393: 1001 Nights: Let it Be(ak) (part 2 of 2)

Quick disclaimer, there is some mention of assault this week.

Nothing explicit or graphic, but it's there.

Please see the post on mythpodcast.com for more info.

This week, on Myths and Legends, we're wrapping up the story of Fasib and the Queen of Serpents.

We'll see that a room full of snakes is a surprisingly good classroom, and that if someone offers you way too much money to climb into a dead mule sleeping bag, that might be a scam.

The creature this week is that tiny invisible naked dwarf that's watching you right now.

This is Myths and Legends episode 393.

Let it be.

This is a podcast where we tell stories from mythology and folklore.

Some are incredibly popular tales you might think you know, but with surprising origins, and others are stories that might be new to you, but are definitely worth a listen.

Last week on the show, Hasid vowed to never learn anything after his dad died from the effects of a floating library accident.

This led to him ending up with the Queen of Serpents, who said that he had to stay with her for a bit and listen to her stories.

On her first story, the protagonist failed hard, but at the end of his tale, she started up the story of Janshaw, a man who got lost and ended up on an island where, sitting at a fire, the person in front of him pulled himself in half.

The two sides hopped off in different directions, and three of the six servants followed out of curiosity.

By the screams they heard from the boat, Jensha and the other three did not think it went well.

They drifted on the waves for nights and days before they ended up on another island.

While the servants worked at weaving a sail, Jensha made his way inland, feeling the whole way like he was being watched.

Because he was being watched.

Standing in an empty crystal palace, Jensha began to lament.

Why?

Why was this happening?

All he had done was follow a gazelle into the ocean.

Actually, that probably is why this is happening.

Then more screams.

These, though, were getting closer.

Jensha stood to see the three servants being rushed up and into the palace, followed by a swarm of apes leaving the forest.

The servants flew to their master's side, and soon a chimpanzee emerged.

Your boat is gone.

We have destroyed it.

There is no way for you to leave, my king.

With that, he and the other apes bowed, and then Jensha blinked.

Um, what?

Apes versus ghouls, Joan Shaw noted six months later while chewing on the berries and raw gazelle that his ape subjects brought him.

So good.

So fun being the king of the apes.

There was a prophecy long ago from King Solomon.

This entire crystal and marble palace was something of a summer home for King Solomon, who, on his final trip, left two alabaster tablets for his successor, whoever arrived after him and led the apes in the battle against the ghouls.

Apparently, as long as a human ruled over the kingdom of the island of the apes, the apes would win their decades-long struggle with corpse-eating ghouls.

And they were.

In fact, Jenshan noticed that the apes still had a complete armory.

They just had no idea how to use the weapons.

Since he had been trained as the son of a king, he taught them how to strike and shoot and fight, and when the ghouls swarmed from the valley of the ghouls, riding horses no less, the apes were able to push them back for the first time in years.

The prophecy was being fulfilled before their very eyes.

The alabaster engravings also said that for any human reading this, don't become the king of the apes, it's a massive drag.

Yeah, it really is, Jensha said to himself.

Was there any way out?

You're probably wondering if there's any way out, the tablet continued, helpfully.

There was.

Two paths.

One through the horrible valley of evil djinn, the marids, and ghouls that ended with the traveler cut off by the ocean that surrounds the world.

The other was through the valley of the ants.

Valley of the ants.

Hm, how bad could that be?

Jensha laughed.

Three hours later, he was screaming as the last of his servants caught in the giant ants' mandibles was cut completely in half.

As the giant ants closed in on him, Jensha could only pray.

Then he heard the horns.

His ape army had arrived.

They leapt from their horses and, though it took 10 apes to kill one ant, they would not rest until their king was safe.

Right, my king, his ape vizier cried out.

My king?

Wait, where did he go?

Running as fast as he could from his ape vizier's shrieks and toward the end of the valley, Jin Shao was getting out of there.

That's where he went.

Hearing his ape army fighting for their lives behind him, he shook his head.

He did not ask for any of this.

He jumped in the water and swam to safety.

27 months wait for a caravan to Yemen?

Janshah said when, a few days later, he made it to the human town full of humans.

The humans, who were human, looked at each other.

Well, it was 27 months to get to Yemen, so really it was more like 54 months, but he was in luck.

They would be back next year.

Next year, Jensha screeched.

And Yemen, Yemen was like 2,000 miles over land from Kabul, his father's kingdom.

He began sobbing.

You look like someone who could use a helping hand.

A voice smiled above him.

Jensha looked up and dried his eyes.

Oh.

The two people he was talking to were gone.

It was just this

really nice-looking straight shooter.

Yeah, he did need a helping helping hand.

Who what gave it away?

The man said, well, the sleeping in the street was a clue, but the weeping really clinched it.

He wasn't one for charity, though.

This man, Janshaw, could work for him.

For half a day he would give Janshaw one thousand dinars and a fair girl.

Janshaw's eyes widened on by by fair girl did he mean exactly how it sounds.

The subtext being Janshaw started, but was interrupted.

No subtext, just text.

An enslaved girl and way too much money for half a day's work.

Really just a short hike up the mountain tomorrow morning.

After the evening, which we're not going to detail, the merchant outfitted Janshaw in everyone's favorite hiking attire, costly silks, and the pair rode their mules up the mountain.

A few hours later, on the side of the mountain, the stranger handed Jansha the knife as he finished tying the mule's legs together and kicking her over.

Here, kill this mule.

Jensha asked, uh, what?

Yeah, kill this mule, cut open her belly, and get in its skin, and he would get the money.

And please don't say, I thought it smelled bad on the outside.

It might sound clever to you, but I hear it all the time.

Jensha said he didn't really feel super comfortable with this.

The man said, oh, so Jensha, the guy who was crying in the dirt when he met the merchant, his life was going so great that he could afford to not crawl in a mule.

Janshaw sighed.

No, no, it was not.

Sure, for that money, what was one sticky, stinking mule sleeping bag?

Why not?

Why not was the giant bird that wrapped its talons around Janshaw and lifted him into the sky after the stranger fled into a nearby cave?

Janshaw landed hard on a pile of sticks and squirmed, tearing at the stranger's shoddy stitching, before kicking open the mule bag and he was in a a nest, a giant nest, a veritable field of corpses.

The giant bird was spooked by all the screaming and flapped off.

For now, and Jenshaw sat cowering.

Then he heard a Jenshaw, Jensha, are you alive?

He climbed over the bodies in the various states of decay as he made his way to the edge.

What was all this?

Throw down the stones, the man cried.

Jenshaw looked around stones.

What stones?

The stones all around you, the magnificent gemstones?

Come on, throw them down and I'll get them.

We don't have much time until she returns.

I'll tell you how to get out of there after I get the stones.

Why do you think I offered you a thousand dinars for a hike?

I think I sent the last guy up there with a bag and rope, so that should be mostly intact.

Jensha felt betrayed, sure, but he also figured this was his only way down.

He went to work digging the gemstones out from underneath the corpses, which, yes, very gross.

He found a rope and bag on one of the the bodies, and when all of them were in one bag, he lowered them down to the merchant, who checked them, thanked Jansha, and started walking away.

What about my way out of here?

Janshaw yelled.

Oh, that's

that's death, the merchant said.

You die up there.

He thought Janshaw would have guessed, you know, on account of him spending an hour rooting through corpses.

Okay, bye.

Janshaw looked out.

It was a couple of hundred feet down, and even that was an almost sheer cliff, surrounded by skeletons and corpses and rot.

He knew that he would soon become one of them.

Jensha

wept.

And since he was on a mountaintop and was going to die anyway, he really just went for it, let it rip, go for broke, snot pouring out, sobbing, ugly cry, and Hey, hi!

Can you hear me?

Jensha thought he heard a voice on the wind.

Janshaw looked around.

Who was that?

Yeah, hi!

He squinted and saw a man with a long gray beard waving from a castle he hadn't seen before, mainly on account of him panicking about death.

Yeah, it's you're being really loud.

I understand you're in a bad situation, but think you could take it down several notches?

Janshaw hissed very loudly that he was doomed to death here in a corpse nest.

Oh

you can't just climb out of it?

The beard shouted across the peaks.

There was a long silence.

It's not like it's floating in the air, it's attached to something.

Jensha said it was really high and steep.

Yeah, it's also not an ROC rock, that giant bird that will 100% eat you when it returns.

You're on borrowed time as it is.

If it were me, I'd be doing everything in my power to survive, but I've never been in a rock's nest because I don't fall for obvious cons.

Jensha glanced toward the sky, to where the bird could be returning at any moment.

He looked down toward the rocks that would be his doom if he made just one misstep.

Swallowing hard, he climbed from the rock's nest.

We'll see what Janshaw finds on the other side of the mountain, but that will be right after this.

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Hey, Jansha said, scraped and ragged when he arrived at the man's palace.

Remember me?

I made it.

The Sheik, the local ruler, looked Jansha up and down.

That's great.

He was never opposed to that.

Um, why was Jansha still weeping?

Jansha said that this was his natural state.

He was having a very difficult time right now.

I really identify with this character, Hasib said back in the cave, munching on a second fruit plate.

Yeah, I thought you'd like him, the Queen of the Serpents smiled.

Back in the story, Jenshah stood there awkwardly.

