When the world was very young, people did not have fire. There was plenty of game, but they ate it raw, and it did not give people much pleasure.
One day the Water Rat man was gnawing on a hard branch, and suddenly a spark flew out of his mouth and fell on the dry grass. The grass burst into flames.
The Water Rat Man was surprised. He began to throw branches into the fire to put it out, but the branches caught fire and flared into a hot fire. And a snake was hiding in the branches. It was roasted in the fire, and the man liked the smell of the roasted meat so much that he ate the snake, and it was delicious.
The Water Rat man threw branches into the fire so that it would not go out, and soon all the tribes heard about this miracle and came to look at the fire.
People realized that they could take the burning branches with them and light new fires. And so people spread burning branches everywhere, and now each camp had its own fire.
These fires burned for many years, people no longer shivered from the cold at night and did not eat raw meat after hunting. People became lazy and began to sleep a lot, much more than in the days when they were freezing at night.
One day a strong hurricane swept over the earth. The rain poured down like from a pumpkin bottle. He put out all the fires, and the lazy people forgot how to light a fire, now they again shivered from the cold at night and ate raw meat.
There lived in one tribe a man called Hawk, and he had two sisters, female Snakes. They were thin, very thin, and their eyes seemed to be looking at one point all the time. They loved the hot sun and were afraid of the cold.
When the Hawk man went hunting, the Snake women lay down on the sand and, without moving, basked in the sun until he returned.
Not far from their camp in the forest there was an old termite mound. The trees protected him from the wind and hid him from human sight. The sun was especially hot here, and Snake women often came here and lay leaning against a termite mound made of grass and clay.
Nobody knew where the Snake women went, because they were secretive and did not tell anyone that they went to this warm place.
One day the sun shone so hotly that behind them the dry grass on the termite mound began to smolder, and then lit up with red fire.
Hawkman's sisters were frightened at first, but then they liked the fire. It turned out that only they alone knew where the fire was, and it began to seem to them that they were more powerful than anyone in the world.
When the women's brother Snake came from hunting, they had already returned to the camp. He gave the sisters their share of the meat, but they did not eat it, but waited until the Hawk man fell asleep, and only then did they quietly go into the forest.
There they took a stick and, breaking through the clay wall of the termite mound, stirred up the fire that was burning inside, and pushed in the meat that their brother gave them. When the meat was fried, the Snake women took it out and ate it, and then returned to the camp.
They did this every day until their brother became suspicious. He smelled the smell of roasting meat and guessed that the sisters had got a fire somewhere.
But when he asked them about this, the sisters said that they did not know about any fire. The brother wanted to follow them when they went into the forest, but the sisters guessed that he would be watching them, and skillfully covered their tracks. Then he asked them what they were doing in the forest, and they answered that they were looking for yams.
Hawkman became worried, he went to the neighboring tribes, told people how his sisters behaved, and asked them to help him figure out why they say that they have never seen fire, but they themselves eat fried meat.
All the tribes took turns trying to track down the sisters of the Hawk man and catch them when they were roasting meat on the fire, but the Snake women were very cunning and eluded everyone. They did not go to the termite mound if there were people nearby, and when they really wanted fried meat, they went further away from the house and approached the termite mound from the other side.
Then the Lizard man said that he would unravel the secret of the Snake women if he was entrusted with it alone.
All the tribes agreed to his condition, and the Lizard man went into the forest and lay there for many days and nights. He did not go hunting with his brothers and did not return to the camp after dark, and then the sisters of the Hawk man decided that the Lizard man had gone on a long journey.
One day all the men pretended to go hunting. When they were out of sight, the Snake women took the meat and, thinking that no one could see them, ran to the termite mound.
But the Lizard man did not lag behind them a single step, and when the Snake women approached the termite mound and began to stir up the fire, he crawled up from the other side and stuck a stick into the termite mound. When he pulled the stick back, he saw that the stick was on fire, and then the Lizard man, with a cry of victory, rushed with the burning stick to the camp where his relatives were waiting.
Hawkman's sisters were very angry with Lizardman for tricking them so cunningly. They swore to take revenge on him and right there, near the termite mound, they turned into snakes to attack people.
And now snakes rush at everyone who comes close to them, and if an evil snake bites a person, he dies in terrible agony.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru