Mericcup Week 2015, Day 1
“When you realise you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.” (When Harry Met Sally)
Over the years, when he comes to visit the Dunbroch castle, the roof has become their favourite haunt. There is an unspoken claim laid on the rustic stones and the breathtaking view of the expanse of the sky by the two, one which everyone in the castle knows of.
So Hiccup is right where she expects him to be when she bursts through the door.
He wheels around at the sound of the wooden door and its clunky metal handle crashing against the stone wall, to find Merida standing there, shoulders rising and falling with heaving breaths.
She doesn’t say anything at first. Rather, she looks at him for a moment - just looks at him.
And then, oddly enough, she turns to close the door carefully. He almost wants to laugh at the irony of it all.
She turns back around to face him again. Silence lulls between them for a while, with nothing but the distant screech of an eagle and the quiet hush of the loch.
“Do you know,” she says, very carefully, “what I saw today?”
He says nothing, only keeps looking at her. Which both of them know well enough signals him listening. He’s good at that.
“I was just doing my usual run in the forest - usually you’re there but today you weren’t, for some reason - taking Angus for a ride, shooting at my targets. Then suddenly, something dropped when I hit the last target! I thought I’d accidentally shot a bird!”
The corner of his mouth twitches, and she doesn’t miss it.
“And do you know,” she continues, still watching him, “what it was?”
Still he says nothing.
This time she takes several steps forward, closing the distance between them - too near to be considered far, but too far to hold. All the while, she reaches into the quiver slung over her back, and pulls out a white piece of cloth with a large, clumsy knot at the top.
With eyes almost forcefully focusing on the white cloth, she fumbles with undoing the knot. Then she takes something small into her hand, and lets the cloth fall onto the stone floor.
Slowly, with a very un-Merida-like delicacy, she unfurls her fingers.
