Andrus Kivirähk - The Man Who Spoke Snakish

I took the lice I’d received from the bear to Pirre and Rääk, and after the Primates had tenderly stroked them and let them scurry over their hairy fingers for a while, they commanded the lice to lie on their backs — and the creatures did so, waving their legs in the air.

“You see, they obey!” said Pirre and Rääk joyfully. “Smart creatures! We’ll let them in with the others; we’ve got enough room.” They could never have enough lice; they picked up every one they came across.

At this time Pirre and Rääk had another exciting task in hand. They had already bred frog-sized lice, but only a few, and wanted to breed lice that were the size of goats. The sturdier lice were separated from the smaller ones, they were allowed to multiply, and from these the very hugest were selected. This did not take long, however, as the lice bred quickly and had plenty of offspring. A few months later a goat-sized louse was born. I have to say that it was an impossibly hideous creature. With a little louse, the ugliness wasn’t visible, as it was simply a little speck, but a big louse was the most unpleasant animal you can imagine. Pirre and Rääk didn’t think so. They were very pleased with their monster.

“In the olden days, all animals were much bigger than today,” they said. “There were incredibly bulky creatures living in the world, which have died out by now, or gone into hiding to sleep forever in darkness. A big animal has a big sleep! They may never wake again, and nobody will see these magnificent giants again. So it’s so nice to see this louse, which will do very well bustling about on the fur of some terribly huge and ancient creature. Leemet, look at it carefully! Before you, you see a fragment of a world of hundreds of thousands of years ago!”

I looked at that fragment and I didn’t like it at all. I was very pleased to be living now, not hundreds of thousands of years before. I wasn’t about to say that to Pirre and Rääk, but for form’s sake I praised their louse, and I even agreed to take the animal for a walk, because the Primates thought it needed exercise. Pirre and Rääk themselves strayed away from their cave extremely rarely, since a little piece of primeval thicket remained just around their home, consisting of strange plants that had died out long ago elsewhere that Pirre and Rääk ate, and from which they harvested their grubs. Away from this little ancient ground they didn’t feel at home.

I invited Ints and Pärtel along, attached the leash to the louse, and took it walking in the woods. The insect was indeed the size of a goat, but extremely stupid. Apparently it couldn’t understand that it was no longer the size of a seed and tried to fit through the narrowest slits, expressing an insane eagerness as it did so. It didn’t care about our injunctions, but tried obstinately to press into some little holes that were a tenth its size. As a result the louse often got trapped, flailing its legs helplessly until we heaved it out with great effort. It was a terrible nuisance, and we decided to take it for a walk in some clearer place where it couldn’t climb anywhere.

We went to the lakeshore, but the louse was even stupider than we had thought. It didn’t perceive at all that the surface of the water was not the same as the grass, rushed headlong straight to the lake, and naturally fell in.

“Can this bastard swim?” squealed Pärtel, and I couldn’t really answer him, because I was no expert on lice. But after a few moments it became clear that it could swim after all, since it rose to the surface and floundered in the water, but again so stupidly that it steered away from us instead to keeping to the shore.

“It won’t be able to swim across the lake,” said Ints. “It will get tired out and sink to the bottom. And as far as I’m concerned it can stay there; such an animal is no use to anyone.”

“I’m afraid I’ll still have to go in the water and try and save it,” I said. “Pirre and Rääk would be angry if we didn’t bring it back. It was entrusted to me and I’m responsible for it.”

I stripped naked and was ready to jump into the water when somebody sternly stopped me.

It was Ülgas the Sage.

“Where’s your sense, boy!” he asked angrily. “Don’t you know this lake is sacred? This is the home of the lake-sprite to whom I always sacrifice two squirrels when the moon is young, so that he will stay in the lake and not let our homes drown in its currents. You must not swim here. It would anger the sprite terribly! First he would pull you down under the water, and then he would flood the whole forest. Get dressed immediately and get out of here, your friend too. The lake-sprite loves silence. He must not be disturbed.”

“I’m sorry for that, but I want to catch that beast!” I said. Ülgas scowled at the louse splashing in the lake, and his face became pale.

“But that’s the lake-sprite himself!” he muttered, falling to his knees, as if at that moment his shinbone had broken in half. “The sacred lake-sprite is showing himself to us. What could it mean?”

He stared at the louse bobbing in the water, his eyes big with wonder.

“Boys, you’ve offended him in some way!” he thundered, raising his arms heavenward. “He came for you, and I must not let you go. The sprite has the right to a sacrifice.”

“That is a louse, not a sprite,” said Ints scornfully. Adders didn’t believe in sprites, just as they didn’t believe in blooming ferns. They knew the forest inside out, and they knew what lives there and what does not. They did not stop people from going to the sacred grove and bringing sacrifices, although in their eyes it was completely senseless. Adders never interfered in other beings’ affairs, as long as it didn’t affect them directly. In their view, everyone has the right to live their lives just as foolishly as they like.

Clearly, then, the sight of a snake did not exactly please the Sage of the Grove. He eyed Ints disdainfully and then looked again at the louse swimming in the water.

“What are you talking about? What louse?” he said. “Lice are small. That is the lake-sprite. I ought to know such things. Don’t make him even angrier!”

“It really is a louse,” I assured him, and I told Ülgas about Pirre and Rääk’s experiments. The mention of Primates didn’t make the sage any happier, because, just like the adders, the Primates didn’t believe in sprites, and never visited the grove. “In ancient times there weren’t any groves, and these sprites were only invented later,” they would explain. “In those days long ago, when the woods were still full of Primates, people would bow in homage to other beings than those, but sadly, we no longer remember who they were and how they were worshipped.”

At any rate Ülgas still didn’t want to believe that it was an ordinary, if oversized, louse swimming in the water, and not the lake-sprite. Unfortunately at that moment the bug managed to flounder closer to the shore, so that its legs reached the bottom and it clambered onto dry land. It was wet and drooping, shivering a little, and tried instantly to scuttle down into a pine root.

“Now you see that it isn’t a sprite,” I said. “Apparently it just looks like a sprite. I didn’t know that sprites look like big lice.”

Ülgas the Sage glowered angrily at the louse.

“Boy,” he said then, having turned his back decisively on the creature and putting his heavy hand on my shoulder. “I want to tell you that you have dishonored the lake-sprite by throwing that horrible animal into the water. The sprite’s domain is polluted and I will have to bring him many sacrifices to quell his rage. And you must help me, since you are most to blame for angering the sprite. Come back here at midnight tonight and bring with you all the wolves from your barn. This time, squirrels’ blood won’t be enough! I must do everything in my power to stop the sprite from avenging this indignity.”