The sheik, Nasser, looked down from his wall, just as awkwardly.

Come on in, the man waved and went to go open the gate.

Jensha marveled at the entire castle just up there in the mountains.

What was this?

It was Solomon's.

He gave it to me.

We're really close, Nasir said.

Jensha said that he was impressed by all of King Solomon's vacation options, and Nasir told Janshaw as he held up some clothes, not soil bike corpses and mule innards, that Solomon taught him the language of the birds.

So Nasir was actually the king of the birds.

Jansha took the clothes and then

looked around.

Didn't seem like there were a lot of them there.

Nasir said that was true.

Birds weren't great servants because they were so flighty.

He smirked, get it?

Because, okay, yeah, they were migrating right now.

They'd be back in the spring.

When they returned, the bigger ones would take Jensha back home.

Genshah said, well, he was going to wait for a caravan down in the city, but that wouldn't be by till next year.

Well, I could do six months, Nasir said.

In the meantime, he could hang out there.

As long as he didn't cry, that was actually a stipulation in the text.

So, for the next six months, Jansha lived with the old man and it was pretty good.

He learned all about the castle and the things the old man had done, ate great food, and waited for his ride.

And when the birds did finally arrive, Janshao was a welcome guest of their king, so in addition to bowing for their sovereign, they would kiss Jansha's hand, which was more pecking, but the thought was nice.

Then, one day, the sheikh to go out and do something as part of his kingship.

So he was going to leave Janshaw in charge of the castle.

The bird servants would give him everything he needed, and, pressing the humorously big ring of keys into his guest's hand, the Sheik said that Jansha could go in any room of the castle, except for the locked room in the dungeon.

Messier said, pointing to the hallway.

All right, he had the parliament of the owls and the convocation of eagles to get to.

Probably wouldn't be back for several days.

Jansha had completely free reign of the place, except for, once again, that one single forbidden locked room.

Gen Sha took a deep breath.

Yes, that single forbidden locked room that he had no interest in seeing whatsoever.

And as soon as the door was clicked shut behind Nasser, Jensha found himself in front of the single forbidden locked room.

He looked at the golden key and the golden padlock.

Terrible metal to make a padlock out of because how ridiculously soft it was.

It was almost asking to be opened.

Then Gensha realized that he was only forbidden from entering the room, not looking inside.

He quickly unlocked the door, threw it open, and

it was not a secret murder room.

That is only when the protagonist is a young woman.

And if you don't know what I'm referring to, I link to the Bluebeard page on TV tropes in the show notes.

For Jensha, it was a room full of gilded fountains and emerald gravel, of wondrous plants and amazing fragrances, and feeling an irresistible draw, he did did enter the room.

Strolling along, he was awestruck.

And then he was terrified as, descending from the open ceiling, three birds dove into the water, him barely managing to get to some bushes before he was in sight.

Looking around in panic, Janshaw had to get out of there before he was caught.

They were still waiting on the birds that would carry him home.

If he could get to the door without them seeing,

and then when the birds emerged from the water, he saw them.

You see, when the story's protagonist is a young man, it is not only not a secret murder room full of dead bodies, but you might just meet the love of your life.

But it might only be the love of his life, not hers.

She was stunning.

The birds that landed in the water emerged as women, leaving their feather cloaks to the side and getting dressed.

And...

Like the draw of the room erased any sort of trepidation about entering the room, the three women banished any thought of him being caught there.

Jen Sha flung himself from the bushes and right to their feet.

Now look, I know this is a fairy tale, but even in a fairy tale, you can come on a little strong.

And a man jumping from the bushes, hugging her shins, and telling her how much he loved her and wanted to marry her, that's a bit much.

Extracting from his grasp, the woman said, Wow, thank you so much.

No, though.

Quote, leave this talk and wend thy ways.

Basically, stop it and move on.

To hear, thanks, but no thanks, maybe choose a different path.

And then decide to shout poetry at a woman about how she was a stone, but you'll get water from that stone is a very specific energy.

And it was also Jenshaw's chosen response.

The poetry goes as follows.

She shone out in the garden in garments all of green, with open vest and collars and flowing hair beseeen.

What is thy name?

I asked her, and she replied, I'm she who roasts the hearts of lovers on coals of love and teen, of passion, and its anguish to her made my moan.

Upon a rock, she answered, thy plaints are wasted clean.

Even if thy heart, I told her, be rock in very deed, yet hath God made fair water well from the rock, I ween

And they laughed at him, as they should have.

Anyway, they got one day a year in this room, so they were not going to waste it.

They laughed and played and sang and made merry while Jansha watched,

pined, whatever it was.

In the morning, they picked up their feather suits, put them on, and flapped off into the sky.

Reaching up toward the blue circle, Jansha wept and swooned.

Like the beauty of the rooms and the bird women made him forget about his oath, the anguish of losing a woman whose love he never had to begin with made him lose all fear of getting caught.

What could Nasser do to him that was worse than losing her?

So, when Nasser found him and dragged him from the room, Jansha was spouting off his poetry about how beautiful those bird women were and how he had to marry her and why couldn't that have been a terrible murder room and not something that would imprison his heart forever?

The Sheikh said he knew.

That's why he told Jensha not to go in there.

But Jensha wouldn't be persuaded.

He must see her again, even though she only visited once a year.

He would wait a year.

Yeah, your ride is here.

You're leaving now, Nasser said, pointing to the beefy birdie boys, ready to take Jensha back to his father's kingdom.

All Jensha had to do was tell them where to go, and they would be off.

But Jensha

smiled.

That's right.

He didn't tell Nasir the location of his father's kingdom.

Well, then, no, no, he was staying.

He would stay for a year until he could see her again.

The Sheikh Nasir might have threatened Janshao with just taking the man anywhere and leaving him or simply dropping him off a mountain, but Nasir

was a good guy.

He wouldn't hurt Jansha.

Instead, he would help Jansha trap this young woman in a relationship.

Mother naked and as fair as virgin silver, Jansha mouthed to himself.

Aloud, as he watched the three bird women frolic and play almost one year later.

Did you hear that?

What if that's that guy from last year?

One said to the others.

The woman Jansha was in love with laughed.

Even if it was that guy, one, that was a whole year ago, nobody would wait around for a year, no one's that sad.

And two, all they would need to do was don their coat of feathers, and they were in the sky.

As long as he didn't get that, they...

She looked to where they had left their coats of feathers.

Wait, one,

two,

oh no.

Jensha stood, and they fled into the water to cover themselves and understand the severity of what happened.

Jensha held her cloak.

Jenshaw justified withholding her cloak because, well, if she left, he would die.

Die of a broken heart, which I've been assured multiple times by apparent physicians writing in that this is a real thing that happens.

Anyway, was her freedom worth a human life?

Yes, she replied.

His, at least.

He shook his head.

She was clearly not in her right mind.

He would hold on to her cloak until her king returned and could adjudicate all of this.

She She squinted, you know what?

Jim Sha Jimshaw was a very handsome man.

Wow.

How had she not seen it before?

It's just his beautiful, musky scent of flop sweat and dirt, his punctuality, the way he looks at her like a dog looking at a sandwich.

Wow, what a man.

I love you, she managed, and forced herself to kiss him on the forehead.

Chansha smiled and relaxed, saying he knew that if they spent any time together, under duress or not, she would see it his way.

She was playing the long game, ish.

She did ask for her cloak back immediately, possibly thinking that the bare minimum of flattery would work, but she was unfortunately wrong.

Chansha let her friends go, but she was going with him before the king of the birds, Nasser.

Sitting on his throne, no doubt covered in way too much bird poop, Nasser asked the woman, Verily, this youth loveth thee with exceeding love.

Deal kindly with him, for he is of the great ones of mankind and of the sons of the kings, and his father ruleth over the land of Kabul, and his reign compasseth a mighty empire.

So let me get this straight, because his dad was rich and powerful, and he's annoying you by sticking around your house I'm basically enslaved?

she asked, and then rolled her eyes.

I hear and obey at thy behest.

behest.

She swore that day that she would never betray Jensha.

He did give her her feather suit back for a bit, so she could fly him home, no doubt keeping a literal tight leash on her.

Panting, she landed among the plains with the gazelle in Kabul.

As he demanded her feather suit, she asked him, Hey,

in the story he always was telling about how he followed a gazelle into the ocean, um, Kabul appears to be one of the most landlocked regions of Afghanistan.

It's at least five hundred miles to the nearest sea.

No, we're not we're not going to address it?

Cool.

My son King Tegmus said, embracing Prince Janshah after he disappeared in that fishing boat on the ocean.

And who is this lovely naked woman?

King Tegmus asked.

Janshah snapped his fingers and servants arrived with a cloak for his betrothed.

This was the king's new daughter in law.

So relationships can be difficult.

Communication can be a challenge, and it can sometimes be unclear when to keep working and when to move on.

If, however, you feel like when you get your new house built, you have to have a special marble chest carved into the foundation in which you seal away your spouse's only means by which they can leave you with molten lead, your relationship

might not be in a great place.

And that is exactly what Jensha did.

It was a bit much.

A bit much, but not nearly enough.

After their wedding, and

yeah, Jensha was zonked out in blissful oblivion.

Shamsa stole down to the foundation with a pickaxe.

Anyone who questioned her was ordered out.

She was now the princess, after all, and she went to work.

By 5 a.m., the marble was in pieces, and she was slipping on her feather cloak.

But but where are you going?

Jansha cried out from his balcony as Shamsa flew by to say goodbye and gloat, mostly gloat.

She said she was going home to the Castle of Jewels.

But I love you, Jinsha said.

Shamsa laughed.

If he loved her so much, he could come find her at the Castle of Jewels with her parents' Jin army.

With that, she disappeared into the morning sky.

We'll see the lengths Jansaw will go to to track down the woman who doesn't want to be with him at all.

But that will, once again, be right after this.

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Genshin, demonstrating that his assertion of, If I can't be with you, I'm gonna die, was pretty much false, mooped for the next six months.

His dad brought in all manner of enslaved women to sing and dance for him, and he didn't really have anything to do at all except for a snack and nap in his palace while he waited for news from any of the merchants or travelers that his father had sent to the ends of the earth to inquire about the castle of jewels.

He was distraught, though, when he learned that the scouts had returned with nothing, no word of this mysterious castle with the djinn and the bird women.

King Tedmus, grieved by the bitter tears that his son wept, sent his armies out to seek after the princess.

It was a bit excessive, yes, it was also extremely ill-advised, because, well, King Tegmus was at war.

Wait, gone, all gone, King Kavid, the king of India, asked.

All gone?

They just marched away from the city and off somewhere?

So his city is completely undefended?

King Kavid said.

Really, after he, quote, had made war upon us, and ravaged our reign and slain our men, and all of our treasures had made gain?

The advisor nodded.

That was a flowery and wordy way of saying it, but yes.

Well, what are we waiting for?

The war spans several nights of the 1001 nights, and honestly, it's a lot.

Hundreds of thousands of people die, and it's basically a stalemate.

Because even though he was caught flat-footed, Jansha's dad rushed back and made up for it.

It must be why he didn't realize that Jansha was gone.

Yeah, Jamsha was unable to deal with Shamsa being gone, and with no idea where the castle of jewels was, he knew who would.

It took him several months, but hiring people to take him across the desert, he managed to avoid people pulling themselves in half in the kingdom of of the island of the apes and the valley of the ants by ending up back at the same city as thousand dinars for a simple job, thousand dinars, he heard, and Jansha walked up and introduced himself.

Again, the guy didn't recognize him.

He sends a lot of strangers to their deaths in mule envelopes.

You can't expect him to remember that many faces.

Or any.

So, the next day, Jansha got in the mule, went up the nest, didn't toss the gemstones down, was betrayed, and then he climbed across to Sheikh Nasir's palace, who told him no, he didn't know, and sent him home on a bird.

That bird, oddly enough, got lost, the world was a big place, I guess, and dropped him off for the King of the Beasts.

And after questioning all the beasts, none of them knew where the castle of the jewels was, but the King of the Beasts did have one more idea, his master, the monk who lived in the quote, Hermitage of Diamonds.

And this next bit is a direct quote, and it sounds like it's straight from Usidor's intro in Hello to the Magic Tavern.

And this magical monk is a cunning inventor and an artificer of all manner of strange works.

And he is a crafty warlock full of guiles and wiles and an arch deceiver of wondrous wickedness who hath mastered every kind of magic and witchcraft.

End quote.

He also probably has several other names you do not know.

So Jensha hopped on a bird with four wings and rode to the monk, Yagmus.

Nope.

Never heard of it.

Sounds made up, Yagmus said.

He had been a monk since the time of Noah, but yeah, he didn't know where that castle of jewels was.

Was Jensha sure this woman wanted to see him again?

Yes, she's my wife.

She was just taken away by her own wings, Jensha glowered.

Well, sure, you came all the way up here.

I'll do what I can.

I have animals and jinn that come swear fealty to me each year.

We can ask them.

Yagumus rose to his feet and found Jensha a diamond bed to sleep on until then.

Jinn, Marides, Elephants.

No one knew about the Castle of Jewels and everyone thought it sounded made up and that she really didn't want to be found.

Wait, did you say Castle of Jewels?

Jin Sha heard as he was about to climb aboard the bird for the long flight back to Kabul.

The bird said, yeah, he had actually heard of it.

When he was a chick, his parents had been out looking for food for them and they were gone for eight days.

They returned with food and told of the place that had captured them, the Castle of Jewels, and the terrifying Marid, which is basically an evil super genie, well, he actually let them go out of mercy for their hatchlings.

The bird taxi's parents were gone now, and they moved pretty soon after, you know, on account of all the evil genies, but it was within a week's flight of their old nest.

He could take Janshaw there.

As they swooped down, Jansha said that, wow, it was really a castle of jewels sitting there on the mountain.

It was also a two-months flight on an elephant bird.

Sorry, this is as close as I can get you, the bird said.

Jensha was about to argue that it was still like a three days walk up the mountain, but remembered what the bird said about his parents.

Sure.

Yeah, totally understood.

Upon landing, they found themselves face to face with a Marid guard.

The elephant bird, shrieking that this was his nightmare, took off toward the sky, leaving the human traveler traveler to face the giant infernal djinn by himself.

The guard looked down at him.

You wouldn't happen to be Jansha, would you?

When Shamsa told her parents that she was actually married to a human prince, they were pretty angry, sure, but marriage was marriage, so they had to find their new son-in-law.

And yeah, look, I'm not going to buy what the story is selling on this one, but I'll let you know what's on offer and you can decide what you think.

According to the story, Shamsa, seeing, I guess, what links Jamsha would go to in order to entrap her, saw his love for her and did, in fact, grow to love him too.

And not to get on my soapbox too much here, but this is after she laughed at him, fled him, returned to the king of the birds, he stole her clothes and means of escape, put them in a vault underneath his house, assaulted her, and then she fled the moment she got the chance.

But she loves him?

And look, maybe the story is just really

internally consistent, because it's being told by Shaharazad, the forced wife of the Sultan, playing to her audience and saying, like, look how happy and in love this prisoner can be.

I don't know, though.

Regardless, whether out of propriety and needing to find their son-in-law, or because she miraculously loved him now, they sent a Mared out to seek Jansha among the whirl of the humans.

And the Mare returned, it's in the text, with Jansha riding on his shoulders, like a little kid going to the zoo.

I'd like to tell you that Jansha had changed, that his journey gave him some time to think, and he came to win both Shamsa and her Jin parents over.

I think there's room for that reading, maybe.

It requires ignoring other parts of the text, where Shamsa has to apologize to Jamsha for sending him on such a journey, so let's all just throw up our hands in exasperation and move on.

Jamshah stayed with Shamsa and her parents for a few months, and then began the trip home, riding on a litter carried by jinn, which are genies but if you didn't know, which compared to clinging to a bird for two months, pretty great.

The besieged city, in Kabul, marveled at his litter carried by genies and their new genie princess.

When they landed in the center of town, right in front of the palace, Jamshah turned to the genies that carried him, hey

he had a small favor to ask them.

That night, the war ended to the sound of screams, of the genies massacring the besieging warriors, quote, to a man, and the cries of their king who was strung up and forced to watch.

They actually let him go home because instead of dealing with an angry army who would come to avenge him, they now had a man who watched genies tear through his army like it was nothing.

So Jemsha and Shamsa lived a long life together.

The end.

Um

what?

Balukia asked the man sitting between two tombs.

Old Jamsha, whose weeping was silenced only by the telling of the story.

Old Jamsha said that that was the story.

Good one, right?

Belukia said yeah, he guessed Jamsha was really kind of a gross protagonist, but what

what was all this?

What was with the tombs?

That was kind of the hook.

He was here, so what happened to Shemsa?

Oh,

she was eaten by a shark.

Belukia could barely contain his laughter.

Um

what?

Oh, I'm sorry.

Is this funny to you?

My wife, the love of my life, getting eaten by a shark?

Yeah, kind of.

What happened?

Belukia was long past the point of trying to hold it in.

We were traveling.

She went for a bath, and then she was eaten by a shark.

I'm actually getting really offended that you keep laughing, old Jamsha said.

I'm sorry, just like talk about left field,

Belukia said.

People get eaten by sharks.

They're dangerous.

Jamsha couldn't believe this.

Not really, though, Belukia said.

People kill way more sharks than sharks kill people.

And tacked on endings like this just spread fear and misinformation about an already misunderstood animal.

It's not an ending, it actually happened.

She was killed, and her parents built me this tombstone next to hers for me to sit here and wait to join her.

Well,

I'm cured, Belukia stood, thanking Jamsha.

He had been wandering aimlessly after failing to get Solomon's ring, but now he saw what wallowing in self-pity would get him.

A grave.

And a sleazy story.

He was a prince too, and he had a kingdom and a people that needed him.

There was a time for sorrow and wallowing, but not for years.

He still had some good that he could do.

He left Jamsha on the mountain and descended.

He rambled on, walking on the waves, searching for home until he came to paradise, a garden resembling Eden.

There he could eat a feast that never spoiled.

There were people and princes that visited the place, but he didn't want paradise.

He wanted Cairo.

Home.

He wasn't ready yet.

He prayed and he woke up in his bed the following morning.

So we have one guy who wouldn't let the past go and is still weeping between some graves.

and another who learned from his mistakes, accepted his life for what it was and not what he wanted it to be, and went on to become a great king, the queen of serpents said to Hasib back in the cave.

