...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