other seconds are tired of this; we're spread too thin as it is.  We need another commander and we can't wait for Gobber to heal up—if he heals up... Thor knows if he'll even walk again!"

"What about Hoark's second?  Why don't you move him up?"

"Sneerspit?" asked Spitelout.

"He's led a fair number of men before."

"Sneerspit couldn't lead himself to water if he fell out of a boat.  Valhallarama's warriors want you."

"I know," Phlegma sighed, rubbing her brow, "but you heard the Chief... no women..."

Spitelout rolled his eyes.  "It's a daft rule and he knows it.  Just talk to him."

"I thought you already tried," said Phlegma, "If he didn't listen to you, why would he listen to me?  I'm just a second.  Barely."

"He'll listen."

"He's still angry with me—" Phlegma pounded the table, "You know we finally found out where Hiccup had gone after he gave Gobber the slip the other night?  This morning the Chief found him playing with dragon-gas—dragon-gas—on his hearth!  The little snipe had brought some of it back in a pail and he was ladling it into the fire... making little fireballs!"

This was news to Spitelout.  Phlegma saw some of the optimism leave his face as he realized how little a stunt like that could have done for Stoick's mood.

"Just... talk to him," Spitelout said again, even so, "He will listen to you.  He always listened to her.  You were her friend."

"Spitelout—"

He laid a serious hand on her arm.  "We need you to take command of her warriors."

- X - X - X - X - X -

"And then he left," said Phlegma, "So I downed another horn of mead... or two or... three... I can't really remember—and went to talk to Stoick.  And I asked him to move me up from second to commander.  And... he agreed."

"What, just like that?" asked Guff, wading two steps behind her, "How did you do it?"

Phlegma thought about it for a moment.

She remembered herself standing across the table from her Chief...

"Enough, Phlegma!" Stoick shouted, "You're not moving to the front—you shouldn't even be a second!"

"I already know how to handle her warriors—they've followed my commands before—"

"You're not ready, and you never will be," Stoick growled.

"I've killed twice as many dragons as any of your commanders!  Why not put me where I can do some good?" Phlegma argued, "I can lead the men—they trust me."

"You trust ME now," Stoick yelled, laying one strained hand on his chest, "I'm doing this for you!  Do you think I want to see another fair woman of Berk stricken to the earth and—and—"  He fumbled for descriptions that his tongue could never repeat.  "Do you think I want to see you dead?  Do you think Tryggr wants to see you dead?"

Phlegma stiffened.  Her jaw clenched.

Stoick attempted to soften his voice, and failed miserably, "What will he do if you get yourself killed?" he boomed.

"I won't get myself killed," Phlegma trembled.

"Valhallarama thought the same thing," Stoick roared, "and look what happened to her!"

"It wasn't through any frailty of hers—it could have happened to anyone!" Phlegma shouted back.

"BUT IT HAPPENED TO HER!" Stoick exploded, "I DO NOT—WANT—what GRIEF I have borne to fall upon anyone EVER AGAIN!"

"Well it already has because she was MY FRIEND TOO!" Phlegma slammed the table with one palm, "I knew her longer than you EVER did!" she yelled, surprised at her own boldness.

A few heartbeats passed.  Phlegma breathed.

"And she wouldn't have wanted this."  Phlegma leaned back from the table.  "She wouldn't have wanted this..."

Her feet moved toward the door...

The seconds dragged.  Guff's question still hung in the air.  How did you do it?

How did you convince the Chief?

The warm water rose to the two Vikings' elbows as they ran out of ground again.

They stopped.

"I don't know," Phlegma said honestly.

"Too much mead?" Guff asked with a grin.

"Maybe," said Phlegma.

They became silent as their toes pushed off the stone, propelling them into another bridgeless void of dark water.

The Scauldron's tail lazily fanned the water fifty yards ahead on the other side of the rocks... and then slapped the surface noisily, disappearing beneath the waves and leaving behind a circle of ripples.

Phlegma and Guff took a heartbeat's pause, and then kept paddling, a bit more vigorously than before.

"Don't splash, don't splash..." warned Phlegma, as much to herself as to Guff.  She ached to shed her spear and swim for it all out.  The distance yet to the rocks was staggering...

They were halfway there.  The Scauldron hadn't resurfaced.  Perhaps the only way for it to continue southward had been through some underwater passageway.  Perhaps it had found some prey animal, something much more interesting than two measly Vikings, and was now chasing it into the depths.  Perhaps it had split off and would now swim away and out of their path.

Perhaps it was waiting for them.

Phlegma felt her fingers at last brush against the cold stone in the warm water.  She hauled herself forward, swiftly and silently, into the shallows in the lee of a huge fang of rock jutting into the sky.  Now if they could just slip around to the other side and get a little higher... they'd be in with a fighting chance...

She shook her head again—she didn't even know for certain if the Scauldron were after them.

But it didn't hurt to be prepared.  Phlegma gripped her spear tightly.  "Quiet, now—" she whispered, and took one more step to lead the way before she heard Guff trip behind her, crash into the water, and felt his hand grab her boot.

Phlegma had a special death-glare for the lower warriors that she reserved for occasions like this.  It sprang only too readily to her face as she whirled around, fully intent on boring it forever into her young companion's skull... until she saw the cause of his fall.

His grip around her ankle tightened as the Scauldron pulled back on his left foot, drawing him toward the deep water.

"Guff!" she yelled, and grabbed onto the rocks behind her.

"It's hot—it's hot it's hot!" Guff screamed.  He wriggled to free his foot from the creature's jaws.

"PULL!" Phlegma shouted, bracing herself in her anchor-hold.

With a terrific wrench, Guff slipped out of his boot and tumbled into the shallows.  The Scauldron's head jerked backward with the release... right before it swallowed the footwear.

"THAT WAS MY BOOT, YOU DEVIL!" Guff bellowed, leaping to his feet.

Phlegma grabbed his arm and pulled him aside just as the Scauldron spewed out a jet of boiling hot water.  It steamed off the rocks as it swept after them, swiping across their backs and seeping into their clothes with hammering pressure.

"Down!" Phlegma screamed, burning her hand as she shoved Guff on the back.  The Vikings dove into the water, submerging themselves to dissipate the heat.  They swam a short distance beneath the surface before coming up again a bit farther around the rock.

The Scauldron followed them, gurgling deep in its throat.

"Up, up!" Phlegma shouted.  She grabbed Guff by the nape of his steaming jerkin, and the two of them scrambled out of the gravelly shallows and up onto the slick stone, the Scauldron twining its interminable neck around the spire and spewing after them again.

Somewhere very, very deep inside, Phlegma really was grateful the dragon was spitting water and not fire.  But this sentiment did nothing to lessen the burn as the second blast soaked through her bodice and seethed against her skin.  Fortunately the water had lost much of its heat to the air as it spanned the increasing gap between the Scauldron's maw and the fleeing Vikings... but it couldn't be enough.

"Aoh that's gonna blister!" Guff grunted as they clawed their way up the slope.

Phlegma saw the look of disappointed pain on his face and knew exactly what he was thinking: blisters never left decent scars.

Faster and faster they scaled the twisting rock, the Scauldron spewing from below and beginning to clamber its way onto the base of the spire.  The stone was far too sheer for a creature of its incredible girth to climb, but the Scauldron's dizzyingly long neck still stretched high into the air after the two Vikings as it pelted them again with a steaming rain.

Guff vaulted over a jagged lip of stone near the spire's crest and quickly turned to give Phlegma a hand up.  The two of them backed away from the ledge and into a shallow crack in the rock behind them, panting as the mist slowly cooled their sodden clothes to more tolerable temperatures.  The Scauldron bellowed long and low and gutturally from below.

"Can Scauldrons fly?" Guff heaved.

"Never seen one do it yet," Phlegma replied.  She shifted her hold on her spear, ready to cast it if need be, though she desperately hoped it wouldn't come to that.  She doubted she would be able to regain it again.

The trouble with Scauldrons was that they were so blasted enormous they could only be dealt with from a distance.  They could take an incredible beating before going down, but more often than not they simply retreated instead of rolling over and dying like good dragons should.  Unless a Viking could pull off a lucky strike to the creature's deeply buried heart, or through its mouth to its brain, or somehow slice through its thick, powerful neck in one go... hand-weapons were largely useless against it.  Catapults and harpoons worked best.

Phlegma looked at her spear again.  If she only had some rope...

Signaling Guff to keep back, she took a step forward to peer over the edge.

There was the beast down below, huge and green and globulous, its wings splayed menacingly, but not moving.  When it saw her it sprayed again.  Phlegma stepped back just as the water hit the edge of the rock-shelf, splashing off the stone and sending up a harmless cloud of steam.

The Scauldron roared and gurgled in agitation.  Phlegma and Guff raised their eyebrows at each other.  They seemed to be safe for the moment.  But their current position hardly gave them cause to celebrate.

The dragon let loose another spray, this time missing the spire entirely by a good six feet.  The Vikings watched the jet of scalding water shoot past them and up into the air.

"Lousy shot," Guff piped up with a pained little smile.  Phlegma smiled back.  Anything to lighten the mood was welcome.

And then the Scauldron's jet of water came arcing back down with perfect accuracy, and drenched them both in a very warm and slightly smelly drizzle.

They both stood there like ridiculous statues as the water coursed down their features.

Phlegma felt as if (and rather wished that) the next thing she so much as looked at might just burst into flame.

She gave up trying to remember worse predicaments she might have been in.  What was the point?  As Bad Days went, Phlegma was sure this was the very worst one of her life.

She really, really wished she had just stayed in bed that morning.

"Well," Guff remarked in the dripping silence, "At least we're not babysitting Hiccup."

Four absurd heartbeats passed... and then Phlegma practically cried in appreciative mirth.  She snickered and snorted and positively howled, Guff chuckling along as the Scauldron sent up another spray.

They laughed and laughed until Guff straightened up sharply.  "What was that?" he asked, his eyes wide.

"What?" Phlegma snapped back to a warrior's alertness, though a nasty, somewhat bitter grin still lingered on her face.

Another warm shower rained down on them.

"—oooyyyy!"

The Vikings went still.

"Did you hear that?" said Guff.

"Where'd it come from?" Phlegma hissed at the same time.

They cast their eyes and ears in all directions, hardly daring to breathe.

"Phlegmaaaa!  Guuuuuff!" the voice said again.  It had come from somewhere behind them and to the right—they had overshot their mark!

The Scauldron gargled and rumbled down below.

It was a new sound.  Phlegma and Guff peered cautiously over the edge once more.

The dragon's head had turned in the direction of the distant calls.  It twined its neck, eerie and snakelike, back down toward the water, low in the mist.  Shuffling backward, slowly and disgustingly jiggling like a beached whale, the Scauldron heaved itself back into the sea, slipping into its element, where it was buoyant and graceful... and most deadly.

It was leaving.  It turned right around in the pocket of deep water down below, and pointed its nose back toward the north.

Phlegma and Guff gawked after it in astonishment, unable to believe their good luck...

...and the bad luck of whoever had been calling them...

"Phlegmaaaa!" came the voice again.

"Oh dear," said Phlegma, her eyes following the Scauldron, "That... beastie might just give them some trouble."

"Trouble, it'll kill them!" Guff exclaimed.  He stood tall and waved his arms.  "Hey!  Hey dragon!" he shouted, "Hoy Scauldron back here!  Up here!"

"It's no use!" Phlegma stopped Guff's flapping when the Scauldron failed to deviate from its path.  It quickly disappeared into the mist.

"Guff?" the distant call floated over the air.

"On three we'll say 'beware'," said Phlegma, "Slowly.  Get it?"

"Right," said Guff.

Phlegma tucked her spear in the crook of one arm, cupped her hands around her mouth like the bell of a trumpet and counted, Guff following her lead, and—

"BEEEEWAAAAAAARE!!!" they bellowed, Phlegma bobbing her head to direct the syllables.

A few seconds of silence.

"Hooooyyyyyy!" the voice sang out.

"Again," said Phlegma, "Say 'Scauldron'.  On three.  One, two, three—"

"SCAAAAUULDROOOONNNNN!!!"

Again a silence.

It carried on a little too long.

"'Beware' again," said Phlegma, "Ready?"

Guff nodded.

"One, two, three—"

"BEEEEWAAAAAAARE!!!"

Nothing.

And nothing.

And nothing again.

And finally... a burbling roar... and the very faint but very definite sound... of irate human shouting.

"Aoh for crying in the mud—come on!" Phlegma shouted, and hopped over the edge to skid back down the slick stone of the spire.

Guff followed her unsteadily.  "They're so close?" he marveled, his words punctuated with each shaky footfall.

"We need to hurry," was all Phlegma said.  She slowed only slightly at the water's edge, careful to enter it quietly while still moving at breakneck speed—not easy.

And she and Guff slipped right back into the wide span of deep, dark, warm water they had only just narrowly escaped... and once again swam for it like madmen.

The sounds led them slightly to the left of the way they had come from, across an even wider and deeper span of groundless, mist-bound sea, but Phlegma spared the thought no room to grow into a mindless fear; she didn't have the time.  She just had to focus on getting back to her ship and her tribe as quickly as possible... they needed her...  They needed Guff.

Phlegma heard a strained creaking and crashing that she thought could only be the snapping of a mast, and redoubled her pace.  But for how briskly they were swimming, the rocks ahead seemed never to draw any closer.  It was unbearable...

But after a few moments the spires did indeed loom a little taller, and a little broader, and more solid through the prevalent mists, until finally, Phlegma felt the brush of a rock against her shin.  She and Guff found their footing and, caring no longer for stealth at this point, sloshed in a very noisy run over the last thirty yards to an enormous, pockmarked fin of stone, jutting from the sea like the blade of a saw.  They clambered onto the rock and dashed toward the far end.  The sounds of angry Scauldron and splintering wood and ugly curses were so clear now it was almost as if they could be just on the other side—

Phlegma and Guff came to the razor-sharp end of the crest and peeked around the edge.

They were on the other side.

One of the ships, Mama's Good Gravy, lay scuttled against a jagged spire.  The Scauldron was stamping it halfway to smithereens while playing a deadly game of ring-around-the-rosie with a Viking higher up the rock.

It was Spitelout.

Scanning the scene quickly, Phlegma laid eyes on the happiest sight she had seen all day: there on the deck of the splintering ship, thumping against the railing, was a poor, neglected harpoon with nobody to cast it.  Excellent.

"Climb to the top and go to the other end," Phlegma ordered Guff, gesturing up the fin of rock they stood on, "Draw that thing's attention."

"Right," Guff turned at once and scrambled, half-shod, up the sharp and jagged slope.

Phlegma meanwhile slipped around in a wide circle, heading toward the ship.  The Scauldron seemed intently and entirely occupied with its current prey, but she didn't want to take any chances of letting it see her.  She hid low in the water as she skirted around rocks and beneath twisted arches of black stone.

"Hoy!  Hey dragon, up here!" Guff called out.

Starting in surprise just before it moved in to chomp the stranded Spitelout, the Scauldron turned its head and twined its neck in the opposite direction.  Phlegma looked too.  Guff had chosen a particularly high perch of jutting stone, well out of reach of the dragon's teeth or claws, whereon he now started jumping obnoxiously up and down.

"I'm gonna hunt down your mother and chop off her head and stick it on my wall you smelly tub of lard!" Guff taunted.

He narrowly dodged a furious jet of boiling water.

"Oh!  Your mother and all your babies!" he jeered on.

That's good, thought Phlegma, keep it busy just a little longer...  She held her breath and swam beneath the surface for the last few yards to the ship, coming up safely hidden behind the sternward hull.

She crept silently over the edge and onto the deck.  There was the harpoon.  Phlegma smiled.  All those cold iron barbs could seriously ruin a dragon's day.  Much more so than her own spear.

She reached out for it...

...and felt the deck shift beneath her feet as her weight disrupted the ship's delicate balance on the rocks, and sent it tumbling completely onto its side, deck toward the dragon.

She landed in a heap against the other railing.

The Scauldron's head jerked back round.

"HEY I'M TALKIN' TO YOU!" Guff bellowed, drawing the knife from his belt.  He flipped it in his hand a few times.

The Scauldron took one more look at Guff, and just had time to see him flick his wrist before the knife came zipping through the air and plunged into its right eye socket.

It reared and let out a gurgling shriek, spewing acid-hot water in all directions.

Phlegma regained her feet and grabbed the harpoon.  She hurled it straight at the dragon's momentarily bared breast, casting it with such force that it plunged beneath the skin for twice the length of its barbed iron head.

The huge dragon slammed back down onto its enormous paws and bellowed, long and low and deafeningly loud, before shoving off and diving lopsidedly down, down, down into the water with an incredible splashing and thrashing.

It had had enough.

Phlegma saw the line from the harpoon uncoiling rapidly beside her just in time.  She jumped out of the way just as the rope tautened, ripping off a piece of the railing, which bounced off the rock, crashed into the water and was dragged swiftly beneath the surface in a whirl of bubbles.

Quickly taking her spear again, Phlegma stood braced in a wide stance for a moment more, ready for anything.

But the Scauldron did not resurface again.

The Vikings breathed.

Spitelout slid down from where he had been clinging like a rat near the top of the spire.

Phlegma walked over to give him a hand down, "Hoo," she breathed, "I thought you were mincemeat for a minute there—"

"What took you so long?" Spitelout snarled, giving Phlegma a shove on the shoulder as he made his rough way to the ground.

Phlegma shoved him back, "What do you mean what took me so long?"  She jerked her thumb over her shoulder toward Guff.  "Swimming for miles without a ship took me so long, you big yammering elephant seal!" she bellowed.

Spitelout took a handful of Phlegma's bodice.  She grabbed his arm—

And then they both let go a moment later, and sighed.  They were getting too old for this.  Phlegma was just relieved to have finally found someone at last.  But that Spitelout was alone had her worried...

"Tell me dragons didn't eat the rest of our hunting party," she panted.

"No, no," Spitelout shook his head, "The other two ships are back that way," he waved vaguely behind him, "I just came back for a few more things—and I thought I heard you, so I called out."

Came back?  "Then, it wasn't the Scauldron that did... this...?" Phlegma asked, gesturing at the wreckage of Mama's Good Gravy strewn about the rock.

"Aoh no, three Nightmares and a Gronckle did that," Spitelout explained, "Mean ones.  Bloody near chewed Starkard's legs off, but had to settle for just his breeches instead... indecent..."  He moved toward the shipwreck and started rummaging through the debris.

Starkard was normally terrifying enough in battle, but the image of him wildly brandishing his axe and sword while bared to the skivvies was just too much for Phlegma.  She pushed the thought from her mind, and turned her attentions to the approaching Guff.

He had descended back down the jagged fin of rock, and wound his way through the shallows, wading toward them, and was now swimming the last few yards to the small islet where they stood.

"Guff!" Phlegma called in her stern commander's voice.

"Phlegma?"

"Where in Thor's name did you learn to throw a knife like that?" asked Phlegma.

Guff lowered his head, as if in concentration on his paddling.  "Well..." he began, looking just a tiny bit pleased with himself, "you always place first at loogie-hocking.  I've been coming in second at knife-throwing for four years running."

Phlegma's eyebrows flicked upward.  "Second to who?"

"Foxtoes the Gamble," Guff said with a little grimace.

"Well next year we'll pit Foxtoes against a live Scauldron and see how well he does then, eh?" Phlegma perked, reaching out a hand as Guff neared the islet, "Guff the Deadeye?"

Guff grinned and took her hand.  "I like the sound of that," he said.  He climbed from the water, his right boot squelching against the stone... and his left sock slashed in several places and tinged with red.

"Oh..." Phlegma started.

Guff followed her eyes to his foot and shrugged, "Sharp rocks."

Phlegma looked up again and recognized the expression on Guff's face.  He was sufficed.  The scarring wouldn't be anything spectacular, but it would be decent at least.

"Ah, found them," said Spitelout.  He emerged from the debris surrounding Mama's Good Gravy's prow with a fine pair of boots in his hands.  "Some Nadder put a hole in Sneerspit's boot—spike went right between his toes.  Good thing Ack brought these extras—"

"Just a hole?"  Phlegma swiped the boots right out of Spitelout's hands.  "Tell Sneerspit you couldn't find them."  She tossed the boots to Guff, who caught them with a grateful look, and set to putting them on.

Ten more minutes of wading saw Phlegma, Guff and Spitelout back to the rest of their tribe amid a small riot of hearty cheers and friendly thumps on the back.  The Vikings (and all their supplies) were crammed a bit tighter into the two remaining ships, but Phlegma noted that they seemed nonetheless in good spirits.  Men boasted to each other of how many dragons they had just killed, or swapped stories while showing off fresh wounds and bruises.

Phlegma breathed the briny air tinged with the scent of leather and sweat.  This was more like it.

Presently she located Hoark the Haggard.  "Found something you lost," she said to him, finally handing off her young companion to his proper keeper.  She smiled to Guff as they parted, and he returned the look, his jovial grin once again accentuating the boyish image Phlegma kept of him in her head.  When had he gotten so big?  So brave?  So like a Viking Warrior?  He had handled himself almost as well as one of her own men.

Maybe not quite as well.  But almost.

As she watched him rejoining his friends, she felt a heavy hand come down from behind on her shoulder.  She knew who it was even before she turned around.

"Are you all right, Phlegma?" Stoick the Vast asked, softly and seriously.

He always spoke to her more gently than he did to any of his other commanders.  Phlegma could never decide whether she liked it or hated it, but she always figured he at least meant it well.

"Well, we were going to go and slaughter the lot of them ourselves, but... eh, we figured you'd want more than just a few leftovers, so we came back."

"How very generous of you," Stoick played along, unimpressed.

Phlegma lowered her voice.  "Ah, it's just been a Bad Day, but... I think it's finally getting better.  I'm all right," she said.

Stoick gave a throaty chuckle.  "Good," he said.

And then Phlegma's heart skipped a little faster as she steeled herself to ask her very least favorite question.  It was a requisite query she had asked many times, but she had never gotten used to it.  Then again, maybe that was a good thing.

"My men?" she said simply.

"Ask your second," said Stoick, nodding his head to a point somewhere behind her.

Phlegma turned around again, and there was Tryggr.  "All accounted for," Tryggr smiled, "Killkeg broke his nose again I think, but that's nothing new and exciting."

Phlegma greeted her husband with a good, tight hug as Stoick moved away to bark a few orders to the rudder-men.

"I was worried," Tryggr murmured, inclining his head to grin peeking at her through his puppy-dog eyebrows.

"You're always worried," said Phlegma.

"Well I love you."

"Hm.  I love you too," said Phlegma, and pecked him on the cheek.

"Thor's beard!  You're talkative today," Tryggr exclaimed, "I trust you'll still let me know if anything changes?"

"Aha, forgive me, I've been chattering all day..." Phlegma rubbed her brow with a sheepish little smile, "Guff wanted to hear about the Purple Beast incident."

"And you told him?"

"Yes."

"The whole story?"  Tryggr was incredulous.

"The whole thing," said Phlegma.

"But you hate telling that story."  He laid a hand on her back as the breeze filled the sails and propelled the boats along through the mist.

"Well, we had nothing else to do," Phlegma shrugged, "And it passed the time well enough; it wasn't so terrible," she admitted.

The eerie spires drifted slowly past as the Vikings sailed deeper into the dragons' territory, the mist pressing in around them as the sun began to sink.

"Better than looking after Hiccup, at least," Phlegma added, and Tryggr laughed.