by Rick Riordan
“It’s for a little project I’m working on.” The shirtless berserker avoided my eyes. Coward.
I tried to push my way in, but my on-again, off-again boyfriend set his massive foot against the slightly ajar door, making our relationship dangerously close to off again.
“That’s the way you want to play it? Fine.” I snatched a slice of pizza from the box, slapped him in the chest with it, and stormed off.
“Mallory! Wait!”
When I didn’t stop, Halfborn swore a blue streak and slammed his door. Maybe he was looking for his room key, planning to follow. Well, I didn’t want to see him or his pizza-stained chest anymore. So I bypassed my room, yanked open a random door, and stalked through, slamming it behind me.
Then I literally froze.
“Oh, Fimbulwinter.”
Hotel Valhalla has countless unmarked doors. Most are shortcuts to other areas of the hotel. A few lead to other worlds. Just my luck, I’d exited right into Niflheim, the land of endless sleet and ice, and plenty of frost giants. Even luckier, a blizzard was raging around me. Cursing, I dug a small square of fabric out of my pocket. Handmade by Blitzen, it unfolded into a thick hooded parka infused with kenaz (fire) magic, courtesy of Hearthstone. Ever since I’d journeyed to Niflheim to help stop Loki—long story—I made sure to carry it with me. Nestled in its warm embrace, I turned back and groped for the doorknob.
There wasn’t one. No door, either. Instead, I found myself peering at a mile-high wall of solid ice.
“A glacier? You have got to be kidding me.”
I scrubbed a circle in the frost and peered into the glacier to see . . . more ice. I pounded on the slab. Attacked it with my twin daggers. Kicked it and screamed at it. I worked up a good sweat, but if Hotel Valhalla was somewhere on the other side, I wasn’t getting back in the way I came out.
I sheathed my daggers, put a hand on the glacier, and began walking, trailing my fingers on the icy wall to feel for a door, a knob, a window—something. Then the wall ended and my frozen fingers plunged into a massive snowdrift.
Growling with frustration, I shoved my hands in my pockets and turned back. The glacier was the only connection I had to the hotel, and I didn’t want to lose sight of it. I’d only gone a few steps when I heard a muffled thudding in the distance. I paused. The thudding grew louder and closer.
Frost giant.
The possibility struck me like a slushball in the face. I knew from past experience that some frost giants were friendly. They weren’t the ones I was worried about.
A solitary figure loomed into view through the driving snow. My first thought was How can he not be freezing in those short-shorts? My second was Jump!
I leaped to one side as Thor pounded past.
“Hey! Wait!” I started after him, but immediately skidded to a halt. Thor was letting out farts like a sputtering engine. A cloud of noxious fumes enveloped me.
“Gods of Asgard!” I waved a hand in front of my face. “What crawled up inside him and died?”
Coughing, eyes smarting, I almost failed to recognize the one plus of the situation. Ever hear the phrase like a hot knife through butter? Well, substitute fart stream for knife and snow drifts for butter. Thor’s gas was melting a wide trail that made walking through Niflheim a hundred times easier. I figured he would eventually end up in Asgard, so I followed in his smelly wake.
Unfortunately, Thor was too fast for me to keep up. Then the blizzard filled in his trail, obliterating it completely. I swallowed my rising panic and pushed on through the stinging snow.
For a while, all I heard was the whine of the wind and my own heavy breathing. But then a new sound entered the mix. A gurgling, like water. I stopped, thinking. Water might mean a river or a stream. Maybe I could follow it out of Niflheim? With Thor’s trail gone, it seemed like my best option. I detoured and headed toward the sound.
The air gradually warmed. I quickened my pace. The driving snow changed into fat, wet flakes that gave way to a thick gray mist. I took off my parka, folded it back into a square, and stuck it in my pocket.
The gurgling changed too, to a bubbling, like water coming to a boil. I paused. Good thing I did. The fog parted momentarily to reveal a vast steaming body of water directly ahead of me. A few more strides and I’d have stepped off a steep bank into its inky black depths.
What is this place? My mind sifted through my knowledge of the Nine Worlds and came up with the answer. It’s Hvergelmir, the hot spring surrounding the roots of Yggdrasil! Yes!
