Ship of the Dead (2 page)

“It's quality, not quantity,” quipped Mist.

“That's why I chose
only
the bravest,” Aurora said with a sniff.

“Really? The one on top has arrows in his back,” Mist pointed out. “And
usually
that means, uh, retreat?”

The said warrior raised his head and sputtered, “I—I—I can explain—”

“Odin takes a dim view of cowards entering Valhalla,” Mist said. “And a dimmer view of sisters who ferry them.”

“But I fought ever so bravely,” the warrior pleaded. “Then we were outnumbered and—
aaaggghhhh
!” Aurora pushed him off her sky horse, and he fell screaming to the ground below. Without so much as a “good day,” Aurora kicked her steed's flanks and flew off.

“I should've let her take the coward and get demoted,” Mist said. “Fun to see her mopping up puke in Odin's mead hall. I suppose we should have a look. I'll take the south side of the meadow, you take the north. Good hunting.”

Mist flew down, disappearing into the fog. Astrid was about to follow when she heard the sharp call of a hawk.
Screeee!
The bird appeared from out of the fog, a bloody shred of flesh in its beak. As it flew by—so near she could have touched it—the bird's eyes met hers and Astrid felt a sharp pang of inexplicable sorrow. She gasped, trying to catch her breath, and when she did the bird was gone.

Was this an omen? With anguish so intense, Astrid feared that it was. Someone close to her, someone she loved, was soon to suffer a terrible fate.

Chapter 2
Crossing the Rainbow Bridge

D
ane had never seen such grisly carnage. The battle was over, and hundreds lay dead or dying in the blood-soaked meadow. He, Jarl, Fulnir, and Drott went about the bodies, doing what they could, offering sips of water and placing the warriors' swords within their grasp so they could die like proud Vikings should, clutching their weapons.

“What did they all die for?” Fulnir asked, gazing across the battlefield, further disgusted to see the many birds of prey feasting upon the dead.

“Cheese . . . ,” gasped one of the dying. It was the spearman, they saw, lying among a heap of nearby bodies. Kneeling beside him, Dane removed his Berserker wolf skull and gently propped the man up, giving him a sip from his goatskin.

“Cheese?” Dane asked.

“Wormtongue's son wanted to marry Bloodaxe's daughter,” the spearman managed to say, his weak voice a whisper. “But Bloodaxe pronounced the boy unfit to join his clan. Wormtongue wanted revenge . . . wanted Bloodaxe to fight . . . so he insulted the thing Bloodaxe is most proud of . . . his cheese making.” The Berserker took his last breath and died, his spear clutched firmly in his hand. Dane lowered his body to the ground.

“Cheese. They all died because of . . .
cheese
,” Dane said, shaking his head.

“Men are
so
stupid,” a female voice said.

He looked up. A Valkyrie on her horse hovered above them.

“Mist!”

Drott, Fulnir, and Jarl gazed upward, their mouths dropped open in wonderment as they beheld the raven-haired beauty in her Valkyrie regalia astride the massive celestial steed. “It's a . . . it's a . . . it's a . . . ,” Drott sputtered.

“Valkyrie!” Fulnir yelped.

Jarl went down on his knees and muttered, “Take me . . . take me now to Valhalla.”

Mist sighed. “You're not fit for the great hall.”

Jarl gaped in shock, as if he'd been slapped. “Because I'm not brave enough?”

“Because you're not dead enough.”

“But if I
was
dead—”

Mist lost patience. “When that happens, a decision will be made!” Her horse descended and off she hopped. “Dane, what are you doing here?”

Dane hesitated. “Is Astrid with you?” he said, scanning the sky for a sign of her.

“No . . . she is at another blood feud. Is that why you came? To see her?”

“I thought a fight like this would attract Valkyries.” Then he stepped forward and took her by the hands. “I want you to take a message to Odin,” he pleaded. “Tell him that I will do anything—anything he asks—to win Astrid's freedom.”

Mist's mouth dropped open in shock. “Take a message to . . . Are you mad? Odin does not bargain with humans. He cares nothing for your concerns.” Mist walked away, threading her way among the dead. “I saw a man with a red beard die bravely . . . now where is he?”

Dane caught up with her. “Are you saying you won't help me? You share blame for Astrid joining your sisterhood!”

“It was the Norns she dealt with, not me. Dane, I know you are hurting, but you must forget Astrid. She is Odin's maid now. You must not attempt to seek her . . . or Odin will banish you to Hel's realm forever.”

Dane felt a buzzing in his head. “He told you this?”

“No, it's standard policy,” she said. “If any mortal harasses a sister, he's sent to Niflheim.” Dane knew that Niflheim was the underworld where the hideous goddess Hel reigned over the tortured souls of those denied entrance to Valhalla. An eternal sentence of agony. Would that be his reward for wanting to reunite with Astrid? Too saddened to speak, Dane watched Mist search among the bodies for a soul to take to Valhalla. “I thought I saw him fall right around here somewhere,” she said to herself. “Maybe he crawled away.” As she turned to examine another pile of corpses, Drott and Jarl began to pelt her with questions about Valhalla.
Is the food good? How about the weather? What does Odin really look like?
and such.

“So you've personally met Odin?” Jarl asked in wonder.

“Yes, one time I had to refill his ale jar,” Mist said.

“Really? What'd he say?”

“He said, ‘Thanks.'”

“All he said was thanks? No tip?”

“No. He said he wasn't in the habit of tipping any of the serving wenches in Valhalla, because if he tipped one girl then he'd have to tip them all, and that would just lead to a lot of jealousy and confusion and it wasn't worth it.”

“What's the best part of being a Valkyrie?”

“The travel.”

“Are all Valkyries as pretty as you?” asked Drott.

“Yes.”

“Can I kiss you?” he asked.

“No!”

Dane stood a short distance away, wretched and miserable, his hopes for Astrid's return all but crushed. He kicked himself for ever believing in his stupid plan, and gazing at the dead all around him, he began to wish he was one of them. Fulnir came over to offer his condolences.

“I know it's not like you to give up,” said Fulnir, “but this time you better do what she says.”

Dane was about to agree when a loud snort from Mist's celestial steed drew his attention. The horse was using his head to nudge a body off a prime tuft of grass. The animal rolled the body away and began to eat, avoiding spots stained with blood.

An idea came to Dane, one so audacious his heart began pounding in excitement. He knew it was the only way. “You're right, Fulny, it's
not
like me to give up.”

Dane ran to Mist's horse and leaped onto his back. The horse whinnied and kicked, trying to unseat him—but Dane's heels gave a hard kick to the steed's flanks. Suddenly Dane was in the air and moving fast—
flying
! He held firm to the horse's reins as he heard Mist's cries of protest, and braving a look down, he saw his friends gazing upward, utter shock and delight on their faces. The last thing that went through his head was the worry that this might be the last he'd ever see of them.

Dane held tightly to the reins, trying to forget his fear of heights. He tried imagining that he was astride an ordinary horse, riding on the ground, but the wind in his face and the nearness of the clouds reminded him he wasn't. He shut his eyes and gave the celestial steed his head, knowing that most horses race for home and their oats if given the chance. All he had to do was hang on and chances were the horse would know where to go.

Higher and higher they rose, the air turning more frigid. When Dane next dared to open his eyes, he saw they were engulfed by clouds. With the ground below obscured, the churning in his stomach eased and he was able to think more clearly. What would happen when he reached Asgard, if indeed this was where the horse was taking him? A Valkyrie's steed returning without a corpse,
or
a corpse maiden for that matter! Even if by some miracle of chance he
did
find Astrid, what would he say? “I love you and I'll do anything to get you back”?

His plan was utter lunacy. He'd given in to impulse without a thought as to what might happen, and now here he was, a puny human arrogantly challenging the rule of the gods. If merely harassing a maiden was punishable by an eternity in Niflheim, he could imagine what kind of excruciating pain he was in for.

To say nothing of what his father, Voldar, would say. As a denizen of Valhalla, surely he would have a few foul words about his son's foolhardiness. What would Dane say to him if they happened to meet? He pushed all thoughts of his father from his mind. Dane pulled hard on the steed's reins, trying to stop his ascent, but the horse shook his head wildly and flew on, unperturbed.

When at last they broke free of the clouds, what Dane saw took his breath away. A vast and vivid rainbow such as he had never seen arced across the sky before him, its many bands of color shimmering in the sunlight. Mesmerized by the sight, he relaxed his hold on the reins and the horse flew on, traveling across the rainbow as if it were a bridge, and then Dane realized what the rainbow was: Bifrost, the legendary pathway to Asgard.

Looking down through the glowing bands of light, he saw he was flying over a wondrous valley of verdant fields and forests, a sparkling river curving around it all, and up ahead, soaring impossibly high over the valley, the craggy peaks of a magnificent mountain. Beyond that, rising even higher into the mist—Dane gasped as it came into view— Odin's enormous fortress, its massive, glowing roof shingled with golden war shields. Valhalla itself!

He had heard the fantastic tales of this place from Lut the Bent, the wise man of his village. He had said that Valhalla was so inconceivably big that, if you were inside, you could barely see the opposite wall. There were five hundred and forty doorways, each wide enough to allow eight hundred warriors to walk out abreast. Odin, it was said, had built Valhalla to house his thousands upon thousands of dead heroes who, on the day of doom known as Ragnarok, would be called to fight the dark forces of destruction in an epic, earth-shattering battle.

Dane gazed up at its vastness in amazement. How wondrous! To be in the presence of Valhalla itself, the paradise every Norseman dreamed of, a hero's reward for bravery and valor. He ached to fly straight to its gates and reside there forever with his father and Astrid.

His celestial steed had other ideas. The horse veered sharply downward and Dane had to grab his mane to keep from falling. Down they flew, past the end of the rainbow and over a treeless meadow where, he was shocked to see, ten Valkyries had landed their mounts and were unloading their slain cargo. His heart leaped when in the distance he saw a maiden, her blond hair streaming behind her. Was it Astrid?

He had to hide from the Valkyries. He jerked the reins to steer his steed toward a grove of trees beside the meadow. The horse gave in and swooped away, alighting at last in the high grass of the grove, well out of sight of the others. Dane slid off his steed, relieved to be on solid ground again. The leaves on the trees were brilliantly golden in color, and looking closer, he was amazed to see that each leaf was made of pure gold. A light breeze rattled through the trees, and each leaf shimmered and shone in the sun. Dane tied the horse's reins to a tree branch and went off to find Astrid.

He crawled through the high grass, moving toward the sound of voices. He parted some shrubbery and peered out onto the meadow. The Valkyries were gathered along with the slain warriors they had ferried. Most of the dead had gruesome wounds, missing limbs, split heads, slashed-open throats. One had even been impaled on a spear, its point sticking out through his back. Despite their injuries, no one seemed in pain—rather, they stood there calmly as a regal-looking Valkyrie addressed them.

“My name is Rain. I am queen of the Valkyries. On behalf of Odin and all the other gods and goddesses, I welcome you to Valhalla,” she intoned in a soothing voice. “As you may know by now, you've just been slain.” There were murmurs of alarm among the men. “I realize this can be rather a disappointing and disorienting experience. But remember, we're here to help you adapt to your new surroundings and ease your way into what most find to be a ridiculously pleasurable afterlife.”

Dane searched the faces of the Valkyries, looking for Astrid, but many maidens were obscured by the hulking warriors. “Your corpse maiden will escort you up the sacred path to Valhalla,” Rain continued. “Odin will rise to greet the bravest among you—but those who are not greeted should not feel slighted, for Odin has many duties and cannot personally welcome everyone. Questions?”

A warrior missing his right arm raised his left. “My right arm was hacked off. Will I get another?”

“Of course,” she chirped. “Tonight you will feast and drink and then sleep the sleep of the dead. When you awake, all your wounds will have healed and your spirit-bodies will be made whole again.”

The dead whose hands were still attached applauded. The others used their stumps to thump their chests.

As another question came, a handsome young warrior shifted his weight and Dane caught sight of the Valkyrie right beside him whose arm was entwined in his. Astrid! He couldn't breathe. The young warrior looked over and smiled at her. Astrid glanced up and gave him an affectionate smile of her own.
What?
That was the very smile she used to give Dane—that look of warmest sunshine that told him he was special. And now she was giving her smile to someone else!

He felt a stab of jealous indignation. Had Astrid already forgotten him? Had he come all this way, braving his fear of heights while risking eternal torment in Niflheim, only to see his beloved cozy up to a handsome corpse she'd just met? He fought the urge to leap over the bushes and confront her and the slain warrior. The Valkyrie queen now bade her sisters to escort the slain up the flower-lined path toward Valhalla. As the dead began to walk, Dane saw why Astrid had held the young warrior's arm. Half of his foot had been chopped off, and she was helping him walk by supporting his weight.

Relieved, Dane thought that perhaps her smile had just been to reassure the warrior that he would soon be whole again. Yes, that had to be it, Dane made himself believe. She was only doing her job as a corpse maiden, helping the slain to adjust to the afterlife, offering comfort where needed.

Dane waited until they had all disappeared up the path and then crept out of the golden grove, following a safe distance behind, keeping out of sight.

Shortly after leaving the meadow, the path led into the mountains and cut through the granite rock, becoming a passage framed on both sides by soaring cliffs. After an arduous climb, Dane rounded a turn to find himself in view of the towering gates of Valhalla itself.

Taking refuge behind a boulder, he watched in silent fascination as the massive gates creaked open and five guards appeared. Dressed in shining coats of chain mail and leather armor, the guards were as large as white bears and twice as vicious looking, and as the Valkyries led the newly slain past them through the gates, the guards studied each passing warrior with the fiercest of stares, no doubt making sure that he deserved entrance to Odin's hallowed corpse hall. Astrid too had disappeared inside the gates, and having seen the size of the guards, Dane decided it was best that he stay hidden and await her return.