It was autumn and the man was going on his evening walk. The dry leaves were falling from the trees and making a carpet of brown and red patterns on the ground and it made such a crackling noise as you walked over it.
It was an overcast sky and the wind was as cold as the sky. There were a shivers all round and the man blew on his cold hands and put them in the warmth of his inside pockets. He was trying to bear up the sight of the gray surroundings and the grayness of his heart.
He thought he heard the sound of weeping and muffled sobs which sounded as if coming from a female. He moved to a grove of trees and looked through the branches and surely enough there was a woman sitting on the ground crying. He moved closer to that comely figure and addressed her. The figure uncoiled itself
She was a maiden lovely as a morning flower drenched in fresh dew and drops of water were sliding down her delicate cheeks. Attracted by her autumnal beauty, the man moved nearer and asked who she was and how she came to be alone in that wilderness.
She told him that she was from an alien land and was wandering about in her pleasure garden but lost her way and ended up here. She was hungry and weary and was sure she was going to die unless some kind soul felt pity for her and took care of her.
She shone like a new moon in the darkness of his soul.
`Such fair lady shall not die and will take care of her.` Said the man gazing ardently on her beauty. He held her hand and lifted her up and started leading her towards his home, which being on the other side of the hill. A fierce wind blew untangling her long hair and blowing her garments but he held on to warm body of her and drew some consolation away from the dreary shadows of evening surrounding him.
He had a little cottage at the end of the small village and led her into it and made her sleep on a newly made soft couch and watched her while she slept deeply, out of her tiredness. He felt her little breaths coming and going and elevations and depressions of her sweet bosom. He lost himself in that fragrant world. for the time being. He listened to her sighs and moans through the cold metallic autumn outside and the steely winter inside.
Spring came and with it new life burst forth. Plants grew in profusion in his outside garden, surrounding his cottage and she delighted in watering and looking after those and soon they flowered. The man moved about his house and in the garden admiring all the beauty surrounding him.
He became enamoured of her beauty and took refuge in the shadow of enchantments cast by that fairy spell. Her smiles bled him to death and her raven tangles gripped him hard and sometime he felt like being suffocated by her beauty. He began to wander hither and thither and one day bewildered by her beauty and wearied out by the excitement, he lay down under a tree and fell asleep as the spring breezes were pleasant.
A long hooded snake was circling the house and entered into it. The back door was ajar and through it, it ventured t into the garden where he was sleeping. It slowly came near him and put out its forked tongue as if to smell his body and began to crawl up his body with a slithering movement. A sweet smelling liquid oozed out of its body. It lay there covering him and slowly began to wound around him and tightened its grip .It projected out its forked tongue and began to lick his flesh.
He screamed and woke up. It was ghastly.
*
The days grew and with all it their intimacy. One day they embraced and kissed for a long time and the taste of it was sweet. They indulged in it more frequently until the urges drove them to become even closer physically. In the darkness they lay close, to feel the warmth of their bodies and this outer warmth slowly seeped into their inner cores, deep under their skin as it warmed their heart and their entrails and they forgot about the outside world. Their passion became powerful and prompted them into lovemaking of long intensity. The wounded around each other to squeeze and taste all the sinuous energies of their bodies.
One night after a passionate love making they became exhausted and fell into each other`s arms and swooned into a deep sleep. He woke in the middle of the night disturbed by, he thought, by some slithering noise and tried to touch her in the dark but she was not there. The moonlight was filtering through the window and the inside of room became visible in that diffused night. The door was ajar. Slowly it opened and he saw a slimy slithering body of a snake entering the room and it was all just like his dream.
He feigned sleep and lay there motionless, shaking with fright. Slowly the form climbed on to the bed and turned into the form of the same beautiful women. He lay there nearly subdued out of fright and with the first light of dawn; he jumped out of the bed and went into the garden bemoaning his fate. The woman came out and suspecting that her secrets were out.
`As you have seen, I am Lamia, the snake woman and have the power of taking a human form.` She said sweetly.
`Please move away, I have nothing to do with you anymore.` He said in trembling voice.
He tried to run away but the snake woman embraced him in her arms tightly.
`You cannot escape from me now; we are made for each other.`
`I want to live my own life.`
`Your life is over.
`Do not say that. Oh God! I cannot bear it!` He screamed
`Do not behave like a mad man. Be sensible. I am two hundred years old and whatever life we have left. Let us enjoy it in all that sweet passion.`
Durlabh Singh© 2013.