There lived a husband and wife. And they didn’t have children. The wife is grieving: there is no one to shake, no one to console...
One day a husband went into the forest, cut down a log from an alder tree, brought it home and said to his wife:
- Here, shake it.
The wife put a log in the cradle and let’s sway and hum songs.
- Lyuli-lyuli, son, with white shoulders, with black eyes...
One day swayed, another day swayed, and the next day, a boy lay in the cradle!
The husband and wife were delighted, named their son Pilipka and began to look after him.
Pilipka grew up and said to his father:
“Make me, Daddy, a golden shuttle and a silver paddle—I want to catch fish.”
His father made him a golden shuttle and a silver paddle and sent him to the lake to catch fish.
And my son - if you catch, catch - he catches all day and night. He doesn’t even go home: the fishing is too good! His mother brought him lunch herself. He will bring it to the lake and call out:
- Pilipka-son, go to the bank and eat a pie!
Pilipka will swim to the shore, throw the fish out of the canoe, eat the pie and go back to the lake.
The old witch Baba Yaga visited him - the bone leg, as his mother calls Pilipka, and decided to kill him from the world.
She took a bag and a poker, walked up to the lake and began to call:
- Pilipka-son, go to the bank and eat a pie!
Pilipka thought it was his mother and swam up. And Baba Yaga picked up the shuttle with a poker, pulled it ashore, grabbed Pilipka and put it in a bag.
“Yeah,” he says, “you won’t catch fish anymore!”
She threw the bag over her shoulders and carried it to her place, into the thicket of the forest.
She carried it for a long time, got tired, sat down to rest and fell asleep. Meanwhile, Pilipka got out of the bag, put heavy stones in it and returned again to the lake.
Baba Yaga woke up, grabbed a bag of stones and, groaning, carried it home.
She brought it and said to her daughter:
- Fry this fisherman for dinner. Baba Yaga shook the bag onto the floor, and there were only stones...
Baba Yaga got angry and screamed at the whole house:
- I'll show you how to deceive me! She ran again to the shore of the lake and let’s call Pilipka:
- Pilipka-son, go to the bank and eat a pie!
Pilipka heard this:
“No,” he says, “you are not my mother, but a witch, Baba Yaga: I know you!” My mother has a thinner voice.
No matter how Baba Yaga called, Pilipka did not listen to her.
“Okay,” thought Baba Yaga, “I’ll make my voice thinner.”
She ran to the blacksmith and said:
- Blacksmith, blacksmith, sharpen my tongue so that it is thinner.
“Okay,” says the blacksmith, “I’ll sharpen it.” Place it on the anvil.
Baba Yaga put her long tongue on the anvil.
The blacksmith took a hammer and began to rivet the tongue. He riveted it so that it became very thin.
Baba Yaga ran to the lake and called Pilipka in a thin voice:
- Pilipka-son, go to the bank and eat a pie!
Pilipka heard it and thought it was his mother calling him. He swam to the shore, and Baba Yaga grabbed him and put him in a bag!
- Now you won’t deceive me! - Baba Yaga rejoices.
And without resting, she brought it straight home. She shook it out of the bag and said to her daughter:
- Here he is, a deceiver! Fire up the oven and fry him. To be ready for lunch.
She said and went off somewhere. The daughter lit the stove, brought a shovel and said to Pilipka:
- Lie down on the shovel, I’ll put you in the oven. Pilipka lay down and raised his legs up.
- Not like that! - the witch’s daughter shouts. “I won’t put you in the oven like that.”
Pilipka dangled his legs down.
- Not like that! - the witch’s daughter screams again.
- What about it? - asks Pilipka. - Show me yourself.
- You're stupid! — the witch’s daughter scolded him. “That’s how it should be.” Look.
She lay down on the shovel herself and stretched out. And Pilipka for the shovel and into the oven! And he covered it with a flap and pressed it tightly with a witch’s mortar so that it wouldn’t jump out of the hot oven.
As soon as he ran out of the hut, he saw Baba Yaga coming.
Pilipka jumped onto a tall, dense sycamore tree and hid in the branches.
Baba Yaga entered the hut and smelled it - it smelled like something fried. She took the roast out of the oven, ate her fill of meat, threw the bones out into the yard and began to roll on them, saying:
- I’ll lie around, ride around, eat Pilipka’s meat, drink blood.
And Pilipka answered her from the sycamore tree:
- Lay around, go for a ride, having eaten your daughter’s meat, drunk your daughter’s blood.
The witch heard this and turned black with anger.
She ran to the sycamore and let’s gnaw it with her teeth. She gnawed and gnawed, broke her teeth, but the strong sycamore stands as it did.
Then Baba Yaga ran to the blacksmith:
“Blacksmith, blacksmith, forge me a steel axe, otherwise I’ll eat your children.”
The blacksmith got scared and forged an ax for her. Baba Yaga ran to the sycamore tree and began to chop it.
And Pilipka says:
- Not into sycamore, but into a stone! And the witch has hers:
- Not into a stone, but into a sycamore! And Pilipka has hers:
- Not into sycamore, but into a stone!
Then the ax hit a stone - it was all chipped.
The witch howled with anger, grabbed an ax and ran to the blacksmith to sharpen it.
Pilipka sees that the sycamore tree has begun to sway. The witch cut him down. We must save ourselves before it is too late.
A flock of geese is flying. Pilipka to them:
- Geese, geese, drop me a feather! I’ll fly with you to my father and mother, I’ll pay you there. The geese dropped a feather on him. Pilipka made only half a wing from these feathers. The second flock of geese is flying. Pilipka asks:
- Geese, geese, drop me a feather! I’ll fly with you to my father and mother, I’ll pay you there...
And the second flock dropped a feather on him.
Then the third and fourth arrived. And all the geese dropped a feather on Pilipka.
Pilipka made wings for himself and flew after the geese.
The witch came running from the blacksmith, chopping the sycamore, and the chips flew.
She chopped and chopped, and the sycamore - bang! - fell on the witch and strangled her.
And Pilipka flew home with the geese. Father and mother were delighted that Pilipka had returned, sat him down at the table, and began to treat him.
And the geese were given oats. That's the whole fairy tale.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru