The Fox Sister
A man had three sons and no daughter. He prayed for a daughter, even if she was a fox.
His wife gave birth to a daughter, but when the girl was six, one of
their cows died every night. He set his oldest son to watch. The boy
watched, and told him that his sister did it, by pulling the liver out
of the cow and eating it. His father accused him of having fallen asleep
and having a nightmare. He threw his son out. The second son was set to
watch over the cows, and nothing happened until the moon was full
again, but then the sister struck, and the second son was also thrown
out. When the youngest son was set to watch, and claimed that their
sister had gone to the outhouse, he claimed that the cows must have died
from seeing the moon.
The older brothers wandered until they met a Buddhist monk, who sent
them back with three magical bottles. They found their sister living
alone; she told them their parents and brother had died, and implored
them to stay. Finally, she persuaded them to stay the night and somehow
made a rich meal for them. In the night, the older brother was woken by
the sounds of chewing. He rolled over, saw the meal, and realized that
they had been eating corpses. The sister stood over his dead brother,
eating his liver. She told him that she needed only one more to become a human.
He fled.
He threw the white bottle behind him, and it became a thicket of
thorns. As a fox, she made her way through it. He threw the blue bottle
behind him, and trapped her in a river, but as a fox, she swam ashore.
He threw the red bottle behind, and she was trapped in fire. It burned
her until she was no more than a mosquito.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar