When they had gone a good way, they neared the house of the devi. At that time their sister and the devi’s mother were sitting on the roof. The devi’s mother saw them coming in the distance, and said to her daughter-in-law: ‘Look there! dost thou see nothing coming?’ Her daughter-in-law replied: ‘I see something like a swarm of flies.’ ‘Woe to their mother and to my son’s mother!’ said the devi’s mother, and asked her again, in a short time, what she saw. The devi’s wife answered: ‘I see three men.’ ‘Woe to their mother and to my son’s mother!’ moaned the old woman.
The three brothers came at last to the devi’s house. There they saw water, but they could not cross it by any means. They threw in stones, and stepped over in this way. Then the girl saw that they were her brothers; she came down and embraced them. When the devi’s mother learnt who they were, she took them in, gave them food, and then hid them, saying: ‘If my son comes home and sees you he will eat you.’
Then the hundred-headed devi came, no one knows whence. On one shoulder he had firewood, and on the other dead game. At the door he undid his burden, and, when he came in, said: ‘I smell a man; who has come hither?’ His mother tried to hide the truth, but her son would not leave her alone, so at last she said: ‘If thou wilt promise not to eat thy wife’s brothers, I will show them to thee.’ The devi promised, and the old woman brought in the three brothers.
A little while after, the devi said to his wife’s brothers: ‘Come, let us prepare supper.’ They all came and began to skin the game the devi had brought. Whilst the three brothers skinned one stag, the devi skinned sixty, cut them up and threw them into the pot. Then he came, seized the stag his brothers-in-law were skinning, and threw it also into the pot.
When they sat down to supper, the devi asked his wife’s brothers: ‘Are you eaters of bone or eaters of flesh?’ They answered: ‘What have we to do with flesh? Bones are good enough for us.’ The devi filled his mouth, tore off the flesh, and threw the bones to the three brothers. Then he again inquired: ‘Will you drink out of a doki[2] or out of a qantsi?’[3] ‘From a qantsi,’ replied the brothers. The devi poured out a doki of wine for himself, while he filled the qantsi for them.
When they had finished supper, and were preparing to go to bed, the devi again inquired: ‘Do you wish to sleep in a bed or in the stable?’ ‘What have we to do with a bed? put us in the stable!’ replied the brothers. The devi lay down in his bed, and the brothers slept in the stable. In the morning, when the devi awoke, he said to his mother: ‘Mother, I am hungry!’ The mother saw his meaning, and not wishing to let her daughter-in-law understand, she thus replied: ‘Go, son, to the stable; there, in the bread-box, are three badly-cooked loaves. Take them and eat them.’
The devi went into the stable where the brothers lay. He swallowed one of them in the doorway, put the other two in his pocket, and went into the wood.
In the meantime the mother of the brothers waited and waited, and when they did not come back, she thought: ‘The devi must have eaten my sons.’ She wept bitterly, her tears flowed until they reached to heaven. At that moment a man was passing by. He asked the cause of the tears, and the woman told him that they were for the loss of her children.
Then the man gave her an apple, and said: ‘Cut this apple into a hundred pieces, and every day eat three; when the apple is finished, thou shalt have a son, and thou shalt call his name Asphurtzela.’
The woman did as he said. She cut the apple into a hundred pieces, and every day ate three. When the apple was finished, she brought forth a son, and called him by the name of Asphurtzela. Asphurtzela grew as much in a day as other children grow in a year.