Chapter Text
The air in the Queen’s war room was heavy with the scent of beeswax, old parchment, and the simmering frustration of powerful people facing a difficult problem. Hiccup stood in his designated corner, a silent shadow whose only purpose was to be invisible until needed. The great round table was surrounded by the most important figures in Berk: Eret, the handsome knight with the crossbows; a council of grizzled, scarred lords whose names Hiccup hadn't yet learned; and at the head of it all, Queen Astrid, her brow furrowed in concentration as she stared at the map spread before them.
The map depicted their new enemy: the Free City of Kartholm, a maritime mercantile fortress on an island to the south. Inspired by tales of ancient Carthage, its founders had built it to be a bastion of trade and naval power. It was protected by near-impregnable sea walls and a devastating armada that had, until recently, been a valued trading partner. But Kartholm, a known ally of Welton, had made a fatal error in judgment. In a show of solidarity with the defeated Duke, they had embargoed Berk and sent a grossly insulting letter to the Queen. It was a declaration of war, and Astrid did not suffer insults gladly.
“Their navy is their strength,” one of the grizzled lords, a man with a beard like a spade, rumbled. “But they hide behind their walls like cowards. We could break our fleet against their harbor chain and still not reach the city proper.”
“We could mine the walls,” another suggested. “Send a team of sappers in the dead of night.”
“Too risky,” Eret countered, his arms crossed as he studied the map. “Their sea patrols are constant. We’d be spotted before we got within a hundred yards of the foundation.”
Astrid waved a hand dismissively, not taking her eyes off the map. Hiccup instantly moved forward, pouring her a glass of water from a nearby pitcher and placing it silently at her elbow. As he did, his eyes scanned the intricate drawing of Kartholm. He saw the outer walls, the heavily fortified harbor entrance, the sprawling city, and at its very heart, the tall, isolated keep where its ruler, Duke Lagos, resided. The whispers started up again from the council members. The Queen’s pet. He ignored them, his mind already tracing patterns, seeing not just the fortress, but the city’s lifeblood.
“Ladders are out of the question,” Astrid stated, her voice cutting through the murmurs. “The walls are too high and patrolled by crossbowmen. Catapults could soften them up, but it would take weeks, and they’d see our fleet coming from miles away.”
Every proposed strategy—explosives, siege towers, brute force—ended at the same, bloody conclusion: a frontal assault on the walls that would cost them hundreds, if not thousands, of Berkian lives. The thought of it sat like a stone in Hiccup’s gut. It was wasteful. It was inefficient.
The talks dragged on, a circular debate of death and attrition. The sun began to set, casting long shadows across the war room. Astrid, noticing the late hour, finally looked up.
“The other squires were dismissed an hour ago,” she said, her tone weary. “You may return to your quarters.”
He didn’t move. “With respect, Your Majesty, as long as my Queen is at work, so is her squire.”
She gave him a direct order. “Go. That’s an order.”
Hiccup simply met her gaze and raised a single, defiant eyebrow. He didn’t budge. A flicker of something—surprise? satisfaction?—danced in her eyes before she let out a small, almost imperceptible sigh. A tiny smirk touched her lips for a fraction of a second. “Fine. Stay.” She turned back to the map, but the mood in the room had subtly shifted.
Eventually, the council members departed, their plans no more advanced than when they had begun. The room emptied until only Astrid and Hiccup remained, the silence thick between them.
“Your Majesty,” Hiccup said, his voice dangerously quiet. “If I may?”
Astrid looked up from the map, rubbing her temples. “What is it, boy?”
“The current plan is inefficient,” he stated bluntly.
She scoffed. “You think I don’t know that? Do you have a better idea, then?”
“Perhaps. But first, some questions.” He stepped closer to the table, his finger hovering over the map. “How do you declare the fortress officially taken?”
“The castle is taken once their lord is in our hands,” she answered, intrigued despite herself. “We can ransom him for their unconditional surrender.”
“And where will we find this Duke Lagos during an assault?”
“In his keep,” she said with a sneer. “He’s a merchant prince, not a warrior. He’s too afraid to fight on the front lines.”
“Final question,” Hiccup said, looking her directly in the eye. “Could you, and one hundred of your best honor guard, take that keep by yourselves?”
“Absolutely,” she said without hesitation. “If the walls weren’t there.”
Hiccup smiled, a slow, dangerous thing. “Then that is our plan. We will take Kartholm without ever attacking the walls.”
Astrid stared at him as if he’d grown a second head. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s a Trojan Horse,” he explained, his voice alive with energy. “First, we use their own arrogance against them. We send a small merchant envoy, a single ship disguised as traders from Welton. On board are not soldiers, but bards and minstrels. For six days, they will spread tales in the taverns and marketplaces of Kartholm. Songs and stories of the fearsome, unstoppable Dragon of Berk, exaggerating your prowess, detailing the fall of Welton, stoking the fires of fear.”
He paused, letting the idea sink in. “Then, on the seventh day, we launch the real attack. You and one hundred of your best warriors will hide in the cargo hold of a large Berkian merchant vessel, also disguised as a Welton trader. It will be noon, the busiest time for the harbor. Your ship will blend in with the dozens of others arriving to trade. Once you are inside the harbor, past the sea chain, you strike.”
Astrid was silent for a long moment, her mind racing, seeing the audacious shape of his plan. “We could take the keep,” she admitted, her voice cautious. “But what about the city garrison? They won’t just surrender because we have their lord. They’ll storm the keep. We’ll be trapped.”
Hiccup shook his head. “You are mistaken, Your Majesty. These are not Berkians. They are allies of Welton. Their strength is in their navy and their gold, not their honor. Their soldiers are mercenaries and city guards who fight for coin, not for glory. Your army fights for Berk. They fight for a paycheck. One is worth dying for; the other is not.”
“And escape?” she pressed. “How do we get out once we have the Duke?”
Hiccup chuckled. “Who said anything about escaping?” He looked her in the eye and repeated her own words back to her. “ Boy, I just conquered this kingdom. Everything here, including the Duke himself, belongs to me if I want it. The only reason he still has a throne to sit on is because I’m showing him mercy. ”
He pointed to a spot on the map just over the hills from the city. “While you are sailing into the harbor, our main army will march into position, hidden just beyond the crest of that hill. Once you have Duke Lagos on the balcony of his keep with a sword to his throat, you give the signal.” He tapped the map. “A single, long blast from a horn. The sound will carry. And the entire Berkian army will appear on the horizon. Anyone brave, or stupid, enough to consider fighting will lay down their arms. These people are not honorable Berkians. They are cowards glittered in gold.”
Astrid stared at him, her expression a mixture of shock, disbelief, and a dawning, terrifying respect. The plan was insane. It was audacious. It was brilliant.
She stood there for a long, long moment, the silence stretching between them. Then, she gave a single, sharp nod.
“Send the merchants,” she commanded. “I trust you to handle the arrangements for the ship. I’ll hand-pick my honor guard.” She looked at him, her eyes burning with a new intensity. “We set sail in six days.”
Six days later, Hiccup stood at the tiller of a repurposed Berkian trading cog, the salt spray misting his face. His stomach was performing a series of unhappy flips, but he fought down the nausea with sheer force of will. He was disguised as a simple blacksmith from Welton, his hands grimy with charcoal, a small, portable forge set up on the deck as part of his cover. Below deck, hidden amongst crates of what was supposed to be iron ore, were the Queen of Berk and one hundred of her deadliest warriors.
He guided the ship into the queue of vessels waiting to enter the magnificent harbor of Kartholm. The city was even more impressive up close. The sea walls were massive, gleaming white in the sun, topped with scorpion ballistae and patrolling guards in polished bronze armor. The harbor itself was a bustling hive of activity, ships from a dozen lands jostling for space at the crowded docks. He blended in perfectly.
Once they were moored, a portly man in fine robes, the harbormaster, came aboard with two guards. “A Welton ship!” he said, his tone sympathetic. “Business must be difficult. I heard what that monster, the Dragon of Berk, did to your Duke.”
“Times are tough,” Hiccup said, his voice rough and common. “Hoping to peddle my wares here. The steel in Kartholm is said to be subpar.”
The harbormaster chuckled. “That it is. Let’s have a look at your cargo, then.”
He and his guards headed for the cargo hold. Hiccup gave a silent, pre-arranged signal. The moment the harbormaster descended the ladder, he was met not with iron ore, but with Eret and a dozen silent, waiting Berkians. The fight was over before it began.
A few minutes later, Astrid emerged onto the deck. She was a vision of terror and glory, kitted out in her full suit of dark steel armor. Hiccup stopped her before she could leave the ship.
“Your Majesty,” he said, holding something out to her. It was a helmet, forged from the same dark steel as her armor, but its shape was new. It was crafted to look like the snarling, stylized head of a dragon, with swept-back horns and a menacing visor.
She took it, surprised. A slow smile spread across her face. “Really playing into the whole ‘Dragon of Berk’ thing, are we?” she chuckled. She donned the helmet. It completed the image. She was no longer just a queen in armor. She was a myth made real.
(Astrid’s Perspective)
The moment her boots hit the stone of the docks, she was moving. Her hundred warriors fanned out behind her, a silent, disciplined wave of dark steel. The plan was working. The psychological warfare had done its job.
As they moved swiftly through the crowded streets toward the keep, she saw commoners and merchants gasp, their faces paling in terror.
“It’s her!” a woman shrieked, dropping a basket of fish.
“The Dragon! The Dragon of Berk is here!” a man yelled, stumbling backward into his own stall.
Panic spread before them like a plague. People were too busy scrambling for safety, too consumed by the terrifying legend Hiccup’s bards had woven, to even think of sounding an alarm. The city guards they encountered were no better. They were frozen in fear at the sight of the mythical Dragon, her dragon-helm a terrifying confirmation of the stories. Some dropped their spears and ran. Others whispered curses and were cut down before they could raise a proper defense.
This is too easy, she thought, a thrill running through her. The boy’s plan… it wasn’t just about tactics. It was about using fear as a weapon.
They reached the keep with shocking speed. The elite guards at the gate, supposedly the best soldiers in Kartholm, took one look at her and the silent, deadly warriors behind her, and their discipline shattered. They broke and ran.
Her honor guard stormed the keep, cutting down anyone who was foolish enough to stand in their way. They swept upwards, a rising tide of Berkian fury. They reached the top floor, kicked open the ornate doors to the Duke’s personal office, and found him cowering behind his desk.
They dragged the whimpering Duke Lagos out onto the main balcony overlooking the city square. Astrid held her longsword to his throat, the polished steel glinting. She took a deep breath and her voice, magically amplified by the acoustics of the square, boomed over the city.
“The people of Kartholm! Your Duke is my prisoner! Surrender now, or he dies, and your city burns!”
Shouts of panic and confusion erupted from below. The remaining city garrison began to form up, their captains debating whether to charge the keep. They still had the numbers.
Astrid nodded to Eret, who stood to her right. He raised a great horn to his lips and blew a single, long, piercing note.
For a moment, there was only the echo. Then, the world began to shake. A low, rumbling thunder grew from beyond the city, the sound of ten thousand hooves. Over the crest of the far hill, the entire Berkian army appeared, a forest of spears and a sea of banners, a black tide ready to crash upon the city.
The sight broke the last of the garrison’s will. Spears and swords clattered to the cobblestones as soldiers raised their hands in surrender.
Astrid looked out at her army, then down at the captured Duke, then at the city that was now hers. They had taken an impenetrable fortress in less than an hour. Without a single siege engine. Without attacking the formidable walls.
All thanks to her squire.
She threw the Duke to the floor and banished him from his own city, turning to a stunned Lord Sven. “This fortress is now yours to govern for Berk,” she declared. She looked at Eret. “Losses?”
Eret’s face was split by a wide, disbelieving grin. “Zero, Your Majesty.”
The word echoed in her mind, more powerful than any battle cry. The victory was absolute, the cost nonexistent. She spent the next hour issuing a whirlwind of commands—to Eret, to the newly-appointed Lord Sven, to her other commanders—securing the gates, disarming the garrison, and establishing martial law. The city of Kartholm fell into Berkian hands with the cold efficiency of a well-oiled machine. Yet, as she walked back through the now-subdued streets toward the harbor, her mind wasn’t on the logistics of occupation. It was on the impossible plan that had made it all possible. A victory won not by a frontal assault, but by a Trojan horse. It was a foreign, almost unsettling way to win a war, and it had been flawlessly executed by the last person anyone would have expected. She needed to see him. The boy. The squire. The architect.
