T h e AE t h e r i u m S a g a
Echoes of the North: The Forgotten Vikings Who Stayed
As published in "Ætherium: Journal of Divergent Histories, Vol. IX, 2025 Edition"
Written by: Joshua W. Murcray
In the year 1001 CE, long before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock or Columbus misnamed a continent, a Norse expedition set foot on the stony shores of what is now known as the Ktaqmkuk & Beothuk Protectorate. Their journey from Kalaallit Nunaat was driven by the tales of Leif Erikson-of a fertile land across the sea he called "Vinland." The records of this voyage are sparse in our primary history, fragmented into sagas and whispered archaeological finds. But in the world of Wakaskató, the voyage did not end in retreat.
This is the story of Einar Thorlakson and his son Bjørn-a father nearing the twilight of his warrior's life and a son just coming into his own. Both were part of the Norse expedition that briefly settled in the land the Saguenay people called Ktaqmkuk, meaning "island of spirits." Unlike their crewmates, Einar and Bjørn did not return to Kalaallit Nunaat. Their names are absent from the later logbooks. They stayed.
Why?
According to the oral records of the Anishinaabek Confederacy-painstakingly preserved in the living histories of the Grand Keepers-Einar was a man of presence, not just prowess. He bore the scars of a hundred battles but spoke with the grace of a skald. In his words and actions, he offered something new: humility. Upon meeting the Mi'kmaq elders, Einar requested to sit, not speak. He offered a carved amber ring in trade for their time. The ring was not a gift-it was a symbol of intent.
Einar saw something in the people of this land that his own had lost: a balance with the world, not domination of it. He told them stories of Snæland's volcanic anger and Kalaallit Nunaat's creeping ice. He spoke of men who hunted the sea empty and bled the land dry for glory. "I have chased conquest," he told them, "but I have never tasted peace."
Bjørn, younger and still gripped by restlessness, was skeptical. But over the weeks, his resistance wore down, tempered by the kindness of the clan’s young warrior-instructors and the wisdom of the medicine woman, Awenasa, who taught him that strength was not just in the arm, but in the root, the stone, and the bloodline. It was Awenasa whom he would later marry.
When the time came for the Norse to depart, Einar and Bjørn made their choice. They gathered their few possessions: axes, tools, cloth, iron nails, and preserved meat. The rest of the Norsemen, left behind what they could not carry, but taking with them gifts from the locals: woolen blankets and glazed pottery, which would later be found in the Kalaallit Nunaat ruins and dismissed by historians as trade anomalies.
The farewell was not mournful. It was resolute. Einar clasped the arm of his longtime captain and said simply, "Go back and tell them we found something more valuable than gold. Even if they do not see it that way."
From that point on, the two Norsemen became integrated-not as conquerors, not as curiosities, but as contributors. Einar shared forging techniques and siege-engine sketches he recalled from his youth. Bjørn taught knotwork, fishing methods, and the basics of seafaring with stars. In turn, they learned herbal medicine, the art of seasonal migration, and the sacred patterns of Indigenous diplomacy.
By the time later European explorers arrived centuries later, they encountered something unexpected: unified nations prepared for them. Immunologically bolstered from earlier exposure to Norse diseases, culturally cohesive due to cross-tribal teachings inspired by the Norse duo, and technologically agile from centuries of shared innovation, the Indigenous people of Wendake were not victims-in-waiting.
They were a civilization forged in unity.
This integration set in motion the cultural momentum that would culminate in the formation of the United Lands of Wakaskató-an unprecedented alliance of Indigenous and settler peoples. It began not with a war, nor a treaty, but with a single, quiet choice:
To stay.
This is what caused the divergence from our world and the events we are familiar with.
A world where location names stayed the same. Where events that would change the names of countries, didn't.
A world that changed in all but name, for in this world, the one you call "Earth", it has kept its original name and its inhabitants know it as, Eden.
This is Iteration-3175.
Welcome.
Now let's introduce you around.