Melianarrheyal

by G. Deyke

Once there was a kretchin boy who was being chased by a noble, who wanted to kill him. As he ran he whistled to Snake for aid, and Snake listened.

  He wrapped up the boy in his coils and swallowed him down, and then he took the form of a small brown snake, so that he was hidden. When the noble ran by he thought nothing of the little snake curled up on the street. He ran by without seeing him.

  Now the noble was very angry at having lost the boy, and prayed to Haryin Two-Faced for aid, promising his own blood in return. Haryin thought this a good deal, and so he agreed, and came up from the darkness beneath the earth, and searched for the lost boy himself.

  When Haryin passed the little snake he saw that it was no mortal snake, but Snake himself, and knew that he must have hidden the boy. So he went up to the snake and said: “Has one of your kretchin run by here fleeing one of my nobles?”

  And the snake said: “No.”

  Haryin thought about this, and then he asked: “Has it come to this corner at all?”

  The snake said: “Yes.”

  Now Haryin grew very angry; but the face he showed was calm. He asked: “Where is it now?”

  The snake said: “I heard that the noble promised his own blood in exchange for the boy, so I swallowed him up and kept him here. If you bring your noble hither I'll give him up, and we can share the reward.”

  Haryin's hidden face was laughing, because Snake would give up one of his own, and because he thought he could trick him. As soon as he gave up the boy Haryin would take his prize, and leave nothing for Snake. So he agreed to this bargain, and went to fetch his noble.

  While the Two-Faced god was gone Snake spat out the boy, and told him to hide in wait; and then he sewed a doll that looked just like the boy, quick as the flick of his tongue, and he swallowed that down instead.

  Haryin told the noble that the boy had been eaten by a snake, and brought him thither. The snake said to the noble: “The boy is stuck in my throat. I will open my mouth for you, and you can pull him out.” And he opened his mouth very wide, wide as only a snake can do.

  The noble peered down his throat and saw the doll, but he thought it was the boy he was chasing. He reached down and held on to the doll's hair and began to pull it out. But then Snake closed his mouth, and sank his fangs into the noble's arm. So Snake took the noble's blood, and poisoned him so that he must die; and so the boy was saved, and he whistled to Snake in thanks.

  And because the noble had seen only the doll, Haryin's bargain was unfulfilled, and he could have nothing at all.

  Part 2

  ~*~

  Curse