Vida played cruel jokes on the Daens who lived nearby. He built more than twenty hampi huts out of grass and lit a fire in front of them, as if someone were living in them. Then he would enter one hut and scream like a baby, then go into another and laugh like a child. Entering the huts one by one, he sang like a girl, laughed like a man, called in the trembling voice of an old man or the shrill voice of an old woman. He imitated every voice he had ever heard, and did it so quickly that passers-by might have thought that many Daens lived here.
And the mockingbird did all this in order to lure as many Daen as possible one by one into his camp, kill them and take over the entire country.
He achieved his goal in the following way. Carried away by the pursuit of prey during a hunt, some Daen would often separate from his comrades and return home alone. Passing by Vida's camp and hearing various voices, he wanted to find out what tribe lived here. Curiosity forced him to come closer. Seeing Vida alone, he approached him. Vida stood not far from the large bright fire and waited for Daen to come very close to him. Then he asked what he needed.
The stranger said that he heard voices, wondered what tribe it could be, and came to find out about it. Then Vida answered:
- I'm here alone. How could you hear voices? Look around, I'm alone.
The confused stranger looked around and said, puzzled:
-Where did they all go? As I approached, I heard children crying, men talking and women laughing. I have heard many voices, but I see only one you.
“The wind was probably moving the branches of the trees, and you thought it was children crying.” You heard Gu-gur-gaga laughing and decided that it was women laughing. The voice of the men you heard belonged to me. When a person is alone among the thickets and surrounded by shadows, he has strange fantasies. Look in the light of the fire: where are your fantasies now? Women don't laugh, children don't cry, it's just me, Vida, talking.
Saying this, Vida pushed the stranger towards the fire. When they found themselves at the fire, Vida quickly turned around, grabbed the newcomer and threw him into the fire.
And this was repeated again and again, until the number of Daen living around Vida’s camp began to noticeably decrease.
Mullian the falcon decided to penetrate the mystery of the death of the Daen. When his cousin Biaga did not return to the camp, Mullian decided to follow in his footsteps and continue until the task was solved.
He followed Biaga's trail and found the place where he had been chasing the kangaroo, killed it and turned home. He traced his path over rocky ground, through sands, plains and bushes.
Following Biaga's trail, he heard voices in the bushes - children crying, women singing and men talking. Convinced that the tracks led him to the place where the voices were heard, Mullian looked out from behind the bush, saw the grass huts and thought: “What kind of people are these? »
Biaga's tracks led straight to the camp, where only Vida was visible. Mullian approached him and asked where the people were whose voices he had heard while passing through the bushes.
Vida replied:
- What can I tell you? I don't know about any people. I live alone.
“But I heard,” Mullian objected, “the crying of children, the laughter of women and the conversation of men.”
“And yet I’m here alone.” Ask your ears what trick they played on you; or perhaps your eyes are now betraying you. Look for yourself, do you see anyone other than me?
“And if you live alone, then tell me, what did you do with my cousin Biaga and my friends?” Their tracks, as I see, lead to your camp, but none lead from the camp. And since you live here alone, only you can answer me.
-What do I know about you and your friends? Nothing. Ask the winds that blow. Ask Balu the Moon, who looks at the earth at night. Ask the sun Yi, who looks down during the day, but don’t ask Vida, who lives alone and knows nothing about your friends.
As he spoke, Vida carefully pushed Mullian towards the fire. Mullian the falcon was also cunning and could not be easily lured into a trap. He saw the blazing fire in front of him, saw the footprints of his friend behind him, and felt Vida pushing him towards the fire. Suddenly he thought that if fire could speak, he would tell where his friends were.
However, the time had not yet come to show that he had revealed this secret. So he pretended to be trapped. But as soon as they got close enough to the fire, Mullian the falcon grabbed Vida tightly and said:
“As you did to my cousin Biaga the Falcon and my friends, so now I will do to you!” - And with these words he threw him right into the middle of the blazing fire.
Then he hurried home to tell the Daens about the fate of their friends, which had remained a secret for a long time.
Having moved some distance from Vida's camp, Mullian heard a clap of thunder. But it wasn't thunder, it was the back of Vida's head being torn off with a sound like a thunderclap. When Vida's head split open, a bird flew out of it - Vida's mockingbird. This bird to this day has a hole in the back of its head, exactly where Daena Vida's head split open and where the bird flew out.
To this day, Vida the Mockingbird makes grassy playgrounds. Running along them, he imitates successively all the voices he has ever heard, from the cry of a child to the laughter of a woman, from the meowing of a cat to the barking of a dog.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru