How to Train Your Dragon Book 7: How to Ride a Dragon's Storm by Cressida Cowell

How to Ride aDragon’s Storm

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANYNew York Boston

by Cressida Cowell

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PROLOGUE: THE CURSE OFBEARCUB’S GRANDMOTHER

A long time ago, a small boy was dreaming.He was dreaming of running through the

beautiful white wilderness that was his childhood home,running and running through snow so perfect you couldhardly bear to touch it. But suddenly his legs grew tiredand so heavy he could hardly move them . . .Something was pulling him back . . . What was it?

And then he awoke and opened his eyes, and hewas about as far from home as he could possibly be,

lying in the darkness below the decks of agreat ship.The boy was called Bearcub. He

belonged to a people called the NorthernWanderers, and he had not always been a slave.

Only two weeks before, he had had miles and miles ofglorious icy desert to play in, as free as the polar bearsand seals that his people harpooned to eat and keepthem warm.

But then the Vikings came.They had surprised the Wanderers by attacking

while they were asleep, dragging them aboard theirViking ships and taking them away from their

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homeland. Since that time, Bearcub had not had aproper meal, and worse still for a boy full of fidgetsand used to running, he hadn’t taken more than acouple of steps.

Bearcub’s father had been out on a hunting partywhen the Vikings struck, so he had not been captured.

“Please, father,” Bearcub whispered into theblackness. “Save me, father . . .”

“HA!” rasped the doom-filled furious voice ofBearcub’s scary grandmother, who was lying chainedbeside him. “Your father cannot rescue you, for hedoes not know where you are. And the gods must haveforgotten us, to let this happen. Vikings are vermin,every single one of them,” she spat into the darkness.“I never met a good one. Murderous, wicked, evilpeople . . . Oh if I had one here, I would do such things.I could eat their livers, I really could. I am Cursingthis voyage and everyone aboard this ship . . .”

“WE are aboard this ship,” Bearcub pointed out.“Do not Curse this voyage or you may be Doomingus too.”

“YOU do not contradict your elders and betters,”cried his grandmother sternly. (It is not pleasant tobe chained to a Cursing grandmother.) “We areDOOMED already . . . No, the only thing left for us

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now is to Hate and to Curse . . .”And so Bearcub’s grandmother had ALL of the

Wanderers Hating, and Cursing, and wanting to eatpeople’s livers, baying out their fury in the rockingdarkness below the decks of the ship.

“YOU BETTER WATCH YOUR STEP UP THERE!”screamed Bearcub’s grandmother, howling up at theceiling like a wolf. “IF ONE OF YOU MISSES YOURFOOTING AND FALLS DOWN THAT HATCH, I’MTELLING YOU, WE’LL TEAR YOU APART!”

Only Bearcub was quiet, and in the blackness noone could see the tears slowly rolling down his cheeks,which was lucky, because Wanderers have the hearts ofpolar bears and they do not cry.

And inside his head he repeated over and overagain, “Please, father, please,help me . . . please, gods,please, please, help me . . .please . . . anybody . . . ifyou’re listening . . . helpme . . . help me . . .help me . . .”

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1. A PROPER VIKINGSWIMMING RACE

One chilly spring day in the Barbaric Archipelago,Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third, the Hopeand Heir to the Tribe of the Hairy Hooligans, wasstanding miserably on the West Beach of theMurderous Mountains with absolutely nothing on buthis helmet, his sword, his waistcoat, and a teeny-weenypair of hairy swimming trunks.

The Murderous Mountains were not the kind ofplace you wanted to visit at the best of times. Theygave Hiccup the shivers. The tall, cruel-looking,dizzyingly high peaks were home to some unspeakablydangerous dragons and mutant wolves, not to mentionthe Murderous Tribe, the fiercest and most ruthlessVikings in the uncivilized world.

The Murderous Tribe did not often receive visitors.Perhaps it was their uncomfortable habit of sacrificingunwelcome intruders to the Sky Dragons at the summitof Mount Murderous that kept people at bay.

But on this occasion, Madguts the Murderoushad taken it into his head to be hospitable, and to invitetwo of the other Tribes, the Hairy Hooligans and theBog-Burglars, over to his island for a jolly little

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Intertribal Friendly Swimming Race. It was a traditional Viking Swimming Race, and

the Vikings were a little bit crazy, so they were goingswimming with their weapons on: swords, axes,daggers, that sort of thing.

It did not seem to have occurred to them thatthis would make them less floaty.

So there they were, the entire Warriorpopulations of the Murderous, Hooligan, and Bog-Burglar Tribes, hopping up and down on theuncomfortable gravel beach, trying to pretend they


weren’t freezing their horns off, with the mutantwolves howling cheeringly up in the mountains above.

There was a strong easterly wind that broughtgoose bumps to Hiccup’s skinny, freckled arms andwhisked off helmets, cloaks, and swords, and sentthem bowling briskly down the beach. Hiccup’stiny hunting dragon, Toothless, washaving difficulty flying withoutbeing blown away.


Toothlesswas a particularlysmall Commonor Garden

dragon with large,innocent greengage eyes.

“Toothless w-w-wouldn’t go swimming today ifToothless was you,” he advised Hiccup. “Is very ch-ch-chilly in there. Toothless has been in already and itnearly froze Toothless’s wings off.”

“Yes, thank you, Toothless,” said Hiccup.(Hiccup was one of the very few Vikings, before orsince, who could speak Dragonese, the language inwhich the dragons speak to each other.) “Very helpful,I’ll bear that in mind.”

Gobber the Belch, the teacher in charge of thePirate Training Program on Berk, had stripped down

to his underwear and was breathingin the gale as if it were the

loveliest of summer breezes.“Lovely swimming weather!”he roared delightedly,beating his chest with hisfist like a great redheaded


gorilla. “Gather round andstand at attention, boys, and I’llexplain the Rules of the Race . . .”

The twelve boys stoodbefore their teacher in ashivering line.

“Now, boys!” boomedGobber. “A proper Viking Swimming Raceis not like those pathetic little competitions they carry outon the mainland. It is a test of your ENDURANCE, yourSTRENGTH, and your SUICIDAL BRAVERY . . .”

“Oh brother,” moaned Hiccup’s best friend,Fishlegs, who was the only boy in the Program whowas even worse than Hiccup at all the Viking activities.He had legs as limp as two strings of spaghetti, and hecouldn’t swim. “I don’t like the sound of this . . .”

“In a proper Viking Swimming Race,” continuedGobber, “the winner is the person who is LAST.”

There were gasps of surprise, and “Oh sir, please,sir, that can’t be right, sir,” from the line of boys.

“In which case,” sneered Snotface Snotlout, agreat bullying brute of a boy whose muscular armswere covered entirely in skeleton tattoos, “Hiccup theUseless will win, no problem. He’s always the lastat everything . . .”

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Hiccup stood on one leg, tried to smile, and fellover in the sand.

“Aha,” grinned Gobber, his beard bristling withkeenness. He laid one finger to his nose. “But thinkcarefully about this, boys . . . We all set out from thebeach and start swimming, and from then on it’s agame of Chicken. Who can swim out the farthest, thelongest, into the deepest ocean, and still return? Manyare the Warriors over the centuries who in their pridehave misjudged the swim BACK, and who havedrowned as a consequence . . .”

“Oh yippee . . .” moaned Fishlegs.“But on the plus side, anyone who drowns in the

course of a Swimming Race will automatically gostraight to Valhalla.” Gobber smiled in the manner ofsomeone giving everybody a great big birthdaypresent.


“Ooooooooooooh,”exclaimed the boys in apleased way.

“MAD,” groanedFishlegs, swaying in the windlike a small, skinny treeabout to snap. “We are theonly sane people in aTribe of totalLOONIES.”


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“Any questions?” roared Gobber.Hiccup put up his hand. “A small point, sir.

Won’t we freeze to death in about five minutes?”“Don’t be a softy!” roared Gobber. “The

Blubberwing fat you have rubbed all over youSHOULD keep you warm enough to prevent actualDEATH . . . but it’s all part of the game, of course.Can you use your skill and judgment to stay out longenough to win the Race . . . but not SO LONG thatyou freeze to death?”

Gobber walked up and down the line of boys,inspecting them before they went out to join thecompetition. “Very smart, Snotlout . . . Chin up, TuffnuttJunior . . . Haven’t you forgotten something, Clueless?”

“I’ve got my sword, sir,” said Clueless.“You do have your sword,” admitted Gobber,

“but you DO NOT have your swimming costume. Putit on quick, boy . . . I don’t think that Thor will bewelcoming you into Valhalla in the nude. It reallydoesn’t bear thinking about . . .”

He moved along the line until he stopped deadin front of Fishlegs. “WHAT,” roared Gobber in anawful voice, “WHAT in Thor’s name are THESE?”

“Armbands, sir,” replied Fishlegs, looking straightahead.


“Fishlegs can’t swim, sir,” offered Hiccup indefense of his best friend. “So we made him these outof a couple of pig bladders. Otherwise he sinks likea stone.”

“Like a stone,” repeated Fishlegs helpfully.“Oh for Woden’s sake,” blustered Gobber, “what

are the Murderous Tribe going to think if they catchsight of THOSE? I’ll lend you my cloak, Fishlegs, andyou can drape it over them, and let’s just hope nobodynotices. Thor, give me strength . . .”

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“Now, have all of you got your hunting dragons?”bellowed Gobber.

The boys had brought their hunting dragons.They were huddled on the beach, their wings overtheir heads, shielding themselves from the rain.

“Your hunting dragon can fly over your head asyou swim. It makes you easier to spot from the beach,and they can maybe fight off any predators . . . sharks,Darkbreathers, that sort of thing . . . OK, you can fallout now and get ready, and I’ll see you at the startingline in about five minutes.”

The boys began their last-minute preparations,chattering excitedly.

“Hi there, LOSERS,” sneered Snotlout, a tall,mean boy with nostrils so large you could stick acucumber up them (Toothless had actually DONE thisonce) and with the repellent beginnings of a mustachesprouting on his upper lip like a little, hairy caterpillar.“I hope little baby Hiccup has been practicing his dogpaddle then . . .”

He gave Hiccup a big shove that sent himsprawling in the sand.

“Har, har, har . . . ,” snorted Dogsbreath theDuhbrain, Snotlout’s equally unpleasant sidekick.Dogsbreath looked rather like a gorilla in goggles who

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had been overdoing it with the doughnuts.“Very funny, Snotlout,” replied Hiccup, spitting

sand out of his mouth.“You guys are normally so good at coming in

last . . .” sneered Snotlout. “In fact this may be your onlyopportunity ever to come in FIRST, for once . . . Justtry and at least go out of your depth, won’t you, beforeyou crawl back to the beach like the pathetic, cowardly,little plankton you are? You don’t want to embarrass usPROPER Hooligans more than you actually have to . . .Nice armbands, Fishlegs, by the way . . .”

And Dogsbreath took the pot of slimy greenBlubberwing goo Fishlegs was holding in his hands andpoured it over Fishlegs’s head before strolling off withSnotlout, who had a rather base sense of humor andwas laughing so hard he could barely walk.

“I hope aDarkbreather gets him,”said Fishlegsgloomily,taking off hisglasses andtrying torub off theBlubberwing


fat with the edge of his swimsuit, but only succeedingin smearing it all over the glass so that they wereimpossible to see through.

“It would just spit him out again,” replied Hiccupeven more gloomily, trying to rub the sand off himselfbut completely failing because the Blubberwing fat wasso sticky. “I bet he tastes horrible.”

PAAAAA-AARAAAP!A musician from the Murderous Tribe sounded

the horn to summon the competitors to gather for thebeginning of the Swimming Race . . .


Copyright © 2008 by Cressida Cowell

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of thispublication may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted in any form or by any means, or storedin a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Little, Brown and Company

Hachette Book Group237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017Visit our website at www.lb-kids.com

Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

First U.S. Trade Paperback Edition: June 2011First U.S. Hardcover Edition: July 2010First published in Great Britain in 2008 by Hodder Children’s Books

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons,living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cowell, Cressida.How to ride a dragon’s storm : the heroic misadventures of Hiccup the Viking / as told to

Cressida Cowell. — 1st U.S. ed.p. cm.

Summary: Hiccup, the reluctant Viking hero, has three months, five days, and six hours todiscover America, return to Berk, save his father, battle Polar-serpents, and win the annual Inter-Tribal Friendly Swimming Race.

ISBN 978-0-316-07916-7 (hc) / 978-0-316-07909-9 (pb)1. Vikings—Juvenile fiction. [1. Vikings—Fiction. 2. Dragons—Fiction. 3. Humorous stories.]

I. Title. PZ7.C83535Hmr 2010[Fic]—dc22

2010012795

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

RRD-C

Printed in the United States of America

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How to Train Your Dragon Book 7: How to Ride a Dragon's Storm by Cressida Cowell

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