Friend and Brother
This happened a long, long time ago, in the autumn, in a certain village.It was time to harvest the crops. And what a splendid harvest it was! The rice had ripened, and the ears bowed heavily toward the ground. The peasants went out to the fields in the morning—only to find that the rice had been uprooted and the field trampled. They were heartbroken: "Who dared to ruin our harvest? Who decided to steal from us?"
They gathered as much rice as they could that day and went home. The next day, they returned and saw that someone had been in the field again.
The peasants then decided to catch the thief and punish him severely. They took turns keeping watch. But the thief turned out to be clever—he stopped coming altogether.
The peasants rejoiced:
"Good for us! We scared him off! Let him know we won’t let him trample our rice without consequences!"
They stopped guarding the field, but the thief returned! He started stealing the rice again at night. What a disaster!
In that village lived a young man named Tara. He was kind and brave. No one could defeat him in karate. Tara really wanted to help the people, so he decided to track down the night thief.
Tara took a big stick and, as soon as it got dark, headed to the field. The night was moonless, pitch black—you couldn’t see a thing. Tara lay down in the grass, held his breath, and waited for the thief to appear. He lay there for a long time. Suddenly, he heard someone creeping up. At first, the steps were light, but as they got closer, everything began to rumble, and a hot wind rose.
Tara lay in the grass, looking around, but he couldn’t see anything—it was too dark. He started listening closely, and it seemed to him that the thief was cutting the rice stalks with a sickle. The brave young man jumped out of his hiding place and ran toward the sound of the sickle. He saw something sitting right at his feet. Tara swung his stick with all his might and struck the thief.
The thief let out a pitiful groan, collapsed at Tara’s feet, and went still—he was dead.
Tara was terrified and began to cry:
"What a disaster! I didn’t mean to kill anyone; it wasn’t my intention. I just wanted to help the people and catch the thief."
But no matter how much he cried, the thief couldn’t be brought back to life. Tara sighed and went to his older brother for advice.
"Help me, brother," Tara pleaded. "Tell the people that I didn’t plan this terrible killing."
"You fool!" his older brother shouted at him. "You’re digging your own grave and dragging me down with you! You should have come to me for advice before you decided to kill the thief. What, do you think a thief isn’t a human being? You didn’t just kill a thief—you killed a person. That makes you a murderer!"
Tara was completely lost.
"Don’t you feel sorry for me at all, older brother?" he asked. "Please, testify that it was all an accident."
"Testify?" his brother snapped. "Are you out of your mind? Then everyone will think I’m in on it with you. Get out of my house! I have nothing in common with a murderer!"
And so, the older brother kicked out the younger one. Tara walked away, tears streaming down his face. "There’s no salvation for me now," he thought. "Even my brother has abandoned me. I don’t know where to go. I might as well drown myself in the swamp."
He walked and walked until he came to his friend’s house. "I’ll go in," he thought, "and say goodbye before I throw myself into the swamp."
His friend opened the door and was surprised:
"What are you doing, Tara, walking around at night? Did something happen?"
Tara told him everything—how he wanted to help the people, how he accidentally killed the thief. But he didn’t mention his older brother—it was too shameful.
"Well," his friend said thoughtfully, "it’s a sad story... But don’t worry, I won’t let anyone hurt you. I’ll tell everyone that you didn’t mean to kill him. And if they don’t believe me, I’ll say that I was with you in the field that night. It’s not so scary to die together."
"Thank you for your kind words," Tara said. "But I don’t want you to suffer for me. I’ll take responsibility for everything if I have to!"
"Alright, don’t be so upset. We’ll see how things go," his friend encouraged him and suggested, "Let’s go to the field and take a look at the thief. After all, you don’t even know who you killed. And it’s not right for him to lie there in the middle of the field—we should bury him."
"You’re right," Tara agreed. "Let’s go."
By then, it was starting to get light. Tara and his friend arrived at the field and saw something dark lying among the rice stalks. They went closer and froze in place! It wasn’t a person lying there—it was a huge swamp eel! The peasants had been hunting it for a long time. That eel was the master of the nearby swamps and had caused the villagers a lot of trouble.
"So that’s your thief!" his friend laughed. "You’ve helped the people twice over: you saved the harvest from the thief, and you freed the village from the evil eel!"
The friends lifted the huge eel and carried it to the village. What joy there was! People came from all the surrounding villages to see the eel.
"So this is the master of the swamps!" they marveled.
"How big he is!"
"How terrifying!"
"Thank you, Tara, for saving us all from starvation and from the evil eel."
The peasants roasted the giant eel and held a grand feast. Tara sat at the head of the table, with his friend by his side. Only his older brother didn’t come to the celebration. He was too ashamed that he hadn’t helped Tara in his time of need. The older brother gathered his belongings and left those lands forever.
More fairy tales
