The Turkish pasha kidnapped the royal daughter, and so that the powerful father would not find the princess, he hid her on an unknown island in the middle of the blue sea. That island was deserted, deserted, there were no trees or animals on it, only thorny bushes grew here and there and all sorts of creeping things swarmed around. The entire island was strewn with huge stones. It was from these that they erected a tower and locked the princess in it behind nine locks. On the bare island the only people there were the prisoner princess, the fat jailer, his wife, and a young man the same age as the princess, kidnapped with her in her country. The captive young man served the princess, bringing her water and bread and various tasty dishes that he managed to steal from the jailer’s abundant table. But this happened rarely - usually once every three months, when water and various supplies were brought to the island. The young man fell deeply in love with the princess. She was beautiful, like a lily that retains its dazzling whiteness even under the rays of the sun. And she liked the young man, and so they planned to escape from captivity and get married, and if they couldn’t escape, they would die together.
The opportunity to escape presented itself only after three years and four months. The Pasha's envoys, who delivered food and water to the island, brought with them this time a barrel of wine. The Turks are forbidden by their faith to drink wine, but they drink it like your Slovenes, only not openly, like those, but secretly. So the Turks rolled a barrel onto the shore, and they became so drunk that in the end no one could stand on their feet. The jailer and his wife were also quite tipsy. The young man grabbed the keys to all nine locks and rushed into the tower. The fugitives jumped into the canoe and pushed off from the shore. They were not afraid of pursuit: the Turks would learn about their escape only when the second boat returned, if they sent it to the island to find out why the first one did not return. A fair west wind blew, and soon they were on the open sea.
Three weeks later they saw a large ship in the distance and, mistaking it for a Turkish one, they leaned on the oars with all their might. But they were noticed from the ship and set off in pursuit. The princess decided it would be better to drown herself than to be captured again, and was about to throw herself into the sea when she suddenly noticed her father’s flag on the ship. They took them onto the deck, tied the canoe to the stern and arranged a rich feast.
The ship was commanded by a general, angry, like a Turkish jailer, and so pockmarked, as if the devils on his face were threshing peas. This was already the third ship sent by the king to the Turkish region in search of his daughter. They sent generals to search for the princess, and they circled the sea for several months, away from the Turkish shores, and then returned home and wove tales to the king about fierce battles with Turkish ships. And this general had already turned home, preparing to regale the Tsar with the general’s old lies.
The general could not remember himself with joy - not today, tomorrow he will become the heir to the king: after all, the sovereign promised to give his daughter as a wife to the one who would find her and bring her to her father. But a young man stood in the general’s way. One day on a stormy night, when menacing waves tossed the ship like a nutshell, the boat crashed into pieces on the ship.
The general called the young man onto the deck - now I’ll show you what happened to your boat. But as soon as the young man approached the board, the general pushed him into the sea.
When the storm subsided, the general sarcastically asked the princess where the young man had gone.
The young man loudly called for help, but the noise of the storm drowned out his cries, and there was no one on deck except the general. Fortunately, nearby the young man saw a fragment of the canoe, grabbed onto it and stayed on the water for several hours. Then his strength began to weaken, and the board sank more and more into the water. Here, to his misfortune, out of nowhere the fox also grabbed the board. “I’ll push him,” the young man thought, “after all, the board won’t support two of us.” He looked into the eyes of the fox, and it seemed to him as if a good FRIEND was looking at him.
The young man felt sorry for the poor beast - every creature of God wants to live - and he decided either to be saved with him, or to die together.
As soon as he thought this, the board floated up again, as if no one was holding on to it. Suddenly a rocky island appeared in the middle of the sea. Without difficulty they reached the reefs and climbed ashore. And what a miracle! - in the middle of the island, in a deep stone basin, there was fresh water, and roses and trees with wonderful fruits, which the young man had never seen before, grew all around.
He lived on the island for three years. The fox caught fish every night, and they were well-fed. In the third year, the fox suddenly spoke in a human voice. He told the young man that the general and princess had arrived home safely and the king had organized a magnificent celebration. The general reminded the king of his promise and demanded that the princess marry him. The princess does not want to marry him, but he keeps her in fear - he threatens to reveal to her father the name of her real savior. But the princess is still waiting for the young man, hopes for his return and asks her father to postpone the wedding. And in order to delay the matter, she set a condition for the general - that he first build a beautiful palace and that the palace must be painted inside. If she likes the palace, she will immediately marry the general. And now for three years in a row the general has been hiring architects, has already built two palaces, and is trying to please the princess. But she didn’t like the second one either, either outside or inside. The palace was destroyed, and the architect was killed when he left the palace. The executioner stood at the door and, at a sign from the general, cut off the poor builder’s head. Now the time has come for the young man to go to the city where the princess lives and offer his services to the general, because the princess can only refuse the palace three times. Let him come to the general and call himself an architect, the rest is not his concern.
That same night the fox carried the young man across the sea to the royal capital. The general was delighted when the young man invited him to build the most beautiful palace in the world, and how could he not be happy: not a single architect in the country would undertake to build it - he was afraid of losing his head.
For a whole year the young man showed the builders and sculptors what the palace should be like; All the plans and drawings for him were made by the fox at night - that fox was always invisibly with him.
A year later, the palace was built, and the princess, accompanied by the general, the king and the architect, went to inspect it. From the entrance to the very top, a twisted staircase ran through the entire palace; Each landing was decorated with sculptures depicting the princess’s entire life: birth, first steps, the princess with her first doll, with her first book, and finally, on the last landing, the abduction of the princess by a Turk. The princess is pleased, the general is beside himself with joy that he has finally found an architect who managed to please the princess; he himself knew no more about such matters than a pig in oranges. We went down another staircase. The princess's face brightened and she kept peering at the architect: she recognized him as her savior. The general grew increasingly gloomy, his face distorted. On this staircase other pictures were depicted: a young man serving the princess in a tower on a deserted island, the Turks were drunk, the princess was sailing with the young man in a canoe, and finally the royal ship was catching up with them. And right at the exit it was shown how the general pushed the young man into the raging sea.
At the last statue, the general suddenly reached for his saber, he wanted to cut off the architect's head - now he understood who this architect was. But as soon as he touched the handle, another saber flashed above him, and his head rolled out of the door. It was the fox who hurried to the young man’s rescue. He turned out to be an enchanted architect. As soon as he executed the villainous general, the evil spell was broken.
The princess and her deliverer, to the joy of the king and all the people, got married on the very first Sunday.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru