Hotel Valhalla [Magnus Chase Series]

A Hero And A Hammer

     By John Henry
A Resident of HV Since
        1871 CE

  Growing up, I never suspected I was the son of the Norse god of thunder.

  Why would I? I was born in America (West Virginia, North Carolina, I’m not exactly sure where) ’round about 1840 or so.
  Oh, did I mention? My
mamma was a slave. That means I was a slave,too.
  And my daddy? In my heart, he was the man my mamma was married to, the man who raised me and loved me like his own. But as it turns out, we
weren’t blood kin. When I was born, Thor sent me an anonymous gift, Mjolnir Junior, a tiny version of his own hammer, though I didn’t know what it was then. There was enough of him in me that I took to that hammer like a duck to water, which is to say I pounded the living daylights out of anything and everything.

(I ate, farted, and snored like Thor, too. Still do. No cussing, though. My mamma raised me right.)

As I grew, so did that hammer. I reckon that should have been a clue that it was magic. But greater things were on my mind in those days. The Civil War, for one, and later, the end of slavery.
  I was in my twenties when I became a freeman. With my mamma’s blessing in my ears and her kiss on my forehead, I stuck my hammer in my belt and set off to make my way in the world.
  I’d been traveling for a while when I met up with a man. Biggest fella I’d ever seen. Tall and wide, with tattooed arms the size of tree trunks and shoulders like granite. Matted red hair and a thick beard to match. One whiff of him, though, and I was ready to hightail it in the other direction. But
something stopped me. He had a hammer in his hand. A hammer just like mine.
  So I sat with him by his fire. We shared a meal of goat stew and a mug of a drink he called mead.

(He called the stew Otis. I found out why when I got to Valhalla.)

  We traded stories. He told a whopper about some thief named Thrym who once stole his hammer. He played a trick on Thrym to get it back. Pretended to be the woman Thrym wanted to marry—bridal gown and all! Just before the ceremony, Thrym gave his “bride” the stolen hammer as a token of his love. Thor grabbed it and bashed Thrym in the head. Took out the groomsmen, the guests, and the cake, too.
  You might think hearing that story would put me on guard. But for some
reason, I trusted the big fella. And he trusted me.
  When I asked if I could try his hammer, he let out a snort of laughter punctuated with a colossal fart. “Be my guest!”
  I passed out from the strain of trying to lift it. When I came to, he and his hammer were gone. But he left a note behind.
  Trouble is, back then, I couldn’t read. So I just tucked the paper in my pocket.
  Not long after, my hammering skill got me a job driving steel spikes for the railroad. Mile after mile, month after month, I pounded track into place.
  I was the best worker of all. Until the day a smooth-talking,scar-facedsalesman rode into town.
  He was selling steam-powered drills he claimed were faster and stronger than any steel-driving man.
  I couldn’t read, but I saw the writing on the wall.
  His machine was going to put me and plenty of others out of work. I had no choice but to try to show him up.
  I bet him that, in one day’s time, my hammer and I could lay more track, and through a mountain no less, than his machine.
  If he won, the railroad would buy his machines.
  If I won, he would leave and never come back.
  He took my bet.

  That night, my redheaded friend showed up at my tent. “John Henry,” he said, “I know this salesman. He’s a

[expletives deleted]

trickster, and

[expletives deleted]

tricksters don’t play fair. So I’m going to lend you something to even the odds.”

  He took off his belt and looped it around my waist. The minute it touched my skin, power surged through my veins.

  He laid his hammer in my hands. This time, I wielded it with ease.

  At dawn, I strode toward the tunnel. That scar-faced salesman raised an eyebrow when he saw the hammer.
  “Well,” he said, “this just got interesting.”

  Here’s what happened next: We competed. I won. And then I died.

I landed here in Valhalla with the hammer in my hand—and the redheaded
man’s note in my pocket.

  A pretty lady on a strange smoky-looking horse read it to me:

"This man is my son. Treat him right. If you don’t, I’ll bash your heads in."

  It was signed Thor. And that’s how I learned who my real daddy was.