Once upon a time, or maybe not, there was a lazy person. From morning to evening he sat by the fireplace and dug into the ashes with a stick. That’s what they called him: Na-tsarkekia - Digging in the ashes. I No matter how hard the mother tried, she could not get her son to work -
A lazy person won't even move from his spot! The old woman is tired of feeding the slacker. One day Natsarkekia went out into the yard, and she locked the door behind him. She gave him bread, young cheese, a skin of ash through the window and said:
- Go wherever you want, feed yourself as you please. Here's a bag of ash for you, dig into it as much as you want.
The lazy man asks and begs not to kick him out of the house, but all in vain. His mother did not let him into the house.
Natsarkekia wandered wherever his feet took him.
Whether he trudged for a long time or for a short time, the lazy man found himself on the bank of a wide river. A dev is standing on the other bank, drinking water. When Natsarkekia saw him, he trembled with fear. Where to go? If you run, the deva will instantly overtake you!
Natsarkekia was lazy, but he was not stupid.
“Maybe I should scare the deva myself? “he thinks. “I’ll pretend to be brave, maybe he’ll chicken out and get away!”
Natsarkekia took a knife out of his pocket, pierced his fur with ash, and screamed at the top of his lungs:
- Hey, little brain, how dare you muddy the water in my river?
He screams, and walks along the shore, shaking his fur and ash. Ash is pouring, spinning, swirling.
The dev looks: what kind of miracle? You can barely see the man, but such a mighty tread has raised such dust! He grabbed a stone from the ground and shouted in response:
“Hold your tongue, little man, or else dust will remain from you, like this stone!”
And the deva squeezed the stone so hard that it crumbled into dust. Natsarkekia thought for a short time, bent down as if to pick up a stone, and quietly took the cheese in his hand.
- And this is what will be left of you! - he shouted. - Look at my strength! — He clenched his fist, and whey from the young cheese began to flow.
The deva was surprised; I had never seen such a strong one among people. I decided not to quarrel with him and invited him to my home to show him to my brothers. Natsarkekia really didn’t want to go to the dev. The poor fellow doesn’t know how to evade the invitation. It’s scary to go, and it’s impossible to refuse.
- Take me across the river. “I don’t want to get my feet wet,” he tells the deva.
Dev walked on the water - afraid to disobey Natsarkekia, and sat him on his shoulder.
- Hey, you’re so light, like a fluff!
- Of course, I’m holding onto the sky with one hand. I’ll put you down, you won’t be able to hold me back.
“If you put it down, maybe I’ll hold it.”
Natsarkekia pulled out a knife and stuck the tip into the back of the deva’s head. The deva howled in pain:
- Oh, don’t ruin it! Grab the sky again!
They came to the dwelling of the devas. The house is tall and spacious. Natsarkekia was amazed; he had never seen such a house.
There was a huge ketsi on the hearth. The devas baked bread in this clay pan.
The devas asked the guest to keep an eye on the ketsi so that the bread did not burn, and they themselves went out into the yard to roast the deer.
It seemed to Natsarkekia that the bread was burnt on one side. He began to turn the ketsi, but he couldn’t cope and knocked it over on himself! He's struggling, poor thing, and he can't get out.
The devas entered and their mouths opened in surprise - a guest under ketsi!
“What are you doing, man?” asks the elder deva.
“My back hurt, so I applied the ketsi to warm the bones,” Natsarkekia answers. “The pain has already subsided, take the ketsi off me!”
We sat down to dinner.
There was not enough wine in the jug. The owners gave Natsarkekia a large jug and sent him to Marani for wine.
Natsarkekia almost lost his mind when he saw this jug. He could barely lift the empty jug; how could he carry the wine?
What could one do, Natsarkekia dragged himself into the marani. The devas are waiting and waiting, but the guest is still not there.
The devas went to see what had happened to the guest, and what they saw: Natsarkekia was digging the earth with a shovel around the kvevri1.
“Are you crazy?” the devas ask.
“It’s better to take out the qvevri and drink all the wine, rather than carry little by little jugs!”
The stupid devas were surprised - the five of them dug an empty qvevri into the ground with difficulty, and the guest alone is going to pull it out, and even full of wine!
The devas took the jug from Natsarkekia, filled it with wine themselves and took it to the house.
Everyone sits, eats, drinks. Suddenly one of the devas sneezes! Natsarkekia was thrown to the very ceiling. It’s good that he managed to grab the beam and didn’t fall.
- Why did you go there? - the devas are surprised.
- How dare you sneeze in front of me! Now I’ll tear out this rod and break all of your sides alive! - Natsarkekia shouts.
The devas trembled and shook in fear. Nine of them could barely drag this beam, and the guest said - a rod!
The devas jumped out of the house and ran in all directions. And Natsarkekia somehow crawled down and from then on began to manage the house of the devas.
1 Kvevri is a large jug for storing wine, dug into the ground.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru