Well you planned it! After all, it is not for nothing that our wise elders said: «It is better to wander than to sit at home in vain.» To go around the whole world is very good, a person sees a lot of interesting things and remembers what will be useful to him later. Go, take a walk, see different countries, talk to wise, experienced people and learn something from everyone. As the sages say: «From each hirman (Hirman tok, threshing floor, a platform on which grain is poured), take an ear so that your hirman is larger than any other.» But if you go and in your journey you will reach
standing on the very border of the city of Nigaristan (Nigaristan is the residence of suburban shah palaces in the vicinity of Tehran), do not enter it and turn from there as soon as possible, because this is not a good city, and anyone who comes there becomes unhappy. The worst thing is that not far from the city, on a hill, behind a stone wall, there is a palace called the «Enchanted Castle». Anyone who enters it will lose everything. Dozens of young men did not listen to the advice of the elderly and went there. They lost their lives and wealth, and so far it has never happened that someone came to the city of Nigaristan and did not go to the enchanted castle. I say it again, my sons! Be on the alert, God forbid that your foot set foot in the city of Nigaristan and you went to the enchanted castle!
The sons bowed low to him, kissed the ground in front of him and said:
We obey! With our soul and heart we heed the order of the Padishah!
The Padishah kissed everyone and said:
Go, be healthy, may God protect you!
The next morning, the sons got up early, mounted good horses, rode out of the gates of the city and drove along the road. But every time they remembered their fathers speeches and his strict order, they began to think: «Is the city of Nigaristan and the enchanted castle such a dangerous place? Why didnt Father tell us to go there? How does he know everything? Have you been there yourself, heard from someone or read in books? Why didnt he tell us more, didnt he explain what kind of city Nigaristan is and what kind of enchanted castle it is?»
Such seductive thoughts came into their heads all the time and deprived them of peace.
Days passed, months passed, they passed through towns and villages, until one day they came to a green, cheerful plain, which beckoned from afar with lush gardens. One could guess that behind the gardens there was a city, abundant with water and fertile. They drove a little further, entered the gardens and between the trees saw the battlements and towers of the city walls rising to the sky. People coming from the city began to come across them. The sons of the Padishah asked them: What kind of city is this?
They were answered:
This is the city of Nigaristan.
Then all three remembered their fathers speeches, shuddered and froze in place Finally Afruz said:
This is the same city standing on the border. Father strictly ordered us not to go to these places. However, as you can see, the city is worth a look. I dont know what we should do, enter the city or not enter?
The younger brother, Behruz, answered him:
How do you not know what to do? It is necessary to fulfill the fathers order and, without looking at this city, immediately turn back.
The middle brother said:
Since we are already here, it would be nice to drive up to the city gate and look there, and then leave.
Then the elder brother spoke again:
I dont think this is the same city where our father didnt tell us to go. That city should lie in ruins, but in this one, so beautiful and blooming, in my opinion, anyone can enter. We left home to see everything worth seeing, and this city is certainly worth seeing. I think we need to go there, and if this is the same Nigaristan that father spoke about, we will not go to the enchanted castle, we will not spend the night in the city, we will ride through this gate and, without dismounting, we will leave the other gate.
For a long time they argued like that, until suddenly they noticed that they had already arrived at the very city gate. As they saw the gates and the decorations above them, they bit their fingers in surprise. And when they looked through the gate into the city itself, they were just dumbfounded They see: yes, this is the same city of Nigaristan, standing on the border, about which my father spoke.
Afruz, the oldest brother, said:
Our father did not tell us to go to this city. But he either did not know what kind of city it was, or he thought that we were still helpless children and if someone attacked us, we would be defeated and captured. He doesnt know that if someone comes face to face with us, he wont be able to. Each of us is worth ten heroes in archery, swordsmanship and wrestling!
He said and added:
«Come what may! Im going to the city! The middle brother said,
«Im coming with you!»
And the youngest says:
I have to go with you, because we are going together. If there is a road in front of us, we must go along it together, and if there is a pit in front of us, we must fall there together!
And so all three brothers entered the city. Theyve never seen anything like this before! Palaces and houses, gardens and flower beds amazed the eye, over every door, at every intersection, on every wall such pictures are painted you cant take your eyes off! But listen, what kind of people are there! Some are white, pink, strong, they are dressed in new beautiful clothes, they talk, laugh, are cheerful, they have a holiday from evening to morning, they do not know grief. These cheerful and beautiful people are more often found on the streets, and others, who are much more numerous than the first ones, work for them, and they, unhappy, hungry, ragged, thin, live in dilapidated houses on the outskirts, no one pays attention to them.
The brothers really liked the city, and they decided to spend a few days in it. We stayed there for two or three days and became completely different just drunk. They didnt care about anything, had fun, and only wanted to sing and dance.
One day, being in a cheerful mood, the elder brother Afruz said to the two younger ones:
I keep thinking about why my father didnt want us to go to this city. Was he jealous of our pleasures?
The middle brother replied:
Maybe this city was destroyed earlier and the father knows about it since then, but does not know anything about today?
The younger brother said:
Maybe he knows about something bad in this city that we havent met yet?
I wont bother you with transmitting their conversation, but they talked for a long time. In the end, they got quite settled in the city.
One day Afruz says:
Brothers! The place here is not bad and probably the enchanted castle is the same, and my father just told us not to go there in vain. We need to look into it too, and if you dont come with me, Ill go alone and come back soon.
Shahruz replied:
I will not enter the castle, but I will go with you to its foot. Behrouz replied:
«If youre both going, then Im going with you.»
The brothers got up here, mounted their horses and went to look for the enchanted castle. But they didnt ask anyone how to get to him, they all showed him the threshold, and then gave the same advice: «Its better not to go there, its a bad place, they say; of the young men who went there, no one returned the same way they left.» And every inhabitant of the city of Nigaristan, who met them, reported something new about the enchanted castle. One said:
In winter, instead of snow and rain, stones and lightning fall from the sky, and in summer, flames shoot out of doors and windows.
Another said:
Padishah divov (Divas, devas slav. «marvel» supernatural humanoid beings, present in Turkic, Iranian, Slavic, Georgian, Armenian, mythologies, in Zoroastrianism evil spirits) imprisoned in this castle the daughter of Shah Peri (Peri Persian. in Persian mythology, creatures in the form of beautiful girls, a kind of analogue of European fairies) and wants to persuade her to become his wife. But the padishah is afraid that if some hero finds the way to the castle, he will take the beauty away, and therefore anyone who comes to the castle is attacked by divas.
Many said:
The daughter of the Chinese emperor has been kidnapped and is being held there in chains. A strong guard is assigned to her so that no one can free her.
Others said:
In that castle, in the dungeon, a girl named Chilgis is imprisoned (Chilgis is a Persian. «Forty braids», the «sacred» number 40. Science does not believe that some numbers are «bad» and others are «good», but such an opinion exists in religious and mystical thinking. Some examples. 3. The idea of the «divine trinity», being a reflection of the fact of the existence of a monogamous family. Dad, mom and child, the role of mom is downplayed due to the rule of patriarchy, instead of mom, the holy spirit borrowed from Zoroastrianism. 13. The damn dozen. The devil is a representative of the «wrong» pagan religion, who wore animal skins, horns, and a kind of hooves on his feet initially in order to get closer to animals and catch them. 12 «dozen», from «squeeze» that is, «be able», the number 12 is divided into many numbers, and 13 it is not divided into anything it turns out «a damn dozen». 40. Ancient tribes of Indo-Europeans lived for thousands of years in the Arctic Circle, where the polar day lasts 40 days, and the Sun was God. 666. Apocalypse, the number of the beast. In many ancient peoples, including the Jews, numbers were denoted by different letters of the alphabet, in Hebrew words are read from right to left: nun (50); vav (6); nes (200); nun (50); nes (200); sameh (60); kuf (100) in the sum of the numerical values and give the number 666, it turns out the emperor «Caesar Nero»). She was tied by her braids to a post so that she would not run away. She will be there until the hero Jahantig (Jahantig Persian. «avalanche») and will not free her.
One or two people said:
This castle belongs to the daughter of the Chinese emperor. She is very beautiful, but she does not marry anyone and will only marry someone who will answer all her questions. Until now, no one has been able to answer her questions, and those who have wooed, but have not answered the questions, are beheaded, impaled on spikes and put their heads on the battlements of the fortress walls. In addition, many young men there were bewitched, and some of them were petrified to the waist, and others from head to toe.
The people they met told the three brothers about all this, and they wanted to see the enchanted castle more and more. It takes a long time to retell everything here, and, in short, Afruz asked those people who told about this castle:
Have you seen everything you are talking about with your own eyes? Answered:
No! We heard from our fathers, but none of us went there, because there is a Chinese border and a fortress behind the famous Chinese wall.
In the end, Afruz, Shahruz and Behruz left the city of Nigaristan in the direction of the enchanted castle. From a distance, they saw a castle rising to the sky on a hill behind a powerful stone wall We reached the top of the hill. At the very wall they got off their horses and tied them to a tree. With great difficulty, they climbed the wall, descended from it and found themselves on the other side of the wall at the foot of the castle. The castle gates were closed and no one was there. For some reason, the brothers were seized with fear, they wanted to return, but Afruz thought and said:
Since we came here, we should still look into the castle. If youre afraid, stay here and wait for me. Ill go there and come back quickly.
Shahruz and Behruz said:
No, brother, lets get out of here! We cant go in there, this castle scares us, lets get out of here!
Afruz replied:
No, as the man said, thats what he should do. Stay here, Ill be back soon.
With the end of his sword, he lifted the bolt, opened the gate and entered the castle. Shahruz and Behruz, trembling with fear, were waiting for him at the castle gate. Two or three hours have passed, and hes still gone. They were alarmed. Shahruz said:
In my opinion, an accident has happened to our brother. Stay here, and Ill go to the castle. If we come back from there with him, well leave right away, and if I enter the castle and dont come back either, dont follow me, go straight to our city, to your father, and tell him everything.
Behrouz asked:
Why dont I follow you if you dont come back?
Shahruz replied:
Because Im afraid you will also disappear with us, and more grief will be added to the grief of the father, he will be left completely without sons, his house will be empty, the hearth will go out. In any case, you alone should stay with him, so that in his old age he would have support!
With these words, Shahruz entered the castle gate and also disappeared Behruz, when he saw that the middle brother also did not appear, wanted to do as he said and return to his father, but then he thought: «That would be ignoble! Ill go to the castle, and if they are captured, I may be able to free them!»
Behruz entered the castle gate and saw: there is a huge building, there are a lot of ayvans (Ayvan is a covered terrace) and rooms, the walls are covered with paintings everywhere, the floors are made of marble and porphyry (Porphyry is a volcanic rock. Porphyry (fabric) is a purple colored material used for the manufacture of outerwear of royal persons and other important persons). He really liked looking at all this at first, but then he suddenly thought: «After all, I came for my brothers and immediately lost my head in front of these paintings, so much so that I forgot about my brothers! I stand as if bewitched! Thats right, they called this castle enchanted!»
He moved from his place and went to look for his brothers. He moved from ivan to ivan, from room to room, until he reached a room that was larger than the others, and saw his brothers standing there confused, biting their finger in surprise, in front of some painting. He was delighted at the sight of his brothers. Looked around and sees: what beautiful paintings! He said to himself:
«We need an expert here to figure everything out! It seems that these paintings were drawn by the hand of the prophet Mani himself!» (Mani is a semi legendary prophet, the founder of the religion of Manichaeism (III century AD). Manichean temples were decorated with wall paintings, and therefore Mani himself was considered a skilled artist).
Then he went up to the brothers and looked at the image they were looking at. Then his heart sank, and he, too, was numb with surprise. The three of them stared at the painting until it got dark. We spent the night there, in the castle, suffering from hunger and thirst. When the sun rose and it became quite light, they came up to the painting again. This time Behrouz examined her and saw next to her an inscription in Chinese, going from top to bottom: «Mei-Kui-Gul, daughter of the Chinese emperor.» As soon as I read it, I turned to my brothers and said:
This is a portrait of the daughter of the Chinese padishah, and she herself is now in this country, and we are not sure why we were stunned here in front of her soulless image!
Afruz said this:
Thats right you say! I fell in love with the one that is painted here, and until I come to her doorstep, the sweet drink of life will be bitter to me! Come what may, Im getting on my horse right now and Ill drive him day and night until I get to China. There I will go to the Chinese emperor and tell him that I am a prince and ask for the hand of his daughter and add: either take this sword and cut off my head, or give me your daughter! And both of you go back to our father from here right now and tell him everything about me.
The younger brothers themselves fell in love with that girl, but they did not dare to say it openly and therefore said nothing: