Hey guys!! I just started a new book called The Monsters In All of Us!! Please please check it out!! I hope it's good!!
"Shhhhh! Quiet girls," Phlegma calls. And the sound instantly diminishes. We face forward in our line. "Girls. No matter who he may choose or what may happen tonight, you are all princesses to me. I'm very honored to have spent this time together. Please be on good behavior. After the ball, you will return to your rooms. Don't forget we have the palace polo game with the prince tomorrow." And with that, she nods, turning and opening the doors.

My heart stops and my stomach clenches in complete fear and wonder. The music floods out, hitting our ears first. I hear chattering and see tons of people. A trumpet blows and the music softens. "May I introduce Phlegma Dondy!" a man calls. People clap as she walks out into the ball room, leaving us alone. I can't see too well through all the other heads,but I can tell the full view will be breath taking.  "introducing Ingrid Thorman! Top student of the academy." She takes a deep breath, straitens herself, and walks forward. "Introducing Jamie Dawes!" the man says once the clapping dies down again.

As the girls go out, I'm able to see better. There's tons of people I don't know, including noble boys. I notice Snotlout standing near the food, but he's the only one I recognize. "Do you see Hiccup?" I ask Heather, in front of me.

"No," she says, quietly.

"I don't see Eret either!" Ruff calls, further up.

"Shhhh!" the remaining girls hiss.

When Heather is the next person to go out, I feel like I'm gonna pass out or throw up or both. I just hope I don't do it in the middle of my walk. "Heather Berserker!" the man calls. She smiles at me, excitement in her eyes. And then she's gone too, and I'm left alone for a little bit. "Astrid Hofferson!" I move forward, taking deep drawn out breaths. I square my shoulders, straiten my back, lift my head high, and begin walking. I wipe my sweaty hands on my dress and place them on the skirt. I scan the room for Hiccup again as I make my way to the other girls, but i don't see him. Even Snotlout is gone now. I take my place beside Heather, looking at the king and queen in their fancy chairs. The king is bent forward, stroking his beard like he's contemplating whether we are right for his son or not. His wife seems calm as she sits strait up and smiling. I could see myself drinking tea in the afternoons with her and planning balls together. "Now, introducing the prince!" the man continues. And it's like the world stops, dragging out the wait. A door at the top of a set of stairs opens and the tip of a shoe becomes visible. This is is. This is what we've been waiting so long for....And when he finally steps out at the top of the stairs, my jaw hits the ground.... "Prince Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third!"

"I found him," Heather whispers to me. I nod. "You had no clue, did you?" I shake my head.

I watch him descend the stairs, quickly. He's wearing a green tunic instead of red, and he's wearing nicer boots, but his hair is the same (messy) and the braids are still in. He comes to stand in front of us, the king and queen meeting him. I catch his eye as he passes by, going to stand in the middle, but he doesn't do anything. It suddenly all clicks together in that one moment of eye contact. He was always around. Granted, so were Snotlout and Eret, but Lout's family and Eret is a close friend. And the, when Snotlout said he was the prince's cousin before elbowing Hiccup. The way Phlegma and other palace workers were so nice to him and could never really get on to him. The way he talked about the prince. He never talked badly about anyone, besides the price because it was himself. How he could relate to the prince over father problems. It all makes sense now. How had I so easily missed the connections? And I suddenly felt betrayed. How could he have not told me the most important bit of information about himself? He knows I wouldn't have told anyone. I sat on the other side of a door trying to comfort him while he cried. Why wouldn't he just let me in? He knew it was me. Was it for pride? I guess it doesn't matter much anymore. This is now. I stare at the ground, biting my lip. The other girls are just as shocked, sneaking glances at me every now and then.

"Welcome, young ladies. We are so glad you could join us. You may call me Stoick, and tis is my wife, Valka. I just wanted to say good luck to each of you," the king says. He and his wife bow and curtsey, and we return the gesture. "Let the first dance begin!" he adds, escorting the queen back to their thrones.

Ingrid steps forward nervously, glancing at me. I offer her a smile, and she relaxes, grinning back. Hiccup holds out his hand and leads her to the middle of the floor. I can't hear what they are saying, but by the looks on their faces, she must be apologizing about something. I assume it's about the nasty things she said about him at the spring that night. After that, they seem to enjoy themselves.

"Hello, Heather," Snotlout says, standing in front of her. "Would you care to dance?" he asks. She looks at me, panicked. I shrug like, 'what can you do'. 

"I guess," she answers.

"Hey, Sweets," a short, dark haired boy says to me.

"Uh," I say, grossed out.

"Wanna dance?" he asks, wriggling his eyebrows.

"How old are you?" I ask.

"Sixteen," he tells me, proudly.

"Um..."

"Why don't you go dance with one of them?" Eret cuts in, pointing to the sixteen-year-old girls of our group.

"But-"

"Gustav...."

"Fine. Whatever. But I'll be back, Babe," he tells me. I roll my eyes.

"Thanks for saving me."

"No problem," he smiles. "Do you want to dance Blondie?" he asks.

"I would love to, but there's this really beautiful girl that would be so happy to dance with you," I say, pointing at Ruff. He thinks about it, nods his head, and walks over to her. I watch the couples dance in the center as I lean against the wall, waiting my turn to dance with the prince. When Heather's done dancing, she comes to stand by me. "Who's that?" I ask her, pointing to a tall, red head with a tattoo.

"That's Dagur. My brother," she syas in obvious disgust.

"Really?!" I exclaim in total shock.

"Yeah. That's his girlfriend that he's with. Elizabeth Samantha. She must be just as deranged as he is in order to want to be in a relationship with him," she tells me, shaking her head.  I laugh at her, amused.

After about an hour, I sit down at a table with Ingrid and Cami to eat some food. "He was a really good dancer," Ingrid tells me. "And he's very polite and forgiving."

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," I say, picking the crust off of my roll.

"It was much better than those times in the room. He wasn't making up his own moves," Cami adds, trying to help lighten my glum mood.

"I just can't believe he didn't tell me."

"I'm sure he had a good reason," Ingrid reassures me, patting my hand. "Besides. You need to go enjoy yourself. You haven't danced with anyone."

"I agree," a deep voice cuts in. I turn around to se Hiccup, Heather beside him. "May I have this dance M'lady?" he asks, holding out his hand, a crooked smile on his face. I place mine in his and he leads me to the center of the dance floor. I can feel the eyes of all the girls on us as we dance. I can tell Hiccup feels it too. "I want you to enjoy this evening. This is your first ball," he says as we turn.

"You lied to me," I whisper.

"I didn't lie to you. I said I was a noble, which I am. I said I was required to be here too, which I was," he defends, casually, and it irritates me. 

This is a big deal. Why is he not acting like it's a big deal? I furrow my brows, my emotions building up until I finally explode the hurt I've been bottling up inside all night. "You don't think you should have told me?!" I blurt out, breaking away from him. I can feel every eye in the room pinned on us. especially Phlegma and the king and queen, because I doubt shouting at the prince is very lady-like.

"Astrid. Just calm down," he says, gesturing with his hands and glancing around the room at the people watching.

"Oh, am i embarrassing you?" I ask, not caring in the slightest. He humiliated me in front of the whole academy. Now, I'm gonna humiliate him. "You can't keep secrets like that and just expect someone to be ok with it. I cared about you. Both of you. I kept no secrets. I trusted you. Thought you trusted me too, but I guess I was wrong. Blinded by my own feelings." He's quiet, staring at the ground. I shake my head and walk away.

"Astrid, wait!" he calls, grabbing my arm. I yank it away, walking faster, heading toward the balcony in need of fresh air. I know he's following me, because I can hear the clanking of his metal foot on the tiles. "Astrid, wait," he says breathlessly, grasping on to door frame that leads out to the balcony. "Please. Just let me explain." I glance at him, my brows creased in anger. "Please," he begs, his eyes wild and his knuckles turning white from gripping the doorway too hard. I plop down on a bench, my arms crossed, waiting. He takes a breath to relax himself and walks toward me. He sits down beside me, but leaves space between us. "I know you are wanting a worthy explanation. A good enough reason for what I did, but I can't give that to you. My reasons are stupid. But, I'll give them to you anyway, because it's the truth." I look up at him, my face softening, ready to listen. He sighs, and meets my eyes. "The truth is, I'm weak. My intentions started out right. In the beginning, I didn't tell you because I didn't want to be the prince. I didn't want you to treat me differently. You were my first new friend in like fifteen years. I wanted you to act like you would with any regular person. I wanted to be just a guy. If you had know, you would have acted differently. You would have acted all polite and used proper communication skills, like curtseying and calling me 'your highness' and been afraid to hurt my feelings or make me mad or touch me in fear of getting in trouble because that's inappropriate or not allowed or you'd get kicked out. I was gonna tell you the day you told me we couldn't hangout anymore and you ran away. But, once we were hanging out again, I didn't want to jeopardize what we had since it was just getting going again. And then there was the night you stumbled in on my little self-pity party. And, I knew I couldn't tell you after that. I was a coward. I didn't want you to think little of me. Think I was pathetic and realize I'm not the happy-go-lucky person you know. I guess I kind of messed that up when we had our fight. I just didn't want you to think badly of me. I'm already physically weak. I didn't want you to know I was mentally weak too.  I messed up. And i'm sorry." His eyes lock with mine, and their glassy as he struggles to keep the tears in. I wipe my own at the tragedy of it all. My anger morphing into sadness. "I'm truly sorry Astrid. I wont ask you to forgive me. That wouldn't be fare."

