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Kautyayuk
Once upon a time, a long
time ago, a family was killed by bears, all that was left was
a scrawny orphan who nobody wanted because he was small and was
another mouth to feed. The orphan was called Kautyayuk.
Kautyayuk tried to become
friends with the village people but they beat him. To keep warm,
he slept with the sled dogs or inside the entrances to the camps
of the people. To eat, he fought the dogs for scraps of meat.
The village people would ridicule him and beat him for they did
not want him around.
When he longed for human
company, he would crawl inside the camp, both for warmth and
to hear the people talk but if they noticed him they would beat
him and haul him outside with their fingers hooked into his nostrils.
They would laugh and
just throw scraps of walrus hide to him for food. Poor little
Kautyayuk was always beaten and his nose now had big nostrils
from always being pulled and thrown outside.
Finally, one night, the
bears who killed Kautyayuk's family, came to the village. They
could smell the cooking of food and were hungry because there
were only a few seals to catch. "Give us food" shouted
the bears. "We do not have enough to eat ourselves, for
the caribou are gone and there are not many seals", cried
back the people.
"Give us food or
we will eat you" demanded the bears.
The people knew that
the group of hungry bears would not stop until they had something
to eat and they would attack soon killing all if no food was
given, so the people who did not like Kautyayuk demanded that
he go outside. They wanted him to be eaten instead of themselves.
Kautyayuk refused, but
the people ganged up on him and whipped and beat him to the outside
where the bears waited. The bears reared up, but a strange thing
happened when Kautyayuk stood up to face his death.
The moonlight shone upon
him and him alone, and he started to grow big and powerful. His
clothes split and his muscles bulged so big did he grow. The
bears attacked, but Kautyayuk was now strong for the Moon Spirit
(Sila) empowered him.
Kautyayuk fights the
bears who killed his family and he breaks them up like little
twigs, Kautyayuk wins and the bears who wanted to eat him are
dead.
Quickly the people rushed
out, to get the meat for their houses but Kautyayuk said no so
they attacked him with knifes but he killed them all but two
old women.
"I have spared your
lives, so that you will be abandoned and that you will know loneliness
as you have taught me to know it" pronounced Kautyayuk.
And so he left to travel the land, leaving behind two old women
who pulled him by his nostrils and who beat him. |