The Ship of the Dead Read Online Free

"Effort IT AGAIN," Percy told me. "This time with less dying."

Standing on the yardarm of the USS Constitution, looking downwards at Boston Harbor two hundred feet below, I wished I had the natural defenses of a turkey buzzard. Then I could projectile vomit on Percy Jackson and make him go abroad.

The last fourth dimension he'd made me try this jump, only an hr before, I'd cleaved every bone in my body. My friend Alex Fierro had rushed me back to the Hotel Valhalla just in fourth dimension for me to dice in my own bed.

Unfortunately, I was an einherji, one of Odin's immortal warriors. I couldn't die permanently as long as I expired inside the boundaries of Valhalla. Thirty minutes subsequently, I woke upward as good equally new. Now here I was once again, gear up for more pain. Hooray!

"Is this strictly necessary?" I asked.

Percy leaned against the rigging, the wind rippling piffling waves through his blackness pilus.

He looked like a normal guy—orange T-shirt, jeans, dilapidated white leather Reeboks. If yous saw him walking downwards the street, you lot wouldn't think, Hey, look, a demigod son of Poseidon! Praise the Olympians! He didn't take gills or webbed fingers, though his eyes were sea light-green—nigh the aforementioned shade I imagined my confront was merely and so. The just strange matter almost Jackson was the tattoo on the within of his forearm—a trident as dark as seared wood, with a single line underneath and the messages SPQR.

He'd told me the letters stood for Sono Pazzi Quelli Romani—those Romans are crazy. I wasn't certain if he was kidding.

"Look, Magnus," he told me. "You'll be sailing beyond hostile territory. A bunch of sea monsters and ocean gods and who-knows-what-else volition exist trying to kill y'all, right?"

"Yeah, I suppose."

By which I meant: Delight don't remind me. Please leave me alone.

"At some bespeak," said Percy, "yous're going to get thrown off the gunkhole, maybe from as loftier up as this. You'll need to know how to survive the touch on, avoid drowning, and get back to the surface set up to fight. That's going to be tough, specially in cold water."

I knew he was right. From what my cousin Annabeth had told me, Percy had been through even more than dangerous adventures than I had. (And I lived in Valhalla. I died at least one time a day.) Equally much as I appreciated him coming upwardly from New York to offer me heroic aquatic-survival tips, though, I was getting tired of failing.

Yesterday, I'd gotten chomped by a corking white shark, strangled past a giant squid, and stung by a thousand irate moon jellies. I'd swallowed several gallons of seawater trying to concur my jiff, and learned that I was no better at hand-to-paw gainsay 30 feet downwardly than I was on dry land.

This morning, Percy had walked me effectually Old Ironsides, trying to teach me the basics of sailing and navigation, but I still couldn't tell the mizzenmast from the poop deck.

Now here I was: a failure at falling off a pole.

I glanced down, where Annabeth and Alex Fierro were watching us from the deck.

"You got this, Magnus!" Annabeth cheered.

Alex Fierro gave me ii thumbs up. At to the lowest degree I think that was the gesture. It was hard to be sure from this altitude.

Percy took a deep breath. He'd been patient with me and then far, but I could tell the stress of the weekend was starting to get to him, too. Whenever he looked at me, his left eye twitched.

"Information technology's absurd, man," he promised. "I'll demonstrate again, okay? Offset in skydiver position, spread-hawkeye to tiresome your descent. Then, correct earlier you hit the water, straighten like an arrow—head up, heels down, dorsum straight, butt clenched. That last part is really important."

"Skydiver," I said. "Hawkeye. Arrow. Butt."

"Right," Percy said. "Sentry me."

He jumped from the yardarm, falling toward the harbor in perfect spread-eagle form. At the last moment, he straightened, heels downward, and hitting the h2o, disappearing with hardly a ripple. A moment subsequently, he surfaced, his palms raised similar See? Zero to information technology!

Annabeth and Alex applauded.

"Okay, Magnus!" Alex called up to me. "Your plow! Be a man!"

I suppose that was meant to exist funny. Most of the time, Alex identified as female, but today he was definitely male person. Sometimes I slipped up and used the incorrect pronouns for him/her, so Alex liked to return the favor by teasing me mercilessly. Considering friendship.

Annabeth hollered, "Yous got this, cuz!"

Below me, the dark surface of the water glinted like a freshly scrubbed waffle iron, ready to squash me flat.

Right, I muttered to myself.

I jumped.

For half a second, I felt pretty confident. The wind whistled past my ears. I spread my arms and managed non to scream.

Okay, I idea. I can practice this.

Which was when my sword, Jack, decided to fly up out of nowhere and get-go a chat.

"Hey, señor!" His runes glowed along his double-edged bract. "Whatcha doing?"

I flailed, trying to turn vertical for impact. "Jack, non now!"

"Oh, I get it! You lot're falling! You know, one time Frey and I were falling—"

Before he could continue his fascinating story, I slammed into the h2o.

Only every bit Percy had warned, the cold stunned my arrangement. I sank, momentarily paralyzed, the air knocked out of my lungs. My ankles throbbed similar I'd bounced off a brick trampoline. But at least I wasn't dead.

I scanned for major injuries. When you lot're an einherji, you get pretty proficient at listening to your own pain. You tin stagger around the battlefield in Valhalla, mortally wounded, gasping your last jiff, and calmly think, Oh, then that's what a crushed rib cage feels like. Interesting!

This fourth dimension I'd broken my left talocrural joint for certain. The right one was merely sprained.

Easy fix. I summoned the power of Frey.

Warmth like summer sunlight spread from my breast into my limbs. The pain subsided. I wasn't as good at healing myself equally I was at healing others, but I felt my ankles beginning to mend—every bit if a swarm of friendly wasps were itch around within my flesh, mud-daubing the fractures, reknitting the ligaments.

Ah, better, I thought, every bit I floated through the cold darkness. Now, there's something else I should exist doing….Oh, right. Breathing.

Jack's hilt nudged against my mitt like a dog looking for attention. I wrapped my fingers around his leather grip and he hauled me upward, launching me out of the harbor similar a rocket-powered Lady of the Lake. I landed, gasping and shivering, on the deck of Old Ironsides next to my friends.

"Whoa." Percy stepped back. "That was different. You okay, Magnus?"

"Fine," I coughed out, sounding like a duck with a chest cold.

Percy eyed the glowing runes on my weapon. "Where'd the sword come from?"

"Hi, I'm Jack!" said Jack.

Annabeth stifled a yelp. "It talks?"

"It?" Jack demanded. "Hey, lady, some respect. I'k Sumarbrander! The Sword of Summertime! The weapon of Frey! I've been around for thousands of years! Too, I'm a dude!"

Annabeth frowned. "Magnus, when you told me about your magic sword, did you lot perhaps fail to mention that it—that he can speak?"

"Did I?" Honestly I couldn't remember.

The by few weeks, Jack had been off on his own, doing whatsoever sentient magic swords did in their gratis time. Percy and I had been using standard-issue Hotel Valhalla practice blades for sparring. It hadn't occurred to me that Jack might fly in out of nowhere and introduce himself. Besides, the fact that Jack talked was the least weird matter about him. The fact that he could sing the unabridged cast recording of Jersey Boys from memory…that was weird.

Alex Fierro looked similar he was trying not to laugh. He was wearing pink and light-green today, every bit usual, though I'd never seen this par

ticular outfit earlier: lace-upwards leather boots, ultra-skinny rose jeans, an untucked lime dress shirt, and a checkered skinny necktie as loose as a necklace. With his thick black Ray-Bans and his choppy green hair, he looked like he'd stepped off a New Moving ridge anthology cover circa 1979.

"Be polite, Magnus," he said. "Introduce your friends to your sword."

"Uh, right," I said. "Jack, this is Percy and Annabeth. They're demigods—the Greek kind."

"Hmm." Jack didn't sound impressed. "I met Hercules once."

"Who hasn't?" Annabeth muttered.

"Fair point," Jack said. "Merely I suppose if yous're friends of Magnus'due south…" He went completely still. His runes faded. So he leaped out of my hand and flew toward Annabeth, his blade twitching equally if he was sniffing the air. "Where is she? Where are you hiding the babe?"

Annabeth backed toward the rail. "Whoa, at that place, sword. Personal infinite!"

"Jack, comport," Alex said. "What are you doing?"

"She'due south effectually here somewhere," Jack insisted. He flew to Percy. "Aha! What'due south in your pocket, sea boy?"

"Excuse me?" Percy looked a bit nervous virtually the magical sword hovering at his waistline.

Alex lowered his Ray-Bans. "Okay, at present I'g curious. What practise yous have in your pocket, Percy? Inquiring swords want to know."

Percy pulled a plain-looking ballpoint pen from his jeans. "You mean this?"

"BAM!" Jack said. "Who is this vision of loveliness?"

"Jack," I said. "It'south a pen."

"No, it's not! Bear witness me! Show me!"

"Uh…certain." Percy uncapped the pen.

Immediately it transformed into a iii-foot-long sword with a leaf-shaped blade of glowing bronze. Compared to Jack, the weapon looked frail, near petite, but from the way Percy wielded information technology, I had no doubt he'd be able to agree his own on the battlefields of Valhalla with that thing.

