فصل 29

We Almost Become a Norwegian Tourist Attraction

JUMPING OFF a cliff was the least strange thing I did in Alfheim.

Blitz, Hearth, and I hiked to an outcropping of rock at the edge of the Alderman property—the sort of place where a megalomaniac businessman could stand, survey the neighbors’ estates in the valley below, and think Someday, all this will be mine! BWAHAHA!

We were just high enough to break our legs if we fell, so Hearth declared the spot perfect. He cast raidho, , the rune of traveling, as we jumped. The air rippled around us, and instead of smashing into the ground below, we landed in a heap on the deck of the Big Banana, right on top of Halfborn Gunderson.

“Eldhusfifls!” Halfborn roared.

(That was another of his favorite insults. As he explained it, an eldhusfifl was a fool who sat by the communal fire all day, so basically, a village idiot. Plus, it just sounded insulting: el-doos-feef-full.)

We climbed off him and apologized. Then I healed his broken arm, which was still in a sling and had been re-broken by the weight of a falling dwarven butt.

“Hmph,” he said. “I suppose I forgive you, but I just washed my hair. You ruined my ’do!”

His hair looked no different than usual, so I couldn’t tell if he was joking. He didn’t kill us with his battle-ax, though, so I guess he wasn’t too upset.

Night had fallen in Midgard. Our ship sailed the open sea under a net of stars. Blitz stripped off his overcoat, gloves, and pith helmet and took in a lungful of air. “Finally!”

The first person to emerge from belowdecks was Alex Fierro, dressed like a 1950s greaser—her green-black hair slicked back, her white T-shirt tucked into lime-colored jeans.

“Thank the gods!” She rushed toward me, which lifted my spirits for about a microsecond until she plucked the pink Buddy Holly glasses off my face. “My outfit wasn’t complete without these. I hope you didn’t scratch them.”

While she polished her specs, Mallory, T.J., and Samirah clambered up to the deck.

“Whoa!” Sam averted her eyes. “Magnus, where are your pants?”

“Um, long story.”

“Well, put on some clothes, Beantown!” Mallory ordered. “Then tell us the story.”

I went below to get pants and shoes. When I came back, the crew was gathered around Hearth and Blitz, who were recounting our adventure in the magical land of elves, light, and reeking dragon carcasses.

Sam shook her head. “Oh, Hearthstone. I am so sorry about your dad.”

The others murmured in agreement.

Hearth shrugged. It had to be done. Magnus bore the worst of it. Tasting the heart.

I winced. “Yeah, about that…I should probably tell you guys something.”

I explained about the conversation I’d overheard between the two robins.

Alex Fierro snorted, then covered her mouth. “I’m sorry. It’s not funny.” She signed: Hearth, your father, the heart. Awful. I can’t imagine. She continued aloud: “In fact, I have something for you.”

From her pocket, she pulled a diaphanous silk scarf of pink and green. “I noticed you lost your other one.”

Hearth took the scarf like it was a holy relic. He solemnly wrapped it around his collar. Thank you, he signed. Love.

“You bet.” Alex faced me, her mouth curling in a mischievous smile. “But honestly, Magnus. You fumbled the heart. You tasted the blood. And now you’re talking to the animals—”

“I didn’t talk,” I protested. “I only listened.”

“—like Dr. Dolittle?”

T.J. frowned. “Who is Dr. Dolittle? Does he live in Valhalla?”

“He’s a character from a book.” Samirah bit a chunk off her cucumber sandwich. Since it was nighttime, she was doing her best to eat all the ship’s food rations as fast as possible. “Magnus, any other effects you’ve noticed from the heart’s blood? I’m worried about you.”

“I—I don’t think so.”

“The effects might only be temporary,” T.J. suggested. “Do you still feel weird?”

“Weirder than usual?” Alex clarified.

“No,” I said. “But it’s hard to be sure. There aren’t any animals around to listen to.”

“I could turn into a ferret,” Alex offered, “and we could have a conversation.”

“Thanks anyway.”

Mallory Keen had been trying out our new whetstone on one of her knives. Now she flung the newly sharpened blade against the deck. The knife sank up to its hilt in the solid wood. “Well, well.”

“Try not to destroy our boat, woman,” Halfborn said. “We’re still sailing in it.”

She made a face at him. “This is quite a good sharpener the boys brought back.”

T.J. coughed. “Yeah, could I see that for my bayonet?”

“No, indeed.” Mallory slipped the stone in the pocket of her jacket. “I don’t trust you lot with this little beauty. I think I’ll hold on to it so you all don’t hurt yourselves. As for the dragon blood, Magnus, I wouldn’t worry. You are a son of Frey, one of the most powerful nature gods. Perhaps the dragon’s blood simply enhanced your natural abilities. Makes sense for you to understand forest creatures.”

“Huh.” I nodded, slightly encouraged. “Maybe you’re right. Still, I’d feel bad if I took away part of Hearthstone’s heritage. I mean, what if Mr. Alderman could understand animals—?”

Hearth shook his head. Father was not Doctor Dolittle. Do not feel guilty. I have the othala rune back. That is enough for me.

He looked exhausted but relieved, like he’d just finished a six-hour test he’d been dreading all semester. He might not be sure he passed, but at least the ordeal was over.

“Well,” said Samirah, “we have the whetstone. Now we have to get to Fl?m, find Kvasir’s Mead, and figure out how to defeat its guardians.”

“Then feed the mead to Magnus,” Alex said, “hoping it gives him the gift of speaking in complete sentences.”

Mallory frowned as if she found this unlikely. “Then we find the Ship of the Dead and pray Magnus can beat Loki in a flyting.”

“Then somehow recapture that meinfretr,” Halfborn said, “stop Naglfar from launching, and prevent Ragnarok. Assuming, of course, we’re not too late already.”

That seemed like a big assumption. We’d burned two more days in Alfheim. Midsummer was roughly ten days away now, and I was pretty sure Loki’s ship would be able to sail well before that.

Also, my mind stuck on Mallory’s words: pray Magnus can beat Loki in a flyting. I didn’t have Sam’s faith in prayer, especially when it was a prayer about me.

Blitz sighed. “I’m going to wash up. I smell like a troll. Then I’m going to sleep for a very long time.”

“Good idea,” Halfborn said. “Magnus and Hearth, you should, too.”

I could get behind that plan. Jack had returned to runestone form on my neck chain, which meant my arms and shoulders now ached like I’d spent the day sawing through dragon hide. My skin itched all over, as if my anti-acid finish had been sorely tested.

T.J. rubbed his hands with excitement. “Tomorrow morning, we should enter the fjords of Norway. I can’t wait to see what we get to kill there!”

I slept without dreams, which was a nice change, until eventually Samirah shook me awake. She was grinning way too much for someone on a fast. “You really should see this.”

I struggled out of my sleeping bag. When I got to my feet and looked over the railing, I lost the ability to breathe.

On either side of the ship, so close I could almost touch them, sheer cliffs rose out of the water—thousand-foot-high walls of rock marbled with waterfalls. White rivulets of snowmelt coursed down the ridges, bursting into mist that fractured the sunlight into rainbows. The sky had been reduced to a jagged ravine of deep blue directly above. Around the hull, the water was so green it might have been algae puree.

In the shadow of those cliffs, I felt so small I could only think of one place we might be. “Jotunheim?”

T.J. laughed. “No, it’s just Norway. Pretty, huh?”

Pretty didn’t do it justice. I felt like we’d sailed into a world meant for much larger beings, a place where gods and monsters roamed freely. Of course, I knew gods and monsters roamed freely all over Midgard. Heimdall was fond of a certain bagel place near Fenway. Giants often strolled through the marshes in Longview. But Norway seemed like a proper stomping ground for them.

I got a little ache in my heart, thinking how much my mom would’ve loved this place. I wished I could share it with her. I could picture her hiking along those cliff-tops, relishing the sun and the crisp, clean air.

At the prow stood Alex and Mallory, both silent in amazement. Hearth and Blitz must have still been asleep below. Halfborn sat at the rudder, a sour look on his face.

“What’s wrong?” I asked him.

The berserker eyed the cliffs as if they might collapse on us if he made a bad comment. “Nah. It’s beautiful. Hasn’t really changed since I was a boy.”

“Fl?m was your hometown?” I guessed.

He let out a bitter laugh. “Well, wasn’t much of a town. And it wasn’t called Fl?m back then. Just a nameless fishing village at the end of the fjord. You’ll see the spot in a minute.”

His knuckles whitened on the rudder. “As a boy, I couldn’t get out of here fast enough. Joined Ivar the Boneless when I was twelve and went a-Viking. I told my mom…” He grew silent. “I told her I wouldn’t come back until the skalds were singing about my heroic deeds. I never saw her again.”

The boat glided onward, the soft applause of the waterfalls echoing through the fjord. I remembered what Halfborn had told me about not liking to go backward, not revisiting his past. I wondered if he felt guilty about leaving his mom, or disappointed that the skalds hadn’t made him a great hero. Or maybe they had sung about his deeds. From what I’d seen, fame rarely lasted longer than a few years, much less centuries. Some einherjar in Valhalla got bitter when they realized nobody born after the Middle Ages had a clue as to who they were.

“You’re famous to us,” I offered.

Halfborn grunted.

“I could ask Jack to write a song about you.”

“Gods forbid!” His brow remained furrowed, but his mustache quirked like he was trying not to smile. “Enough of that. We’ll be docking soon. Keen, Fierro, stop gawking at the scenery and help! Trim the sail! Ready the mooring lines!”

“We’re not your pirate wenches, Gunderson,” Mallory grumbled, but she and Alex did as he asked.

We rounded a curve, and again I caught my breath. At the end of the fjord, a narrow valley split the mountains—layer upon layer of green hills and forests zigzagging into the distance like an infinite reflection. At the rocky shore, shadowed by cliffs, a few dozen red, ochre, and blue houses clustered together as if for protection. Parked at the dock was a giant white cruise ship bigger than the entire town—a twenty-story floating hotel.

“Well, that wasn’t here before,” Halfborn grumbled.

“Tourists,” Mallory said. “What do you think, T.J.? Are they exciting enough for you to fight?”

T.J. tilted his head as if considering the idea.

I decided it might be a good time to refocus the conversation.

“So, back in York,” I said, “Hrungnir told us to take the train in Fl?m, then we’d find what we were looking for. Anybody see a train?”

T.J. frowned. “How could anybody lay tracks across terrain like that?”

It did seem improbable. Then I glanced off our port side. A car zipped along the base of a cliff. It made a hairpin turn and disappeared into a tunnel, straight through the side of the mountain. If Norwegians were crazy enough to build and drive on highways like that, maybe they were crazy enough to lay train tracks the same way.

“Let’s go ashore and find out,” Alex suggested. “I recommend we dock as far as possible from that cruise ship.”

“You don’t like tourists?” Sam asked.

“That’s not it,” said Alex. “I’m afraid they’ll notice this bright yellow Viking boat and think we’re a local attraction. You want to give rides around the fjord all day?”

Sam shuddered. “Good point.”

We slipped into the dock farthest from the cruise ship. Our only neighbors were a couple of fishing boats and a Jet Ski with the dubious name Odin II painted on the side. I considered one Odin quite enough. I wasn’t anxious for a sequel.

As Mallory and Alex tied the mooring lines, I scanned the town of Fl?m. It was small, yes, but more convoluted than it had appeared from a distance. Streets wound up and down hills, through pockets of houses and shops, stretching out about half a mile along the shore of the fjord. I would have thought a train station would be easy to spot, but I didn’t see one from the dock.

“We could split up,” Mallory suggested. “Cover more ground that way.”

I frowned. “That never works in horror movies.”

“Then you come with me, Magnus,” Mallory said. “I’ll keep you safe.” She frowned at Halfborn Gunderson. “But I refuse to be stuck with this lout again. Samirah, you’re useful in a pinch. How about it?”

The invitation seemed to surprise Sam, although Mallory had been treating her with a lot more deference since the incident with the water horses. “Uh, sure.”

Halfborn scowled. “Fine by me! I’ll take Alex and T.J.”

Mallory arched her eyebrows. “You’re going ashore? I thought you wouldn’t set foot—”

“Well, you thought wrong!” He blinked twice, as if he’d surprised himself. “This isn’t my home anymore, just a random tourist stop! What does it matter?”

He sounded less than certain. I wondered if it would be helpful to offer to switch up the teams. Mallory had a gift for distracting Halfborn. I would’ve been willing to trade her for…I don’t know, Alex, maybe. But I didn’t think the offer would be appreciated by anybody else.

“What about Hearthstone and Blitz?” I said. “Shouldn’t I wake them up?”

“Good luck with that,” Alex said. “They are out.”

“Could you fold up the ship with them inside?” T.J. asked.

“Doesn’t sound safe,” I said. “They could wake up and find themselves stuck in a handkerchief.”

“Ah, leave ’em here,” Halfborn said. “They’ll be fine. This place was never dangerous, unless it bored you to death.”

“I’ll leave them a note,” Sam volunteered. “How about we scout around for half an hour? We’ll meet back here. Then, assuming somebody’s found the train, we can all go there together.”

We agreed that plan had a low possibility of violent death. A few minutes later, Halfborn, T.J., and Alex headed off in one direction, while Mallory, Sam, and I headed the other way—wandering the streets of Fl?m to find a train and some interesting enemies to kill.