I did a little happy dance. If I could get to the tree’s roots, I could climb Yggdrasil back to Asgard or some other, more hospitable world.
Peering through the mist, I could just make out the twisted and humped roots sticking out of the black water like the knees of cypress trees—only much, much bigger. I caught a quick glimpse of Yggdrasil’s trunk stretching skyward from their midst before the steam shrouded it from my view.
So, my Niflheim exit was out there. Getting to it, however, presented some problems. I’m a decent swimmer, but I wasn’t convinced I could make it across Hvergelmir without being boiled alive by the hot spring water. With my einherji power, I could have tried jumping the whole expanse. But the mist made it difficult to see where the water ended and the roots began. If I misjudged the distance, who knew where I might land.
There’s got to be a way, I thought. I circled the pool. On the opposite side, I spotted an undulating root stretching to the shoreline like a long section of roller coaster. It was treacherously slick with humidity and green moss. But it was the only bridge I could see over the water.
Sweat beading down my face and hands feeling for purchase, I crawled across the root inch by inch. After what seemed an eternity, I reached the other side. I rolled off onto moist loamy earth. I picked my way through the outer roots and sat against one near Yggdrasil to catch my breath.
The root twitched. Gasping, I scrambled back. Nothing in my memory banks said Yggdrasil could move.
I looked closer at the root. It was brown and green, but unlike the other, mossy roots twisting around it, this root looked decidedly scaly. While my mind processed that fact, I heard a chewing sound. My heart sank.
It’s not a root. It’s Nidhogg’s tail.
In my rush to get to Yggdrasil, I’d forgotten about Nidhogg, the dragon that lives at the World Tree’s base. Nidhogg spends his days gnawing on the tree’s roots and trading taunts with an eagle that nests in the treetops. Ratatosk, the gigantic insult squirrel, acts as go-between, delivering messages from roots to treetop and back again.
Now, I myself am a fan of the barbed word. Insults come in handy with an oafish lout like Halfborn. But to cast aspersions upon one another for millennia, the way the eagle, dragon, and squirrel do? I’d never let our relationship reach that level of dysfunction.
Nidhogg’s green-and-brown body was coiled around the base of the tree. To climb out of Niflheim via Yggdrasil, I’d first have to climb over Nidhogg. That prospect did not thrill me, especially when I spied the claws on his powerful back legs. I moved to look for the dragon’s head—always know where the dangerous mouth parts are, is my motto—and put my foot right into a pile of bones. Crunch! Apparently, Yggdrasil’s roots weren’t the only things Nidhogg gnawed on.
I unsheathed my daggers, expecting the dragon to attack at the sound. Instead, he muttered to himself.
“That eagle thinks he’s all that. Well, my new insult will be so scathing he’ll molt his feathers. Now all I have to do is think it up.”
A gleam of hope sparked inside me. Nidhogg needed an insult? I had a million of them. Maybe we could cut a deal—one eagle-bashing zinger for safe passage up the tree. No guarantee Nidhogg wouldn’t devour me on sight, of course, but it was the only plan I had, so I went for it.
I kicked a rib cage off my foot and swaggered around the tree as if I owned the place. “Hey there!”
Startled, Nidhogg stopped in mid-mutter. He stared at me, his huge yellow eyes blinking in
confusion. Then, nostrils flaring dangerously, he let out a bellow that doubled as an impressive display of razor-sharp fangs.
My heart faltered, but I swallowed my fear and pressed on.
“Is that supposed to intimidate me?” I made a big show of rolling my eyes. “I’ve heard louder roars from Thor’s butt.”
Nidhogg flinched as if I’d whacked him on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper. “That wasn’t very nice.” He sounded so hurt I almost felt sorry for him.
Instead, I snorted with derision. “Buddy, I insult everyone.” I waved my daggers. “See these? They’re sharp, but not as sharp as my tongue.” Or your fangs, I added to myself as the dragon loomed in closer to inspect my blades.
“Wow. Those are pointy.” Nidhogg looked genuinely impressed. “Are your insults really sharper than that?”
“Mister, that question is so dumb it makes me think your brain is like Odin’s left eye socket—completely empty.”
Nidhogg winced. “Wow. That really, really hurt. But you’re right, of course.” He tapped a daggerlike claw against his skull. “My brain is empty. Of insults, anyway.”
That was my opening. I sheathed my daggers and cocked my head to one side as if considering something. “You know, I have some powerful one-liners that never fail to infuriate. I’d be willing to share a few, but what’s in it for me?”
Nidhogg scratched his belly. “Well, for starters, I won’t eat you,” he offered.
“Hmm. Tell you what. Let me climb up Yggdrasil when we’re done, and you’ve got a deal.”
Nidhogg stuck out a claw. I thought he was going to slice me to ribbons, but then I realized he wanted to shake on it. I did so, very carefully.
“Okay,” I said, “now listen closely.”
Nidhogg swept down and pressed his ear to my mouth.
“Not that closely.”
“Sorry.” He backed off.
“Right. Let’s start with the four classic retorts: One: I know you are, but what am I? Two: I’m rubber, you’re glue—whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you. Three: Takes one to know one. And four: So’s your face!”
Nidhogg’s eyes widened with astonishment. “Those are brilliant!” His bellow blew my hair back. “Let’s test them out.”
I shrugged. “You are one ugly snake.”
Nidhogg recoiled, the wounded expression back on his face.
“That was your cue to use one of the retorts,” I explained.
His face cleared. “Oh yeah! Ha-ha!”
“Let’s try again. You are one ugly snake.”
“I know I am, but what are you?” He smiled with delight.
I am never getting out of here, I thought. Out loud, I said, “Let’s go over that wording again.”
After a few more sample rounds, Nidhogg got the hang of it. By then I was enjoying myself, so I threw in some simple bird-themed taunts for him to use against the eagle: You’re so loony, cuckoos think you’re crazy!, No birds of a feather would want to flock together with you!, and I heard you taste like chicken!
In retrospect, that last one might have been a mistake. When Nidhogg heard it, his stomach growled. He gave me a sideways, hungry look. “So, um, want to stay for dinner?”
I casually sidled away from his mouth region. “Much as I’d love to, I should get back to Valhalla. Okay if I climb up over your coils now?”
“I’m rubber, you’re glue!”
I took that as consent.
I’d never been happier to feel Yggdrasil’s bark beneath my fingers. I scurried up the trunk, scrambled through the branches, and finally found an opening to another world. I didn’t know which one it was until I tumbled out onto floor nineteen, right at Halfborn’s feet.
“Mallory!” he yelled. “I’ve been looking all over for you, woman! You are the most reckless, foolhardy einherji—”
I got to my feet and glared at him. Then I hurled myself into his arms. “Oh yeah?” I murmured against his bare chest. “Well . . . takes one to know one.”
SOMEONE STOOD in the hallway outside my door. I tensed. Waiting. Listening.
Knock-knock. Knock. Knock-knock-knock.
That was the sign. I opened the door. “Get in. Quickly.”
Alex Fierro skirted past me with a bundled-up towel in his arms. I glanced up and down the hallway, then closed the door. I turned to find Alex rolling his eyes.
“I still can’t believe you made me use a secret knock.” He handed me the towel, then dusted off his pink cashmere sweater vest and lime-green pants.
I showed him a mangled slice of pizza. “Mallory tried to get in a few minutes ago. I had to be sure it was you and not her coming back to trash the place.”
“Yeah, your peephole wouldn’t work at all.”
“Oh. I forgot about that. Anyway.”
I led him into my arts-and-crafts room. That’s right—arts and crafts. There’s more to me than just fighting to the death. I’d started with the basics—finger paints and macaroni sculptures, glitter glue on paper hearts, string art and coat-hanger mobiles—and worked my way up to finer artistic endeavors.
Alex gaped when he saw my latest project. “Dude. It’s huge.”
I shrugged. “Go big or go home, right?”
The project was a mosaic for Mallory made from an assortment of found and recycled objects: weapon fragments, pebbles from different worlds, shards of shattered glass. Alex, floor nineteen’s resident potter, had brought me pieces of broken pottery, which he’d handcrafted by hurling unsatisfactory pots against a wall.
