In Wonderland: A Combination Of Fact & Fiction

Everything has changed. The noise picked up its pace and stopped me in my tracks. A slight but persistent buzz from within. A quiet noise pushed against my ears. My blood slows. I hear a hiss that sizzles in my head, so steady that I cup my ears to muffle the discord. The buzzing in my spine continues, becoming a quiet thrum.

Is that the sea I hear behind me? I look for the source, but the violence of sound is in me. A hand on my back startles me. I feel it move across me, a palm rubbing in slow circles. Stalker escorts me by my elbow, leading me towards my car.

My heart beats in my ears. Skin prickles and shivers spiral across my body.

“Everything has changed,” I repeat the thought aloud.

Stalker nods and continues to move me toward my car. As we pass by her register, the owner says something to me, but I don’t hear her words. Stalker lifts my arm and waves it for me, pushing the corners of my mouth into a smile. I am clay in her hands.

Judging by the owner’s reaction, I look like an odd marionette. She must think I’m tweaking out. I’m such a bore when it comes to drugs.

“Not a meth-head,” I say, laughing at my own joke. “Just losing my marbles.”

Stalker drags me away faster as the woman looks at me, confusion approaching concern, while I try to look like I’m in control of my feet.

Personally, I’m pleased that my sense of humor has kicked back into gear. It distracts from the noises inside, which linger while I sit behind the driver’s wheel. My escort ushered me into place and buckled me in before climbing into their seat. We looked at each other. There was an understanding in Stalker’s eyes — a silent empathy that sat waiting for my reply.

“What the fuck just happened?”

Stalker shrugs its shoulders.

“Don’t you dare. Talk. Start talking, damn it,” I grip the wheel, using it to steady myself. Stalker scoffs, still a bit of a gurgle, and points to the unfinished tongue in its mouth.

“Then start typing,” I barked, fumbling with my phone to open a new text message before handing it to Stalker. Brows wrinkled, Stalker held it, brushing the keys before returning it to me.

“Come on. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you? Can’t you write, too?”

Stalker nods, then points to my phone and shakes their head.

“Fine. Paper and pen, then,” I grab a pad and pen from my console and hand it over, uncapping the pen.

Stalker explores the pen, pushing the ink onto the paper, then begins to write entirely in runes.

“You understand English, but you can’t write in English?”

Another nod.

“Okay. Well, I don’t understand anything you’re writing. Draw it. Pictures,” I gesture, painting with an imaginary brush.

I earn an eye roll, but Stalker begins to sketch. At first, I understood none of it; the sketches were rudimentary. A tree with a circle drawn around it, branches curled up and under themselves, and a second circle behind it. Stalker traced the second circle with a finger and pointed to the sky.

“The sun?” They nodded. I followed the first circle with my finger. “What about this one?”

Stalker shakes their head but continues to draw. Someone sits under the tree, their hands holding onto the roots. Stalker points to me, placing my hand on the stranger.

“That’s me?”

Stalker nods but puts a hand on their heart. Then, they rest a second hand on mine, before bringing our hands to rest on the figure together, and repeats the gesture, moving from my heart to their own, then places our hands on the caricature.

“It’s both of us?”

With another nod, Stalker draws more people, characteristically female, sitting under the tree and wraps them around its perimeter. Then, gesturing to one at the front, Stalker points to their body first, pausing a finger on their heart, then points to the person to the right of them before pressing their palm against my chest, resting there long enough for them to feel my heartbeat.

“Got it. This one is you; that one is me. Who are the others?”

Stalker gestures to their breasts, staring pointedly at me.

“Women? Who are they?”

Stalker nods and draws a rune: ᛟ.

“I don’t know what that means,” I say.

Stalker gestures vaguely, looking out the window, then grabs my phone and hands it to me.

“Okay, I can’t just search for an image, but I get your point. If you don’t start talking soon, it’s a trip to the library next. What about you – are you a woman?”

Stalker grunts a reply, gesturing with one of its hands in a so-so motion, then points to the wheel and turns to look out the window.

“Oh, you’re done with the conversation now? As if you’re in charge.”

Stalker points to the owner, who has been watching me converse with myself.

Sinking into my seat, I start the car and pull away, waving at the owner with an embarrassed grin.

“You could have told me that earlier. Asshat.”

Stalker laughs, another gurgling chortle, as I return to the house.

“I am going to need a full psych eval after this shit,” I grumble, unsure of what to do next.

“What happened back there? There was a body. I heard it. It fell. It – did it die?”

Stalker nods again.

“You killed it?”

A mumble of assent follows my question, and Stalker watches for my reaction.

“Would it have hurt me if you didn’t kill it?”

Stalker stares at me, then rests a hand on my shoulder.

“Well shit. Thank you. Was it. Human?”

Stalker nods, then shakes its head.

“Both? Or. Used to be? What, like a zombie? Zombies are after me in fucking Canada? And you’re the ghost who’s going to save me?”

Stalker laughs and shakes their head at me.

“The lack of information you’re giving me is insane, like this day has been. Finish growing your tongue, please, so we can move past these bobblehead conversations.”

Stalker sticks a pink stub out of a mouth and echoes my frustration, waggling it for comedic effect.

“Gross,” I laugh, cracking my face open with a wide grin, before I fold my face into a scowl. “What is happening, though? I just want to pick some wildflowers and walk on the beach for a few months. I wanted to escape reality, but not actual reality. This is ridiculous – “

Stalker’s foot slams onto mine, interrupting my rant and causing me to yip sharply at the pain as their foot brings my car to a sudden halt, avoiding crashing into a white-tailed deer standing in front of us. The deer stares at us, turning her head from me to my passenger, then bowing her neck towards Stalker, her front legs moving gracefully as she leans forward, touching the ground gently with her nose before rising. Stalker reciprocates the honor with an acknowledging bow, though restricted in the seat. The deer looks at me again, cocking her head, and my body and mind still. The silence fills the space long enough for me to believe what I see. Then, the deer walks away towards the ocean, never looking back at us.

“Deer aren’t native to the island,” I say, repeating something learned from a book about the island. Stalker laughs and rolls their eyes at me. Less of a gurgle and more of a chortle, I note.

Everything I thought I knew now fell away. This new horror sat in the distance, and we watched for it from our periphery, waiting for it to emerge from the trees. We sped past in my friendly convertible. What would Henry think of all of this, I wonder? I ache for his humor to distract me from the madness.

“Hm,” I mumble, “Interesting that he’s my first urge for comfort.”

Stalker seems to understand who I’m talking about and touches a finger to the side of their nose, tapping it.

“Am I at risk of being killed tonight, or can I have this sleepover with my new friends?”

My escort looks at me like I’m an idiot.

“I don’t disagree with you,” I commented wryly. We spent the rest of the drive home in silence.

When we entered the house, I texted the group and asked if they could come over sooner. I was eager for the distraction and company. They arrived within an hour, bringing the warmth of noise and laughter. I tried to pocket my fears for the evening, but I couldn’t shake off the absurdity of the afternoon. Emma watched me but said nothing, choosing not to pry. Shivers haunted my spine when I fell asleep later in the early morning after our revelry ended. They had left me to sleep, soft and yawning as they stumbled upon the sand, tripping their way back home. My thoughts were spiked and edged with fear, fighting with my mind for peace until I fell asleep. The sound of three loud knocks on a door startled me in the hours before dawn. The knocks remained echoing in my ears, waking me from whatever was waiting on the other side to come out.

I reached for my phone to text Henry, but put it away, leaving the message unsent and half-written. What exactly could I say that wouldn’t sound insane? I stayed there staring at the ceiling until Stalker lay beside me and held my hand.

“Thank you,” I whispered, and they squeezed my hands three times. We looked at the walls until I drifted back to sleep. I woke up with my new friend still holding my hand, and found the company reassuring and maternal.

“Heill dohtrir mín,” they said, brushing my cheek with their fingers, then sticking a tongue out and laughing with a voice that croaked from its dormancy.

“Finally,” I replied, and they laughed again, this time a youthful giggle. “Now, what the hell did you just say?”

Stalker just rolled their eyes and stood up, shaking their arms and legs out to wake up their muscles, then started to sing a song. I understood none of the words, but the melody was pretty, and their voice—no, her voice, I think—was soft and reed-like.

“You’re not see-through anymore,” I noted, poking her stomach, and she returned the favor, then stood in front of my mirror, stroking her cheeks and wheat-colored hair, which ran down the length of her back. Pretty, but much younger than me. Still a child.

“That explains your humor. You’re just a kid. A girl?”

She wagged her tongue at me, but nodded, and laughed as we took stock of her reflection. She wriggled her eyebrows up and down, turning her head to inspect both ears. Her eyes were blue like my grandmother’s—the color of glaciers, at the point where the ice has cracked open, bringing light to its brilliance. They were a bright turquoise hue that shifted to a deep, intense blue when the light changed. Something started to hum in my mind.

“What did you say to me? Repeat it.”

She looked into my eyes and squeezed my hand again, three firm grips at the same pace as the pulse of a steady heart. It was the same gesture of love that my family used to convey “I love you” without words, a tradition that generations of my relatives have shared across our dining tables.

“Heill dohtrir mín,” she spoke clearly and steadily, watching me as I worked to translate the words. A thought that was building in my brain bubbled to the surface. The language was not German, but familiar, and my eyes widened as I solved this short puzzle.

“I am not your daughter,” I replied and broke away from her, putting distance between us. She spoke, nodding, but continued to explain to me in her language, words hitting my ears quickly. I was savvy enough to cobble together and translate some of them into English, but I couldn’t understand enough of what she said. I lost patience.

“We’ve got to teach you how to speak English and quickly. I took French in school, not whatever this is. I know only a handful of words and phrases in German. And a few others. What language are you speaking?”

“Norrǿnt mál. Norræna mâl,” Stalker replied, moving her hand in a sweeping motion as if choosing between the two answers.

“Right. Where are you from?”

“Norðvegr.”

“North-vay-gur?”

“Já,” she nods, smiling.

“Já. Yes,” I reply, and she tries the word, pleased with its sound, repeating it like a toddler.

“Okay. Norðvegr. Norway. You’re Norske? So is my family. Well, on my mom’s side, at least.”

For the second time, she looks at me like I’m stupid and says, “Yes, fam-il-ee. Ætt. Fam-ily,” and jabs her finger into my stomach again before resting her hand on her chest. She walked to the dresser, where I had stored her drawings, and repeated herself, tracing the circle of women before pointing to the two of us. “Family.”

“The fuck you say,” I sputter, but I know she’s speaking the truth.

“The fuck you say,” Stalker laughs, running the words together, and thrust the notepad at me before walking away, her bare feet padding to the kitchen. Her laughter rings out in peals. I stare at the drawings, studying the other women whom Stalker drew.

“Who are they? Where are they?” I ask her, catching up as she grabs items from the fridge, setting orange juice and fruit, cheese, and an odd assortment of condiments on the kitchen island.

“Family. Dauðr,” she tells me, then makes a few gruesome sounds and mimics a violent stabbing through her chest and across her neck, play-acting cartoonish sounds of death before her body folds over dramatically against the counter.

“Dauðr,” Stalker nods, then points to her left, angling her body towards the floor.

“Dead. That’s the word you’d be looking for.”

“Ded. Yes. Ded, ded, ded, dead,” Stalker repeats to herself in a sing-song voice, shaking the gallon of juice and pulling on the lid before she gives up and hands it to me.

“You have to twist the lid this way. Watch,” I explain, then pour two glasses for us. Stalker smiles, chugging the juice quickly before pouring herself a second serving.

“They’ve been dead for a long time, and they’re your family. Fine,” I say, ignoring her look of reproach, “Our family. You’re saying these women are my ancestors, and so are you?”

“Yes,” Stalker smiles, then hands me the ketchup and starts to bite into a red apple.

“You should wash that first,” I tell her, reaching for the fruit, but she growls and pulls the apple away.

“You little monster. Look,” I explain, grabbing another apple, turning on the sink’s faucet, and rinsing the apple off.

“Wash it in the water. To clean it before you eat it,” I add, taking a bite of the crisp fruit before gesturing to hers. “Apple. Water.”

We shift into a conversation with our hands while we teach each other, trading words.

“Epli. Vatn,” Stalker replies, in between crunches, before we start a game of point and repeat.

“Ketchup. Mustard. Butter.”

She insists on trying everything.

“Not a fan of mayonnaise, are you?” I chuckle, watching her chug more juice as she makes a pursed face. “I don’t blame you. Miracle Whip’s where it’s at, really,” I tease, putting the jar back in the fridge.

“What is your name? Caroline. Name,” I explain, pointing to myself.

“Yrsa. Name,” she says, chirping gleefully when she figures out how to open the egg carton, and hands it to me expectantly.

“Alright, Yrsa. I’ll cook the eggs. You wash the blueberries,” giving her a small carton from her pile on the counter, and we prepare our first meal together.

“I’m thirty years old. You look like you’re about ten years old. How old are you?” When she looked confused, I held up ten fingers and asked, “Ten?”

She stared at my hands, then added one of her fingers next to mine.

“Ellifu. Ellifu vetr,” then grabbing a pen from the counter, drew snow falling onto the ground. “Vetr,” and drew eleven lines across the page for emphasis.

“Eleven winters—years old. You’re just a kid, and you killed that, whatever that thing was, yesterday.”

Yrsa snorted and folded her arms across her chest.

“You’re a prepubescent badass, is that it? And I should be impressed, not horrified, that you’re so used to violence? Fine. What was that thing?”

“Óvættr,” Yrsa grimaced.

“How bad?”

“Bad,” she replied solemnly, turning to rifle through the silverware drawer. It was my turn to nod. “Tell me more.”

Yrsa turned and clasped my hand, holding my eyes with hers before nodding. She moved quickly and sliced my palm with a knife, and I shrieked. She moved faster than I could, switching hands and slicing my second palm. At first, it doesn’t even feel like pain. Pressure followed by heat. A flash of red blooming too fast, too bright. My brain lags behind, struggling to buffer reality. I see the gashes on each hand before I feel them. The skin opened with a strange, rubbery reluctance. And then: the sting.

It’s sharp and electric. As if every nerve ending in my hand woke up screaming. The air hits the wound like salt. And still, a part of my mind just stares at it like it happened to someone else. That quiet voice: Well. That’s going to leave a mark.

I stepped back when she dropped my hand.

“What the shitting fuck. What the fuck,” I howled, and moved to strike her with my hand, drops of blood leaving a trail on the floor, red rain splattered in a haphazard semi-circle around us. Blood pools, slick and metallic, making my palms look and feel worse.

Yrsa laughs and sidestepped me, moving with speed and grace, then quickly slashed each of her hands.

“What are you doing, you lunatic?” I cupped my hands and moved to the sink.

“Kom þú hingat,” she said, gesturing me towards her.

“Nope. Out. Now.” I yelled, pointing to the door. She was by my side, grasping my hands before I could stop her, palms clasped against mine. Yrsa stared into my eyes, her own dark and wide open, and began to speak, soft and low, as she called out to something I could not see. I tried to move but our feet were rooted to the ground. Her words hummed from her throat, a child’s voice that deepened as she spoke, aging with each word. I understood none of what she said, but as she continued, something shifted. I heard a second voice, older than Yrsa’s soon joined by another, speaking slowly, their voices strong and lower than hers, but I thought them to be women. Girls and women speaking without bodies, spanning ages, multiplying until I lost count of their number and could no longer find one in their legion. Wonder spilled into me faster than I could hold it, shining brightly in my eyes.

I couldn’t look away from Yrsa. Didn’t want to as the words started to fill my throat, and I joined them, speaking in a language I still did not understand. My mind buzzed with words that were guttural at times, beautiful and lilting at others, the tone contoured and melodic. The words echoed like slow-moving water, uninterested in rushing to the edge of my tongue. There was a knowing that surrounded me. I heard the voices’ words and gleaned their meaning, beginning to learn them as I spoke. Yrsa grinned, tossing her head back and whooping victoriously. The others joined her, and I howled along with them, laughing at ourselves.

She spoke again, our hands still clasped, and the language altered until I recognized Germanic vowels, lingering before they sounded Gaelic, perhaps French, peppered by bits and pieces that cobbled themselves together with others that confused me and remained unrecognizable until I learned them. Yrsa’s eyes shifted with each language, blues and greys, hazels and browns, slipping from shades of one to the other. Yrsa’s eyes widened when the words turned to English. I watched her nod as she began to speak in full sentences. The other voices called out to us, calling us ‘daughter’ and ‘mother’. We listened to them as they spoke to us, calling us by our names.

“Stay,” said the voice of an older woman, a reed that broke before another interrupted her.

“Follow,” a younger woman instructed us, “Watch for,” she added, but was interrupted by a shriek, something wild that slashed at our minds, the pain sharp in my head. Yrsa released my hands, jerking away as we clutched at our own ears, the shrieks echoed, lingering while the voices were gone. Their silence left us empty. There was no peace in it.

Yrsa sat on the floor. I joined her, winded and listened to my heart, waiting for it to slow, and batting softly at my ears before I was reminded of the sting of my palms and stared at my open hands. The bleeding had stopped. Yrsa took them back in hers and pressed them together, whispering then thanking someone by name. When she released me again, she leaned back against a cabinet and sighed.

“Drained our batteries,” I rasped.

“Yes,” she said, and I understood her.

“Which language are we speaking, English? Norse?”

Yrsa shrugged. “Does it matter? We understand each other. Now we can begin our work.” She was breathing slowly and with intention, centering herself. “Breathe with me. That was your first time seeing. It can leave you spent. But your recovery will quicken with more experience.”

She watched me for a while, then stood and offered me her hand. “English now. I think,” she added, and pulled me to my feet.

“What do you mean, ‘our work’, Yrsa? I’m supposed to be on holiday.”

“On an adventure. You wanted one,” Yrsa grinned with a full set of teeth and, laughing, bit into her apple with a satisfying crunch.

“Yeah, one where I don’t die and I drive my zippy little car back to Chicago.”

“No problem. I teach you. We fight the evil. We defeat the evil. Then zippy-zappy back to Shitcago.”

“Chicago.”

“I know,” Yrsa smirked. “Show me how to make coffee.”

“Should you be drinking that when you’re just a kid?”

“I am over twelve hundred years old,” Yrsa scoffed. “You’re the one who is the child. You will show me proper deference.”

“An eleven-year-old ancestor who’s over twelve hundred years old. Are you a ghost?”

“No, I am alive. Coffee,” Yrsa added, shoving a bag of beans at me. “I want to try it with the cream and the other stuff that you put into yours.”

“Whipped cream,” I said guiltily, “And, yes, I am a sucker for it. Whipped sugar in a can.” Yrsa watched as I ground the beans and pressed buttons. She sniffed at the bag and smiled.

“How are you alive?” I asked her.

“My mother sent me to you. She’s a vǫlva. A prophetess, a sorceress, and a healer. A triple threat,” Yrsa added, “And your maternal ancestor. Just like me. Just like all of the other women you heard. We are your family, Caroline.”

“The fuck you are,” I said again.

Yrsa laughed and repeated the phrase. “The fuck we are. I like that one. The fuck we are. The fuck we are. The fuck we are. You’ll have to teach me more of these phrases. They will annoy my cousin, and I live to annoy her, she says.”

“You’re younger than her?”

“Yes, she’s my elder. So dull and responsible. And married. Smug married. Like you, only you have no partner.”

“Yes. Desperately single over here,” I rolled my eyes at her. “Go back to the bit about how I heard a bunch of my ancestors in my head. Are they dead?”

“No. All alive. Each in their own time. We called to you through our blood. A temporary pain. But necessary this first time.”

“You’re forgiven. This time,” I told her, and poured two cups of coffee.

“I did not apologize,” Yrsa replied, her eyes serious again. “Besides, I healed your cuts,” she added, nodding at my hands. She was right, I realized. No trace of the violence there. Though I felt a warm burn, like holding my hands over a fire, the heat comforting but approaching pain.

“Noted,” I said, “But next time you want to try to cut me, Yrsa, you tell me first. And the why of it, or I’ll knock you out flat.”

Yrsa laughed. “That’s my dohtrir. You see? You are one of us. A skjaldmær in the making. A shield-maiden.”

“Well, minus the virginity bit. That’s long gone.”

“Skjaldmær do not have to be virgins,” Yrsa scoffed. “That’s just some stupid fallacy an old man made up.”

“Oh, yeah, we still have those old men lurking around the place.”

“Of course, they linger like flies on flesh.”

Yrsa took her first sip of black coffee and frowned at it, wiping at her tongue with her hand.

“Sugar. Now,” she sputtered. I did not withhold my satisfied smirk as I added the extra ingredients to our mugs.

“So, how did you get here, in my time? A big poof of air, a giant bubble?”

“Through a crack in the earth, courtesy of your ancestors. It was a group effort.”

“A bit melodramatic of you lot.”

“Not at all,” Yrsa countered blandly, lifting her mouth to her cup and smiling, covered in whipped cream. I sipped my drink quietly and thought about all of it, parsing the details together.

“Alright, I’ll believe everything you’ve told me and everything that’s happened to me so far. Now tell me why you’re here.”

We stared at each other, our mouths covered by white froth, then she began to tell me a story.