Everyone has a story. Be aware, don't miss a moment. The author's hand is in every detail, how do I know this? Because this is my story.
I am Sophie Elisabeth Hadassah Weinberg, although due to life altering circumstances I had taken the name of Aurelie. Even I cannot have imagined such a thing to befall me.
But I best explain how it all started.
Sophie Weinberg was born on June 7, 1924, to a biracial father, Isaiah Regler -who took on his wife's surname and converted to Judaism- and a Jewish mother, Romy Weinberg in Austria. I grew up a child of nature, the eldest of three. She excelled at swimming, fishing, and mountain climbing but with scholarly inclinations.
She was a spritely young thing, with curls the color of cinnamon, honeyed skin and the sea green eyes of her mother.
Now families had taken it upon themselves to ensure that her young brother, Tannen and the youngest Emmeline and Sophie learned speak at least three or four languages besides German: Hebrew, French, English and Yiddish.
Soon in 1934 while her siblings are studying for an exams, Sophie traveled through America with her innovative grandparents on a road trip. Although they kept many their family traditions such as their faith and speaking their tongues, the two grown-ups have gotten quite venturesome at their current age, having seen so much of their new home and wishing to share it with their family. As an early birthday present, since they sensed Sophie was already a young woman, and would enjoy a better hands-on experience of history and appreciating nature. However much of the trip would be done by automobile.
First they set off early morning from New York city to a half hour long ride to Sleep Hollow, where they enjoyed three days of calm afternoons fishing or bird-watching in the countryside, visiting historical locations and the farmer's market. Soon after a couple more visits to different places for food and other necessities, upon one of several stops by morning they've reached a small town in Connecticut called Gravesfield as their final stop.
The teenager and her grandparents would be staying five days in the rented house that came with a fair price. The town name sounded eerie but was actually rather picturesque.
"Now you put that book away, Aynikl! The day is much too fine to be inside!" Sophie's grandfather remarks.
"You should be outside, gardening or dancing with the other inge mentshn!" added Sophie's grandmother
Her grandparents often mixed Yiddish words and more whenever they spoke English.
"I'm having a much better time in Oz! Sometimes I can see myself exploring and traveling unexplored lands full of exotic creatures and extraordinary people." Sophie responded calmly. "I could even entertain the thought of joining a good cause… so long as it's to help people not tease and gawp like those childish boors in town! Some of them don't even knew the difference between Ivy Berries and blueberries!"
The truth is she felt nothing but contempt towards the adolescents in the area she and her grandparents were visiting for the time being, because they were far from friendly. Sophie never fit in with them no matter what she did. Her hair is almost always a mess even with attempts to keep it tied, and she's almost always covered in bruises and bandages from her outdoor activities.
"A day will come when you want to see more to find a good mensch among them."
"No, I won't. They're all no better than snakes!" Sophie grumbled.
Well, she did different ideas. Some of those came from being German, some from being Jewish, and some just from being me. She stopped worrying so much about fitting in with everybody else when she had her bat mitzvah. Oh, she still wanted friends, good loyal ones. But she just don't want to be everyone's else's idea of normal. I wanted to be appreciated as she was.
"You hear that, Papa? According to our little Sophie there isn't an ounce of difference between us and the hairless creatures that eat the mice in old country!"
Sophie rolled her eyes. "Oh, Bubbe, you know there are some exceptions."
Her grandfather then began to shoo Sophie out the door. "Pshaw! You go out and find something to do outside and when you come back, dinner will be ready!"
"But Zayde, I don't…" and found herself outside. "Want to go out!"
'At least it's tranquil in here. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if I had someone I can actually talk to.' I thought
Looking back, one could say Sophie's destiny was framed on that distant day when… another form of bullies crossed her path. Adela Herbert and her gang of cackling cronies.
"Look, it's the misfit!"
"Adela, why can't you just leave me alone for one day?" Sophie grumbled. "I already gave you my snack-pack pudding and my glow-in-the-dark pen, just to get you to shut up. What more do you want? What did I do to you? Why are you so mad at me?"
"Oh I'm not mad at you, Sophie," Adela said. She flashed me a catty smirk. "I'm concerned about you."
"Concerned?" Sophie echoed. "Ha! You think I don't hear you and those vipers laughing and saying things about me?!"
"Well, you're different. And in a big city that might be a good thing. But here in Gravesfield, being different can get you hurt—or worse."
"Don't give me that! You just came up so you and your friends can mock me!"
"Alright, don't say I didn't try." Adela shrugged falsely.
Doris and Brooke each grabbed one of Sophie's arms and dragged her into the forestal area. Her heart started to thump hard. Were they going to tie her to a tree and just leave her there?
They dragged her down a dirt path before reaching a decrepit abandoned house. An abandoned two-story house with white walls and a brown roof. It had a front door in the middle and two windows on each side of the door. It has four pillars in front, but the third one was broken. And there was a large hole in the roof with two broken windows.
Doris and Brooke let go of Sophie's arms, only to shove her right inside!
Sophie stumbled to her hands and knees inside. It was quite small living room; there is a fireplace to the right and an abandoned armchair in the left corner. Filled with abandoned items and the floor is littered with old newspapers. Behind the living room, a staircase leading upstairs could be seen.
She turned to hurry out, but the door closed right in her face.
"Alright, you schmucks! This isn't funny! Now let me out!" Sophie tried the door, but she couldn't push it open. "This has gone on long enough, open up!" She looked out the windows and could see the girls laughing maliciously outside, and moving further away!
Irritated, Sophie huffed. Fine! Then I'll make my own way out.
She turned to look for anything she can use to pry open the windows, and was met with something else surprisingly.
It looked like an ash brown rabbit, but with small ridges on its back like an iguana.
But how did it get in? The door had closed behind her when and the rest shoved her inside. And the windows were still closed. The little creature twitched it nose, looking up at Sophie curiously before turning and starting to hop further into the shack.
If she follows the little thing, she could find a way out somewhere. Having nothing else to do, she decided to take a chance and follow the little animal.
As she walked, it occurred to her that she'd before never seen such a rabbit with ridges. But by then she was already burning with curiosity.
From outside, the entire inside of the house glows a blinding white, visible through the windows and the holes in the roof.
"Huh?"
And then she fell into an open dirt trap. Sophie wasn't too bothered at first, she tried to climb out, however the moment she clutched an old root, it broke apart. This sent her tumbling down again and covering her face from the falling dust and leaves.
Just as she attempted to try again she looks up to see a shadowy figure looking at her from the hole's edge.
"Oh, young lady!" The voice sounded female. "Are you alright? Here, let me help you."
The stranger offers a hand which Sophie took gratefully. She is then pulled out of the hole.
"Thanks. I…" Sophie began only to stop short. She sees the 'woman' is actually a three headed biped in a dual Elizabethan ruff collars that now looked just as startled. "Aaah!"
The stranger that helped her screamed back in shock. Frightened, Sophie runs off only to bump into one creature after another. Some looked like animals or insects, other were more monstrous or just plain outlandish.
She crashes into one that looked like a cloaked ghoul that was holding something that fell into Sophie's hands. It looked like a little goblin.
"Do you mind?" It retorted.
"Aah!" Sophie tossed it back like a hot potato to the ghoul.
"Aah!"
By then, many were already gawking at the ruckus, but the girl manages to escape and hide behind some barrels. Nervously, she peeks out in disbelief from behind the barrels, watching the denizens go about their lives like… well like actual people. Occasionally she would see what she thought were other people except for a few certain details. Some of them had painted ears like elves, other had one or more eyes. And another factor she soon noticed was wat they were able to perform with their hands.
Bewildered, Sophie both pinched and slapped herself several times to make sure she's not dreaming.
It was something out of a fever induced nightmare… or some incongruous fiction novel.
She had a feeling that she's not in Connecticut at all. Carefully, she walked to what look like the edge of a cliff and sees a dense, medieval-style town surrounded by bone mountains and forests, with two large green arms looming over it. For the architecture had far too many arms, claws and teeth. The houses were made of wood and stone, and can be up to four-stories high; some of them were built on the side of a cliff or on the green arms. Other houses also had a peculiar monster-like architecture, donning an eerie appearance with either bones, eyes, teeth, hands or a mixture. Many of the stone pathways intersected the narrow walls of the town. The more notable buildings had a gothic appearance, being made of stone and the windows are made of stained glass.
It was a sight too impossible to imagine. Supposedly the residents here aren't used to seeing well, people like her.
Alright so most of this place was bizarre and yet compelling. The more she explored, the more thrilled Sophie became, Imagine: Another world, just like in her stories!
Wait until I tell… she thought excitedly, then stopped. No. She was going to keep this place a secret, this was her discovery and she wasn't going to let some mean-spirited folks take all the credit for it.
And so she returned to the spot she'd fallen into the dirt trap, which lead her right through and empty clearing close to what looked the iron gates to a graveyard.
Confused, she walked around found what appeared to be a floating doorway with a large, yellow, slit pupil eye hovering close to the trees. As she stared at it, the door opened revealing the outside of the old house she'd been thrown into.
Quickly she dashed towards the doors, the portal folds up and disappeared.
The next morning Sophie took a messenger bag in which she took a diary, a sketchbook, pencil case and some food. She was eager to find the strange place again to see more thus she devoured her breakfast of latkes, fried wurst, eggs and tomatoes.
"Where are you off to this early?" Her grandmother questioned.
"I found something interesting to do, just like you said!" Sophie said excitedly, she kissed her grandparents on their cheeks then ran out the door. "I'll be back before supper!"
Her grandparents were astounded then shrugged. "At least she's out enjoying the sunshine."
From the entirety of her stay, Sophie continued visiting the Boiling Isles, this time she brought a diary in which she recorded her explorations of this strange, new world. Despite her being Jewish, she remains very skeptical of the referral of the word "demons" to the other creatures and beasts in this world. For she feels as though she were using a quite denigrating speciesist slur.
She eventually gets used to it and enjoys some of the positive attention that make her more self-confident however she knew she had to return home to Austria.
But Sophie promised herself that once she was of age, she would someday go back and explore more of this uncharted region. Little did she know, was that she'd be making good on that promise within four years.
To be continued…
Author's note: OK fair warning the first few chapters will show Sophie's story, so she won't be meeting any major players just yet.
