Kurdzhimuko Laursen had everything: father and mother, good family, prosperity.
In his yard there was a large haystack, prepared for the winter for livestock. One day, when the owner was not at home, the stack caught fire.
At this time, Kurdzhimuko Laursen was returning home. He saw that the hay was burning, took a long twig and approached the haystack. The stack was burning from below, and a snake was hissing at the top.
“Those in trouble are not allowed to burn,” said Kurdzhimuko Laursen and handed the snake a twig. It instantly crawled along the twig and wrapped itself around the savior’s neck.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen wanted to remove the snake, but he couldn’t; The strongest horsemen of the aul tried, but they couldn’t either. They decided to leave the snake like that - they were afraid that if they removed it by force, it would strangle its savior.
But the snake did not cause him any trouble. Gradually everyone got used to the fact that Kurdzhimuko Laursen walked around with a snake around his neck, and stopped talking about it.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen once dreamed that a man came to him and said: “If you want the snake to leave you, you must walk a path that you can cover in seven months. Prepare enough supplies and hit the road. The first three months you will walk through the forest, the next two months - underground, the sixth month - on sand and stones. In the seventh month you will cross a field strewn with goose eggs, and here a snake will catch you.”
Kurdzhimuko Laursen got up in the morning and said to his father and mother:
“It’s hard for me to live, because my appearance makes your hearts suffer.” Today I had a dream - if it comes true, maybe I will get rid of the snake.
“May your dream be good,” said the mother. - Tell me, son, what did you dream about?
“They told me in a dream that the snake would leave me if I walked the path that I would cover in seven months.” So I decided to hit the road. Prepare for me, mother, travel provisions so that it will last until the end of the journey! – answered Kurdzhimuko Laursen.
“It’s unlikely that the snake will leave you because you go this far!” You never know what you dream about - don’t ruin yourself and don’t go anywhere! - his mother began to ask.
But the son insisted on his own, and the mother prepared travel provisions to last him for seven months. They loaded it onto seven donkeys, and Kurdzhimuko Laursen set off.
The first three months he walked through the mountains and valleys, the next two months - underground, the sixth month - along sand and stones. For the seventh month he walked through a field strewn with goose eggs.
By that time, he had run out of travel supplies, he was hungry and tired from the road. Seeing a large tree, he lay down under it and fell fast asleep. He woke up because someone called him:
– Get up, Kurdzhimuko Laursen!
Then Laursen felt extraordinary lightness - there was no snake on his shoulders, and three girls stood in front of him. They held various foods in their hands.
“Taste our treat,” the girls said and placed the food in front of him.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen ate, looked around - did not see his horse.
-Where is my horse? he asked.
“Rest easy, your horse will not be lost,” the girls said.
Soon Kurdzhimuko Laursen fell asleep, and when he woke up, there were neither the girls nor the horse nearby.
He climbed the tree under which he was sleeping and looked around.
- Where is my horse? - he said again.
Suddenly he saw an old woman riding his horse. “Uh-uh, may Allah send her misfortune, where did this old woman get my horse and why does she need it?” thought Kurdzhimuko Laursen.
At this time, the old woman rode up to the tree and got off her horse.
– Welcome, Kurdzhimuko Laursen, be our guest! – she said and went back.
Laursen mounted his horse and rode after the old woman. He stayed with the old woman for three days and three nights. On the fourth day she said:
“Now you need to swim in the seven waters.” The horseman was bathing in seven waters, and the old woman asked him:
- How are you feeling now?
– It seems to me that I can do more than ten horsemen like me! Laursen replied.
- Then put on this shirt. - And the old woman handed him a brand new shirt.
- How are you feeling now? – she asked when Laursen put on his shirt.
“It seems to me that there is not a person in the world whom I could not defeat!”
“Then help me defeat my enemies—the seven cruel brothers—the other ones.” They live not far from here. Every night snow falls from the stones and covers the ground up to half a man's height. Every morning they force me to remove this snow, and at night it falls again. I have been looking for a long time for a person who could defeat these foreigners. Once in a dream, someone told me: “If you had gone to Kurdzhimuko Laur-sen, he would have defeated these foreigners.” After that, I turned into a snake and brought you here.
In the morning, Kurdzhimuko Laursen took a wooden shovel, the kind used to clear snow, and left the yard.
He walked and raked snow stones, walked and caught ice. So he killed seven foreigners. After that, he went to the stable and began to hit the horses on the ridge with his fist. He broke the backs of six horses, and they fell dead, and the seventh did not even stagger from his blow.
“This horse will suit me,” said the horseman and went back to the old woman.
- What swag, my son? – she asked.
- I killed all the others, calmed your heart.
- Thank you. You have done a great job, but I want to ask you one more thing. There is one more enemy of mine left. He himself is about an inch tall, his beard is seven inch long, he rides on a rooster, and instead of whips he has hissing gray snakes. “He kidnapped my eldest daughter, and only you can return her,” said the old woman.
- Tell me where your enemy is, and I will bring your daughter!
- It is impossible for a person to find the place where Sam-s-vershok lives. Tonight he should come here - it would be nice to catch him.
Laursen sat in ambush and waited for his arrival. When midnight came, Sam-s-s-here arrived. His beard was seven inches long, he sat astride a rooster, and instead of whips he had hissing gray snakes. He grabbed the old woman’s middle daughter and galloped back.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen chased after him. He galloped for a long time, but could not catch up - He came up to the mound and disappeared into it.
Laursen could not go where Sam-he-he went. He returned to the old woman, took a wooden snow shovel from her and galloped back to the mound. He cleared the loophole through which Sam-s-here had passed, entered the mound and captured the kidnapper. He took away from him the rooster, and the magic whip of gray hissing snakes, and the old woman’s middle daughter.
-Where is the old woman’s eldest daughter? he asked.
“I don’t know anything about her,” answered Sam-he-very-very.
“Better not say that, bring her to me as soon as possible, don’t force her to kill you!” – Kurdzhimuko Laursen said then.
- Well, since you demand it, I will bring her, although I did not take her away. Give me the rooster and the whip, and I’ll give you back the girl,” Sam-s-he-vershok promised.
As soon as Laursen gave him the rooster and the whip, Sam-hey started laughing:
“Kurdzhimuko Laursen, I didn’t deceive people like you,” he said. “Now that I have both a rooster and a whip, I’m not afraid of you.”
And he galloped off at full speed.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen chased him, overtook him at the entrance to the dungeon and killed him. After that, he entered the mound, brought the girl out of there, and carried out all the wealth that Sam-s-he-top had plundered from the people.
He returned to the old woman and brought her daughters.
“I’m done with this enemy of yours too.” If you have any more enemies, speak up,” said the young man.
“I have no more enemies,” said the old woman. “You have defeated the cruel aliens and the evil old man, and everyone who suffered from them will breathe freely.” Now we will all live in peace. If you want, take one of my daughters as your wife.
Laursen married the old woman's middle daughter.
Time has passed. Kurdzhimuko Laursen had a son and a daughter. One day he decided to explore the region where he settled. He rode and came to the seashore.
In front of him was a hedge of thorny bushes, and behind it was a kunatsky hedge. He drove into the yard and shouted: “Zhiu!” A woman came out of the house.
“Come to us, be a guest,” she said.
-Where is your master? – asked Kurdzhimuko Laursen.
“He’s away, but his house is still there, come in and you’ll be a guest,” the woman answered.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen did not know that the woman’s husband was different and that he was planning to defeat the guest by cunning.
Kurdzhimuko Laursen came into the kunatskaya. He was well fed and put to bed.
Meanwhile, the foreigner said to his wife:
“You can turn into any creature, and we will take advantage of this.” In the morning, when our guest is riding his horse along the seashore, you turn into a duck and splash around the shore so that he notices you. Do this two or three times, and then, as if by chance, tell him: “I had a learned duck. Now she has swam out to sea, I’m bored without her, but I can’t catch her.”
