The Ship of the Dead (Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard #3)

“Hmm, Turkish bathrobe,” T.J. said.

“Hmm, staying alive,” Blitz said.

Nobody mentioned the autographed motivational books.

“Finally, Magnus Chase,” said the All-Father, “I understand you were the one who stood toe-to-toe with Loki and took the brunt of his withering insults. Would you ask any special boon of the gods?”

I gulped. I looked around at my friends, trying to let them know that I didn’t find it fair for me to get special treatment. Defeating Loki had been a group effort. That was the whole point. Waxing poetic about our team was what got Loki trapped, not my skill itself.

Besides, I didn’t keep a list of boons in my back pocket. I was a man of few needs. I was happy being boonless.

Then I recalled my Uncle Randolph’s last act of atonement, trying to steer me toward Kvasir’s Mead. I thought about how sad and lonely his house seemed now, and how happy and peaceful I’d felt on the roof deck with Alex Fierro. I even remembered a bit of advice Andvari’s ring had whispered in my mind, right before I’d given the golden treasure back to the fish.

Othala. Inheritance. The hardest rune of all to make sense of.

“Actually, Lord Odin,” I said, “there is one favor I would ask.”





YOUR TYPICAL trip back home.

Golf-cart rides, trying to remember where we parked our warship, sailing into the treacherous mouth of an unknown river, getting sucked into rapids that shot us into the tunnels underneath Valhalla, jumping off a moving ship and watching the Big Banana disappear into the darkness, no doubt on its way to pick up the next lucky group of adventurers bound for glory, death, and Ragnarok-postponing shenanigans.

The other einherjar welcomed us as heroes and carried us to the feast hall for a big celebration. There we found that Helgi had arranged a special surprise for Samirah, thanks to a tip-off from Odin himself. Standing by our regular table, looking very confused, wearing a name tag around his neck that proclaimed VISITOR. MORTAL! DO NOT KILL! was Amir Fadlan.

He blinked several times when he saw Sam. “I—I am so confused. Are you real?”

Samirah tented her hands over her face. Her eyes teared up. “Oh. I’m real. I so want to hug you right now.”

Alex gestured at the crowds pouring in for dinner. “You’d better not. Since we’re all your extended family here, you’ve got several thousand heavily armed male chaperones present.”

I realized Alex was including himself in that group. At some point during the voyage home, he had shifted to male.

“This is…” Amir looked around in wonder. “Sam, this is where you work?”

Samirah made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a joyful sob. “Yes, my love. Yes, it is. And it’s Eid al-Fitr, isn’t it?”

Amir nodded. “Our families are planning dinner together tonight. Right now. I didn’t know if you would be free to—”

“Yes!” Samirah turned to me. “Would you give my apologies to the thanes?”

“No apologies necessary,” I assured her. “Does this mean Ramadan is over?”

“Yes!”

I grinned. “Sometime this week, I am taking you out for lunch. We’re going to eat in the sunlight and laugh and laugh.”

“Deal!” She spread her arms. “Air hug.”

“Air hug,” I agreed.

Alex smirked. “Looks like they’ll need me for chaperone duty, if you all will excuse me.”

I didn’t want to excuse him, but I didn’t have much choice. Sam, Amir, and Alex rushed off to celebrate Eid and eat massive quantities of tasty food.

For the rest of us, the evening was all about drinking mead, getting patted on the back a few thousand times, and hearing the thanes give speeches about how great we were, even if the quality of heroes was much better back in their day. Above, in the branches of the Tree of Laeradr, squirrels and wombats and tiny deer ran around as usual. Valkyries zipped here and there serving food and mead.

Toward the end of the feast, Thomas Jefferson Jr. tried to teach us some of his old marching songs from the Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts. Halfborn Gunderson and Mallory Keen alternately threw plates at each other and rolled around in the aisles, kissing, while the other Vikings laughed at them. It made my heart glad to see them together again…though it also made me feel a little empty.

Blitzen and Hearthstone had become such fixtures in Valhalla that Helgi announced they were being made honorary hotel guests, free to come and go as they pleased, though he made a point of saying they did not have rooms, or minibar keys, or any sort of immortality, so they should act accordingly and avoid flying projectiles. Blitz and Hearth were given large helmets that said HONORARY EINHERJI, which they didn’t look too happy about.

As the party was breaking up, Blitzen clapped me on the back, which was sore from all the other clapping that my back had received that night. “We’re heading out, kid. Gotta get some sleep.”

“You guys sure?” I asked. “Everybody is heading to the after-party. We’re doing a tug-of-war over a lake of chocolate.”

Sounds fun, Hearthstone signed. But we will see you tomorrow. Yes?

I knew what he was asking: Was I really serious about following through with my plan—the favor I’d asked Odin?

“Yeah,” I promised. “Tomorrow it is.”

Blitz grinned. “You’re a good man, Magnus. This is going to be awesome!”

The tug-of-war was fun, though our side lost. I think that’s because Hunding was our anchor and he wanted to bathe in chocolate.

At the end of the night, exhausted, happy, and doused in Hershey’s syrup, I staggered back to my room. As I passed Alex Fierro’s door, I stopped for a moment and listened, but I heard nothing. He was probably still out enjoying Eid al-Fitr with Sam and Amir. I hoped they were having a great celebration. They’d earned it.

I stumbled into my room. I stood in the foyer, dripping chocolate all over the carpet. Luckily, the hotel had great magical clean-up service. I remembered the first time I’d entered this room, the day I died falling off the Longfellow Bridge. I had stared in wonder at all the amenities—the kitchen, the library, the couch and big-screen TV, the big atrium with the starry night sky twinkling through the tree branches.

Now there were more photos on the mantel. One or two magically appeared every week. Some were old pictures of my family: my mom, Annabeth, even Uncle Randolph and his kids and wife during happier times. But there were also newer pictures—me with my friends from floor nineteen, a photo I’d taken with Blitz and Hearth when we were still homeless. We’d borrowed somebody’s camera to do a group selfie. How the Hotel Valhalla had retrieved that shot from the ether, I didn’t know. Maybe Heimdall kept a cloud library of all selfies ever taken.