The Honeyed Trap
The Tale:
Long ago, when the stars were young and the heavens a wilder place, the Hunter boasted he could capture any beast, mortal or divine. “I’ll bind the Great Bear himself,” he declared, his voice echoing across the cosmos, “and hang his pelt among the stars as my trophy!” The Great Bear, lounging on a cloud of nebulae, overheard this and chuckled, his starry fur rippling. “Let’s see the Hunter chase his own tail,” he said to his cub, who grinned and flicked his tail like a spark.
The Bear devised a plan. He whispered to the winds, who carried sweet scents of celestial honey to a glade of starlight oaks. There, he conjured a massive honeypot, its golden glow irresistible. His cub, ever the helper, sprinkled the glade with shimmering pollen to lure the Hunter’s hounds—star-beasts with noses keen as comets. When the Hunter arrived, bow drawn and hounds baying, he saw the honeypot and laughed. “The Bear thinks to hide? This is his doing, and I’ll have him yet!” Greedy for the prize, he plunged his hands into the pot, only to find them stuck fast in sticky star-sap, conjured by the Bear’s magic.
As the Hunter struggled, the Bear appeared, lounging atop an oak. “Oh, Hunter, you aim for my pelt, but you’ve caught only your pride!” The Hunter roared and swung his bow, but Ursa Minor darted in, tying his boots with vines of starlight. The Hunter tripped, tumbling into the sap, his hounds licking at the mess and yowling in confusion. The Bear and his companion vanished into the night sky, leaving the Hunter stuck until dawn, when the sap melted under the sun’s gaze.
Moral: Pride sticks tighter than any trap.
The River of Stars
The Tale:
The Hunter vowed to drown the Great Bear in the River of Stars, a shimmering current that flows through the heavens. “No beast escapes my bow,” he growled, stringing an arrow tipped with moonlight. The Great Bear, lounging by the river’s edge, overheard and winked at his cub. “Let’s give the Hunter a swim he won’t forget,” he said, his voice like a low rumble of thunder.
The Bear and cub worked through the night. The cub scampered along the riverbank, digging channels with his starry claws, while the Bear wove a net of starlight reeds, thin as gossamer but strong as iron. When the Hunter arrived, he saw the Bear standing on a rock in the river’s center, taunting, “Come, Hunter! Your bow’s no use if you can’t cross!” Enraged, the Hunter leapt into the river, but the channels the cub had dug turned the current into a maze of swirling eddies. The Hunter floundered, his arrows floating away like fireflies.
Then the Bear tossed his net, which tangled the Hunter’s arms and legs. “You chase the wrong prey, friend,” the Bear called, as the cub tugged the net tight. The Hunter thrashed, but the river carried him downstream, spinning him in circles until he washed up on a distant star, dizzy and disarmed. The Bear and his cub danced along the riverbank, their laughter lighting new constellations.
Moral: A clever path turns the hunter into the hunted.
The False Feast
The Tale:
One starry night, the Hunter, weary of defeat, decided to outsmart the Great Bear with hospitality. He invited the Bear to a grand feast in the Hall of Constellations, claiming, “Let us end this chase with peace and plenty!” The Bear, wise to the Hunter’s tricks, sniffed deceit but played along. “A feast? Why, I’d be delighted,” he rumbled, nudging his cub. “Let’s serve the Hunter a dish of his own making.”
The Bear and his cub arrived at the hall, where tables groaned under celestial fruits, wines of comet-dust, and roasts carved from nebulae. The Hunter, grinning slyly, offered the Bear a golden goblet filled with a potion to bind his spirit to the stars, trapping him forever. But the cub, quick as a spark, had swapped the goblets while the Hunter boasted. When the Hunter raised his own cup in a toast, he drank the potion instead, his body freezing into a constellation, stiff and unmoving.
The Bear laughed, his voice shaking the hall. “You cooked a fine feast, Hunter, but you’ve seasoned it with your own folly!” The cub scampered about, tossing fruit into the air, which became new stars. The Bear and his companion left the Hunter frozen among the heavens, a warning to those who think they can outwit the Trickster.
Moral: A trap set for another may catch the trapper.
The Star-Stuck Snare
The Tale:
The Hunter, grew tired of the Great Bears pranks—stealing his game, hiding his quiver, and leaving pawprints across his sacred hunting grounds in the sky. So, he crafted a trap: a net of starlight, woven from the threads of a supernova, so fine and bright that no creature could escape it. He hung it in the heavens, baited with a glowing stag made of pure moonlight, knowing the Bear couldn’t resist such a prize.
The Great Bear, with his cub scampering at his heels, spotted the stag from afar. “Look at that, Little Cub,” he rumbled, his eyes twinkling like the North Star. “The Hunter thinks he’s clever, but he’s about to learn a lesson.” The cub, quick as a comet, sniffed out the trap. “It’s a net, Papa Bear! Shiny, but sticky!” The Bear grinned. “Then let’s give the Hunter a show.”
Instead of charging the stag, The Bear ambled right up to the net, pretending to be caught. He thrashed and roared, shaking the stars, until the Hunter swooped down, laughing. “Got you at last, Bear!” he crowed, raising his bow.
But the Great Bear, sneaky as a shadow, had crept behind and tied the Hunter's starry cloak to the net’s edges with a knot of moonlight. When the Hunter lunged to claim his prize, the net snapped shut around him, tangling his arms and legs. The Great Bear slipped free, chuckling, and swiped the moonlight stag for good measure. “Better luck next time, Hunter!” he called, as he and Little Cub danced away into the cosmos, leaving the Hunter to untangle his pride.
Moral: A trap set with pride catches only the fool who wove it.
The Shadow Hunt
The Tale:
The Hunter, his patience thinner than a crescent moon, declared a final hunt to end the Great Bear’s tricks. He summoned a pack of shadow-hounds, woven from the darkest voids between stars, and set them to chase the Bear across the sky. “No trick will save you now!” The Hunter bellowed, his bow gleaming with starfire.
The Great Bear, with his cub riding on his back, saw the hounds coming, their eyes like black holes. “Time to play, Little Cub,” he said, leading the hounds toward a dense star cluster. The Bears wove through the twinkling maze, dodging and darting, until Little Cub had an idea. “Papa, let’s make a mirror!” Using their combined trickster magic, they spun a veil of starlight into a shimmering wall that reflected the heavens.
The shadow-hounds, seeing their own dark forms in the mirror, turned on each other, snarling and snapping, thinking they’d found the Bears. The Hunter, charging in behind, mistook the reflection for the Great Bear and loosed his arrows—only for them to bounce back and nick his own cloak. While the Hunter cursed and the hounds tore themselves apart, the Great Bear and his cub slipped away, laughing under a canopy of stars. “Hunt shadows, get shadows!” the Bear roared, as Little Bear added a cheeky pawprint to the Hunter's quiver.
Moral: Chase a trickster’s shadow, and you’ll only catch yourself.
