There lived an old man and an old woman. They had no children and only two deer, which grazed on a long rope right next to the yaranga so that they would not run away across the tundra. The neighbors had many children, and the old man and the old woman were jealous of them. One day the neighbors moved away, and then the old man and the old woman became completely bored. The old man said to the old woman:
- Hit the tambourine!
— I can’t hold the tambourine in my hands.
- I will hold the tambourine, and you hit! - said the old man. “Although we won’t be able to hit like we did in our youth.”
They did so, and the old woman began to beat the tambourine. The devils came to the call. - What do you want from us, old woman? - they asked.
“The old man and I want a son.”
— Make two wooden seals and throw them on the path when the caravan of devils passes.
The next morning the old woman makes tea, and the old man makes seals. The old man made seals, put them under his pillow, and before he had time to drink his tea, he heard the noise of a caravan. A caravan of devils is walking past the yaranga. The old woman threw a wooden seal onto the road, and the whole caravan stopped. Then the kele shouted:
- Get the seal out of the way!
- No, we won’t remove it!
- Take it away, then you will run fast!
- No, we don’t need to run fast, we’re already old.
- Then I will enrich you!
- No, no, we’re already old.
- What do you want?
- Son!
- OK. Only I have big sons, if I give them, they will run away from you. Better ask Kele Seken, he has small ones.
The seal was removed from the road, and the kele caravan flew past. Kele Seken's caravan approaches. The old woman threw the seal on the road, the whole carazan stopped, and the front deer began to trample Seken.
“Get the seal out of the way,” Seken shouts, “you will run like young people!”
- No need!
- I will enrich you!
- No need!
- So what do you want? - Son!
Seken led them to the sleigh where the children were riding. Seken wanted to give it to the one who had just started running.
“No,” said the old man and the old woman, “he will run away.” Seken wanted to give them a child who could sit.
- No, we’ll only take the one whose eyeball hasn’t fallen off yet! - and the old woman took the boy to her yaranga, and the old man removed the seal, and Seken’s caravan left.
The boy grew day and night. When he was two years old, he went to sleep with the reindeer and came to the yaranga only during the day.
One night Kele came to the boy and said to him:
- Get up, Seken, it’s time to go to Tanayrgin for the bride!
- How can I go there?
“I’ll tell you: you will come to the moon, to the sun, then to the constellation Nauskatyemkyn and you will end up in the yaranga with Tanayrgin. He will throw out a stone, you catch it in your mouth, and the stone will fly into fragments. When you come to the yaranga, he will treat you. Whoever eats more than Tanayrgin will give his only daughter to him. When you go to the upper tundra, do not forget to rip open your stomach so that the food you eat will fall through you, the sun and the earth. When Ta-nayrgin sends you for the herd, you pick up the fallen kamleika of Eurasian tails and pour them into the middle of the herd. When a wild deer attacks you, break its antlers. If you go to the upper tundra, tell your mother not to worry, that you will be visible as a small cloud. Just don't let her say anything to the old man!
Seken went home and told his mother that he would go to Tanayrgin to marry his daughter.
“No, don’t go,” the old woman dissuaded, “they’ll kill you there!”
- No, they won’t kill you. In two days I will return home like a little cloud.
“Okay,” the mother agreed, and Seken went towards the sun.
Seken flew to the moon, then to the sun, to the star Nauskatyemkyn, and then Tanarygii threw him a stone. Seken caught it in his mouth and flew up to the star. He approaches Tanayrgin’s yaranga and knocks.
- Who are you? - asks the owner.
- I'm Seken!
— From the lower tundra?
- Yes!
Seken entered the yaranga, the old woman Tanayrgina lit a fire and began to brew tea.
- While the tea is brewing, wife, give us something to eat! - said Tanayrgin.
The old woman served them the whale on a large wooden platter. The two of them ate the whale. The host asks the guest:
- Do you still want to eat?
“I want to!” answers the guest. The old woman served the walrus. Ate it.
- More? - Tanayrgin asks Seken.
- Come on again!
At Seken, all food falls into a hole through the sky, sun and earth.
The hostess served the seal. Ate it. The hostess served the seal and they ate it.
“More?” asked the old man.
- More! - said Seken.
- Well, apparently you can’t be fed! - And they began to drink tea. Then the owner said: “Tomorrow morning you will drive my entire herd of deer to my yaranga.”
Tanayrgin knew how large his herd was and that it needed to be split into pieces - only then could it be brought in, and even then this was beyond the power of one person.
In the morning Seken went and collected a full load of eurasian tails. As soon as the leader of the herd saw Seken, he rushed towards him like a whirlwind, trying to crush him. Seken grabbed the leader by the horns, twisted his head, and the horns remained in Seken's hands, and the deer disappeared into the herd. Seken poured the tails of the kamleika onto the ground, and invisible shepherds became from the tails, and they drove the whole herd.
Tanayrgin came out of the yaranga and asked where the wild deer was?
Seken showed him the horns and said:
- That's where!
Tanayrgin turned away from Seken and said nothing. The holiday has arrived. Seken thinks: “How can I get to the bride? The old kele said that she is buried in a box! So Seken says to Tanayrgin:
- I'm thirsty!
- Go to the yaranga.
Seken entered the yaranga, turned into a bug with a light spot on his head and crawled through all the nooks and crannies. He climbed into the box where his bride was hidden and became Seken again. In the evening Tanarygin remembered Seken and ran to the yaranga. He began to listen, and heard his daughter and Seken laughing happily. The father opened the box, and his daughter had already given birth to a child.
