Classic Audiobook Collection - Gods of the North by Robert E. Howard ~ Full Audiobook [fantasy]

Episode Date: April 19, 2023

Gods of the North by Robert E. Howard audiobook. Genre: fantasy 'The Frost-Giant's Daughter' is, arguably the earliest chronological story by Robert E. Howard in terms of Conan's life. The brief tale is set somewhere in frozen Nordheim, geographically situated north of Conan's homeland, Cimmeria. Conan is depicted by Howard as a youthful Cimmerian mercenary traveling among the golden-haired Aesir in a war party. Shortly before the story begins, a hand-to-hand battle has occurred on an icy plain. Eighty men ('four score') have perished in bloody combat, and Conan alone survives the battlefield where Wulfhere's Aesir 'reavers' fought the Vanir 'wolves' of Bragi, a Vanir chieftain. Thus, the story opens. Following this fierce battle against the red-haired Vanir, Conan the Cimmerian, lying exhausted on the corpse-strewn battlefield, is visited by a beautiful, condescending and semi-nude woman identifying herself as 'Atali.' Upon her bodice, she wears a transparent veil: a wisp of gossamer that was not spun by human distaff. The mere sight of her strange nakedness kindles Conan's lust and, when she repeatedly taunts him, he madly chases her for miles across the snows with the intent of raping her. The excitement continues but I won't ruin the story for you by saying more. Can Conan deal with this daughter of a frost-giant? And what when her daddy shows up? For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 01 (00:19:12) Chapter 02 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

gods of the north by robert e howard part one the clangor of the swords had died away the shouting of the slaughter was hushed silence lay on the red-stained snow the pale bleak sun that glittered so blindingly from the ice fields and the snow-covered plains struck sheens of silver from rent corselet and broken blade where the dead lay in heaps The nerveless hand yet gripped the broken hilt. Helmated heads back drawn in their death-throes, tilted red beards and golden beards grimly upward, as if in last invocation to Emir the frost giant. Across the red drifts and male-clad forms, two figures approached one another. In that utter desolation, only they moved. The frosty sky was over them, the white, illimitable plain around them, the dead men at their feet. Slowly through the corpses they came, as ghosts might come to a trist through the shambles

of a world. Their shields were gone, their corslets dented, blood smeared their mail, their swords were red, their horned helmets showed the marks of fierce strokes. One spoke, He whose locks and beard were red as the blood on the sunlit snow. Man of the raven locks, said he, Tell me your name, so that my brothers in Vonaheim may know who was the last of Wolf-Harris band to fall before the sword of Heimdol. This is my answer, replied the black-haired warrior. Hot in Vanaheim, but in Valhalla will you tell your brothers the name of Amra of Akbitaana.

Heimdl roared and sprang, and his sword swung in a mighty ark. Amra staggered and his vision was filled with red sparks as the blade shivered into bits of blue fire on his helmet. But as he reeled, he thrust with all the power of his great shoulders. The sharp point drove through brass scales and bones and heart, and the red-haired warrior died at Amra's feet. Amra stood swaying, trailing his sword, a sudden sick weariness assailing him. The glare of the sun on the snow cut his eyes like a knife, and the sky seemed shrunken and strangely far.

He turned away from the trampled expanse, where yellowed bearded, warriors lay locked with red-haired slayers in the embrace of death. A few steps he took, and the glare of the snow-fields was suddenly dimmed. A rushing wave of blindness engulfed him, and he sank down into the snow, supporting himself on one mailed arm, seeking to shake the blindness out of his eyes like a lion might shake his mane. A silvery laugh cut through his dizziness and his sighted. cleared slowly.

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, and, save for a veil of Gossamer, she was naked as the day. Her slender bare feet were whiter than the snow. So they spurned. She laughed, and her laughter was sweeter than the rippling of silvery fountains, and poisonous with cruel mockery.

Who are you? demanded the warrior. What matter? Her voice was more musical than a silver-stringed harp, but it was edged with cruelty. Call up your men, he growled, grasping his sword. though my strength fail me yet they shall not take me alive i see that you are of the vunner have i said so he looked again at her unruly locks which 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 spellbound her hair was like elfin gold striking which the sun dazzled him her eyes were neither wholly blue nor wholly gray but of shifting colors and dancing lights and clouds of colors he could not recognize

her full red lips smiled and from her slim feet to the blinding crown of her billowy hair her ivory body was as perfect as the dream of a god amros pulse hammered in his temples i cannot tell said he whether you are of vonaheim and mine enemy or of osgard and my friend far have i wondered from zingara to the sea of vilayet in stygia and kush and the country of the hyrcanians but a woman like you i have never seen your locks blind me with their brightness not even among the fairest daughters of the acer have i seen such hair by emir who are you to swear by emir she mocked what know you of the gods of ice and snow you who have come up from the south to adventure among strangers by the dark gods of my own race he cried in anger have i been backward in the sword play stranger or no this day i have seen fourscore warriors fall and i alone survive the field where mulchre Havar's reavers met the men of Braki. Tell me, woman, have you caught the flash of mail across the snowplains, 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. Njord should have come up with us before the battle joined. I fear he and his warriors have been ambushed. Wolfhair lies dead with all his weapon, men. I had thought there was no village within many leagues of this spot, for the war carried us far,

but you can have come no great distance over these snows, naked as you are. Lead me to your tribe if you are of Asgard, for I am faint with the weariness of strife. My dwelling place is farther than you can live, walk, Amra of Akbita, she laughed. Spreading wide her arms, she swayed before him, her golden head lolling wantonly, her scintillating eyes shadowed beneath long silken lashes. Am I not beautiful, 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 followed? down before me she chanted in maddening mockery lie down and die in the snow with the other fools amra of the black hair you cannot follow where i would lead with an oath the man heaved himself upon his feet his blue eyes blazing his dark-scarred face convulsed rage shook his soul but desire for the taunting figure before him hammered at his temples and drove his wild blood riotously through his veins passion fierce as physical agony flooded his whole being so that earth and sky swam red to his dizzy gaze and weariness and faintness were swept from him in madness he spoke no word as he drove at her fingers hooked like talons with the shriek of laughter she leaped back and ran, laughing at him over her white shoulder. With a low growl, Omra followed. He had forgotten the fight, forgotten the mailed warriors who lay in their blood,

forgotten Neard's belated reavers. He had only thought for the slender white shapes which seemed to float rather than run before him. Out across the white blinding plain she led him. The trampled red field fell out of her. sight behind him, but still Amra kept on with the silent tenacity of his race. His mailed feet broke through the frozen crust. He sank deep in the drifts and forged through them by sheer strength. But the girl danced across the snow as light as a feather floating across a pool.

Her naked feet scarcely left their imprint on the hoar-frost. In spite of the fire in his veins, the cold bit through the water. warriors male and furs, but the girl in her gossamer veil ran as lightly and as gaily as if she danced through the palms and rose gardens of poitaine. Black curses drooled through the warrior's parched lips. The great veins swelled and throbbed in his tipples and his teeth gnashed spasmodically. "'You cannot escape me,' he roared. "'Lead me into a trap. and I'll pile the heads of your kinsmen at your feet.

Hide from me and I'll tear apart the mountains to find you. I'll follow you to hell and beyond hell. Her maddening laughter floated back to him, and foam flew from the warrior's lips. Farther and farther into the wastes she led him, till he saw the wide plains give way to low hills, marching upward in broken ranges. Far to the north he caught a glimpse of towering mountains,

blue with the distance or white with the eternal snows. Above these mountains shone the flaring rays of the borealis. They spread fan-wise into the sky, frosty blades of cold, flaming light, changing in color, growing and brightening. Above him the skies glowed and crackled with strange lights and gleams, the snow shone weirdly now frosty blue now icy crimson now cold silver through a shimmering icy realm of enchantment amra plunged doggedly onward in a crystalline maze where the only reality was the white body dancing across the glittering snow beyond his reach ever beyond his reach

yet he did not wonder at the necromanic strangeness of it all not even when two gigantic figures rose up to bar his way the scales of their mail were white with hoarfrost their helmets and their axes were sheathed in ice Snow sprinkled their locks. In their beards were spikes of icicles. Their eyes were cold as the lights that streamed above them. "'Brothers!' cried the girl, dancing between them. "'Look who follows. I have brought you a man for the feasting. Take his heart, that we may lay its smoking on our father's board.'

The giants answered with roars like the grinding of icebergs on a frozen shore. and heaved up their shining axes as the maddened Akbatainen hurled himself upon them. A frosty blade flashed before his eyes, blinding him with his brightness, and he gave back a terrible stroke that sheared through his foes' thigh. With a groan the victim fell, and at the instant Amra was dashed into the snow, his left shoulder numb from the blow of the survivor, from which the warrior, year's male had barely saved his life. Amra saw the remaining giant looming above him like a colossus-car device etched against the glowing sky. The axe fell, to sink through the snow and

deep into the frozen earth, as Amra hurled himself aside and leaped to his feet. The giant roared and wrenched the axe head free, but even as he did so Amra sword sang down. The giant's knees bent, and he sank slowly into the snow, which turned crimson with the blood that gushed from his half-severed neck. Amra wheeled, to see the girl standing a short distance away, staring in wide-eyed horror. All mockery gone from her face. He cried out fiercely, and the blood drops flew from his sword as his hand shook in the intensity of his passion.

"'Call the rest of your brothers,' he roared. "'Call the dogs. I'll give their hearts to the wolves.' With a cry of fright she turned and fled. She did not laugh now, nor mock him over her shoulder. She ran as far her life, though he strained every nerve and few, until his temples were like to burst in the snow swam red to his gaze. She drew away from him, dwindling in the the witch fire of the skies, until she was a figure no bigger than a child, then a dancing white flame on the snow, then a dim blur in the distance. But grinding his teeth until the blood started from his gums, he reeled on, and he saw the blur

grow to a dancing white flame, and then she was running less than a hundred paces ahead of him, and slowly the space narrowed, foot by foot. She was running with effort now, her golden locks blowing free. He heard the quick panting of her breath, and saw a flash of fear in the look she cast over her alabaster shoulder. The grim endurance of the warrior had served him well. The speed ebbed from her flashing white legs. She reeled in her gate.

In his untamed soul, flamed up the fires of hell she had fanned so well. With an inhuman roar he closed in on her just as she wheeled with a haunting cry and flung out her arms to fend him off. His sword fell into the snow as he crushed her to him. Her supple body bent backwards as she fought with desperate frenzy in his iron arms. Her golden hair blew about his face, blinded. him with its sheen. The feel of her slender figure twisting in his mailed arms drove him to blinder madness. His strong fingers sank deep into her smooth flesh, and that flesh was cold as ice. It was as if he embraced not a woman of human flesh and blood, but a woman of flaming

ice. She writhed her golden head aside, striving to avoid the savage kisses that bruised her red lips. You are as cold as the snows, he mumbled dazedly. I will warm you with the fire in my own blood. With a desperate wrench she twisted from his arms, leaving her single gossamer garment in his grasp. She sprang back and faced him, her golden locks in wild disarray, her white bosom heaving, her beautiful eyes blazing with terror.

For an instant he stood frozen, awed by her. her terrible beauty as she posed naked against the snows. And in that instant she flung her arms toward the lights that glowed in the skies above her and cried out in a voice that rang in Amran's ears forever after. Emir! Oh, my father, save me! Amra was leaping forward, arms spread to seize her. When, with a crack like the breaking of an ice mountain, the whole skies leaped into icy.

sea-fire. The girl's ivory body was suddenly enveloped in a cold blue flame so blinding that the warrior threw up his hands to shield his eyes. A fleeting instant, skies and snowy hills were bathed in crackling white flames, blue darts of icy light with frozen crimson fires. Then Amra staggered and cried out. The girl was gone. The glowing snow lay empty and bare. above him the witch lights flashed and played in a frosty sky gone mad, and among the distant blue mountains, there sounded a rolling thunder as of a gigantic war-chariot rushing behind steeds, whose frantic hoofs struck lightning from the snows and echoes from the skies. Then suddenly, the borealis, the snowy hills, and the blazing heavens reeled drunkenly to Amra's sight.

Thousands of fireballs burst with showers of sparks, and the sky itself became a titanic wheel which rained stars as it spun. Under his feet the snowy hills heaved up like a wave, and the Akbatanin crumpled into the snows to lie motionless. End of Part 2 of Gods of the North by Robert E. Howard. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. In a cold, dark universe whose sun was extinguished eons ago, Amra felt the movement of life, alien and unguessed. An earthquake had him in its grip and was shaking him to and fro, at the same time chafing

his hands and feet until he yelled in pain and fury and groped for his sword. "'He's coming, too, harsa,' grunted a voice. "'Haste, we must rub the frost out of his limbs. he's ever to wields sword again. He won't open his left hand, growled another, his voice indicating muscular strain. He's gulching something. Amra opened his eyes and stared into the bearded faces that bent over him. He was surrounded by tall, golden-haired warriors and male and furs.

Amra, you live! By Grom! Nyard! gasped he. Am I alive? Or are we all dead and in Valhalla? We live, grunted Asair, busy over Amra's half-frozen feet. We had to fight our way through an ambush, else we had come up with you before the battle was joined. The corpses were scarce cold when we came upon the field.

We did not find you among the dead, so we followed your spoor. In Emer's name, Amra, why did you wander off into the wastes of the north? We have followed your tracks in the snow for hours. Had a blizzard come up and hidden them, we had never found you by Imyr. Swear not so often by Emyr, muttered a warrior, glancing at the distant mountains. This is his land, and the god bides among yonder mountains, the legends say. I followed a woman, Amra answered hazily. We met Brockie's men in the plains.

I know not how long we fought. I alone lived. I was dizzy and faint. The land lay like a dream before me. Only now do all things seem natural and familiar. The woman came and taunted me. She was beautiful as a frozen flame from hell. When I looked at her I was as one mad and forgot all else in the world.

I followed her. Did you not find her tracks? Are the giants in ice-mail I slew?" Nyard shook his head. We found only your tracks and the snow, Amra. Then it may be I was mad," said Amra, dazedly. Yet you yourself are no more real to me than was the golden-haired witch who fled naked across the snows before me.

Yet from my very hands she vanished in icy flame. He's delirious, whispered a war. warrior. Not so, cried an older man, whose eyes were wild and weird. It was Atali, the daughter of Emir, the frost giant. To the fields of the dead she comes and shows herself to the dying. Myself when a boy I saw her, when I lay half-slain on the bloody field of Woolraven. I saw her walk among the dead in the snows.

Her naked body gleaming like ivory and her golden hair like a blinding flame in the moonlight. I lay and howled like a dying dog because I could not crawl after her. She lures men from stricken fields into the wastelands, to be slain by her brothers the ice giants, who lay men's red hearts smoking on Emir's board. Amra has seen Atali the Frost Giant's daughter. bah grunted horser oh gorm's mind was turned in his youth by a sword cut on the head amra was delirious with the fury of battle look how his helmet is dented any of those blows might have addled his brain it was an hallucination he followed into the wastes he is from the south what does he know of atali you speak truth perhaps muttered amra it was all strange and weird by crumb he broke off glaring at the object that still dangled from his clenched left fist the others gaped silently at the veil he held up

a wisp of gossamer that was never spun by human distaff end of gods of the north by robert e howard