Hasib said he knew, he understood.

His eyes widened.

He he learned.

The queen of serpents smiled.

He had been learning the whole time.

The funny thing about life was that most of it is out of our control.

Things would happen, good things, bad things.

It might be hard to see the reason for them at the time, or if there's a reason at all, but there is one thing you can do.

Keep going.

I mean, you could be Janshah, sitting sitting weeping between two tombs for the rest of your days, or you can be Belukia, rejecting Eden itself to do what you can to make the world a better place.

She said she was sorry his dad died in a freak sinking library accident, but that didn't need to define his life, even if it would define hers.

Hasib was confused about that last part, but wasn't about to question it when the Queen of Serpents said that he could leave now, if he wanted.

She had only said the waiting until winter part so that he would settle in and listen.

He had actually been down there for two years, don't worry about it.

She just had one request.

Oh, yeah, the public bath thing?

Hasib asked.

Yeah, sure.

He wouldn't go into a public bath.

Not even that difficult of a promise to keep.

He was doing it right now.

Sure.

Hasib's mother and wife were ecstatic that he was alive, and the woodcutters, upon learning of his return, came to him and gave him half their earnings, begging him to not take retribution.

Hasib could only laugh, saying,

What is past is past.

That which befell us was decreed of Allah, and destiny doeth away with dexterity.

They looked at each other.

Um, what did that mean?

No matter how capable someone is, you can't change what's fated to happen, he said.

Wow, you sound very learned, they said.

Long way from that kid hitting a rock with a axe.

Hasib could only smile.

Then they invited him to a big group bath.

As you do, he politely declined, not only because awkward, but because of his promise.

They all had him over to their houses instead.

Hasib became one of the wisest, most powerful men in the city.

He became rich by investing the honey money, and he was beloved by all.

Well, almost all.

Hey, you too good for my baths?

Nobody is too good for my baths, a voice cried out from a doorway.

Oh no, I just I made this weird oath to a snake woman, Hasib said.

The bath owner scoffed as if he hadn't heard that excuse before.

Come on in, these baths will get you so clean.

No, really, I'm I'm good, he said, and started to walk away before he heard a get him, boys, behind him.

Yeah, we're gonna wash you up real good, the bath owner cackled, as the men tore Hasib's clothes off and the door closed behind him.

I will say, with the threatening overtones and the threatening actions, I thought this was going to go to a dark place, but that was really just the best bath I've ever had in my life, Hasib said, sitting with his back against the wall.

The bath owner said, yeah, he was sorry about having to use force, but he was just really proud of his product.

Also, all the Sultan's guys had been hanging out there for like

weeks?

Hasib said, Sultan's guys.

And just then the door burst open.

Rise, O man, and come with us to the Sultan, for thou art his debtor.

Hasib was allowed to clothe on the way, but stumbling into the palace, he couldn't get a straight answer as to what, exactly, he owed the Sultan of Persia.

The Sultan himself was no help, laying down with a quote, napkin on his face, and groaning for the pain.

The vizier pointed at the Sultan.

Heal him.

Hasib shrugged.

How?

That was what he was supposed to know.

He was the son of Daniel, right?

Hasib nodded.

And as such, he went to school and was educated like his father.

Hasib said, well, it was it was tricky.

He started to tell them about the recent epiphany and everything, but they shut him right down.

Do not multiply words upon us, they cried in the original, which I kind of love as a retort to someone obviously trying to talk their way out of something.

The vizier got up and paced.

Well, maybe the queen of serpents knew.

Hasib shook his head.

He didn't know what they were talking about.

You spent some time with her and returned miraculously.

Two years, to be exact.

The vizier nodded, yeah.

They knew.

They knew all about the honey basin and the woodcutters and the queen.

And if Hasib stayed in school, he would have known about the prophecy.

Prophecy?

Hasib cocked his head.

Exactly, that the one who spends two years with the queen of serpents, when he enters a public bath, his belly will turn black.

He shall have the power to heal the sultan.

The vizier pointed to a goon, who tore open Hasib's shirt to reveal his rather large birthmark.

They didn't believe him that it was a birthmark, neither then nor during the beatings that followed.

Hasib held out a long time.

But soon he broke.

He would show them.

He would show them the cavern of the Queen of Serpents.

You just lift up that ring.

There's a sticky cistern inside, but she's down there.

There are a lot of stools, too, if you're into that.

12,000.

Hasib winced.

The long horseback ride up to the mountains wasn't exactly comfortable with a broken rib.

The vizier scoffed, sprinkling his prepared spell, and the ground melted.

It revealed the cistern, the hall, the iron door, and the stools, and finally, the queen of serpents, who was riding on her mule-sized snake up to the surface.

