A silvery laugh cut through his dizziness, and his sight cleared slowly. He looked up; there was a strangeness about all the landscape that he could not place or define — an unfamiliar tinge to earth and sky. But he did not think long of this. Before him, swaying like a sapling in the wind, stood a woman. Her body was like ivory to his dazed gaze, and save for a light veil of gossamer, she was naked as the day. Her slender bare feet were whiter than the snow they spurned. She laughed down at the bewildered warrior. Her laughter was sweeter than the rippling of silvery fountains, and poisonous with cruel mockery. Who are you? asked the Cimmerian. Whence come you? What matter? Her voice was more musical than a silver-stringed harp, but it was edged with cruelty. Call up your men, said he, grasping his sword. Yet though my strength fail me, they shall not take me alive. I see that you are of the Vanir. Have I said so? His gaze went again to her unruly locks, which at first glance he had thought to be red. Now he saw that they were neither red nor yellow but a glorious compound of both colors. He gazed spell-bound. Her hair was like elfin-gold; the sun struck it so dazzlingly that he could scarcely bear to look upon it. Her eyes were likewise neither wholly blue nor wholly grey, but of shifting colors and dancing lights and clouds of colors he could not define. Her full red lips smiled, and from her slender feet to the blinding crown of her billowy hair, her ivory body was as perfect as the dream of a god. Conans pulse hammered in his temples. I can not tell, said he, whether you are of Vanaheim and mine enemy, or of Asgard and my friend. Far have I wandered, but a woman like you I have never seen. Your locks blind me with their brightness. Never have I seen such hair, not even among the fairest daughters of the Æsir. By Ymir — Who are you to swear by Ymir? she mocked. What know you of the gods of ice and snow, you who have come up from the south to adventure among an alien people? By the dark gods of my own race! he cried in anger. Though I am not of the golden-haired Æsir, none has been more forward in sword-play! This day I have seen four score men fall, and I alone have survived the field where Wulfheres reavers met the wolves of Bragi. Tell me, woman, have you seen the flash of mail out across the snow-plains, or seen armed men moving upon the ice? I have seen the hoar-frost glittering in the sun, she answered. I have heard the wind whispering across the everlasting snows. He shook his head with a sigh. Niord should have come up with us before the battle joined. I fear he and his fighting-men have been ambushed. Wulfhere and his warriors lie dead. I had thought there was no village within many leagues of this spot, for the war carried us far, but you can not have come a great distance over these snows, naked as you are. Lead me to your tribe, if you are of Asgard, for I am faint with blows and the weariness of strife. My village is further than you can walk, Conan of Cimmeria, she laughed. Spreading her arms wide, she swayed before him, her golden head lolling sensuously, her scintillant eyes half shadowed beneath their long silken lashes. Am I not beautiful, oh man? Like Dawn running naked on the snows, he muttered, his eyes burning like those of a wolf. Then why do you not rise and follow me? Who is the strong warrior who falls down before me? she chanted in maddening mockery. Lie down and die in the snow with the other fools, Conan of the black hair. You can not follow where I would lead. Art by Mark Schultz
Posted on: Tue, 27 May 2014 17:05:36 +0000
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