Jack turned his point toward me, his runes flashing burgundy. "See, Magnus? I told you it wasn't stupid to carry a sword bearded every bit a pen!"

"Jack, I never said that!" I protested. "Y'all did."

Percy raised an countenance. "What are yous ii talking about?"

"Cipher," I said hastily. "So I guess this is the famous Riptide? Annabeth told me virtually it."

"Her," Jack corrected.

Annabeth frowned. "Percy's sword is a she?"

Jack laughed. "Well, duh."

Percy studied Riptide, though I could've told him from experience it was almost incommunicable to tell a sword's gender by looking at it.

"I don't know," he said. "Are yous certain—?"

"Percy," said Alex. "Respect the gender."

"Okay, fine," he said. "Information technology's just kinda strange that I never knew."

"On the other manus," Annabeth said, "yous didn't know the pen could write until last yr."

"That's low, Wise Girl."

"Anyhow!" Jack interrupted. "The important affair is Riptide's here now, she's beautiful, and she's met me! Maybe the two of us can…y'all know…have some individual time to talk almost, er, sword stuff?"

Alex smirked. "That sounds like a wonderful idea. How near we let the swords become to know each other while the residuum of u.s. have dejeuner? Magnus, do you recall you tin handle eating falafel without choking?"

WE ATE ON the aft spar deck. (Look at me with the nautical terms.)

Afterward a hard forenoon of failing, I felt like I'd actually earned my deep-fried chickpea patties and pita bread, my yogurt and chilled cucumber slices, and my side club of extra-spicy lamb kebabs. Annabeth had bundled our picnic lunch. She knew me too well.

My wearing apparel dried quickly in the sunlight. The warm breeze felt good on my face. Sailboats traced their manner across the harbor while airplanes cut across the bluish sky, heading out from Logan Airport to New York or California or Europe. The whole city of Boston seemed charged with impatient energy, like a classroom at 2:59 P.Grand., waiting for the dismissal bell, everybody ready to go out of town for the summer and enjoy the good weather.

Me, all I wanted to do was stay put.

Riptide and Jack stood propped nearby in a coil of rope, their hilts leaning confronting the gunnery rail. Riptide acted like your typical inanimate object, but Jack kept inching closer, chatting her up, his blade glowing the same dark statuary equally hers. Fortunately, Jack was used to belongings i-sided conversations. He joked. He flattered. He name-dropped like a bedlamite. "Y'all know, Thor and Odin and I were at this tavern ane fourth dimension…"

If Riptide was impressed, she didn't show it.

Percy wadded upwardly his falafel wrapper. Along with existence a water-sabbatical, the dude also had the ability to inhale food.

"So," he said, "when do you guys sail out?"

Alex raised an eyebrow at me like Aye, Magnus. When practice nosotros canvas out?

I'd been trying to avert this topic with Fierro for the past ii weeks, without much luck.

"Soon," I said. "We don't exactly know where nosotros're headed, or how long it'll take to get in that location—"

"Story of my life," said Percy.

"—but we have to find Loki's big nasty ship of death before it sails at Midsummer. It's docked somewhere along the border between Niflheim and Jotunheim. Nosotros're estimating it'll take a couple of weeks to sail that distance."

"Which means," Alex said, "we really should've left already. We definitely have to sail by the end of the calendar week, ready or not."

In his nighttime lenses, I saw the reflection of my own worried face. We both knew we were as far from ready as we were from Niflheim.

Annabeth tucked her feet underneath her. Her long blond pilus was tied back in a ponytail. Her night blue T-shirt was emblazoned with the yellowish words Higher OF ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN, UC BERKELEY.

"Heroes never get to exist ready, do nosotros?" she said. "We just exercise the best we can."

Percy nodded. "Yep. Ordinarily it works out. We haven't died yet."

"Though you proceed trying." Annabeth elbowed him. Percy put his arm around her. She nestled comfortably against his side. He kissed the blond curls on the top of her caput.

This prove of affection fabricated my middle practise a painful little twist.

I was glad to see my cousin so happy, but it reminded me how much was at stake if I failed to stop Loki.

Alex and I had already died. Nosotros would never historic period. Nosotros'd live in Valhalla until Doomsday came effectually (unless we got killed outside the hotel before that). The best life we could hope for was grooming for Ragnarok, postponing that inevitable battle every bit many centuries as possible, and then, one day, marching out of Valhalla with Odin'south army and dying a glorious death while the Nine Worlds burned around united states. Fun.

But Annabeth and Percy had a chance for a normal life. They'd already made information technology through high school, which Annabeth told me was the most dangerous time for Greek demigods. In the autumn, they'd go off to college on the West Coast. If they made it through that, they had a decent risk of surviving machismo. They could alive in the mortal world without monsters attacking them every v minutes.

Unless my friends and I failed to stop Loki, in which example the world—all the worlds—would end in a few weeks. But, yous know…no pressure level.

I set down my pita sandwich. Even falafel could merely do and then much to lift my spirits.

"What about yous guys?" I asked. "Straight dorsum to New York today?"

"Yep," Percy said. "I gotta babysit tonight. I'yard psyched!"

"That's right," I remembered. "Your new baby sister."

Yet another of import life hanging in the residue, I thought.

But I managed a smile. "Congratulations, human. What's her name?"

"Estelle. It was my grandmother'south name. Um, on my mom's side, apparently. Not Poseidon's."

"I approve," Alex said. "Old-fashioned and elegant. Estelle Jackson."

"Well, Estelle Blofis," Per

cy corrected. "My stepdad is Paul Blofis. Not much I tin practise about that surname, but my little sis is awesome. 5 fingers. 5 toes. Two eyes. She drools a lot."

"Just like her blood brother," Annabeth said.

Alex laughed.

I could totally imagine Percy bouncing baby Estelle in his arms, singing "Under the Sea" from The Trivial Mermaid. That made me experience even more miserable.

Somehow I had to buy little Estelle enough decades to have a proper life. I had to notice Loki'south demonic ship full of zombie warriors, stop information technology from sailing off into battle and triggering Ragnarok, then recapture Loki and put him dorsum in bondage so he couldn't cause whatsoever more earth-burning mischief. (Or at to the lowest degree not as much globe-called-for mischief.)

"Hey." Alex threw a piece of pita at me. "Finish looking so glum."

"Pitiful." I tried to appear more than cheerful. Information technology wasn't as like shooting fish in a barrel as mending my ankle by sheer forcefulness of will. "I'm looking frontwards to meeting Estelle someday, when nosotros go back from our quest. And I appreciate you guys coming up to Boston. Really."

Percy glanced over at Jack, who was still chatting upwards Riptide. "Sorry I couldn't be more help. The ocean is"—he shrugged—"kinda unpredictable."

Alex stretched his legs. "At least Magnus fell a lot better the second fourth dimension. If worse comes to worst, I can always plow into a dolphin and save his lamentable barrel."

The corner of Percy's mouth twitched. "You can turn into a dolphin?"

"I'm a child of Loki. Want to see?"

"No, I believe y'all." Percy gazed into the distance. "I've got a friend named Frank who's a shape-shifter. He does dolphins. Also behemothic goldfish."

I shuddered, imagining Alex Fierro as a giant pink-and-green koi. "We'll brand do. Nosotros've got a proficient team."

"That's important," Percy agreed. "Probably more important than having sea skills…" He straightened and furrowed his eyebrows.

Annabeth unfolded herself from his side. "Uh-oh. I know that look. You've got an idea."

"Something my dad told me…" Percy rose. He walked over to his sword, interrupting Jack in the eye of a fascinating tale nearly the fourth dimension he'd embroidered a behemothic'south bowling purse. Percy picked up Riptide and studied her blade.

"Hey, man," Jack complained. "We were just starting to hit it off."

"Lamentable, Jack." From his pocket, Percy pulled out his pen cap and touched it to the tip of his sword. With a faint shink, Riptide shrank back into a ballpoint. "Poseidon and I had this conversation about weapons one fourth dimension. He told me that all sea gods have i thing in common: they're really vain and possessive when it comes to their magic items."

Annabeth rolled her optics. "That sounds similar every god we've met."

"True," Percy said. "But sea gods even more so. Triton sleeps with his conch-beat out trumpet. Galatea spends most of her time polishing her magic sea-horse saddle. And my dad is super-paranoid near losing his trident."

I thought about my one and only see with a Norse body of water goddess. It hadn't gone well. Ran had promised to destroy me if I always sailed into her waters once more. Just she had been obsessed with her magical nets and the junk drove that swirled inside them. Considering of that, I'd been able to fox her into giving me my sword.

"Y'all're saying I'll have to utilise their own stuff against them," I guessed.

"Correct," Percy confirmed. "Also, what y'all said most having a practiced team—sometimes being the son of a sea god hasn't been enough to relieve me, even underwater. I time, my friend Jason and I got pulled to the bottom of the Mediterranean by this storm goddess, Kymopoleia? I was useless. Jason saved my butt by offering to make trading cards and action figures of her."

Alex almost choked on his falafel. "What?"

"The bespeak is," Percy connected, "Jason knew zippo about the ocean. He saved me anyway. Information technology was kind of embarrassing."

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