Old Tanayrgin divided his herd in half - he kept one half for himself and gave the other half to his daughter. And the caravan went - ahead was Seken with a spear in his hands, behind him was a herd of deer, and behind him was a wife and child in a warm card. Old Tanayrgin stood for a long time, seeing off his daughter, until the caravan disappeared from sight.
...Seken's mother sits on deer antlers and looks at the sky. She sees a small, small cloud. The cloud began to approach the ground, she saw: someone was standing on the cloud, and the old woman sang:
“I need to make tea, my son is in a hurry to come to me.” The old man heard the old woman's song and asked:
-Who are you talking to, wife?
- Yes, with myself.
The cloud is very close. The mother lit a fire, hung up the kettle and went to meet her son.
Seken jumped from the cloud, hugged his mother and ran to meet his wife, and then deer swam and swam and descended from the clouds to the ground in whole herds. So the warm sled touched the ground and stopped, and Seken brought his wife and child out of there, and it became light all around.
An old man and an old woman are standing with their mouths open in surprise. Seken’s wife waved her hand—a yaranga stood in front of her, white as snow and as big as a hill.
She entered the yaranga, waved her other hand, and copper utensils sparkled around her. She sat down in the middle of the yaranga - and a white hearth stood in front of her, and a fire blazed in the hearth, and a large cauldron with whole deer began to boil.
Seken's wife raised the white canopy and called the old people. And then Seken said to his father:
- Go, father, to the neighboring camp, say that we have a holiday tomorrow.
- As soon as I go, they will laugh there and won’t come to me.
- If you invite them, they’ll go - okay, but if they don’t go - that’s also okay!
The old man went to call his neighbors. He comes to the camp, invites you to visit him, and the neighbors laugh at him:
- Yes, old man, you don’t have any deer! What will you treat?
— My son brought a lot of deer. The neighbors laughed:
- Some kind of lousy one?
- No, no, let's go!
And so, out of curiosity, the rich Chukchi went laughing:
- Well, old man, lead us quickly! It’s very close, you can see the yaranga.
- Where is your yaranga?
- Here she is!
-Are you out of your mind? This is a snow hill! They're coming, right - yaranga! They come in and look around.
Seken came out to them. He said hello and asked to sit down. The wife came out of the curtain and began to treat the guests. But they don’t drink the vat and don’t eat meat, they look at the hostess all the time. The neighbors returned, gathered in one canopy and said:
- We must kill Seken!
And Seken lies at home in the canopy and says to his wife:
“Listen, wife, to what they say—they want to kill you!”
The next morning the kulak neighbors came and called Seken to go hunting.
Seken went with them.
They took Seken far into the tundra and sat down to rest. One struck a fire. Seken leaned over to light a cigarette. And the other one stabbed him in the back. Seken fell to the ground. The rich people jumped up and ran to his yaranga. The one in front shouts:
- Whoever gets there first will take the woman! The second one shouts:
- Whoever comes second will take the yaranga!
They run, gasping for breath. The one in front ran to the yaranga and immediately sat down. The second one ran up and did not rush into the yaranga, but also sat down. So they came running and saw Seken sitting in the yaranga and drinking tea. Fists raised, let's go home. They came and asked the oldest Chukchi:
- Tell me, old man, you lived a lot. We killed a man, and he got up alive. How is this?
The old man thought and said:
“You didn’t kill a man, but his shadow.”
The next morning the kulaks again came to Seken’s yaranga. Seken saw them and said to them:
- I see you are hunting. Take me!
- We came for you!
Fuck them. As soon as Seken's yaranga disappeared, the rich people attacked him, cut him into small pieces and scattered them across the tundra; crows swooped in and pecked at everything. The fists laughed and said:
- Now try, come to life!
And they rushed to Seken’s yaranga with a cry: whoever comes first will take the woman, whoever comes second will take the yaranga!
They ran to the yaranga - Seken was sitting in the canopy, drinking tea and saying to everyone: “He has arrived! Etty!
Silently they turned and walked away. They walked away a little and asked each other: “What is it? What is this? They decided to invite Seken to a holiday, throw him into a deep hole and cover him with earth.
They invited Seken to the holiday. Seken arrived with his wife and child. During the dance, the owner gave him a tambourine and asked him to dance. Seken took the tambourine and quietly said to his wife:
“Put the child on your lap!” As soon as I fall into the hole, you immediately fall after me!
Seken went to dance and fell into a hole. His wife followed him: They fell and fell and finally found themselves in the lowest tundra. The old devil sits there and asks them:
- Why did you come?
“We didn’t come on our own, we were thrown out!”
Then the old devil said to his little devils:
- Take them back to earth! Tie a mad deer behind the sled.
The kulaks are sitting in the yaranga, rejoicing that they got rid of Seken. An old Chukchi stands in front of them. They tell him what they did to Seken. The old man shook his head and said:
- They did it badly. Bad things will make you feel bad too!
The old man was driven away by his fists. Suddenly a bug came out of the ground, followed by a deer horn. The fists sit and watch. Then the second horn appeared, and then the head of a deer, the neck and the whole deer, and behind the deer was a sled, and on the sled was Seken with his wife and child, and behind the sled on a rope was a mad deer. How the mad deer began to run around and jump in circles and trampled his fists into the ground. And Seken and his family went home.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru