The Snake and The Two Lonely Men: African Folktales, Snake tales, Fabling, Pam, Free Short Stories

Once upon a time, in a village, there were two men who were unmarried and lonely. All the men in their village had found wives, but they could not, because there was a scarcity of women, and so there was no woman of marriageable age for them. They both went about their lives gloomy, praying that the Gods will one day save them from the envy that they felt for the married men and give them a wife.

One day, one of the men, Aku, went to the forest to hunt for meat to sell and eat. He scouted the forest for a long time under the scorching sun and finally found an antelope that had strayed from his family, he aimed his gun and shot it, then carried it over his shoulder and began his journey back home.

On his way home, he saw the Eke, the great python. He was afraid and grabbed his gun to shoot it. But before he could shoot, Eke begged him to have mercy, it was then that he took a closer look at Eke and saw that he looked dried up, weak and miserable.

“Please, the sun is killing me, carry me to the river so I maybe cook.” The great snake begged.

At first the man was sceptical, but he took another look at the python’s state and resolved to help it. He carried the antelope on one shoulder and the snake on the other and took the snake to the river.

When they got to the river he threw the snake in, then the snake brought out its head from the reads and spoke. “Thank you very much for your kindness, the gods have heard your prayers for a wife and the river goddess has decided to give you a gift. Throw your antelope into the river and a portal will open, put your hand into the portal and take the first thing you touch.”

The man did as Eke had told him since everybody knew that the serpent was the messenger of both the earth and river goddesses.

He threw the antelope into the river and a portal opened above the ripple, then he put his hand into the portal and pulled out a pumpkin, then went home with it.

When he got home, he stared at the pumpkin, wondering what gift the river goddess could have given him, he wondered if he would become a women magnet by eating the pumpkin. When he got tired of his imagination, he broke the pumpkin and from it, came a beautiful woman, “Aku, I am your wife. The gods have made me specially for you.” she said

She was way better than any wife he could have found by himself. She was the most beautiful woman in the village, she cooked, fetched water, kept the house clean, went to farm while he hunted, and made money for him. He had been delivered from envying the other men in the village and now they envied him and tried to seduce his wife, but the gods had made her just for him and he was the only person she loved.

Now the village had just one lonely man, Obiagheli. Obia was filled with envy, and unlike Aku who had not found a wife because he was too kind for his own good, Obia could not find a wife because he was too bad for his own good.

Seeing how happy Aku had become with his new wife, Obia paid him a visit to ask him where he found his wife from, and the kind Aku told him everything thing that had happened, so Obia set out to the forest to hunt for an antelope.

Obia wanted a better wife than Aku, so he hunted down the biggest antelope in the forest and carried it over his neck to the river. On his way to the river, he ran saw the great Eke, drenched and miserable on the dry ground. At first, he was scared by the size and tried to shoot it, but then he remembered that Aku had mentioned seeing the snake so he changed his mind and relaxed.

“Thank you for not killing me.” the snake said. “Please will you carry me to the river so I may not scorch to death.”

Obia laughed. ‘You want me to carry a disgusting creature that crawls on its belly over the faeces of other animals on my neck like this, you must be joking.’ Obia thought.

“You sincerely do not expect that I will carry a snake which can kill me on our way, do you?” he asked, “Carry your self to the river, I promise not to shoot you on your way.”

“But I am to patched to move.” the snake begged

“My friend, if you do not start moving now, you’ll become useless to me and I’ll have no choice but to shoot you.” He threatened.

The snake ‘labourously’ crawled to the river and crawled in through the reeds. He stayed submerged for a long time and Obiagheli lost his patience and began to curse out at it, calling it an ungrateful betrayer.

The snake eventually came up and without addressing Obia’s reign of curse it said “Thee gods have heard your prayers for a wife and the river goddess will give you a gift. Throw your antelope in the river, a portal will appear, put your hand into it and take the first thing that you touch.

Obia did as Eke had told him and he also got a pumpkin. He took the pumpkin to his house and immediately smashed it on the ground.

Out of the pumpkin rose a woman, he could tell she was a woman because she had the private parts of a woman, but she was the ugliest woman he had ever seen, and she looked as strong as she was ugly, built with monstrous muscles.

Obia panicked and tried to run away from his house but she pulled him back saying. “I am you, wife, I was created specially for you by the Gods and you will never leave me. She was a terrible wife, she never once cooked or cleaned the house, or farm or sell. All she did was eat, lye around the house lazy and beat Obia whenever he did not obey her.

The end

The End