...and as I was following the trail of blood in the snow, it led me further and
further into a forest, that seemed to be
beckoning me. The winterland stretched
out like some painting by John Bauer where the mist of morning lay thick among
the trees
creating a vibe so magical it felt as if I had stepped right into a
saga. Determined as I was to find my furry companion I kept walking
without
fear, ironically without whom I wouldn't normally have dared to walk this deep
into an unknown forest, but the great
whiteness came across as pure as innocent,
not a bit frightening or threatening - I was seduced. Every now and then soft
whiffs of
wind blew and from branches, powder-snow gently was falling, amongst
the treetops thousands of icecycles played their tinsel tingling
music. Though
he seemed to have ran out of blood I followed his limping footprints through
the untouched snow, it seemed that no
living thing had set its foot on this
place for thousand years, a place this beautiful couldn't possibly possess
anything
evil.............. it's funny what a little snow can do
I must have walked for hours when I finally came to a mountainside at
the
end of the enchanted forest. The traces now led into a crevice and through a
narrow pathway, all the time I was thinking of my
furry four-legged friend and
it wasn't until I was totally engulfed by the white light that I became aware
of the striking
similarities with what many claim happens when we die, when our
disembodied spirit enters the land of the dead. As the mist scattered
from my
snowblind eyes I saw that in a glade I was standing staring out over a
beautifully snowclad valley down below. The silence
was deafening, the greenish
mass of ice-cycles reached all the way up and looked as if they were attached
to the sky itself,
raindrops were hanging like crystals in the air as if time
stopped and them froze while they were falling, it was like seeing the
world
through frosted glass and I imagine this is what he had in mind when he
invented the expression "when hell is freezing over".
At first I thought the
blood would freeze in my veins but after awhile I adapted so well the chilling
bite began to feel like it was
burning, by and by I removed my clothes as I
went along. Just a stone's toss inside the entrance his foot-prints
suddenly
disappeared, as if he had been given wings
I looked up and saw I was standing in front of a gate so gigantic
it
dwarfed the two mighty statues of ice standing on each side. In the sort of
dream-like state I was I didn't stop to marvel at
what it was I just passed by
between the two frost bitten guards and into the garden. Freely and without
fear I wandered amongst an
abundance of icy sculptures so carefully carved they
looked human, there was a grotesque sculpture of a man standing on his
knees
with both his arms raised overhead, you could tell by looking at his tormented
face that he was screaming his lungs out.
Behind him stood a mother and her two
children, whom she sheltered with her bare body. I let my fingers run over the
sad face of an
old man, every wrinkle was perfect and so was the tears. The
whole bizarre scenery reminded me of an oft-told tale when I was a child
where
an entire village was turned into stone, could this be, it was the different
but yet the same. I literally froze in front of a
sculpture of a naked young
woman who seemed to be smiling, fascinated I sat in my own thoughts and didn't
notice the roar that
quickly grew in the distance. When I turned around it was
like the nightfall had already fallen, I began running as fast as my legs
could
bare me but it was too late the approaching blizzard was already over me and I
got sucked into the whirl, the snow covered
every inch of my body, I tried to
scream but the whirling avalanche came down through my mouth and nostrils and
filled my lungs. I
knew now what had really happened here and that I would soon
become an ice-sculpture myself. When I stopped fighting it and gave in
a
wonderful warmth washed over me and the closest thing I can think of when
describing it, is an orgasm... I died with a smile on my
lips