You broke your oath, she said to Hasib, who couldn't meet her eyes.

She laughed.

He should know by now that there was no fighting fate.

It was written on his forehead as it was hers, and it was sealed the day Hasib was born.

As for you, she looked to the vizier who had just wrecked her home and her many, many stools, you will be ash before the day is out.

Truly, the queen of serpents didn't see any reason for her death, but she said she didn't need to.

It was fate, ordained by eternity for Eternity, and she imagined that, could she see the whole picture, the wide ripples her story would have not just in the lifetime of her contemporaries, but for all time, she would agree.

But for now, she could only close her eyes and accept.

Asib, though, sobbed, as, back at the palace, the Vizier slaughtered the Queen of Serpents.

Asib went to work preparing her flesh the way she had told him to.

After the Sultan ate her flesh and was in recovery, he returned to the vizier's workshop to see the man pointing at two vials.

What were those?

Hasib said, Oh, well, just one of those will give you all the wisdom it's possible to acquire.

Hasib stopped when the vizier snatched the first vial and gulped it down.

Not that one, though.

That one, well, that was hyper-concentrated serpent blood.

But she said he would do that.

The vizier coughed or tried to.

His throat had already closed for the last time as his neck, hands, and finally his face swelled and turned purple.

True to the Queen of Serpents' last prophecy, he was burned that day.

Hasib was made the new vizier and returned home to his wife.

A few weeks later, when he was helping his mother move into the palace, he noticed a chest.

What was that?

His mother said, Oh, yeah.

Well, he was all into learning now.

That was actually all that remained of Daniel's, his father's, library.

Four leaves.

Four leaves that would give someone all the wisdom in the world.

Hasib opened the chest and then

and then he closed it again.

He would have loved to learn it that way.

But his fate had been different.

He had to learn it from a snake woman in a cavern and being arrested in a bathrobe, being beaten in the palace, and having to kill a friend.

Life had been his teacher, but he would save those leaves for his own child someday, that they might avoid his hardship and simply read the book he asked them to, because he could see now that his mother and late father were just trying to help, and he had no doubt his own child would see that in him.

I'm sorry, is something funny?

A Sib asked his mother, who was stifling a laugh.

She said, No, it's just

you'll see.

That's where we'll leave Hasib's story.

I linked the source again in the show notes if, after almost two hours, you're still hungry for more Hasib content.

And yeah, the death of the Queen of Serpents is a little confusing.

She definitely leans hard into the fatalism and accepting what's going on, and even though I try to link the stories thematically and draw some sort of meaning out of them, in the original there's very much a feel of, hey, a bunch of fun stuff happened to these guys.

Okay, you can go home now, Hasib.

Someone did a graphic novel of the story that I have not read, but it looks interesting.

I link to that too in the show notes.

Next week, it's the story of a French knight.

who knows that it's always a good idea to sucker punch dragons.

Also, real quickly, we're on YouTube now.

Not in any way that would matter to you if you're already listening, but we've had numerous requests, so you can find us there now too.

At this time, there's no specific YouTube or video content, just the audio episodes.

But if you're listening there, hi.

I put a link in the show notes.

The creature this week is the Wokulu from Mali in Africa.

Now, not to alarm you, but the Wokulu could be watching you right now.

And yes, the idea of anyone watching me as I'm standing in our studio recording this is kind of scary.

And not just because of my many line flubs, but it's a little bit more off-putting that it's a three-foot-tall, hairy naked man.

And that's just what the Wokulu is.

Similar to mythological dwarves and other cultures, the Wokulu are shorter and stocky in magic.

As I said, they can turn invisible.

which leads to the maybe odd choice of going around naked.

That led me to a weird mental rabbit hole of if you could turn invisible, would you be naked by choice all the time?

I don't think I would, and I don't know what that says about me, but the Wokulu, they are super down for that.

They have large heads full of abundant hair, though I'm not sure how people actually know that given that once again, they're invisible.

But the reason I said they could be watching you is that they can also see through walls and trees.

So when it comes to the Wokulu, it's privacy for me, but not for thee.

And when it comes to keeping invisible naked dwarves from looking through your walls at you, I'm sorry, you can't.

This is apparently a fact of life we all just need to learn to live with.

Because not only are they super alert to danger and very sneaky, but if cornered, they are oddly great wrestlers, being able to throw a full-grown man.

And probably the only thing that's worse than being silently watched by a little hairy naked man is being thrown against a brick wall by a little hairy naked man.

That's it for this time.

Myths and Legends is by Jason and Carissa Wiser.

Our theme song is by Broke for Free, and the Creature of the Week music is by Steve Colmes.

There are links to even more of the music we used in the show notes.

Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you next time.

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