For the next week Hiccup sat by the barred window looking out for his father's War Party.
Toothless came and sat on Hiccup's head. This was a familiar ritual to both of them, as it was Toothless's usual seat when Hiccup was dragon watching at the Wild Dragon Cliffs. Hiccup would draw and write in his Dragonese book, while Toothless perched on his head, one eye shut, the other half open, watching out for careless rabbits or small mice that he could catch. They could sit there for hours in happy, companionable silence.
152 Now they sat looking out the window, searching, searching, for the boats that were not there.
They were being held in a barred tower room high in the air. The one good thing about being held prisoner was that they didn't have to go outside.
[Image: A man.] Because outside it was raining. Not your ordinary, average kind of spitty little rain, but rain such as you only really get in the Barbaric Archipelago, one 153 of the wettest places on this good green earth. For the whole week it rained as if the sky above was one big endless bucket of water, pouring down without stopping on the poor souls beneath.
The Romans are excellent travelers, but they are not used to this kind of weather. Nobody is. Hiccup watched with interest from his tower window high above as the soldiers' training grounds turned into one big puddly mess of black mud. The Consul's heated swimming baths overflowed into the horses' exercise yards. The kitchens were knee-deep in water. Even the Tower itself seemed to sink a few centimeters as its foundations softened and oozed.
[Image: Curtains.] The one good thing about the rain was that it silenced the screeching dragons being held prisoner in the giant cages down below. Dragons tend to sleep 154 through rain. Their skin is waterproof, so they put up their wings like umbrellas, and sleep underneath them.
Inside the Tower room, although it was bare, it was at least dry. The young Vikings were allowed to keep their swords and shields to practice for their appearance in the arena on Saturn's day Saturday.
A soldier brought them food every day. There was lots of it, although it was all a bit too rich for Hiccup's liking. Pig stuffed with dormice stuffed with baby frogs carbonara and oysters fried in cream is a bit of an acquired taste. They all refused to eat it when it was fried dragon pie or Common-or-Gardens in batter.
Toothless hardly ate at all. Hiccup tried to persuade him, but Toothless put his nose up.
"Roman f-f-food YUCKY," he said. "Too much g-g-garlic. Want some good f-f-fish. Want mackerel."
Camicazi carried on with her escape plans. They were all completely crazy.
For the first one she persuaded Hiccup and Fishlegs to help her knit their waistcoats into two ropes and she attached one end of a rope to a fish head and the other to one of the bars in the window. She then spent three nights in a row throwing the fish head out the window, hoping for a passing dragon to catch it.
155 Finally her patience was rewarded when it was snapped up by a hungry Gronckle who flew off with it, the rope pulling out the bar in the window before it snapped. Camicazi squirmed out the window and down the rope, which dangled twenty meters above the ground. She held on for as long as she could, but eventually had to let go, and landed on a fat soldier playing dice under an umbrella with a dozen fellow soldiers below.
They were then moved to another, supposedly more secure, cell on the ground floor.
[Image: A girl.] 156 Camicazi wasn't about to give up with this little setback, though. She spent four days tunneling her way out of their new prison with Hiccup's helmet.
Unfortunately the tunnel came out right slap bang in the middle of the Consul's bathroom. A naked Fat Consul screeched for reinforcements and they were moved back to the Tower room again, where the window had been repaired.
157 Her third plan was the craziest of all.
She ambushed the soldier who brought them their food every day, knocking him out with his own food tray.
She was planning to wear his clothes to pass herself off as a soldier.
[Image: Men.] "It'll never work," said Hiccup. "You'll get caught. You're a girl for starters.
And you're only four 158 feet high. There are no four-foot-high soldiers. They don't let them in the army."
"Oh, you're always bringing up PROBLEMS," grumbled Camicazi, putting on the soldier's helmet, which was so big she could hardly see out of it.
"And let's face it, they're going to be really cross you knocked out one of their men," Hiccup pointed out, looking at the soldier slumbering peacefully in his Roman underwear on the floor.
"Why don't YOU face it?" snapped Camicazi. "Look at you, staring out the window all day long. Your father is NEVER GOING TO COME ..."
Hiccup flinched.
"He'll come," he said defiantly.
Camicazi had to turn up the sleeves of the soldier's shirt four times. The tunic trailed some way along the ground behind her. She looked like a very small military person in a wedding dress.
"Ze great CAMICAZI will be back home, guys, while you are facing those gladiators on Saturn's day Saturday ..."
She took three steps and fell flat on her face.
The boys tried very hard not to laugh.
With great dignity Camicazi got back onto her 159 feet again. She picked up the front of the tunic like she really was a bride.
"You can't keep a Bog-Burglar under lock and key," she said, taking the keys from the tunic pocket and unlocking the cell door. With a final bustle of skirts she was gone.
Hiccup looked out the window again.
[Image: Hiccup.] "He'll come ..." said Hiccup. The rain was being blown through the window at such a rate that he had been driven from his usual post. But now he peered through the bars, seeking, seeking, for the sails that were not there. There was only rain and more rain, pouring down relentlessly on the ocean, drumming on the rocks, sogging up the heather, and filling the 160 pockets of the poor sentries as they stood, sandals full of mud, dreaming of Roman sunshine.
The wind shrieked across the ocean, up over the grim black cliffs, and through the Roman courtyards of the fort. And as it came through Hiccup's barred window, blowing in great drenching streams of water, it seemed to be answering...
"... but he's late ..."
Camicazi didn't return that night. Hiccup and Fishlegs wondered with amazement if she really had escaped this time. But the soldier who brought their food that evening very grumpily told them she had been caught within two seconds of leaving the Tower and put into solitary confinement for three days.
"And serve her right, the little barbarian," said the soldier, rubbing the lump on his head.
"Three days!" said Fishlegs excitedly. "At least we'll have some peace and quiet around here."
161 " ...dreaming of Roman Sunshine..."
"Camicazi's all right, really," said Hiccup.
"Mmmm," said Fishlegs, unconvinced. "But she's very pleased with herself and she never stops talking. I'm looking forward to a nice, quiet night."
[Image: Men and a woman.] 162