She found Hiccup back on the ship, anxiously waiting. She strode up to him, her mind still reeling from the sheer, elegant brutality of his plan.
“I was hesitant,” she admitted, her voice raw. “This was not my style. A frontal assault is honest. This was… deceitful.” She paused, a small, begrudging smile on her face. “But perhaps my style could use some deceit. That was… amazing.”
She looked at him, truly looked at him, not as a tool or a project or a boy, but as the architect of her greatest, most bloodless victory.
“ You’re amazing, Hiccup.”
The words, and the name, echoed in the sudden quiet of the ship's cabin. Hiccup. Not "boy." Not "squire." Not "reparation." Just… Hiccup. He replayed the sound of it in his mind. It was the first time she had ever used his name as a statement of his identity, not just a label to get his attention. It was a validation, a promotion, an anointing. It was the single greatest compliment he had ever received in his entire life, and it had come from the one person whose opinion had, against all logic, come to matter most. For a moment, the victory at Kartholm, the brilliant gambit, the fall of a city—all of it paled in comparison to the simple, profound weight of his own name spoken with genuine respect.
When they returned to Berk, the reception was different. As Hiccup walked through the squires’ courtyard, he still got glares, but now they were mixed with something new. A grudging, fearful respect. Fishlegs ran up to him, ecstatic.
“Hiccup, that was brilliant! Everyone is talking about it! They’re calling it the Kartholm Gambit!”
Their celebration was cut short by Spitlout, who sauntered over, his face twisted in a sneer. “Don’t get a big head, pet . You just got lucky. You’re still just her little plaything.”
Hiccup thought of Astrid’s words. Fight clever. He didn’t draw his sword. He just smiled. Remembering what Eret said to him.
“You know, Spitlout,” he said, his voice calm and conversational. “I could have your head for saying those treasonous things. That is your Queen you are talking about. Just one word from me to my master, and I imagine your time as a squire would come to a very sudden, very permanent end.”
Spitlout’s smirk faltered. He looked shocked for a second, then recovered. “Ooh, going to cry to your mommy? I bet she makes you call her that.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “Oh, wait. You’re an orphan, aren’t you? No mother at all. My mistake.”
Hiccup didn’t flinch. He put on his best impression of Astrid’s icy authority. “You do realize she has cut down entire armies single-handedly. I think it would be wise not to insult her any further.”
Spitlout’s face went pale. The threat, coming from the mouth of the boy who had just orchestrated the fall of an impregnable city, suddenly had teeth. “You’re no fun,” he grumbled, waving a dismissive hand. “I’m bored.” He turned and stalked away.
Hiccup felt a surge of triumph. It was a small victory, but it was his.
The feeling lasted for approximately ten seconds.
A heavy hand clamped down on the scruff of his neck, lifting him effortlessly off the ground. He came face to face with a sneering, brutish knight with a familiar Jorgenson jawline. Snotlout.
“I heard you were threatening my squire,” Snotlout snarled, his grip tightening. Behind him, Spitlout was snickering.
Hiccup rolled his eyes. “I was trying to keep your squire from losing his head,” he choked out. “But it appears he ran to his daddy instead. Hypocrite.”
Snotlout’s face contorted in rage. He dropped Hiccup and drove an armored fist into his gut. The air rushed out of Hiccup’s lungs in a pained whoosh, and he collapsed to the ground, gasping.
“That’s enough, Snotlout!” Fishlegs shouted, rushing forward.
Snotlout turned on him. “That’s Lord Snotlout to you, Fish-face!” He then turned back to the wheezing Hiccup on the ground. With a dramatic flourish, he pulled off his leather glove and threw it down in the mud in front of Hiccup’s face.
“I declare blood insult,” he announced in a pompous, booming voice for all the courtyard to hear. “For the dishonor you have shown my house and my squire, you will face me in a duel to first blood.”