Once upon a time there lived a man named Neyavkan1 with his wife. They live and live in their yurt. Everything is fine, but they don’t have children. They're bored. There is silence in the house.
How many years have passed like this - no one knows. But then their son was born. Neyavkan walks cheerfully, his wife becomes joyful. Whether Neyavkan goes hunting - he’ll bring a sledge full of prey, whether he starts to catch fish - he can’t eat it, whether he starts carving patterns on a wooden box - you can’t take your eyes off it.
But one day he went hunting and reached a large and high hill. I tied a moose to a stone and just began to climb the hill when I saw a moose. He placed an arrow on the bowstring and shot it. The elk fell dead. Neyavkan skinned him, put the carcass on his back and began to go down to the morass. The stones rustle underfoot, as if they want to say something, but Neyavkan doesn’t want to listen. He went down to the shore and laid the burden near the omorochka. I wanted to sit in it. I just lifted my leg when I saw a large green frog at the bottom.
What kind of frog? Where did she come from in my confusion? - he thought. I looked, and the frog’s eyes were like those of a person. No-show and asks her:
- Eeki2, why did you get into my little hole? I'll kill you now!
He grabbed a small paddle from the fool and wanted to hit the frog. She opened her mouth and spoke in a human voice:
- Don't kill me, Neyavkan! I am the daughter of water. Ask me whatever you want, I will do everything for you. Don't leave me alone, take me home!
Neyavkan thought and thought and decided to take her with him, but so that his wife would not see. He wrapped the frog in silk and hid it in a quiver.
Neyavkan sailed home and brought the spoils. His wife greeted him joyfully. She helped him bring in the loot and began to take care of the housework. Neyavkan took the quiver with the frog, brought it into the house, and put it in the corner. He took out the frog and said to her:
- Eeki! Stay in your house, don’t go out anywhere. Otherwise, the wife will see and kill!
This is how they live and live. Every day the wife cooks elk meat and feeds it to her husband. And Neyavkan will take a piece of meat from the table, bring it to the corner and feed it to Eeki. But then they ran out of meat, and Neyavkan began to get ready to hunt again. He took a quiver of arrows, put the sword on his shoulders, attached a spear to his belt, said goodbye to his wife and son and went into the taiga.
The hunter left, and the son was crying. No matter how much his wife comforted him, he kept crying. Then she says:
“Don’t cry, son, father will come and bring some bone marrow.” I'll give it to you!
She had just uttered these words when she heard someone in the corner say:
- First get the beast, and then divide it. Also, they wanted bone marrow!
Who is speaking? - the wife thinks.
I looked into the corner - there was no one, only an empty quiver without arrows. It seemed to the woman that he was moving. She was even more surprised and, although she was not allowed to touch men’s things, she opened the quiver. And there, a large green frog, wrapped in silk, sits like a rich bride.
The woman grabbed the frog and threw it to the floor. And she herself went to the river bank, picked prickly rose hips, and returned home. She whipped the frog with it.
He beats and kicks her in the ashes. And the frog at first endured and endured, and then began to cry. Tears flow from her eyes. She sobs and asks:
“Woman, woman, don’t roll me in the ashes, otherwise I might go blind.” Your husband will come from hunting and punish you! Have pity! After all, I didn’t do anything bad to you!
And the woman became even more angry:
- Oh, you vile frog, you still dare to speak the same language with me. Why did you come to our house? Who invited you here? Your place is in the swamp!
And she started beating her again. She beat and beat, but the frog didn’t say another word, only moaned occasionally. A woman heard the dogs barking, grabbed the frog, wrapped it in a rag, and threw it into the quiver. Neyavkan entered. He brought the spoils. This time he was very lucky on the hunt, he only had time to butcher the animal. He says to his wife:
- Wife, quickly prepare the meat, boil it and feed everyone, we are hungry.
The wife cooked some meat and fed her husband and son. I had just finished eating when a frog’s voice came from the corner:
- Oh-oh! How it hurts me! At least I didn’t hit you with rose hips or roll in the ashes. Now I have become ugly and dirty. Nobody wants to look at me!
Neyavkan heard this, went up to the quiver, opened it, and a woman appeared from it. Her clothes are torn, her face and hands are covered in ash and bruises. And his wife says:
“You see, we have a wood frog here, a witch, it’s disgusting to look at it, we need to kill it right now!”
She grabbed the spear, but her husband snatched it out of his hands and said:
- How can you just harm a frog? Она ведь живая. She became a person. По-человечьи говорит. I can't live with you anymore. Go to the taiga, become a taiga beast!
After these words, he drove his wife away. She cried and went into the taiga and turned into a green frog.
Neyavkan took Eeki as his wife, took his son and left far down the river. He began to live there. That's how they live there.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru