Awake and preparing

When Delvin awoke he was no longer in the caves.

His surroundings had shifted from the dark and cold caverns of the cave to the familiar smell of medicine and goats milk, a smell specific to the house of Gothi, berks silent healer, and a woman who could only communicate through words written on the ground

"Hey! He's awake!" a voice sounded, feminine and ridiculously overexcited. Hiccup, Astrid, his mother, and the crew were sitting beside his bed. Well, only hiccup and Astrid were conscious, the rest lay in different sleeping positions scrambled around the small room, and were only just waking.

"Are you okay?!" hiccup asked in his squeaky voice

"Did you kill a dragon!?" Snotlout yelled upon waking up

"What kind was it?!" Fishlegs dished in

Bonk! Bonk! Bonk!

Gothi appeared behind the three, whacking each firmly on the head with her stick before offering a frustrated "Shhhhhh" and walking towards Delvin, checking his forehead and pulse for anything wrong before moving on to the wounds on his back, leg, and arm

"Wicked!" The twins exclaimed as they saw the large burn spreading across Delvin's arm "i wish a dragon would burn me…" Ruffnut complained, clearly ashamed that she hadn't been there to get a "wicked" scar

"I bet i can get a bigger scar!" Tuffnut yelled, puffing out his chest and indicating towards his chest "I'd get a fireball to the chest from a Monstrous Nightmare!"

"Would not!" his twin argued

"Would too"

"Would no-"

Bonk! Bonk!

Gothi shut them up with two swings of her cane, which Delvin was beginning to believe might be thors own hammer at this point before slowly gesturing with her hands for the group to leave.

"But Gothi!" hiccup began before shutting up when he saw the serious look on her face and the tight grip she had on her staff. Soon the whole group had left except for Astrid, who was family after all and had been asked to stay, and that was when Gothi motioned toward Delvin's leg and began to draw on the floor

~I was able to begin treatment on the puncture wound on your back and then burn on your arm~ she began to write on the dirt

"That's good isn't it?" His mother asked, sitting down beside Delvin and gently looking towards his wounds, Gothi informed them that while the burn looked bad, thankfully it was a glancing hit and not a direct one and the wound on his back from the Nadder spike had missed any bones or important arteries "so it's all treatable?"

~the only issue~ Gothi began writing before stopping, unsure of what to write

"The only issue is what!?" Astrid demanded, clearly not interested in a slow conversation and being impatient as usual

~his leg was bitten… badly~ Gothi began, looking sad as she wrote, not making eye contact with Delvin or his mother ~while it won't kill him, the Nadder bitt and severed a lot of muscle and pretty much anything that wasn't bone~

"So?" Delvin asked, unsure what this meant, especially seeing as his leg was clearly still attached

~you will never be able to walk quite the same, you may need a cane or staff~ Gothi finished her diagnosis with a sniff, looking genuinely sad that she couldnt do anything more

"So ill be walking like…" he didn't finish, instead looking towards the cane Gothi held

~like me yes~ Gothi answered with a nod, thankfully not looking too offended by his rather obvious look and not beating him with the same club he had looked at ~If its any condolence, it is not as bad as you might think~

"Will i still be able to fight?" Delvin asked, worrying what it could mean if he were unable to fight dragons alongside other Vikings in the future, to at the least even the score for what they had done to him

"No!" his mother yelled, looking panicked at the prospect

~Yes~ Gothi wrote

****

Three months later Delvin was finally released from his treatment in Gothi's tent, now with a noticeable limp however

"I won't go any easier on you in training!" Astrid declared the moment he had arrived back at the Hofferson clan house. Folding her arms and looking completely unsympathetic, a far cry from the girl who had spent so much time helping nurse him back to health alongside the crew and Gothi

"I'll beat you anyway" Delvin replied with a smug grin, he had recently taken to using a Halberd as a walking cane, ignoring how much the weapon dwarfed him with his childish height, he had no plans to be caught unarmed by a foe ever again "Hofferson five?"

"Hofferson five!" Astrid responded, high-fiving him before letting him into the house, where the rest of the house had already begun feasting in honor of his swift recovery. Apparently, he didn't even have to be present for his family to get drunk on his behalf, who knew?

And once the feast was over, the bar fights extinguished and all those who were going to sleep had gone to bed, Delvin made his way to his room. Delvin had much time to think during his stay in Gothi's tent and he realized something

If he were to hunt dragons he needed a weapon and he needed to start crafting one as soon as possible

Sure a halberd was great, the perfect weapon in his opinion, it allowed for range, power and speed. Combining the techniques of great axes, spears and staffs made it easily one of the most diverse weapons to ever exist and easily one of the deadliest

And before the Nadder incident, he might have only needed this, but now? With a damaged leg and chip on his shoulder

No, he needed something even stronger

And as walked toward his room he found all the materials he needed

Harvested bones and skin from the Deadly Nadder he had slain, perfect for armor and anything else he might wish to craft, heat resistant and more, not the best, but hardly the worst

And a dragon egg, the key to knowledge over the enemy

[author note: Delvin at present has never thought of dragons as anything but enemies and that won't change until later on, also i should say it now that due to both him being directly related to her and seeing hiccup as a friend, Astrid will not be a love interest. I personally just enjoy her relationship with hiccup and have no wish to tamper with it]