The guest will promise you to catch a duck. When he goes to the seashore the next day, you get ahead of him, turn into a duck, swim near the shore and even go ashore. When the guest sees you, he dismounts. You swim very close to the shore. Then he will undress and enter the water. Then you swim further into the sea and lure him there, and when he is far from the shore, rise and fly away. Then turn back into a human, take his undershirt and return home. Without a shirt, I can easily defeat him.
In the evening, when Kurdzhimuko Laursen returned, the woman brought him dinner to the kunatskaya. They began to talk, and among other things she said:
– I had a scientific duck. Now she has swam out to sea, I’m bored without her, but I can’t catch her.
– Isn’t it difficult! – said Kurdzhimuko Laursen. - Tomorrow I will catch her!
The next morning Kurdzhimuko Laursen ate, saddled his horse and rode out of the yard. The woman got ahead of him - she turned into a duck and began to swim along the shore.
When Kurdzhimuko Laursen approached the sea, he saw that the duck was swimming very close to the shore. He quickly undressed, left his clothes on the shore, and entered the water. Immediately the duck began to swim away from the shore. She moved further and further into the sea, and the horseman swam after her. When he was very close to her, the duck rose and flew away.
Then she turned into a human again, took Laursen’s undershirt, which contained his power, and returned home.
Laursen went out to the seashore and did not find his shirt. He realized that he had been deceived. He mounted his horse and rode back. When Laursen drove into the yard, a foreigner jumped out to meet him and struck him with a sword.
“You killed me,” Laursen said to another. “Please, put me on the horse and let him go.”
The horse galloped to the old woman and brought its owner when he was already barely alive.
- Allah, Allah, what happened? – the old woman wailed when she saw the wounded Laursen.
– I don’t know what happened. I lost the shirt you gave me, and then I got hurt by some guy.
The old woman took the horseman off his horse and carried him into the house. Kurdzhimuko Laursen lay for a long time, finally recovered. Just like the first time, the old woman bathed him in seven waters and gave him a shirt exactly like the one he had lost.
- Now can you defeat Inyzha? - asked the old woman.
“I promise you that I will bring him on the back of my horse!”
“I don’t want you to bring him here—it’s enough if you bring me three stripes from his back.” “And bring the inyzha’s wife, the sorceress, here alive,” said the old woman and released the horseman.
Laursen galloped towards the foreigner. He burst into his house, grabbed him and dragged him into the yard. He took off three stripes from the inyzh’s back, tied the inyzh’s wife to the croup of his horse and rode back.
The old woman greeted Laursen joyfully.
“Now my heart has calmed down,” she said, “and it’s time for you to return to your father and mother.” Leave the boy to me, and take your wife and daughter with you.
They did so, and they set off. When we reached the outskirts of the village, Laursen asked one guy:
– What kind of swag do the Kurdzhimukovs have?
- They had one and only son. A snake wrapped itself around his neck, and no one could free their son from it. Then he himself set out on a long journey, and since then nothing has been heard of him. Everything that his father and mother had was taken by one psha, and the old people now live in poverty,” the guy said.
“Won’t these old people let me stay?” – Laursen asked.
“Maybe they’ll let me in,” the guy answered.
Laursen came to his parents. They did not recognize him, and he began to live with them.
Once Laursen asked the old people about their lives, and they told him everything and how their son left the house with a snake on his shoulders. “And now,” they finished their story, “the pshi took away everything we had, and we live on what the villagers donate to us.”
– Don’t lose heart, your son has returned! Laursen said. The old people could not believe their eyes and ears, and Laursen had to tell everything that happened to him. The old people rejoiced when they were convinced that their son had returned alive and unharmed.
The next morning Laursen went to Psha. He killed the psha and his entire family, drove out the orcs*, and distributed all their wealth to the poor. He took for himself only what he had taken from his father.
The fame of Kurdzhimuko Laursen's affairs spread throughout the area. And he began to live calmly and happily.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru