Andrus Kivirähk - The Man Who Spoke Snakish

I didn’t know who the “devil” was, but I guessed from the girl’s tone that it wasn’t likely to be someone from the village. I sat down next to Magdaleena.

“Then your father will be no help to you now,” I said. “To get the poison out of your blood you have to invite the same adder that bit you. He’ll suck his poison out of your leg and you’ll be all right. It’s a small thing; I’ll hiss him up right away.”

Magdaleena looked at me incredulously, but I uttered a very simple hiss, taught to me as a small boy by Uncle Vootele, and after a little while a snake of a smaller kind crawled up to me. It wasn’t an adder belonging to the tribe of the king of snakes, but a common viper, though this viper was known to me; we had hibernated together in Ints’s burrow.

Magdaleena was startled at the sight of the snake and tried to crawl away in panic, as if afraid that the little snake was now going to swallow her whole. I held her fast and told her there was no need to flee and the snake wouldn’t bite her, because I wouldn’t allow it. Magdaleena stayed put and just stared at the little snake, which had coiled itself, waiting for me to say what I wanted of it. I greeted the snake politely and asked it to suck the poison out of Magdaleena’s leg.

“Why did you sting her at all?” I asked. “You can see she’s a human.”

“But she doesn’t know Snakish!” replied the viper. “And besides, she wanted to hit me with her basket. I asked her what was wrong with her that she leapt at me that way, but she didn’t answer me. Well, then I pecked at her. Don’t let her try it a second time!”

I sighed.

“You see, these humans are simply stupid,” I said apologetically. “Forgive them. Their minds aren’t quite right; that’s why they can’t learn Snakish words. But there’s no point in biting them, so next time just keep away.”

“I don’t want to bite them either, but this girl started it,” explained the viper. “All right, I don’t hate her. Make her stretch out her leg; then it’s better for me to suck.”

“You have to stretch your leg out,” I told Magdaleena, who of course understood nothing of our hissing. “And don’t beat snakes with your basket again. They haven’t done anything to you.”

“But they’re disgusting!” sobbed Magdaleena, but she did stretch out her leg as requested, and screwed her eyes tightly shut. The viper pressed itself against the wound and began sucking. The reduction in the swelling was visible: the thick red stump became a pretty slender leg. The viper raised its head and licked his mouth.

“This sucking tickles my tongue,” he said. “Finished! Not a drop of venom left in there.”

I thanked him and the little snake undulated away into the grass. Magdaleena got up and supported her healed leg, a doubtful expression on her face. But everything was all right. The poison had been sucked out.

Then she suddenly fell upon me and kissed me on the cheek.

“Thank you!” she cried, hugging me tightly. “You saved my life! You’re a wizard! You’re a sorcerer! You do good magic! Come with me; we’ll go to my father! I want to tell him what you did.”

In any other circumstances I would have certainly refused such a suggestion. I had no desire to meet Johannes. But in Magdaleena’s arms, my cheek a little damp from the passionate kiss, I didn’t see a way of declining. The previous day I had held Hiie in my embrace. Now Magdaleena was caressing me — but how different those hugs were! With Hiie I’d felt uncomfortable, but standing in Magdaleena’s grasp was very good. Now that she was no longer crying or complaining, but quite the opposite, glowing with happiness, I saw how beautiful she was. I can’t even begin to describe her appearance. Suffice to say that I thought she was perfect, much more beautiful than Hiie, more beautiful than my sister, even more beautiful than her prettiest and bustiest girlfriend. To use Ints’s expression, just at that moment I felt that I was in heat.

So how could I refuse when Magdaleena invited me to her home? I went.

Johannes the village elder, who had turned gray in the intervening years, did not express any surprise at seeing me.

“Things are ordained in threes!” he said, and made a strange movement in front of his face. Later I found out that this was a peculiar spell that was called the sign of the cross, but I never observed that this incantation was of any use. Johannes squeezed my hand and added, “I’m sure that you won’t be running back to the forest a third time. A man of the cross does not belong where beasts of prey walk about and Satan rules. Come, step inside, my boy. We’ll have breakfast.”

“Father, you can’t imagine what happened to me today!” said Magdaleena, interrupting. She couldn’t wait to get inside, but told right there on the threshold how a snake had stung her, how her leg had swollen, and how she thought her last hour had come. And how I had then invited the snake back and healed her leg.

“Father, isn’t that a miracle?” she cried excitedly, and it was somehow embarrassing for me that these people got so excited about such a trifling thing. But at the same time Magdaleena’s enthusiasm gave me pleasure, because it was beautiful to see her eyes glistening with great rapture.

Johannes didn’t reply; he only crossed his hands on his breast and lowered his head.

“Father, say something!” begged Magdaleena. “I think it was miraculous. Or … do you think the devil is at work here?” Magdaleena paled and threw me an uneasy look. “Do you think it was some sort of witchcraft? That I shouldn’t have let the snake suck my leg? But Father, I would have died then! You don’t know how bad I was! Father, say something, please! Why are you silent?”

“I was praying,” replied Johannes the elder quietly, now looking straight at Magdaleena. “Don’t be afraid, my child. You haven’t strayed against God. Of course a snake is a foul creature, Satan’s own handiwork, but the power of God overcomes the power of the devil. He can use even the most abominable creature to a holy purpose. Satan moved the evil snake to sting you, but God in his infinite mercy led this boy to you who saved you. God forced the snake to suck its own poison and choke on it. May the heavenly ruler be praised!”

“Never in the world would the snake choke on its own poison!” I said. “It was simply a mistake that he stung Magdaleena, and I asked him to clean the wound. There’s no miracle about it; you only have to know Snakish words.”

“Nobody knows those!” claimed Magdaleena. “That’s just the miracle, that you understand them!”

“Any human can learn Snakish words,” I said quietly. “It’s not such a difficult art. In the olden days everyone knew them, and back then no snake would bite a human.”

I suddenly felt very sad, and noticed a faint smell of death, a scent that came back to me at these moments. I could not get free of that smell, as if, after the burning of Uncle’s body, the stink had been released to the skies and mixed with the blue above, and now, at any moment, the wind could carry it back to me. That stench came like a rain cloud, and I never noticed its approach until the first drops assaulted my nose. It mostly came when I was sad, as I was now, because here they were admiring me for knowing Snakish words, which to me were as ordinary and natural for a human as being able to speak at all, or having legs to walk, and hands to do work. Suddenly I felt terribly alone, in the midst of alien people, with whom I had not the least thing in common. I had felt just as alone and abandoned that time in the cellar, where my only companion was the corpse of Uncle Vootele. I turned my head away to seek fresher air, but the stench would not leave me alone and the whole world seemed full of decay. Johannes the village elder invited me indoors. I went, but even there it stank.