I smile, swiping at my tears. "I forgive you though."

"Why?"

"I get it. You wanted to be somebody different. Somebody better. That's what I wanted whn I came here. But, you can't change who you are. But, you can change what you do with yourself instead. Like being a great and compassionate king." He nods, giving me a sad smile, and I reach out, placing my hand on his arm. I swipe at my tears again. When I pull my hand away, there are mascara stains on my fingers. "Oh, no. My makeup's running," I say worried I messed it up.  Hiccup watches me rub the black off my hand.

"You look beautiful tonight," he tells me.

I look up startled. "What?" I breathe.

"You look beautiful," he says again, with as much meaning as the first time. He smiles softly at me, his cheeks turning red, though it's kinda hard to see in the darkness, with the only light coming from the ball room. And I realize that when Hiccup looks at someone, he really looks at them, and it makes me blush. he's the first boy to ever tell me I was beautiful.

"Thank you. Though, I think all of my makeup is gone now."

"Eh," he shrugs. "I still would have thought you were beautiful if you were wearing rags and covered in mud." I let out a laugh, feeling better. "Do you maybe want to go inside?" he asks, ready to stand up. "it's kinda chilly out here and I still owe you a dance, whether I'm Hiccup or the prince.... Wait. Does that mean I owe you two dances, then?" I laugh, pushing him in the shoulder. I get to my feet,looping my arm through his.

"I'll be right back," he says, once we are inside again.

"Are you ok?" Ruff asks, hurrying up to me.

"Yeah. We talked it over. All fixed." She nods, and we watch Hiccup talk to the band. On his way back, the music begins. Ruff and I share a look, recognizing it. He holds out his hand to me, and we go out to the floor. "You didn't!" I shout over the music. (not lady-like)

"But I did!" The king and queen sit up in their chairs. I don't know if it's because I'm back and dancing with the prince, or because they don't recognize the song. "I told you my dance was gonna be a hit. ."

"that's not possible. Your dances are just random silliness."

He shrugs. "Ok, so it's not a hit. I only taught it to the band because I thought you'd get a kick out of it."

"You are a witty one, Hiccup Haddock," I tell him.

He smiles bowing. "May i have this dance M'lady?" he asks, using the same fake norse accent he did the first time we did this dance in the room.

"Why of course you may." I curtsey. We both know the cheesy dance by heart already, so our movements are smooth. Sashay around five times and turn and trade partners, and my friends are there by this point. "Hey, Heather," I say as we sashay together.

"Hey!" she says. I look at Ruff with Hiccup, and Cami trying to teach Ingrid the movements. Everyone else, not knowing the dance is watching, smiling and clapping along to the rhythm. Even the king and queen.  When I'm back to Hiccup, the beat has sped up some.

"So, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third, huh?" I tease.

"We can't all be the Fearless Astrid Hofferson," he says.

"I still can't believe your making me do this dance!"

"Just wait. After this, it will be a crowd favorite." And for some reason, this makes me laugh. And I lean back in a fit, lost in the moment. I know a lady covers her mouth when she laughs, but I want everyone to see the joy on my face.

And of course, Hiccup decides to pull his favorite stunt, which he knows always knocks the breath out of me. As we turn, he yanks hard on my arm, spinning me. It completely throws me for a loop (no pun intended lol), surprising me, and making me dizzy. I smack into his chest, hard, the music returning to what they were playing previously. I look up at him, blinking quickly to reorient myself, my hands between our chests. I suck in air trying to stop my heart from exploding, and I swear it does when he kisses me. In front of everyone.

Heyy! Read chapter Co. Ed next ( chapter got out of order sorry)