I unrolled the towel and inspected the shards. “These are perfect. Thanks. Now I just need Vanir dragon scales.”
“Why Vanir dragons?” Alex wanted to know.
“They’re red, yellow, and orange—perfect for battlefield flames, blood, and gore. See, I’m depicting Mallory’s and my first battle together.”
“Aw, Halfborn.” Alex chucked me under the chin. “You’re a romantic!”
“I’m also behind schedule. I want to give it to her on the battle’s anniversary next week. I gotta get to Vanaheim and back before Mallory really does break down my door.”
Alex uncoiled his garrote from his belt. “Want a wingman?”
“Nah. I got this.” I opened a closet full of weapons and selected an ax and a shield from my collection. “Could you stay here, though, and make sure Mallory doesn’t get in?”
Alex grimaced. “I’d rather fight a dragon than face your angry girlfriend, but sure, I’ll hang out here until you get back.”
“Thanks. I owe you one.”
Alex smiled. “I’ll take you up on that sometime.”
Weapons securely in place over my TOUGH MUDDER T-shirt—I love those Midgard obstacle-course challenges—I made my way through the hotel hallways to the kitchen and the enormous walk-in refrigerator in the feast hall food-prep area. The quickest way to Vanaheim was via fresh produce. I went feetfirst into the potato bin and landed at the bottom of a gentle rolling hill in Folkvanger, the Vanir realm of the afterlife.
I surveyed my surroundings. The hill was covered with sweet-smelling wildflowers and dancing butterflies awash in warm, glowing light—the power of Freya, goddess and ruler of Vanaheim, washing over the realm. On the hilltop, Freya’s handpicked warriors lounged on blankets, laughing and sipping chai.
I scowled. Peace, butterflies, chai: this world was awful.
Eeeeeeeeeee!
A high-pitched trumpet blast suddenly pierced the air. A cry to battle! My berserker instincts kicked in as if someone had flipped an ON switch. With a mighty roar, I tore off my TOUGH MUDDER tee and charged up the hill.
Nothing I’d ever encountered in Asgard prepared me for what came next.
The trumpet blast segued into a soft jazz tune. Brush drumsticks shushed out a whispered rhythm while other instruments—a piano, a clarinet, a bass guitar—wove a melody of notes through the air. The lilting music rolled over me like warm syrup on a stack of Sunday brunch pancakes.
It was horrible
. I dropped my ax, fell to my knees, and clutched my ears.
“Whoa, buddy! You okay?” A dark-haired girl in a bikini top and sarong stared over at me with concern. She poked her blanket-mate with her elbow. “Hey. I think this dude needs some herbal supplements.”
“No!” I stumbled to my feet. “I’m fine. Just point me toward Sessrumnir, and I’ll be on my way.”
“You’ll miss the clarinet improv solo,” she warned.
I shuddered. “No, I really won’t.”
The girl shrugged. “Your loss. Freya’s palace is down the hill, past the volleyball court. Keep calm and bebop on!”
“Who was that?” I heard her friend ask as I hurried away.
“From the looks of him, I’d say someone who likes”—she lowered her voice to an embarrassed whisper—“polka music.”
(She wasn’t wrong. Give me a good oompah band over what they were listening to any day.)
I continued on to Sessrumnir, Freya’s upside-down ship/palace of gold and silver, to seek the goddess’s permission to hunt the dragons of her land. Inside, warriors lined the aisle to Freya’s throne. Dozing warriors in hammocks, that is. Freya’s throne was empty.
I shook a sleeping blond man in an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, tattered Bermuda shorts, and Birkenstock sandals. “Wake up. Where’s Freya?”
The guy blinked sleepily. “Who are you?”
“Halfborn. Where’s the goddess?”
“Halfborn.” The guy said my name like he was testing it out. “What’s that short for?”
“Nothing.”
He chuckled in amazement. “Halfborn is short for Nothing? It’s so weird how names work, isn’t it?” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Miles. And sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but Freya’s not here right now. I’d be super-pumped to help you out, though. Speaking of super-pumped”—he pointed to my bulging biceps and six-pack abs—“did you get ripped like that by going vegan?”
I ignored his question and got right to my own. “Whose permission do I need to hunt your dragons? I need some of their scales.”