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Free Spirit | Merida x Hiccup AU

Merida DunBroch was not his friend.

Children of the same age who happened to live nearby didn’t have to be friends, after all. Hiccup had never considered this, nor had anyone asked him about it.

01.

Hiccup first met Merida DunBroch when he was ten years old. At the time, he lived in a small, quiet town, where his days and nights repeated each other like clockwork. His world extended no farther than the short distance between his house and the park a few streets over.

That year, the DunBroch family moved into the tea-colored house next door—a place that had sat vacant for years because its resale price was too high. Merida’s room was on the second floor, and her window faced the screened window of Hiccup’s room. Yet for a long time, her curtains remained tightly drawn. Occasionally, though, he could hear faint music drifting across the divide, accompanied by her slightly off-key but surprisingly soothing singing voice.

Merida DunBroch was not his friend.

Children of the same age who happened to live nearby didn’t have to be friends, after all. Hiccup had never considered this, nor had anyone asked him about it.

Their first meaningful interaction didn’t happen at school.

That summer, when the oppressive heat made it impossible to sleep, Hiccup lay awake, kept company by the endless chirping of cicadas. One restless night, he pulled back his curtains to the sound of rustling leaves and caught sight of a figure moving stealthily outside the opposite window.

Merida’s curls spilled out from under a black hoodie as she carefully gripped the branches of the old locust tree outside her house. When she turned her head, their gazes locked.

A flicker of surprise crossed her face, a fleeting expression easily missed in the dim night. It quickly disappeared, masked by the determined set of her lips, followed by a silent gesture: her finger pressed to her lips in a plea for secrecy.

Hiccup gave her a small nod. Only then did she resume her climb, nimbly lowering herself to the ground before vanishing into the shadows at the end of the street.

02.

In middle school, Merida often got detention for a variety of peculiar reasons: skipping class once a week, passing notes during lessons, or drawing bizarre doodles all over her test papers.

During these detentions, she would sit in the corner of the classroom, munching on an apple from her lunch bag while staring out the window with a level of intensity that suggested the sky might be hiding a treasure long stolen from her.

But there were exceptions.

Sometimes, she wouldn’t look out the window. And sometimes, Hiccup was there, sitting in detention too.

On those occasions, Merida would throw crumpled pieces of paper at him. When he unfolded one, it was usually covered in bold, chaotic scribbles made with a marker. It was hard to decipher what, if anything, she had been trying to draw.

When he turned to her with a puzzled look, she would silently mouth the word:

“Dragon.”

Feigning a lightbulb moment, he nodded, pulled out his notebook, and began sketching clean, deliberate lines. Then, with a flourish, he tore the page from the notebook and tossed it back to her.

“This is a dragon,” it read.

That was the first time she ever smiled at him.

03.

Hiccup never knew which of their seemingly insignificant interactions marked the true beginning of their acquaintance. He wasn’t even sure, during that period of time, whether they could say they truly knew each other at all.

What he did know was this: whenever the sound of a window sliding open reached his ears, he would turn in his chair, almost instinctively, to find Merida leaning halfway out of her bedroom window.

Her eyes gleamed with a phosphorescent blue light that flashed briefly in the darkness, a signal of sorts. As always, Hiccup would nod—his silent promise to keep her secret. Then, with practiced ease, she would descend the tree outside her window and slip into the night.

He never asked where she went on those countless nights, just as he never asked when she planned to return. The next morning, without fail, she would step out of the DunBroch house as though nothing had happened, heading off to school like everyone else.

When he was younger, Hiccup used to wonder if she might be some kind of nocturnal sprite, belonging to the realm of the night.

He knew he was the only witness to her secret.

04.

By sophomore year, Merida DunBroch had become a legend at school.

Rumor had it that last year, she and a few others had snuck into the community pool at midnight for an all-night party, somehow evading the security guard. Others claimed she had smuggled fireworks into the winter carnival, setting off a spectacular display near the skating rink. There was even talk that she had gotten into a fistfight at a party in ninth grade with an upperclassman nearly a head taller than her.

Hiccup would occasionally spot her in the hallway, while she stood by the lockers with a group of friends. She wore a long-sleeved tank top under an oversized denim jacket, her black ripped skinny jeans tucked into combat boots. Draped over her shoulder was the arm of Macintosh, the star of the baseball team.

Everyone said the two of them had been dating since the start of the year. Rumor also had it that Macintosh had earned an athletic scholarship, and the couple was planning to attend the same college together.

No one knew if any of the stories were true. People always needed something to talk about, after all. Hiccup doubted Merida herself cared much about the gossip, though it was clear she had never once invited Macintosh over to her house.

In the crowded hallways, Hiccup occasionally saw Merida laughing so hard her shoulders shook. She would clutch her stomach, doubling over as if she could barely catch her breath. But her laughter was never directed at anything MacIntosh said. In fact, she rarely glanced in his direction.

Instead, her gaze would be fixed on the Thorston twins across the hall, who were busy scrawling ridiculous caricatures on each other’s faces with marker pens.

Hiccup didn’t put much stock in the rumors about her, nor did he care much for the other gossip circulating around school.

He did know one thing: Merida DunBroch had never seemed particularly interested in MacIntosh—or, for that matter, anyone else.

05.

Hiccup had once harbored a quiet crush on a girl in his physics class.

Astrid Hofferson was sharp-minded and captivating, her bright blue eyes brimming with emotions he could never quite decipher, sparking his endless curiosity. Her long golden hair, always neatly tied, shimmered under the sunlight, as if the universe had poured all its beauty into her. For a time, his gaze was irresistibly drawn to wherever she happened to be.

“Go talk to her.”

It was at a party hosted by the Thorston twins.

Their house was like an oversized Spanish villa, filled with chaos and neon-lit energy, from the crowded courtyard to the pulsating poolside, all drowning in a haze of music and voices.

Hiccup didn’t usually enjoy such hot, suffocating gatherings, where people, emboldened by alcohol, seemed desperate to act out of character. He hadn’t wanted to come despite the twins’ enthusiastic invitation. But he showed up—because she was there.

Astrid was always the center of attention, even without trying. That night, she sat idly on the staircase, and yet she stood out effortlessly amidst the chaos. Boys flocked to her, vying for her attention, but she remained composed, untouched by their antics, as though the world spun wildly around her, leaving her undisturbed.

“People can’t lie to themselves forever.”

A few seconds ago, Hiccup had seen Merida at the dining table, flipping cups in a drinking game with a group. Now, suddenly, she was in front of him, holding out a plastic cup as if daring him to take a drink and muster the courage to confess to Astrid.

Hiccup shook his head awkwardly.

He never imagined someone could so easily read his mind, but there she was. He scrambled internally for some argument to deny her claim, but before he could, Merida’s attention had already shifted elsewhere.

“Now pretend I just told you the funniest joke you’ve ever heard.”

He obeyed, though he didn’t understand why.

Merida drained her punch and stood with the casual air of someone who knew exactly what they were doing. Hiccup assumed this was part of some rivalry between her and Macintosh—a jealousy-fueled game. But then he remembered: no one had seen Macintosh at the party all night.

“See? You’ve got her attention now.”

Merida’s mischievous smile was impossible to miss, brimming with a sense of personal triumph. Hiccup glanced toward Astrid, still seated on the staircase. Though surrounded by admirers, her gaze seemed to linger in his direction.

“Do you think I should go talk to her now?”

“I bet she’ll come to you first.”

Hiccup felt like the quintessential lovestruck boy, unsure of himself, fumbling with his hands and suddenly self-conscious about his hair.

“How can you be so sure?”

The butterflies in his chest were in full frenzy when she leaned in and kissed him.

It was his first kiss, sweet with the lingering taste of punch and tinged with a fleeting chill, like the faint fragrance of roses in winter. Her hands rested lightly on his shoulders, the touch lasting barely three seconds—just like the kiss itself, fleeting and impossible to interpret.

For a moment, he caught a glimpse of himself reflected in her eyes, but as she stepped away, the reflection vanished along with her retreating silhouette.

“Consider this a thank-you for keeping my secret.”

She was right. People couldn’t lie to themselves forever.

Astrid, just as Merida had predicted, wandered over to him and struck up a conversation. For the rest of the night, Hiccup didn’t see Merida again at the party.

06.

He once had a black cat.

To be precise, he had tried to have it.

Hiccup named it Toothless after he first spotted it on the roof by Merida’s window. Its soft, dense fur made it look like a fluffy ball that had landed there by accident.

“I don’t think she’s home,” he murmured to the cat, a strange compulsion overtaking him. Those piercing, watchful eyes made him feel as though it were waiting for Merida.

The cat often loitered by Merida’s window. Though she didn’t seem like the type to keep a pet, Hiccup initially assumed it belonged to her. Eventually, he couldn’t stop himself from talking to it, leaving his room open, and preparing food for it.

At first, Hiccup could sense Toothless’ wariness. The food he left in the morning was usually untouched until he returned home in the afternoon. Toothless was like a freeloading marauder who vanished without notice. But Hiccup enjoyed this routine.

As time passed, Toothless began to warm up to him. It would lounge lazily by his window on sunny afternoons, unbothered by his touch.

Hiccup started to think of it as his and felt a deep satisfaction in their unspoken bond.

But then, Toothless’ visits became sporadic, and Hiccup worried it might’ve been scared off or harmed by a stray dog.

That day, the world was shrouded in leaden gray, and by afternoon, a heavy rain had begun to pour. Streets were empty except for the occasional pedestrian, and raindrops pattered loudly against car windows.

Hiccup had spent the entire morning searching for Toothless, but his efforts yielded nothing until he saw Merida emerging through the mist.

Raindrops pooled into streams that just covered the hems of her soaked brown trousers. She strolled leisurely through the downpour, holding Toothless securely in her arms, as if the rain didn’t exist.

Merida pulled the hood of her moss-green sweatshirt over her head. She noticed Hiccup standing across the street, her expression hesitant for the briefest moment as a flash of lightning illuminated her face.

“Toothless? What a peculiar name,” she remarked.

It turned out Merida didn’t know the cat. But they both recognized it.

Through Merida, Hiccup learned Toothless was called “Orion” by the café owner on East Street. To the ice cream vendor, it was “Cookie,” and to the basketball teens at the corner, it was an early audience member. The boy scouts down Sixth Avenue called it a witch’s messenger.

Merida explained that sometimes it silently followed her, neither begging for food nor making a sound. Perhaps its earlier interest in her window had been nothing more than a whim.

Toothless nestled comfortably in Hiccup’s arms as they reached Snoutlout Jorgenson’s house. Merida stopped and pulled something wrapped in newspaper from her damp backpack.

“What’s that?”

“A dead catfish.”

The torrential rain showed no sign of stopping. Tightening her hood, Merida shook a can of spray paint vigorously and started toward the bushes beside Snoutlout’s gray Corvette.

“Tell me you’re joking.”

Hiccup felt an ominous sense of foreboding. Yet he already knew Merida DunBroch was about to do something audacious.

“Normally, I don’t care who messes with my brothers,” she said, shaking the can as she stood before the car, “but anyone stupid enough to cross me deserves to pay for it.”

“Why do you hate him? I thought you were friends.”

“I’m friendly with a lot of people,” Merida replied with a smirk, “but Snoutlout’s just an arrogant jerk.”

Before Hiccup could respond, Merida mouthed for him to be ready. She hurled the catfish at Snoutlout’s second-floor window. The crash of shattering glass was followed by lights flickering on throughout the house.

The alarm blared. Hiccup found himself racing after Merida into the rain-soaked streets, their footsteps splashing through puddles as the blaring alarm receded into the distance.

07.

Merida’s expression was calm and natural, her breathing quickly recovering from the mad sprint. It was as if the past few heart-pounding minutes, so intense for Hiccup, had never existed in her life.

“If I were you, I’d be careful not to get too attached,” she said.

Merida walked to the lit porch, pulling back her hood and peeling off her sticky sweatshirt. She tugged at the T-shirt underneath to keep it from clinging to her damp skin.

As she wrung the rainwater from her hair, she cast a quick glance at Toothless cradled in his arms. Only after she disappeared into the DunBroch household did Hiccup realize what she meant.

He had known all along.

Hearing so many different names for Toothless made it impossible to deceive himself any longer—this stray cat was never truly his. Deep down, he realized that the thought of keeping a creature like Toothless had been unrealistic from the start.

Every animal has its instincts.

And when offered the entire world, why would it choose to stay with him?

08.

Merida didn’t even attend her high school prom.

No one knew where she went, or in which direction she had disappeared.

Hiccup did, though. He knew she had been saving up in secret to buy a Harley-Davidson. Sometimes, he overheard her arguing with Mrs. DunBroch through the window, her thick Scottish accent sharp with defiance. But everyone understood—nothing could stifle her wild, untamed spirit.

She would often throw on Mr. DunBroch’s old black leather jacket, straddle the roaring engine of her motorcycle, and let its growl carry her through starlit nights. She tore through the dusty streets of the small town, a blazing streak of freedom.

Though they were never truly friends, whenever Hiccup heard the fading hum of her bike vanishing into the distance, he knew she was slipping further away from him.

She would ride day and night, diving headfirst into horizons he could only dream of. Her eyes shone with a vitality he could only envy, consumed by the journey, unconcerned with looking back.

When she returned, dismounting her bike and letting her fiery curls tumble free, she never glanced his way. She didn’t even notice he was there.

Her nighttime escapades grew more frequent, and each time she disappeared into the darkness, it left Hiccup with the haunting feeling that she might never return.

09.

So, when Merida leaned out of the window across from his one evening, it was the first time Hiccup dared to speak to her in that moment.

She sat perched on the windowsill, legs tucked up, their faces separated only by the thin glass pane. Time seemed to freeze as they stared at each other, taking him back to the first night he’d seen her escape.

The difference this time? She extended a hand to him.

“I can’t give you the answer you want,” she said, a faint smile tugging at her lips. “But you can see for yourself.”

The slight curve of her mouth shattered every doubt Hiccup had held onto. Without hesitation, he took the red-haired sprite’s hand and became her accomplice.

There was no going back now.

Merida had received a Lexus for her sixteenth birthday, but she’d lend it to her brothers instead. They parked it at the edge of the driveway, its gleaming crimson exterior a shade deeper than her fiery hair.

Sliding into the driver’s seat, she softly revved the engine, steering the car into the dark corridors he had only observed from afar.

They ventured into the lively East District, a perpetual carnival of neon-lit bars and restaurants. The windows blurred with streaks of colorful lights, transforming into a kaleidoscope of vibrant hues against the city’s eternal darkness.

The saxophone melodies of a bookstore owner echoed between fire escapes, met by the distant trumpet of a street performer. The sizzle of food on hot pans filled the air, mingling with the smoky allure of an underground bar hidden behind a tropical rainforest facade.

Under the gaze of starlight, she led him to the rooftop of an old apartment building, where an artist with a lavender beret captured the rust-free nightscape with her brush.

“For now,” she exhaled, “this world is yours.”

Hiccup looked down at the sea of lights below—glittering intersections, pulsing streetlamps, and a city veiled in a faint, dreamlike mist.

10.

Merida steered toward the ink-black strait.

Hiccup rolled down the car window, letting the thick, humid night air whip across his face. The breeze tossed Merida’s untamed red hair as she stared ahead, driving through the tranquil night as if it belonged to her alone.

They stopped by the beach. Merida kicked off her shoes, tossing aside her jacket before running toward the moonlit waves.

She dove into the shimmering sea, fully immersing herself before calling out to him, urging him to join her.

She splashed water his way, drenching his shirt until it clung to his skin, and he retaliated by soaking her fiery curls.

“Have you ever seen anything so breathtaking?” she asked, her voice breaking through the sound of the crashing waves.

From her jacket, she pulled out a pack of cigarettes. The flicker of her lighter struggled against the sea breeze until Hiccup shielded it with his hands, igniting a fragile flame in the night.

The briny air mingled with the faint aroma of tobacco. Smoke swirled and dispersed above them as she tilted her head skyward, her gaze lost in the expanse of stars.

“Not everyone sneaks out at night like you,” he teased, watching her from the corner of his eye.

“Do you always come here?”

She shrugged with a mischievous grin. “This is just the tip of the iceberg. See those stars?”

He followed her gaze upward as her voice and the waves blended into a soothing rhythm.

“Everyone’s desperate to belong. Everyone’s fighting to own everything.”

They stared at the distant horizon, where the shoreline met the night sky. Her shoulder brushed his, their hands nearly touching.

“No one likes an uncontrollable gamble,” she said, exhaling a plume of smoke. “When I moved here, people stayed away because they were afraid of something different. Then, almost overnight, everyone wanted to stand out. And I became an easy target—something to gossip about over dinner.”

“Even MacIntosh?”

“He’s just the son of my parents’ old friends,” she replied bluntly, extinguishing her cigarette. “I’ve never belonged to him.”

For the first time, Hiccup felt completely at ease.

They lay on the sand beneath the stars, her arm draped over him, her head resting on his shoulder. The city lights flickered faintly in the distance, and he could feel her breath against his neck.

Maybe they could stay like that forever, suspended in this fleeting dream, until dawn crept in to shatter its fragile reality.

For now, the dream was real.

11.

“We are too difficult to define and far too insignificant,” Merida said, gazing at the starry night above and the sandy beach beneath them. Just as no one knows where the edge of the universe truly ends, no one can count the grains of sand at the shore.

“That’s precisely why the world is worth exploring, isn’t it?”

It’s hard for people to truly understand one another. Hiccup understood this well, so he never presumed to decipher all her actions. Perhaps she wanted to embrace the vastness of the world, or maybe she was seeking a force grander and more irresistible than herself. But he didn’t care, because none of it really mattered.

Merida told him she always knew he would one day step into the serenity of this night as well.

They were, after all, the same kind of people—rebellious at their core, untamed, and unbound by rules. She knew that once he took the first step, he would fall in love with this feeling and, like her, be unable to resist.

“From now on, everything will be different, won’t it?”

She didn’t answer.

He took her hand again, interlocking their fingers. She tightened her grip in response.

Under the night sky, Merida’s blue eyes shimmered with light. At that moment, she looked astonishingly beautiful. Her soaked jeans clung to her legs, and it seemed as though the entire starry sea was etched into her gaze.

Hiccup knew he would, like this wild, untamed girl, crave more nights like these from now on.

12.

She turned off the car’s headlights and slowly pulled into the DunBroch driveway.

Merida brushed off the remnants of sand on her clothes and softly bid him goodnight, even though they had returned at the brink of dawn.

She took his hand, only to release it a moment later, then turned toward the old oak tree between their two windows.

For a brief moment, Hiccup was struck by the illusion of her walking away alone into the night. A wave of profound loneliness seemed to spill from her retreating figure, surging toward him in an instant.

His throat tightened, and he called out to her with the first thought that came to mind.

“I love you.”

His calm eyes met hers, and the words slipped out as naturally as if he were saying a simple goodnight.

Those three words lingered in Merida’s ears. Her brief daze quickly turned into a flicker of emotion in her eyes as she turned back toward him and embraced him.

Hiccup felt her rise on tiptoe, her lips near his ear, speaking each word with deliberate clarity. “I love you too, Hiccup. I always have.”

Her lips hovered so close to his.

Hiccup felt like they were in an old film, where the scene slowed frame by frame. Every small detail stood out and magnified: the raw emotion in her gaze, the faint smile in her whispered words. “But that doesn’t mean we belong to each other.”

“I don’t belong to anyone, you know that—because neither do you.”

Her reply didn’t surprise him. He knew it, especially after a night like this, where every thought bristled with an unsettling certainty.

He saw the weariness she tried to hide in her eyes—not from their night at the beach, but something deeper, something long buried. His words had only given it an outlet.

“But I’ll remember this night,” she said.

Hiccup wasn’t as shocked or disappointed as he thought he might be. Her words were imbued with her unique style—a distinct, inimitable signature of Merida DunBroch.

She could be a captivating question mark, as well as an ouroboros, an endless, open-ended conclusion.

At least the weight in his chest had lifted, and at least they understood each other now.

He felt her smile before she let go and stepped back, one step at a time. Finally, she raised her eyebrows, her figure glowing in the growing sunlight. She made a shushing gesture—the same one from when they first met.

He shrugged and nodded back at her, knowing how much she trusted him with that gesture.

He watched as she climbed the tree, landing on the roof outside her second-floor bedroom. She gently pushed open the window, slipped inside, and closed the curtains behind her.

13.

That window was never opened by the same person again.

From that day forward, Merida DunBroch vanished as though she had evaporated into thin air. No one in town ever saw the proud, free-spirited red-haired girl again—not even her Harley, which disappeared along with her.

The DunBroch parents were convinced she had left unannounced for Scotland yet again. Her triplet brothers claimed she had joined a legendary biker gang, riding as a daylight knight in distant towns.

Some townsfolk swore they’d seen her playing with bears at the zoo, while others insisted she was working as an archery coach on a ranch in the northern suburbs. But in the end, no one truly knew where she was, and no one had proof.

Maybe everyone was right, Hiccup thought. After all, her untamable spirit could never be confined or defined.

Since that night, he often returned to the bustling East District under the cover of darkness, savoring the damp seaside air and the endless unknowns just beyond distant streets.

He believed her when she said she would miss that night, because it often drifted into his mind too.

Though it was a pity they couldn’t explore the awe-inspiring edges of the night together, he didn’t dwell too much on the sadness.

Yet sometimes, in the middle of the night, he would wake and see the starry sky silently sparkling outside his window.

There, by the windowsill, he’d find a crumpled note marked with scribbles from a red marker. On it was a familiar, unidentifiable doodle, with a single bright red “M” etched in the corner.

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