Meanwhile, a bear was passing by the area. When he saw the hedgehogs, they had already been eating the honey.
– “Give me some honey too!” – asked the bear.
And they answered him:
– “Get it yourself!”
– “Show me where the honey is!” – said the bear to them.
– “There, you see, in the tree, the bees are flying there.” The bear climbed up the tree, took out some honeycomb and asked the hedgehogs:
– “How do I get them down?”
– “Lie down on your back and put the honeycomb on your chest, so you can bring them down to the ground.”
The bear obeyed the hedgehogs' advice. He lay down on his back, flew down from the top of the tree and crashed to his death.
The hedgehogs slaughtered the bear; they also brought the carcass of a deer. They made ahsarfambals from the deer's lungs, piled the honey on the bear's chest and prayed to the God:
– “O God, we thank Thee! You saved us, and we fulfill our word to you: we give thanks with honey on the bear's chest and ahsarfambals made of reindeer lungs!”
Widow's son
Once upon a time there lived a sorceress and Verahan the beautiful, the daughter of an aldar, a recluse of the tower. She was an unusually slender girl. Word about her spread throughout the world. The aldar did not give her away to anyone, though many people were trying to marry her. He kept her in a tower, and the tower was such that no one could find its doors without destroying its top.
One day the aldar announced:
– “I will only marry my daughter to the man who can destroy her tower.”
And the tower was unusually tall. The aldar gave a deadline of two days:
– “Whoever can destroy the tower will be my son-in-law”, – he said. “Let everyone try his prowess!”
The suitors began to flock from all sides. There were suitors from the Nart people. The sorceress's son showed up too. Everyone wanted to destroy the tower of the aldar daughter, but none of the suitors could think of a way.
The sorceress's son began to go around the people, hoping to find a good man among them. He entered a small house and found a widow with a boy lying in a cradle in front of her.
– “Do you have no one else?” – asked the sorceress's son.
– “There is no one else besides this child and myself”, – the widow answered him.
Then the boy in the cradle tore his bandages and turned to the son of the sorceress:
– “I am ready to fulfill your wishes!”
(And this boy was pointed out to her son by his mother, the sorceress: “There is such a young man born there, check him up!”) The son of the sorceress rejoiced and said to the boy:
– “May God give you years of life! You are the one I need, you will be useful to me.”
The boy made himself dressed and said;
– “I'm going out of the house!”
The sorceress's son took him, and they appeared before the assembled people. And on the way, the sorceress's son made a deal with the boy:
– “We shall do this in such a way: I will load a cannon with you and shoot you at the top of the tower. Maybe you'll be able to destroy it. There is no other means.”
– “All right!” – said the boy. “That's a good idea! I agree; if I get to the top of the tower and hold on there, I will proceed to destroy it with my heels; but if I fall off-anything is possible-then you be sagacious and don't let me touch the ground, or it will be my death.”
And he also added:
– “When you carry me, do not put me to the ground until you have carried me across the seven rivers.”
